Talking To Dragons

by Patricia C. Wrede

  I stood up and looked around. Over on my right there was a little gap in the trees, not enough to call a clearing, just a place where me trees were farther apart. I went over to the middle of it and stood there while I tried to unfasten the sheath. It was a lot more complicated than it looked; finally I had to take the whole belt off. I wrapped the belt around the sheath and set the whole thing down in the middle of the open space. I backed up a couple of steps and sat down on the ground with the hilt of the sword closest to me and the end of the sheath pointing away from me.

  The woods had gone very, very quiet. I didn’t like that, but I would have felt stupid if I’d gotten up and picked up the sword without doing anything. Besides, leaving things half-finished can be awfully dangerous. I took a deep breath and spoke as steadily as I could.

  “Sword of the Sleeping King, I conjure thee:

  By stream and starlight,

  By sun and shadow,

  By song and stormwind,

  Show me thy tale!”

  It was the simplest spell I knew; almost the only one, in fact. It’s supposed to let the spell-caster know more about the nature of whatever object is named in the first line of the chant. I didn’t think the spell would work quite the same way on a magic sword, but it shouldn’t do any harm, and I was hoping to find out something useful. I finished the spell, and everything was quiet for about two heartbeats. Fast heartbeats; I was nervous. Then the world turned over.

  That’s what it felt like. The ground started shaking, and the part under the sword pushed up until it made a mound taller than I was. I didn’t have much of a chance to look at it; I was being rolled all over the open space and trying to grab hold of something. Then everything went dark, and I was falling, and a huge, deep voice said solemnly, “All hail the Bearer of the Sword!”

  And then it was over. I was lying on the ground in the Enchanted Forest, trying to dig my way through the moss. I stopped and waited. Nothing else happened, so I sat up and looked around. I was still sitting in the same not-quite-a-clearing, with the sword and sheath in the middle. The sword...

  The sword was standing upright, half-buried in a kneehigh mound that hadn’t been there before. The blade was about a handspan out of the sheath, and it glittered when the sun got through the trees enough to hit it. I stood up and walked out. The mound was covered with moss, just like the rest of the forest floor; it could have been there forever. I shivered, wondering how I was going to get the sheath out of the ground.

  I put one hand on the hilt of the sword, intending to shove it back down into the sheath. When my hand touched the sword, my whole arm started to tingle. I jerked my hand away and stared at the sword. It just sat there. I reached out again, this time for the sheath.

  As soon as I touched it, the sheath slid out of the ground. The belt was still wrapped around it, and there wasn’t any dirt clinging to either of them. I touched the hilt again. It still made my arm tingle, but this time I was ready for it, and I shoved it back into the sheath. Then I stuffed the swordbelt under my arm and started walking. I was sure somebody must have noticed what had just happened, and I didn’t want to be around when they came to find out what was going on.

  I didn’t stop again until mid-afternoon. By then I was hungry as well as tired; I’d forgotten to bring any food with me, and I certainly couldn’t go back for it now. I sighed and sat down under another tree to rest and think some more, but I didn’t get much thinking done. Mostly, I stared at the sword.

  Finally, I gave up. Sitting under a tree wasn’t going to teach me anything. I stood up and buckled on the swordbelt. As I adjusted it, my hand touched the hilt of the sword again. Three little tingles ran up my arm before I pulled my hand away. I looked at the sword for a moment, then shrugged and reached for the hilt with my right hand, as if I were going to draw it.

  As soon as my hand touched the hilt, I felt the tingling. This time I didn’t let go; I concentrated on the way it felt instead. I got three distinct impressions. One was a low, sort of background vibration, like a kitten purring in its sleep; one was a deep rumbling feeling; and one was a bright buzz like a bee in a jar. Almost as soon as I figured them out, they started to fade. In another minute they were completely gone, and they didn’t come back.

  I took my hand off the sword’s hilt, then put it back. I didn’t feel anything. I tried a couple more times, but whatever it was had stopped. I finally gave up and started walking again. I wasn’t getting anywhere trying to figure out the sword, and I had to find somewhere to spend the night.

  At least I didn’t have to worry about giants; they live farther east, by the Mountains of Morning. It occurred to me suddenly that I didn’t know where I was; I might be in the Mountains of Morning for all I knew. It wasn’t a particularly cheerful thought. I started walking more quietly.

  I’d been walking for nearly half an hour when I realized that I knew where I was going. Unfortunately, I didn’t know where I’d be when I got there. It was very odd, and I was a little uneasy until I realized that I didn’t have to go that direction. I could just as easily turn around and walk the other way, or go sideways. In fact, I did for a while, just to prove I could.

  After that I felt better, so I stopped avoiding whatever it was and. started walking toward it again. I wasn’t going to get anywhere if I kept avoiding things; I might miss something important. Besides, there isn’t any way you can avoid everything in the Enchanted Forest. This way, at least I knew something was coming.

  I was still walking very quietly when I heard the noises; it sounded like somebody crying. I headed toward the sound, wondering what I was getting myself into. You can’t just ignore something like that, especially in the Enchanted Forest. On the other hand... I stopped, staring at a thick, prickly hedge. It was taller than my head, and impossible to see through, much less shove through. The crying was coming from the other side.

  I bent over. The bushes were much too close together for me to crawl through them. I could make out sunlight and long red hair and a brown tunic on the other side, but not much else. I stood up and walked to one side, looking for a thin spot in the hedge. It wasn’t long before I realized I was going in a circle. Terrific, I thought. I bet it goes all the way around without breaking. I kept walking anyway, just in case.

  It didn’t take long to make the full circle. I bent over and peered through the bushes again. Suz might be able to get through, but I never would. I stood up and tapped lightly on the outside of the bushes.

  “Excuse me, please, but would you mind letting me through?” I said as politely as I could.

  The bushes rustled and pulled apart. I stared at them for a minute; I hadn’t really thought it would work. The bushes rustled again; somehow they managed to sound impatient. “Ah, thank you very much,” I said, and stepped through.

  The hedge closed behind me with a prim swish, and I looked around. The inside of the hedge was a circular clearing full of sunlight and the feel of magic. A red-haired girl in a brown tunic was lying at one side of the clearing; she sat up as I came in, and her face was tearstained.

  “Who are you?” she demanded fiercely as soon as she saw me. “And what do you want?” She looked about my age, but I never was very good at guessing how old people are.

  “My name is Daystar,” I said. “I heard you, um, crying, and I wanted to see if I could do anything.”

  She looked at me suspiciously. “You just walked through that hedge? Ha! I’ve been trying to get out of here all day. It’s not that easy. I think you’re a wizard.” I noticed some scratches on her arms and some fuzzy places in the tunic where it might have caught on branches or trees.

  “I’m not a wizard. Maybe it’s easier to get in than it is to get out,” I offered.

  The red-haired girl sat back. “That could be true,” she said a little less belligerently. She eyed me skeptically; I tried to look trustworthy. “Well, you don’t look like a wizard,” she said at last. “Can you get out again?”

  “I don’t know,” I
said.

  “Well, try!” she said, “No, wait; I’ll stand next to you so I can get out, too. Then we’ll both be rescued.” She jumped to her feet. “What are you waiting for?”

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t really think I need to be rescued,” I said. “I was looking for a place to spend the night and this seems pretty safe. I’m not sure I want to leave just yet. Besides, I don’t know anything about you. Maybe I don’t want to rescue you.”

  “Oh, rats.” The redhead sat down again. “I thought you might be a hero; you can talk them into anything. Stupid creatures.”

  “Who are you?” I asked. “And why are you worried about wizards?”

  “I suppose it won’t matter if I tell you,” she said after thinking for a minute. “They’re chasing me. My name’s Shiara,” she added.

  “Wizards are chasing you? More than one?” I was impressed. Wizards usually don’t cooperate much, even the ones who belong to the Society of Wizards. “What did you do?”

  Shiara hesitated, then threw her hair back over her shoulder with a toss of her head. “I,” she said defiantly, “am a fire-witch.”

  “You’re a fire-witch?” Well, she had the red hair for it, but that doesn’t always mean someone is a fire-witch. She must have heard the doubt in my voice, because she scowled at me.

  “I am a fire-witch! I am!”

  “I didn’t say you weren’t,” I said hastily. That only seemed to make it worse.

  “You don’t believe me!” she said accusingly. “But I am so a fire-witch! I am! I am!” She was shouting by the time she finished. She glared at me, and her hair burst into flame.

  That settled it; she really was a fire-witch. “I believe you, I believe you,” I said. “Uh, shouldn’t you do something about your hair?”

  Shiara burst into tears and her hair went out. I stood there feeling silly and useless. Finally I remembered my handkerchief; Mother made me carry one all the time, even chopping wood, so I actually had it with me. I pulled it out and offered it to her. After a couple of sniffs, she took it and mopped her face, but she didn’t say anything.

  “I’m sorry,” I said finally. “I didn’t mean to make you mad.”

  “Well, you did,” she snapped. She crumpled the handkerchief into a little ball and threw it at me.

  I caught it and stuffed it back into my pocket. “I said I was sorry.”

  “I can’t help having a temper,” Shiara said crossly. “All fire-witches do.”

  “Really? I’ve never met one before. I’ve met heroes and Princes, and once in a while even a wizard, but no fire-witches. Does your hair always do that when you get mad?”

  “No,” she said. She looked like she was going to cry again.

  “Why are the wizards chasing you?” I asked hastily, hoping it was a safer topic.

  “I burned the Head Wizard’s staff,” Shiara said matter-of-factly.

  My jaw dropped about a foot. A wizard’s staff is the source of his power; furthermore, most wizards store spells in them. Sort of an emergency reserve. A lot of the staffs get passed down from one wizard to the next, accumulating magic as they go. They’re practically indestructible. They get lost a lot and then found in the nick of time under peculiar circumstances, but I’d never heard of one being destroyed before. And the Head Wizard’s staff...

  “You burned a wizard’s staff?” I managed finally.

  “You bet.” Shiara’s eyes glinted at the memory. “He deserved it, too. But the rest of them got mad. So I ran away while they were arguing about what to do with me.”

  “And you came to the Enchanted Forest? On purpose? Isn’t that a little extreme? I mean, you could get, well, enchanted. Or killed, or something. This place is dangerous.”

  “Having the whole Society of Wizards mad at you is just as bad,” she snapped.

  I thought about it. She was right. “Why did you bum the Head Wizard’s staff?” I asked after a minute.

  “I didn’t like him,” Shiara said shortly. I got the distinct impression she didn’t want to talk about it, so I decided to change the subject again. Besides, my feet hurt.

  “Would you mind if I sat down?” I asked. “I’ve been doing a lot of walking today.” She nodded. I moved the sword out of the way and sat down; I was starting to get the hang of it. Shiara saw the weapon and frowned.

  “Are you sure you’re not a hero or an apprentice hero ‘» or something?”

  “I don’t think I am,” I said cautiously. “I’m not really sure.”

  “You’re not sure? Don’t you know who you are?”

  I blinked. I’d never really thought about it that way. “I know who I am,” I said. “I just don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing. Except finding out what I’m supposed to be doing.”

  Shiara stared at me. “I don’t believe it. Nobody comes to the Enchanted Forest without some kind of reason.”

  “What’s yours, then?” I said. I was getting a little tired of people and animals and things not believing me.

  “None of your business!” Shiara said. She was glaring at me again. Then she jumped up and glared down at me. “I want to leave,” she announced. “Right now.”

  “All right,” I said. “But I thought you couldn’t get through the hedge.”

  Shiara stamped her foot, and a little flame flared up from it. “I can’t! Open it for me! Right now!” She was really mad, but at least this time her hair wasn’t burning. I was glad; watching someone glare at you with her hair on fire is a little unnerving.

  “I don’t want to open the hedge yet,” I said reasonably. “I don’t even know if I can. Besides, it could be dangerous. There are wolves in this forest. And it’s getting dark; there could be nightshades out there already. That may not bother a fire-witch, but—”

  “I hate you!” Shiara cried. She sounded like she meant it.

  “Just because I don’t want to get eaten by wolves or driven mad by a nightshade or something?” I said, puzzled. “What’s wrong with that?”

  Shiara didn’t answer; she just turned her back on me. I watched her for a minute, then sort of settled back on the ground. Things were getting very complicated. I was lost in the Enchanted Forest, with no food or water. I had a magic sword I didn’t want to use because it did strange things to the ground. In another day or so I would probably have a wizard looking for me. I still didn’t have any idea how I was going to figure out why Mother wanted me to leave home. And then there was Shiara.

  Fire-witches are rare. Nobody can learn to be one; you’re either born one or you’re not. They’re very powerful. They can burn anything, of course, and fire doesn’t hurt them at all. Fire-witches can learn almost any kind of magic there is. They’re immune to most spells, too, which is why wizards usually don’t like them much. Fire-witches can even summon Elementals and get them to listen. Well, sometimes. And Shiara was a fire-witch. With enough power to bum a wizard’s staff. The Head Wizard’s staff.

  I didn’t think I wanted her to be mad at me.

  I didn’t know what to do about it, though. I didn’t even know what I’d done wrong, and I wasn’t at all sure what to do next. What do you say to a mad fire-witch?

  Right about then I heard snuffling noises; Shiara was crying again. I sighed and dug out my handkerchief.

  “I didn’t mean to make you mad,” I said as I watched her mop her face again. “I just keep doing it by accident. It’d make things a lot easier for both of us if you would tell me what I’m doing wrong so I can stop.”

  Shiara looked at me over the top of the handkerchief, which was starting to look sort of damp and wrinkled. “You want to talk to me? You’re not scared?” She lowered the handkerchief and stared at me. “You mean it!”

  “Of course I mean it,” I said. “Why shouldn’t I? And why should I be scared?”

  “I guess I’d better tell you,” she said with a sigh.

  3

  THE PROBLEM WAS, Shiara was a fire-witch who couldn’t do anything. On purpose, I mean. Things happened som
etimes when she got mad, and once in a while she could make a spell work, but most of the time she couldn’t make anything happen. She didn’t have very many friends because everyone was afraid of her. I could understand that. I mean, with a temper like hers and no way of telling what would happen when she lost it, people had reason to be nervous.

  On top of that, everyone kept telling her about all the things she ought to be able to do because she was a fire-witch. Like not worrying about nightshades; that was why she got mad at me. She was awfully sick of being told about what fire-witches could do, especially when she couldn’t. I couldn’t blame her for getting mad.

  And then somebody told the Society of Wizards about this fire-witch who couldn’t cast spells or anything. They decided it would be a great chance to find out more about fire-witches. As I said, wizards don’t get along with fire-witches very well. So a whole bunch of wizards came and grabbed Shiara right out of the middle of town. Shiara didn’t like it; she liked it even less when she found out they wanted her to stand in the middle of a circle of wizards while they threw spells at her to see what would work.

  “I said no,” Shiara told me. “And they said I didn’t have any choice. That’s when I burned the Head Wizard’s staff.”

  “They don’t sound like the wizards I’ve met,” I said. Then I remembered Antorell. “Most of them, anyway.”

  “I don’t care; I don’t like wizards,” Shiara said. I couldn’t blame her, and I said so. She nodded and went on, “Anyway, it turned out that the wizards had brought me to the edge of the Enchanted Forest. They said something about the magic in the forest and fire-witches’ magic being related. That was before I got away. So I decided to see if there was somewhere in the forest I could find out how to use my magic. Only then I stumbled in here and I couldn’t get out. I was afraid the wizards would catch up with me, and I was tired and hungry and mad. That’s why I was crying.”