The Tropic of Serpents: A Memoir by Lady Trent (A Natural History of Dragons)

by Marie Brennan

  The way he phrased it, I wasn’t sure whether it was a statement or a command. “After this, I may finally have some notion of how to do that. But much will depend on when the egg-laying season is.” I thought about how long we had already been gone, and added, “Would you like to go back and report to him? He must be wondering.”

  “No,” Faj Rawango said. “I will stay here.” (A decision which I chalked up mostly to his unwillingness to report so little progress. He did not seem to be enjoying his sojourn among his father’s kindred.)

  Tom was another matter. “You’ll be going from camp to camp,” he said, having queried Yeyuama for details. “Not going entirely on your own. Still…”

  “You do not like it,” I said.

  “First that business with witchcraft, now this test of theirs. I didn’t expect you to embrace so many of their ways.”

  I had not embraced anything. In the case of the witchcraft ceremony, it was more “shoved unwillingly,” and as for this—“We require doctors to obtain certification before they can practice, and lawyers must sit examinations before they can pass the bar. Whatever this test may be, think of it in that light. It is a matter of qualification, nothing more.”

  “Passing the bar,” he said dryly, “rarely threatens one’s life. But you’re right about one thing: it appears to be necessary. We can observe dragons all we like, but there are some secrets we won’t know unless you go through with this. I’m not trying to stop you. I only wish we had another way.”

  For my own part, I wished he could come with us, though I had wit enough not to pain him by saying so. Natalie and I packed up what we could; it was not much, as neither of us had the strength of neck to carry a basket on a tumpline. Then we made our farewells to Tom and Faj Rawango, Akinimanbi and Mekeesawa, Apuesiso and Daboumen, and ventured deeper into the swamp.

  I will gloss over the process of our journey, in favor of coming more quickly to its end. Suffice it to say that we did, as Tom had predicted, go from camp to camp, meeting both strangers and people who had formerly been part of our own camp, and enduring a thousand questions when they discovered that Yeyuama was taking us on this pilgrimage. I soon realized our destination was not secret; it was merely taboo, a thing not spoken of except when the occasion arose. Those we passed seemed to have at least a general understanding of what Natalie and I faced, and few of them seemed to think we stood much chance.

  There is no faster way to harden my determination to do a thing than to assume I will fail at it. But when I saw at last the challenge Yeyuama intended, the revelation shook even my self-confidence and will.

  * * *

  We had left the last camp behind two days before. My sense of geography was sorely addled by the tracklessness of the swamp, but Natalie and I, making estimates of the distance we had traveled, could guess where Yeyuama was taking us. We were drawing near to the western border of the Green Hell.

  The noise grew by subtle degrees as we traveled onward, at first remaining faint enough that my conscious mind did not notice it. Then it rose high enough to attract my attention: the steady, rushing thunder of falling water. “We must be near,” I said, and got a bright grin from Yeyuama in response.

  This I took to be agreement, only realizing my error after we had slogged at least another mile onward. We were not yet near at all. I had simply underestimated the magnitude of what we had come to see.

  The Great Cataract of Mouleen.

  As I have said before, the three rivers of Girama, Gaomomo, and Hembi come together west of the Moulish swamp, a confluence of the sort that happens in many parts of the world. But here, as nowhere else, the rivers are stopped shy of their peaceful meeting by a fault in the earth that dropped the land of Mouleen not quite a hundred meters below the rivers’ previous beds. Along this curving and irregular edge, the three rivers spread out and break up their flow, plunging downward in a roar of countless waterfalls.

  Yeyuama brought us to the very edge of the great lake which forms the base of these falls, an expanse of water large enough to give me an unobstructed view of much of the Great Cataract. Even at this range, I could feel the force of it: the constant thunder of the water, torrents of it crashing endlessly down, threatening to drive the air from my lungs. Everywhere I looked I saw rainbows, light refracting from the mist thrown off by the falls. I might have stepped through some portal into a magical place—the homeland of wild-hearted faerie creatures grander and more terrible than any human could hope to understand.

  My face opened with exhilaration, in an expression that was not quite a laugh. I could not help myself; the madness I felt at the mere sight of this place could not be held in. Natalie looked much the same. Yeyuama was solemn by comparison; but then, of course, he had been here before. And this place, clearly, was sacred to his people.

  I could not imagine a place less like the sober Assembly Houses I associated with religion; but I could, with no difficulty at all, understand why one might attach such a word to this place. Such sublime grandeur seemed very much like a thing of the gods.

  The cataract itself was too breathtaking to behold for long, even though the height of the floods had passed and the waters of the swamp were beginning to subside. My eye sought out more restful sights. I saw that the lake was the hollow pounded out by the falling water, and surmised that it must be quite deep. From there the mingled contents of the three rivers spread out through the low-lying region we called Mouleen, and thus gave rise to the swamp; indeed, from here we could no longer speak of it in a meaningful sense as a river, whether singular or multiple, for the waterways branched and recombined into the mazelike delta which I had been inhabiting for the last five months.

  But for what purpose had Yeyuama brought us all this way?

  Such was the noise that I had to raise my voice almost to a shout in order to be heard. “Is this the place of the test?” I asked, gesturing at the entire stunning scene: cataract, lake, and all.

  Yeyuama grinned again. “That, Reguamin, is your test!” And he pointed.

  The broken curve of the Great Cataract was not a single fall, but many. Here and there along its length, islands persisted on the edge, dividing the whole into its parts. It was not, however, to one of these that Yeyuama directed my attention, but rather to an island within the cascade itself.

  It jutted out from the white thunder perhaps two-thirds of the way between us and the plateau above. It was framed by falling water all around: the rivers tumbling down one stage behind, then parting to plummet the remaining distance on either side. Thinner trickles, some of which might have been respectable falls in other parts of the world, ran through the island and emerged from its front like strings of diamonds. And the whole of the island was thickly covered in verdant growth, trees finding purchase on the stone, vines falling in elegant curtains below.

  “You must visit that island,” Yeyuama said, his voice strong over the roar of the water. “Then you will be ready to touch the dragons.”

  I understood why many boys refused, and few women tried. Visit the island? How was one to get up there, or for that matter to come back? It stood in the midst of the falls, nowhere near the border of the lake. To go over the first edge in a boat (or the more stereotypical barrel) would only result in missing the island, or being dashed to pieces if one did not. Swimming the lake would be both hazardous and difficult, as the current pushed one away from the base, and once that obstacle was surmounted one still had the challenge of climbing the rock face.

  Yes, these were the thoughts in my mind as I stared at the Great Cataract of Mouleen. Of course I had begun to ponder how it might be done. If you know anything of my life, you will not be surprised.

  Natalie and I discussed it, once we had retired far enough to be able to converse in more normal tones. “I expect it used to all be like that,” she said, sketching out a shape with her hands. “Multiple tiers—you can still see fragments of it, apart from that major island. But the force of the water would, over time, knock down t
he lower tiers, leaving that one remnant as the only piece of significant size.”

  The geologic history of the place interested me less than the navigational opportunities it afforded. “I don’t suppose there are likely to be caves behind? Perhaps it’s a mystery of sorts, with a tunnel that offers safe passage. Those who pass the test are the ones who find it.”

  “And those that don’t are the ones who die,” Natalie said, with a decided lack of optimism. “It would be lovely if there were a tunnel, but somehow I don’t think you will be that lucky.”

  I noticed her choice of pronoun. Somehow, without ever saying so directly, we had agreed that I would be the one to attempt this thing, not both of us together. There was no particularly good reason for it, and several against; indeed, others were quick to point out later that only one of us had a small dependent child at home, and that one was not Natalie. But only one of us was mad enough to try, and that one was not Natalie, either.

  Because I could not look at that island, overgrown and floating in the midst of rainbows, and not want to experience the triumph of standing on it with my own two feet.

  Yeyuama caught frogs and roasted them while the two of us discussed the matter in Scirling. There was no need to speak in the Moulish tongue for his benefit; he had made it clear that he would offer no advice, and he was good enough at maintaining his poise that no twitch of alarm or satisfaction would steer us in one direction or another. We were entirely on our own.

  “Why is this the test?” I asked at one point, when our speculations had ground to a halt. Then I repeated myself in Moulish, for this, at least, was a question Yeyuama might answer.

  But he shook his head. “You will see—or you will not.”

  Meaning that only those who passed the test were fit to know the answer. I ground my teeth in frustration and renewed my determination to reach that island.

  We scouted the area for another two days, circling the edge of the lake to view the island from different angles. It seemed likely that the best approach was from above, coming down from the rivers onto the island; without viewing the land up there it was hard to be certain, but it seemed more promising than any attempt to come at it from below. But then how to return? “If I had a long enough rope…” I began, then shook my head. “It would have to be absurdly long, and I have never been good at climbing.”

  Natalie opened her mouth to answer, then stopped.

  “No, it’s foolish,” she said, when I looked at her inquisitively.

  I laughed. “And I am, of course, the last person to entertain foolish notions. Out with it, my dear.”

  “You would break your neck,” she protested.

  “And I am unlikely to do so by the means we have already discussed? You have my curiosity up now, you know. There is no help for it; you will have to tell me.”

  She sighed. “We don’t even have suitable wood, so it couldn’t be done anyway. But I was thinking of those glider wings.”

  Her obsession back in Scirland. An untested design, though recently improved by that enthusiast in Lopperton.

  A chance to fly.

  I tried to throw a halter over the nose of my sudden, wild hope and hold it back from galloping away. It was reckless. It was impossible. Natalie was right; we did not have suitable wood.

  We did, however, have something else.

  EIGHTEEN

  A need for dragonbone—Sketches in the air—An angry dragon—More truth—“We have the forest”

  “Can you not tell me what you need them for?” Tom asked, as we waded across a shallow stream. “Even the slightest hint.”

  I could have told him that I didn’t want to offend Yeyuama and the others; it had the virtue of being true. It was not, however my chief reason. “If I tell you, then you will try to talk me out of it.”

  He stopped on the bank and stared at me. “Is that supposed to set me at ease?”

  Our time in the swamp had left him a scruffy thing, his clothing stained beyond repair, his hair grown shaggy and his jaw darkened by stubble. Likely my own appearance was little better (although I was at least spared the stubble). Had we wandered the streets of Falchester in this state, we would have been thought lunatics—which was, I imagined, not far off the mark. Long residence in harsh and unfamiliar conditions does strange things to the mind. You swiftly learn not to heed irritations that would be unbearable in the normal course of your affairs, and you embrace notions that would be unthinkable at home.

  “It is supposed to be honest,” I said. “I do not want you chiding me afterward for hiding more from you than I must.”

  Tom’s first response to that was inarticulate. Then he said, “I have asked myself, time and again, what possible need you could have for dragonbone—dragonbone, when we’re among a people for whom dragons are in some way sacred. You don’t mean to impress them with it; that wouldn’t be as dangerous as you’ve implied. What, then? Everything I can think of is worse than the previous idea.”

  He would not have thought of Natalie’s wings; I was fairly certain he had no idea of her interest in the subject. I considered asking him what he had thought of, but decided it would only upset him further. Instead I fell back on the only recourse available to me, which was simple persuasion. “Please, Tom. If we are to proceed with our research, and fulfill our promise to the oba, I must do this. And it will go better with your help.”

  He sighed in frustration, but said, “I am here, am I not?”

  “Yes,” I admitted. “For which I thank you.”

  By then the others had caught up to us: Natalie and Yeyuama, Mekeesawa and Faj Rawango. The rest of our camp was not far off, but we six were making a side journey to retrieve something left behind during our earliest days in the Green Hell.

  The box was still where we had buried it. Already the wood was somewhat worse off for being buried in the wet earth, and the fabric that wrapped the bones was half-eaten by insects, but the bones were still wholly preserved.

  “Will it be acceptable to use this?” I asked Yeyuama, holding out an alar humerus for him to see.

  He frowned at the bone. “Who killed this dragon?”

  “A hunter,” I said. “But not in the way that your brothers are hunters. He kills animals only for the pleasure of proving himself stronger than they, and takes trophies to prove his strength to others.” Yeyuama indicated the bone, and I shook my head. “He does not know we have this, and would try to take it if he did. We kept the bones so we could understand dragons better.”

  Akinimanbi had explained to him our purpose in the swamp. Her rendition had made us sound more like priests than scholars—but that was not entirely unfitting; or at least it was useful to our cause. Yeyuama said, in a cool tone masking something I could not read, “Dragon bones fall to dust. How is this one still solid?”

  We had been cautious in who we shared that information with, but I had no fear of sharing the truth with him. Not because he lived far from Vystrana and would never trouble the dragons there; not because he lacked the chemical equipment to imitate our work. Those things were true, but also irrelevant. Yeyuama was pure: he would never kill a dragon for its bones. Nor would he help others do so.

  I therefore told him everything, as much as my command of his language allowed. The mourning behaviour of rock-wyrms; Rossi’s experimentation; Frederick Kemble’s struggle to synthesize a replacement for the bones, which might be aided by Tom’s efforts with the savannah snakes. Yeyuama listened in silence, and when I was done he sighed, gesturing at the bones. “You should not have done this before facing the island. But you may use it.”

  I wondered if the Moulish had funerary customs for their own dragons. Was that what Yeyuama meant by “touching the dragons”? Well, I would find out soon enough—if I did not break my neck.

  Natalie sorted through the bones, chewing on her lower lip. “Mr. Garsell insists a curved surface is better, but still, I could wish some of these were straighter. The ribs, though, will be useful for the center of the fr
ame, and we can make cords…” She trailed off, sketching in the air.

  Tom had a good visual imagination. He followed the movement of her finger with narrowed eyes. Before I could divert him, his jaw sagged in disbelief. “You—Isabella, please tell me she isn’t planning to build some kind of wing.”

  My mouth opened and shut a few times, while he stared at me. Then, helplessly, I said, “Would you like the truth, or a comforting lie?”

  “What in God’s name are you doing?” he demanded. We were speaking Scirling; the three Erigans looked on in interest, no doubt speculating as to what we might be saying. “Do you have to fly with the dragons to prove your right to study them? Moulish swamp-wyrms don’t even fly!”

  “They do glide, though—and I shall do the same. It’s an unconventional solution to the problem I’ve been set … but Tom, I believe it will work.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut, hands frozen in midair as if, should he just concentrate hard enough, he could make this entire conversation not have happened. Then he opened his eyes and fixed his gaze on Yeyuama. In Moulish, he said, “I know I am not ‘pure.’ But please, for the love of—of whatever spirits you worship, let me help with this. If she is injured, I’ll never forgive myself.”

  His concern touched me, all the more so because he made no reference to the consequences he would likely face in the event of my death. Jacob had once told me he would be blamed if anything happened to me in Vystrana; Tom, I suspected, now occupied the role of “man responsible for my well-being” in the eyes of society. I said to Yeyuama, “He has some knowledge of healing injuries. I hope, of course, that his skills will not be necessary, but if they are…”

  Yeyuama sighed, looking resigned. “If I don’t agree, he will probably follow us.” Tom did not deny it. “Very well, Reguamin. Your brothers and sister may assist you. But they may not go all the way with you.”

  (At the time, it surprised me that Yeyuama agreed to let anyone else be involved. In retrospect, I think Tom was not the only one dumbfounded at my chosen approach to the problem of the island, and Yeyuama did not want to be responsible for killing me, however indirectly. That is only speculation on my part, though.)