Chapter 8
Daylight permeated the windows of the storeroom by the time Rylana woke up.
The scents of coffee-rubbed bacon—her favorite—quiche, pancakes and syrup, and sautéing vegetables wafted back to her.
With her mouth watering, she took care of her biological needs and dressed quickly, certain Jildarin had returned.
Tired after cleaning up as much of the mess as had been practical by lantern light, she’d slept hard and hadn’t heard anyone come in. It was a good thing the intruder hadn’t been the one to return.
“Greetings, my business partner,” Jildarin said as Rylana entered the kitchen.
If he was tired from whatever had kept him out late, he didn’t show it. His errand had probably been more appealing than cleaning a ransacked storeroom. No, that might not be true. If, as she’d been thinking, he’d visited her father, that wouldn’t have been a delightful time.
“Good morning, Jildarin. Sorry about the mess in your lair. Someone broke in while I was at the market. I tried to sweep up the oats and flour so they wouldn’t stick to your scales, but I might need the help of Gniknik and his cleaning contraption when he comes in.”
“You are most thoughtful. I was perturbed when I returned and caught an unfamiliar scent lingering in the storeroom and saw that my ingredients had been disturbed.”
“Was it the scent of a couple of dwarves searching for a hunting horn?”
“It is difficult to tell what a person might be seeking simply by the odor that lingers after their passing. I am not even certain of the species of the intruder, as dwarves living in the city don’t smell particularly different from equally urban humans and orcs and elves and such.
” Jildarin plucked up tongs and offered her a hot piece of bacon.
“Do dwarves living in tunnels smell different?” Rylana accepted the bacon and chomped into it. Oh, yes. All she needed was a hot cup of coffee to go with it, and she would be ready to face the day.
“Like their surroundings, yes. Ore and rock, and sometimes brimstone and molten lava.”
“Those sound like the ingredients of an interesting cologne.”
“I believe it was a female who intruded. There are variations in the scents between the sexes that a dragon’s nose can detect.”
“There was a female dwarf following me in the market.” Rylana grabbed a plate to fill with hot food and explained what had happened with the horn the night before. Once again, she felt guilty that his diner had been put in danger—or at least vandalized—because of something intruding from her life.
“How unexpected that a simple tool lost in the forest for centuries would draw the attention of so many,” he said.
“Maybe it was stashed in the woods rather than lost. Even if the story those two dwarves told wasn’t true, I think someone hid it in that log. It’s not like it would have tucked itself away so nicely if it had fallen out of someone’s pack.”
“Yes, I believe that is correct. Also, Calling Rock has been a landmark for as long as intelligent species have lived in and visited this area. The horn may have been placed near it intentionally so it would be easier to find later.” Jildarin took two more pieces of bacon from the pan and placed them atop the mound of delicious food she’d prepared for herself.
She’d already put several strips on the plate, but she didn’t object to more, merely beaming a smile at him before sitting at the table.
She was about to tell him about the dragon sisters, but Sylin walked in first, carrying her gnomish vacuum flask as well as a to-go cup, which she offered to Rylana.
“Is that a latte?” Rylana accepted it gratefully.
“Despite my aversion to seeing a delicious and robust dark roast degraded by the addition of milk and sugar, I did suggest to Vilma that you would enjoy your usual.”
“I adore you.”
“Were that true, you wouldn’t have set me up with that overly loquacious and solipsistic dragon.” Sylin eyed Jildarin, perhaps wondering if he would be offended by her description of his brother.
He merely looked at Sylin and said, “The front door is locked since the breakfast service doesn’t start for ten more minutes.”
“I came in through the back.”
His gaze shifted to Rylana before he bent to take a quiche out of the oven. “You are certain it was a dwarf female who ransacked the storeroom?”
“No, but I know it wasn’t Sylin. She wouldn’t do anything to risk the ire of her favorite chef and deliverer of breakfast.”
“Absolutely true. But what was ransacked? And why?” Sylin placed two silver coins on the counter and grabbed a plate.
Rylana summed up finding the mess.
“Maybe it was the dragon sisters,” Sylin suggested.
“I doubt they need an antique dwarven horn.”
“No, but they clearly want to intimidate you.”
“They would have flamed my underwear, not tossed it atop a crate.”
“Foxvonla and Loxvonla were here?” Frowning, Jildarin turned from his cooking to face them again. “In the city?”
“Yes, I was about to get to that part of the story.” Rylana explained the rest of her eventful shopping trip.
“You did not think they were more important to inform me about than a horn with glowing ale mugs?” Shoulders growing tense, Jildarin stalked about the kitchen, stirring and cutting with palpable irritation.
“That they continue to threaten you is intolerable. Also, it is clear that they waited until I departed from the city to do so. Had I sensed them, I would have driven them off. They fear to face me. Do they think I will mate with them if they harm or slay my business partner? I would be furious and slay them.”
“Any chance you’d like to do that preemptively?” Rylana asked, though she didn’t truly expect Jildarin to kill dragons from a clan aligned with his. It would really irk his mother if he did that, especially when their focus was apparently on repopulating the decimated dragon species.
Jildarin exhaled a growl and faced her. “They are vexing me enough that I am tempted. I should have taken you with me last night, but I am… I did not expect… I hadn’t planned to travel away from the lake.”
“Where did you go?” Rylana asked.
“On an errand.” Jildarin waved vaguely, then returned to cutting. Thunk, thunk, thunk went his knife. Who would have thought spring onions needed such aggressive blade work to be sliced acceptably?
“Did it have anything to do with my father? I wondered if you might have visited him for… some reason.” Rylana hesitated to admit she’d been reading his book—and his underlined passages. It felt a bit like eavesdropping. Of course, she’d been doing that too.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.
“I don’t think successful couples are supposed to withhold information from each other,” Sylin said in a bland tone between bites of quiche.
“You being an expert on relationships,” Rylana said.
In the more than ten years that she’d worked with Sylin, Rylana had never seen her involved in more than the very occasional one-night fling.
“I’ve observed others in them,” Sylin said. “And I’ve read many books.”
“I know that latter is true. Non-book-readers hardly ever throw around terms like solipsistic.”
“I had a lot of time to think of creative words to describe Zilek while he was speaking.”
Jildarin set down his knife and faced Rylana. “I will speak to you of my errand when the elf princess leaves. It is not my desire to withhold information from my… business partner.” He frowned at Sylin. “But dragons do not speak of personal matters in front of others.”
“I can go eat breakfast in the dining room if you two want to chat.” Sylin pointed her thumb toward the hallway. Voices out there suggested Zalani and Gniknik had arrived for the day.
“Do so,” Jildarin said at the same time as Rylana held up a finger and said, “Wait. I’m trying to figure out what to do with this horn.”
Since Sylin had been helping her on the quest thus far, Rylana wouldn’t mind hearing her opinion before she left. Especially since Jildarin had been dismissive of it and its glowing ale mugs.
“Give it to your brother promptly,” Sylin said, her eyes glinting with amusement. “He was the one who tried to get you evicted, right? Let the dwarves ransack his home.”
Rylana scratched her jaw, a little wistful at the idea.
“You should find out if it truly belongs to the dwarven king,” Jildarin surprised her by saying.
“How could I do that? I don’t even know his name.”
“King Ekton,” Jildarin supplied, then tapped the handle of a spoon to his jaw, a thoughtful expression crossing his face.
“I don’t suppose you’d like to fly me to the mountains to visit him?” Rylana asked.
“Dwarves live deep underground and have sentries and magical explosives and other deterrents guarding the entrances of their cities.” He slanted her a sidelong look. “Further, they allied with humans during the Ore War.”
“Meaning that you could fly me to the mountains but not get me in to see him?”
“Correct. You might have better luck sending a letter to him—or whatever lackey handles his mail. There is, I believe, regular postal service from Tranquility to the dwarven settlements in the Icefang Mountains.”
“Probably. They ship a lot of ore out of the ports here, so there are a lot of wagons that go back and forth. I know my father has a big account with the dwarves in their capital. Hm. I do have that drawing of the horn that I could send with a letter.” Rylana wondered what the odds were that the king would read mail from a random human in a city a hundred miles away.
His lackey would probably toss it in a trash bin.
“I could put my surname on it. That might get it read, especially if the king is aware of the means by which they ship their cargoes. You’d think he would be, wouldn’t you? ”
“Does everybody do business with your family?” Sylin asked.
“Everybody who has something to ship.”
“I guess I knew that based on the fact that every freighter that docks here has that Sun Whale harpoon logo on its hull. I’ve heard your surname mentioned often as I’ve walked around the city.”