The travelers’ sled is now within my sight. So is the entrance to the canyon, a shadowed passage between two rock faces. Longingly, I looked to the side, the route we could take toward the open dunes. Our wolves are quiet, focused as they run. Well-disciplined, all of them. Orion whistles to steer them toward the canyon. Brute doesn’t stumble, but his pace slows momentarily.
This idea is madness; even the alpha wolf knows it.
The sun has disappeared completely, but its heat still lingers in the air. Sweat collects on my brow, under my arms. The breeze created by our speed does nothing to cool us as we go.
Our sled crests the hill, and the canyon spreads out before us. The tall cliffs on either side block the moonlight and even the stars appear weaker from this vantage point.
Orion calls the wolves to a halt on the last piece of level ground before the decline into the canyon.
It’s my first look at the landscape, but it feels familiar, as if I’ve heard it described in stories, or visited it in dreams.
The dread that fills my chest—that is familiar, too.
“Nima Storyteller told us a tale once,” I say, my voice hushed. “She told us about defeating the windhaunt army that tried to overtake the Kingdom of Sand, when the Sand and Stars were separate kingdoms. Brave warriors stuffed their ears with wax and recited the epic tale, a throwaway tale that Nima invented. We have a tale, too, a tale of love found, a tale of sacrifice. But I don’t want to lose this tale.”
“Nor I,” Orion murmurs, pulling wax from one of his pockets.
“What would you forget, if you had to forget something?” I ask Priya.
“Hatred,” she says without pause. “Greed. Envy. Distrust.”
“Then we shall think on those things.” I pull wax from a sack on the floor of the sled and hand some to Priya before balling up the rest and fixing it in my ears. We’ll still hear the windhaunts’ whispers, but their words will be muffled until they get close.
My dragon form remains unavailable to me. What’s the use of harboring a monstrous form within, if I can’t even summon it to protect myself and my loved ones when I need it most? But we are here, with a wild, unlikely plan, and I have to believe we’ll get through this.
“Are you ready?” I ask, taking Orion’s hand.
“Almost.” He turns to face me and tugs me to him before capturing my mouth in a kiss. His lips are soft and warm, and he tastes of a cool desert morning, before the sun has completely risen, those quiet moments before the heat of the day. Sparks of heat travel through my body. I want more, I never want to stop kissing him.
This was the kiss he promised. It is everything I’d hoped for. Even more.
I could blame this on what Priya called a dragon’s fierce love, but I don’t believe that. It’s Orion and me. The two of us together. Our love and friendship create this full, happy, completed feeling.
We pull back at the same time and I open my eyes to see him smiling.
“Now I’m ready,” he says.
At the same time, we reach for the reins. He gets them first, and I stick out my tongue at him. He only stops smiling long enough to whistle wolves forward.
The sled moves ahead and tilts downhill. We gather speed without much help from the wolves, gravity doing most of the work. Priya whoops with joy. Her silver hair streams behind her and her eyes sparkle in the moonlight.
She sees me looking at her. “What? I’ve never ridden in a sled before.”
I look behind us and see Petre’s sled cresting the hill, squatting at the top like a hat on an ancient, sandy-faced soldier. They pause there, likely debating the potential risks and rewards.
Turn back, I urge them in my mind. Turn back, we’re not worth it.
Fran whistles their wolves forward.
“Winds take them, they’re coming after us,” I say.
Orion reaches over and holds my hand in his. “I have faith in us. We will get through.”
“Forget your faith,” I whisper, reaching up to tuck a brown lock of hair behind his ear. “Forget us, for now. The windhaunts will be upon us soon.”
“Hatred,” he says. “Greed. Envy. Distrust.”
Priya repeats the words, muttering to herself as the sled flies across the sand. My dragon form remains dormant, unreachable. I keep hoping that will change, that I will shed my human skin once more and save us all—a true hero.
As we travel farther into the canyon, though, I realize my human skin remains intact and my dragon will not emerge to save us. I begin to think of my mother and father, and wonder whether they’re watching from the ancestral stars above. I wonder if they’re disappointed.
Tell me about your mother, your father...
It is a suggestion in my head; it is a trap.
“The windhaunts,” I tell Orion. “They know we’re here.”
I fill myself with feelings, with memories of greed. Envy. I remember that—my jealousy of Nima, who was my closest friend. The jealousy had nearly ruined that friendship. I could easily forget any remaining jealousy, and gladly.
Turning back, I see Priya covering her ears with her hands. She’s still muttering to herself, but she spares me a smile.
Beyond her is the travelers’ sled. I think of my grudge against them—they stole our water; we could have died. All that, after we had saved their lives.
Tell me more, a whispering voice says.
So I do. I recount my anger and rage, my inability to forgive. And in recounting their offenses, I’m able to forgive them and let go.
Those things are gone. I can’t remember what I gave the windhaunts, but I see them closing in—not on my sled, but on Petre, Fran, and Caleb.
“We have to help the travelers,” I say.
Six, seven, eight windhaunts have flown to the travelers’ sled, carried by wind and evil intentions. I know, in the back of my mind, that there’s a reason I shouldn’t care. I shouldn’t want to help those people. Yet when my human skin cracks and flakes, I reach for my dragon so I can fly to the other sled’s assistance.
“Inez, no!” Orion cries.
“Inez,” Priya shouts at the same time.
“I’m helping them,” I say, my voice turning into a growl. My body is still human, but not for long.
I leap from my sled. Petre shouts and points at me.
Shedding my human skin, I welcome the scales and the growing of my body. I feel my wings erupt from my back and I fall to all fours. Once it is done, I stand in the canyon not as a girl, but as a dragon. I will save Orion and I will save Priya, and I will save the others, too.
Other than that goal, my mind is silent. It is just as Priya promised. The windhaunts don’t affect me now.
Petre’s sled isn’t far, and they’ve continued forward despite the windhaunts, intent on their prize—me. However, they’re flailing and shouting. Fran, in the front, appears confused. Roaring, I leap toward them, claws out. The closest windhaunt turns its sandy face in my direction, the grains swirling together like an endless storm. Reaching forward, I use my claws to separate its head from its body. The rags it had been wearing collapse to the ground along with the pile of sand that had made up its form.
Petre kills another, arcing his arm up awkwardly with a sword that he clearly doesn’t know how to use. He turns to me as I approach. His expression transforms to murderous intent, but then Caleb grabs his arm and leans toward him. Caleb’s face is gone, replaced with shifting sands, and he yanks Petre closer. Petre cries out.
Fran, at the reins, turns around. Her confusion must not be too extreme, or perhaps she’s reacting on instinct, because she slices back with her blade and strikes down Caleb. He falls into sand and clothes.
A windhaunt flies toward Fran, but I shred my claws through its head and neck, and it crumples to the ground. I take down another, and another. So many that I lose count, until none are left. If any windhaunts remain in the canyon, they aren’t coming forward.
Now that Petre is no longer in immediate danger, he raises his s
word in my direction and shouts to Fran, “To the dragon!”
Fran whistles. The sled starts forward. Petre drops his sword and lifts a large crossbow, larger than any I’ve seen before. Quickly, I backtrack. I don’t know what I expected, but I hadn’t thought Petre’s first act after being rescued would be attacking his savior.
The arrow on the crossbow looks wickedly sharp. If anything could pierce my dragon scales, it would be this.
Scrambling backward, I search for a way to launch myself into the air. The walls of the canyon seem so close together now that I’m so large. My giant heart trips in my chest. It answers my earlier question of whether dragons have hearts. We do.
I roar, hoping to intimidate Petre and Fran. The sound has no effect on Petre that I can see. Fran still looks faintly bewildered.
Suddenly, Fran’s face transforms into sand. Another windhaunt has lingered nearby. I turn my head, wildly searching for it. There, just behind a reddish boulder, it crouches. I lunge for it and cut its head off.
Petre hesitates only a moment before shoving the crossbow into the crook of his arm and grabbing his sword. He leaps to the front of the sled. He removes Fran’s sandy head with the sword, then kicks away her empty garments.
So callous, so calculating. Why hadn’t I seen this side of him when we talked at the City of Sand?
He doesn’t have to kill me. He can find water with my map of smoke.
I bellow fire into the air. Flames erupt, then diminish. Raising one of my front feet into the air, I point at the smoke that remains. Already it swirls into the forms of a map.
“A map?” he says. “Nice. I’d heard of that trick. Thanks, but no. Your skin will be more valuable than any map.”
I shake my head, confused. The map should be enough. I’m sharing it with him now, and I would share it again, should he ask.
He raises the crossbow.
I could never fly fast enough to escape it. There’s nowhere to go.
Back up, Priya’s voice says inside my head.
Trusting her, I do as she says, until my wings are flattened along the canyon wall. Even though I’m terrified to take my eyes off of Petre, I turn my head to see what Priya is doing. She’s in her dragon form, speeding toward us.
No, I say, as Petre takes aim. He shoots.
Everything seems to slow down as I make sense of the world around us. The arrow is coming straight for me, moonlight glinting on the shaft. Petre’s mouth lifts at the corners, showing his satisfaction. I start to move, but my effort doesn’t matter—Priya is suddenly in front of me.
The arrow lodges in her chest.
She falls to the canyon floor without a roar, without a shriek. The only sound is the thunder of her massive body hitting the ground. I leap from the edge of the canyon and fall toward her, screaming inside.
This can’t be happening.
From far away, Orion is shouting. His words don’t penetrate my mind. I can make no sense of this. The arrow was meant for me, and Priya took it.
Why? I ask her in my mind.
A dragon’s love is fierce and all-consuming, little daughter, she says.
Petre grabs another arrow at the same time I reach Priya. I’m torn between escaping his attack and helping her. If I could get the arrow out of her, somehow, maybe she’ll be saved.
Dark, dark red blood soaks into the sand.
Priya lifts her head. Inez, watch out.
I’m clumsy on my dragon legs, and when Priya opens her mouth and takes a deep, shuddering breath, all I can do is stumble back. I know what’s coming.
Petre nocks the new arrow into his crossbow.
“Inez, look out.” Orion is running on foot toward us, a crossbow of his own in hand.
Priya unleashes her fire, engulfing the front of Petre’s sled, as well as Petre. He screams, one long shriek, before falling down, motionless.
I can’t spare him a thought; he doesn’t deserve my attention.
Priya? I say in my mind.
She doesn’t answer.
I think about my human form, remembering my legs, arms, and human skin. The dragon shrinks away and I stand as a girl once more.
I fall to the ground next to Priya. Bloodied grains of sand dig into my knees. She’s still in her dragon form, still breathing. Barely.
“Should I remove the arrow?” I ask Orion.
“I think you should leave it. Don’t cause her unnecessary pain.” He lands next to me on his knees. Tossing his crossbow to the side, he yanks off his tunic and hands it to me. I fight with the fabric, struggling to get it on and angry that my modesty wants to waste this time with clothing while Priya is dying.
The bottom of the tunic reaches to the middle of my thighs. Adequately covered, I return my attention to Priya.
Daughter, Priya says in my head, it is all right.
“It’s not all right,” I say aloud. “You’re dying and I cannot let you die.”
I got to know you, little daughter. And you will thrive.
I shake my head. I can’t thrive without her. I know nothing about the magic that grips my body. “I can’t thrive—I don’t know who I am.”
I’m not the hero, I know that much.
You know enough, she says. If you want to know more, you can travel...to the land of the dragons. They will teach you, little daughter. And you can tell them what happened to me. You can tell them that the hunters remain active.
I look to Orion, wanting his input. He can’t hear what she’s saying, though. Shaking his head slightly, he looks back at Priya and touches her front leg.
“I don’t understand,” I whisper.
There is so much for you to learn, she says quietly.
Her breathing is too shallow, and it sounds wet. Blood trickles from the side of her mouth.
“I wish you hadn’t come back to help me,” I say. She wouldn’t have transformed back to human and been trapped on our journey, she wouldn’t have been killed while saving me.
Every breath of our short time together was worth this, she says, staring into my face.
Her silvery-gray eyes flutter shut. I wait for her next words, another piece of advice, some instruction, but she’s silent. The only sounds are Orion’s and my breaths, and the nervous whines of the wolves.
“She’s gone,” Orion says.
I shake my head. I know it’s true, but I don’t want to hear it. Instead, I settle into the cleaner ground next to her belly, the part that isn’t covered in her blood, and lean against her smooth, solid form.
Silently, Orion joins me. His upper arm touches mine, and I scoot closer to him. We sit quietly while the moon tracks over the sky, chased by the diamond huntress constellation.
Orion is patient and doesn’t rush conversation. Finally, I break the silence.
“We need to bury her.” As soon as I say the words, I realize what an impossibility this will be. Her dragon form is massive. But I can’t leave her body out here to be picked apart by scavengers, or worse, skinned by someone like Petre.
I direct my thoughts and feelings inward. My dragon form is waiting, available even though I just changed forms. Now it cooperates with my desires, when it is too late to really matter?
“Close your eyes,” I say to Orion.
He immediately complies. I take off his tunic and hand it back to him, then embrace the itchy, dry feeling of my skin and call forth my dragon side.
The wolves’ whining increases at the sight of me, a giant reptile filling the canyon floor. But now that I’m bigger and stronger, it’s easy enough to scrape a large hole into the hardpacked sand. Carefully, I drag Priya’s body into the grave, then cover her. Orion helps, pulling armfuls of sand to the mound. As soon as Priya’s scales are out of sight, I find three large boulders and roll them on top of the grave.
Then I embrace my human form once more and put Orion’s tunic on.
“She was a legend,” I say. “A beautiful tale. I barely even knew her, but I loved her.”
“Her soul will become a j
ewel protected by the diamond huntress,” Orion says. The burial phrase always sounded hollow to me, as if not everyone deserves that honor, but Priya truly does.
We remain by the burial mound, holding hands, until the full moon is high in the sky and Brute barks.
“We’ve neglected the wolves too long,” I say.
“Yes, but they’re all right,” Orion says. “I think they understand.”
Orion tends to our wolves while I untie the others from Petre’s sled. They don’t know me, but they sit quietly. I slash their knots with my knife; I’m too impatient for disentangling them, and it isn’t as if they’ll need to be re-harnessed. I wonder if they’ll run free or follow us to the City of Stars.
Petre’s sled is completely torched, even the water barrels at the rear. Nothing can be salvaged, so I stand and wipe the sand from my knees after helping the wolves.
I linger once more next to Priya’s burial mound.
“A jewel in the sky in both death and life,” I murmur. Then I hurry to Orion and our sled.
Chapter 8
If a dragon questions its own heart, the dragon must have a heart. It takes a heart to know the question.
The City of Stars is a welcome sight, flickering with torches along the outer walls as we approach. It’s the middle of the night. The constellations urge us forward. The tracks of our sled whisper rest, rest instead of hush, hush.
Five of Petre’s wolves have remained with our sled; the other four branched off on their own as soon as we left the canyon.
“Nearly there,” Orion says. “I want a bath. Fresh food. A sleeping platform with a pillow. A night where I’m not awoken by a dune spider crawling on my leg.”
He’d woken with a shriek the day previous, and I don’t bother to hide my smile at the memory.
“You’d have screamed, too,” he says, “if you saw the size of that monster.”
“I want clean clothes,” I say. I haven’t been able to change clothes since the canyon. “Water to wash in, and fresh clothes to put on after.”
We spend a lot of time talking about what we want to do when we reach the City of Stars. Most of it centers on bathing, food, fresh water.
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