Dragons of the Watch - Donita K. Paul [56]
Bealomondore pointed to a red wagon by the garden shed. “I pulled that out this morning. Fortunately it’s a toy. We’d never be able to pull the big wagon or push the urohm’s wheelbarrow.”
“Do you think we could take some eggs as well?”
Bealomondore turned to face her, his eyes wide. “We need eggs? We sometimes get eggs with our breakfast.”
“I was thinking how much my gramps likes a soft-boiled egg on toast at teatime. Not every day, but once in a while as a treat.”
“So Old One might like the same?”
“Possibly.”
“You’re probably right. But he asked specifically for daggarts. And we don’t know what Wulder has provided for him these many years.”
“Apparently not daggarts.” She frowned in concentration.
Bealomondore responded cheerfully. “Just so.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Remember we talked about Wulder giving us things just so we have something to enjoy?”
“Button grain for Tak. Pie for us.”
“Yes, that discussion. Why doesn’t Wulder give Old One daggarts?”
“That one is easy.”
“Easy, huh?” She gave him her best skeptical look. “Then explain it.”
“A long, long time ago, when Wulder planned this urohm expedition, He knew that there would one day be an almost empty Rumbard City, wild and dangerous little heathens, and a grumpy old man holed up in the library. Wulder also knew that Ellicinderpart would fall into this bottled city and bake daggarts. If He had been feeding the small riffraff and the curmudgeon daggarts all along, then the daggarts the lovely young tumanhofer baked would not be so special and wouldn’t dent the armor of Old One or soften the hearts of the ragamuffins, convincing Old One to come out of hiding and the young ones to be nice and not bite.”
Ellie laughed. “I’m not convinced.”
“You will be. Once you accept Wulder as your creator and provider, you will change your tune.”
“You did say you were going to tell me more about Him.”
“I will. Maybe as we walk back to the library today.”
Ellie came in from the kitchen and sat down to fold the linens Bealomondore had washed. “This is my last chore,” she called. “I wish we could iron them.”
Bealomondore pulled a cushion back into the room and placed it where he’d found it the first night they stayed at the house. “I think I’m done, Ellie.”
“Good. We can leave soon.”
He sat down beside her to help. “Have you figured out why we are doing this?” He waved his hand with an unfolded towel in it, indicating the whole room and the house beyond.
“Respect for someone else’s property?”
He tilted his head to look at her. “This house is actually no one’s property. They’re all dead.”
She scrunched her face and continued folding.
“Well, almost all,” said Bealomondore.
“That’s right.” She thought for a moment. “So I guess I’m doing it because I was raised to leave things tidier than when I arrived.”
“Really?”
“Yes.” She put the last folded cloth on the stack. “Why are you doing it? You haven’t exactly been a mule, too stubborn to cooperate. In fact, you’ve done more than I have.”
He stood and helped her up. “I like your reason. Leave things better.”
She shook her head. “Can’t have it. That’s my reason, not yours.”
He shrugged. “Well … in the last few years, I’ve grown to appreciate order. The quest to put the three statues together so Verrin Schope would quit falling apart. Simultaneously, the world unraveling. The war with Baardack. The awful, muddy, bloody battlefields. Wulder opening my eyes again to the beauty around me.”
He pinched his lower lip. “All right. I’ll make a stab at it.” He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked straight into her eyes. “Wulder created this world and everything in it. He expects us to take care of it. When events occur that put things in disarray, He appreciates our trying to right wrongs and do the best we can to restore order, His order.” He gestured with his head, looking at the room around them. “Someone built this home. They created it. It’s fitting to restore their home as closely as we can to the original state.”
Ellie smiled. “Minus several dishes, ingredients