the dead mandrake would have grown into a likely dragon, had there been time. That was precisely why he’d had to kill it, of course. . . .
Time to speak. He reveled in the fine calculations of this game, khûn tenadh, the game of power. This was not even a particularly difficult problem—although, like a master, he took pleasure in every exercise of his skill. He had presented enough marvels to astonish and bewilder a better mind than this creature could possibly have. The main thing now was to speak first. If it spoke first, he would have to answer, and even if he answered by destroying it (which Saijok did not intend to do) the creature would have won a kind of victory. The cardinal rule of the game of power (of which the rest were merely variations) was: allow your enemy no victories, only concealed or open defeats.
He raised himself from the dark glittering water in a cloud of steam.
“You came at my command,” he said, with some benevolence. “You have learned your first lesson well.”
You have trespassed against the Guard, it said dimly, then something else, then, Summoner Earno.
Saijok threw back his head and laughed, letting fire trail from his jaws. He was disturbed and intrigued. He had heard of Earno Dragonkiller. He knew, of course, that a summoner and a set of Guardians was part of the hoard of Vild Kharum. If he could obtain a summoner of his own, and a dragonkiller at that, he might use it as a stake to tempt Vild into a real and final challenge . . . without his slave-guards, winner take all.
He saw the creature eyeing his collar of power. He was pleased and surprised. But it was a drawback as well. If the creature had seen members of the guile, he knew they all wore collars.
It was saying something— . . . challenge of the summoner Earno. No member of the guile may stay my embassy.
He snarled. “I am Saijok Mahr; I am no member but master of the Ghân guiles.” Then an idea took him and he laughed. It emerged, complete to the last wriggle, in his mind. Vild Kharum was as good as dead. “Yet I will allow you to pass,” he continued. “You will be my envoy to the guile.”
The creature raised its face in defiance, as Saijok had guessed it would, and he caught its eye. And the thing was done; the dragonspell was placed.
Except . . . it was not. Saijok fixed the thing’s eye with a fire-bright glance and waited for that moment, that pause, that snap that was like biting through bone. Yet it never came.
As the echoes of the creature’s shouted defiance faded away, Saijok shifted thoughtfully in the pool and pondered the creature. The dragonspell seemed to surround it like a dark red cloud. He found the phenomenon interesting. It more than made up for his failure in placing the spell. Let this creature go to Vild and deliver his challenge; let Vild see the strange effect and wonder at the powers of Saijok Mahr.
He laughed. “Go now!” he said, gesturing with a foreclaw. “Take the tunnel yonder.”
The creature said something. Saijok paid no attention to the words, but he tasted insolence in the tone. So he said, “You are my ambassador whether you will it or not.” He laughed again; fire and steam floated through the chamber. When they began to dissipate the creature was gone.
Saijok was content. Then his thirst overpowered him and he lowered his snout to drink.
Morlock crouched, gasping, in the rough tunnel beyond the dragon’s den.
You are my ambassador whether you will it or not! Each word had seemed to make the stones tremble. But perhaps that was just the spell working.
“You looked in its eyes! You looked in its eyes!” he raged at himself uselessly. For a few moments he had been sure it would kill him. Now it did not need to, though. And that was worse. His mind felt free and might even be so . . . except as the dragon wished it. There was a taste of venom in his mouth; he turned his head and spat.
He sat down and put both hands over his face. He felt the same; he felt no control on him. He remembered everything that had happened (or so it seemed). Would that be so, if the dragon had placed a spell?
There was another thing the dragon might have meant, he realized. Morlock’s