Feathered Dragon

13

“I don’t like it. It’s not like Halloran to be gone so long.” Daggrande huffed in annoyance, but he couldn’t conceal his concern. Anxiously he paced about the small campsite while Luskag and Jhatli looked at him sympathetically. Lotil listened impassively, his short, blunt fingers dexterously working a tuft of plumage into the cotton mesh he held upon his lap.

The camp of the desert dwarves filled a broad clearing in the forest, with several dozen small fires lighting the area. They had feasted on the forest’s bounty, for several deer had fallen to their bows that afternoon. And still Halloran and Erixitl had not returned.

“He’s always been a good lad-reliable, responsible. A true companion, the kind of fellow you’d like to have at your back in a fight.”

Jhatli looked at Daggrande in surprise. Obviously the characterization of the brawny fighter as a “lad” struck him as somewhat unusual. Still, he hadn’t previously appreciated how far back the paths of the two legionnaires were linked. There was something paternal in the way the gruff dwarf spoke of his human companion.

‘”Course, I never told him that,” continued Daggrande, his tone angry, “The big lunk wouldn’t have understood!” Daggrande looked at the group around the fire, as if he expected someone to challenge him.

“ What’re you starin’ it?” he growled at Coton as the cleric eyed him curiously. The priest made no answer, and Daggrande sat down with a sigh. “I don’t know what’s got into me! Surely they’re all right somewhere. They’ve got to be!” He couldn’t allow himself to think of any other alternate c

“Maybe they just wanted some time by themselves,” guessed the youth. Still, a look at the darkening jungle around them dispelled this suggestion even as he made it The forest at night did not create a very romantic environment.

“Should we search for them?” asked the chieftain of the desert dwarves.

“Yes-but not now,” came Daggrande’s response. “We’ll only get more of us lost in the jungle, and we can’t hope to find anything until morning.”

“They could be back before then, in any event,” Lotil offered, though the blind man’s tone suggested that he shared the dwarven captain’s concern.

“At first light, then,” said Luskag. “If they haven’t returned, we shall commence the search.”

Hoxitl stirred in his stench-filled lair, which had once been the grand temple of Zaltec in Nexal. Now ruined stone walls leaned and tilted around him. Where once a proud archway had created the entrance, now a slimy tunnel cut through the piles of rubble.

Beyond the lair, the monsters of the Viperhand prowled restlessly through the ruins of the city Gangs of orcs snarled and fought with each other, only to scatter, howling, at the approach of looming ogres. After the long march across the desert, the creatures had returned to their city with crude pleasure. Yet now, after many weeks of en-forced idleness in the brackish ruins, the pleasure turned to boredom. The beasts, Hoxitl knew, needed activity.

He himself had succumbed to a lethargic passivity that had verged on the comatose. For a time, he lay unknowing his mind vacant, awaiting the command and the vitality OF his god. The towering statue of Zaltec, near his lair, stood impassive and unmoving as the weeks became months. Finally, not knowing why, the monster Hoxitl raised himself from lethargy into stiff, unpleasant movement.

Gradually a command took shape in the cleric-beast’s mind, an image of a destination and a growing compulsion to again put his beastly force into motion. At the end of this march, he sensed, there would be killing, and hearts to feed the god, and final, ultimate victory over the humankind of Maztica.

Hoxitl emerged from his cavelike lair and raised his voice in a high, ululating howl. The sound echoed from the great mountains around the valley, rolling across the muddy, swamp-like stretches that had once been lakes. Among the ruined streets and cesspools, the ores looked up from their bickering. The cry called forth other ores and ogres and trolls from slumber or feeding. All took up their weapons and responded.

Slowly, by ones and twos, then by dozens and scores and hundreds, the beasts of the Viperhand moved to their master’s call. They gathered across the sprawling chaos of the great plaza, perching on ruined temples, clustering in the few flat expanses of the stonework, all of them turning their beastly faces toward the great stone monolith that was their power and their glory.

“Creatures! My children!” Hoxitl bellowed in his grotesque language, and the creatures listened attentively.

“Zaltec calls us, and we must obey! Again we shall march so that all Maztica will know the terror of our presence!”

His creatures responded with dull roars of anticipation. The long days of inactivity weighed heavily upon them, and now they stood, once again ready for war.

“Chief Tabub, we bring two of the Big People as prisoners,” explained the little man, who was called Kashta, after placing his bow and arrows-the tips of the deadly missiles wiped clean of their kurari poison-beside the door to the chief’s low hut. Kashta carried Halloran’s sword with him into the hut. The weapon was as long as the warrior himself.

“It is as I dreamed, as the Lord of the Jaguars told me in my sleep,” said Tabub in a low monotone. The chief sat cross-legged, flanked by two of his wives. “A man and a woman… she carries a child?”

“Indeed,” whispered Kashta, awed.

“They must go to the pit tonight,” pronounced the potbellied chief. Like Kashta, his face was painted red and black, though in vertical stripes while all the other warriors bore their marks in horizontal lines.

“But this man, he is like no other 1 have seen, no other man in the world,” the warrior objected tentatively. “His face is covered with hair, like a bearded monkeys, and he wears a shirt of hard silver. He bore this great knife, also of silver.”

“Let me see,” said Tabub. He drew the weapon from its scabbard, and his wives shrank back as the glow from the enchanted blade filled the tiny hut. Tabub reached out with one short finger and traced it along the keen edge. “Ah,” he grunted, without any display of pain, as blood ran from a gash in his skin. “This is a potent weapon indeed.”

“The stranger speaks gibberish, also like a monkey, but the woman understands him. She can talk, too, in the normal language of the Big People.”

Tabub’s visage grew stern. “You know the commands! You may not speak with the Big People! They must be placed in the pit, and there they die!”

“But always we kill the Big People! We place them in the pit, and the Cat-God devours them! For how many years must it go on this way?”

The chief’s scowl didn’t waver. “You know of the words of the god, as told me by my father, and his father before him, and on through the history of our people!”

Tabub’s eyes closed, and his words came forth rhythmically, reciting the prophecy that had long been lain on his folk.

“The Big People are our enemies, and they will kill us unless we kill them first. They go to their deaths to appease the gods, and the gods are pleased, and the Little People will live on.”

“But the killing must end sometime, to that same tale,” argued Kashta. He, too, spoke the rote of long-taught prophecy: “ ‘There will come a man, a giant even among the Big

People, who will turn night into day and lead us into the peace of a new age.’”

“Is this man a giant?” demanded Tabub.

“He is tall, even for a Big Person. Yet truly I could not call him a giant,” Kashta admitted.

“Then he will be fed to the Cat-God.” Tabub, his pronouncement final, turned with studied arrogance to inspect his newest wife. Kashta knew that the interview was over.

The small garrison of Helmsport, some thirty men, rushed to the shore, shouting hurrahs, at the appearance of Don Vaez’s fleet of carracks. Their delight swiftly turned to chagrin when, after landing his troops, the commander of the relief expedition ordered them thrown into irons and imprisoned in the very fort they had guarded for so many long, lonely months.

Helmsport was in fact little more than a huge, rectangular earthwork. It stood upon a low hill, commanding the sheltered waters of Ulatos Lagoon, where first Cordell and now Don Vaez had anchored their fleets.

The wall itself enclosed a rectangular compound, although a low gate had been built, a notch in the earthen wall where horses, men, and even carts could pass through. The rest of the rampart loomed some thirty feet above the surrounding ground and supported a wide walkway at the top. Any defending force occupying the top of that wall would have a commanding advantage over an attacker forced to scramble up the steep outer slopes.

The base of the wall within the fort was lined with wood and grass huts, with roofs of thatch. Several wooden barns had been erected plus one framed structure, much like a house, that had been intended to serve as Cordell’s headquarters. Several smaller, but solid, wooden buildings served as storage sheds. It was to one of these that the captain ordered the garrison members, still chained, to be confined.

“What’s the meaning of this?” howled Sergeant Major Tranph, the burly veteran Cordell had left in command, when Don Vaez confronted them in their rude dirt cells. “What manner of enemy are you?”

“Cautious,” explained the blond-haired captain, unruffled by his prisoner’s outburst. “You are suspected of treason, of betraying the charter of Amn. Rest assured that you will have ample opportunity to defend yourselves. It may be that you were duped by the real villain in the affair.”

“Cordell?” Tranph gaped at Don Vaez, understanding his meaning but disbelieving just the same. “Surely you jest! What has he done to arouse the ire of the merchant princes? Why, his profits after conquering Ulatos alone would pay for the expedition tenfold!”

“Those profits have not been delivered into the proper hands. Indeed, we have evidence that he is concealing them from the just owners. Where is the eminently loyal captain-general? Why does he not appear to defend himself?”

“Profits delivered? To Amn? By Helm, man, we haven’t had contact with the Sword Coast since our landing a year ago!” Tranph sputtered, indignation wrestling with outrage.

“And that, in itself, may be at the root of the treason,” Don Vaez suppressed a yawn. “But come now, my good sergeant. Where is your general? Surely he is the one who must provide the ultimate answers.”

“1 tell you, he has marched on the capital of this land-a city reported to hold more gold than you can possibly imagine! Our last message from him told us that he had entered the city and was engaged in negotiation with their ruler. We have heard nothing else from him for these last four, maybe five months.”

“Nor will he hear aught from you,” promised Don Vaez with a tight smile. “When he returns, we shall have a quiet reception-call it a trial, if you will-and he will have ample opportunity to answer the charges against him. Perhaps if his mission is a success, he will return with enough gold to convince us of his noble intentions.

“Then he will accompany us-in chains, of course-on a return to Amn.” And then my own triumph shall be complete! he added silently.

Don Vaez, in a flurry of blond curls, turned on his heel and marched from the cell. A burly guard slammed the door shut behind him, while a company of trusted watchmen stood as sentries about the small building.

Rodolfo, the veteran navigator, stepped over to Don Vaez as he left the shed. “Beggin’ your pardon, sir,” he began, “but I wonder if we’re bein’ a bit hard on these lads here.”

Don Vaez’s eyes flashed, and he fixed the man with all the glare his clear blue eyes could muster. “You’re not being paid to wonder but to follow orders! If I were you, I’d have a care to remember that!” he barked.

Rodolfo met the gaze in those blue eyes for several seconds, but Don Vaez couldn’t read the look he saw there. He held his own gaze firm, and the navigator finally nodded slightly.

“As you wish, Captain,” he replied softly. Rodolfo turned and disappeared into the darkness collecting in the fortress. Don Vaez watched him go, pleased with the result of the confrontation. He knew that he had gone far to secure his position as unquestioned leader of the expedition. The only question now was what to do next.

Still, it was a fine start to the mission! Don Vaez congratulated himself as he crossed the compound within Helm-sport, toward the large wooden building-the only permanent structure here-which he had claimed as his headquarters. Within that house, he knew, Pryat Devane worked his auguries, trying to determine with the aid of Helm what would be the appropriate course of action. That was useful, thought the commander, but not essential. He had time now, and could afford to wait.

He took no notice of the eagle soaring in serene circles high overhead.

“We have folk like this where I come from,” Halloran explained. “They’re called halflings.”

Do they lack clothing and take your people prisoner?” Erix wondered.

Hal chuckled grimly “No-they’re more of a nuisance! than a threat. Most of them live among humans, in the same cities and towns and villages. Sometimes they’re brave, sometimes cowardly, They’re just like other men, except a little smaller.”

He and his wife sat on the ground within a small cage fashioned from sturdy wooden bars lashed together with toughened strands of hemp. Around them, the Little People settled down to their evening’s cooking. The village was a collection of straw huts, with overhanging roofs of heavy thatch and low, rounded doorways. Racks in the center of the structures held a variety of meats over low coals.

Night settled across the surrounding jungle, a night filled with the heavy drone of insects, punctuated by the shrill howls of monkeys and birds. Every once in a while they heard the rumbling cry of a jaguar, and for a few moments afterward, the forest fell still.

Several children advanced cautiously toward the cage, watching them with wide eyes. Erixitl smiled at them, and they quickly scampered back to the shelter of their parents cookfires.

If Erix was frightened, Halloran thought, she didn’t show it. He tried to hide his own fear, even though he didn’t fear for himself. But what kind of hope was there? What were their prospects of flight, even if they could get away, with Erix carrying the burden of their child within her.

“What do you think they’ll do with us?” she asked.

Halloran could only shrug, “At least I don’t see a pyramid or an altar. But who knows what their plans ate? Have you heard of these folk before?”

“In the same sense as the ‘Hairy Men.’ the desert dwarves,” she admitted. “The Little People are told of in ancient legends, and some claimed that they dwelled in the deepest jungles of Far Payit. But like the desert dwarves, no one seemed to take the stories seriously. I have never heard of anyone who has seen them before.”

“We are the lucky ones,” Hal remarked dryly.

For a time, they lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. Finally Erixitl shook her head and offered her husband a wan

smile “Still’ believe things will be all right,” she said. “1 don’t know why, but I do.”

“Me, too,» Hal agreed though neither of them believed him. He had to do something, he knew-but what?

“Big People, you come with me now.” The remark drew their attention, and they saw the same warrior who had been the first to accost them at the waterfall approaching.

“Where are you taking us?” asked Erixitl as the little man opened the cage door. Several other warriors stood well back from the pair, carrying the short bows with deadly-looking arrows, ready to shoot.

The native didn’t reply, instead commanding them with a peremptory gesture to follow him. They walked among the small grass huts of the village to a clearing on the far side. A dozen warriors, each bearing a blazing torch, stood in a ring at the center of the area.

Halloran’s chest tightened in fear, again for Erixitl and the unborn child. Instinctively he understood that the prisoners would be at the center of the evening’s activities. He wondered what rite these diminutive warriors had prepared for them.

“Go here,” commanded the warrior who led them.

As the ring opened to allow them to pass, Halloran saw a circular pit, perhaps twenty feet across, in the center of the circle. He couldn’t see the bottom until he and Erix were prodded to its edge. Then he saw that it was about twelve feet deep.

Opposite their position, at the base of the pit, he saw a door made of heavy wooden bars. Something dark and shadowy moved beyond those bars, and his fear grew to sick horror.

“Go in now,” ordered the warrior. His voice carried a trace of reluctance, but he displayed no hesitation as he raised his weapon menacingly

No ladder or other means of descent presented itself. Halloran knew that a twelve-fool leap might very well prove deadly to Erixitl or the baby.

“Wait!” he objected. “Leave her out-let her alone! I’ll go in there by myself!”

The warrior looked at him, and Hal thought he saw sympathy through the garishly painted lines on his face. But then another of the Little People came up, with a peremptory air that made Halloran suspect that he was some sort of chief. This one had the same war paint as the others, though his was drawn in vertical lines and he had long feathers tied to his ears and his wrists.

The stocky leader raised a hand and gestured toward the pit. A group of archers behind him raised their weapons, and Halloran looked at the bristling row of arrowheads.

Suddenly the chief pushed Erixitl in the small of her back. With a startled scream, she tumbled forward off the edge of the pit as she twisted to face Halloran. His heart froze at the look of terror on her face.

But his body remained mobile.

“My hand!” Hal shouted. Erix spun in the air as he tumbled to the side, seizing one of her hands in both of his. He fell prone at the lip of the pit as she dropped and grunted in pain. But he held firm, arresting her fall halfway down. J

“I’m okay,” she gasped. “Let me down.”

Halloran gasped as another warrior kicked him in the ribs, pushing him toward the edge. He felt Erix slip from his grasp and drop the rest of the way to the floor of the pit. Then he rolled off the edge, twisting in the air to land on his feet beside her.

Erix threw her arms around him, trying to choke back her terrified sobs. “Are you hurt?” he asked her, and she shook her head, sniffling.

Then they heard, from the darkness across the pit, a deep and very menacing growl.

The surviving Itza warriors pressed through the dense tangle of the valley bottom, pushing their way toward the heights above. Gultec, at the rear of his army, saw that the ants did not pursue after the bloody skirmish.

That, at least, was something. He hadn’t had time to count their losses, but he knew that more than a hundred of the

Itza warriors had fallen in the short, violent engagement. But they had accomplished their objective. The man-bugs had apparently paused to regroup. If the rest of the people had the opportunity to gain the pass because of the sacrifice of some, the warriors had not died in vain.

He remembered, with a cold chill, the pale white monster who had lashed out with magic against them. Once again he thought of the battle against the foreigners at Ulatos and how the magic of the albino sorcerer had broken his army.

Could there be a connection between the two powerful spell-casters? He didn’t see how, and yet the distinction of their whiteness seemed too obvious for coincidence. One had been a humanlike elf, the other was a grotesque and unnatural beast. Yet something about the beast’s face seemed similar, in its alluring femininity, to the elf.

He pushed his speculation aside, focusing instead on the rigors of the climb. The warriors straggled across a swampy valley bottom, a flat depression that marked another barrier in their long march up the pass.

From here he could look before him into the black dome of the star-speckled sky and faintly see the outline of the narrow pass above. It looked impossibly remote and distant, yet somewhat closer than the last time he had seen it. Most of the Itza people should be passing through it even now.

“You have made us a good plan,” said Zochimaloc, appearing out of the darkness to walk softly beside Gultec. “The high route must be the safest.”

The Jaguar Knight sighed. “I wish it were true. But I fear no place is safe from the kind of enemy that pursues us.”

“You must know that your attack was successful,” countered the old man, stepping nimbly over a low vine. “They have fallen behind us now, and this gives us time to escape.”

“Time? Can it be enough time?” Gultec wondered. “Is there enough time in the world?”

Zochimaloc chuckled, a patronizing, grandfatherly sound that somehow made Gultec feel more confident. “There is time, now, for the old people, the children, and the mothers ° go through the pass and over the mountains. Perhaps there is time, too, to have faith.”

The warrior looked up at the pass, still outlined against the stars. Perhaps Zochimaloc was right. Indeed, many of the Itza must have already reached the far side of the mountains. By morning, the warriors would reach the summit of the pass. Once there, they would have to turn and face the inevitably pursuing enemy. There they would make their stand.