DragonKnight

  Kale’s eyes scanned the bushes, trees, and undergrowth. Her mind wouldn’t rest but kept pondering what strange power lay over this region.

  At times she had trouble hearing, and at others, she would hear one thing almost to the exclusion of the other natural noises. She heard a drummerbug until she thought she would go insane. When she mentioned it to Regidor, he said he didn’t hear it at all.

  Kale stirred the bubbling liquid and sniffed the fragrance of onions and meat. I find it odd that I’m not tired. Walking is my least favorite mode of transportation. And I’m not really hungry, either. Bromptotterpindosset doesn’t appear tired, and he said he wasn’t hungry.

  She peered into the pot and frowned. When did I put carrots in this soup? Regidor must have put them in. He likes carrots.

  Bromptotterpindosset, Bardon, and Regidor pored over maps and the diary, trying to retrace their steps. They passed the different items to one another. As far as Kale could tell, they hadn’t resolved anything during their hour-long discussion. She listened to them speculate and wondered if she and Regidor could build a gateway, choosing a place to go.

  Bardon pointed first to a spot on one of the maps and then to a mountain to the east. “If we came into this range of mountains from this direction, then that peak is this one on the map.”

  Bromptotterpindosset shook his head. “That would mean the scale is wrong. We haven’t traveled nearly long enough to get from there to here.”

  “There is the possibility that the map is wrong,” argued Bardon. “I don’t believe this area is recorded on any of these charts. None of the drawings match with the configuration of this range. Everything is just a bit off in either size or spacing.”

  “I agree.” The mapmaker folded the map in his hand. “Could we have passed through a gateway without knowing as we traveled through the burrows?”

  Bardon scrunched his face. “I’ve never been through a gateway that didn’t squeeze the breath out of me.”

  “There was the large gateway made by the wizards to transport dragons and warriors to the Battle of Bartal Springs Lake,” said Regidor. “That one was less constricting.”

  “Yes, but the sensation of sticking to air was the same. I don’t think we could walk through a gateway totally oblivious to making the passage.”

  Regidor grunted. “Neither do I.”

  Kale turned her mind away from the discussion. It seemed to her that they repeated the same argument in a cycle. Soon they would spread out the maps again and try to determine where they were. The minor dragons refused to come out, and she sensed their fear and confusion. Something was not right, but her little friends did not know what.

  In the thicket not far from her, a squirrel picked up a nut, scampered along a rotted log, and buried his treasure.

  Kale sat up, attending to the small details around her, and waited. Overhead, a bird took off from a limb. The branch shook and three leaves fell to the ground. Kale looked at the fallen leaves in the dirt. They lay in a rough triangular formation.

  With her lips pressed together, she watched for more signs of life in these woods. A bee flew to a bush covered with small white flowers, then after a long pause, a bluebird brought a twig to the tree at her left. Her eyes turned to the sky and followed a cloud as it sailed past a mountain peak.

  In the thicket not far from her, a squirrel picked up a nut, scampered along a rotted log, and buried his treasure.

  Kale nodded her head and waited patiently for the three leaves to fall from the tree after the bird took to the air. They landed, making a triangle on the dirt. In due time, the bee came, and then the bluebird with his twig. She looked up to the mountain and saw the same cloud drift out of sight over the same mountain peak.

  “We’re in an illusion,” she announced, loud and clear.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, dreading what she might see when she looked at her three male companions.

  They had the same discussion over and over, but they didn’t use the exact same words.

  She turned her head and opened her eyes.

  Bardon, Regidor, and the tumanhofer had stopped what they were doing and stared at her.

  She sighed and smiled. “I’m so glad. I thought you might be part of the illusion as well. In which case, I would be alone. But you’re not repeating.”

  Bromptotterpindosset glanced first at Bardon and then at Regidor. “Does anyone know what she’s talking about?”

  “I think,” said Bardon as he stood, “these maps are useless in our present circumstances.” He moved toward Kale.

  “What does he mean?” the tumanhofer asked Regidor.

  Regidor rose to his feet and looked down at Bromptotterpindosset. “If this place is under a spell, the maps will not guide us out.”

  The meech followed Bardon, and the mapmaker got up clumsily. “See here, I’ve been around the world, and there has never been a time when my maps failed me. Even if I couldn’t determine where we were by landmarks, the stars remain constant to the celestial charts. You, yourself, said the sun never lies.”

  “Yes,” said Regidor over his shoulder, “but is that the sun?”

  Bromptotterpindosset glanced at the sky and then sputtered, “Ridiculous! How could the sun not be the sun?”

  Regidor ignored him. “Tell us what you’ve seen, Kale.”

  She pointed to a limb above them. “That bird will take off, and three leaves will fall to the ground.” She pointed to the dirt. “They’ll come to rest there, making a triangle.”

  The bird took to the air, and the leaves landed in the dirt just as Kale predicted.

  “Next a bee flies among those white flowers, then a bluebird carries a twig to that tree.”

  The three men watched the insect and the bird.

  “Coincidence,” scoffed the tumanhofer.

  Bardon and Regidor cast him disapproving glares.

  “Next,” said Kale, “the cloud goes over the mountain peak.”

  Bromptotterpindosset shifted in irritation. “Anyone can see which way the cloud is going.”

  Kale ignored him. “Notice the three leaves are gone.”

  They looked to where dirt lay in the cleared patch.

  The cloud drifted out of sight.

  “A squirrel will pick up that nut and bury it over there.”

  “I’m convinced,” said Bardon as the squirrel flicked its tail and grabbed the nut.

  “What does it mean?” asked the tumanhofer.

  Regidor frowned at the shorter man. “It means we’re lost unless we can break the spell.”

  Kale put her hand on Bardon’s arm. “We broke a similar illusion in Risto’s dungeon with music. Dar played his flute.”

  Bardon reached inside his tunic and pulled out his small silver instrument. He played a few random notes. Nothing happened. He played a scale. Nothing. He played the first bars of a popular tune. Still nothing. He looked to Regidor. “Any ideas?”

  “We could try interrupting the cycle.”

  “It’s the bee’s turn to make an appearance,” said Kale.

  Regidor stood ready beside the flowers and scooped the insect out of the air with his bare hand. He threw it to the ground and stepped on it.

  “It didn’t sting you?” asked the tumanhofer.

  “My forefeet are covered with very thick skin. But that’s beside the point. It didn’t try.”

  A minute later, the bluebird flew by with a twig in its beak.

  “So,” said Bardon, “the destruction of a bee did not disturb the order of the illusion.”

  “What do we do now?” Bromptotterpindosset asked, while looking around nervously.

  “I doubt that anything is going to attack us,” said Regidor.

  The tumanhofer’s eyes snapped back to glare at the meech dragon. “I didn’t expect that something would. It’s just”—he shuddered—“this place is unsettling. Nothing’s real, isn’t that so?”

  “Mostly,” said Regidor, patiently. “I believe the ground under our fe
et is real. It perhaps doesn’t look like this ground we see, but we are standing on something.”

  “You’re a clever fellow,” said Bromptotterpindosset. “You’ll figure some way out.”

  Regidor inclined his head but said nothing.

  Kale wiped her hands on her britches. “Could we build a gateway, Reg? You and I have studied them and repaired them, and I helped make one. Bardon did too. Shall we try?”

  “It will be difficult, if not impossible. One needs to know one’s exact location in order to begin.”

  After two tries, they gave up.

  “Don’t quit!” exclaimed the tumanhofer. “Get us out of here.”

  “I don’t see why you’re so upset,” said Bardon. “Surely you’ve been in more dangerous situations than this.”

  “I like to know where I am, that’s all.” The mapmaker’s eyes darted right and left. His eyes latched on the bee as it returned to the flowers. “Let’s burn a section. Maybe that will do the interrupting thing you tried to do by killing the bee.”

  Bardon and Kale both looked to Regidor, waiting for the more proficient wizard to pass judgment on the idea.

  “I don’t think we can get an illusion to catch fire. But I don’t mind giving it a try.”

  “You got the fire to start to cook the soup.” Bromptotterpindosset whined, sounding as if he accused the meech of some kind of trickery.

  “I used material from my hollows,” said Regidor with a sigh. “You didn’t see me gather any wood, did you?”

  “Well, no,” he admitted. He glared at each of the others in turn and then grabbed a stick from the fire, holding the end that stuck out from the coals.

  He poked the stick under a bush, but the branches sizzled to black and then reformed. He tried burning old leaves on the ground, but they did the same thing. In disgust, he threw the lighted branch down in the dirt. It burned for a minute and slowly went out.

  Bromptotterpindosset sat down hard on the log. “We aren’t going to get out. We’ll die here. There’s no real food to eat after Regidor runs out of his supply. No water to drink, either. We’re trapped.”

  Regidor sat down beside him. “We’re a long way from being dead, my friend. Wulder has not abandoned us.”

  “Wulder? Wulder! You think a fable can help you?”

  “Well, He has in the past.”

  “I don’t believe in your Wulder. He does not exist.”

  Regidor chortled. “I would be very worried if Wulder said that about you.” He spoke in an authoritative voice. “‘I don’t believe in Bromptotterpindosset. He does not exist.’” The meech dragon clapped the tumanhofer on the back. “If He said that, my dear friend, then you would not exist. However, your saying such a thing about Him does nothing but make noise in the air. And that noise is soon gone.”

  “So, is your Wulder going to break this illusion and show us the way out?” The mapmaker rubbed both hands over his face, ending with his palms covering his eyes. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “If we must depend upon a myth, then we shall truly perish.”

  “This ‘myth’ can turn a stream or a river from one path to another. And He also turns the minds of men to one destiny or another. I would not be surprised if the way of our salvation has not already been established.”

  Bromptotterpindosset groaned. “What does that mean?”

  “It means,” said Kale, “that someone is already on the way to rescue us. Or, the collapse of this fancy illusion has already been devised.”

  “You really believe that?

  “Yes.”

  “If we get out of here in the next hour, or even today, I’ll think about your Wulder being more than a figure in a fable.”

  Regidor stood. “You would still hesitate, even if He clears a way out of this illusion in less than an hour?”

  The tumanhofer stood, puffed out his chest, and glared at the meech dragon. “No! By the word of Bromptotterpindosset. If we escape this madness, I’ll believe in your Wulder. Or at least, try.”

  “Even to the point of reading the Tomes and learning more about Him?”

  “I’ll spend the rest of my days chasing down every fact I can discover about this marvelous myth.”

  Regidor shook his head, but a big grin broke the solemn expression he’d worn just previously.

  “No myth. He’s Wulder. And you are going to find out the risk involved in challenging the all-powerful Creator.”

  A rough shout resounded across the forested region. “There. There they are. Onward, we shall capture them.”

  Bromptotterpindosset jumped and grabbed Regidor’s arm. “Grawligs.”

  The wizard meech laughed. “Yes, it would be just like Him to use the lowly mountain ogres to do His will, but have you ever known a grawlig to speak in a complete sentence?”

  “Here now,” the voice from the woods spoke again, “who’s put all this muck in my way? Be gone, you falsified flowers. Off with you, you bloodless creatures. Of what use is a sun with no warmth and no place in the galaxy? Good work, though. Must admire the good workmanship of this fantasy. But enough. Be gone.”

  The colors of the trees dripped into the dissolving bushes. The birds, insects, and creatures faded into nothing. Kale, Bardon, Regidor, and a stunned tumanhofer stood at one end of a large cavern aglow with lightrocks. At the other end stood two old wizards, one leafy and one wet. Beside them, two women, a child, and a librarian waited.

  Kale let out a shriek and ran to greet them.

  49

  MORE JOINING OF FORCES

  “Mother.” Kale threw her arms around a tall, elegant o’rant woman.

  Lyll Allerion returned the hug, then shook a finger at her daughter. “Young lady, you scared me. I went to Fenworth’s castle for a visit and found you were gone. Fenworth had no idea where you were.”

  “I sent a bird to tell him.”

  “Yes, but Fen was meditating.”

  “Harrumph!” The old man interrupted, putting an arm around his apprentice’s shoulders. A lizard darted out his sleeve, scampered down Kale’s tunic, and sprang to the floor of the cave. Kale didn’t even jump. Three years in constant company with the bog wizard and his creatures had inured her to their sudden appearances.

  Fenworth squeezed her shoulders. “I was resting, and the bird, very politely, waited in my branches until I awoke. Of course, when your mother started tugging on my beard, I roused from a very pleasant slumber.” He cast Lyll a disapproving look.

  She smiled in return.

  Toopka jerked her hand out of Taylaminkadot’s and ran to leap into Bardon’s arms. The tiny doneel child, dressed in bright and mismatched colors, squealed. She hugged the squire fiercely around the neck.

  “Are you a knight yet? Can I call you Sir Bardon? Did you miss me? Where’s Greer? Why did you take Kale away?”

  Bardon laughed. “No. No. Yes. I don’t know, and she wanted to come.”

  Toopka stuck out her lower lip, and her whiskers quivered. “I wanted to come, too, and they almost left me until they figured out everyone was coming but me, and they couldn’t leave me home by myself. Only they really could have because I can take care of myself.” She took a big breath. “But I wanted to come. Wizard Fenworth swirled us to the courtyard of a funny castle that looks like a mountain. Wizard Cam scolded a bunch of grawligs. He shook his finger at them, and lake water sprayed out of his sleeve.” Toopka stopped to giggle. “Grawligs do not like to be wet. And Wiz Cam told them to clean up everything. They’d made a horrible mess. And he dried up a circle of quicksand and let the stuck ones get out, but they had to agree to help clean. And Wizard Lyll fixed their hurts. Isn’t she pretty? She is so pretty, except when she’s tired and then she looks like a very comfy grandma. Then Librettowit said we had to quit fooling around with the dirty grawligs and find Kale.” Again she took a deep breath. “I said Kale would be all right, because she was with you.” She looked over Bardon’s shoulder and waved at Regidor, who waved back. “And if Regidor is with y
ou, almost nothing bad can happen that he can’t fix, because he’s probably the greatest wizard and the greatest warrior that ever lived.”

  Librettowit walked over to Bromptotterpindosset and stuck out his hand. The disgruntled mapmaker took it reluctantly, shook briefly, and dropped the friendly gesture as quickly as possible.

  The newly arrived tumanhofer seemed not to take offense. Kale knew the librarian Librettowit could be hot-tempered, and she watched with interest. She squeezed her mother’s hand, drawing attention to the little drama taking place. But Librettowit’s face remained neutral, expressing neither irritation at Bromptotterpindosset’s rudeness nor projecting false cheer.

  “I’m Trevithick Librettowit.”

  “Gordonnatropp Bromptotterpindosset. Pleased to meet you.”

  “I’ve heard of you,” said Fenworth’s librarian. “I have some of your maps in our library.”

  The mapmaker’s expression brightened. “This was supposed to be a fact-collecting expedition. I hoped to make new maps and improve some of the old. At least on my part, it was that and nothing more. These others are on a quest to save sleeping knights.”

  “So I heard.”

  “And we were trapped in this cavern.” Bromptotterpindosset slowly shook his head. “So many things I don’t understand. For instance, we walked some distance.” He glanced from one end of the cave to the other. “We should have covered miles, and yet, we are still in this one space.”

  “When trapped in an illusion,” Librettowit explained, “you think you are traveling in a straight line, but you are actually going in circles.”

  The mapmaker nodded toward the two old wizards. “Can they get us out of this mountain? Can they return us to civilization?”

  “Oh yes. But first I think their plans include rescuing the knights. They were quite put out when Risto commandeered Strot’s castle for his own evil purposes. We all were under the impression the castle-fortress had been destroyed eons ago.”

  Librettowit scratched his nose before continuing. “I suspect a blinding spell was cast over many written records of the castle and its history. I’ll be doing some research when I return.” Librettowit’s eyes gleamed with anticipation. “And there will be the library in Strot’s castle to examine.”