Dragon Spear (7 page)
If I needed to, I would burn the linen wrappings for the gown, and then the basket.
If I needed to, I would burn the gown itself.
When Shardas came roaring and splashing down into the water beside my islet, the last of the linen had burned, and I was reaching for the basket.
“Creel!” Luka threw himself off Shardas and into the water, thrashed up onto the islet, and embraced me. I greeted him with equal enthusiasm: in fact, to my embarrassment, I began to cry.
“Th-they t-t-took her, I don’t know where,” I sobbed into his shoulder, while Shardas roared and sent spurts of water in every direction. Overhead other dragons circled, dragons I knew, like Niva and Feniul, who would have died rather than betray their queen.
“Both of you calm down!” Luka had to shout to be heard.
“Where is she?” Shardas’s eyes glowed with rage.
I sniffled. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize they had other dragons to help them—”
Shardas’s gaze softened and he swallowed the flames coming from his mouth.
“Creel, I am not blaming you,” he said in a gentler voice. “We all . . . Pots of firebane were thrown out of the jungle at us, and we were all helpless,” he explained. “I would never expect you to defend Velika alone. Did you see which direction they went?”
Gulping, I pointed to the arrows I had drawn in the sand. Part of my drawing had been washed away by Shardas’s violent arrival, and with a squawk I ran to retrace the lines before they disappeared entirely.
“I didn’t think there was anything in that direction,” Shardas said, studying the arrows and looking out across the water. “South and east? You are certain?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s where we’re going.” He lifted his head and roared out something in the dragon language. It was loud and harsh, and Luka and I put our hands over our ears until it was over. Then he turned to us. “Get on.”
Luka grabbed my basket and Shardas obligingly held out a foreleg. We managed to get on his back without dunking, and Shardas took off as soon as we were settled.
“Where’s Hagen? Is he all right?” I had to turn my head around as far as I could and shout the question, we were going so fast.
“He’s coming with supplies,” said Luka. “I think that’s what the dragontalk was about. Shardas has the rest of them waiting back on the islands. As soon as we find anything, they are going to gather food and follow.”
“How long since they left you?” Shardas called back to me, his speed never wavering.
“Since dawn.”
It seemed impossible, but he put on more speed, and Luka and I could do nothing but hunker down and cling like burrs. The usual exhilaration of flying was gone, stolen away by fear, and anger, and wind.
W
e flew for days on end, and would have given in to despair except for little signs our quarry left behind, giving us hope. There was no real land, but here and there tiny clusters of islets would provide rest and clues. We found signs of fresh fires, dragon claw marks, and recently shed scales of dull brown and green, proving we were on the right path.
“I never knew the ocean was so vast,” I said helplessly one morning as I climbed up on Shardas’s shoulders with Luka.
“I don’t think anyone did,” Luka replied, grim.
We were all feeling bleak. Shardas’s raging had subsided into a dreadful silence, broken only by the occasional grunted answer to a direct question.
Hagen and a horde of other dragons caught up with us at one of the islets. I invited my brother to trade places with Luka so that we might ride together for a while, but Hagen told me that he much preferred riding on Feniul, who looked less likely to suddenly turn violent.
While I agreed that Shardas looked near his breaking point, it was all the more reason for me not to abandon him. So whenever he held out his foreleg, I clambered up and took my customary seat, with Luka behind me.
And we flew.
We came at last to a long, low island, curved like a sickle and covered with tall palm trees. We landed on the shore to rest, and a host of men in rough, brown kilts came out of the trees, wielding spears and shouting.
Luka leaped off Shardas’s back and went toward them with hands outstretched. I signaled to Hagen to stay on Feniul and went to stand beside Luka. I’m sure we looked a sight: sunburned and filthy, Luka’s hair standing on end and mine unraveling from its double-dozen braids.
And then there was the fleet of dragons with us.
Using hand gestures, Luka tried to signal to them that we wanted only to rest here, but the leader of the men was adamant that we go. He seemed particularly agitated by the dragons. Not frightened by them, I noticed, just insistent that they leave. He indicated that we humans could stay, but that our friends were not welcome.
“So they have seen dragons, and they don’t like them,” Luka said in an undertone.
I looked at our friends. They were all tired. Their scales were crusted with salt and several of them were twitching the nets strung over their backs, wanting to scoop up some fish and eat. Shardas looked like he was losing his patience, lashing his tail and snorting hot little bursts of air.
Then a man came out of the trees wearing an incongruous red frock coat over his kilt and bearing a staff decorated with pigs’ teeth. I identified his coat as of Roulaini make, and whispered as much to Luka.
The man bowed his head gracefully, and asked a question in what I recognized as Citatian, even though my grasp of that language had never been good. With obvious relief, Luka replied in the same language, and they talked for some minutes, the man occasionally gesturing with his staff.
When both Luka and the man were satisfied, they nodded cordially and the spear-carrying men retreated. All but two, that is, and their leader in his frock coat. They stood on the sand and watched us as we walked back to Shardas and the others.
“That was very unexpected,” Luka said.
“He’s been to the Grand Market at Pelletie,” I guessed.
“His family goes every ten years or so,” Luka confirmed. “He says that we can rest here, and fish,” he went on in a louder voice, and most of the dragons dispersed to gather food or sprawl on the sand.
Niva and her mate, Leontes, Amacarin, Feniul, and Shardas remained to hear what else Luka had to say. Hagen slid down off Feniul and came to my side, putting an arm around my shoulders so heavily that it nearly dragged me to my knees. We were all so tired I didn’t know if we would even be able to fight Darrym and the others when we caught up to them.
“They flew overhead only last night,” Luka said. “They didn’t land, though. They know that they aren’t welcome here.”
“So these people have had dealings with Darrym’s dragons, and the people with them, before?” Leontes, an alchemist, was peering keenly at our three watchers as he asked.
“Some. Not long ago the dragons came here, towing people in those baskets, and asked questions by drawing figures in the sand. They wanted to know if there were any dragons living here, if dragons had ever been seen here, and what colors the dragons were.”
“Strange,” Leontes said slowly.
“The only ones who had ever seen a dragon before were the chief’s family, who had been to Citatie and seen dragons there, so the visitors flew on. A week later a half dozen dragons arrived and tried to capture the people of this island, but they managed to fight the attackers off.”
“Stranger and stranger,” Leontes commented.
“You can see why they don’t want a whole army of dragons landing on the beach,” Hagen said.
“Precisely,” Luka said. “I had to assure him over and over that we weren’t going to attack, that we were just passing through. I think the news that we had been attacked by one of those hostile dragons, and were looking to fight with them, was what really persuaded them to let us rest here.”
“Will they help us?” I looked over at the three men watching us, but their faces were expressionless. “Would they send any warriors with us, to fight Darrym’s people?”
“I’ll ask, but I don’t think so,” Luka said.
While we were eating, Luka did ask Frock Coat if he would send some men with us but the response was a resounding “No!” Apparently they had their hands full dealing with an island nation to the west that occasionally sent an invading force against them.
“Do they know how far it is to wherever Darrym is headed?” I fastened my sewing basket to Shardas’s spine ridges and then sat down in front of it.
“No,” Luka said. “They’ve never gone that far. But they also believe that there is a land even farther to the southeast that is the home of the gods, and they don’t want to risk the gods’ wrath by trespassing. The farthest anyone from here has gone is two days’ journey by boat, and there was no sign of land.”
“Two days’ journey by boat is a matter of hours to me,” Shardas said, speaking for the first time since we’d landed. “And Darrym is not a god.” He flung himself into the air.
H
ow is it that no one in Feravel has ever heard of a country this large?”
We had landed on a small mountain that jutted from the water just off the shore of a country that was dark with forest. Country? No, it was a continent, stretching in all directions as far as we could see. Great mist-wreathed mountains rose in the distance, covered with exotic trees: dark green and twisted in shape, with odd spiky leaves.
“I don’t know,” Luka said in a hushed voice. “But without a dragon it would have taken months to get here.”
“Winter storms would likely have sunk the ships if anyone had tried,” Leontes said. “And if they couldn’t find fresh water . . .” He surveyed the landscape. “And then there are superstitions that keep some people from exploring.”
“Like that the home of the gods lies in this direction?” Luka snorted. “I’ll wager Darrym and his friends started that rumor themselves, so that no one would bother them.”
“But why? What are they doing?” I pounded my fist on Shardas’s shoulder in frustration.
We had found this country, had even found a wide clearing in the trees near the shoreline that was the start of a dragon-sized path and marked with recent signs that Darrym and the others had passed that way. Taking refuge on this mountain a little ways offshore, we hoped to spy on Velika’s captors, but they had disappeared into the forest.
We were at a loss as to what to do next.
“We need to go down into the forest and look for them,” I said.
“But how?” Luka held out his arms. “You saw what the people looked like, Creel. We’ll never pass as being from around here, and neither will the dragons.”
“Not without disguises,” Leontes said.
“I’m not putting a spike through my nose,” Hagen piped up. “I’m sorry . . . I’ll do whatever else.” He gave a little shudder. “But no spikes through my nose. And how did they make those white tattoos?”
Leontes gave a huff of laughter. “I meant the dragons, actually. We can all speak in dragon tongue, but you cannot speak the language of these humans.”
“But how can we dye your scales?” I looked him over. He was a buttery yellow color with violet streaks, and nearly twice the size of Darrym. “And all the dragons with Darrym are small.”
“A physical disguise won’t work,” Leontes agreed. “But an alchemical one might.”
I held my breath and looked at Shardas. Though he had lived with a human alchemist for many years following Velika’s supposed death, he objected to dragons using alchemy. I had thought this was due to Velika’s betrayal by King Milun the First, but then I learned that Shardas’s brother, Krashath, had also used alchemy to enslave their own people. Now I waited for Shardas to object to Leontes’s plan.
But Shardas never took his eyes off the path into the forest. “What supplies will you need?” he asked Leontes.
As it turned out, Leontes was prepared for any contingency. Strapped to his back was a large, leather-bound trunk which he had filled with various potions, powders, and tools that were the staples of an alchemist’s practice. The only extra ingredients he needed to transform a half dozen of our large, brightly hued friends into the small, dull, forest-blending enemy dragons were scales.
“There are plenty of those,” Feniul said, and raised one foreclaw to his neck. “How many do you require?”
“I’m afraid that I need scales from these brown and green dragons,” Leontes clarified. “In order to get the look right. We’ll have to sneak down off the mountain and get a few.”
“How many?” Luka and I asked at the same time.
“At least three, and from different dragons,” Leontes said. “So that our spies don’t all look precisely the same.”
“All right,” I said. “We’ll wait until dark, and then someone can fly us down to the shore. Luka and I can scrounge up some scales and you can make the potion.”
“It’s a paste,” Leontes corrected me. “Niva is the darkest, and might appear the closest in color to the dragons we’ve seen, if she stays in the shadow of the trees. Feniul’s green scales are rather . . . bright.”
“I want to come, too,” Hagen said.
“No.” I folded my arms. “Absolutely not.”
“If you’re going, I’m going,” he insisted.
“I’m used to this type of danger,” I began.
“I’m older than you were when you fought in the First Dragon War,” Hagen interrupted.
Leontes’s eyes twinkled as he broke in, stopping me from replying. “I could use some assistance in preparing the paste,” he told Hagen. “A pair of human hands would be welcome.”
Hagen hesitated, torn between his desire to be included in what he no doubt saw as an adventure and helping an honest-to-Caxon alchemist prepare one of his secret recipes. “All right,” he said finally.
“There are some hours still until dark,” Shardas said. “And my scales are even brighter than Feniul’s.” He heaved a sigh. “We should find a place to make camp where we can all be concealed.”
In the end we located a small island a few leagues offshore, just large enough for our army to encamp. It was craggy enough that the dragons could hide in the crevices during the brightest parts of the day, and far enough from the mainland that Velika’s captors would have a hard time seeing us anyway.