After fifteen minutes or so, he gave up trying to make sense of the noise and returned to his bed.
The next morning at breakfast he got the full story pieced together. Arnen and his companions had never had any intention of fighting a dragon; they had planned from the first to steal the reward money and anything else valuable that they happened to come across. Their frequent wanderings about the castle had been attempts to locate the treasury.
They had thought that they had found it when they discovered an entire small wing that no one was allowed to enter and from which no one ever seemed to emerge, directly adjoining the wing occupied by the royal family itself. Accordingly, that night, when they believed everyone to be asleep, they had somehow gained entry to the forbidden rooms; but instead of gold, they had found two middle-aged women who had assumed that rape was intended and had raised a cry.
The five would-be thieves had scattered. The two princesses, Sadra and Shasha, had gone to their nearer brother, Debrel, for aid; it was he whose shouting had first awakened Tobas.
Debrel’s wife, Shen, had misunderstood what was happening and thought that her sisters-in-law were somehow conspiring against her; she began her own shouting.
The king and queen and their eight unmarried children had all been awakened, along with a dozen assorted servants, by the noise, each with his or her own interpretation of what was going on, resulting in the incredible confusion Tobas had observed.
The Queen Mother had managed to calm down her family, finally, and the Lord Chamberlain had gotten the commoners in line. Two of the thieves were captured immediately; the third, Korl Korl’s son, was found in a larder when the cooks started preparing breakfast. The remaining two, Arnen and one of the ones from the Small Kingdoms, had apparently gotten out of the castle and escaped.
The whole affair struck Tobas as singularly stupid. He had no idea where the thousand pieces of gold might be, but surely they would not take an entire room, let alone an entire wing! One fair-sized chest should do, he estimated. That assumed that the money really existed; at times, he had his doubts. This entire dragon hunt seemed preposterous, and he had wondered whether it might not all be an elaborate fraud of some sort. He had noticed that a few of the adventurers had departed alone or in pairs or threesomes, presumably giving up the quest, and Tobas suspected they might have had the right idea. Azraya had been one of them, to his surprise; he had thought she was the sort of person who would stick it out no matter how foolish or dangerous it might become.
He had never quite found the nerve to ask any of the Dwomorite officials why the hunt was being carried out as it was and why no experts or high-order magicians had been called in; that still seemed to him like a far better approach than turning this motley group loose on the countryside.
The attempted theft was the sole topic of conversation throughout breakfast and on into the morning, but Tobas was far more concerned about his own fate than Arnen’s. He had signed up to fight a dragon, made a commitment at least to get out in the hills and look, and he intended to make at least a pretense of honoring that commitment, if only because he saw no other way to survive for long in Dwomor and no way to get safely out of the country. He would accompany four others out there and would wander around a little; if they had the monumental bad luck actually to come across the dragon, he would do everything he could to help the others kill it. That, he felt, was as much as anyone could expect from him under the circumstances. As yet, however, he had found no team willing to take him on, and this was the final day, the first day of Harvest.
By the midday meal the population of the castle had dropped significantly, despite the disturbance of the night before. The king himself made a tour of the dining halls as the adventurers ate, then returned to the chamber where Tobas and the remaining Ethsharites, the trio of Peren, Arden, and Elner, were eating and announced, “Only nine of you remain. Two groups, then, five in one and four in the other. Have you decided how the division is to be made? There are four in here and five in the Lesser Hall; is that to be the final ordering?”
Tobas and the others looked at one another; this quickly transformed into the other three studying Tobas while he looked warily back.
“I have no plans to the contrary, your Majesty,” Tobas said, breaking the silence.
“We have no objection to the wizard’s aid,” Peren said, ignoring distressed glances from Elner and Arden.
“Then that’s how it shall be,” Derneth declared. “We would not send even a wizard against this dragon alone.”
“Your Majesty is very considerate,” Tobas said.
The others said nothing, and Tobas looked at them with some misgivings as the king departed. For the most part, they avoided looking at him at all.
Three hours later the four found themselves in the castle courtyard, their supplies heaped at their feet and the sky thick with clouds above their heads.
“I guess we can’t put it off any longer,” Arden said.
“There’s no reason to; we’re all here. Let’s go kill a dragon,” Elner said, hoisting his pack.
“You make it sound easy,” Tobas replied as he picked up his own.
“It will be easy,” Elner answered. “With your magic and Arden’s strength and my cunning, that dragon’s as good as dead. I just hope someone else didn’t get to it first; some of those princes and other foreigners had horses, where we’re on foot. We better hurry if we want that reward.”
“Oh, really?” Tobas demanded. “You’re sure it’ll be easy, are you? Who do you think you are, Valder of the Magic Sword?”
Startled, Elner stared at Tobas.
“Valder didn’t kill any dragons that I ever heard of,” Arden commented.
“He killed demons, though, and if he could kill demons he could presumably kill dragons,” Peren pointed out.
“It doesn’t matter what Valder killed; I’m the one who’s going to kill this dragon,” Elner insisted. “It’s not as hard as you think.”
“What do you know about dragons?” Tobas demanded.
“More than you, anyway!”
“Ha!”
That ended the discussion for the moment; when he judged that it was safe to speak, Peren asked, “Can you provide transportation, Wizard?”
“No,” Tobas said. “All I know is fire-magic.”
Peren shrugged. “It was worth asking.” He shouldered his pack and started toward the gate.
The other three followed, and together the four marched out beneath the raised portcullis.
On the road outside they paused, looking about at the drab scenery and leaden skies.
“Which way?” Arden asked.
“North,” Peren answered. “All the sightings and killings have been north of the castle.”
“Which way is north?” Elner asked.
Tobas thought he remembered the castle’s orientation, but to be sure he looked for the sun, which he hoped would be visible as a bright spot in the deepening overcast. Before he could locate it and reply to Elner’s question, Peren pointed off to the right. “That way.”
Tobas nodded agreement.
“There’s a road up ahead that branches off that way,” Arden pointed out.
“The dragon won’t follow the roads,” Elner said. “Why should we?”
This received general agreement, and the four headed off cross-country, around two of the village’s houses and past the castle midden.
Tobas tried to ignore the stench of the refuse heap by studying the land and sky around him; the mountains were fascinating, a little like gigantic frozen whitecaps. He looked them over, wondering how much climbing he would be doing in the next few days, then glanced up in time to catch the first raindrops in his face.