The Dragon's Path

Marcus

Nightfall came early. Only half of the carts had been emptied, and the caravan master was all but chewing his own wrists over it. Marcus didn't think it would be a problem. The storm had come from the west, and the mountains would squeeze the worst of the snow out. They might be tunneling up from the roofs in Birancour, but Bellin was in the rain shadow. They'd be fine. At least when it came to snow.

Yardem had arranged a separate barracks for the so-called guards. Two small rooms with a shared fire grate, but in the town proper, tucked snugly in the living rock. Carved swirls and whorls caught the firelight, and the walls seemed to breathe and dance. Marcus pulled off the soaked leather of his boots and leaned back, groaning. The others were about him, lounging and talking and negotiating for the best sleeping spaces. The ease the actors took in close company wasn't all that different from real sword-and-bows, and the jokes were better. Even Yardem seemed half relaxed, and that wasn't a common thing.

Still, Marcus's work wasn't done.

"Meeting," he said. "Our job's changed now. Best that we talk that through, not find ourselves surprised later."

The chatter stilled. Master Kit sat beside the fire, his wiry grey hair standing like smoke gone still.

"I don't see how the 'van can afford this," the actor said. "Even with small quarters, it's going to cost having us kept and fed for a full season."

"Likely they'll lose money," Marcus said. "But that's the caravan master's problem, not ours. We aren't here to see a profit turned. Just everyone kept safe. On the road, that means bandits. Holed up for a winter, that means no one gets stir crazy or starts sleeping with someone, makes someone else jealous, or gets in mind to cheat too much at cards."

Smit, the jack-of-all-roles, pulled a long face. "Are we playing guards or nursemaids?" the man said.

"We're doing whatever gets the 'van to Carse safe," Marcus said. "We'll protect them from ourselves if we have to."

"Mmm. Good line," Cary, the thin woman, said. "Protect them from ourselves if we have to."

Marcus narrowed his eyes, frowning.

"They're writing a new play," Master Kit said. "A comic piece about an acting troupe hired to pretend they're caravan guards."

Yardem grunted and flicked an ear. Maybe annoyance, maybe amusement. Likely both. Marcus chose to ignore it.

"We've got a dozen and a half carters," Marcus said. "Add the 'van master and his wife. You've traveled with these people for weeks. You've watched them. You know them. What problems are we going to have?"

"The man hauling the tin ore," Smit said. "He's been spoiling for a fight since those raiders. He's not going to last a season without one unless someone starts sharing his bed or puts him down hard."

"I'd thought the same," Marcus said, allowing himself a moment's pleasure. The actors were much more perceptive than his usual men. Given the circumstances, that would help. "What else?"

"The quarter-Dartinae," Opal, the older leading woman, said. "He's been avoiding the 'van master's sermons almost as much as you have, Captain. A constant diet of scripture isn't going to sit well with him."

"The girl in the false whiskers," Mikel, the thin boy, said. "She's looking mightily fragile."

"Oh, yes. Her," Cary said.

"And God knows what she's really hauling," Opal said, her tone all agreement. "Gets jumpy as a cat whenever anyone gets too near her cart. Won't talk about it either."

Marcus raised a hand, commanding silence.

"Who?" he said.

"The girl in the false whiskers," Master Kit said. "The one that calls herself Tag."

Marcus looked at Yardem. The Tralgu's expression mirrored his own blank surprise. Marcus lifted an eyebrow. Did you know? Yardem shook his head once, earrings jingling. No.

And God knows what she's really hauling.

"With me, Yardem," Marcus said, pulling his boots back on.

"Yes, sir," the Tralgu rumbled.

The carters and and 'van master were in a separate network of rooms and tunnels. Marcus went through the smoke-hazed halls and common rooms, Yardem looming at his side. The other guards or actors, or whatever they were, trailed along behind like children playing follow-me-follow-you. With every room that Tag wasn't in, Marcus felt the hair on the back of his neck rising. His mind ran back over everything that had happened on the road, every time he'd spoken to the boy, everything that the 'van master had said about him. There was very little. Almost nothing. Always, the boy had kept himself - and, more the point, his cart - to himself.

The last of the rented rooms looked out over the dark and snow-carpeted hills. Behind him, Marcus heard the high, excited voices of the carters asking what was happening. The chill, wet air smelled as much of rain as snow. Lightning sketched the horizon.

"He's not here, sir."

"I see that."

"She can't have gone," Opal said from behind them. "Girl hardly knew how to steer the cart without something in front for the mules to follow."

"The cart," Marcus said, walking out into the gloom.

The carts that hadn't been unloaded were near the low stone warehouses. Half a foot of snow covered them, making them all seem taller than they truly were. Marcus stalked among them. Behind him, someone lit torches, the fires hissing in the still-falling snow. Marcus's shadow shuddered and danced on the wool cart. The snow on its bench was hardly an inch thick. Marcus hooked a foot on the iron loop beside the wheel and hauled himself up. Once atop it, he pulled back the tarp. Tag lay curled in a ball like a cat. Now that the words had been said, Marcus could see where the whiskers were unevenly placed, the dye in the hair patchy. What had been an underfed, half-dim Firstblood boy resolved into a girl with Cinnae blood.

"Wh-what - " the girl began, and Marcus grabbed her shoulder and pulled her to her feet. Her lips were blue from the cold.

"Yardem?"

"Here, sir," the Tralgu said from the cart's side.

"Catch," Marcus said and shoved her over. The girl yelped as she fell, and then Yardem had her in a headlock. Her cries were wild and Yardem grunted once as a lucky blow struck. Marcus ignored the struggle. The wool was damp and stank of mildew. He lifted up bolt after bolt, letting them drop to the ground. The girl's cries became sharper, and then quiet. Marcus's hand found something hard.

"Pass me a torch," he called.

Instead, Master Kit scrambled up beside him. The old man's face expression said nothing. In the torchlight, Marcus pulled up the box. Blackwood with an iron fastener and hard leather hinges. Marcus drew his dagger and slashed at the hinges until there was enough play to let him push the blade between lid and box.

"Be careful," Master Kit said as Marcus bore down on the knife.

"Late for that," Marcus said, and the lock gave with a snap. The box hung open, limp and broken. Inside, a thousand bits of cut glass glittered and shone. No. Not glass. Gems. Garnets and rubies, emeralds and diamonds and pearls. The box was full to the brim with them. Marcus looked down into the hole he had left in the wool and snow. There were more boxes like it. Dozens of them.

He looked at Master Kit. The old man's eyes were wide with shock.

"All right," Marcus said shortly, letting the box fall closed. "Come on."

On the ground, the other guards were clustered around Yardem and the girl. Yardem still held the girl in his wide arms, ready to choke her asleep. Tears were flowing down her cheeks. The set of her jaw was all defiance and grief. Marcus pinched off a bit of the whiskers from her cheek, rubbed them between his fingers, and let them drop to the ground. Beside the Tralgu's bulk, she seemed barely more than a child. Her eyes met Marcus's, and he saw the plea there. Something dangerous shifted in his chest. Not rage, not indignation. Not even sorrow. Memory so vibrant and bright it was painful. He told himself to turn away.

"Please," the girl said.

"Kit," he said. "Take her inside. Our quarters. She doesn't talk to anyone, not even the 'van master."

"As you say, Captain," Master Kit said. Yardem loosened his grip and stood a half step back. His eyes were locked on the girl, ready to incapacitate her again if she attacked. Master Kit held out a hand to her. "Come along, my dear. You're among friends."

The girl hesitated, her gaze jumping from Marcus to Yardem to Master Kit and back again. Tears filled her eyes, but she didn't sob. He'd known another girl once who'd cried the same way. Marcus pushed the thought aside. Master Kit led her away. The others, as if by habit, followed the master actor and left the soldiers to themselves.

"The cart," Marcus said.

"No one comes near it, sir," Yardem said.

Marcus squinted up into the falling snow. "How old do you think she is?"

"Part Cinnae. Makes it hard to tell," Yardem rumbled. "Sixteen summers. Seventeen."

"That was my thought too."

"Same age Merian would have been."

"Near that."

Marcus turned back toward the cliff. Light glimmered in the stone-carved windows, and the ancient, snow-filled script carved into the cliffside above shone deep grey against the black.

"Sir?"

Marcus looked back. The Tralgu was already sitting on the cart's bench and wrapping the wool around himself in the style of Put nomads to keep his body warm and his sword arm free.

"Don't let what happened at Ellis affect your judgment. She's not your daughter."

The emotion in Marcus's chest shifted uneasily, like a babe troubled in its sleep.

"No one is," he said and walked into the darkness.

A cup of warm cider, Master Kit's sympathetic ear, and half an hour got the full tale. The Medean bank, the original carter's death, the desperate smuggler's run to Carse. The girl wept through half of it. She'd left the only home she'd known and the nearest she had to family. Marcus listened to it all with arms crossed, the scowl etching into his face. What caught him were the small things about her - the way her voice grew stronger when she talked about letters of exchange and the problem of capital transport, the habit she had of pushing her hair out of her eyes even when it wasn't there, the protective angle of her shoulders and her neck. Tag the Carter had been beneath his notice. Cithrin bel Sarcour, amateur smuggler, was a different matter.

When she was done, Marcus left her with the actors, took Master Kit by the elbow, and steered him out through the thin stone corridors that laced the stones of Bellin. The darkness was broken by candles at each turning; enough light to see where they were going, if not the individual steps that would get there. But walking slowly fit Marcus's needs at the moment.

"You knew about this?" Marcus said.

"I knew the girl was traveling in disguise."

"You never mentioned it."

"I didn't think it was odd. In my experience, people take on roles and put them off again quite often. Consider my own position with the caravan."

Marcus took a long, slow breath.

"All right," he said. "I'll have to take this to the 'van master. We can't stay here."

"No offense meant, Captain, but why not? It seems to me that the caravan's mission remains what it was before. Now that we know the situation, perhaps we could help the girl maintain her illusion. We could hide her cargo until spring, and carry on as if nothing were different."

"Doesn't work that way."

"What doesn't work that way, Captain?" Master Kit asked. Marcus paused at a sharp turn. The single candle gave the carved lines of the wall the aspect of life and awareness. In the dim light, the actor's face was dull gold and blackness.

"World doesn't work that way," Marcus said. "You never have that much money without blood coming out of it. Eventually one of us would get greedy. And even if we didn't, there's someone looking for that cart."

"But how would they find it, if they didn't also know to look for us?" Master Kit asked. Marcus noted that the man hadn't argued against the dangers of greed and betrayal.

"At a guess? They'd hear stories about a 'van being guarded by the hero of Gradis and Wodford. And with a cunning man who can turn aside arrows and command the power of the trees."

The chagrin on the actor's face told Marcus that his point was clear.

"This isn't what I hired you on for," Marcus said, "but I need you to stay with me."

Master Kit pursed his lips, hesitated for a long moment, then turned and walked farther into the darkness between candles, heading toward the 'van master's lodging. Marcus followed him. For almost a minute, their footsteps were the only sounds.

"What are your plans?" Master Kit said, his voice cautious. Marcus nodded to himself. At least it hadn't been no.

"Go south," Marcus said. "West is snowbound, east is back toward whoever follows us. North is the Dry Wastes in winter. We let it be known we're taking the goods to Maccia or Gilea, trying to sell at the markets there instead of wait for Carse. Move off east, then cut south."

"I don't know of any roads going south until - "

"Not roads. We have to get off the dragon's roads and take farm tracks and local paths down to the Inner Sea. There's a pass along the coast hardly ever freezes. Put us into Birancour in four weeks if it stays cold. Five, if it thaws enough to get muddy. They don't take well to armed bands crossing the border, so anyone following us might be turned back. Another week and we're in Porte Oliva. It's a big enough city to disappear into for the winter. Or if the roads are decent, we can push on for Northcoast and Carse."

"It seems like the long way around," Master Kit said. The hallway opened out into a wider chamber where several passages came together and an oil lamp hung from a worked iron bracket, and Master Kit stopped in the light, turning to face him. The man's face was gentle and sober. "I wonder whether you've considered the other option?"

"Don't see there is one."

"We could all visit the cart, fill our pockets and purses, and vanish like the dew. Anything left, we could put in a warehouse as someone else's problem."

"That might be the wise thing," Marcus said. "But it's not the job. We keep the 'van safe until it gets where it's going."

Marcus could see the skepticism in the actor's long face, and the grim amusement. It was, Marcus knew, the moment that would decide all the rest. If the actor refused, there weren't many options left.

Master Kit shrugged.

"Then I suppose we should tell the 'van master that his plans have changed."

The caravan left just before midday under low, grey skies. Marcus rode fore. His head still ached from a night of dreams as familiar as they were vicious. Blood and fire. The dying screams of a woman and a child who were both twelve years' dust now. The smell of burning hair. It had been years since he'd woken calling for his wife and daughter. For Alys and Merian. He'd hoped the nightmares had passed forever, but clearly they had returned, at least for the time.

He'd lived through them before. He could again.

The 'van master sat at his side, their white-plumed breaths falling in and out of time. Crows watched them from snow-caked trees, shifting their wings like old men. The snow was wet, but not more than a foot thick on the road. It would be worse once they turned off the dragon's roads.

"Can't believe we're doing this," the 'van master said for the hundredth time. "They didn't even tell me."

"They didn't think of you as a smuggler," Marcus said.

"Thought of me as a dupe."

"Me too," Marcus said. And then to the Timzinae's outraged look, "No, they also thought I was a dupe. Not that I also thought you were."

The 'van master sank into a bitter silence. The cliffs of Bellin faded behind them. It promised to be a miserable winter. When they stopped for the night, putting up tents in the fast-fading twilight, Marcus walked through the camp with Yardem at his side. Conversations paused when they came near. Smiles grew false and unconvincing. Resentment soaked the caravan like oil on a wick. He'd have to be sure nothing happened to light it. It was no worse than he'd expected. When he came to his own tent, she was waiting for him.

Tag the Carter was gone, vanished from the world as if he'd never been. The actors had helped her wash the worst of the dye from her hair, and without the lichenous whiskers her face seemed almost unnaturally clean. Youth and her Cinnae blood conspired to make her coltish, but a few years would change her into a woman.

"Captain Wester," she said, then swallowed nervously. "I didn't get to say how much I appreciate this."

"It's what I do," Marcus said.

"All the same, it's more than I could have asked, and... Thank you."

"You aren't safe yet," Marcus said, more sharply than he'd meant. "Save your gratitude until you are."

The girl flushed, her cheeks like rose petals on snow. She half bowed, turned, and walked away, footsteps crunching in the snow. Marcus watched her go, shook his head, and spat. Yardem, still at his side, cleared his throat.

"This girl's not my daughter," Marcus said.

"She's not, sir."

"She doesn't deserve my protection more than any other man or woman in this 'van."

"She doesn't, sir."

Marcus squinted up into the clouds.

"I'm in trouble here," he said.

"Yes, sir," Yardem said. "You are."