Rrrnlf was still standing by the curtain wall, holding the serpent by the neck with one hand, with the other on the wall, ready to vault over.
"Shall I dip the serpent in your castle's swamp, after all?" he asked.
"No, no…" muttered Jim. He raised his voice. "No, just tie him up someplace. We may have a use for him later on. I've got to make some plans. We've all got to make some plans…"
Carolinus had appeared beside him, evidently by magic from the solar. But that was not what occupied Jim's attention at the moment. For some strange reason the courtyard and the castle and even the ground underneath him was both rocking under him and beginning to rotate slowly in a very strange sort of way. He found it hard to keep his balance. He staggered.
Angie caught hold of his left upper arm, and someone else caught hold of his right arm, holding him upright.
"You're out on your feet!" said Angie. "Forget about making plans or anything else. Right now bed is what you need. Bed and sleep."
"But the solar… Dafydd…" It was even difficult for him to talk.
"Dafydd and Brian are both out of the solar now," said Angie. "Brian is up on his feet and going to be down here in a moment or two. We can't stop him. Dafydd was sensible enough to let us talk him into lying down on a bed in one of the smaller rooms. I think Brian's going to fold up just the way you're doing, shortly. Then we'll get him to bed too. But for right now, you come along with us and we'll help you to our bed in the solar."
"But…" began Jim.
He never finished. A wave of darkness seemed to close in on him and the ground threatened to come up at him. Then the darkness enclosed him and that was all he remembered.
Some later time, it was impossible to say how long it had been since he had blacked out in the courtyard, Jim woke up to discover himself lying happily naked, cocooned by the bedding and furs of their bed in the solar, with the rays of an early morning sun striking through the glass in the window slits and into his eyes. He was supremely comfortable. He yawned, ducked his head away from the light and snuggled down into the bed, ready to go back to sleep again.
Perhaps he did, because when he opened his eyes again Angie was standing over him.
"How do you feel?" asked Angie anxiously.
"Comfortable. Sleepy," he said. "This is really a very good bed, you know?" He stretched out an arm to her. "Why don't you join me in it?"
Angie, however, resisted when he tried to pull her down into the bed.
"What about the serpents?" she said.
"Serpents?" he echoed. "What serpents? Serpents!"
He sat up suddenly in the bed and began throwing off the covers.
"Where are my clothes?" he said. "Where's my armor? What day is this?"
"You can have your clothes and armor when I'm sure that you're all right," said Angie, without moving. "You don't need your armor right away, anyhow. Everybody else is gathered down in the Great Hall, trying to put some plans together. If you're up to it, they need you down there with them."
"I'm fine. I tell you, I'm fine!" shouted Jim, bounding out of bed and feeling the sudden chilliness of standing naked in the room. "I'll go down right away. Where did you hide my clothes?"
Angie folded her arms and stared at him.
"On the other side of the bed," she said.
Jim went hastily around it and found a neat pile of clothing: fresh underwear, shirt, hose and cote-hardie—or jacket—such as he would normally wear, all neatly folded and piled there for him. He began scrambling into them.
"You said everybody was downstairs," he said to Angie, even while he was occupied with this. "Who did you mean by everybody?"
"Carolinus, Sir John, Brian, Giles, Dafydd, Aargh, Secoh… and to answer your earlier question, you've slept for about thirty-four hours."
"Slept?" raved Jim, putting on his hose under his shirt, and shrugging himself into his cote-hardie. "Do you realize I was supposed to see the leaders of all the dragons that same night that I fell asleep—or whatever I did?"
"You collapsed, that's what you did," said Angie, standing still. "As for your meeting with the leaders of the dragons, Secoh took them a message that you'd had no sleep for several days, and simply couldn't come right now; but you'd see them as soon as you were able to."
"You let Secoh go with a message like that?" raved Jim. "They'd tear him to bits—"
He checked himself suddenly not only in what he was saying but in dressing. He stared at her.
"But you said he was downstairs?"
"Yes," said Angie. "Carolinus took me and we showed up at the Cliffside dragons' cave at the same time as Secoh got there. They were inclined to be a little upset with Secoh but Carolinus made it clear to them they were just going to have to wait. They listened to Carolinus."
"What did he do?" asked Jim, finishing his dressing. "Turn them all into beetles for a minute or two, before he started explaining things to them?"
"Not exactly that," said Angie. "He merely convinced them. At any rate, they're expecting you as soon as you wake up. But what you're going to have to do is make some plans of your own, first. The dragons don't have any—except to sail into the sea serpents and get themselves torn to pieces, even if they do manage to kill off a good share of the sea serpents first."
"True," said Jim. "I'm going to have to come up with some kind of workable plan. That's no way to deal with an enemy like this. Come to think of it—it must be all the sleep I had—I've just got a notion of something from what you said, right now."
In fact, it was true. Sleep had acted on him like a tonic; and his mind was racing. What he had just had was only an idea. It might turn out to be nothing. On the other hand, it might be worth elaborating.
"These other dragon leaders are over at Cliffside cave right now, aren't they?" he asked Angie, as they started down the stairs of the tower together.
"As a matter of fact, no," said Angie. "Brace yourself. They're going to have to get back to their own communities in time to carry out whatever decision you've all come to. So they decided—well, Secoh helped talk them into it—that they'd come here and wait for you to wake up. That way, as soon as something's planned, they can take off for home right away, each one of them."
"Couldn't be better!" said Jim, all but rubbing his hands together in satisfaction at the way the idea was growing and maturing in his mind. He was half tempted to mention it, just as it was now, to Angie; if only to try it out. Then he thought better of it. Better to get the whole thing in shape, first.
They reached the bottom of the stairs and went out into the Great Hall, emerging just behind the high table.
They stepped up to the high table and took seats at the far end, where the stool there and the one right next to it had been left empty—undoubtedly deliberately, in expectation of their arrival.
Jim took the seat at the end of the table where he could see everybody, including the dragons that were now at the lower table with Secoh. Angie sat down behind the table next to him. Next to her was Chandos followed in order by Carolinus, Brian, Giles and Dafydd. All the humans sat behind the table overlooking the dragons below.
The dragons, on their part, not being restricted to benches at the lower table, had simply squatted down facing the men above them. Whether it had been part of Secoh's enticement or not, the long table next to them was loaded with pitchers, both empty and full of wine; and the five dragon visitors seemed to be thoroughly a part of the lively conversation going on.
And it was, indeed, a lively conversation. Not merely Chandos and Carolinus, whom Jim would have expected to have entered into a conversation with anyone, including dragons, but Dafydd and Brian and Giles were all involved in the debate, as were the dragons. A certain amount of order was evidently being observed, however, in that once one had really begun speaking, the rest fell silent and listened to him.
But still, so lively was the verbal exchange that for a moment or two it continued, ignoring the arrival of Jim and Angie. Then, one by one, Chandos
and the other knights fell silent, and the dragons did also.
There were five of the dragon representatives, and the least of them dwarfed Secoh, who was squatted closest to the wine on the table, on its left-hand side and more or less in front of the others. Jim wondered for a moment if he should have turned into a dragon before he came.
But it would have been awkward, as a dragon, squatting at the high table with the other knights; and on second thought, since the dragons all knew he was a george part of the time, if not most of the time, the other dragons would simply accept the fact that he was being a george at the moment.
He opened his mouth to speak, but Secoh was before him.
"M'Lord James!" cried Secoh. "It's wonderful to see you up and around again. May I introduce the representative dragons from other parts of our island?"
"By all means," said Jim. "I'm surprised, though, to see only five of them. I thought there were more communities than that between here and the end of Scotland."
"There are," said Secoh; and the other, larger dragons all nodded their heads to show their agreement. "We could have had several hundred dragons here as representatives; but it was thought wisest to send as few as possible. So each of these here speaks for a large section of the island. Nearest to you, Jim, is Egnoth, of the Lower West Dragons. I will give all places the names you georges give them; so you'll be clear about where each of these representatives comes from."
"Thank you," said Jim. The knights looked surprised. So did Secoh.
"What did I do, m'Lord?" he asked, flustered.
"You were being helpful," said Jim. "Go on talking."
"Well—Egnoth, at my furthest right, speaks for the Lower West Dragons from the Mersey River to the mouth of the Severn to its South; and inland some sixty or eighty miles. Next to him is Mamagh of the East Dragons. He speaks for all dragons from the Humber River in the north down the coast to the bight of land beyond the East Anglican Heights, and again in toward the island's center perhaps fifty to seventy of your miles."
Jim's mind scrambled with his mental picture of England, Wales and Scotland, and his knowledge of place and topographical names. He got a mental picture, though it was not a sure one, of the areas Secoh was talking about.
"In and below these two," the mere-dragon was continuing, "is the area of the third dragon you see before you, and next to me. She is Artalleg, who speaks for the land between the other two you were just introduced to. First on my left is Chorak, the fourth dragon before you, who speaks for all dragons north of the Cheviot Hills. Finally, beyond him is the fifth dragon to which I have the honor to introduce you, who represents all the land in the south to the sea, from the Channel waters to the Irish sea. His name is Lanchorech."
Secoh stopped speaking. There was a moment of silence, while Jim hesitated over a proper phrase with which to acknowledge the introductions.
"My greetings to all you dragons," he said finally. "You honor the place where I live by coming here."
The five dragons nodded again, apparently not ill pleased by what he had just said.
"As we were saying just before you got here—" Brian broke in. Brian, in his usual impatience with anything that was not action, had been tapping the tabletop with his fingers while the diplomatic introductions were going on. "We and these good dragons have been considering—"
"I heard what you were considering as I came in," Jim said. Far from being insulted by this, Brian actually looked relieved. "You were trying to decide where the best place would be for both the george army and the dragons to join and fight the sea serpents that must be even now coming ashore, if they aren't here already. Well, I've been considering another possibility. A way to get rid of the sea serpents, possibly without fighting them at all; and a way to get rid of the French without fighting them, either."
These words were greeted with a moment of silence, broken by Chandos's cultured tones.
"You speak most interestingly, m'Lord," he said. "Pray tell us more."
Alerted by the fact that Chandos had chosen to emphasize his feudal rank by calling him "m'Lord," instead of simply "Sir James"; even though he, Chandos, was not only the senior knight but had a greater reputation as a war-captain, Jim decided to use the authority of that rank to play for time while he got his plan in order.
The idea still had a lot of holes in it that could give rise to questions by the others. He wanted to put it into the kind of form that would be attractive both to the knights, who would just as soon have a battle; and the dragons, who probably preferred not to fight, but were ready to, if they had to.
Happily, he had a powerful argument in the French dragons' promise of aid. But that should be saved for the proper moment.
"First," he said, "I want to know more about the situation as it now stands. You all know I've been asleep nearly two days; and things must have been happening. My apologies, but I simply didn't arrange to have myself wakened the way I should."
"He need not apologize, gentlemen and dragons," said Angie, firmly beside him. She was sitting with her arms folded and looking as much like the rock of Gibraltar as a rather small, attractive, black-haired woman could. "It was my decision to let him sleep. And now that he's slept, why waste any more time, since I gather time is precious, in talking about it?"
Artalleg opened her mouth, but closed it again on being nudged by the dragon on her right.
"Well, to go on, then—" Jim suddenly broke off. "Come to think of it, where is Rrrnlf? I know he probably couldn't get into this hall, but—"
"Rrrnlf," Angie's clear voice cut in again, "is not interested. As soon as he heard that Essessili was coming here and that all he had to do was wait for him, he left anything else up to the rest of us. He simply curled up next to his sea serpent, who's tied up so that he can't move, and went to sleep. Outside of the fact they're both taking up a lot of space in the courtyard, Rrrnlf might as well not be here."
"I see," said Jim, and coughed a little self-consciously. "Well, then some of the rest of you can tell me. What's the situation with the sea serpents now? Are we starting to have more around the castle? Do we have any idea whether a lot more have come ashore yet—"
"I can answer that," said Secoh. "I've flown out three times now to take a look at the nearest shoreline, not far from the Loathly Tower. I stayed always high up in the air, so that I wouldn't be recognized as a dragon. Anybody looking up could see something, but he would probably think it was a bird. Of course, sea serpents don't seem to look up, anyhow."
"Did you find out about more sea serpents coming ashore?" Jim asked.
"They're not coming, they've come," said Secoh. "Thousands of them. They landed all up and down the shore, a ways down below the Meres and the Loathly Tower. Then some of them started to move this way, but not all of them. The last time I looked, most seemed to be still just getting into groups."
Jim turned to Carolinus.
"What do you think?" he said. "It's still your opinion the Dark Powers aren't behind all this?"
"Curiously enough," said Carolinus, "this once, the Dark Powers don't seem to be having anything to do with it. It's merely Chance and History colliding. Also, the unknown magician Mastermind. I've still no idea who he or she could be."
"That," Jim said, "we can worry about later. The important point right now seems to be what to do about the sea serpents."
He looked at the five dragons.
"How soon could you bring your dragons down here?"
Lanchorech spoke up.
"We talked that over among ourselves, back at the Cliffside cave," he said. "From the time we leave here to pass them the word to come, until they're overhead of your castle here, is going to take at least six hours, even if all are ready and waiting to fly."
"You may have some assistance," Jim said, "from the French dragons. You know that?"
"If they come," said Lanchorech gloomily.
"They will," said Jim as confidently as he could. "Remember, I have their surety in gems. At least, that
is to say, I had it—"
Secoh broke in unexpectedly.
"You do still have it, m'Lord!" he said. "I was careful to collect it from where I'd hidden it, when these dragon representatives here left Cliffside for your castle. In fact I have it with me, under the table here. After all, it was you who was given it to hold!"
"In that case," said Jim, "perhaps you'd just pass it up to me."
Secoh's head dipped under the table for a moment and he came up clutching a certain large and bulging sack. He passed it up to Jim at the high table. Jim took it, undid the leather thong that held the mouth of it shut, and spilled some of its contents on the table in front of him. The effect on the five representative dragons was automatic; even though they must have seen these before.
"Jewels—such jewels!" said Egnoth. "Never have I seen such jewels!"
This was the moment to play that ace.
"They are precious to the French dragons," said Jim. "Now, they didn't commit themselves to fight. But they said they would come; and you have some idea of the numbers of how many dragons they can bring. If you can fill half the sky over the head of the sea serpents, they can fill the other half. Together, you could seem an endless host."
"If they won't fight, they're not going to be much use," growled Egnoth. "Just what you'd expect of Continental dragons!"
"If neither you nor they have to fight," said Jim, "then no harm's done. And, as I say, I think I have a plan that may save anyone from having to actually fight the serpents. But first—"
He turned to Chandos, just beyond Angie at the high table.
"What of the English army, Sir John?" he asked. "Was its gathering point close enough to the place where the serpents are coming ashore, so that they might have encountered serpents by now?"
"I doubt it," said Chandos. "The gathering place was to be some distance north of here, perhaps a day and a half's march once the army's assembled. In fact, I'd asked Carolinus before you joined us whether perhaps individual serpents might not have surprised the levies already. He gave me his opinion that he did not think the serpents, any of them, would have penetrated that far north yet."