“They’re supposed to be laying the country waste,” he said. “They may as well start now.”
“True,” Barnabas said cheerfully. “I’ll break the walls. If it’s a hedge, you and Callette can just walk through it.”
“But mind the thorns!” Mara called out anxiously. “Don’t tear your wing feathers.”
As the drive went on, its pace slowed to a crawl. Men in the midst of the crowd kept stumbling. When that happened, one of the riders would have to force their way among the shiny black bodies and haul the fallen man up before the others trod all over him. As Beauty would not go near the army and Barnabas had to lead the way, it was mostly Blade or Mara who had to do this. Blade was riding Nancy Cobber, who was the most obliging of all the horses, so he did most of it. He hated it. Probably Nancy did, too. The black armor smelled like tar, and the men themselves had a nasty smell of sweat and the drug and something Blade had never smelled before, which he suspected was the smell of prison. And he hated being surrounded by all their blankly staring faces.
By evening it was worse. Men were stumbling so often by then that Don and Elda were flying overhead shrieking a warning every time a man fell. And when Blade went to pull the latest fellow up, he found expressions beginning to grow on some of the faces he was pushing past. They were not pleasant expressions. They were angry or sullen. Some were jeering or plain brutal. But a few faces were full of simple flat hatred. Blade went in and out as quickly as he could, and his stomach felt odd. He was sure the drug was wearing off. And unless Derk made a truly miraculous recovery, Blade knew that he and Shona and the griffins were going to have to march these dangerous people to more than just the one camp they were making for tonight.
The camp was a large transparent dome of magic in the middle of a big field, shining a faint blue-green in the evening light. Even the soldiers seemed to be aware of it. Their stumbling steps went faster, and they streamed through the opening Barnabas made in the side of the dome at what was for them a brisk walk. Inside, Blade could see heaps of bedding, piles of bread and barrels of other food and drink, and latrine huts at intervals.
“There. That should keep them safe and happy until Derk gets back,” Barnabas said cheerfully, sealing the dome shut. Kit, to Blade’s admiration, hung over Barnabas while he did it, trying to learn how it was done. Blade felt sick. He saw one man pick up a loaf inside the dome and have it instantly snatched off him by another. When the drug wore off, he knew there would be bullying, quarrels, and strong ones forming gangs to terrorize the rest.
“Shouldn’t we take their swords away?” he said.
Barnabas shrugged. “We don’t usually bother. They have to be armed for the battles, after all. I don’t suppose we’ll lose many in camp fights. You reckon on twenty or so, most years.”
“They’re criminals, Blade,” Shona said, seeing how Blade was looking.
Blade was not sure even criminals deserved this sort of thing, but he had no idea what to do instead. He felt miserable. He was still miserable when Barnabas said good-bye and vanished in a cheerful clap of thunder, horse and all. He found himself thinking of that camp most of the way home.
Mara had arranged for the skeletal Fran Taylor to come up from the village and nurse Derk. Fran met them at the gate, surrounded by pigs, who were all giving out anxious squeaks and snorts and fanning their wings in distress.
“I’ve got the supper on,” Fran said, “since you were all so late. And there’s been no change. I had to spend all day chasing these pigs away from him.”
“I expect they’re worried about him,” Mara explained, getting stiffly down from her horse.
“And the owls, too. You ask Old George,” said Fran. “He’s had no end of bother with those birds. If he turns his back for a moment, they’re in through that bedroom window and gobbing all over the bedspread like there was no tomorrow.”
“Old George?” said Shona. “Mum! I thought you had Old George over at Aunt’s
house to be your wasted lover.”
“That was just a joke,” Mara said irritably. “He’s here for the animals while Derk’s ill. Now I really must go and look at that dragon.” She handed Shona her reins and hurried away to the side valley. Shona looked exasperated.
“Wasted lover indeed!” Fran said, following them up the drive in the crowd of pigs. “Don’t you let Old George hear you say that. It’s bad enough being like a stick person without people passing rude remarks. We’re only like this to oblige your father, Shona.”
“I know, I know,” Shona said hurriedly. “I apologize. It was Mum’s joke.”
Everyone was in a hurry to see how Derk was. Blade handed the horses over to Old George and dashed upstairs after the others. Even Kit and Callette made the journey to Derk’s bedroom, cautiously crawling up one side of the creaking magic-supported stairs and squeezing through the doorway to stare down at Derk’s bed. Derk still looked terrible. His breathing rattled as he slept. It was most discouraging.
“And Mum hasn’t even been to look!” Shona said. “She’s gone to look at the dragon instead.” She was angry enough to ask, sweetly and dangerously, over supper, “And how is the poor dear dragon, Mother?”
“Oh, I think he’s going to be all right,” Mara said, quite failing to notice Shona’s sarcasm. “He’s just slept himself nearly dead, poor creature. The healer stitched the worst of his wings and told him to rest and eat once a day for the next few weeks, and I can see she was right. He’s a better color already.”
“More than Dad is,” Blade said.
“Lucky your father met that dragon when it was half dead, I say,” said Fran. “If it had been able to breathe fire, he’d be a crisp by now. They say the fire gets into your lungs and burns you up from inside. You can go about for weeks and then suddenly drop dead.”
“Wonderful!” said Lydda, sitting with her beak poised over a plate of stew which she had, for a wonder, scarcely touched. But then the stew had been cooked by Fran and was far from godlike.
“Dragons are wonderful,” Old George observed. “They can will you into being dead. Did you know that?”
“Or they can see into your mind and twist it,” added Fran. “It worries me that your poor father may have looked it in the eye. If he did, then there’s no knowing what it might have done to him.”
“Sometimes they can take up a wizard’s own magic and use it against him,” Old George said, ladling himself a third bowlful of stew. His skeletal condition made him very hungry.
“They do that by singing, you know,” Fran put in. “You didn’t let this dragon sing to your father at all, did you?”