The Eyes of the Dragon(71)

"I don't understand you, my Lord."

"Neither do I, Dennis. Neither do I. Do you know what day this is?"

Dennis blinked at this sudden change in direction, but an-swered readily enough. "Yes-Tuesday."

"Tuesday. Good. Now I'm going to ask you a question that my cursed intuition tells me is very important. If you don't know the answer-even if you are not sure-for the gods' sake, say so! Are you ready for the question?"

"Yes, my Lord," Dennis said, but he wasn't sure that he really was. Peyna's piercing blue eyes under the wild tangle of his white brows had made him very nervous. The question was apt to be very difficult indeed. "That is, I think so."

Peyna asked his question, and Dennis relaxed. It didn't make much sense to him-it was only more nonsense about the napkins, as far as he could see-but at least he knew the answer, and gave it.

"You're sure?" Peyna persisted.

"Yes, my Lord."

"Good. Then here is what I want you to do."

Peyna spoke to Dennis for some time, as the three of them stood in the chilly sunshine in front of the "retirement cottage" where the old judge would never come again. Dennis listened earnestly, and when Peyna demanded that he repeat the instructions back, Dennis was able to do it quite neatly.

"Good," Peyna said. "Very, very good."

"I'm glad I've pleased you, sir."

"Nothing about this business pleases me, Dennis. Nothing at all. If Ben Staad is with those unfortunate outcasts in the Far Forests, I mean to send him away from relative safety and into danger because he may be of some use to King Peter. I'm sending you back to the castle because my heart tells me there's something about those napkins he asked for... and the dollhouse... something. Sometimes I think I almost have it, and then it dances out of my grasp again. He did not ask for those things idly, Dennis. I'd wager my life on that. But I don't know." Peyna abruptly slammed his fist down on his leg in frustration. "I am putting two fine young men into terrible danger, and my heart tells me I am doing the right thing, but I... don't... know... WHY!"

And inside the man who had in his heart once condemned a boy because of that boy's tears, the stranger laughed and laughed and laughed.

88

The two old men parted from Dennis. They shook hands all around; then Dennis kissed the judge's ring, which bore the Great Seal of Delain on its face. Peyna had given up his judge-General's bench, but had not been able to part with the ring, which to him summed up all the goodness of the law. He knew he had made mistakes from time to time, but he had not allowed them to break his heart. Even over this last and greatest of mistakes, his heart did not break. He knew as well as we in our own world do that the road to hell is paved with good intentions-but he also knew that, for human beings, good intentions are sometimes all there are. Angels may be safe from damnation, but human beings are less fortunate things, and for them hell is always close.

He protested Dennis's act of kissing his ring, but Dennis insisted. Then Arlen shook Dennis's hand and wished him speed o' the gods. Smiling (but Peyna could still see the fear lurking in Dennis's eyes), Dennis wished them the same. Then the young butler turned east, toward the castle, and the two old men headed west, toward the farmstead of one Charles Reechul. Reechul, who raised Anduan huskies for a living, paid the grinding taxes the King had imposed without complaint, and was thus considered loyal... but Peyna knew that Reechul was sympathetic to the exiles encamped in the Far Forests, and had helped others reach them. Peyna had never expected to need Reechul's services himself, but the time had come.

The farmer's eldest daughter, Naomi, drove Peyna and Arlen north on a sled pulled by twelve of the dogger's strongest huskies. By Wednesday night, they reached the edge of the Far Forests.

"How long to the camp of the exiles?" Peyna asked Naomi that night.

Naomi cast the thin, evil-smelling cigar she had been smoking into the fire. "Two more day if the skies keep fair. Four more days if it snows. Maybe never, if it blizzards."

Peyna turned in. He drifted off to sleep almost at once. Logic or illogic, he was sleeping better than he had in years.

The weather kept clear the next day, and on Friday as well. At dusk of that day-the fourth since Peyna and Arlen had parted from Dennis-they reached the small huddle of tents and makeshift wooden huts for which Flagg had searched in vain.

"Ho! Who comes, and can you say the password?" a voice called. It was strong, sturdy, cheerful, and unafraid. Peyna recognized it.

"It's Naomi Reechul," the girl called, "and the password two weeks ago was 'tripos.' If it's not that now, Ben Staad, then put an arrow through me and I'll come back and haunt you!"

Ben appeared from behind a rock, laughing. "I'd not dare meet you as a ghost, Naomi-you're fearsome enough "live!"

Ignoring this, she turned to Peyna. "We've come," she said.

"Yes," Peyna said. "So I see."

And I believe it's well that we have... because something tells me that time has grown short... very short indeed.

89

Peter had the same feeling.

By Sunday, two days after Peyna and Arlen reached the camp of the exiles, his rope would still, by his calculations, finish up thirty feet short of the ground. This meant that when he dangled from the end of it with his arms fully extended, he would face a drop of at least twenty-one feet. He knew that he would be wiser by far to go on with his rope for another four month seven another two. If he dropped from the rope, fell badly, and broke both of his legs so that the Plaza guards found him groaning on the cobbles when they made their round-o'-the-clock, he would have wasted more than four years, simply because he did not have the patience to pursue his labor another four months.