Dragon Mage

  "She stole something valuable," he added, thinking that would serve as a reasonable explanation for the force.

  "Cloth?" This from the woman again.

  "Yes." Ekurzakir wondered if he had hesitated in answering.

  "This cloth?" She held up a shawl that had already been cut from it.

  "Yes." Ekurzakir saw the disappointment in the woman's eyes. "But you can keep the cloth." He added, "all of it," when he saw another piece of the material with another woman. "We desire only the girl, not what she stole.'

  Hre-Threndal waggled his fingers, trying to disperse the villagers.

  "She is not here," he said, turning back to face Ekurzakir. "She was here, though how you know of that so soon is a wonder. She was here only yesterday, and she left during the night." He crossed his arms in front of his chest and scowled at a group of young men who were standing firm and not returning to their chores.

  "Where did she go, sir?" Ekurzakir stepped toward the elder. He did not try to hide the menace growing in his eyes. "And when in the night did she leave?" Again he raised up on his toes and scanned the villagers, most of whom were returning to their homes.

  Hre-Threndal shrugged his shoulders.

  "I know of that, of the girl and the priest who was with her." A stoop-shouldered man with a careworn face came to stand behind Hre-Threndal.

  "And you are—"

  "Nurthar, brother of Kuth, son of—"

  "Good meeting, Nurthar." Ekurzakir returned to his silky tone. "You saw the girl leave?"

  Nurthar shook his head briskly. "Not the girl, but the Shamash priest. He wras with a different woman. It was a dark, still night. I could not sleep, my stomach ailing me." He patted his stomach for emphasis. "I stood by my window and looked to the south, thinking the stars would ease my discomfort."

  Ekurzakir tapped his foot, but forced himself to be patient. "And the girl—"

  "Not the pale-skinned one. But another one was with Nidintulugal."

  Ekurzakir's lips tightened. He remembered the name of the Shamash priest who'd helped the girl flee the city. Two guards he'd met on the road had been coming from Ibinghal and mentioned seeing the priest there, but not the girl.

  "And—"

  "They took my brother's ox and cart. I thought my brother must have given his permission. Nidintulugal is known to us, a friend to Hre-Threndal. Nidintulugal would never steal."

  "But I did not give my permission." A man looking similar to Nurthar shouldered his way to the front. "Nidintulugal took the ox and cart without permission."

  "You must be Kuth. So the priest stole—"

  "Borrowed," Kuth corrected. "A priest of Shamash would not steal."

  Nurthar nodded. "I watched Nidintulugal and a young woman, but not the pale-skinned one with the spots on her face, take the ox and cart down the road to the north. I'd not seen the woman before. She was not from the village, and I do not know where she came from. In any event, the two of them must be traveling to the village Knarr. There is a shrine to Shamash there."

  "I will get my ox and cart back." Kuth glowered at his brother. "And the priest had best provide a gift."

  Ekurzakir growled softly. "Hre-Threndal, elder, I would speak with you and Nurthar alone."

  Hre-Threndal appeared surprised, but nodded, turning and inviting Ekurzakir and Nurthar into his small home. Ekurzakir gestured to four guards, who followed. Once inside, Ekurzakir grabbed the elder by the throat and shoved him up against a wall. The guards made certain Nurthar did not interfere.

  "Old man, I have no patience left for this. The girl who left the village in the night . . . she must be the same one who left with the priest. Disguised, wearing different clothes, I see no other explanation."

  Hre-Threndal tried to speak, but Ekurzakir gripped him tighter.

  "Sh-sh-she might have been the same one, she could have been." This came from Nurthar. Visibly shaken, he looked back and forth between Ekurzakir and the four guards. "She traded in the village for clothes. It was dark when I looked out the window. She could have been wearing one of the robes she traded for. In the darkness, I might not have seen her pale skin." He swallowed hard. "Indeed, as dark as it was, I could not have seen her pale skin."

  "And they traveled north?"

  Hre-Threndal made a gagging sound and Ekurzakir loosened his grip.

  "Y-y-yes," Nurthar said. "There are other villages to the north, but I thought they might go to a Shamash shrine."

  "Because of the priest Nidintulugal?" Ekurzakir hissed.

  "Y-y-yes." Nurthar directed his full attention to Ekurzakir now. "Why so much worry over a girl with sore feet and pale skin? Why so many guards? Why—"

  "Why do you ask so many questions?" Ekurzakir indicated that two of the guards should leave. "Get my horse, we leave for the north immediately. Tell Ipqu-Aya to search for wagon and ox tracks." Ekurzakir had included the expert tracker in the dozen guards.

  "Elder, describe the garments she traded for." Ekurzakir pressed his face against the old man's. "Describe them very precisely." He turned to Nurthar. "And you supply any information this one leaves out."

  Ekurzakir again grabbed his throat. "This one's tongue,' he hissed to the two guards. "He doesn't need it anymore." He gestured with his head to indicate Nurthar. "And he can do without his as well." Ekurzakir shoved the old man to the ground. "Make sure neither of them screams too loudly. And be quick to join me on the road."

  Ekurzakir had not ordered such violence in a long while, but did not want the men telling the villagers and other visitors about his interrogation.

  This girl, he had come to believe, was very important.

  Gaining her for the Hand of Nebuchadnezzar might do more than insure his own prosperity.

  18 To Save Dragonkind

  SHILO HAD EXPECTED NIDINTULUGAL TO ASK HER PLENTY OF questions: about magic—since he'd admitted he hadn't believed in it, and about where she had come from, and what she intended to do.

  "It has to be possible," she whispered.

  As they made their way toward Babylon, she kept turning over various answers in her mind: that magic was new to her, too, and that a part of her was excited by it; that she came from this world, but not this time or place; and that she wanted to go home, even if she didn't like Wisconsin. The more she played with the answers, the more disconcerted she got that Nidintu-lugal didn't ask her about anything.

  "Penny for your thoughts, Nidin."

  "Pardon?"

  "What are you thinking about?"

  "This," he said, waving an arm to indicate the fields. "This dryness is typical of this time of year. But Babylonia is not always like this. Much of the year the land north of the great city is marshy, which is why the crops flourish, such as in the village of Ibinghal."

  "You're thinking about the weather." She shook her head.

  "The heavy rains should start within a few weeks, making irrigation unnecessary. Wheat, barley, sesame, flax, vegetables, fruits. All grow tall and plump in Babylonia because of the seasonal rains. The heat of summer will remain once they start, but the ground will be soggy. In the mornings, fog, like steam, will hover around the stalks."

  The weather, Shilo groaned to herself. Leave it to someone to avoid all the important topics by talking about the weather. Barley and flax and rain. Lovely.

  "The great city itself is dryer, rarely seeing the rain that this land to the north enjoys. It is as if a line has been drawn, and foul weather not permitted beyond that point."

  "I see," Shilo said.

  "The river is down along its banks now, but still there is plenty of it to irrigate the fields north of the great city and to supply the Hanging Gardens with enough to keep everything beautiful and green. In a few weeks, the river will flood its banks, and the Gardens will grow wild. The heat and the rain make Babylon lush. In the Gardens, I try to stand in the shade of the weeping trees every few days. Through their branches the sun shines at me in patterns. I try to read the play of light and see if Shamash is se
nding me messages."

  Shilo had nothing to add to that monologue, and so after a while said: "I'm used to it being hot." I'm also used to taking a shower once in a while, she added to herself, sniffing at her armpits and wrinkling her nose.

  When they were several miles south of Ibinghal, they led the ox back onto the road. Nidintulugal did not want the ox and cart to damage the irrigated fields any more than necessary.

  "The friggin' weather." Shilo decided if he wasn't going to ask her anything pertinent, she'd politely badger him. "Nidin, will you return to the Temple of Shamash if we manage to escape with the eggs?"

  He shrugged.

  "Can you return?" Though sounding similar, Shilo knew it was a different question.

  He shrugged again.

  "Because you helped me? The priests at your temple can't be mad at you for that."

  "Shilo, I do not know if I can return ... to the only home I have known. The priests are forgiving, but they have no real power in the city. If I have angered those in power by helping you, I will cast shadows on the Temple of Shamash with my presence."

  "And shadows in the sun god's place probably aren't welcomed," Shilo said.

  "Not shadows of a human sort. Perhaps I will have to test just how much of a shadow I cast."

  They rested late in the afternoon, to the east side of the road this time. The ox made it plain he was tired. Nidintulugal gathered grasses for the beast and emptied one of the nut bowls, filling it with water from one of the irrigation pipes, and letting the ox drink before either Shilo or himself.

  Shilo nearly complained at that, but knew she'd caused Nidintulugal well more than enough grief. Besides, she was so thirsty that she didn't care who or what she drank after. She dozed with her back against a wheel, finding it uncomfortable, but not so bad that she wasn't able to catch a little sleep. And to think that I grumbled about the mattress in my room at Meemaw's, she thought.

  Nidintulugal leaned up against the wheel on the other side. Shilo figured he kept his distance so he wouldn't have to answer any more of her questions ... a priest of Shamash, he wouldn't duck them once asked. But if he could avoid them in the first place . . .

  No need for an alarm clock. Shilo knew if the ox decided to stir, taking the cart with it, she and Nidintulugal would wake up. She listened to it snort, and to the grass rustling in the warm breeze, and she tried to remember the Wynton Marsalis tune, "Thick in the South," that had been playing on Big Mick's jukebox some nights past.

  She finally drifted off, seeing her father's face, then seeing him in the casket at the funeral home, seeing the faces of his friends and coworkers who had come to pay their respects. What would her father think of her adventurer she wondered. He probably would have been envious, she decided. And he probably wouldn't have needed a huge silvery-gold dragon to send him home.

  She was still tired when the ox moved and woke them up. The breeze had vanished and a cloud of flies had gathered, biting and annoying the ox. Her neck was stiff and her back a little sore from sleeping sitting up—probably feeling a little like the stagecoach passengers who had passed the night on the third floor of the antique store once upon a time.

  Nidintulugal swatted the flies while Shilo led the ox back onto the road. She retrieved a small handful of nuts from the cart, held them in her hand and concentrated, pleased when they quickly turned into a brown paste. Some of the dye had streaked on her feet and fingers, and she applied enough of the new mixture to cover the patches of pale skin. Nidintulu-gal gently pointed to the soft hollows beneath her eyes and the skin just under her lips, and she spread the rest of the paste there.

  Then without a word, he started toward Babylon again, his pace fast but tolerable, Shilo easily keeping up, her feet no longer aching.

  They neared the city the following afternoon, just before Shilo applied one more handful of nut dye to her skin.

  "What's our cover story, Nidin?"

  Nidintulugal gave her his perturbed look.

  "You know, our story. If someone asks us why we're in the city with an ox and a cart, a couple of bowls of nuts, and two spare robes, what do we tell them?"

  "We will hope that they ask you and not me."

  Because you are a priest of Shamash and will not lie, she thought. "Do you know how to get beneath the Hanging Gardens?"

  "No." He nodded to a pair of middle-aged men leaving the city. When they had passed, he said, "They are priests of Mar-duk, on a pilgrimage to the villages to the north. Today is Ak-itu, the festival of the House Where the Goddess Temporarily Dwells in Babylon. Akitu honors the mother goddess, and so only a few Marduk priests will leave. It is the month of Tashritu, the barley harvested two months past, and so a good month for bringing brides into homes."

  "Excuse me?"

  "The Marduk priests go to perform marriage ceremonies in the villages, I said. Other Marduk priests go to the south. We priests of Shamash prefer to perform such ceremonies in Arakhsamna, Sabatu, and Adaru."

  "You have months for weddings?"

  Nidintulugal looked surprised. "I know the names of months vary from place to place, but certainly you understand of what I speak."

  Shilo raised a hand to scratch her head, then stopped herself, not wanting to smear any of the nut dye. "Uhm, no. I don't understand."

  Nidintulugal let out a deep sigh. "I know you are from far away, Shilo, but do you not have a calendar?"

  "Of course I have a calendar." My favorite is the Far Side cartoon-a-day calendar, and I keep it on my desk.

  "And does it not have alternating twenty-nine- and thirty-day months? And does not your king add a month three times every eight years, or more if the calendar falls too far from the seasons? And do you not have dates for festivals, such as the Festival of the Carnelian Statue of Su-Sin? The Festival for the Chariot of Nergal? Dates for offerings to Lugalasal and Lugalbanda? The Day of Anointing the Throne of Shamash? Do you not have lucky days?"

  "Uramm . . ."

  "We have two hundred and forty-two. And half lucky days? We have thirty. Do you not set aside days twenty-six and twenty-seven of each month for penance in preparation for the moon disappearing on the twenty-eighth?"

  "Ummm . . . you really have months for marriage?" Shilo tried to change the subject without altering it too much. 1 think I liked it better when he was quiet.

  "There are months for all manner of things. King Nebuchadnezzar recites penitential psalms in the months of Nisannu, Simanu, Arakhsamna, Tashritu, and Abu. He cleans his robes and skirts in Nisannu, Ajaru, Abu, and Tashritu. You may move out of your dwelling in Simanu, Abu, Sabatu, and Adaru, and into a dwelling in Nisannu, Ajaru, Adaru, and Arakhsamna. A palace can be founded in . . ."

  "Wow, where I come from we only have to worry about the first and last of a month for rents and mortgages, bills and such. And I don't have to worry about any of those things because I'm only fifteen."

  He shook his head, exasperated that she didn't seem to understand the simple matter of days, and directed his full attention on the road.

  So he considers the discussion ended. Shilo, however, needed a little more information.

  "I should have asked this earlier, Nidin, but does Babylon have hotels? Motels? Super 8s of Mesopotamia?"

  "So many of your words sound pleasing to my ears, Shilo, but they are as cryptic as when we first met." His face looked stern, but his eyes glimmered with amusement.

  "Look, I'm very sorry. When I'm nervous I tend to babble on—" She put her hand over her mouth. "Oh, I made a pun."

  He raised his eyebrows.

  "I talk when I'm nervous."

  "Then try not to be so nervous, Shilo."

  "You like my company, don't you, Nidin?''

  He drew his lips tight and shook his head again. "I find you interesting, Shilo. And I think Shamash put you in my path as a test."

  "A test of what?"

  "I have not yet figured that out."

  They passed into the city, Shilo shivering and drawing herself into h
er robe. Act natural, she told herself. Walk casual. She held her breath when she passed by a guard. All of this notion to save dragon eggs had seemed intimidating but doable when Ulbanu had spelled it out in the cave. Shilo knew roughly how heavy an egg was because she'd carried the bolt of cloth, and she knew they were in tunnels or chambers somewhere below the Hanging Gardens.

  Perhaps it had sounded doable earlier because she wanted to return to No-wheres-ville, Wisconsin . . . and because she wanted to save dragonkind and mankind.

  But now—in this city—guards and buildings all around, and her more than two thousand years out of sync, everything seemed suddenly impossible. She gasped for air.

  "What is wrong?"

  "Nidin, I'm hyperventilating."

  A look of horror appeared on his face. "You are what?"

  "Not dying," she quickly added. "I'm just real nervous, having trouble breathing. Happens every once in a while. Freshman year before a swim meet, speech team competition, before my first date." She waved a hand in front of her mouth. "Is there someplace to stash the ox and cart? Near the Hanging Gardens?"

  With a nod, he pulled the animal in that direction.

  She slowed her breathing a little. It's all right, she told herself. Everything's fine. No one's stopped us and asked questions, we look just like the locals. Heck, Nidin is a local. Slow it down. Slow it down, or someone will look too closely at me.

  They went down a road so narrow there were only inches on each side of the cart.

  "The courtyard, Nidin. We passed through the courtyard and through the Ishtar Gate. I didn't look for two strangers. We have to turn around and—"

  "We will stable the ox first, Shilo, else we will be looked badly upon."

  "What?"

  "Standing with an ox in the courtyard that could sully the ground with its—"