Fire Dragon - Katharine Kerr [139]
“Get your people out, Rakzan,” Verrarc said. “For their sake.”
Waving his arms and yelling, Kral strode back to the warriors, who began backing and turning their horses. The cart, mercifully, still stood outside on the road. As soon as it became clear that the Horsekin were moving outside the gates, the crowd of citizens began to calm. Gart kept urging, Kiel kept talking, the militiamen slowly moved forward, and at last the citizens began to disperse, walking away slowly, muttering to themselves or shaking the occasional fist in the wild man's general direction. Through all of this Raena had stood off to one side and smirked. Verrarc crossed to her and grabbed her by both arms.
“What be all this?” he snarled. “Ye gods, woman! Who is that filthy warlock?”
“Just that, a warlock indeed. His name be Nag-arshad.”
“He may call himself Lord Filth for all I care. You do owe me many a truth, Rae. And I'm taking you home where you may tell them.”
She started to speak, then shrugged and pulled her arms free of his lax grasp.
“Move, woman!”
She shrugged again but turned and began walking toward the lakeshore. Verrarc followed close behind, and as they hurried through the scattering crowd, he noticed how all the townsfolk stopped to stare at her with hatred in their eyes.
When she'd left Verrarc at the gates, Dallandra had not gone far. She found a quiet spot near the wall, turned her face to the stone to shut out distractions, and called to Evandar. In her mind she pictured his country, gone dead and brown; she imagined an image of herself there, walking by the leaden river, and she imagined that image calling his name. When she felt an answering touch of his mind, she banished the images and came fully back to the grass and stone of Cerr Cawnen just in time to hear the child shrieking in terror.
Caught at the back of the crowd as she was, she could barely see what was happening, much less reach the scene in time to stop it. Once the crowd began to break up and clear off, she could finally make her way back to the gates. By then the rakzan had managed to get all his men back onto the road outside and the mazrak with them. She only caught a glimpse of him, striding along barefooted and waving his staff above his head as if in celebration. Two young townsmen were carrying the dead dogs away. One of them was weeping.
Verrarc and Raena stood arguing a few paces off. Dallandra was shocked by the change in her. During last summer's siege she'd managed to get a few glimpses of a plump, sleek Raena. Now she'd turned gaunt. Her face and neck showed every tendon and muscle, it seemed, just because her skin was stretched so tight over the bone. Before Dallandra could make up her mind to confront them, Verrarc had grabbed Raena by the arm and hauled her off, heading for the lakeshore.
“Let them be,” Evandar murmured.
With a yelp Dallandra spun around. He had either materialized right there or appeared elsewhere and walked up so quietly she hadn't heard him—the latter, she supposed, since none of the townsfolk were paying him any attention.
“This is a bad omen and a worse outcome,” Evandar said. “I'm tempted to blast that nasty-looking fellow into ashes and his Horsekin entourage with him.”
“Please don't! The Horsekin would only send a bigger and nastier lot here to look for them.”
“You speak the truth, so I shan't. But I fear for you, my love. Be on your guard, will you? Better yet, can you and the prince and the rest of you all move onto Citadel and camp near the dragon?”
“I doubt that. We'd have to bring Zatcheka and her people with us, and there's no grass for the horses and suchlike. I wish you could stay with us.”
“So do I, but the iron aches my bones, or what would be my bones if I had any. At