She had not been aware of Sintara on the edge of her thoughts until the dragon responded sleepily, Now you are thinking like a queen. There may be hope for you yet.
Day the 21st of the Prayer Moon
Year the 6th of the Independent alliance of Traders
From Detozi, Keeper of the Birds, Trehaug
to Erek, Keeper of the Birds, Bingtown
Enclosed, from the Rain Wild Traders’ Council at Cassarick and from the Rain Wild Traders’ Council at Trehaug, a list of those confirmed dead from the calamitous quake, flood and collapses in the excavation cities, said scroll to be posted in the Traders’ Concourse at Bingtown and to become part of the Traders’ Records there.
Erek,
This is a substantial list. When you receive it, please take time to sit down with my nephew Reyall, and tell him gently that there have been losses in our family. Two of his cousins were working in the excavation at the time of the flood. No trace of either has been found. These lads were his playmates as he was growing up. This news may be hard for him, and the family wishes that you may give him time to make a visit home and mourn with us. I know it is hard to spare your apprentice, but if you can comply with this request, you will have my everlasting gratitude.
Detozi
CHAPTER EIGHT
Horns
The dragons woke her. Alise had heard nothing before their trumpeting calls jerked her from her slumbers. All around her in the crowded shelter, keepers were rolling to their knees. The raft shifted, and a wave of vertigo washed over her. She clenched her teeth. She missed her nights on the Tarman, when the barge was beached and the world was still beneath her. And she missed Leftrin, more than she dared think about.
The dragons trumpeted again, not in unison, but in a ragged response to a sound she hadn’t heard. She heard Sintara’s clear clarion call, and Mercor’s bull bellow. Fente’s note was a drawn-out shriek, while Nortel’s lavender dragon made a sound like a bow thrumming. ‘What is it?’ she asked, but only heard her question echoed in half a dozen voices. A jam of bodies trying to exit the shelter plunged her back into dimness and tipped the crude raft. She waited where she was, looking up at the blue sky through the crude roof woven of leafy branches and wondering if some new disaster was about to befall them all.
By the time she could join the others outside, all the dragons were roused. Amongst their excited trumpeting, in a small gap of quiet, she heard both the winding of a long horn call and the cry of another dragon. ‘Veras! It’s Veras!’ Jerd shrieked. She went scuttling over the packed logs, heading for the unstable edge of the floating debris pack, and Greft went scrambling after her. He caught her by the shoulders and held her back from falling in as Veras approached. In her wake, periodically blowing three short blasts on a horn, was one of the hunters from the Tarman. Her heart leapt and then sank at the sight of him. It was Carson, Leftrin’s friend. But he was not Leftrin, and the barge was nowhere in sight.
A hail of questions peppered them both as they drew nearer. Carson didn’t even attempt to reply. He abandoned blowing his horn and applied his efforts to his paddle to swiftly approach the shore. By the time he could toss a line to one of the awaiting keepers, Veras had already thrust her way into the packed debris and was allowing a weeping Jerd to stroke her face. Alise crowded forward with the keepers to hear what tidings he might bring.
‘Are you all here and safe?’ was his first question, and when Greft shook his head, the hunter’s face fell into lines of disappointment.
‘The Tarman and Captain Leftrin are just around the last bend. They should be showing any minute now. As soon as he’s here, he’ll take you on board and get a hot meal into you. Not much we can do for the dragons just yet, but the river’s been dropping fast since dawn. I hope that by this evening, there will be some shallows where they can at least stand and take some rest.’
Lecter had caught the rope and secured the small boat to their raft as Carson spoke. Now the hunter clambered nimbly from the boat to the raft and looked around at the gathered people, grinning. As he scanned the waiting faces, hope slowly died. ‘Who’s missing?’ he asked.
‘Who’s on board the Tarman?’ Greft countered.
Carson looked annoyed with him but answered, ‘Captain Leftrin and the full crew came through just fine. Big Eider banged up his ribs some, but nothing’s broken so far as we can tell. My boy Davvie’s on board, too. We lost our other hunter, unless Jess is here with you. And what about Sedric? Is he here?’
‘Sedric!’ Alise gasped his name. Sedric was missing? She’d always thought he was safe on board the Tarman. He’d been there, in his cabin when she left. How could he be missing, unless the barge had taken a terrible beating in the wave? Had his shelter been torn free, had he been drowned in his bed? The devastating news that Sedric was definitely missing collided with her joy that Leftrin was fine and would soon appear to rescue her. It was as if neither emotion would allow her to fully experience the other, and so she was trapped between them, feeling disloyal and numb. She worked her way around the clustered keepers and through them until she stepped out in front of Carson. At the sight of her, a sudden smile lit his face.
‘Alise! You are here! Well, that will take away the captain’s greatest fear.’ A light of cautious hope spread over his face. ‘And Sedric? Is he with you?’
She shook her head as Carson sidestepped Greft and came straight to her. She found her voice and tongue, though she could scarcely draw breath to push out the words. ‘I thought he was on the Tarman.’ A devastating guilt dizzied her. She’d made him come with her. And now he was missing. Dead. Sedric was no swimmer, no tree climber. He was dead. Unthinkable. Impossible. Don’t think on it, don’t allow it to be real. She cleared her throat and her tongue babbled on without her. ‘Now that Veras has returned, we are missing only the copper dragon, the silver one, and Heeby. Of keepers, we’ve seen nothing of Rapskal, Alum or Warken. Are any of them with you?’
A silence fell, and when Carson slowly shook his head, low groans and sighs met his denial of their hopes. ‘They’re gone, then,’ Alise said aloud, and hated the finality of her words. It was like pronouncing them dead.
‘I intend to keep looking.’ Carson’s words jolted her back to awareness of the world around her. The keepers were milling around and talking, absorbing this latest piece of news. Veras had rejoined the other dragons; Jerd, Sylve and Harrikin were working together to show her how to use the logs to float so she could rest.
‘I found her wedged between some trees,’ Carson told her. His gaze had followed hers. ‘She’d climbed up there when she was too weary to swim any more. That probably saved her life. But as the water went down, she found herself wedged. She’d probably have gotten herself out after she starved a bit more, but I’m glad it didn’t come to that.’
Alise met his eyes. ‘You’re trying to tell me that the others may be in similar situations somewhere. Stuck, but alive.’
‘That’s what I’m going to keep believing. Excuse me.’ He turned away from her, lifted the horn to his lips, and blew three short but deafening blasts. This time, in the distance, she heard an answering horn. He turned back to her with a smile and raised his voice so that all on the raft could hear him. ‘And that will be the Tarman. We’ll ferry all of you out to the barge as soon as we can. The floats for the dragons are a good idea. We may be able to make them a bit more sturdy with line from the Tarman. If the river continues to fall, they probably won’t need them much longer.