13

THE DRAGON WAS still sneezing in medium-sized puffs of flame. The man with the staff looked at it closely and shook his head. “That certainly is a dragon.” He made another pass with his staff.

The staff vanished, and the dragon stopped sneezing abruptly. The dragon looked extremely surprised; it sniffed a couple of times in an experimental way, as if it were expecting to start sneezing again any minute. I was surprised, too. I mean, wizards never let go of their staffs, not willingly, anyway.

The man bowed politely to the dragon. “I must apologize for inconveniencing you,” he said. “I offer you greetings and welcome to my home, and I wish you good fortune when you leave.”

“What?” said the dragon.

The man looked a little startled and peered at the dragon more closely. “Oh, I see,” he said after a moment. “Well, you’re welcome; come and make yourself comfortable.”

Shiara scowled at him and bent to pick up Nightwitch, who had come running toward her as soon as the flames had died. The dragon looked suspiciously at the man.

“I don’t like wizards,” it said. “And I don’t like people who put invisible things in the middle of my shortcut.”

“I am not a wizard,” the man said with a sigh. “And my tower has been here for years, and it isn’t invisible. Now, come in and talk. There hasn’t been a dragon by for a long time, and I’m a bit behind on the news.”

“If you’re not a wizard, who are you?” Shiara said, petting Nightwitch and glaring at the man.

“I’m a magician,” the man said. “And my name is Telemain.”

“Pleased to meet you,” I said.

“Mrrow,” said Nightwitch, and started purring loudly.

Telemain looked at the kitten, and suddenly he began to laugh. He had a nice laugh, sort of deep and friendly. I started thinking that I might be able to like him after all, even if his firewall had nearly burned me to a cinder.

“I don’t believe I have ever seen a group quite like this one,” Telemain said when he finished laughing. “Please, tell me who you all are.”

I introduced everyone, and Telemain nodded courteously to each of us. “Welcome to my home,” he said.

“Some welcome!” Shiara said. “You nearly got Daystar killed, and you started the dragon sneezing again. And how come the dragon was allergic to you if you aren’t a wizard?”

“Dragons aren’t allergic to wizards,” Telemain said, sounding surprised. “What gave you that idea?”

“I did!” the dragon said. It came forward and sat down emphatically, right next to me. “All dragons are allergic to wizards. I should know: I sneeze every time I get near one.” It eyed Telemain belligerently.

“Oh, I don’t doubt that at all,” Telemain said. “But I am afraid it isn’t wizards you’re allergic to; it’s their staffs. You stopped sneezing as soon as I got rid of mine, didn’t you?”

The dragon looked startled. “I did, didn’t I?” it said after a minute.

“If you aren’t a wizard, what are you doing with a wizard’s staff?” Shiara asked.

Telemain raised his eyebrows. “What business is it of yours, may I ask?”

“We’ve been having some trouble with wizards,” I said before Shiara could answer. I didn’t want her to make him angry; we had enough people mad at us already.

“Really,” Telemain said. He looked as if he were going to laugh again. “All of you?”

“Well, mainly just Shiara and me,” I said. “We’ve been sort of worried about them. Most of them are after Shiara,” I added.

“What would the Society of Wizards want with a fire-witch?” Telemain said. “I can see that I shall have to invite you in, if only to hear your tale.”

“How do you know about the society?” Shiara said angrily. “And why should we trust a wizard, anyway?”

“Anyone who knows much about magic can tell you’re a fire-witch, and the only reason I can think of for a fire-witch to have several wizards after her is if she has done something to offend the Society of Wizards,” Telemain said. He still sounded amused. “And for the third time at least, I am a magician, not a wizard.”

“What’s the difference?” Shiara demanded.

“Magicians deal with many ways of magic,” Telemain said. “Wizards with only one. Now, will you come in and sit down?”

Shiara was still looking at him doubtfully. Telemain smiled. “Will an oath content you? If you mean no harm, I am not your enemy, and I will do you no harm while you are my guests, save in self-defense. I swear by the sword.”

I felt a kind of popping at my side, even though I wasn’t touching the sword, and a ripple ran through the clearing, like a shimmer of light in the air. I thought it kept on going, out into the forest, but I couldn’t be certain. Shiara started and dropped Nightwitch, who landed on her feet with a yowl. The dragon stretched its neck; it looked almost as if it were trying to purr. Telemain suddenly looked very intense.

“That is the way of it, then?” he said when the ripple passed. “I don’t think I blame you for your caution.” He looked pointedly at my sword.

Shiara scowled again, but I thought she looked a little more doubtful than the last time. “If you’re so smart...” she began, and stopped. Nightwitch was rubbing against Telemain’s leg and purring. “Nightwitch?” said Shiara.

“An intriguing name for a cat,” Telemain said, bending over to pick up Nightwitch. “Even more interesting for a kitten. Where did you come by her?”

“She was a present,” Shiara said grudgingly. “From a witch named—”

“Morwen?” said Telemain. Nightwitch started to purr. “I suspected as much. Now, will you come in? Or do you wish to continue this discussion where anyone may hear?”

We went in. The door of Telemain’s home looked like an ordinary, normal-sized door, but it couldn’t have been because the dragon fit through it without any trouble. The room inside was made of stone and very bare. In the center of the floor were two iron staircases that twisted around each other in a spiral and disappeared into the ceiling. The whole place seemed much taller from the inside; if I hadn’t seen it before we came in, I would have been sure we were in a tower.

As the door closed behind the dragon, Telemain waved his hand. A table and three chairs materialized beside the stairs. “Sit down,” said Telemain, “and tell me more about yourselves.”

We sat down, except for the dragon, who sort of curled itself around the outer edge of the room. I started explaining about Mother and Antorell and everything that had happened in the Enchanted Forest. I wouldn’t have mentioned the Sword of the Sleeping King at all if I hadn’t been pretty sure from the way he looked at it that Telemain already knew something about it. Too many people seemed to be interested in it; I didn’t think it was a good idea to keep talking about it.

There wasn’t much I could do about Telemain, though. The questions he asked made it pretty clear that I was right: he did know something about the sword. Maybe more than I did; he sounded like he knew exactly what answers he expected, and when I told him about the voice that had said, “All hail the Bearer of the Sword,” he nodded in satisfaction.

Then I explained how Shiara and I had met, and why the wizards were after her, and about the one who’d tried to get us at the stream. Shiara frowned at me, but she didn’t interrupt. When I told him about meeting Morwen, Telemain seemed very interested. “I haven’t seen Morwen in years,” he said. “How is she?”

“You know Morwen?” Shiara said.

“We grew up together,” Telemain said shortly, and if Nightwitch hadn’t started purring again, there would have been an awkward silence.

After a minute, I cleared my throat and kept going. Telemain asked a lot of questions about the things the Sword of the Sleeping King had done, but he didn’t seem particularly interested in the wizards. He wasn’t interested in the Princess at all. Then I told him about finding the invisible castle and the fire-witch.

“So that’s how you knew about it,” Telemain said. “I was wondering about that.”

“That’s how we knew,” Shiara said. “How did you know?”

“The castle landed in my clearing sometime around noon,” Telemain said dryly. “I was understandably curious as to why someone would go to all the trouble of making a castle invisible and then drop it on top of a magician who can’t help noticing it.”

“It’s not there now,” Shiara said.

“Of course not! What would I want with an invisible castle? When I found no one home, I cleaned the place up a bit and got rid of it.”

“Cleaned it up?” I said, puzzled.

“The most recent owner had a number of unattractive habits,” Telemain said even more dryly than before. “Turning people into statues was one of them; there were others. I don’t believe you would be at all interested in the details.”

“Oh.” He was right; I didn’t really want to know about it. Telemain looked at Shiara again.

“I believe I owe you an apology,” he said. “I knew that the castle was the property of a fire-witch, and I’m afraid that when you showed up, I thought you had some connection with it.”

“Well, I don’t, but I suppose I can see why you might have gotten mad,” Shiara said. She sounded a lot friendlier than she had before; I think she would have been friendly to anyone who didn’t like that other fire-witch. Then she frowned. “How did the castle get into your clearing, anyway?”

Telemain shrugged. “As far as I can tell, it was designed to move around the Enchanted Forest more or less randomly. It’s a rather unusual spell to put on a castle, particularly an invisible one; it’s too easy to be outside when the castle moves, and get left behind.”

“Then why on earth would anyone put a stupid spell like that on a castle?”

“Presumably this fire-witch didn’t expect to have any problems finding the castle again. I don’t believe it occurred to her that someone else might find it first.” He smiled. “I left a few surprises for her; somehow, I doubt that she’ll be pleased.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” the dragon said. “Daystar got rid of her.”

Telemain looked at me. “Really. How did you manage that?”

“She threw some sort of spell at me, but Nightwitch scratched her, so she missed,” I said. “And after that, I had the sword out.”

“You used the Sword of the Sleeping King on a fire-witch?” Telemain said. He sounded somewhere between shocked and horrified.

“I couldn’t think of anything else that might work,” I said apologetically. “And it did work, sort of. I mean, it got rid of the fire-witch.”

“She went up in smoke,” the dragon said with considerable satisfaction. “I watched.”

“She went up in smoke,” Telemain repeated in tones of fascination. “And what were you doing while this was going on?”

“I was trying to hang on to the sword,” I said. “It was glowing red, and my hands felt like they were burning or something, so it was sort of hard to do. But as soon as the fire-witch was gone, it stopped.”

“You are extremely fortunate,” Telemain said. “I don’t recommend that you try that again. Stick to wizards; that’s what the sword was meant for.”

“It was?” said Shiara. “How do you know? What else does it do?”

Telemain looked at her. “Magicians know many kinds of magic.” He turned back to me. “Please, continue.”

I was curious about what the sword did, too, but Telemain obviously didn’t want to talk about it, so I didn’t ask. Instead, I explained about fixing Shiara and not finding the castle and meeting the second elf. Telemain listened carefully, then shook his head.

“So the war is beginning again,” he said, half to himself. “I had best make my own preparations.”

“War?” Shiara and I said together.

Telemain looked up, almost as if he had forgotten we were there. “The war between the dragons and the wizards,” he said in the tones of someone trying to be patient.

The dragon, who had been falling asleep, suddenly came awake. “War with the wizards?”

“What else can it be?” Telemain said a trifle crossly. “The elves are choosing sides, the dragons are restless, the wizards are coming into the Enchanted Forest in large numbers, and the Sword of the Sleeping King has returned. What more do you need to know? It is obvious!”

“What does the Sword of the Sleeping King have to do with a war between the dragons and the wizards?” I asked before the dragon could take offense.

“The sword is what started the war in the first place,” Telemain said, and then refused to say any more. “If Cimorene didn’t see fit to explain, I certainly won’t,” he said. “When you meet Kazul, I am sure she will tell you whatever you need to know. I’m afraid I don’t have time at the moment; I must see to things at once, if we are to win this war at last.”

“Who do you mean, ‘we’?” Shiara said suspiciously.

“The dragons,” Telemain said, “and the rest of us who follow the sword. Now, if you will excuse me?” He rose and started for the stairs.

“Wait a minute!” Shiara said. “What about us?”

“What? Oh, of course,” Telemain said. He waved his hand again and muttered something, and suddenly the table was full of plates and bowls of food. I jumped. Telemain didn’t seem to notice. “Help yourselves while I am gone,” he said. “I don’t expect to be long.”

He turned away and went up one of the iron staircases. Shiara and I looked at each other. “Now what do we do?” Shiara said.

“I think I’m going to eat,” I said. “Would you like something?”

Shiara snorted, but she reached for one of the bowls. There was plenty for all of us, including Nightwitch and the dragon. About the time we finished, Telemain came back.

“I was right,” he said to no one in particular. Then he looked at me. “I think you should all stay here for the night,” he said. “It will be much safer for everyone, and it will give me time to look into things a little more. You’ve been extremely lucky so far; there’s no reason to take any more chances until you must.”

I started to nod, then looked at Shiara. Shiara looked at me, then looked at Nightwitch, who was curled into a small ball on Telemain’s chair. She looked back at me. “Let’s stay, then,” she said.

“You will find rooms upstairs, on the second floor,” Telemain said. “Just pick one and go in.” He turned to the dragon. “I think you would be more comfortable down here.”

“I think you’re right,” said the dragon, eyeing the iron staircases a little dubiously.

“And thank you very much for your hospitality,” I said.

Telemain nodded. Shiara and I started for the stairs. Shiara got there ahead of me and started climbing, but she didn’t get anywhere. “What’s the matter?” I asked.

“There’s something wrong with this stupid staircase!” Shiara said. “I keep trying to climb up, but I don’t go anywhere!”

Telemain, who had been talking quietly to the dragon, turned. “I’m sorry; I should have warned you. You’ll have to take the other staircase. The one you’re trying to use only works going down.”

“That’s ridiculous!” said Shiara. “How can a staircase only work going in one direction?”

“He’s a magician,” I said.

“Oh, all right.”

We didn’t have any trouble getting up the other stairway. Telemain’s tower really was a lot taller than it looked from the outside, because the stairs kept going after they got to the second floor. Shiara and I didn’t climb any farther, though. We got off on the landing at the second floor and looked around.

We were standing on a narrow circle of wooden floor around the hole where the two staircases came through. Around the edge were six identical wooden doors. It looked even barer than the room below had when we arrived. “Well, he said to just go in,” Shiara said.

Each of us picked a door and opened it. The rooms on the other side were identical; they looked very comfortable and not at all bare. They each had a bed, a table, a lighted lamp in a bracket on the wall, a padded chair, and a small set of drawers with a mirror above it. Shiara looked thoughtful. “I wonder if he keeps lights going in all these rooms?”

“He might,” I said. “I mean, he is a magician. Does it matter?”

Shiara glared at me and went into the room she’d picked, slamming the door behind her. I stood there for a moment, wondering whether to knock on the door and apologize. I decided not to; I didn’t even know what to apologize for. I decided to wait until morning to talk to Shiara, since by then she probably wouldn’t be mad anymore.

I kept the Sword of the Sleeping King with me all night. It was a little uncomfortable sleeping that way, but I felt better knowing where it was. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Telemain; I was just getting more and more worried about the sword. Everyone I met seemed to know about it, or want to know about it, or something. I spent a lot of time thinking about it instead of sleeping.

Telemain served breakfast the next morning on his magic table. He was very quiet while we were eating, but as soon as we finished he looked at me and said, “I have watched the Enchanted Forest all night, and there are some things you should know, but I do not wish to detain you against your will.”

“What things?” Shiara demanded.

Telemain smiled slightly. “I fear you will have some difficulty in reaching the castle,” he said. “I found no less than twelve wizards searching the area between it and you.”

“Oh, great,” Shiara said disgustedly. “Just what we need: more wizards!”

“I don’t think it’s very good,” the dragon said. “Why do you?”

“I don’t,” Shiara said.

“Then why did you say so?”

“What can we do about them?” I asked Telemain.

“I think you can avoid them if you go through the Caves of Chance,” Telemain replied.