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saw he could not believe.
"That's why I told you in the Solar to brace yourself," said Angie at his
elbow. "Not the neighbors. This."
"But there aren't that many hobs inEngland !" said Jim.
"Apparently there are and more still coming. You're not looking at a tenth of
them," she answered. "The castle's full of them helping in everything that's
being done. Helping and trying to cheer up the sick ones. Some hobs have gone
off to get more opium and pipes for all the plague victims. Others have
already left on other errands. Some of them have been taking Nursing Room
patients brave enough to go for small rides on the smoke anything to give them
heart."
"But where did they all come from so quickly?"
"Don't underestimate the smoke," said Angie.
"I've got to talk to Hob our hob," said Jim, turning towards the nearest
chimney poking through the tower roof. Then he remembered the crowd around
where he was, and checked the move. "You're right. The Solar. Let's go!"
They went back downstairs, unquestioned and unimpeded. The neighbors were
already starting to argue among themselves. But as the four of them closed the
door behind them and sat down around the table, Jim reflexively threw a ward
around the Solar to let them hear any outside talk clearly, but prevent anyone
outside from hearing any word of theirs. Just then the alarm gong above them
began to sound again but with a strange, measured beat that Jim had never
heard from it before.
Thud, pause,thud, thud, said the gong, continuing to repeat itself. Jim was
halfway to his feet, when Brian's words stopped him.
"A dragon coming in to the roof," said Brian briefly.
"A dragon?" said Jim, starting to rise again.
"Sit down, now, Jim!" said Angie. "It's all arranged. The neighbors have
already learned to move back to stand with their backs against the
embrassures, to clear a landing space."
Jim switched his hearing to make it sensitive enough to pick up the larger
noises from the roof, and sure enough, within seconds there was the typical
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heavy thud and wing-scrape noise of a dragon landing.
"It will doubtless be Secoh, James," said Dafydd calmly. "Full-grown as he
is, he is still smaller than most among the young Cliffside recruits to his
Dragon Patrol."
"What's going on?" cried Jim. "And how could all these people have gotten
here so quickly? You'd think I'd been asleep two nights not one."
"Three nights, dear Jim," said Angie softly, laying a hand on his arm. "I was
hoping for a quiet moment to tell you about it, before this I knew you'd be
upset but it didn't come in time. You slept like a log for three nights and
two days, Carolinus told me not to worry, that you'd thrown off the plague,
but not all of the effects of the magic overstrain that may have saved your
life, in a way if Barron was right about it. 'Let him sleep,' said Carolinus,
'as long as he can. It's the best thing to get him back in shape.' "
There were noises from the stairs, scrapings against walls, grunts, a
half-stifled woman's scream, and what Jim, at least, recognized as dragon
curses, followed at last by a shuffling of heavy feet down the corridor toward
them. When these halted, a heavy scraping of great and sharp claws at the
door, in what was clearly a too-powerful version of the normal polite
scratching that asked for admittance.
"Come!" shouted Angie, and the door opened to admit Secoh, who squeezed in
through its opening that had, happily, been widened to get the Roman bath into
the Solar.
"How are you, m'lord?" asked Secoh, squatting on what any other animal might
have considered his haunches at one corner of the table, which now seemed
decidedly crowded.
"Fine, thanks," said Jim. Abruptly remembering his duty as host, he raised
his voice.
"Servant here!" he shouted. One of the women of the castle staff opened the
door and took a gingerly step inside. Jim was known to be a sort of
blood-brother with this latest visitor but dragons were still dragons, and
once upon a time had pounced upon stray humans for their lunch, as they might
have on any other animal.
"Mazers and three pitchers of wine here and two gallons of wine in the
special bucket you'll find in the Serving Room."
"Twogallons, my lord?" The servant blanched.
"Certainly. Two gallons for our dragon guest. Get help if you need, to carry
it all at once!"
"Yes, m'lord. Immediately." The staff member curtsied and went out, partially
reassured. She was not one of the staff who dated back to when Secoh had been
in the habit of making excuses to visit the Great Hall in hopes of what Jim
had just ordered for him. Secoh had finally, gently, had it made clear to him
that such visits should be restricted to times when there was some important
reason for a visit. The small marsh-dragon had never intruded unnecessarily
again. But his eyes glistened kindly on the servant, following Jim's mention
of the bucket of wine. Jim, however, barely noticed this.
"Three nights, two days!" Jim was repeating, shaking his head.
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"Be at peace, James," said Brian. "All has gone well while you slept."
Jim looked at him, about to ask if, and how, the Prince might have been
sticking his nose into what was going on, with commands that could only tangle
matters up, but then he remembered why he had come back to the Solar.
"Hob!" he shouted in the direction of the large Solar fireplace. "Malencontri
Hob!"
"Yes, m'lord?" said Hob, appearing out of the fireplace and standing in front
of it.
"Come over here and join us."
Hob summoned a small puff of smoke and rode it, sitting cross-legged, to the
opposite corner of the table from Secoh and, as it happened, also at Jim's
elbow ending up level with the heads of everyone there, except Secoh's.
"I'm so glad to see you up, m'lord and m'lady, and Sir Brian and Master
Dafydd& and this dragon." Hob knew perfectly well who Secoh was. Secoh said
nothing.
"Since I've been dead to the world for three nights " Jim was beginning.
"Dead, m'lord?" cried Hob.
Brian looked a little shaken at Jim's choice of words, Secoh unmistakably
alarmed, Dafydd unperturbed.
"Just in a manner of speaking!" said Jim. "Actually, I was only asleep. But
as I started to say since I was out of things, I'll have to know what's been
happening, and I'd appreciate all of you telling me. To begin with, Hob, how
did all the other hobs get here so fast?"
"Oh, I sent out messages on the smoke to all my friends, m'lord. A bit of the
smoke can carry a simple message like that. I said, 'Come fight goblins. Bring
your own weapon. Tell everyone.' "
"And they came? But how did all these others know to come?"
"Oh, each of my friends sent messages to all their friends except the ones
I'd sent messages to and those sent messages totheirfriends& and so it went,
very fast. Everybody wanted a chance."
"But how did the neighbors get here? And come to think of it, how about their
horses? I suppose a couple of hobs could carry a man in armor and fully armed
on the smoke. But what about their horses, all equipped?"
"I can tell you, m'lord,' said Secoh eagerly. "Even one of our young members
of the Dragon Patrol can carry fifteen or sixteen hobs. There's nothing much
of weight to them, you know. In fact, it isn't even so much their weight,
anyhow, as the fact that we can't have them riding on our wings, and such. Not
decent. Of course an enormous number of hobs are needed to carry a george's
big fighting horse back to Malencontri."
"As a matter of fact," said Hob, cutting in sharply, "as few as fifteen
hobs with the smoke to help can carry a gentleman's destrier right over the
heads of the goblins out of spear-throw. Of course at least one horsewise hob
must talk to the destrier first and explain, so the horse doesn't get scared [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]