Tales of Ethshar

to find you but couldn’t afford to hire a magician to do it, it’d make things much easier on them if they could ask the guards at the gate, ‘Did my girl come through here? A pretty thing in a blue tunic, about so tall?’ And I’d be able to tell them, so they’d know whether you’re inside or outside the city walls.”

Sirinita blinked up at the man. He was a big, heavy fellow, with deep brown eyes and a somewhat ragged beard.

“What if I went out a different gate?” she asked.

“Oh, we report everything to the captain, and he tallies up the reports every day, so your folks could check the captain’s list. Then they’d even know which gate you went out, which might give them an idea where you’re going.”

Sirinita said, “My name’s Sirinita, and I’m just going out to find a place for my dragon. I’ll be back by nightfall.”

“Just Sirinita?”

“Sirinita of Ethshar. Except the neighbors call me Sirinita of the Dragon.”

“I can understand that.” The guard released her arm. “Go on, then.”

Sirinita had gone no more than three steps when the man called after her, “Wait a minute.”

“Now what is it?” she asked impatiently, turning back.

“What do you mean, ‘find a place for your dragon’?”

“I mean find somewhere he can live. He can’t stay in the city any more.”

“You don’t have any supplies.”

Sirinita blinked up at him in surprise. “Supplies?”

“Right, supplies. It’s a long way to anywhere it would be safe to turn a dragon loose.”

“It is?” Sirinita was puzzled. “I was just going to take him outside the walls.”

“What, on someone’s farm, or in the middle of a village?”

“No, of course not,” Sirinita said, but the guard’s words were making her rethink the situation. She probably would have just turned Tharn loose on someone’s farm.

But that wouldn’t be a good idea, would it?

“Um,” she said. “I’m going to take him to my grandfather, I’m not going to turn him loose.”

Her grandfathers both lived in the city — one was a Seagate merchant, the other owned a large and successful carpentry business in Crafton — but she didn’t see any reason to tell the guard that.

“Your grandfather’s got a farm near here?”

Sirinita nodded.

The guard considered her for a moment, then turned up an empty palm. “All right,” he said. “Go ahead, then.”

“Thank you.” She turned eastward once again, and marched out of the city.

She wondered what sort of supplies the guard had meant. Whatever they were, she would just have to do without them. It couldn’t be that far to somewhere she could turn Tharn loose.

She looked out across the countryside, expecting to see a few farms and villages — she had seen pictures, and had a good idea what they should look like, with their half-timbered houses and pretty green fields.

What she actually saw, however, was something else entirely.

The road out of the city was a broad expanse of bare, hard-packed dirt crossed here and there with deep, muddy ruts. A few crude houses built of scrap wood were scattered around, and people stood or crouched in doorways, hawking goods and services to passersby — goods and services that were not allowed in the city, and Ethshar was a fairly tolerant place.

A hundred yards from the city the farms began — not with quaint cottages and tidy little fields, but with endless rows of stubby green plants in black dirt, and rough wooden sheds set here and there. The only roads were paths just wide enough for a wagon.

Sirinita was surprised, but walked on, Tharn at her heels.

She was still walking, hours later, when the sun sank below the hills she had already crossed. She was dirty and exhausted and miserable.

She had finally reached farms that more or less resembled those in the pictures, at any rate — not so clean or so charming, but at least there were thatched farmhouses and barns, and the fields no longer stretched unbroken to the horizon.

But she hadn’t reached forests or mountains or even a fair-sized grove. The only trees were windbreaks or orchards or shade trees around houses. As far as she could see, from any hilltop she checked, there were only more farms — except to the west, of course, where she could sometimes, from the higher hills, still see the city walls, and where she thought she could occasionally catch the gleam of sunlight on the sea.

And everything smelled of the cow manure the farmers used as fertilizer.

The World, she thought bitterly, was obviously bigger than she had realized. No wonder her father’s trading expeditions lasted a month at a time!

Tharn had not enjoyed taking so long a walk, either; he was a healthy and active young dragon, but he was still accustomed to taking an afternoon nap, to resting when he felt like it. He had not appreciated it when his mistress had dragged him along, and had even kicked him when he tried to sleep.

When the sun went down, he had had enough; he flopped onto a hillock, mashing some farmer’s pumpkin vines, and curled up to sleep.

Sirinita, too exhausted for anger or protest, looked down at him and started crying.

Tharn paid no attention. He slept.

When she was done weeping, Sirinita sat down beside her dragon and looked about in the gathering gloom.

She couldn’t see anyone, anywhere. They weren’t on a road any more, just a path through somebody’s fields, and she couldn’t see anything but half-grown crops and the shadowy shapes of distant farmhouses. Some of the windows were lighted, others dark, but nowhere did she see a torch or signboard over a door — if any of these places were inns, or even just willing to admit weary travelers, she didn’t know how to tell.

She was out here in the middle of nowhere, miles from her soft clean bed, miles from her parents, her friends, everybody, with just her stupid dragon to keep her company, and it was all because he was growing too fast.

Tharn wouldn’t even stay awake so she could talk to him. She kicked him, purely out of spite; he puffed in annoyance, emitting a few sparks, but didn’t wake.

That was new; he hadn’t managed actual sparks before, so far as she could remember.

It didn’t matter, though. She wasn’t going any further with him. In the morning she was going to turn him loose, just leave him here and go home, maybe even slip away while he was asleep. If the farmers didn’t like having him around, maybe they’d chase him off to the wilderness, wherever it was.

And maybe they’d kill him, but at least he’d have a chance, and she just couldn’t go any farther.

Tharn breathed out another tiny shower of sparks, and a stench of something foul reached Sirinita’s nostrils; Tharn’s breath, never pleasant to begin with, was getting really disgusting — even worse than the cow manure, which she had mostly gotten used to.

Sirinita decided there wasn’t any need to sleep right next to the dragon; she wandered a few paces away, to where a field of waist-high cornstalks provided some shelter, and settled down for the night.

The next thing she knew was that an unfamiliar voice was saying, “I don’t see a lantern.”

She opened a sleepy eye, and saw nothing at all.

“So maybe she just burned a cornstalk or something,” a second voice said.

“I don’t even see a tinderbox,” the first replied.

“I don’t either, but what do I know? I saw sparks here, and here she is — it must’ve been her. Maybe she had some little magic spell or something — she looks like a city girl.”

“Maybe there was someone with her.”

“No, she wouldn’t be lying here all alone, then. No one would be stupid enough to leave a girl unprotected.”

The first voice giggled unpleasantly. “Not if they knew we were around, certainly.”