“That’s it,” muttered Haplo, hearing the horn calls. He looked up from his hiding place in the wilderness, made a gesture to the dog. “All right. You know what to do. Remember, I just want one!”
The dog bounded off into the jungle, disappearing from sight in the thick foliage. Haplo, tense with anticipation, glanced around the coppice where he lay hidden. All was ready. He had only to wait.
The Patryn had not gone to the elven house with the rest of his shipboard companions. Making some excuse about performing repairs on his vessel, he had stayed behind. When he had seen them cross the large backyard, its moss blackened and charred from Lenthan’s rocketry experiments, Haplo had climbed over the ship’s hull to walk along the wooden “bones” of the dragon wing.
To walk the dragon wing. To risk everything, life included, to gain your goal. Where had he heard that saying? He seemed to recall Hugh the Hand mentioning it. Or had it been the elf captain whose ship the Patryn had “acquired”? Not that it mattered. The saying didn’t count for much with the ship parked securely on the ground, the drop beneath only about three feet instead of three thousand. Still, Haplo had thought, jumping down lightly to the ground, the sense of the saying was, at this moment, appropriate.
To walk the dragon wing.
He crouched in his hiding place, waiting, running over the runes he would use in his mind, fingering each like an elven jeweler searching for flaws in a string of pearls. The construct was perfect. The first spell cast would trap the creature. The second hold it, the third bore into its mind-what mind there was.
In the distance, the horn bleats grew louder and more chaotic, sometimes one would end in a horrible, gurgling cry. The elves must be battling their enemy, and the fighting was drawing near his position from the sounds of it. Haplo ignored it. If the tytans handled the elves the way they had handled the humans- and Haplo didn’t have any reason to suppose the elves would do any better-the fight wouldn’t last long.
He listened, straining, for another sound. There it came-the dog’s barking. It, too, was moving in his direction. The Patryn heard nothing else, and at first he was worried. Then he remembered how silently the tytans moved through the jungle. He wouldn’t hear the creature, he realized, until it was on him. He licked his dry lips, moistened his throat.
The dog bounded into the coppice. Flanks heaved, tongue lolled from its mouth, its eyes were wide with terror. Wheeling, it turned in the middle of the grove and barked frantically.
The tytan came close behind. As Haplo had hoped, the creature had been lured away from its fellows by the pesky animal. Entering the grove, it stopped, sniffed. The eyeless head revolved slowly. It smelled or heard or “saw” man.
The tytan’s giant body towered over Haplo, the eyeless head stared directly at the Patryn. When the tytan ceased movement, its camouflaged body blended almost perfectly into the background of the jungle. Haplo blinked, almost losing sight of it. For a moment, he panicked, but he calmed himself. No matter. No matter. If my plan works, the creature’ll be moving, all right. No doubt about that!
Haplo began to speak the runes. He raised his tattooed hands. The sigla seemed to glide off his skin and dance into the air. Flashing fiery blue and flaming red, the runes built upon themselves, multiplying with extraordinary speed.
The tytan gazed at the runes without interest, as if the creature had seen all this before and found it intensely boring. The tytan moved toward Haplo, the incessant question rattled in his head.
“Citadel, right. Where is the citadel? Sorry, I can’t take time to answer you right now. We’ll talk in just a few moments,” Haplo promised, backing up.
The rune construct was complete, and he could only hope it was working. He eyed the tytan closely. The creature continued coming toward him, its wistful pleading changing instantly to violent frustration. Haplo felt a qualm, his stomach clenched. Beside him, the dog whined in terror.
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