The Shadow Isle - Katharine Kerr [43]
“I was wondering if you could answer me a few questions,” Val said to the dragon, “about this.” She opened her hand to reveal a chunk of lapis lazuli the size of a crab apple, carved into an egg shape. A fine gold chain ran through a hole drilled into the smaller end. “Dalla told me it belongs to you.”
“So it does,” Rori said. “Or it did, once. I wondered what had happened to it.”
“I found it on the ground with your clothes,” Dallandra said, “after the transformation.”
“Ah, I see.” He sighed in a long hiss. “It’s of little use to me now. Val, it’s yours if you want it.”
“That’s very generous,” Valandario said, “but I assure you that I wasn’t trying to get it away from you. I was just wondering what it is. It’s got dweomer upon it, doesn’t it?”
“Yes. An old dwarven woman gave it to me—Otho’s mother, in fact.” He turned his massive head Dallandra’s way. “Otho the dwarf, the silver daggers’ smith—I doubt me if you knew him. He’s the one who got me to Haen Marn, in fact, for all the good it did the poor old bastard. I never met a man more sour than Otho, and I hope to all the gods that I never do, either. Be that as it may,” he turned back to Valandario, “his mother told me that no one could scry me out as long as I was wearing that talisman. She may well have been right, too. I know that Raena couldn’t find me when I was wearing it.”
“No more could Jill,” Dallandra said.
“Very powerful, then.” Val considered the lapis egg with a small frown of concentration. “Are you telling me that the Mountain Folk have dweomer? Here I always thought they mocked it.”
“The men do,” Rori said. “The women don’t. What their men think doesn’t matter a cursed lot to dwarven women.”
“Good for them,” Val said. “But are you sure that the women used dweomer on this stone? They could have come by this some other way, traded for it or the like.”
“That’s true, but I’d wager it was made right in Lin Serr. When I met her, Othara was ill and blind with sheer old age, but she still reminded me of Jill. You could feel power around her. And the trip down—” The dragon paused, looking away as he remembered. “She lived in the deep city, you see, where visitors weren’t supposed to go. I was still in human form then, of course. So a friend—Garin, it was—led me down hooded like a hawk. Once I was good and confused, he let me take off the hood. We went into a cavern where it was lit with blue light, oozing out of the walls. There were some women standing there, waiting to look me over and make sure it was safe to let me through the next doorway. Garin told me that the name of the cavern was the Hall of the Mothers.” The dragon shuddered. “I went cold all over, just hearing it.”
“That makes me shiver even now,” Dallandra said.
Valandario nodded her agreement and went on studying the talisman. Dallandra tested the willow water and found it pleasantly warm. She put on her glove, picked up a linen bandage, wrapped it around a big handful of lamb’s wool, then dipped the lump into the water to soak.
“Lie down again,” Dalla said to Rori. “And remember, it might sting.”
The dragon flopped onto his side, making the ground shudder and the water in the kettle slop back and forth. With her gloved hand, Dallandra laid the wet bandage over the wound and squeezed to let the medicinal seep into the cut. He flinched, then relaxed with a ripple of scales.
“Much better than itching,” he said.
“Good.” Dallandra glanced at Valandario, who had closed her hand over the talisman and was staring off at the horizon. “Val? Are you still with us?”
“Hmm?” Valandario looked at her. “My apologies. Now, about Haen Marn. Rori, I know that it disappeared. Do you know why, exactly?”
“It had the best reason in the world. Horsekin. One of their armies was marching straight for it.”
“I just thought of something.” Dallandra put the lump of cloth back into the herbwater to refresh. “At the time I assumed that the army was heading for Cengarn and that Haen Marn was merely on the way. Do you think they could have been planning to attack the island?”
“I have no idea,” Rori said. “I never