Quag Keep by Andre Norton Read Free Book Online

lizardman croaked out barely understandable words in the common tongue.
    â€œDesert—a desert ready to swallow any venturing into it.” His expression could not change, but there was a certain tone in his croaking which suggested that he repudiated any plan that would send them into that fatal, trackless wilderness.
    Hystaspes frowned at the map. “We cannot be sure. There is only one who might hold the answer, for these mountains are his fortress and his range. Whether he will treat with you—that will depend upon your skill of persuasion. I speak of Lichis, the Golden Dragon.”
    Memory, the new memory, supplied Milo with identification. Dragons could be of Chaos. Such ones hunted men as men might hunt a deer or a forest boar. But Lichis, who was known to have supported Law during thousands of years of such struggles (for the dragons were the longest lived of all creatures) must have a command of history that had become only thin legend as far as men were concerned. He was, in fact, the great lord of his kind, though he was seldom seen now and had not for years taken any part in the struggles that swept this world. Perhaps the doings of lesser beings (or so most human kind would seem to him) had come to bore him.
    Wymarc hummed and Milo caught a fragment of the tune. “The Harrowing of Ironnose,” a saga or legend of men, once might have been true history of a world crumbled now into dust and complete forgetfulness. Ironnose was the Great Demon, called into being by early adepts of Chaos, laboring for half a lifetime together. He was intended to break the Law forever. It was Lichis who roused and did battle. The battle had raged from Blackmoor, out over Great Bay, down to the Wild Coast, ending in a steaming, boiling sea from which only Lichis had emerged.
    The Golden Dragon had not come unwounded from that encounter. For a long time he had disappeared from the sight of men, though before that disappearance, he had visited the adepts who had given Ironnose being. Of them and their castle was left thereafter only a few fire-scorched stones and an evilaura that had kept even the most hardy of adventurers out of that particular part of the land to this very day.
    â€œSo we seek out Lichis,” Ingrge remarked. “What if he will have no word with us?”
    â€œYou”—Hystaspes swung to Naile—“that creature of yours.” Now he pointed the staff at the pseudo-dragon curled against the berserker’s thick neck just above the edging of his mail, as if it had turned into a torque, no longer a living thing. Its eyes were mere slits showing between scaled lids. And its jaws were now firmly closed upon that spear-pointed tongue. “In that creature you may have a key to Lichis. They are of one blood, though near as far apart in line as a snake and Lichis himself. However—” Now he shrugged and tossed the ivory rod behind him, not watching, as it landed neatly on a tabletop. “I have told you all I can.”
    â€œWe shall need provisions, mounts.” Yevele’s thumb again caressed her lower lip.
    Hystaspes’s lips twisted. Perhaps the resulting grimace served the wizard for a smile of superiority.
    The elf nodded, briskly. “We can take nothing from you, save that which you have laid upon us—the geas.” With that part of Power Lore born into his kind, he appeared to perceive more than the rest of their company.
    â€œAll I might give would bear the scent of wizardry.” Hystaspes agreed.
    â€œSo be it.” Milo held out his hand and looked down at the bracelet. “It would seem that it is now time for us to test the worth of these and see how well they can serve us.” He did not try to turn any of the dice manually. Instead he stared at them, seeking to channel all his thought into one command. Once, inthat other time and world, he had thrown just such dice for a similar purpose.
    The sparks which marked their value