Meghan's Dragon Page 19

  Rowan parried Bryan’s attack casually with the sword in his right hand, while simultaneously throwing some sand in the young man’s face with his left. Bryan’s blink reflex almost saved him, but the smaller particles that traveled a little slower than the larger grains of sand got into his eyes when the lids popped back open. He stumbled backwards with his sword held above his head like a shield, waiting for the inevitable follow-up blow, but none came. Bryan blinked several times as tears worked to clean his eyes, and looked up to see big man standing at ease.

  “What did I do wrong?” Rowan asked.

  “You? You threw sand in my eyes.”

  “What did I do wrong?”

  Bryan realized the repeated inquiry was a test rather than an ethical question, and thought for a moment. “You didn’t take advantage of the opportunity you created,” he admitted. “You should have pressed the attack.”

  “And you should have killed the war mage when you had the chance,” Rowan said matter-of-factly.

  Bryan let his sword fall as he tried to come up with a plausible evasion, but in the end he just asked, “How did you know?”

  “Storm Bringer sent his hawk to keep an eye on the two of you this morning. You’ve been taking some serious risks.”

  “But we all went inside the gatehouse,” Bryan protested. “I could have killed him in there and the bird wouldn’t have seen it.”

  “I’ve been around enough fighting and death to be able to see if a young man has killed for the first time just by looking at him,” Rowan replied. “But I can also tell you have the soul of a warrior, so I wouldn’t be surprised if you told me your wife talked you out of it.”

  “She did!” Bryan seized on the excuse. “Meghan said that the war mage would be too embarrassed to admit that somebody punched him in the stomach and broke his jaw. She’s always stopping me from killing guys.”

  “And she’s probably right about the mage staying quiet this time. But the Blue Duke is a puppet of the false king, and when the time comes to fight, that mage will be lined up on the other side of the battlefield.”

  It took Bryan a while to digest what Rowan was telling him, but the big man waited patiently. “So the whole acting troupe, our festival tour, it’s all a cover for planning a revolt?”

  “No, it’s how we all make our living, but we do seem to be performing more tragedies than comedies this year.”

  “And the natives who are always coming out of the woods and talking with Storm Bringer? The farmers who bring a little produce from their fields and walk along for a while with your group leaders? The local men who gather around for beer after every show?”

  “You could say they’re sympathetic to the cause.”

  “I don’t know anything about war, but it’s hard to believe that the veterans in the troupe and some local militia will be a match for an army, no matter how good you are,” Bryan objected. “There just aren’t enough of us, even if you add a few hundred sympathizers.”

  “We aren’t the only troupe of strolling players, and the soldiers serving the barons and dukes aren’t doing it out of loyalty. It’s just a job, a bloody job at that, and men have been known to quit or change sides.”

  “Why now? Why didn’t you tell us when we joined you?”

  “Old friends vouched for Meghan, but you and your mythical Castle Trollsdatter were complete unknowns. I wanted time to see if your heart was in the same place as your words.”

  “I should have punched out a war mage earlier.”

  Rowan laughed. “With your swordplay, it’s the only way you’re ever going to beat one, but it was a smart move in any case. Mages are accustomed to instilling fear into everybody around them, and their hoods are a warning to beware. If you’d tried to launch a magical attack or draw a weapon it would have ended very differently, but he wasn’t on guard against a street brawl.”

  “Have you ever fought against a mage?”

  “I’ve fought against just about everything that walks and holds a weapon at one point or another,” Rowan answered quietly. “I suppose you could say I have a gift for fighting and leading men in battle. Between you and me, I’d rather have Chester’s talent for acting, but we don’t always get what we ask for.”

  Chapter 65

  The first words out of Bryan’s mouth when he met Meghan back at their tent after his training session were, “Rowan knows.”

  Meghan set aside the scroll she’d been trying to decipher and asked, “About you being a dragon?”

  Bryan grimaced and shook his head. “About our outing to the Blue Duke’s castle and the war mage. The shaman’s stupid bird was watching us.”

  “I’d say that makes it a smart bird. What did Rowan say?”

  “He said you shouldn’t have stopped me from chopping Sawith’s head off, but I already knew that.”

  “He was lying on the floor unconscious, and I still believe he’ll keep it to himself.”

  “That wasn’t Rowan’s point. He finally let me in on what’s going on around here, and it turns out that the players are part of some sort of rebellion. That war mage is loyal to the king, so we could end up fighting him again someday.”

  “I’ve been hearing rebellion talk ever since I can remember, but nothing ever comes of it,” Meghan said, picking up the scroll again. “The baron would even make jokes about leading a revolution on his Naming Day feast. Nobody likes the king, but he keeps the best soldiers around him, including mercenaries from overseas. And in the end, who the king is just doesn’t make a big difference in the everyday lives of most people. Somebody will always collect the mill and barrel taxes, and most of that money goes to pay soldiers and bribe dragons in any case.”

  “Of all the people, you, who needed to summon a dragon for protection against your own baron and king, think it doesn’t matter who’s in charge?” Bryan had to fight back the urge to shake her by the shoulders. “Life isn’t all about magic and dragons. Even if the only choice between leaders is bad and worse, only an idiot would say it makes no difference.”

  Meghan looked up from the scroll in surprise. He was showing her a thoughtful side she hadn’t suspected he possessed, even if she didn’t agree. The women in the castle had always dismissed royal politics as something men talked about over their beer, and it hadn’t ever occurred to her that things could substantially change in the kingdom. Her only goal had been to find a way to insulate herself from it.

  “So you’ve chosen sides?” she asked.

  “I think we both did that already when we fled your baron and started breaking into castles to steal stuff.”

  “It’s not stealing. The items were left there for me, they belong to us. I just wish this scroll was written in my language for a change. All the gifts seem to be for you!”

  “Let me see it,” Bryan requested in a resigned voice. He cleared his throat and read, “Instructions for reverting to human form.”

  “I got that far,” Meghan said in irritation. “What’s the next letter sound like?”

  “J, as in, I don’t know, J,” he said unhelpfully. “Join minds with one who wants you back. Seek your core and concentrate on its essential humanity and solidity while—it’s just a bunch of New Age crap,” he concluded, discarding the scroll. “This business about a revolt is serious.”

  “Do you want to get stuck being a dragon forever when you finally change?” Meghan demanded. She picked up the scroll and began studying it again. “It’s funny, though. I did make out most of it with the letters you already taught me, and there weren’t any instructions for becoming a dragon in the first place. It’s all about returning to human form. I wonder if you’ll be willing to give up being a dragon.”

  “Are you serious? Dragons eat raw meat, bones and all, and they probably don’t have any beer,” Bryan pointed out. “I get that they live a long time, but what’s the point if you have to spend it all hanging around a cave to keep watch on your treasure? I have my own solution to that, by the way.”

  “What are
you talking about now?”

  “You know all the coppers and small silvers we’ve been saving up from tips? I traded them in for this.” He pulled a cord out from around his neck and proudly displayed the small gold ring suspended there. “It’s gold,” he added unnecessarily.

  “I can see that it’s gold, but how are we going to buy anything on the road or at the next fair if you’ve turned all of our earnings into one little ring?”

  “I figure you must have some savings left.”

  Meghan buried her head in her hands and moaned theatrically.

  Chapter 66

  Juliana ran up to Bryan and Meghan, flushed and breathing hard from the exertion. “My father says the two of you need to hide, right now. Storm Bringer says there’s a dragon coming.”

  “A dragon? I want to see it,” Bryan said, trying to shake off Meghan’s hands as she pulled him towards the ravine at the edge of the evening campsite.

  “You promised on your word of honor that you’d follow Rowan’s orders as long as we eat his bread,” Meghan argued, holding on to his arm with a death grip. “We’ll get into those rocks and watch from there.”

  “Please,” Juliana added, bringing to bear her formidable talents of persuasion. A goofy grin spread across the young man’s face and he yielded to Meghan’s tugging, all the while looking back over his shoulder at the beautiful twin.

  “Stop it,” Meghan said, swatting him on the back of the head. “It’s not like you don’t see Nesta every day.”

  “That was Juliana,” he replied, rubbing his hair where the pretend-wedding ring on her finger had bounced off his skull. “And I wasn’t staring. I just wanted to make sure she didn’t have further instructions from her father.”

  “Stop lying and climb down there to check for snakes,” she ordered, adding a shove for good measure. Between the constant eating and his daily sword exercise with Rowan, Bryan was filling out rapidly, and pushing against him was like trying to move a boulder. But he followed her instructions without complaint in the hope that she would forgive his latest transgression.

  There was a recently fallen pine, brought down by a combination of storm winds and soil erosion around the roots, bridging the narrow gorge. The broken branches on the underside held the trunk up off the ground, and the green nettles formed a nearly impenetrable curtain. By working their way under the toppled giant where the unbroken branches jutted down into the ravine, the two young people were completely hidden from view, yet still able to see most of the campsite.

  After a short wait, a giant shape glided over the wagons and then rose again, as if the dragon was taking a precautionary pass to check for hazards. It wheeled about in the air, its leathery wings flexing and twisting, and then it went into a shallow dive, landing about fifty paces in front of the waiting reception committee. The dragon needed a few hopping steps to bring itself to a halt, its wings spread to their fullest extent and tilted up like a drag parachute.

  Rowan stood at the front of the group facing the dragon, his wife on his right and Storm Bringer on his left. Although the big man wore the sword that he was never without, the others were unarmed. Meghan muttered something to herself that sounded like “louder” to Bryan, which he took as a cue to focus his own unnatural hearing on the far-away conversation. The sounds of the birds, squirrels, and insects around them seemed to fade into the distance as the dragon’s first words were spoken.

  “Colder than I thought,” the giant reptile said in a deep bass voice. “Not too windy, though.”

  “Sun is nice,” Rowan responded conversationally. “What brings you to New Land, Shorinth?”

  “Always straight to the point, Rowan,” the dragon responded. “You’re as beautiful as ever, Isabella. Surely that’s enough reason for me to make the long flight.”

  “And you remain ever the flatterer,” Rowan’s wife replied. “Have you angered your elders enough to be driven into exile?”

  “This is more of a fact-finding expedition.” Shorinth blinked rapidly a few times and settled on his belly. He reached for his face with one of his forelimbs, which forced him to bring his head in close to his body. After a desultory scratch or two at his right eyelid, he extended his neck all the way out, with his lower jaw coming to rest on the ground just in front of Rowan’s wife. “Would you mind?”

  Isabella sighed and leaned forward to rub the itchy eye ridge for the dragon. Then she turned to Nesta and said, “Go and get some axle grease from the wagon master. Somebody has been scratching to the point where the scales are flaking.”

  Shorinth let out a rumble of pleasure and closed the eye that the woman was tending, but the other eye, as large as a child’s head, remained wide open. “Some interesting rumors have reached Old Land in recent weeks. Castles being torn down by magic, revolution in the air, the barrier between our world and Dark Earth being breached. It occurred to me that if anybody in New Land knew what was going on, it would be you three,” he concluded.

  “And if you discovered even a speck of truth in those wild rumors, what would you do with it?” Rowan inquired.

  “That would depend on the speck,” Shorinth replied. “Information wants to be expensive, and I happen to be in need of funds to woo Ethelinda. She’s finally left that insufferable flying whale of a dragon, Magnor.”

  “Isn’t she a bit old for you?” Isabella asked.

  “Beggars can’t be choosers, and she’s practically the only dragoness left in Old Land who isn’t a sister, an aunt or a cousin. I tried going east for companionship, and I have the scars to show for it.”

  “So you wish information from us that you can trade for gold when you return,” Rowan surmised.

  “Even if I could obtain a sufficient hoard here, it would be a tedious operation to get it home,” Shorinth said. “Renting a ship, escorting it all the way across the ocean, never knowing if the sailors below deck were dipping their grubby hands in my treasure. Information weighs nothing.”

  Nesta returned with a tub of axle grease and held it for her mother. Isabella stuck her bare hand in the thick mess without hesitation and began slathering it over the dragon’s eye ridge, working it into folds in the hide where the scales chafed. Her daughters watched with interest, as if rubbing down dragons was a useful skill to be acquired.

  Back under the pine, Bryan complained to Meghan, “You never do anything like that for me, and we’re supposed to be married.” Meghan shushed him frantically, but Shorinth had already shifted his gaze towards the ravine. He blinked slowly, and then turned his open eye to Storm Bringer.

  “I don’t suppose you know any young dragonesses on this backwards coast who would be interested in meeting a sophisticated drake such as myself?”

  The shaman snorted and shook his head. “I’m afraid the only dragons on this coast are male, and I doubt they would be pleased by your prospecting on their grounds.”

  “Narl is an outlaw, and his brother, Barth, is mentally defective,” Shorinth said. “Besides, they’re both up north at the moment. Back when it happened, there was a rumor that a young dragoness was at stake, which was the only thing that could explain Narl’s behavior. But five decades is a long time to remain in hiding, so maybe he broke the pact for a pile of gold after all.”

  “You’re more generous with information than the last time we met, Shorinth,” Rowan observed. Isabella moved in front of her husband to work on the eye ridge on the other side of the dragon’s head, her daughters following in tow. “Could it be that you’re choosing sides already?”

  “Oh, I’ve always been on your side,” Shorinth insisted. “But if, for example, a mage in New Land did figure out how to reopen the passage to Dark Earth, I’m sure it would come to your attention. I only ask that you remember your humble servant to said mage as an eligible bachelor.”

  “And you flew all the way from Old Land just to make that request?” Rowan asked skeptically.

  “I believe I’ve learned what I came for,” the dragon answered cryptically. “Thank you f
or your hospitality, but I should think about hunting something up for dinner and heading back. Ladies, always a pleasure,” Shorinth added, nodding at Isabella and the girls. “Wisest thing I ever did was rescuing your great-grandmother from that pack of idiotic wolves. She was such a little thing that they would have been hungry again an hour later in any case.”

  The dragon turned and took a few steps into the gentle breeze, flapping his wings lackadaisically. His long neck curled back around his body and he addressed Storm Bringer. “A little help? I usually prefer to land near cliffs to make it easier to get airborne, but your campsite was chosen without me in mind.”

  The shaman shrugged and made a winding-up motion with one arm, creating a vortex of dust between the humans and the dragon. Then Storm Bringer cast his arm forward, and the miniature tornado seemed to flatten out and spring up under the dragon’s wings. Shorinth soared into the air, pivoted, and swept back across the campsite, flying directly above Bryan and Meghan’s position as he headed for the nearby hills to hunt.

  “Laziest dragon I ever met,” the shaman commented. “No wonder he never found a mate.”

  “He did fly all the way here just to warn us,” Isabella said reprovingly. “If rumors have reached the dragons in Old Land, they’ve certainly come to the ears of the false king.”

  Chapter 67

  “Just try putting it on and flapping a little,” Meghan pleaded. “I’ve got the reversion-to-human-form instructions memorized, even if you couldn’t be bothered to read them. I’m sure I can walk you through it.”

  “The twins did seem pretty interested in that dragon,” Bryan mused. “If I was him, I would have changed back on the spot.”

  “Maybe he can’t, or maybe he’s saving the human time he has left,” Meghan said. “Dragons can live for thousands of years, even longer if nothing kills them, but they can only spend a human lifetime in human form. And once that time is past, they can no longer breed.”

  “You mean that dragons all start as humans, and they don’t breed as dragons at all?”