The Will of the Empress - By Tamora Pierce Page 0,58

blankets with, but it was an agreeable coincidence. It helped that he was so friendly, and the ladies were so friendly in return. He certainly could tell none of them, or worse, tell his sisters, that he had a horror of sleeping alone. Admitting that to anyone would force him to admit there was something wrong with him.

He lay awake for over an hour, listening to the small noises that Zhegorz made, settling into his mattress, then falling to sleep. The crazy man buzzed in place of snoring. It was a soothing kind of noise, hardly crazy at all. When Briar finally realized what it was, it soon lulled him to sleep.

He ran through a series of rock-sided canyons, all of them stripped of vegetation. He reached every way around him with his magic, seeking even a blade of grass to keep him company, but the ground here was bare and dry, a desert high above the forests and plains of all the world. He kept looking for a way out of the canyons, but all he saw was smooth rock walls, innocent of cracks or ledges.

Behind him Briar heard the thud of Yanjingyi war drums, a loud, flat thump echoed by thousands of marching feet. The sound had followed him into the stone corridors, driving him like game in the dark. Now came the thin, shrill blast of the Yanjing emperor's battle trumpets, and the frightful first roars of the black powder called boom dust. They were blowing up the stone canyons...

...which turned into the twisting hallways of the First Temple of the Living Circle, jammed with dedicates, fleeing the attacking Yanjingyi army. Briar fought against their rushing tide, trying to find Rosethorn and Evvy, his student. Where were they? Evvy was small, yet — she could have been trampled in this chaos! He screamed her name, but it was lost in the cries of the frightened civilians who had taken shelter in the temple.

Everything went dark. Suddenly Briar was crawling over heaps of loose and wet bodies, feeling his way, shuddering. He knew he was crawling on the bodies of the dead. He reached out and felt a dying flare of green magic, plant magic. Screaming, he clutched the dying Rosethorn to his chest.

"... know it's a bad idea to wake a dreamer, but it didn't sound like you're enjoying yourself and if I can't get you to wake I'll have to get one of the Viymeses, though perhaps—"

Briar grabbed Zhegorz's skinny arm and sat up, glaring into the older man's eyes. He could see them clearly: Zhegorz had managed to light a candle. "Don't you dare," Briar ordered softly. "They're not to know you caught me bleatin' like a kid, you got me, daftie? Elsewise I'll plant a bit of green on your lip that will grow your teeth shut, you got me?"

Zhegorz blinked at him, his odd blue-grey eyes bright. "I don't think that's possible," he replied. "I don't believe it would cling."

"It's got stickers on it, and they sink in the cracks." Realizing the man had no intention of telling on him, Briar released Zhegorz's arm. "It's only a dream."

Zhegorz sat cross-legged at the foot of the bed. "So you'll give me drops for my dreams, but not yours?"

Briar rubbed his aching head. "Just what I need — a daftie that makes sense," he grumbled. "Besides, your dreams is bleating, and mine is real. Except for some bits. And those might have been real."

"But Viymese Tris thinks some of mine are real, too," Zhegorz pointed out in a reasonable tone.

"Viymese Tris thinks too much, and she yatters about it too much," Briar grumbled. "You'd best learn that right off."

"If I learn it, will you take the drops?" asked Zhegorz.

Briar stared at him, baffled and confused, then began to chuckle. "Crazy you may be, but when you get an idea in your head, you stick to it," he said when Zhegorz raised an eyebrow. "How about I just make us both some sleepy tea instead? We'll be all right with a cup of that in our bellies."

The tea sent Zhegorz back to bed, at least. Briar had known it would have no other effect on him than to calm him down. Instead he pulled his chair up to his work desk and put his hands around the base of his shakkan, letting the tree's centuries of calm banish the last shivers from the dreams that had made him so reluctant to sleep alone anymore. Looking at