Chapter 21
Vormalt must not have heard their approach because, as the pillar continued gonging, he bent back to the hole he was digging beside the temple wall.
Or was he trying to dig down under the foundation?
Rylana couldn’t imagine why until he opened the pack beside him and drew out two glowing red orbs. The magical items Jildarin had sensed?
Vormalt pulled out a short wand with a tip that also glowed red and touched it to the side of one of the orbs. It started pulsing. He tucked the orb into the hole he’d excavated, then filled it in, covering the orb with rocks as well as dirt and tamping everything down.
With the second orb in hand, he grabbed his tools and pack and moved around to the far side of the temple. Soon, clinks and scrapes sounded again.
“Explosives?” Rylana whispered, having seen such magical items during the war.
Their creation took time, rare materials, and talented alchemists usually working with a glassblower, so they were expensive, and she hadn’t encountered them often. If anyone could afford to buy such things, Vormalt could, but to what end?
“Is he going to blow up the temple?” she asked. “That’s sacrilegious, not to mention criminal,” she added before recalling his belief that the new god didn’t exist.
Maybe it wasn’t sacrilegious. But even if it wasn’t, destroying public property was a criminal act.
And, from what she remembered of similar magical explosives, they were powerful.
What if he meant to blow up the whole island for some reason?
She spotted a rowboat drawn up onto the beach.
Maybe that would let him escape the area and detonate the explosives from afar.
“Perhaps the curse isn’t what’s been responsible for the fires,” Jildarin said softly.
Rylana barely heard the words over the continuing gongs of the pillar. She was tempted to ask him to speak louder, hardly caring if Vormalt heard them, since they ought to confront and stop him anyway.
“I doubt he’s been setting fires all over the city,” she said, though she was growing less and less confident that Vormalt wasn’t responsible for such lawless activities.
Was he truly going to blow up the temple?
Or was it a part of his blackmail plan? Even if all he was doing was blackmail, that was criminal too, she told herself.
“And there haven’t been any explosions that I’ve heard about.
Besides, he wouldn’t have been able to get into the elven enclave without an invitation. ”
“Perhaps.”
As the digging sounds continued, Rylana shook her head. She had to stop Vormalt before he got any further with his scheme. She took a step, but Jildarin grasped her wrist and held up a finger.
“Unless you have fern activities in mind,” she said, “I’m planning to stop him.”
“Someone else is coming.”
“This way, troops,” came a call from the direction of the boardwalk. Was that a gnomish voice?
Rylana stepped deeper into the trees to stand beside Jildarin, not wanting to be caught next to Vormalt when the authorities arrived. She didn’t need to be condemned as guilty by association.
The clinks and scrapes stopped. A moment later, Vormalt appeared around the corner of the temple with his tools put away and his pack slung over his shoulder.
Rylana bit her lip with indecision. What if he ran for the boat and escaped before the gnomes found him?
“Let’s stop him.” This time, when she moved away from the trees, Jildarin didn’t interfere.
But Vormalt headed toward the pillar, not the rowboat on the beach.
Was he going to plant a magical explosive underneath it too?
He didn’t have any more in his hands. All he did was stop next to the pillar and turn to look expectantly toward the main road where it came out of the trees.
The voices of the gnomes grew louder, and Rylana could pick out the thuds of heavy golem feet.
She hesitated before stepping out of the trees. Jildarin was behind her, but he was letting her take the lead now, and he waited to see what she would do.
Uniformed gnomes with lanterns came into view, fanning out around the observatory and wedding pavilion.
“Look for trouble,” their leader said. “Something has brought those dragons to the lake and gotten them agitated.”
“It has to be the curse, Lieutenant!”
“Even if the city is cursed, that shouldn’t make dragons come here to fight. And get close enough to make the pillars gong. We have a treaty with them. They usually leave Tranquility alone.”
“We don’t— Oh!” A startled gnome had noticed Vormalt.
He hadn’t been hiding, merely standing in the shadow of the pillar and waiting.
Rylana didn’t know what to make of his behavior. Would the peacekeepers figure out he was up to something and arrest him? She wished she’d gotten an opportunity to question him before they’d shown up. Not that his responses had been that enlightening the last time she’d questioned him.
“Who are you?” the gnome asked.
“Lord Vernest Vormalt,” he said, bowing toward the group.
“What are you doing out here at night?” The lieutenant looked around, as if expecting to find more people with Vormalt.
Rylana eased behind a tree again, though she believed the shadows hid her and Jildarin. They weren’t close enough for the lantern light to reach them.
“Waiting for someone,” Vormalt said.
“There are dragons flying around.”
“I did notice that, yes. I was afraid to abandon my meeting and travel back across the boardwalk lest one think me enticing prey.”
“Wise,” another gnome muttered.
“Who are you waiting for?” the leader asked.
“Lieutenant Wogmork,” a new male voice came from the road. Its owner also sounded gnomish but older. “You and your patrol have done a good job securing the area. Please turn off the pillar, and head back to town.”
“Er, Mayor Sedgewick?” the lieutenant asked.
“Yes, High Priest Miknog and I have a meeting on Lucky Island tonight.” The speaker stepped off the road and into view, a comrade—the priest?
—with him. He waved toward the pillar and Vormalt.
“After you’ve ensured there are no dragons on the island, please return to the city.
I don’t expect further trouble out here tonight. ”
Rylana did. She was beginning to guess what Vormalt was up to.
Jildarin tapped her on the shoulder and gestured for her to follow him farther back into the trees. She went with him, and they crouched down to watch and listen.
The head of one of the golems swiveled in their direction, and Rylana froze.
As magical beings, they might be able to detect other magical beings, such as a dragon, but she thought they simply obeyed orders and wouldn’t have the wherewithal to alert the gnomes to eavesdroppers. She thought that but wasn’t positive.
“Are you sure you don’t want me or some of my troops to stay, Mayor? High Priest?” the lieutenant asked as his troops searched the area. He was walking around the pillar, using his lantern to light others mounted near the observatory.
Fortunately, their illumination only brightened the structures, not the trees.
Rylana didn’t know what she would say if the peacekeepers stumbled upon her and Jildarin.
That they’d been frolicking in the ferns, she supposed, not that such activities would explain her soggy clothing. The dew wasn’t that dense.
Sedgewick looked at Vormalt. “Leave two golems at the boardwalk. We’ll call if we need them.”
“Yes, sir.”
Vormalt spread his arms, as if to say that was fine with him. Despite his height, he was more awkward than agile and hadn’t, as far as Rylana knew, ever trained as a fighter. He didn’t appear to be armed in any way—except with knowledge. That was what the mayor needed to worry about.
Before departing, the peacekeeper lieutenant walked up to the pillar, opened an access panel, and did something inside to turn off the alarm.
“Thank the new god,” the high priest murmured.
Sedgewick nodded. “I’m glad that one was able to be turned off. Not all of them have been working as designed.” He looked toward Vormalt. “I trust you know something about that.”
“I may.” Vormalt watched the peacekeepers, probably waiting for them to leave before he spoke. The troops were still searching the area, with a couple wandering around in the observatory and another pair checking the beach for who knew what. One paused and pointed toward the starry sky.
Jildarin shifted and looked up. Between the tree branches, one of the black dragons was visible flying past the island.
“Is that your aunt or your mother?” Rylana whispered.
“My aunt. My mother is busy communicating with the other dragons she brought along.”
“There are more dragons?” Rylana forced herself to keep her voice down—with the pillar no longer gonging, the night had grown quiet, and she could hear the waves lapping at a beach below the observatory.
“More females.”
“That are… looking to mate?” Rylana guessed. “Why are all the female dragons in the world after you, Jildarin? I know they like that you fought well in the war and can kick their asses, but…”
“It is not all of them,” he said dryly. “The two she brought along are the same two sisters that you met.”
“The sisters that tried to kill me? I don’t like them.”
“They are not my favorite females either.”
“Good. Why are they back?”
“Apparently, my mother led them to believe she would convince me to put aside my hobby, as she calls my culinary endeavor, for long enough to impregnate them.”
“Romantic.”
“We’ve discussed that romance is not a goal of dragons.” Jildarin shifted his weight, and his shoulder pressed against hers.
Once again, his warmth appealed to her, especially since she was still wet and cold.
She caught herself leaning into him. He didn’t pull away, and his body heat seeped through her damp clothing.
She hoped the meeting wouldn’t take long.
She was more than ready to return to the diner and change into dry clothes.