But the guv'nor's case was different. There was a war on now. Edward had a duty to King and Country. Even his debt to Eleal must take second place to that call. He certainly couldn't trust Tion.
Could he even trust the Service? He stumbled wildly, caught his balance. “Never mind what I want. What does the Service want with me?"
"Save you from Zath. Cameron's son."
Mana or not, she was panting harder than he was. How much farther?
"Suppose you do. Then what? Creighton told me you were divided over the Filoby Testament."
"Obviously. Oh darn it!"
A peculiar, rumbling explosion rent the night. Edward shied to a halt as he registered two huge green eyes glowing at him from the darkness.
"What in Hades is that?"
Onica had gone on to the monster and was embracing its huge head, provoking more belching rumbles. “This is Cuddles. She's a dragon. Quick! They're closing on us."
She scrambled up into the saddle. “Up here, behind me. Hang on. Cuddles, Zomph!” She held out a hand for him.
As she hauled him aboard, the saddle simultaneously shot skyward. He grabbed at the woman's arm and a pannier, was almost thrown as the huge brute launched itself forward. He caught a glimpse of two black shapes and cried out at a sudden pain in his leg like a jolt of electricity. He started to overbalance, then the spasm passed and he could grip again. A nasty pins and needles remained, but was already fading. The rush of wind in his face told him they were racing over the ground, although the ride was as smooth as the Bodgleys’ Rolls.
"All right?” the woman yelled.
"Fine. Reapers?"
"Not quite within lethal range, fortunately.” The wind caught her words and flung them past him. “They can't catch us now. You can relax."
He had been that close to death and he was expected to relax?
He shouted, “Righto!” and passed the word to his insides: relax! That was not so easy when he was perched on the rim of the saddle with a bony plate digging into his back.
Dragon? He had thought the word referred to something like a horse—T'lin Horsetrader. This thing was more like the stegosaurus in The Lost World, bigger than a full-grown rhino. She had a ridge of high plates along her back, one of which had been cut out to make room for the rider. A couple of wicker panniers were strapped to the one behind the gap. Dragon was a fitting name for the beast, though—she even had long winglike frills stretching back from her shoulders.
The monster raced along a flat, treeless terrace. Rugged hillocks and cliffs flowed by, pale in the moonlight, casting multitoned shadows. There was a gully ahead. Onica's hair kept flying in his face, and conversation was impossible. Cuddles hurtled down into the gully and up the other side with a stomach-churning lurch. They were heading east, passing the temple at a lower level.
Three or four gullies later, Onica yelled, “Hang on now. Whilth!"
The dragon swung to the left and headed straight up a fifty-degree slope. Edward toppled back, steadying himself against the panniers. He was deucedly uncomfortable. Onica had the advantage of a flat seat and stirrups.
When they reached the level again, she said, “Varch!” Cuddles dropped to a slower pace. No reins or handlebars—she was entirely controlled by voice commands and must be at least as smart as a dog.
In a few minutes Onica told her, “Zappan! Wosok!” Cuddles stopped and crouched down. “Off!"
Edward assumed that meant him, and gratefully scrambled to the ground. She slid down beside him. They were in another gully, a smaller one. It was dry and shadowed.
"Come on!” She hurried up the slope.
He strode beside her, his longer legs giving him an advantage.
The boy strolled along at his side. Edward turned to him and met the same inscrutable smile as before. He forgot what he had been about to ask.
"Well?” the woman said. “Which is to be, Exeter? The temple, or Olympus? If you want the temple, you can walk from here."
He could see it, not half a mile away, and the city beyond. “I want to go Home. To England. We're at war with Germany."
"I heard about that. We'll see you get Home, then, if that's what you want. Yes, we're of two minds about the Liberator, but if that's your decision, then I'm certain the committee will consent."
They crested the rise, coming to flat farmland. Onica headed for a clump of palmlike trees.
"Do you mind explaining what we're doing?” he asked politely.
"Wondered when you'd start wondering. I want to go west, to Lameby. I'm hoping the opposition will be deceived and give chase. We can watch the road from here."
A low stone wall ran through the grove. She sat down on it and wiped her face, puffing. “May be a long wait. They'll have to run back up to the town and find mounts."
"What sort of mounts?” Setting himself beside her, he tried to visualize a midnight chase of dragons.
"Moas."
"I thought moas were one-rider animals?"
"They are, but I suspect reapers can get around that. They probably have moas of their own, anyway."
They were in shadow, and now he could see the dirt track that was the main highway across Suss, a couple of hundred yards away. It was deserted at this time of night. The countryside slept peacefully under the light of three moons, which was much brighter than the moonlight he knew. Only a week or so ago, he had come along there with Dolm and Eleal.
Again he turned to say something to the youth sitting beside him, and again that cryptic smile distracted him.
Onica said, “Tell me what happened after T'lin escaped from the reapers."
"I arrived...” Edward told what he knew from his own blurred memories and what Eleal had recounted.
When he had done, she said, “Hrrnph! We thought you'd been knocked off, of course. I came to investigate. Arrived last night, detected reapers still around. That made me wonder if you might be alive after all, keeping under wraps somewhere."
"How did you find me?"
"Sheer chance. I saw the playbill, saw a D'ward listed. Good job I made the connection before Zath's thugs did, you bloody idiot."
A change of subject was called for. “Tell me about Olympus."
"It's in a little side canyon. There's hundreds of those, of course, but that one's a beautiful spot. We try to keep it an outpost of real civilization—it's not unlike Nyagatha, actually."
"You know Nyagatha?"
"Dropped in there with Julian in ‘02. Met you—solemn, stringy kid, brown as walnut. Could have been a native, except for those blue eyes. You'll feel right at home in Olympus. We don't fly a Union Jack, but we do dress for dinner."
Mm! It sounded as if the Service was not unlike Holy Roly's Lighthouse Missionary Society, bringing enlightenment to the heathen. The guv'nor had supported it, so it must do some good.
He asked about dragons and received a long lecture on their habits and strengths. Mason was obviously an enthusiastic dragon-lover and made them sound like the finest riding beast in the Universe. Eleal had raved about them, although without thinking to describe what they looked like. When he had learned much more about the lizards than he wanted to, he managed to ask something more relevant.
"What about Gunuu? Why is there no god of courage?"
"How much do you know about the Great Game?"
He could say, “It means the struggle between England and Russia to control Afganhistan and the Northwest Frontier, which has been going on for more than a hundred years,” and he would sound like a complete muffin. In the Vales there was a similar political rivalry between Joalia and Thargia, the major powers of the Vales, which he had privately classed as equivalents of Athens and Sparta, with Niolland, off to the north, roughly corresponding to Corinth. Obviously that was not what was meant either.