Read Online Dragon Ultimate by Christopher Rowley - Free Book Online
Authors: Christopher Rowley
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closes the gates."
"By the Hand, but the rat plague is the worst. There be a lot of rats in the lower city with all those old wharves and warehouses."
"We've got plenty of work ahead of us," Relkin agreed.
"May the Mother look after our souls," said the other guard.
Inside the dragonhouse Relkin found that the dragonboys were already engaged in a full-blooded sweep for rats. Swane had borrowed some terriers, and Jak had brought in some ferrets from a friend in the Elf Quarter.
"What have you found?" said Relkin as he pitched in to help.
"Just a couple so far. Under a crate in the corner storeroom. Must've been eating the leather."
"Were they sick?"
"No."
"There'll be more."
There were more; rats can hide in the most remarkable places. But it was also soon clear that the plague had not spread inside the walls of the dragonhouse or the Tower of Guard. The rats they caught were all healthy and vigorous, sure signs that they were not infected.
The hunt for rats in the rest of the city was already well under way. Where possible, volunteers from among the elvish folk worked to actually kill the rats. The black plague did not harm the green-flecked folk of the forestlands in anything like the manner in which it killed men.
Unfortunately men still became infected. They were placed in quarantine conditions within a closed-off courtyard. The dead were collected on wagons and taken out of the city at once, while plans for mass graves were hurriedly put into operation.
That night more people in the Fish Hill sector of the city came down with the plague, and more victims were recorded from other parts of the city, too, though not from the upper end of Tower Street, or on Foluran Hill.
The ratkillers went down into the sewers below the houses. They tore apart the thatch above the roofs. They went through the attics and the cellars. And they brought in terriers and ferrets.
At the second hour before dawn a desperate rider approached the West Gate. He shouted the news from Kadein. The plague was loose, and a holocaust was brewing.
Chapter Nine
Plague gripped the cities of the Argonath: first Minuend, then Kadein and Marneri, then Talion and the rest all reported the infection. The disease took very different courses, however, from city to city. Kadein saw a veritable catastrophe as one-third of its population succumbed over the next two weeks. Others escaped with scarcely a scratch. Ryotwa was saved by the Cat Witch, Nadeen, whose feline legions destroyed the infected rats before they could spread. Vo was helped by its design. One hundred years before, after fire had devastated the old city, Imperial Engineers rebuilt the central parts of Vo with a new sewer system, so there the plague did not catch on.
In Minuend the plague broke out in the camps of migrant field workers, and spread through the city with terrifying speed. By the end of the first day there were more than a thousand dying of the disease and a hundred already dead.
The following morning it began in Kadein. The first sickness was recorded from the crowded cribs of sailors in the harbor. From the beerhalls it spread to the overcrowded districts farther inland and became a conflagration overnight. By the dawn of the second day in old Kadein, every hour brought another thousand deaths.
Led by the wealthy, an exodus spread out from the cities. There was much talk of firing the cities and burning them to end the disease. That was what had been done in the early days of the Argonath. It had worked then, when nothing else had.
Others maintained that prayer was enough, that if the people were to pray to the Goddess with open hearts, She would hear them and end the plague. These believers flocked to the temples.
The priestesses pooh-poohed that sort of thinking right away. The Mother would help those who helped themselves, as it had always been.
During that second morning, beginning at the tenth hour, there came witches from Cunfshon, traveling by the magic of
"By the Hand, but the rat plague is the worst. There be a lot of rats in the lower city with all those old wharves and warehouses."
"We've got plenty of work ahead of us," Relkin agreed.
"May the Mother look after our souls," said the other guard.
Inside the dragonhouse Relkin found that the dragonboys were already engaged in a full-blooded sweep for rats. Swane had borrowed some terriers, and Jak had brought in some ferrets from a friend in the Elf Quarter.
"What have you found?" said Relkin as he pitched in to help.
"Just a couple so far. Under a crate in the corner storeroom. Must've been eating the leather."
"Were they sick?"
"No."
"There'll be more."
There were more; rats can hide in the most remarkable places. But it was also soon clear that the plague had not spread inside the walls of the dragonhouse or the Tower of Guard. The rats they caught were all healthy and vigorous, sure signs that they were not infected.
The hunt for rats in the rest of the city was already well under way. Where possible, volunteers from among the elvish folk worked to actually kill the rats. The black plague did not harm the green-flecked folk of the forestlands in anything like the manner in which it killed men.
Unfortunately men still became infected. They were placed in quarantine conditions within a closed-off courtyard. The dead were collected on wagons and taken out of the city at once, while plans for mass graves were hurriedly put into operation.
That night more people in the Fish Hill sector of the city came down with the plague, and more victims were recorded from other parts of the city, too, though not from the upper end of Tower Street, or on Foluran Hill.
The ratkillers went down into the sewers below the houses. They tore apart the thatch above the roofs. They went through the attics and the cellars. And they brought in terriers and ferrets.
At the second hour before dawn a desperate rider approached the West Gate. He shouted the news from Kadein. The plague was loose, and a holocaust was brewing.
Chapter Nine
Plague gripped the cities of the Argonath: first Minuend, then Kadein and Marneri, then Talion and the rest all reported the infection. The disease took very different courses, however, from city to city. Kadein saw a veritable catastrophe as one-third of its population succumbed over the next two weeks. Others escaped with scarcely a scratch. Ryotwa was saved by the Cat Witch, Nadeen, whose feline legions destroyed the infected rats before they could spread. Vo was helped by its design. One hundred years before, after fire had devastated the old city, Imperial Engineers rebuilt the central parts of Vo with a new sewer system, so there the plague did not catch on.
In Minuend the plague broke out in the camps of migrant field workers, and spread through the city with terrifying speed. By the end of the first day there were more than a thousand dying of the disease and a hundred already dead.
The following morning it began in Kadein. The first sickness was recorded from the crowded cribs of sailors in the harbor. From the beerhalls it spread to the overcrowded districts farther inland and became a conflagration overnight. By the dawn of the second day in old Kadein, every hour brought another thousand deaths.
Led by the wealthy, an exodus spread out from the cities. There was much talk of firing the cities and burning them to end the disease. That was what had been done in the early days of the Argonath. It had worked then, when nothing else had.
Others maintained that prayer was enough, that if the people were to pray to the Goddess with open hearts, She would hear them and end the plague. These believers flocked to the temples.
The priestesses pooh-poohed that sort of thinking right away. The Mother would help those who helped themselves, as it had always been.
During that second morning, beginning at the tenth hour, there came witches from Cunfshon, traveling by the magic of
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