Dragon Blood

While I tried to chart a course with a possibility of survival, I was dimly aware of the door opening quietly and a murmured argument. The door shut and I was left once more in silence with my fears, but not left alone.

Every plan I came up with led to disaster sooner or later. I was in the middle of trying to see how we could lure the Seaforders to Alizon's cause (something I wouldn't have dreamed of without the Warder of the Sea's little speech), when I experienced another of the debilitating bouts of miserable shaking. This time I itched as well.

A cool damp cloth wiped my face and then the rest of my body as armies of imaginary bugs trooped over my skin, driven away by the clean water and Tisala's soft crooning.

She waited until the fit left me before she spoke. "Ward? Are you all right?"

"What are you doing here?" I asked. She was supposed to be safe at Hurog. Jakoven had taken her once already.

She lit a small candle from the banked fire and set it in a holder on a table near my bed. The flickering candle lit her dark hair with red tones. The darkness of the window coverings told me I'd lain with my eyes closed longer than I'd thought—or I'd fallen asleep.

"As if I would sit in safety when I could help," she said crisply. "I came to help get you out of the Asylum—though you got yourself out in the end."

The Asylum. The drugs had left me with a pitiful handful of clear memories amidst the nightmare images. I closed my eyes in embarrassment. "You came while I was there. I thought I had made it up." I thought of what a fool I must have looked like, hiding under the straw, and laughed.

"What?" she asked.

"I was just wishing I had some straw to cover my head," I said with more bitterness than humor.

Her hand, as callused as mine, touched my temple and trailed down my sweat-streaked cheek. "Oreg says that you should feel better in a few days."

"He told me," I said.

"After I found where they had you, Oreg tried to get you out." She took her hand away suddenly, as if she had just noticed she was touching me.

Though the king's men had scrubbed and soaped, and I'd done it again here, maybe the smell of the Asylum still clung to me. "I know he did." I remembered the call of Hurog magic as I tried to drown myself—had it been this morning or last night? "The Tamerlain couldn't get me out, either. The part of the Asylum I was in was designed to hold mages."

"The Tamerlain?" she said.

She would know what the Tamerlain was, of course, but I doubted she really believed in it. I shouldn't have said anything about the creature—not coming out of an asylum for crazy people. I glanced around the room, but the Tamerlain, having done what she could, was gone.

"You really saw the Tamerlain?" she asked, but more in wonder than if she truly doubted me.

"She made it possible to carry out that little farce in Jakoven's court," I said.

"Who are you that Aethervon takes an interest in your deeds?" she asked.

I wasn't ready for undeserved admiration. I felt fouled and small, so I snorted and told the truth. "A pawn. Don't get your hopes up, Aethervon has done all he intends to."

Tisala crouched beside my bed and looked hard into my eyes. "Tell me again what you feel about Alizon's rebellion."

I sat up and rubbed my face wearily. "If this is a serious conversation, would you mind lighting a few more candles so I can see you when I'm talking?" The shadows in the room reminded me of the cell in the Asylum.

When she was through I made her drag a chair over near the bed. Between the candle lighting and the rearranging of furniture, I bought myself enough time to decide I didn't have to be entirely honest with her, but I was going to do it anyway.

"The time is still wrong for a rebellion," I said. "The harvest was good this year, not only in Shavig, but Tallven and Oranstone as well. My father used to say that full bellies make for happy subjects, and he was right. Jakoven's tithe is fair. He hasn't overtly oppressed anyone who would incite the nobles. It's unlikely Alizon can draw any of the Avinhellish lords away from Jakoven, and the Tallvenish and Avinhellish lords can raise larger, better-trained armies than Shavig, Seaford, and Oranstone combined, even if Alizon could gather them all together—which he can't. In return for battling a superior fighting force, Alizon offers to replace one Tallvenish king with another, himself. And Alizon is base-born. I suspect that your father is not the only Oranstonian who's refused to follow Alizon."

Her face was carefully blank while I talked. Toward the end of my speech she turned her face away.

I shrugged. "I'll tell you what has changed, though. Jakoven has made it impossible for me to do anything except join the rebellion."

Her eyes snapped back to me and ran over my bare chest and shoulders looking for wounds that weren't there. For all the pain I'd endured, the only blood I'd lost in the Asylum had gone to the lice—and the Bane.

"What did he do to you?"

I smiled at her, but she didn't look reassured, so I stopped. "He found Farsonsbane."

She started to look puzzled before the name registered. "I thought Farson destroyed it—or the boy emperor."

I shook my head. "Jakoven found it while he was rebuilding Estian castle. It needs dragon's blood to activate it."

"Oreg," she whispered.

I felt my eyebrows rise. How did she find out about Oreg? No wonder she'd accepted that I'd met the Tamerlain. From dragons to the minions of gods was a small step.

I could have left off there. She'd have believed that I'd throw myself behind Alizon for Oreg's sake.

"My blood did something to it," I said. "I need to keep every person who can claim Hurog blood away from him. If Alizon is ready, I'll declare for him. If not, Hurog will rebel on its own. It's that, or allow Jakoven access to the same power that brought down the Empire."

She stared at me a moment, then said baldly, "The reason I knew how to get into the Asylum is because Alizon is not the heart of the rebellion—Kellen is."

"Kellen?" I said, startled. The king's brother—I remembered a quiet-spoken, clever boy a few years older than I. My heart began to race with a shard of hope. Kellen was legitimate: moreover, he had been terribly wronged by Jakoven and had a just cause for rebellion. With Kellen, the rebellion Alizon was leading was much more likely to succeed.

"He's been in there a long time, Ward," Tisala said. "Since it was first built. We left him there because it was the safest place for him—Alizon knew we'd have to wait for success, too. But it's been too long. He's not insane, but … " Her voice trailed off.

"Not exactly healthy, either," I finished, inwardly shuddering at the thought of spending years in the Asylum. "How long has it been?" Kellen had disappeared sometime after my father beat me stupid; I couldn't remember exactly when. But I knew it had been a long time.

"Over ten years," she said.

What I thought must have shown on my face, because she continued, "It's not as bad as what they did to you: Mostly they leave him alone. We've been looking for a safe way to get him out. Oreg said he'd try it, with your approval."

There was a plea in her voice, and I realized she was worried that I would refuse. "If Oreg can get him out, we'll do it. We can take him to Hurog if no one has a better plan. I think the dwarves will agree to transporting him to a safer place."

I swung my legs to the floor, but was taken with a fit and couldn't do anything more for a while. When I steadied enough to pay attention again, Tisala had pressed me back on the bed and was crooning to me.

"I'm fine," I said. "Would you get Oreg and bring him here?"

She looked at me, but I couldn't tell what she was thinking. After a moment she left

I must have slept, because it seemed like I only blinked my eyes and Oreg was waiting. Tisala wasn't with him.