Dragon Stones Read Free Page A

safely returned and our mounts are ready to leave, you will have your small, pretty daughter back unharmed.  If you refuse to serve us, if you work to thwart us, or if you set your friends against us, you will not have her back.  Am I clear?"
    "Don't be a fool," Ponn said.  "You cannot go to the islands.  The dragons will not tolerate—"
    The man raised his hand, palm out, forestalling Ponn's protestations.  "Am I clear , innkeeper?"
    They stared at each other.
    "Yes," Ponn said.  "You are clear."
    "Good.  Make your preparations quickly."  Gelt drained his cup, put it back on the table with a bang.  "We will leave at first light, two days hence."
     
    Adaran clung to the great bird's neck, buried his face in its feathers, and tried to pretend that he was on the ground.  The rushing wind and ceaseless beat of its wings continually reminded him that he wasn't; in fact, he and the others were thousands of feet in the air, their lives depending on the ability of these enormous, stupid avians to get them well away from the mountain before the dragon returned.
    His mount flew near the end of a train of seven overgrown eagles, all of them yoked together with drooping leather thongs, keeping them in rough formation behind the leader.  That bird carried their guide, one of Lord Dunshandrin's men, a grimy, reckless maniac who, Adaran believed, deliberately performed erratic aerial maneuvers to make the rest of them sick.
    The bird's feathers were beginning to smell like his own stale sweat.  He risked a glance behind him, at the last eagle in the line.  It carried the crystals they had taken from the dragon's lair.  He didn't know what Dunshandrin wanted them for; people who sat upon thrones rarely shared much information with those they retained to do their dirty work, and hirelings who asked too many questions tended to have bad accidents.  He did know that Dunshandrin had dispatched another group on a similar mission to Enshenneah, and another to the icy wastes of northern Yttribia; he and Redshen had tried to finagle an assignment to that expedition, thinking to visit their homeland of Madroval along the way, but Dunshandrin had insisted that their skills were needed here.
    Looking back didn't seem to make him need to vomit, so he ventured a look downward and discovered that they were nearer to the ground than he'd expected; in fact, they seemed to be descending toward a mountainside meadow, where a few small campfires burned among a knot of tents.  Relieved, he relaxed his grip, only to be thrown when the eagle made a rough landing.  He tumbled to the ground at its feet and was trampled by the avian bringing up the rear; fortunately it was still flapping its wings and he didn't receive its full weight, although its talons gave him a painful jab in the side.
    As he picked himself out of the dirt, one of Dunshandrin's men approached and helped him to his feet.  "Are you all right?" the man said, not trying to conceal his amusement.
    "I'm fine," Adaran said.
    "Are you sure?  You look a bit … downtrodden."
    Adaran eyed the birds.  They fluttered and preened a short distance away as the other riders dismounted in a more or less orderly fashion.  "That is no way for a man to travel.  Give me a fine horse, and leave the skies to the dragons."
    The soldier, evidently disappointed with this response, shrugged and drifted back toward the camp.  Adaran noticed that he had lost a dagger in his tumble; it lay on the ground at his feet.  He picked it up, hefted it, and aimed it at the soldier's back, then spun it around and sheathed it in his belt.
    He turned away, looking to the north, toward the dragon's lair.  He could not see her mountain, of course; it was lost in mist and distance, hidden behind other summits.  The ridge on which they had landed did not rise above the snow line, but the surrounding peaks did, the dark pines and barren rocks like flies on sugar.  The wind from the south felt stiff and chill,