DW01 Dragonspawn by Mark Acres

desert tribesmen mingled in the streets with stout Heilesheimers who derived their living by trading grain, fine cloth, and baubles to the desert men in exchange for meat on the hoof, captured weapons, information about the relations of desert tribes and the contacts of merchants of other regions with them, and gold, silver, and gems from lands unknown. Merchants from all over Heilesheim sent traders to Laga to barter with the swarthy desert men within their black, flowing robes. The streets of Laga were narrow, winding, crowded alleys lined with the cloth-covered booths of Heilesheim merchants, traders, and farmers. They were also filled with thieves, sons of the poverty of a great trading city who prey on Heilesheimers and desert men alike.
    The day had been a torment, Valdaimon remembered. The sun, always bright over Laga, had beat down on the streets that day with unbearable vigor. The heat was so great that even the barefoot urchins of the city had congregated at the city’s fountains and pools to soak their feet in the tepid water, for the paving stones were so hot the skin would burn from walking on them. If the heat had not been bad enough, the wind had joined it to contribute to the city’s misery. It had been the hot, dry easterly wind off the desert, howling through the tunnels the folk of Laga called avenues, bearing on its back a load of swirling, stinging sand that crept into every nook, cranny, and crevice of every building and made its way inside the folds of every robe.
    Valdaimon had gone to Laga to find a certain desert shaman and sage, reputed to know by memory verses and incantations learned by his people a millennium ago in the Unknown Lands, the lands beyond the mountains, where no civilized man had ever ventured, no wizard ever scried, no bird ever flown. Perhaps, Valdaimon had thought, those verses and incantations contained final confirmation of what he had long suspected. Perhaps they would verify the secret Valdaimon believed in the depths of his being lay in the great treasure of Parona.
    Whether they did or not, Valdaimon never learned. He had been lying in his litter, the curtains drawn against the sun, heat, sand, noise, and the stench of the city, struggling to breathe the sandy air while four servants bore him down one of the city’s endless snaking streets. The air was hot and dry, his old lungs paper-thin, and his throat so dry and scratched from inhaling the ubiquitous sand that he was forced to swallow small globules of his own blood. In desperation the mage had extended his scrawny arm and hand and yanked back the shielding curtains.
    Just off to his right his eyes had seen a narrow, crowded, open square with one of the fountains in which the youngsters of Laga romped half nude. The old mage had kicked, thumped, and grunted, until the lackeys bearing his litter understood he wished to be carried to the fountain. Carefully, slowly, the bearers had picked their way through the crowd. Inside the litter, Valdaimon’s impatience had grown; his entire being was focused on his need for water to relieve his pain.
    At last the litter had come to a halt. The old wizard had parted the curtains with his great staff. The fountain was still several feet away, its base mobbed by playing children. In frustration, the mage had lashed out with his staff, striking the nearest adult to get the man’s attention.
    The man was stocky, naked to the waist against the heat of the day, his skin brown and his torso well-muscled. His hair was long and coal black, tied into a tail that fell far below his neck. A gold earring dangled from his left lobe, and a tiny diamond flashed from one of his gleaming white upper teeth. The man’s brown eyes had bored into Valdaimon’s face.
    “Water,” the old mage had managed to croak. “I need water.”
    “See,” the man had replied, kneeling and putting his arm around a young child, maybe five years old. “This old buzzard needs water. What say you, son? Shall we