The Dragon Keeper

by Robin Hobb

Her mother sighed. “Yes. Now. As in the ‘now’ that I have been telling you to expect all day. You knew that Hest Finbok was coming. You have known it since his last visit, last week at this same hour. Alise, his courtship honors you and our family. You should always receive him graciously. Yet whenever he calls, I have to come and ferret you out of hiding. I wish you would remember that when a young man comes to call on you, it is only polite to treat him respectfully. ”

  Alise set down her charcoal. Her mother winced as Alise wiped her smudged fingers clean on a dainty kerchief embroidered with Sevian lace. It was a tiny act of vindictiveness. The kerchief had been a gift from Hest. “Not to mention that we must all remember that he is my only suitor, and therefore my only chance of wedding. ” Her comment was almost too soft for her mother to hear. With a sigh, she added, “I’m coming, Mother. And I will be gracious. ”

  Her mother was silent for a moment. “That is wise of you,” she said finally, adding in a voice that was cool but still gentle. “I am relieved to see that you have finally stopped sulking. ”

  Alise could not tell if her mother was stating something she believed was true or was demanding that she accede to a dictation of deportment. She closed her eyes for an instant. Today, to the north, in the depths of the Rain Wilds, the dragons were emerging from their cases. Well, she amended to herself, today was the day appointed by Tintaglia for the leaves and debris to be swept away from them, so that the sunlight might touch them and stir them to wakefulness. Perhaps even now, as she sat at her tidy little desk in her pale room, surrounded by her tattered scrolls and feeble efforts at notes and sketching, dragons were tearing and shouldering their way out of the cocoons.

  For a moment, she could imagine the whole scene: the verdant riverbank warmed by summer sunshine, the brilliantly hued dragons trumpeting joyously as they emerged into daylight. The Rain Wild Traders were probably heralding the hatching with all sorts of festivities. She imagined a dais decorated with garlands of exotic flowers. There would be speeches of welcome to the emerging dragons, song, and feasting. No doubt each dragon would parade before the dais, be joyously introduced, and then would open wide its glittering wings and lift off into the sky. These would be the first dragons to hatch in Sa knew how many years. Dragons had come back into the world . . . and here she was, trapped in Bingtown, shackled to a docile existence and subject to a courtship that baffled and annoyed her.

  Disappointment suddenly smothered her. She had dreamed of making the trip to witness the dragons’ hatching since she had first heard of the serpents encasing themselves. Alise had begged it of her father, and when he had said it might be improper for her to travel on her own, she had flattered and bribed her younger brother’s wife until she had persuaded Alise’s younger brother to promise to accompany her. She had secretly sold off items from her hope chest to amass the passage money she needed and pretended to her parents that she had been saving from the small monthly allowance they gave her. The precious billet for the trip was still wedged in the corner of her vanity mirror. For weeks, she had seen it every day, a stiff rectangle of cream-colored paper scribbled over with a clerk’s spidery handwriting attesting that she had paid full price for two round-trips. That bit of paper had represented a promise to herself. It had meant that she would see what she had read of; she would witness an event that would, that must change the course of history. She would sketch the scene and she would write of it authoritatively, tying all she witnessed to her years of scholarly research. Then everyone would have to recognize her knowledge and ability and concede that although she might be self-educated on the matter, she was certainly far more than an eccentric old maid obsessed with dragons and their Elderling companions. She was a scholar.

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  She would have something that belonged to her, something salvaged out of the miserable existence that life in Bingtown had become. Even before war had descended, her family’s fortune had been scraping bottom. They lived simply, in a modest manor house on the unfashionable edges of Bingtown. No grand park surrounded their home, only a humble rose garden tended by her sisters. Her father made his living by expediting trades between wealthier families. When war came and trading faltered, there was little profit for a go-between. She was, she knew, a plain, solid girl, from a plain, solid family ensconced firmly toward the lower end of the Bingtown Traders’ social ladder. She had never been anyone’s idea of a “good catch. ” It had not brightened her forecast when her mother had delayed her debut into society until her eighteenth year. She’d understood the reasons: her family had been arranging and financing her older sister’s wedding. They’d had nothing to spare to launch yet another daughter. When, finally, she had been presented to Trader society three years ago, no man had raced to claim her from the butterfly mob of young girls. Three crops of Bingtown femininity had been released into the pool of eligible maidens since then, and with every passing year, her prospects of courtship and marriage had dimmed.

  The war with Chalced had obscured them entirely. Her mind shied from recalling those nights of fire and smoke and screams. Chalcedean vessels had invaded the harbor and burned the warehouses and half the market square to the ground. Bingtown, the fabled and fabulous trade town where “if a man could imagine it, he could find it for sale,” had become a city of stinking ruins and sodden ash. If the dragon Tintaglia had not come to their aid, like as not, Alise and her entire family would be tattooed slaves somewhere in Chalced by now. As it was, the invaders had been repelled, and the Traders had formed a rough alliance with the Pirate Isles. Jamaillia, their motherland, had come to its senses and seen that Chalced was not an ally but a plundering nation of thieves. Today, Bingtown Harbor was clear of invaders, the city had begun to rebuild, and life had begun a hesitant return to routine. She knew she should have been grateful that her family’s home had escaped burning, and that their holdings, several farms that grew mostly root crops, were now producing food that was greatly in demand.

  But the truth was, she wasn’t. Oh, not that she wished to be living in a half-burned hovel or sleeping in a ditch. No. But for a few frightening, exhilarating weeks, she had thought she might escape from her role as the third daughter in a lesser Bingtown family. The night Tintaglia had landed outside the burned shell of the Traders’ Concourse and struck her bargain with the Traders, offering her protection of their city in exchange for the Traders’ pledge to aid the serpents and the young dragons when they hatched, Alise’s heart had soared. She had been there. She had stood, shawl clutched about her shoulders, shivering in the dark, and listened to the dragon’s words. She had seen the great creature’s gleaming hide, her spinning eyes, and yes, she had fallen under the spell of Tintaglia’s voice and glamour. She had fallen gladly. She loved the dragon and all that she stood for. Alise could think of no higher calling than to spend the rest of her life chronicling the history of dragons and Elderlings. She would combine what she knew of their history with her recording of their glorious return to the world. On that night, in that moment, Alise had suddenly perceived she had a place and a mission in the world. In that time of flames and strife, anything had seemed possible, even that someday the dragon Tintaglia would look at her and address her directly and, perhaps, even thank her for dedicating herself to such a work.

  Even in the weeks that followed, as Bingtown pieced itself back together and struggled to find a new normalcy, Alise had continued to believe that the horizons of her life had widened. The Tattooed, the freed slaves, had begun to mingle with the Three Ships folk and with the Traders as all united to rebuild Bingtown’s economy and physical structures. People—even women—had left their usual safe orbits and pitched in, doing whatever they must to rebuild. She knew that war was a terrible, destructive thing and that she should hate it, but the war had been the only really exciting thing that had ever happened in her life.

  She should have known her dreams would come to naught. As homes and businesses were rebuilt, as trade took o
n a new shape despite war and piracy, everyone else had tried desperately to make things go back as they were before. Everyone except Alise. Having glimpsed a possible future for herself, she had struggled wildly to escape from the suffocating destiny that sought to reclaim her.

  Even when Hest Finbok had first begun to insinuate himself into her life, she had kept her focus on her dream. Her mother’s enthusiasm and her father’s quiet pride that the family’s wallflower had finally attracted not only a suitor but such a rare prize of a suitor had not distracted her from her plan. Let her mother flutter and her father beam. She knew Hest’s interest in her would come to nothing, and thus she had paid little mind to it. She was past pinning her hopes on such silly, girlish dreams.

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  The Traders’ Summer Ball was only two days away now. It would be the first event to be held in the newly rebuilt Traders’ Concourse. All of Bingtown was in a stir about it. Representatives and guests from the Tattooed and the Three Ships folk would join the Bingtown Traders in commemorating the rejuvenation of their city. Despite the ongoing war, it was expected to be a celebration beyond anything Bingtown had ever experienced, the first time that the general population of Bingtown had been invited to the traditional event. Alise had given it little thought, for she had not expected to attend it. She had her ticket for her trip to the Rain Wilds. While other eligible women fluttered their fans and spun gaily on the dance floor, she would be in Cassarick, watching a new generation of dragons emerge from their cocoons.

  But two weeks ago Hest Finbok had asked her father’s permission to escort her to the ball. Her father had given it. “And having given it, my girl, I can scarcely withdraw it! How could I imagine that you would want to go up the Rain Wild River to see some big lizards hatch rather than go to the Summer Ball on the arm of one of Bingtown’s most eligible bachelors?” He had smiled proudly the day he had dashed her dream to pieces, so sure he had known what was truly in her heart. Her mother had said that she had never even imagined that her father should consult her on such a matter. Didn’t she trust her parents to do what was in her best interest?

  If she had not been strangling on her dismay and disappointment, Alise might have given her father and her mother a response to that. Instead she had turned and fled the room. For days afterward she had mourned the lost opportunity. Sulked, as her mother put it. It hadn’t deterred her mother from calling in seamstresses, and buying up every measure of rose silk and pink ribbon that remained in Bingtown. No expense would be spared for her dress. What did it matter that Alise’s dream had died in the egg, if they had theirs of finally marrying off their useless and eccentric second younger daughter? Even in this time of war and tightened budgets, they would spend feverishly in hopes of being not only rid of her but also gaining an important trade alliance. Alise had been sick with disappointment. Sulking, her mother called it. Was she finished with it?

  Yes.

  For an instant, she was surprised. Then she sighed and felt herself let go of something that she hadn’t even known she was clutching. She almost felt her spirit sink back to a level of ordinary expectations, back to accepting the quiet, restrained life of a proper Trader’s daughter who would become a Trader’s wife.

  It was over, it was past, it was finished. Let it go. It wasn’t meant to be. She had turned her eyes to the window during her brief reverie. She had been staring sightlessly out at the little rose garden that was now in full blossom. It looked, she thought dully, just as it had every summer of her life. Nothing ever really changed. She forced the words out past the gravel in her throat. “I’m not sulking, Mother. ”

  “I’m glad. For both of us. ” Her mother cleared her throat. “He’s a fine man, Alise. Even if he were not such a good catch, I’d still say that about him. ”

  “Better than you expected for me. Better than I deserve. ”

  A pause of three heartbeats. Then her mother said brusquely, “Don’t make him wait, Alise. ” Her long skirts swished gently against the hardwood floor as she left the room.

  She had not, Alise noticed, contradicted her. Alise was aware of it, her parents were aware of it, her siblings were aware of it. No one had ever spoken it aloud, until now. Hest Finbok was too good for her. It made no sense that the wealthy heir of a major Bingtown family would wish to wed the plain middle child of the Kincarron Traders. Alise felt strangely freed that her mother had not denied her words. And she was proud that she had spoken her words without resentment. A bit sad, she thought as she resmudged her fingers by neatly restoring her charcoal to its little silver box. A bit sad that her mother had not even tried to claim she deserved such a fine man. Even if it was a lie, it seemed to her that a dutiful mother would have said it, just to be polite to her least attractive daughter.

  Alise had tried to think of a way to explain her lack of interest in Hest to her mother. But she knew that if she said to her mother, “It’s too late. My girlhood dreams are dead, and I like the ones I have now better,” her mother would have been horrified. But it was the truth. Like any young woman, she had once dreamed of roses and stolen kisses and a romantic suitor who would not care about the size of her dowry. Those dreams had died slowly, drowned in tears and humiliation. She had no desire to revive them.

  A year past her emergence into society, with no suitors in sight, Alise had resigned herself to her fate and begun grooming herself for the role of maiden aunt. She played the harp, tatted excellent lace, was very good at puddings, and even had selected a suitably whimsical hobby. Long before Tintaglia had jolted her dreams, she’d become a student of dragon lore, with a strong secondary knowledge of Elderlings. If a scroll existed in Bingtown that dealt with either topic, Alise had found a way to read, buy, or borrow it long enough to copy it. She believed she now had the most extensive library of information on the two ancient races that anyone in the town possessed, much of it painstakingly copied over in her own hand.

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  Along with that hard-earned knowledge, she had earned a reputation for eccentricity that not even a large dowry would have mitigated. In a middle daughter from a less affluent Trader family, it was an unforgivable flaw. She didn’t care. Her studies, begun on a whim, had seized her imagination. Her dragon knowledge was no longer an eccentric hobby; she was a scholar, a self-taught historian, collecting, organizing, and comparing every scrap of information she could garner about dragons and the ancient Elderlings rumored to have lived alongside the great beasts. So little was known of them, and yet their history was woven through the ancient underground cities of the Rain Wilds and hence into the history of Bingtown. The oldest scrolls were antiquities from those cities, written in letters and a language that no one could read or speak. Many of the newer scrolls and writings were haphazard attempts at translations, and the worst ones were merely wild speculation. Those that were illustrated were often stained or tattered, or the inks and vellum had become food for vermin. One had to guess what had originally been there. But with her studies, Alise had begun to be able to do more than guess, and her careful crossreferencing of surviving scrolls had yielded up to her a full score of words. She felt confident that with time, she could force all their secrets from the ancient writings. And time, she knew, was one thing an old maid had in abundance. Time to study and ponder, time to unlock all these tantalizing mysteries.

  If only Hest Finbok had not stepped into her life! Five years her senior, the heir son of a Trader family that was very well-todo, even by Bingtown standards, he was the answer to a dream. Unfortunately, the dream was her mother’s, not Alise’s. Her mother had near fainted with joy the first time Hest had asked Alise to dance. When, during the same evening, he had danced with her four more times, her mother had scarcely been able to contain her excitement. On the way home in the coach she had been unable to speak of anything else. “He is so handsome, and always so well dressed. Did you see the look on Trader Meldar’s face when Hest asked you to dan
ce? For years, his wife has been throwing her daughters at him; I’ve heard she has asked Hest to dinner at her home as many as seven times in a month! The poor man. All know the Meldar girls are nervous as fleas. Can you imagine sitting at a table with all four of them at once? Twitchy as cats, the lot of them, their mother included. I believe he only goes there for the sake of the younger son. What was his name? Sedric? He and Hest have been friends for years. I hear that Trader Meldar was offended when Hest offered Sedric a position in his household. But what other prospect does the man have? The war has taken most of the Meldar family fortune. His brother will inherit what is left, and they’ll either have to dower the girls well to marry them off, or keep them all and feed them! I doubt Sedric will see so much as an allowance. ”

  “Mother, please! You know that Sophie Meldar is my friend. And Sedric has always been kind to me. He’s a very nice young man, with prospects of his own. ”

  Her mother had scarcely heard her words. “Oh, Alise, you looked so lovely together. Hest Finbok is the perfect height for you, and when I saw the pale blue of your gown against the royal blue of his jacket, well! It was as if you’d both just stepped out of a painting. Did he speak to you while you danced?”

  “Only a few words. He’s a very charming man,” Alise had admitted to her mother. “Very charming indeed. ”

  And he was. Charming. Intelligent. More than handsome enough for all ordinary purposes. And wealthy. On that night, Alise had been unable to divine what on earth Hest wanted of her. She had been unable to think of a single thing to say to him while they danced. When he had asked her what she did to pass the time, she told him that she enjoyed reading. “An unusual occupation for a young lady! What sorts of things do you read?” he had pressed her. She had, in that moment, hated him for asking but she had answered truthfully.

  “I read about dragons. And Elderlings. They fascinate me. Now that Tintaglia has allied with us, and a new generation of dragons will soon grace our skies, someone must become knowledgeable about them. I believe that is my destiny. ” There. That should betray to him how hopelessly unsuitable a dance partner she was.