by Bryan Davis
Koren closed her eyes, grunting at the pain. How could she possibly keep hanging on? Had the stardrop made her arm that strong? Whatever the cause, she had to keep Shrillet from chasing Tamminy. Nothing else mattered.
Shrillet looked back at Koren, her head swaying with her wobbly neck. As Cassabrie’s energy continued to flow, the dragon blinked several times and shifted her weight to keep from falling. Finally, she lifted her tail, Koren still attached, and slapped it against the floor.
Koren’s forehead smacked the stone. Pain throttled her spine. Barely able to see, she released the tail and laid her cheek down. The surface was rough and abrasive, but she couldn’t lift her head even an inch.
After teetering to each side, Shrillet toppled over and crashed next to Koren, shaking the floor.
Koren grimaced. More pain ripped through her body. Darkness flooded her vision. As consciousness fled, she whispered, “I’m sorry, Petra. I’m so sorry.”
seventeen
Cassabrie pushed back from Jason and brushed away her tears. With the star’s radiance still washing over her, she seemed more alive and solid than ever. “I need to tell you another reason for your coming here. The king wants you to collect some energy from the star and take it to someone who sorely needs it.”
“Who?”
“Does it matter? You need only know that he will die unless you take it.”
Redness tinged Jason’s vision again. “Why does this white dragon want to test me? If he’s so wise, doesn’t he already know what I would do?”
“No, Jason. When unfamiliar duress is introduced, the future choices of a free man cannot be known, not even by the man himself or by those who watch over him.”
“You and your puzzles.” He looked toward the stairway. “Deference mentioned an old man who nearly drowned. Is he the one?”
Cassabrie’s tone sharpened. “I heard. She should not have told you.”
“Why not?”
“I should not reveal even that. Just be willing to help the man.”
“I’m willing. But why did the king ask me to do it? If the man needs help, couldn’t someone else have done it long before I got here?”
“The king knows of your immunities. You probably noticed that something in the air has affected your body.”
Jason scratched his palm, again peeling away skin. “I noticed. It’s not too bad.”
“If not for my finger in your chest, it would be much worse. This proves that you are the only one who can do this. As a spirit who can affect the physical for only the shortest of times, I cannot carry anything very far.”
“Okay, I’m convinced.” Jason turned to the star. “So how do I do it?”
“Like this.” Cassabrie formed her hand into a scoop and dipped into the outer surface of the sphere. She extended her cupped hand to Jason. At first, it appeared to be empty, but it then filled to the brim with a milky liquid that began to glow. After a few seconds, it congealed and shrank until it formed into a glittering ball the size of her thumb’s knuckle. “Hold out your hands.”
Jason formed his hands into a cup. “We call it a stardrop,” she said as she rolled the ball into his palms. She then backed away a step, her eyes wide as if watching for a miracle.
The ball of light sizzled on his skin. It stung badly, but not so much that he couldn’t hold it.
“Does it hurt?” Cassabrie asked.
He nodded. “Quite a bit. But it’s okay. Just show me where to take it.”
She pulled his hood up over his head. “Follow me. Quickly.” She glided toward the stairway, passing into the whispering streams of light.
Glancing between the stardrop and the Starlighter, Jason followed, his hood falling back with each step. Cassabrie’s body slowly melted. Redness dripped from her hair and fell to the ground like drops of blood. Blue and white streamed from her clothes and spilled into stretched-out pools along her path, shining bodies of liquid that quickly evaporated into puffs of sparkling fog. Soon, she was a spirit again, perceptible only as a wisp of moving light.
As before, the voices brushed by, now streaming from behind. With his back to them, they didn’t pause to offer their hushed words. Still, seeing them whisk past and knowing they each carried a story, he half wished they would collect and let him in on the secrets they held. Their knowledge seemed to be a vast treasure scattered into millions of pieces—the wealth of kings, raining down in copper coins.
When they reached the stairway, Cassabrie hurried up the steps. Jason paused at the bottom and let his gaze wander up the hundreds of narrow, uneven stairs climbing out of sight and into the darkness above. The stardrop grew hotter. He rolled it in his palms to keep it from scalding his skin.
Cassabrie stopped a dozen or so steps up and looked back, fading as she spoke. “Is there a problem?”
“Deference said there were other ways to exit.”
“She spoke the truth. There are other paths.”
“Well, climbing all these stairs isn’t my idea of an easy route.”
“It is not easy, but it is necessary.” Sparks from her mouth again gave away her position. “Come. I assume the stardrop is getting hotter.”
“It is.” Jason rolled it into his right hand and used his left to open a pocket in his trousers. “I’ll just put it in—”
“No!”
Jason jumped back. Cassabrie’s outburst seemed like an explosion.
“I should have told you earlier. The stardrop will burn your clothing, and it would quickly deteriorate.”
He set the ball near the fringe of his cloak. The material immediately began smoldering. “Okay. So much for that.”
Cassabrie appeared again, scurrying up the stairs. Jason launched himself upward, careful to keep the stardrop safe. At first, the climb seemed easy, in spite of his tired legs. The sword, still at his hip, clanked now and then against the stairs, but it was too important to leave behind. Who could tell when he might need it?
After a hundred steps, his muscles burned, yet not as much as the spherical spitfire in his hand. It felt like it was drilling a hole in his palm. In fact, the peeling skin smoldered as it melted away, raising the odor of scalded flesh.
He stopped and rolled it out onto a stair. “I need to put it down for a minute until—”
“No!” Cassabrie bolted down the steps. “Pick it up! Now!”
Jason pinched the ball and set it in his palm again. It dwindled, emitting arcs of light until it disappeared.
Cassabrie let out a harsh sigh. “It can’t touch the stone or it will deteriorate.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that before?”
“Because I told you to carry it. I didn’t expect you to put it down.”
“Isn’t there anything that will hold it?”
“There is a certain kind of metal that can, but it doesn’t exist in the Northlands.”
“But it’s too hot. I can’t hold it.”
“You have to. Alaph thinks you can do this, so I—” A lightning-fast hand covered her voice sparks.
“Alaph? Is he the white dragon?”
The sparks resumed. “Please don’t tell him I told you. He has … an obsession, I suppose, with names. I don’t know any other way to explain it.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t say a word.” He looked at the spot where the stardrop left a burn mark on the stone. “So what do we do now?”
“We’ll get another and try again.”
“But it’s so far. Can’t we go one of the other ways?”
She pointed at the stairs. “This is your path. Do not think the path you’re on is the most difficult when you haven’t experienced the other options.”
Jason looked up the stairway. With no end in sight, judging how hard it was seemed impossible. He let out a quiet sigh. “If you say so. I’ll give it another try.”
They retreated together and, after scooping another stardrop, began ascending the stairs again. This time he never stopped, never slowed. He just concentrated on taking one ste
p at a time while trying to ignore the awful pain. Now it would be better if the voices whispered their story segments into his ears. At least they would take his mind off the scalding little demon in his hand.
Cassabrie’s voice drifted down from above. “Would it help to concentrate on the man to whom you are delivering aid?”
“Yeah. Good idea.” Jason imagined an old man lying in bed. His face was vague, and a thin sheet covered his body, trembling as he shivered. Jason glanced at the stardrop. Maybe it would bring him warmth no other medicine could provide. Alaph probably knew how to make a potion out of it that could—
The stardrop’s heat suddenly spiked. Jason winced. As hot as burning coals, it tore into his skin.
“Ow!” He dropped the ball and rubbed his palm against the cloak.
“Jason!” Cassabrie scrambled down the stairs. “Why did you drop it?”
“Because it was hot!” he snapped.
“I know it’s hot, but now you’ll have to start over again.”
“I can’t. This is insane. No one can do it.”
“Don’t you want to help the old man?”
“Of course I do.” He showed her his hand. The whispering streams passed by, drawing streaks of light across his skin. A raw spot blistered the center of his palm. “Can’t you see it’s impossible?”
She stepped down to his level, making herself visible for a moment. A firm scowl bent her features. “Is it?”
Jason took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. “Look, Cassabrie, we’re not even halfway there and it nearly burned a hole in my hand. What do you expect me to do?”
“I expect you to do what the king called you to do.”
Jason looked away, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at the ghostly girl. With the lives of hundreds of slaves at stake, she wanted him to play a game of hot potato while Elyssa and Koren risked their own lives in the midst of dragons and wolves.
Cassabrie slid her hand into his. It tingled, not quite physical but enough to let him know she was there. “Come with me.”
Her pull felt more like a mental impulse than a tug. As she hurried up the stairs, he ran alongside. Her cloak flowed behind her, and her legs, bare from the calf down, churned, never slowing, never tiring.
After at least a hundred steps, Jason began puffing. He couldn’t give up. Not now. Not when they were finally leaving this place.
When they reached the top step, he stopped and let out a long breath. “What now?”
“You will meet the man you are called to heal.”
“Will he be angry that I didn’t bring the stardrop?”
“Angry? That’s probably not the word for it. But you will be.”
Before he could ask what she meant, she marched ahead. Jason followed, once again entering the foyer where he and Uriel had first come in, but the old man had not returned.
Cassabrie breezed into the corridor to the right, and Jason joined her, the sword now hanging low at his hip and scraping the floor. He hiked up his belt and tightened it in place. If he were ever to meet the white dragon, looking like a warrior might help in more ways than one.
As Cassabrie strode through the spacious corridor, Jason angled his head to check her expression. Since she was only a moving outline of light, reading her face proved difficult. With her lips pressed in a tight line, she seemed upset, perhaps disappointed. He had let her down.
They passed under a high arch and walked into a smaller chamber, dim and quiet. It seemed that light from the corridor was unable to penetrate the archway, leaving them in a room that felt like a cemetery just before nightfall.
Cassabrie stopped, and, except for her cloak flowing in a slight draft, she disappeared.
Continuing with slow, cautious steps, Jason walked onto the new room’s floor, a network of twisted vines and branches. About a hundred feet long and fifty feet wide, and with tall trees lining the walls to the left and right, the room looked like a small jungle. The floor bent slightly as he pressed his foot down, but it seemed stable.
“Explore,” Cassabrie said as she gave her cloak a gentle swirl. “You will find what you have been called to save.”
Jason walked to the first tree on his left. As he drew closer, another object came into view. It looked like a bed with someone lying under a blanket, motionless and quiet. Jason stopped at the side of the bed and waited for his eyes to adjust. Soon, the occupant became clear, an old man with deep wrinkles and watery eyes. With a large leathery hand, he rubbed his bulbous nose, smearing his finger with mucous.
He coughed hard, bringing up more mucous, but he swallowed it back down.
Jason forced himself not to cringe.
“Did you bring it?” The man’s voice sounded like a deep gargle, pain-filled and tortured.
Jason looked at his burned hand. Now the wound seemed miniscule. Showing it to this man and explaining his failure would make him sound like a whining child.
He lowered his head. “No. No, I didn’t.”
“I see.” The man heaved a sigh. “The white dragon said as much, but I hoped for better.”
Jason’s cheeks flushed hot. “The dragon thought I wouldn’t bring it?”
“He said you were a fine young man, but …” He hacked up another phlegm ball and spat it into a cloth in his hand. “But you lack a crucial quality.”
“What quality?”
“He didn’t say. I assume it’s none of my business.”
Jason averted his gaze. How could he look this man in the eye? He had failed. But how could he have succeeded? The dragon had given him a test beyond his abilities. It wasn’t fair.
Clenching his fist, Jason fumed. Not fair? What a childish thought! Fair or not, he failed an important test, and that was all that mattered.
He slid his wounded hand into the man’s grip. “I’m sorry. I’m very sorry. If there is anything I can do—”
“Get the stardrop.” The man jerked his hand away and pointed above his face. “Put it there, and I will be healed.”
Jason looked up. The tree wasn’t a tree at all. It was a tall, elongated man with spindly arms. With his eyes closed and his face expressionless, he appeared to be asleep or perhaps dead. Just above Jason’s eye level, one of the tree man’s arms extended over the bed, his hand open as if checking for rain.
Reaching up, Jason touched the tree man’s skin. Rough and segmented, it felt like bark. In fact, the man was completely covered with bark, concealing any anatomical details and making it appear genderless rather than male. Yet, with two clearly defined arms and legs as well as humanoid facial features, it definitely wasn’t a normal tree, although its roots stretched out in a complex network, creating the room’s floor.
“The stardrop goes in his palm,” the old man said. “That’s all I know. The dragon said the tree would do the rest.”
Jason looked again at the man. Of course he needed the stardrop. Of course he needed to be healed and get out of that bed. But the stardrop would just burn another hole. It was impossible.
“Again, I’m sorry,” Jason said as he backed away. “I wish I could help, but I just can’t.”
“Can you not?”
Jason spun toward the new voice. A white dragon towered over him, his sleek ivory neck supporting a hoary head of smooth shiny scales.
His legs trembling, Jason took a step backwards. He almost coughed out the dragon’s name, but at the last moment, he sputtered, “The … the king?”
Alaph lowered his head to Jason’s eye level. His ears pointed straight up, rotating as he spoke. “More than a mere guess, I assume.”
“Cassabrie …” Jason’s voice squeaked like a rusty hinge. “Cassabrie said you wanted me to …” His thoughts fled away.
“Ah, yes. Cassabrie, the Starlighter, the talebearer, the conjurer of images that make her stories come to life.”
Nodding, Jason kept his stare locked on Alaph’s blue eyes, so different from the dragons in the south. Should he say something else? Alaph hadn’t asked a qu
estion. Maybe he could ask his own now. “I was wondering something. Arxad, a dragon in the …” Again his words failed him. Alaph’s eyes seemed to drain his thoughts.
“I know who Arxad is. Feel free to pursue your question. Do not let my presence intimidate you.”
Jason cleared his throat. “Arxad said we … that is, Koren and I … could find someone here who could help us free the slaves. Might that be you?”
“I am able to help. Yet I am not the one to whom Arxad referred.”
Jason offered a courteous head bow. “Then please, sir, would you tell me who that is and where I can find him?”
“Certainly.” Alaph turned and, using his wings, half walked and half flew toward the far side of the room.
Jason followed. He glanced back at the old man, but in the dimness he had faded to a shapeless mass.
Another tree and bed took shape on the left, but no patient lay there. This place seemed to be a hospital ward, with perhaps four beds on each side.
Alaph stopped at the farthest bed on the right, apparently oblivious to the branches bending under his weight. A man lay there, and a humanoid arm extended over him with its palm begging to be filled.
Before the man’s features became clear, Alaph blocked Jason with a wing. “This is the man to whom Arxad referred, but I fear that he is not well enough. In fact, he will likely not survive the night. I pulled him out of icy water, and he had sustained a head injury that has caused severe swelling. Only a stardrop can help him now.”
Jason leaned to the side but caught only a glimpse of Deference carrying a suction bulb to the bed. “Deference mentioned him. Who is he?”
“I will answer your question if you will answer mine.”
“Okay. I’ll try.”
“You wish to know the identity of this patient. Will you kindly tell me the identity of the first patient you visited?”
“You mean his name?”
The dragon nodded. “That will be sufficient.”
“Uh …” Jason ran the conversation through his mind. The man never spoke his name. Cassabrie had said the white dragon had an obsession with names, so his question wasn’t too surprising. “I’m sorry. I don’t know.”
