Warlock Apprentice, Black Lake Novel 4

Chapter Thirty-Five

~

I’d already studied half a dozen villages the dragons ignored, and two that could be called cities. My lids weighed heavily as we approached another. But this was indeed a city. Buildin’s rose many stories and neighborhoods stretched out for the horizon. The air hung coal-dust thick. My need for sleep evaporated.

I sat up and wiggled to get more comfortable between Tir’s neck ridges.

Taiz’lin stilled his wings and glided slowly toward the Earth, and Tir reduced his thrusts to follow. My chest tightened, vibrated with excitement. I had never seen such a place, never could have imagined so many people heaped together.

As we neared, I made out crisscrossin’ boulevards filled with carts and wagons. Warehouses, docks, and storefronts. A few factories belched smoke. A stockyard to the west. The dragons circled and descended more quickly, the wind pullin’ at my jacket and pants. I squinted as my eyes watered.

We approached an open field and what I assumed earlier was a blotch of wild flowers, moved. The golden dragon lay baskin’ in the sun.

Ike, Morgan, and Selene had already climbed down from Taiz’lin as Tir approached. Taiz’lin had moved near his mate and nuzzled her. I gripped loose hide to prepare for the landin’, but the oddest sensation flooded my mind.

“I’ll make this a gentler landin’ than my launch,” Tir promised.

“Ahhhh.” I jerked to release the dragon’s flesh.

“Ya didn’t hurt me. I’m sorry for startlin’ ya, before.”

“Huh. I didn’t know ya could speak directly to me like this.”

Distracted, though Tir thrust down hard to ensure a peaceful landin’, I still nearly went over the dragon’s shoulder. Tir pressed his right wing forward awkwardly in support, but Asr caught me by the coat and managed to keep me from plummetin’ on impact.

“Ya three playin’ some kind of game?”

The amber-haired Lucas stood glarin’ at us, fists on his hips.

“I just, just—”

Lucas’ grim expression turned into a smile, and he turned away. I slid down, and Asr handed me the heavy saddle bags. By the time I walked around the dragon, Lucas led Morgan and Selene toward the fenceline borderin’ the city’s business district.

“Good luck,” Tir told me.

I swallowed and turned around. Tir dropped his jaw in that ghastly smile dragons make, and launched. I exchanged a wave with Asr.

I’ll not be gettin’ used to dragon’s voices in my mind any time soon.

The rush of Taiz’lin launchin’ drew me out of my thoughts, and I sprinted to catch up with the other three, saddle bags thumpin’ me in the gut and lower back.

We walked in silence about a half mile, fifteen of the most rivetin’ minutes I’d ever experienced. I gawked, takin’ in the whirlwind of activity. Horses flew past, carriages rattled over quarried stone. We strode down boardwalks under merchandise bein’ pullied to upper-level warehouses.

I wished we had time to dawdle. So many thin’s lay just past reach on the other side of plates of glass, glass like those which lined the northern face of Ike’s home. So, such glass wasn’t so uncommon after all.

I ploughed into Selene’s back.

The man calmly stretched his arm over my shoulder in a brotherly fashion. Lucas would have teased me, but he had walked into the storefront we stood before. I craned to read the awnin’ sign. No words, just the black silhouettes of a hammer and anvil. If my mind had been engaged, it wouldn’t have taken a genius to figger out what wares were sold within, for the half-dozen workin’ hammers echoin’ past the open back door.

“What are we doin’ here?” I asked Selene.

But Lucas, standin’ in the far doorway, pointed directly at me and motioned to follow.

Selene grabbed my bags, and I hurried to join the dragon rider. The din rose considerably as I crossed the threshold leadin’ to the shop yard, which was about seventy by forty feet. Blacksmiths and their apprentices lined the left under a corrugated-steel awnin’ that reached the back of the yard. Smoke and heat billowed.

A man who appeared two hundred years old, nothin’ but skin with tight-stretched muscle hobbled to us. Lucas spoke, but from the combined efforts of perhaps twenty men in the enclosed space, there was no makin’ out the words.

The old man carried an armload of leather, scroll-like bundles, which he set on a heavy-planked table to my right. Lucas waved me closer, and spoke again, but I only caught two words of it. Select, and fits.

“Fits what?” I shouted.

The old man unrolled the six bundles, each containin’ a single, shinin’ sword. Six different lengths. Six different size grips.

Lucas leaned near and shouted, “Select what best fits yar hand, lad.”

“But I—”

“Don’t quibble that ya don’t have a clue how to handle it. The important thin’ is ya have one hangin’ from yar hip, and if ya have to bluff someone with it, it doesn’t slip out of yar sweaty mitt.”

“But I—” They obviously didn’t want a repeat of my first Northern debacle.

“Shut up and give each a swing.”

I couldn’t help lookin’ down at Lucas’ waist. He wore no sword, only the usual, broad huntin’ knife, which everyone in the mountains wears.

The old question-mark of a man thrust the hilt with the shortest blade at me. When I took it, the man shoved me toward an open area of the yard.

Lucas shouted, “Give it a swing.”

The noise of hammers, shouts, thrown iron, hissin’ bellows, and the crunch of coal bein’ shoveled ground into my temples. The heat of the yard, the plain, pricked my skin, the smoke burned my eyes. I worried I might throw up my breakfast.

The old man swung his arm, and scowled, to press me to try out his wares.

So I drew it back and forth. What did I know about what the grip of a sword should feel like? After a few moments my muscles burned as hot as the embers in the fires.

Lucas turned a grin away. The old man shook his head, and exchanged the long-knife for the next, and the next until I tried the last. Yes, there was a difference between the thinnest and heaviest of the six hilts but I had no clue which was best—for me. Finally pointed to the fourth one and peered questionin’ly at Lucas. His eyes gleamed. He nodded to the ancient smithy and we moved to the storefront with the selected weapon to conclude business.

From a broad drawer, the man made of scrawny bone-and-muscle withdrew a sleeve and belt for the mid-length sword. He polished the blade carefully with a woolen cloth before slidin’ it home in the leather scabbard, and handed it to me with the hint of a bow.

Lucas counted out six gold coins into the man’s outstretched hand, and I lost function of my lungs.

Six. Gold. Coins?

I could buy a team of six horses for two.

The man gave Lucas a brisk handshake, evidently happy with a generous tip.

Wouldn’t Morgan benefit from the sword more than me? My leaden head teetered upon my shoulders as I followed Lucas out of the shop. We rejoined Morgan and Selene, where I posed that question. The ogre laughed.

“I’ll not need a toy to keep riff raff from botherin’ me.”

Considerin’ Morgan’s shoulders are as wide as my eldest sister is tall, that sounded about right.

“And in a battle,” Morgan continued, “I’m comfortable with Bacchus in my hands.”

“Not a toy,” Selene hissed. His expression indicated he intended no humor. “Strap it on lad. Now. And never draw it unless you intend to kill a man. That tool can take off a man’s arm without half an effort. Don’t forget it.”

The man grasped my rune-etched walkin’ stick, held it while I managed the belt and arranged the blade’s sheath, but there was no keepin’ it from feelin’ as though it were a new appendage stickin’ out my arse.

My ears burned. Why had the wizard shouted at me? I hadn’t called it a toy, the ogre had. Was Selene unhappy they placed the weapon in the hands of one not trained to use it? Or did somethin’ else entirely bother him? There were plenty of emotions swirlin’ from the man, as there were from Morgan, and even Lucas.

We walked up the boardwalk and crossed the next street without speakin’. Lucas led us first to a shop where we purchased a replacement cape for Selene’s scorched one, and a newly tailored cape and vest for me, styled much like those Selene wore. Why were they tryin’ to mold a bumpkin into a gentleman? Made no sense—and none of them attempted an explanation. As though I would ever fit in Selene’s world.

Five minutes later we strode into a stable yard. A young man, maybe two years older than me, stood five stalls away throwin’ hay. He turned and smiled broadly.

“There you be, Master Lucas. Your party arrived, eh?” He leaned his pitchfork against the half-wall and hurried forward with his hand out to Lucas. But his eyes were on Morgan. They moved up and down the length of the ogre at least three times.

“They did,” Lucas answered. “Horses ready?”

“Aye. Checked every inch of ’em. New shoes as you ordered. Gave them oats this morning, so they be smiling and fit.” He walked to an opposite stall. “You wish me to saddle them up now for you?” I struggled to pick his words out of his accent.

“Aye. They have urgent business north.”

“Absolutely, Master Lucas.” His eyes darted back to Morgan.

“Horses?” I hissed at Morgan’s back.

Morgan leaned down as though he required privacy, and whispered, “Not for any ogre, lad. But yar loins will soon be gettin’ another rash of saddle sore.”

“Ahhh—”

Selene turned and burned an angrier glare through me, shuttin’ me up.

The young stableman quickly had two beautiful mares bridled and standin’ in the center of the stable. They didn’t have the sleek muscle of the horse Selene left with Avar’s clan in the Range, but they were still tall, attractive creatures, neither of which I could see over, unless I chose to jump in the air like a fool.

Horses are indeed efficient transport, but I started to ache just thinkin’ about what came next. Would it be as bad as it had been sittin’ behind Selene? Could a leather saddle be any less jarrin’ to a man’s arse than the bare backside of the horse?

“You paying attention?” Selene hissed. “I’m not caring for your mount for you.”

Evidently he meant the way the man dressed the tack. I focused. I can harness a mule to a plow in the morning dark. A saddle, stirrups and bridle couldn’t be that difficult.

Days in a saddle. To my uncallused arse, the worst nightmare.

Selene’s anger in no way pushed aside my dread. And why is he so angry?

Stinkin’ horses. I think Morgan and I had the same thought at the same time.

~