A Guile of Dragons Page 0,3

a moment she was simply afraid. Merlin was Merlin! Who could tell what he knew, or how he knew it?

“Yes,” he said, unaware of her distress. “From your description, it’s a relic of your ancestors, the Coranian exiles. Exiles, that is, from my country, the Wardlands. In the last stages of their decadence, they conquered Ireland and they nearly conquered Britain.”

“What stopped them?” asked Nimue, more at ease now (or at least less frightened).

“I did. I had uses for these islands; I still do. But as to your tower: it will have a cave underneath it, I expect, which you did not find. Within this will be a grave and a treasury. Yes, if it hasn’t been broken into, it might be interesting.”

“You knew the Coranians well?” Nimue asked. Earno had spoken of them also, but she wanted to know more. She always wanted to know more.

“In a way,” Merlin replied. “Hereabouts, and elsewhere, too, they talk about the Coranians as if they were a different breed of humankind. But they weren’t, really—just some people with . . . with a common idea. An idea with certain merits, I’ve come to realize. Someday I’ll bring you to the Northhold of the Wardlands. There you can still see the graves of the Corain, the high kings of the Coranians.”

“Are they so impressive?” Nimue wondered.

“In a way. At night.” There was an odd tone in his voice—pride mixed with shame or grief.

They were nearly at the tower; it loomed over the nearby trees.

“Who is Earno?” The question, so often on her mind, was out of her mouth before she was aware of it. But she decided, belatedly, that it was only fair that Merlin have a warning, however oblique, of his imminent danger.

But Merlin was serenely, stupidly unflappable. “Have I mentioned him to you? That seems odd. He’s a vocate, a member of the Graith of Guardians. He killed a dragon once—his chief claim to fame.”

“Many knights have done as much.” Despite her words, Nimue was impressed. Imagine old Earno with a mailcoat and a longsword! she thought, and smiled.

“So they say,” Merlin agreed dryly. “But this was no sickly Scandinavian hole-dweller. Kellander Rukh was his name, full master of a guile of dragons. To defeat such an enemy is something to boast about, and to give him credit, Earno never does. Not really. Earno was a man to watch at one time, but he missed his chance somehow. Not a player, just a piece; he follows Lernaion’s faction on the Graith. He has some cause to dislike me.”

“Then you’re in danger from him.”

Merlin stopped walking and took her hands. “No. He had some suspicions, but Lernaion reined him in. I am perfectly safe.”

“But the Third Summoner—suppose—”

“Be at peace. I am the Third Summoner. There. Now you know something worth knowing.” He squeezed her hands once more, let them go and walked into the green shadows at the base of the tower.

Nimue followed silently. There was nothing more to say. And if there were, she would not.

The tower spiraled, hornlike, above the green-gold tops of the nearby trees. It was set on a gray rock carven with strange letters. There were no stairs ascending the sheer rock, but Merlin wasn’t concerned.

“‘Venhadhur,’” he read. “A king’s name. The epitaph is mere bombast. He must have been very late, a semibarbarian petty king of mixed Coranian ancestry. Otherwise he would have been buried near the Hill of Storms in the Northhold.”

“You taught me to read the secret speech, but I can’t read this.”

“Yes, yes. It’s a Firbolgi script, if I’m not mistaken. But I beg you to remember, my dear, it is not ‘the secret speech,’ nor ‘Coranian.’ It is the language of the Wardlands—Wardic, some call it. Aha. Look at this, now.”

He had made one of the carven words recede, revealing a small lever.

“This is very clever workmanship,” he said, “but it won’t last. Look at the cracks in that tower! Much of the foundation is based on spells that are now fading. In a century, no one will know this tower was ever here. The Coranian makers could have learned something from their enemies, the dwarves.”

He pulled the lever and stood back. Part of the stone split open and moved aside, revealing a curved stairway that led deep under the rock.

“That’s strange,” Merlin remarked. “No treasury; no coffin. There is something on that bottom step, however. Wait here; I’ll just go see what it is.”

She had no intention of going down. This