Vixa immediately spotted Armantaro and broke from Egriun to greet him. “Hail, Colonel!” she cried.
“Highness!”
The princess threw her arms around the elder elf.
“I thought you were dead!” he exclaimed when they parted. “But you look well enough.”
“You look as if you’ve been wrestling a dragon.” It was true. The colonel’s clothes were scorched, and he had scores of shallow cuts and scrapes on his face and arms.
“I’m too old for this nonsense,” he said ruefully, his breath wheezing in his chest. “Two hundred years ago I could have knocked Coryphene from here to the Mortas Trench.”
Vixa’s smile was fleeting. Sobering, she said softly, “I heard about Harm and Van.”
“A lot of good folk died yesterday. These sea elves claim they had other worries and couldn’t take the time to check on their captives.” Armantaro’s voice was low and bitter.
Vixa tightened her grip on his arm. She had no comfort to give the colonel. And none for herself, either.
Slowly, afraid his answer might be more bad news, she asked, “Did Gundabyr survive?”
“Yes!” Armantaro turned to survey the room. “There he is,” said the colonel. Gundabyr lay by the far wall, his back to the room. “Poor fellow, he’s taken his twin’s death hard. Very hard.”
Vixa and Egriun went to the dwarf. She laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Wake up there. They need you at the forge.”
Gundabyr rolled his head back so he could see who spoke. “Hello, Princess,” he rumbled.
“Hello yourself, Gundabyr.”
The dwarf noticed Egriun looming behind her. He rubbed his face and sat up. “What’s this long drink of water here for?”
“Coryphene wants to see you,” Vixa explained. “He knows about the gnomefire. He wants you to make more, to use against the chilkit.”
The dwarf turned his bearded face to the wall. “Tell him to go and … soak his head.”
“Listen to me!” Vixa shook his shoulder hard. “You have a chance-
“So what.” His voice was flat and emotionless. “Let the redshells have the city. We’ll never see the sun again, no matter who wins.”
Vixa yanked his arm, turning him to face her. She whispered fiercely, “I saw what happened to Garnath! Do you want the same fate for us all? If the gnomefire helps defeat the chilkit, Coryphene has hinted he’ll let us go. Our lives are in your hands, Gundabyr. Garnath saved my life. Can you save us all?” She stood and stared down at him. “Show the blueskins what a forgemaster of Thorbardin can do!”
Gundabyr stared at her for a long time. Suddenly, he exhaled sharply and hopped to his feet. He stalked past Vixa and the patient Egriun.
“Well,” he said to the sea elf, “what are you waiting for? Take me to your Protector. If he wants gnomefire, I’ll give him a crab boil he won’t soon forget!”
The dwarf’s proud words echoed through the chamber. When he and his escort had departed, Vixa allowed her trembling knees to bend at last. She sank to the ground. The terror and excitement of the past twenty-four hours had left her weak and wrung out. Her mind was filled with thoughts of Harmanutis and Vanthanoris, of Captain Esquelamar and all the others who’d been lost on this journey.
Her first command was supposed to have been a simple task: pick up the ambassador-what was his name? Quenavalen? — and take him safely home to Qualinost. She hadn’t thought of Quenavalen or the Ergothian civil war in many days.
How many days had it been? The lack of day and night made things extremely confusing. The weary princess occupied her mind for several moments trying to determine exactly how long she’d been in this city of sea elves. She guessed five days since they’d been brought here by the dolphin shapeshifters. It certainly seemed much longer.
She was so very tired. Vixa’s eyelids began to droop. Armantaro came to sit beside her. She dozed, leaning against his shoulder, while he watched the comings and goings of their captors. Racks of arms were dragged out and rapidly distributed to those who’d lost their weapons in the previous battle. Helmets were repaired or replaced. A single warrior casually stood watch over the former slaves. Even this guardian seemed unnecessary. None of the exhausted, bedraggled slaves appeared capable of making an escape, and even then they would have to get past the chilkit surrounding the city.
Vixa had been sleeping only a short time when the sound of Armantaro’s coughing roused her. “Are you ill?” she asked groggily.
“Not at all. I just swallowed more of the ocean than is prudent.”
She had to smile. “Adversity never wears you down, does it, Colonel?”
“So,” said Armantaro in a very low voice, “how did you survive in the sea, lady?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
He feigned amazement. “I? Doubt the word of my princess and commander?”
She sat up, stretching and yawning. “I thought I was dead,” she finally replied. “But someone took me up and restored me to life.” The colonel’s only reply was an upraised eyebrow. “Naxos, the dolphin herald,” she whispered.
“By Astra!”
“That’s not the half of it. There was no way for me to return to Urione, since I had no airshell, so Naxos offered me a solution.” She hesitated, now that the time had come to speak of it. Armantaro begged her to continue. “Naxos said I could become like him,” she finished.
The old colonel paled. “Like him? You mean, become a dolphin?”
Vixa nodded, watching the Dargonesti moving around them. “It was the only choice I could make.”
“But you’re an excellent swimmer, lady! You could have reached land!”
“Two hundred leagues? Besides, do you think I would leave you and the others behind? Is that what a Qualinesti officer does in time of danger?”
“No, lady. Forgive me. No child of Verhanna Kanan would abandon her troops.”
Armantaro’s mention of her mother brought that lady strongly to Vixa’s mind. The princess pondered what might be happening in Qualinost now. Did they even know she was missing? Somehow the bright, leafy beauty of her home didn’t seem real now. The only reality was Urione, the chilkit, and the life-and-death struggle being waged.
“Did I ever tell you about my son, Vintarellin?” Armantaro asked.
“No,” she replied, surprised. “I didn’t know you had a son.”
“My only child-he’s perhaps twenty years older than you. I was thinking of him just now. When he was very young, he came to me and asked permission to enter the priesthood of Astra. He had no interest in becoming a soldier, but wanted to learn the ways of leaf and vine.”
“An admirable ambition.”
Armantaro sighed heavily. “I didn’t think so at the time. The family of Ramantalus have always been fighters in their prime, and stewards of the Speaker in their old age. I told Vintarellin he would have to learn the duty of combat first.”
This harsh attitude seemed unlike the Armantaro Vixa knew. She asked, “And did he?”
“Oh, yes. I sent him off to a frontier post in northern Qualinesti. He became a remarkable archer and hunter. It was said my son could pierce the eye of a hawk on the wing. Unfortunately, blood and sport took control of him. He came to love the hunt, not as a necessary craft, but for the killing itself.”
Vixa didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry, Colonel,” she finally murmured.
“It’s a hard thing to say, but I despise my son. We haven’t spoken in over thirty years. He lives in the high forest, feared and hated by all-an outcast. It’s my fault, of course. I should have let him have his heart’s desire when he asked for it.”
“Maybe the blood lust was always in him. At least he expends it in the forest and not on his fellows.”
Armantaro said softly, “Parents complain when their children are foolish. They blame it on youth. I think it’s
Vixa patted his battle-scarred hand. “Parents and children always have problems. Look at my mother and me.
