The Abbot appeared highly pleased and gratified at her departure. The mysteriarch had disturbed his Abbey with her imperious demands, caused a stir among the brethren, brought too much of the world of the living into one devoted to the dead. He himself escorted Iridal up the stairs, through the Abbey, and out the front entrance. He promised that Hugh would be sent out to meet her, if he could walk, carried if he could not. Perhaps the Abbot was not sorry to rid himself of this troublesome guest as well.
Iridal bowed, expressed her thanks. She hesitated, wanting to remain nearby, in case Hugh needed her help.
But the Abbot, clutching the purse, did not go back inside the Abbey. He waited beneath the glowlamp, intending to make certain that the woman was truly leaving.
Iridal had no recourse, therefore, but to turn and depart the Abbey grounds, make her way back to her slumbering dragon. Only then, when the Abbot saw her with the dragon, did he turn and stalk into the Abbey, slam shut the door.
Looking back, Iridal wondered what to do, wished she knew what Hugh had planned. She decided that the best thing she could do was awaken the dragon, have it ready to carry them speedily away from this place.
Waking a slumbering dragon is always a tricky maneuver, for dragons are independent by nature, and if the beast woke up free of the spell that enthralled it, it might decide to fly away, attack her, attack the Abbey, or a combination of all three.
Fortunately, the dragon remained under enchantment. It emerged from sleep only slightly irritated at being awakened. Iridal soothed and praised it, promised it a treat when they returned home.
The dragon stretched its wings, lashed its tail, and proceeded to inspect its scaly hide for signs of the tiny and insidious dragon-wyrm, a parasite fond of burrowing beneath the scales and sucking the dragon’s blood.
Iridal left it to its task, turned to watch the Abbey entrance, which she could see from her vantage point. She was just beginning to be anxious, more than half-afraid that Hugh might have changed his mind. She was wondering how to cope if he had, for the Abbot would most certainly not let her return, no matter what dire magics she threatened.
Then Hugh burst out the front door, almost as if he had been shoved from behind. He carried a bundle in one arm—a cloak and clothes for the journey, no doubt—and a bottle of wine in the other. He fell, caught himself, glanced backward, said something it was probably just as well Iridal couldn’t hear. Then he straightened, stared around, obviously wondering where she was.
Iridal lifted her arm, waved to draw his attention, called out to him.
Perhaps it was the sound of her voice—startlingly loud in the clear, frosty night—or her sudden movement. She never knew. Something jolted the dragon out of its enchantment.
A shrill shriek rose behind her, wings flapped, and, before she could stop it, the dragon had taken to the air. The dragon’s disenchantment was nothing more than a minor annoyance for a mysteriarch. Iridal had only to recast a very simple spell, but, to do so, she was forced to turn her attention away from Hugh for a few moments.
Unfamiliar with the intrigues and machinations of the royal court, it never occurred to Iridal that the distraction was deliberate.
CHAPTER 24
KIR MONASTERY
VOLKARAN ISLES
MID REALM
HUGH SAW THE DRAGON TAKE TO THE AIR, KNEW IMMEDIATELY THAT IT had slipped the reins of its enchantment. He was no magus. There was nothing he could do to help Iridal recapture it or cast a spell on it. Shrugging, he pulled the cork of the wine bottle out with his teeth and was about to take a drink when he heard a man’s voice, speaking to him from the shadows.
“Make no sudden movement. Give no indication you hear me. Walk over this direction.”
Hugh knew the man, searched to give the voice a name and a face, but failed. The wine-soaked months of self-imposed captivity had drowned the memory. He could see nothing in the darkness. For all he knew, an arrow was nocked and aimed at his heart. And though he sought death, he sought it on his own terms, not on someone else’s. He wondered briefly if Iridal had led him into this ambush, decided not. Her anxiety over that kid of hers had been too real.