sprawled half out of his cot, eyes wide with fear and fixed in death.
“Toreth!” Kiron wailed himself, and started for his friend.
“Wait!” Heklatis barked, throwing out an arm to stop him, halting him in his tracks. Just in time, as the head of the largest cobra that Kiron had ever seen rose up out of the blanket half covering Toreth’s body. It hissed, and flared its hood, daring all of them—because by now, the doorway was crowded with people—to come any closer.
The dragon went silent. In the silence, the cobra rose farther above Toreth’s body and swayed back and forth.
There was a murmur of fear, and as the cobra bent forward, they all moved involuntarily back.
“The sign of the gods—” someone muttered at the back of the crowd. “Don’t touch it!” cried someone else. “It is sacred to the gods!”
“Not my gods,” said Heklatis impatiently. He looked around swiftly, seized a sling and a handful of pellets from the weapon rack against the wall, and before anyone could stop him, let fly.
It was either the best, or the luckiest shot that Kiron had ever seen in his life, for it hit the cobra right in the head. The snake tumbled off Toreth’s body, and Heklatis made sure of the beast a moment later. He dashed across the intervening space, and crushed what was left of the head and hood beneath his sandal.
No one else moved. Not even Kiron, who felt as if he was paralyzed and could not have moved to save his own life. It was Heklatis who tenderly draped the blanket over Toreth’s face, then picked up the body of the prince, blanket and all, and carried it out. Kiron had no idea that the bandy-legged little Healer was so strong; he carried the burden as if it was nothing. The crowd parted before him, and closed up behind him, but still, no one moved except to get out of the Healer’s way.
“The sign of the gods—” someone else murmured. But all Kiron could think was—I was in that chamber before he came back. There was no snake there, and there is no way for a snake to get past his dragon.
Snakes can’t abide dragons, and dragons eat snakes. How did it get there?
Had the gods sent their sacred serpent to punish Toreth? Were the gods truly favoring the Magi against all the rest of their people?
The dragon began her keening again, and a wave of chill passed over him. A shadow seemed to pass over them all, and the wings of despair enveloped them.
The gods. The sign of the gods. How can you go against the gods?
He started to shake, and he was not the only one. He put one hand against the wall, fear welling up inside him in a bleak, black tide.
It came between him and everything else, and he felt it weaken him until he could not stand. Slowly he sank down into the sand pit, as the dragon wailed her heartbreak, and people began to back away carefully, as if this place and everything that was in it held some dreadful curse.
He lost himself in despair and grief. His eyes burned, and yet he could not weep. His throat felt choked with a lump of tears that would not leave him. His eyes burned, and he closed them, but the images in his mind kept playing over and over—Toreth, alive but a few moments ago, and now dead, with that look of terror on his face—
“This foul creature was sent.”
He looked up, startled to find that he was no longer alone. Heklatis stood there, face set in a mask of rage, toeing what was left of the cobra.
“What?” he asked, somehow getting the word past the lump in his throat.
“This was no accident, and no act of the gods,” the Healer said flatly. “This snake was sent. It is a Fetch, a thing called into a place by magic, and commanded to act by its master. Someone brought it here specifically to attack and kill the prince. I can taste the magic, smell it, a vile odor—” He shook his head, the gray-streaked curls of his hair bouncing. “They must not have known there would be a Magus here, or they would have covered their tracks.” He glanced over at Kiron, who was staring at him in bewilderment. “You don’t understand what I’m saying, do you? Let me put it simply. The Magi murdered Toreth, and did it in a way that would