But Swift was not. He stood before her, an ant protecting a castle. The Fool's brightly painted arrow flew from his bow, to splinter uselessly against the stone dragon. Undaunted, he drew another from his quiver, nocked it and drew it back. From some reserve of courage that seemed too large for such a small boy to contain, he took two steps forward, toward the dragon. He let fly again, with as futile a result. Still, he stood his ground as he pulled out yet another arrow. To reach Tintaglia, Rawbread would have to trample him. I saw Swift call a warning back to his father over his shoulder. An arrow was set to Swift's bow. And all I could do was watch helplessly as the stone dragon's relentless gaze fixed on the boy. Abruptly, Rawbread broke into a clumsy gallop. Swift looked up at his death and his mouth stretched wide in a scream that was both terror and defiance. His bow shook in his hands, the head of the grey arrow wobbling wildly, but he stood his ground.
Burrich lifted his head. He turned. Even now, I recall every instant of that moment. I saw him draw breath and heard through the ringing of my ears the deep roar of his outrage that anything would threaten his son.
I had never seen him move so swiftly. He threw himself toward Swift and the dragon, his boots throwing up clumps of snow as he ran. Tintaglia lifted her head slightly, feeble witness to his charge. Then Burrich was between his boy and the dragon, drawing his belt-knife as he ran. It was the most ridiculous and the most courageous attack I've ever witnessed. As he sprang to meet the suddenly-bewildered dragon's charge, he drew back his knife. I saw the blade splinter as he drove it against the stony flesh. At the same moment, I felt the blast of Wit repel that he levelled at the creature. It was like one of Chade's explosions. It was the fierceness of a stallion defending his herd, the savagery of a wolf or bear that protects its cubs, compounded more from love of what he protected than hatred of what he battled. It was targeted at the dragon, and the prodigious force of that blast dropped the stone beast to his knees.
But as Rawbread fell, a wild flap of his heavy wing swatted Burrich, flinging the man to one side as if he were nothing. His body spun as he flew. 'No!' I cried, but it was done. He hit the
frozen snow badly, bending like a flung rag-doll, and then skidding away across the ice, spinning as he went. Rawbread lumbered back onto his clawed black feet. He shook his heavy head and I saw him gasp for breath. Then he advanced, open-mouthed, on both Swift and Tintaglia.
Swift had turned his head to watch the shattering of his father's body. Now he turned back to the dragon, and the roar that stretched his mouth wide was hatred, pure and simple. With that strength, he drew his bowstring back and back, until I thought the bow itself would splinter-1 saw him become his arrow as he locked eyes with the dragon lumbering toward him.
He let his shaft fly.
True as a father's love, the shining grey missile flew. It struck the dragon's eye and sank in, nearly vanishing. I saw Rawbread begin to lift a forefoot to paw at it. Then he halted abruptly, as if listening to someone. I was aware of the Skill the Pale Woman directed at him, as she hysterically commanded him to finish it, kill the bowman, kill the she-dragon, and then he could do whatever he wished, whatever he wished at all. I thought Rawbread paused to listen to her. But he did not move again. The drab colour of life fled his skin, as a dull patina of stone settled over him. He remained as he was, wings half lifted, forepaw about to claw the arrow from his eye, jaws agape. A silence of disbelief settled over the whole battle. The stone dragon was dead.
An instant later, the girl in my arms came back to life. My Wit-sense of her blossomed into full bloom. She had stopped struggling at the moment of the dragon's death. Now she suddenly curled into my arms. 'I'm so cold. I'm so hungry,' she wailed, and then, as I looked down in astonishment at her, she burst into childish tears.
'A moment, a moment,' I told her, and hated that I had to set her little bare feet down on the snow. I tore Chade's cloak from my body and settled it around her. It came all the way down to her toes, and as I picked her up again, she pulled her feet up into it gratefully, huddling into a shivering ball in my arms. 'Give her to me, give her to me!' Peottre demanded. Tears were streaming down his face, cutting through the blood.
'Oh, little fish, oh my Kossi! Elliania, look, look, our Kossi has come back to us. She is herself!' The old warrior turned to his niece, and then as if joy had drained his strength from him, he fell to his knees, holding the child to his chest and murmuring over her.
Elliania looked over at us, her heart in her eyes, and then looked down at the woman who sprawled in the snow at her feet. She dropped to her knees by her mother and her tears came as she said, 'We saved one of them. At least we saved one of them. Mother, I did my best. We tried so hard.'
Dutiful looked over at her from where he knelt on the other side of the woman. Gentle as a nurse, he pushed the filthy hair back from her emaciated face. 'No. You saved both of them. She's unconscious, Elliania, but she's back, too. I can feel her with my Wit-sense. Your mother has come back to you, too.'
'But. . . how can you know this?' She stared down at the woman's face, not daring yet to hope.
Dutiful smiled at her. '1 promise you, I know this is so. It's an old Farseer magic, a gift of my father's lineage.' He stooped again to take up the lax woman. 'Let's get her to warmth and shelter. And food. The battle seems to be over, for now.'
The)1 all just stopped fighting when the dragon died, Chade confirmed for me as I stood and peered out over the battlefield below us. It was as if they ail just suddenly lost heart.
No. They regained it. It's hard to explain, Chade, but 1 feel it with the Wit. Her servants were partially Forged, but with the dragon's death, all that was taken and put into him came back to them. The same thing happened to the Narcheska's mother and sister. They're no longer Forged. Have the Outislanders speak to those we fought. Offer them food and welcome. And comfort them. They may be very confused.
I allowed my eyes to wander over the battlefield below me, and saw the truth of my own thought. The Pale Woman's soldiers, to a man, had dropped their weapons. One man stood, his hands clapped over his ears, weeping. Another had seized one of his fellows by the shoulder and was laughing wildly as he spoke to him. A small group of men stood clustered around the stone dragon. Lifeless, it had settled unevenly into the glacier, an ugly statue set awry.
But strangest of all was that Tintaglia had come to her feet. She walked stiff-legged as a stalking cat toward the stone dragon. Cautiously, she extended her head on her gracile neck- She sniffed the monster, nosed it cautiously, and then without warning, struck it a ringing blow with her clawed forepaw. The stone dragon rocked stiffly in the snow but did not fall over. Nonetheless, Tintaglia lifted her head high on her long neck and trumpeted her triumph over her foe. Blood might still ooze from the bites and scratches he had dealt her, but she claimed victory as hers. And around her, men raised their voices to join their cries of triumph to hers. If ever there had been a stranger sight than this dragon celebrating amidst human cheering, than no minstrel has ever told it.
From high above, a trumpeting call echoed hers. Battered and tattered, Icefyre circled in a wide spiral above us. He banked his wings and slid down the sky, swooping over us in a lower circuit. On the ground, Tintaglia threw back her head and bugled again. Around her throat, panels of her scales suddenly stood up like a mane and a crest on her head, scarcely noticeable before, stood erect and silver like a crown. A wash of colour went over her, from deepest blue to brightest silver. The men who had gathered around her drew back. When she leapt from the ground to the air it was effortless in the manner of a cat floating from the floor up to a tabletop. Her wings opened as she sprang, and with three beats of them she was climbing.