The Silver Mage - Katharine Kerr [194]
“What are you doing here, Dar?” Salamander said. “You should be sleeping.”
“I can take a turn on watch with all the rest,” Dar said. “What about you?”
“I’m too bruised to sleep. Why not let me take your position, and you go get some rest? You’ll need your wits about you tomorrow, dealing with this lot.”
Dar chuckled and agreed. Salamander watched him as he made his way back to the archers’ camp. Dawn would be soon enough to apprise the prince and the banadar of the omens he was feeling, the dread and the sense of death hovering close on widespread wings. When he turned his mind to Cerr Cawnen, he saw in vision that the Horsekin army had invested the town. His stomach knotted so badly he nearly vomited. Too close, indeed. He thought of alarming the camp right there and then, but the two dragons, the silver and the black, were flying toward the lake. He waited, watching them in vision.
Rori and Arzosah flew high above Cerr Cawnen in an odd path, back and forth in long loops, one flying deosil, the other widdershins, while the waning moon shone upon their scales and made them glitter in the night. Back and forth as if they were weaving—they were doing just that, Salamander suddenly realized, weaving a dweomer spell over the sleeping army. All at once, the pattern changed. Rori spiraled down toward Citadel while Arzosah flew a spiral up toward the stars. It seemed that he might land on the island, but he smoothed his flight and began to spiral up, whilst she changed her course and spiraled down.
Three times they danced out the dweomer, then met in the sky and began to wheel in tandem. Salamander focused his vision upon them. Their mouths moved as if they spoke, but he could, of course, hear nothing. Around and around—the earth shook under him, breaking the vision. Salamander dropped to his knees as the camp behind him exploded with shouts and screams of fear. The earth trembled and rolled yet again. He twisted round and saw everyone in camp getting to their feet only to fall to their knees as the earth quaked a third time. Horses whinnied and pulled at their tethers. Children shrieked, and the young dragons took flight, wheeling high above the panic.
Salamander forced his mind steady and brought all his trained will to bear upon his second sight. The vision returned. It seemed that he hovered above Cerr Cawnen with his brother and Arzosah as, below, the town shook and rolled. The water in the lake broke into waves as large as a stormy sea, rushing onto the crannogs, then pulling back to expose the lake bottom. Steam rose in great gouts from the lake and between the houses. Once again the earth trembled under him, but Salamander managed to lock his scrying onto the town.
Cerr Cawnen’s walls were shaking and twisting as the earth beneath them quaked and bucked like the terrified horses tethered on the commons. The wooden gates shattered and tore away from the stone. The horses reared, kicked, and broke free, racing in panicked herds out of the town at every gate. Behind them men went running back and forth. Some rushed out of the broken gates behind the horses just as the walls began cracking into huge hunks of mor tared stone. They fell, crushing anyone beneath them. Out in the lake the water rose into huge waves that bubbled and steamed. They came roaring toward land and slammed onto the crannogs. Houses ripped apart and fell. Salamander saw men slide, openmouthed and screaming, into scalding water and tore his gaze away.
Citadel shook the worst of all. The sides of the island were giving way, crumbling like a child’s sand castle at high tide. Rocks, houses, huge lumps of soil—they all slid into the lake below. Above the island, Arzosah and Rori still flew their long loops, weaving their dweomer. The peak of the island cracked open and split in avalanches of rock and dirt. Ugly yellow steam rose in tendrils through the cracks. Through the shimmering curtains of this deadly mist, Salamander saw the gleam of fire.
With a roar that reached the camp, some fifteen miles away, the ancient caldera sprang