Dragon's Treasure by Elizabeth A. Lynn Read Free Book Online

other thing he was, a being of glitter and flame.
    Her hand trembled in his. He opened his fingers.
    They left the cottage. The sky was a bright pale blue. The dragon-lord turned to climb the ridge. Morga, tail flying like a flag, frisked playfully ahead of him.
    "Morga, no," he told her. "Stay with thy mistress." The black dog's tail drooped. She retreated, to stand at Maia's knee. He turned once, halfway up the slope, to look back. Then he reached the crest of the hill. Lightning flashed along the ridgetop.
    The Golden Dragon rose from the hillside. His vast bright wings beat. A hot dry wind seared the pliant grasses. His shadow swept over her.
    Then the shadow lifted, and he was gone.
     
    * * *
     
    In the province of Nakase, two weeks' ride from Dragon Keep, Treion Unamira watched a village burning.
    Its name was Alletti. It was scarcely big enough to be called a village: it had a scant thirteen houses, along with a mill, a cobbler's shop, and a forge. The smith mended wheels, doctored sick horses, forged plowshares, and repaired the holes in kettles. It also had an inn, where travelers stayed while the smith repaired the wagons and the cobbler mended frayed tack. They drank the local liquor, which the miller brewed in a shed behind his house, and sometimes slept a night or two in the inn's lice-ridden rooms.
    Treion had brought his men into town, as was his custom, at sunset. The town's constable looked at twenty armed, horsed men and at the confident face and ready sword of their leader, and offered no resistance.
    But the grey-bearded innkeeper had loudly proclaimed what anyone could see was not true, that he had no money.
    Treion hung him for the lie from the oak outside his own front door. When the innkeeper's wife foolishly refused to give up the strongbox, he had said, "Burn it down." The insect-ridden wood burned easily, fueled by the gouts of liquor his men had splattered. The fire had spread to the mill. The villagers had tried to save it; his men had killed three of them, including the miller, and now the rest stood glumly silent.
    Treion stared into the fire. Fires were better at night. The sight and sound of flames burning into darkness brought a rush of pleasure to his blood.
    He had always loved fire. As a child he had spent long hours gazing into the kitchen fires, speaking to them, certain that if he could only find the right words he could make the dancing flames obey his thought.
    It had happened, once. Riding through the dry forest, as flames roared around him and a dragon soared overhead, he had spoken to the encircling fire, and it had let him and his followers pass through unharmed. He remembered the exhilaration and terror of that moment. Staring into the flames, he spoke to them again now, willing them to hear.... Awake! Arise! But nothing happened.
    He watched the red blaze fall in upon itself. Edric arrived at his elbow.
    "We found the money." He brandished a leather pouch. "It was under the stairs. It's mostly silver. Stupid, to die for a sack of coins with Alf Ridenar's ugly mug on them. You want us to keep looking?"
    They had been here too long already. "No."
     
    * * *
     
    They camped that night in one of their best hiding places: a huge cavern, easily large enough to hold them all.
    A narrow, nearly invisible trail led to its entrance. Others had used it before them: they had found bits of metal and cloth and old glass fragments scattered about the place. An elaborate system of smoke holes—impossible to say whether they had been created by happenstance or design—sent smoke entirely in the opposite direction from the cave's mouth.
    Treion sat in his usual place, cleaning his sword. Firelight glittered on the steel. It was a good sword, of Ippan steel, which was nearly as good as Chuyo steel. He had taken it from Evard diScala's armory the day he left Arriccio. Someday, maybe, he would have a Chuyo blade. In the depths of the cave, the men were buoyant with drink, and because they had