Kiron whistled and got the big male’s attention. “Kashet,” he said firmly, and making the “up” gesture with both hands. “Fly! Pen!” Kashet didn’t know the word “home”—which to Avatre meant two things; both Sanctuary itself, and any pen in which she had spent more than a couple of nights. But he did know “pen,” and “fly” as separate concepts—he just didn’t know what “fly” meant if Ari wasn’t on his back.
Kiron had done a lot more training to make Avatre autonomous from the beginning than Ari had ever done with Kashet. He’d had to; on their trek to Alta, he’d needed to be able to direct Avatre in hunting from some other place than in her saddle, because sometimes he needed to drive the game into Avatre’s waiting talons. Kashet, on the other hand, had never had to meet that challenge. The dragon looked at him with his head to one side, as if he was hearing some strange sound he didn’t recognize at all.
“Pen,” Kiron repeated, putting as much emphasis as he could on the simple word. Kashet knew what it meant, and he’d just seen Avatre fly off in that direction—surely he could reason out that he was meant to go there, too. . . .
Kashet blew out his breath in a puff, then turned away, but instead of flying as Avatre had, he stalked off through the streets afoot. People scrambled to get out of his way, not with any sign of fear, but only because the streets of Sanctuary were very narrow, and there wasn’t really room for a dragon and even a small person to pass side by side in them. He was going in the right direction.
Maybe he remembers walking all those corridors in the Jousters’ Compound, Kiron thought, He was used to walking in the Compound, rather than flying. Well, as long as it gets him there on his own, he can walk or fly as he chooses!
He turned to enter the chamber himself, reasonably sure that Kashet would get himself to where he belonged, because even if he got confused, by now one of the other Jousters would have heard he was stalking through the streets and come to guide him back. Or else Aket-ten would send someone to get him.
Or both, Kiron thought, as he slipped in through the doorway, and started to edge around the walls to get to his spot among the other councilors.
He saw that there was a woman in the gown of a priestess—a compromise between the tightly-pleated mist linen of the Tian priestesses, and the loosely-draped, heavier linen of the Altans, this was mist linen for coolness and comfort, but without pleating, and held in place by twin shoulder pins and a belt. Most other women of Sanctuary wore purely Altan gowns, since most women here were Altans.
“. . . and every one of them has confirmed it,” the speaker was Tir-ama-ten, the Priestess of Beshet of the Far-Seeing eye. She looked very unhappy. “I do not know how it is that those whose Gift is to see forward did not warn us about this!”
“Because, Great Lady, their gaze was confused and befogged,” Kaleth said soothingly. “As my gaze has been increasingly confused and befogged. We have known this was happening, as the Magi make the future more uncertain. There is no responsibility to be laid on you or on them; rather, allow me to thank you for always having the eyes of one of your Far-Seeing Priestesses keep watch over the Winged Ones of Alta. Your duty is to the people of Tia, not of Alta, and yet you have been bending your eyes to my folk. If you had not, we would never have known they were besieged until it was too late.”
“Besieged?” Kiron said—though it was not really a question. “The Magi, of course.”
“And every armed man of their private guard they can put around the Temple of the Twins,” Kaleth confirmed. “I think they would have used the army to break down the doors, except that they knew the army would not obey them in such a task.”
“I wonder how they get even their private guard to attack priests,” Lord Khumun said, looking grim. “To raise hands against the servants of the gods—”
“They grow bold, these Magi,” said Pta-hetop the Tian Thet priest. “First they move to take our acolytes, and now your priests. I wonder that they do not use your army.”
“I do not think they could gain obedience from the army to move against the servants of the gods,” Haraket said. “Oh, yes, it has happened in the past—the far past—of our land, but only when the priests themselves were corrupt, so corrupt that the people wept beneath their heels.”
“I think you are right,” Kaleth nodded. “We had two warnings it was happening today; one from the acolytes of Beshet, the other a cry for help that I heard from those trapped within the temple.”
“According to my acolytes, the siege began this morning. Somehow enough of the Winged Ones mustered strength and will to bar the temple doors against the Magi,” said Tir-ama-ten, her face a study in anger, though the gods being so insulted were not technically her own. “When the Magi could not get at the Winged Ones, they immediately mounted an armed siege. But it is a curious sort of siege; they mount guard around the temple and let no man in or out, but otherwise, do nothing.”
“I think they do not dare—yet,” Heklatis said, with a nod of his grizzled head. “The Winged Ones are much beloved of the people. The Magi may be saying that the Winged Ones are in danger, and that they are being guarded for their own protection.”
“It may be so. Fortunately, the temple might have been designed to withstand such a siege,” Kaleth replied, making a soothing motion with his hand. “And before my contact with him was blocked, the Winged One who called to me told me that the temple itself is well-provisioned and has its own well of pure water. The great danger is that the Magi will decide to use the Eye on them.”
Kiron shuddered, and Nofret made a little strangled sound in the back of her throat. Kiron was just as glad Aket-ten wasn’t here to have heard that. She had a great many friends in that temple. He remembered only too well seeing the Eye lash down out of the Magi’s Tower. It had been a fearsome sight that had left nothing but earth turned to glass behind it.
“I don’t think they will yet,” Ari said, thoughtfully. “If they do, they’ll lose the very thing they are anxious to have back—and they will earn themselves the hatred of the people. Fear is one thing; it is useful to them, but hatred? Hatred is dangerous. Hatred turns fear into anger, and anger turns inaction into action. No, I think they’ll wait for a few days at least, to see if they can force the Winged Ones out with hunger or thirst. And when that doesn’t work, they’ll try some sort of magic first, I think. Maybe try to enspell them from outside and make them walk out, or at least open the doors. Then, perhaps, they will try to get a traitor inside, to open the doors from within. Mind you, I don’t think they would hesitate for a moment to kill your Winged Ones if they can’t use them anymore. But I believe they will hope to find some other way, not the Eye, and that will take time.”
I hope you’re right, Kiron thought apprehensively.
“That is my judgment, too,” Kaleth agreed. “So we have a window of time during which we can get the Winged Ones out of their trap.” He looked straight at Kiron.
Kiron felt his eyes widening as he realized that Kaleth intended him and his Jousters to rescue the Winged Ones. “There are only ten of us!” he objected. “We can’t carry more than a single passenger, perhaps two, if they are children! That would take—”
“—days,” Ari interrupted, with a nod to Kaleth. “Or rather, nights, because I am in no mood to have that fire-sword you lot call an Eye burning me out of the sky. Kiron says he thinks it can’t work without sunlight, so there’s another reason besides stealth to fly in darkness. We couldn’t be better set up for this. We’re in the sickle moon, and it’s waning toward the three nights of dark; we’ll have full moon in a fortnight, and I’m willing to try flying in a full moon. We’ll just have to be careful.”