“Good morning,” she called. “The Akkad-Dar is sleeping well.” She chuckled meaningfully. “But I cannot. He gave me permission to visit the dragon.”
The guards exchanged glances. Although her Tarmakian was more than a little rough, they seemed to understand all of it. The question was, Linsha thought, would they accept it?
“The dragon’s cave is forbidden to women,” one guard told her.
Linsha continued to walk toward them. “I’ve already been here, remember? I remember you. You helped the priests prepare the funeral pyre and stood guard at the foot of the steps in the cavern.”
The guards looked uncertainly at each other again, and Linsha pressed her point in her most arrogant tone of voice.
“I’m not like the other women. I have fought to the death and won. I am the Chosen of the Akkad-Dar. Do I have to go back to him and tell him you did not allow me access to the dragon’s cave when he has already given his permission?”
By this time she had almost reached the two Tarmaks. They glowered down at her, their expressions tense.
“I shall ask the priest Imshallik if you may enter,” one guard told her.
He was turning to go into the cave when Linsha threw the bag of powder and hit the other guard in the face. The first guard whipped around, drawing his sword as he turned, and he met Linsha’s dagger coming around to strike his stomach.
The Tarmak blade sank in deep just below his ribs. He gave a grunt of surprise, clutched his wound with one hand and with the other brought his sword around to chop her head off.
Linsha ducked the blow and lunged toward the second guard who lay sprawled on the stone floor. Her hand reached for the dusty powder bag, snatched it up, and threw it at the wounded guard. It grazed his head and flew by to hit the wall behind him. Linsha thought she had missed him with the bag, but the light graze had been enough to shake powder loose over his face. He staggered, fell to his knees, then toppled forward onto the dagger still embedded in his stomach.
Satisfied, Linsha retrieved another sword and dagger and hurried into the cave. The guards had warned her that a priest was somewhere within. As late as it was, she hoped he slept in the room Sirenfal had mentioned. Perhaps she should ensure he remained asleep.
Quietly she ran into the cave and hurried down the stairs to the main cavern floor. She saw Sirenfal asleep by the wall, but she turned away from the dragon and slipped over to the doorway that led into the priest’s sleeping room. The room was dark and silent. The bed was empty. Where was the Keena?
Linsha muttered several frustrated words under her breath and dashed to the dragon. This time the brass did not rouse at her arrival. She lay curled tightly in a ball. Her eyes were firmly shut. She was barely breathing.
“Oh no.” Linsha hissed. The dragon seemed to be in a state of dormancy. She knew dragons could put themselves in a deep hibernation, but she could not believe Sirenfal had done this to herself intentionally, not after their talk only three days ago. The brass had been truly sincere in her desire to escape her captivity. Which meant, Linsha decided in growing anger, the priests had probably drugged her again.
Desperate, she heaved at Sirenfal’s head and pulled it out from under the dragon’s wing. Staggering under the dead weight of the dragon’s big head, she tugged and pulled and finally stretched the neck out onto the stone floor. She untied the bottle under her tunic and brought it out. Afec had said to pour it into the dragon’s mouth, so Linsha hauled open Sirenfal’s mouth and, holding the dragon’s upper jaw with one hand, she poured the thick, dark liquid over the dragon’s tongue.
Obviously the dragon could not swallow while she was asleep, so how did the liquid get into her stomach? Linsha wondered. Maybe it didn’t have to. Maybe it absorbed into Sirenfal’s blood through her mouth. She didn’t know, and Afec hadn’t told her. She just had to trust the Damjatt and hope this tonic worked quickly.
She dropped the bottle and spread her hands over Sirenfal’s forehead. Her eyes closed as she concentrated on the power of the dragon scales hanging around her neck. She focused the power and send it inward to the dragon’s mind. At this close proximity, she should have no trouble reaching Sirenfal’s conscious thoughts—if there were any. Yet she found nothing. The dragon was completely unconscious and her thoughts buried under a shroud of dense obscurity. Linsha wished she had the talent to reach deeper. All she could do was try to talk to her and perhaps lead her closer to consciousness.
Sirenfal. I am here. It is time to go. You have to fight this! I have given you a tonic. Find it in your body and put it to use. It will help you, if you want to leave this place. She went on, sending her message to the unconscious dragon with growing urgency.
All at once a massive pain exploded in her back. Linsha cried out and fell sprawling on the floor beside the dragon. The high priest in his black robes leaned over her, a staff in his hands and a look of utter fury on his rugged face. Several Tarmak guards stood behind him, and one held a bloody dagger in his hand.
“Where is the text, woman?” snarled the priest. “What have you done with it?”
Linsha had no idea what he was talking about and had no time to give it further thought. The priest reached into his robes and pulled out an amulet of dragon’s teeth hanging on a cord around his neck.
Linsha struggled in the hands of the guards. “Sirenfal!” she screamed. “Wake up!”
The priest laughed, a nasty sound that reverberated through the cave. “The dragon cannot hear you, and the Akkad-Dar will not save you.” Holding the amulet in his hand, he reached out to Linsha.
She saw his hand coming and threw herself backward in the Tarmaks’ hold. She looked frantically for her powder bag, but she had left it in the tunnel beside the wall where it had fallen after she threw it at the guard. The warriors tightened their grip and held her still.
The priest’s hand touched her face. Pain bright and agonizing exploded in her head, and yet, even as the priest’s magic ripped away her strength and tortured her mind, she realized this was not as bad as the time the Akkad-Ur or Lanther had used this spell on her. Either the priest was not as strong or something was interfering with his magic.
Then she had no more time. The Tarmaks dragged her up the stairs away from Sirenfal and into the tunnel. She sagged in their hands in despair. Her chance to waken the dragon was gone. She would be taken to Lanther, and if he was lenient he would punish her and imprison her somewhere where she would never see the light of day again. If he was not, she would die.
Silence crept back into the cave. Solitude returned.
The Tarmaks were gone; the human was gone. There was no sound except for the distant crash of waves that washed quietly through the sea tunnel. On the cold stone floor of the cave, the empty bottle lay unseen in a shadow by the wall.
Then another sound intruded into the quiet—the sound of scales scraping on stone.
The dragon stirred.
Linsha felt herself hauled up the long flight of stairs, and she could do nothing about it. Every time she moved or tried to object, the priest touched her and sent his magic ripping through her head until she thought her skull would shatter at the merest touch of his fingers. Eventually she stopped struggling and simply let them drag her through the halls and out a large door.
It wasn’t until she heard voices of other guards that she opened her eyes and recognized the large, flattened cobbles of the huge courtyard of the imperial palace. Torches still burned in the sconces, and a few slaves moved around the tables making a desultory effort to clean up. Then she remembered with start that this was her wedding night and the feast that had been going on in the court when she and Lanther were escorted out was probably over. The Tarmaks, those that could still move, had retired.