Mother watched in stooped, ominous silence, like a gutbeaked blackbird looming over fresh carriage-kill. Fitting, since that’s exactly how dead I would be if I actually tried to climb Drakken Peak, claim my dragon, and get into the Legion Academy. Like she wanted.
Cutting a glance at Raff and Pali, I wondered if they were holding hands under the table. I was struck with sudden inspiration for a distraction.
“Mother?” I asked as sweetly as I could.
“Hmm?” she grunted.
“Did you know Raff has been letting Pali ride cindragons in the Burn?”
Pali laughed, and I could see that Raff was biting the inside of his cheek.
“Of course I know that,” Mother sighed, and I could practically hear her eyes rolling. “You think I wouldn’t ask where they were spending their afternoons?”
“You knew?” I sputtered, sending specks of greenloaf all over the table. “How could you let her?!”
Mother shrugged, which involved her whole back humping upward. “It never hurt you.”
“But she’s—”
“Crippled?” Pali snapped, slamming a hand on the table. “What would you have me do, Dima? Lie on my mat until I’m dead?”
I slammed my own fist on the table. “Stop talking like that!”
Pali rolled her eyes and slumped back in her chair. “Mother, will you please explain Wasting Sickness to Dima again?”
“I know what Wasting Sickness is, Pali!” I banged the table again. “I’m sorry that I refuse to just give up on you.”
Pali scoffed. “Can’t you see you already have?”
I reeled back in my chair. “How can you say that?”
“You don’t want me to do anything but waste!”
“Girls!” Mother barked, the top of her head moving back and forth between us.
We fell silent. Raff’s lips puckered into a silent whistle, as though that would make anyone look nonchalant.
Mother sighed and carefully lowered her bent frame into the remaining chair. She smoothed back the few tendrils of gray hair that had escaped from her bun. Two decades working under the sun had turned her skin into leather, dotted with uneven spots. Rumor had it that Noble women didn’t get their first wrinkles and gray hairs until they were several years past the average Pithe woman’s lifespan.
“Dima, finish your greenloaf so you can pack. The merchant leaves before sunrise, and we’ll need to see if you can hitch a ride.”
I planted my elbows on the table and buried my face in my hands. “Mother, please. I don’t need to pack. I need to sleep so I can get up early and look for a new job before Nav tells everyone what happened.”
A smirk twitched Mother’s lips. “I imagine it’s a little late for that. You’ll likely have better luck with the dragons now.”
“But Pali’s medicine…” I whispered.
Mother held up a hand. “I will go back to the fields.”
My head shot up. “Absolutely not! Picking greenleaf all day will—”
“Will what, Dima? Destroy my back?” She laughed softly. “Honestly, Dima, it’s easier now than when my back was straight. I’m already halfway there. All I have to do is pick.” She shook her head. “I only ever quit because it was causing you such distress.”
“No. No. No.” I jumped up, nearly knocking my chair over. “This isn’t happening. I won’t allow it!”
“Dima Marren,” Mother growled, leaning forward as best she could. “You may wear your father’s trousers, but you are not the head of this household. Bent as I may be, I am still your mother. It is my responsibility to provide for Pali. It is your responsibility to answer your dragon’s call.”
Locking my hands behind my head, I paced around the table. Why was my own mother trying so hard to send me to my doom?
“Dima,” Raff spoke for the first time all evening. He stood up, squaring his shoulders so he was almost my height. “If you’ve been called, you have to go. It wouldn’t be fair not to.”
I paused on my second circle around the table. “Fair? What’s that supposed to mean?”
He swallowed. “I have dreamed of riding dragons my whole life. Along with every other child of Pithe. And I can’t imagine it’s just us. I can’t imagine we’re the only kids in Outer Lanthe who ever jumped on cindragons and hit each other with sticks…”
Mother’s head snapped toward him. Guess he forgot to mention the jousting.
“But we’ve always known it was never happening. Not for people like us.” He stepped toward me, eyes brimming with passion. “But if it happens once, it could happen again. Maybe your mother is right. Maybe the dragons are changing their minds. Maybe this… maybe this is the start of something, Dima. If you’ve been called, you…well, you owe it to the rest of us. You have to go.”
I stepped closer to him and spoke in a tone low enough that only he could hear me. “I will die if I do this.”
“We all die if we stay here,” he said softly, casting his sad brown eyes toward my sister. “Why not be the one who died somewhere else?”
Chapter Four
“I can’t believe I’m going to die here,” Raff groaned, clutching his stomach as the merchant’s cart clunked over yet another hole in the so-called road.
“I can’t believe I’m not,” I muttered, imagining for the millionth time what it was going to feel like to be snapped in half between a dragon’s jaws.
Three days and nights had passed since the morning we left Pithe. The merchant, Devin, had only agreed to let us ride in the back of his cart after Mother offered to buy an amount of produce equal to mine and Raff’s combined weight. That seemed a little steep, but at least I wouldn’t have to worry about Mother and Pali going hungry any time soon.
However, securing us both a seat had left Mother ten gemlinks short of what she would need to buy Pali’s next dose of medicine from the apothecary. I had begged her not to send Raff with me—to the point that I’d probably hurt his feelings—but she wouldn’t have it any other way. It wasn’t safe for a young woman to travel solo between territories, she insisted. So Raff’s job was to make sure I reached Drakken Peak, climbed it, and died whatever terrible death awaited me with my virtue still intact.
As insulting as it was for anyone to think scrawny little Raff could protect me better than I could protect myself, and as troubling as it had been to leave without knowing for sure that Pali was getting her next dose on time, I had to admit I was grateful for his company.
Or at least I had been before I discovered how often he got wagon sick.
The cart lurched once more and so did Raff, flinging his upper body over the side to spew stomach acid into the crisp pre-dawn air. I grimaced at the sound and shifted away from him as he melted back down into the cart bed, moaning softly. After three days of this, he smelled almost as bad as the pair of hogsteeds we were hitched to.
A cold damp breeze wafted over us, and Raff rolled toward me, burrowing his face between my shoulder blades. Even though I could hear his teeth chattering, I drove my elbow into his ribs.
“Stop breathing on me,” I growled into the lumpy sack of tuberines I was using as a pillow.
Whimpering like a canin cub, Raff turned the other way—jamming his bony butt right into mine. I sighed and wiggled away from him as best I could in the cramped space, throwing my left leg over a bale of greenloaf. This trip would have been really awkward if Raff were a real boy and not my halfway-adopted brother. Although apparently my sister felt differently about him…
“So you and Pali, huh?” I’d been ignoring what I’d seen in the Burn for four nights now and I couldn’t take it any longer.
Raff moaned. “Do we have to talk about this now?” His voice caught on a little gag at the end.
“I could be dragon dung this time tomorrow. I need to know what your intentions are after I’m gone.”
I heard him scooting into a sitting position, so I shoved the tuberine sack out of my way and sat up next to him. The sharp bend of his shoulder dug into
mine.
He sighed. “You’re not jealous, are you?”
“Don’t be an ass-bat!” I leaned away from him. “You know you’ve always been like an annoying little brother to me.”
Raff made a goofy face at me. “Well, Pali was always like an annoying little sister to me. Until she wasn’t.” He shrugged.
So it was true. A confusing mix of emotions swirled in my heart. Romantic jealousy was definitely not one of them, but… we were supposed to be best friends. We didn’t keep secrets.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Raff laughed. “Because anything having to do with Pali makes you overreact?”
I leaned my head against the back of the cart. In front of us, Devin’s silhouette stood out against the slowly brightening sky. His elbows jostled every now and then as he communicated some direction down the reins to the hogsteeds.
“I just want Pali to understand the reality of her condition,” I said, crossing my arms.
Raff leaned away from my jutting elbow. “She knows, Dima. Pali has to carry her leg everywhere; we only have to look at it.”
Before I could argue, the wagon wheels stopped their constant creaking. An eerie silence fell on us, thick as the fog that had rolled in—or that we had rolled into. No birds, no bugs, no breeze. Even the hogsteeds seemed to be holding their breaths. Not that I blamed them. They were one of the few animals large enough to satisfy a dragon’s appetite in a single meal, and their stench could be picked up for miles.
“This is far as they’ll go,” Devin whispered as though we’d entered some sort of sanctuary. “Your feet will have to do the rest.”
My heart scrambled up into my throat, pounding right behind my tongue, crowding out all the questions I wanted to ask—namely if Devin would just let us finish the route with him and head for home.
Every muscle in my body clenched with the force of my attempt to speak, but nothing came out. I suddenly became aware of a dozen lumpy shapes pressed against my torso, and looked down to find my arms clinging to the sack of tuberines like they could save me.
“Seriously?” Raff asked, stretching his neck to see over Devin’s bench. “I can’t even see the hogsteeds right now.”
“Keep your voice down, Riffraff,” Devin snarled in the same hushed tone from before. “They may still be out hunting.”
Raff shrank back into the cart bed, but I crawled forward over the sacks of produce and bales of greenleaf, hooking my elbows over the back of Devin’s bench. Squinting, I could just make out the shapes of the hogsteeds, standing stock still. Not even an ear twitch.
“How far?” I whispered. “Is it straight ahead?”
“Don’t know,” Devin grunted. “This is the closest I’ve ever come. I always turn west toward the pass a few miles back. I’ve heard there’s a market at the base, but I’ve never been dumb—I’ve never felt the need to investigate.”
“Market?” I asked, stalling for time. “But nobody lives here, do they?”
“Not for long,” he muttered under his breath. Then he pasted on a false smile. “Like I said, I’ve never seen it. May not even be true. Market might not be the right word.”
One of the hogsteeds abruptly lifted its snout to the sky, and a shiver ripped down its broad back, all the way to the tip of its tail. Devin glanced up, nervously licking his lips.
“I’m sorry, but I have to go.” His fingers clenched the reins. “Now.”
“Dima.”
The familiar warm glow spread over my skin. The second hogsteed lowered its ugly head and whined. I didn’t even know they could make a sound so pitiful and scared.
Alright, alright, I’m coming, I grumbled back at the voice inside my head.
The warmth subsided, leaving only a small ember of resolve in my chest. This was really happening. I was really about to climb Drakken Peak.
Standing, I stepped over the contents of the cart and snatched up my father’s old leather satchel. Slinging it over my shoulder, I looked down at Raff. “You don’t have to come.”
“Are you kidding?” He jumped up so fast, it rocked the wagon. Devin made a sound of irritation. Raff lowered his voice, “I’m not sending you off into the fog alone.”
Sighing, I vaulted over the back of the wagon. As soon as Raff’s boots thudded on the rocky ground beside me, Devin clucked his tongue and cracked the reins. The hogsteeds bolted, whipping the cart around so quickly it knocked Raff into my arms.
I pushed him away and ran after the cart, shouting, “Hey! Wait! Don’t forget to come back for Raff!”
But the cart bounced out of sight, kicking up a cloud of dust that blended seamlessly with the all-consuming fog.
Raff touched my arm. “I’m sure he’ll come back.”
I turned to face him and choked back a scream.
Dozens of dark jagged shapes had risen out of the fog, their scales shimmering with dew. I shoved Raff behind me, spreading my arms out as though that would really help if the dragons attacked.
“Don’t move,” I whispered. “I’ll distract them, and then you run after Devin, fast as you can.”
Raff tapped me on the shoulder. “Um, Dima? I think those are rocks.”
Squinting into the fog, the true nature of the massive boulders came into focus. All the air whooshed out of my lungs in relief. It wasn’t time to die. Not yet.
Raff edged around me and walked right up to the first boulder, placing his hand on its side. “Dima, look!”
I jogged over to him. Up close, the scales I thought I’d seen turned out to be a thick carpet of green moss. But into that moss, someone had carved an uneven arrow, revealing the dark brown stone underneath. It pointed straight ahead.
***
“Do you hear that?” Raff whispered.
We had been zig-zagging through the fog, from marked boulder to marked boulder, for at least an hour. I was starting to think the arrows were just some kind of cruel prank, but sure enough, voices were filtering through the fog. Real ones. Not just the sadistic one that kept saying my name over and over inside my head until I’d begun to seriously consider bashing my own brains out on one of the big rocks.
Up ahead, men and women were laughing and hollering, maybe even singing a tuneless sort of song.
“Come on!” Raff said, but I caught his arm before he could run.
“Wait. Who knows what kind of people these are?” I asked. “What if they’re soldiers meant to keep peasants from attempting the Peak?”
Raff scrunched up his forehead. “They don’t sound like soldiers. They sound kind of rough. Like Pithens.”
“Still.” I cut my eyes toward the voices, straining for a glimpse of anything through the fog. “I think you’d better wait here.”
He jerked his arm away from me. “I’m supposed to make sure no one stops you from reaching the Peak.
“I think you have,” I said, glancing up into the fog. I couldn’t see the Peak, but somehow I knew we were standing in its shadow.
Raff shook his head. “I promised Pali I would watch until I couldn’t see you anymore.”
A frustrated sigh blew through my lips. “I don’t have a good feeling about taking you in there.”
Raff pushed his hair off his forehead, revealing his troubled eyebrows. I’d known him long enough to know when he was calculating his chances of winning an argument. Finally, his shoulders slumped. He knew those chances were low.
“I will wait until you know that it’s safe,” he said. “Then you must signal for me to join you. I have to watch you climb.”
“Fine.” I spit into my palm and held it out. “But if you hear me screaming, you have to run. No hero stuff. Go home.”
He spit into his palm and pressed it to mine. “Fine.”
We stared at each other for a long moment. I opened my mouth, unsure which of the hundred things I needed to say before I died was going to come out first.
“Don’t,” Raff said sharply. “I’ll see you soon.”
Nodding, I dropped his han
d and turned my back on him. There wasn’t really anything he didn’t already know. Except maybe that I had no intention of ever signaling for him.
My feet moved swiftly across the pebbled ground. Moments later, a ring of boulders emerged from the fog, lower and flatter than all the others I’d seen. A roar of laughter from within that circle spurred me on.
“Hello, hello! What have we here? Another boy already?”
The old man stepped out from behind one of the last normal boulders, and a sudden strong odor suggested he’d been attending to some personal business in its shadow. Two crazy eyes peered out from a matted white mask of hair and beard, taking in the long hair hanging over my father’s tunic. He whistled.
“Not a boy! A pretty girl, pretty girl! You must be lost. Come in, come in!”
The man bowed low and swept his arm behind him. The fog thinned out around a crackling fire, revealing the low, flat boulders to be a series of raggedy brown tents that looked as if they’d been patched together by a drunken hogsteed. Another fire burned beyond the tents, larger and for cooking I supposed since there was nothing on the first fire to account for the stench of overcooked meat assaulting my nose.
My instincts told me to turn and run back to Raff, but the man had already grasped my shoulder with the three remaining fingers of his right hand.
“This way, this way!”
He dragged me into the middle of the encampment where two men and two women looked up from the large flat rock they were gathered around under an open-faced tent. An array of painted pebbles and tokens were laid out in odd formations on the stone. I’d seen makeshift betting games like this back in Pithe before. Father used to invite friends over to play, and on mornings after the nights he got lucky, we would actually have breakfast for a change.
A bad taste rose in my mouth. So that’s what happens here.
“Third one today, ladies and gents!” He spun me around in front of them. “Strong arms, but the legs look a little weak. What do we think, what do we think?”
Dragon Games Page 3
