The Serpent by David Drake

Author:David Drake [Drake, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: sort4
ISBN: 9781982125578
Google: YRX0zQEACAAJ
Publisher: Baen
Published: 2021-07-06T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

Going Home

We left Allingham as quickly as I could. I was eating slabs of ham and cheese between halves of a crusty roll. Sam had eaten but he was carrying along the hambone, which I knew from experience he would demolish overnight. He had jaws that didn’t quit and he was still a young dog with perfect teeth.

Allingham seemed a perfectly nice place now that the Duke was gone. The whole business had given me a sour feeling, but that was what being a Champion was all about: dealing with bullies who preyed on other people. Duke Ronald hadn’t been a bad example of the type, but the whole breed had to be stopped. Otherwise people would grow up believing that if you had the strength to do it, you could take anything you wanted. Without the rule of law there could be no safety and no progress: if you created something, somebody else might just take it away because they wanted it.

In a way that was worse than monsters from the Waste. The monsters were destructive but random. People like the Duke and his daughter took exceptional items that other humans had created or found with difficulty, reducing the willingness of ordinary people like me to prospect the Waste or rebuild the rare wonders that they found there.

I was very tired when we reached Elvira and I think Sam was wearing down as well. I’d decided when we left Allingham that if Baga wasn’t ready to go back when I arrived I was going to return to Dun Add by myself. I’d buy him a dog of some sort so that Baga would be able to follow when he felt he was ready to. Now…I was thinking that relaxing at Mistress Sarah’s farm might be a pretty good idea.

“Hello the house!” I shouted as we walked through landingplace. I hadn’t been aware of much when I arrived the first time, breath burning in my lungs and my legs wobbly from the effort of carrying Baga from where we’d met the termites. “Mistress Sarah, I’m back a bit sooner than I’d expected.”

Robin came out of the barn an instant before Sarah appeared on the porch of the house. “Pal?” she said. “Wilf is just checking over Baga and he’s doing quite well.”

I cranked the hand pump in the yard, bringing up a gourdful for the pottery dish on the ground which Sam had shared with the chickens, then an additional gourd for myself. I walked into the house behind Sarah and reached Baga’s room just as the healer was preparing to leave.

“How soon will you be able to start for Dun Add, Baga?” I asked.

“Right now if he says so,” Baga said, nodding to Wilf.

They were both standing beside the bed. I nodded to Wilf and said, “Healer?” on a rising note.

Wilf said, “He should keep the burns out of the sun and covered in grease. But there was no serious damage to the muscles, so if he’s willing and you’re reasonably careful on the way I see no reason not to.

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