It was also obscurely comforting to find the Hold occupied by a few drudges only. The other Thread fighters were hours away from the rewards he could now enjoy. While Ruth drank long and deep at the courtyard well, Jaxom asked a drudge to bring him any warm food available and a mug of wine.
As Jaxom entered his own quarters to change out of his stinking fighting gear, he passed his worktable and, seeing the cove sketch, remembered his promise of the previous evening. He thought longingly of the hot sun in that cove. It’d bake the cold out of his bones and dry the wetness in his head and chest.
I would like to swim in the water, Ruth said.
“You’re not too tired, are you?”
I am tired but I would like to swim in the cove and then lie in the sand. It would be good for you, too.
“It’d suit me down to the shell,” Jaxom said as he stripped off the fighting clothes. He was pulling on fresh riding furs when the drudge, tapping nervously on the half-open door, arrived with the food.
Jaxom gestured toward the worktable and then asked the man to take the discarded clothing to be cleaned and well aired. He was sipping the hot wine, blowing out against the sting of it in his mouth, when he realized that it would be hours before Lytol returned to the Hold and so he couldn’t inform his guardian of his intention. But he needn’t wait. He could be there and back before Lytol had returned to the Hold. Then he groaned. The cove was halfway on the other side of the world, and the sun which he had wanted to bake the illness out of his body would be well down now on the cove’s horizon.
It will remain warm enough long enough, Ruth said. I really want to go there.
“We’ll go, we’ll go!” Jaxom gulped down the last of the hot wine, and reached for the toasted bread and cheese. He didn’t feel hungry. In fact the smell of the food made his stomach queasy. He rolled up one of his sleeping furs, to keep the sand off his skin, slung the small pack over his shoulder and started out of his quarters. He’d leave word with the drudge. No, that wasn’t sufficient. Jaxom whirled back to his table, the pack banging against his ribs. He wrote a quick note to Lytol and left it propped up between mug and plate where it was clearly visible.
When are we going? Ruth asked, plaintive now with his impatience to be clean and to wallow in the warm sands.
“I’m coming. I’m coming!” Jaxom detoured through the kitchens, scooping up some meatrolls and cheese. He might be hungry later.
The head cook was basting a roast and the smell of it, too, made him feel nauseated.
“Batunon, I’ve left a message for Lord Lytol in my room. But, if you see him first, tell him I’ve gone to the cove to wash Ruth.”
“Thread is gone from the sky?” Batunon asked, ladle poised above the roast.
“Gone to dust, all of it. I’m away to wash the stink from both our hides.”
The yellow tinge in Ruth’s whirling eyes was reproachful but Jaxom paid that no heed as he scrambled to the dragon’s neck, loosely fastening the fighting straps which would need to be soaked and sunned as well. They were airborne in such haste that Jaxom was glad he had the straps about him. Ruth achieved only the barest minimum of wing room before he transferred them between.