Bard's Oath Read Free Page B

between him and us. Stop worrying, Dun.”
    Dunric tugged at his ear, frowning. “The plow—? Oh, him. Why do you say he was a plowboy? I don’t think that horse was—”
    “Oh dear gods! Can’t you tell a plow horse when you see one, you ignorant oaf? Didn’t you see the feathers on its legs? That was just a Shamreen draft horse some fool was riding.” Tirael laughed in derision, then drawled, “If you’re going to be a nervous granny, Dunric, go somewhere else so you don’t bore me.”
    Dunric fell back, feeling his face burn. “Still,” he muttered under his breath, “that ‘plow horse’ was damned fast.”

One
    The following spring in Pelnar
    The Dragonlords came to the inn after a miserable day of riding in the rain. Water pooled among the cobblestones of the yard between inn and stable; the earth was so sodden it had nowhere to go.
    Linden swung down from Shan and stepped right into a puddle. Brown water lapped over his boot toes. He sighed in resignation; it wasn’t as if his boots—and Maurynna’s and Shima’s—weren’t already soaked through, but still … He heard Maurynna’s disgusted “Feh!” and knew she’d done the same.
    “Gods, but I’m sick of this rain,” she said. “If we don’t dry out soon, we’re going to turn into fishes.”
    Shima pushed back the hood of his cloak a little. “I don’t think I’ve seen as much rain in my entire life as we’ve had in the last tenday. I’m glad we’re stopping so early in the day.” He looked up at the leaden sky and grimaced. “If this keeps up, I’m going back to my desert in Nisayeh!”
    Even the Llysanyins looked disgusted as the little party waited for the grooms. The three stallions stood morosely, water dripping from the ends of their noses.
    “Hopefully it will end in the next day or so and we can wait out the rain here,” Linden said, eyeing the inn.
    It was a large one, and—to him—new, being only about fifty years or so old. Though he’d never had occasion to travel this particular route since the first timbers had gone up for the Gyrfalcon’s Nest, other Dragonlords had. “Damned fine ale,” Brock Hatussin, another Yerrin like Linden, had reported. “Even better wine and cider. Good food and plenty of it. And best of all, not only are the beds clean, they’re long enough for a Yerrin or a Thalnian.”
    For which I will thank the gods, Linden thought. Both he and Maurynna were fed up. The last few inns where they’d stopped, they’d had to sleep curled up like hedgehogs to keep their feet from hanging over the ends of the beds.
    Thinking that the grooms might not have realized that more travelers had arrived, he led the way toward the stable. “I’d really like to get inside and dry out as quickly as possible,” he said to his Llysanyin, Shan. “Will you go with the grooms when they come? Brock said that they know their business.”
    Shan snapped at a raindrop. Linden knew the stallion was as annoyed as he was with the turn the weather had taken a tenday ago. Before that, their journey from the College of Healers’ Gift in Pelnar had been pure pleasure. Up in the crispness of dawn, a leisurely ride in the morning coolness, then a long midday halt to avoid the worst of the summer heat, followed by another easy ride and a stop at an inn or a night spent under the stars: a traveler’s delight. Everyone had enjoyed it—until the cursed rain started.
    As they neared the stable door, it opened and a man bustled out, followed by two smaller figures so swaddled in their cloaks it was impossible to tell their age or sex.
    “Sorry, m’lords and lady,” the man said cheerfully, peering nearsightedly at them through the curtain of rain. “But a large party arrived a bit ahead of you and we’ve just finished with their animals. Luckily we’ve enough room left for your horses.” He beamed at each of them in turn.
    One potential disaster averted, thank the gods; Linden knew if Shan had to spend another night