The First Dragoneer (2016 Modernized Format Edition)

by M. R. Mathias

Chapter Four

  March could never in his life remember being as relieved as he was when he finally saw the daylight shining at the mouth of the cavern. By the look of the sun, it was still only early afternoon. What had seemed like a day-long ordeal had actually lasted less than a turn of the glass. Thankful to still be alive, he grabbed the rope and his skinning knife, and began to gather up pieces of dried wood. The medallion hanging around his neck gleamed brightly in the sunlight. He was compelled to pause a moment to examine it.

  It was palm-sized and disc-shaped, formed from a heavy metal that he had never seen before. Not gold or silver, but easily as shiny and as beautiful. It was finely worked with runes and symbols that he did not recognize. In the center, a thumb-sized, teardrop-shaped diamond was mounted. Turning it over, he saw that both sides were identical and that the jewel sparkled with a million prismatic colors. The chain appeared to be made from the same metal as the medallion. When he tucked it into his shirt he found that it hung perfectly below his collar between his pectoral muscles. It felt as if it had been fitted for him. He decided that it would be his good luck charm since he’d worn it while defeating that slithery beast. It could be magical like the artifacts from the old world he had heard about. If not, it was surely worth its weight in gold. Enough to buy a small farm, he figured. Silently he swore to never sell it, or give it away. He also vowed to try to find the meaning of the markings on its surface.

  The scream of a distant predator bird pulled him from his musings. He still had to get his badly injured friend home. It wouldn’t take the wolves long to pick up the scent of all that blood, and Prominence was a long way away.

  After gathering some wood he started back into the darkness of the cave. He could see the dim torch flame flickering ahead and he carefully continued in that direction. His arms were full, so it was hard to step over the lifeless lump of the dead creature, but he managed. He marveled at the size of it. It was easily three times as long as Bren. Maybe he would cut off the head and some claws. He could make himself a trophy, and make Bren a necklace with the teeth.

  “Marcherion?” Bren called out weakly. “Is that you?”

  “Who else would it be, you big giboon?” March laughed. “How are you feeling?”

  “Like a tumbler at the fair.” Bren smiled broadly, but he gasped and turned a sickly pale color when he tried to sit up. Through clenched teeth he said, “My leg is pretty bad off, March!”

  “We will get you home,” March reassured. “If I can get you back over the ridge to our camp before dark, I’ll have you back in your bed by tomorrow night.”

  March talked on as he built a fire. “Getting back over the ridge is gonna be hard on you.” He looked at Bren seriously. “But if you can grit it out that far, we’ll be home free.”

  “I don’t think I can stand,” Bren said with more than a little worry in his voice. He knew the way the wolves had tracked and attacked other groups of hunters when they hadn’t gotten their fresh kills into the lower valley fast enough. He also knew that he smelled like a fresh kill, and that the wolves would surely come for him. March was a great hunter, and a superb woodsman, but no match for even a small pack of hungry wolves.

  “I wish I had something to make a splint with,” March muttered. Then he cursed himself for letting the medallion dazzle him from his wits while he was outside. He was about to start back through the cave when he noticed the sword’s scabbard lying on the cavern floor. An idea struck him then, and even though the cuts on his hands hurt badly, he went over to the white-scaled wyvern’s side and struggled to pull the sword free. He screamed loudly as his hands slid roughly off the hilt. The sword hadn’t budged and the cuts on his palms were reopened. He stood there grimacing, with his palms held to his chest, as fresh blood trickled down his arms and dripped from his elbows.

  Bren positioned himself to where he could see March. He saw the blood-soaked band around his friend’s head and watched him wince as he wiped his bloody hands on his pants. Bren started to worry. They wouldn’t stand a chance if they got stuck in the woods in the dark. With both of them lame and smelling like a feast, all sorts of hungry things would come sniffing. He felt little relief when March tried again and grinned proudly after finally pulling the sword free of the wyvern.

  March searched the cavern for something to wipe the sword’s blade clean. His gaze finally landed on Bren, who was staring straight back at him with true fear in his eyes. March disregarded the look and walked over and pulled the dead man’s pack out from under Bren’s head. He opened it, and luckily, right there on top was a rolled up woolen cloak. It was exactly what he needed to save his friend. As he pulled it free, a fat leather pouch fell out of the roll. It chinked to the floor just beside Bren’s ear. Bren struggled to grab it while March went about rummaging through the rest of the backpack.

  “March, look!” Bren said excitedly. He rolled to his side and poured a pile of shiny gold coins onto the floor. “We're rich!”

  March found a wine skin and was sniffing the spout to try to see if it held water or wine. It turned out to be some sort of liqueur. It probably had a fruity aroma at one time, but now it smelled of nothing but pure grain. He braved a small sip as he turned to see what Bren was carrying on about and nearly choked. Whether from the strength of the drink or from the sight of the pile of golden coins, he would never know. He forced himself to swallow and felt the burn of the liquid all the way down his throat and into his belly. He nearly choked again when he saw that Bren had only dumped out a small portion of the contents from the pouch. Bren was holding the heavy bag of coins in his hand and grinning ear to ear.

  Without hesitation, and with the eagerness of a small child reveling under the Giver Man’s tree on full winter’s morn, March dropped down to his knees and began rummaging through the rest of the contents. To his disappointment only two items remained. Neither was as glamorous as the bag of coins.

  “What’s left?” Bren asked excitedly.

  “Only an old book and a scroll tube,” March said flatly. “It’s all for nothing if we can’t get you back home. The wolves don’t take bribes.”

  He regretted saying it as soon as it came out of his mouth. It wasn’t right for him to scare Bren like that. It would be hard enough to get Bren over the ridge, even if his idea worked, and all the harder if either of them panicked.

  After giving Bren the skin full of the liqueur, March laid out the cloak and began cutting it into strips. After that, he gently took off the blood-soaked pieces of the shirt he had tied around Bren’s leg. The cut looked like a long, black, gooey line. March wished he had a way to stitch it up, but the nearest needle was back over the ridge with their other gear. He thought about leaving Bren here and making the trip alone, but thoughts of what could happen to his friend lying defenseless in the cave made up his mind for him.

  “You pouring, or me?” March asked, pointing from the wine skin to the gash.

  “I’ll pour it,” Bren sounded reluctant. “You have to hold my leg still so I don’t pull it all back open if I jump.”

  “All right,” March couldn’t help but laugh. “But you’re such a giboon. I ought to just leave you here, take all this stuff and go buy myself a castle.”

  Bren tried to laugh, but the anticipation of the pain to come kept him from it. March put one hand on Bren’s knee and the other on Bren’s hip. Then he nodded that he was ready. Bren took a big swig from the skin. Then, before he lost his resolve, he poured a generous amount of the liquid down his thigh just as he swallowed.

  To March’s surprise Bren just looked at him stupidly. It seemed as though he wasn’t feeling any pain at all. Then, Bren’s face slowly flushed pink. It quickly graduated to a bright reddish color. Soon it looked as if Bren’s head would burst. Then the scream came.

  It was long and loud, and it was followed by several quick sharp huffs that sent spittle flying from Bren’s mouth in every direction. He looked pleadingly at March and started to scream again, but mercifully his e
yes rolled back into his head as his body succumbed to the pain.

  March wasted no time. He first padded the wound with a folded piece of the cloak. He bound it once more with strips so that it wouldn’t pull open on its own. Then he bound it again with a second layer of strips. After putting the sword back in the scabbard, he laid it along Bren’s wounded leg. He made sure that the ball of the hilt was jutting just past the bottom of Bren’s boot heel. He was glad to see that the tip of the sheathed blade was above Bren’s hip, nearly at his armpit. He strapped the sword to Bren’s leg with more strips of the cloak and some lengths of rope. He tied a fancy knot around Bren’s foot and the hilt, so that the sword couldn’t come sliding out of its scabbard. Finally, he slipped the thick leather sword belt under his friend’s waist then buckled it tightly around Bren and the sword’s blade. He hoped that most of Bren’s weight would be on the tempered steel and not on his leg.

  March took a moment to rest after his labors. He wanted desperately to be back over the ridge and in their camp before dark. He rounded up everything he could find, including the coins from the floor of the cavern. He put them all into the backpack. He strapped Bren’s bow and quiver around his shoulders, and took the time to remove three of the arrows from the body of the beast. Then he decided to take some proof of the kill. With his skinning knife, he cut the fore claw off of the creature, and after wrapping it in what was left of the cloak, he forced it into the pack. He shouldered the load, and after a quick look around to make sure that he had gotten everything, he went to wake Brendly.

  It was a slow, tedious climb. The sword splint was awkward, but it worked. Bren was more or less just stumbling from tree to tree. He clung to the lower branches and used his muscled arms to keep himself from falling all the way down.

  March was carrying the packs and finding that keeping the bow ready was a chore all by itself. His ruined palms wouldn’t close around the grip correctly and even the slightest squeeze of his hands caused extreme pain. To make things worse, he could feel the icy burn of his skull where his scalp wasn’t covering the bone anymore. He would have just fallen down and cried if it weren’t for the heartwrenching determination Bren was showing by just keeping himself upright.

  Ever so slowly they continued the journey upward, fighting their pain as they climbed. They stopped to drink from the wine skin and to eat some dried beef but found that it was a mistake. The short reprieve allowed their bodies to relax but caused their wounds to stiffen. Bren felt far worse than he had when they had started from the cave. March didn’t feel much better. The strong content of the skin, which the skeleton had so generously preserved for them, did very little to ease their suffering, but Bren found himself wanting more of it. March let him finish what was left before they started back up the mountain.

  They climbed some more and eventually the ridge came into view. Bren used the sight of it to strengthen his resolve. He used all that he had left in himself to get there.

  March wasn’t far behind, but blood loss had him feeling dizzy. He was sure that the sticky wetness he was feeling running down his back was as much blood as it was sweat. A glance at the sun told him that they probably wouldn’t make it back to the camp by nightfall, but since they would be within the kingdom’s boundaries, and traveling downhill, he felt their chances were good of getting there alive. That is, if he could keep from passing out. He was sure that Bren was having a harder time of it. It amazed him that Bren hadn’t done much more than grunt and wince on the way up. Bren had to be in incredible pain. March’s wounds were superficial in comparison.

  “Well that was the hard part!” March managed to say between breaths as he gained Bren’s side at the top of the ridge.

  Bren was holding desperately onto a branch to steady himself and he was gasping for air. He managed a grim smile.

  March plopped down heavily onto a rock and began rummaging through his pack until he found his water skin. After taking a long drink, he handed it to Bren’s trembling hand. Bren finished it off then playfully tossed it at March before he started down the mountainside.

  “We're not stopping here,” Bren called out over his shoulder. “And you’d better hurry up and lead, because if it’s up to me, we are going straight down into the valley.”

  March reluctantly got to his feet and started after his friend. He was completely amazed at the way Bren was handling the pain.

  It was dark when March finally found the camp. He wouldn’t have found it, if not for the many tracking and hunting lessons he’d learned from his father and two older brothers over the years.

  The stars weren’t very bright this night, but the moon would be up soon. He’d use its light to check Bren’s wounds.

  Bren was in a bad way. Several times, on the last portion of the trek, he had stumbled into trees and shrubs. Once, when his tired arms wouldn’t hold him up any longer, he had fallen into a stiff-legged heap on the forest floor. He was stretched out now, under the shelter March had made for them the previous night. March made him drink the remainder of their water, and then helped him eat some dried beef before letting him pass out.

  As soon as he got a fire started, March was going to range out in the darkness and find the pool of clean water where they had seen the stag. He had to be sure that the fire wouldn’t burn out while he was gone. If it did, every hungry creature in the forest would be after Bren like ants on a piece of sweet candy. All they would have to do to find him was follow the blood trail they had left throughout the day. The fire would also help March find his way back from the pool. The fire roared to life, and while stoking it to the size he needed it to be, March felt its warmth sink into his aching bones. He fought, but to no avail. Before he could leave, he too fell into a deep, much needed sleep.

  March woke to the sound of Bren’s agonizing moans. Somewhere beyond the mountains, the sun was breaking the night, giving him just enough rosy light to see by. The morning sky was glorious and filled with color, where it could be seen peeking above the mountain tops. March couldn’t enjoy it though because he knew they desperately needed water.

  The air was thick with a sense of urgency. Bren was fever stricken. His tired body was now fighting infection. What Bren really needed was the care of an herb master. March was tempted to make a litter and drag his friend down the mountainside. He wondered if the time he spent going and getting some water would allow the infection to get into Bren’s blood. He’d seen that happen once when a copper miner who had been cut on the arm had stayed in the mine too long. The Herb Master had had to cut the arm off, but the miner eventually died anyway. All of Prominence Village had been forced to endure his screaming torment until he finally died.

  The gravity of their situation weighed heavily on March. If he made the wrong decision it could cost Bren his leg, or worse. He was so concerned with Bren that he completely ignored the pain of his own wounds. He made the decision to make the litter and drag Bren to the stag’s pool with him. There he could wash the wounds and boil water to clean the bandages.

  Methodically he went about making a litter out of the oil cloth they had used for their shelter and some limbs he cut from nearby trees. He had made several litters in his life. It was the easiest way to get a big buck down the mountain. He and Bren had used them a few times when they were younger, before they were strong enough to spit a carcass and shoulder it down.

  The sun was above the peaks by the time he was done making the travois-like device. He was weak and dehydrated, but he packed all their gear onto it with Bren and then gripped the two poles. His split hands were still bleeding and raw, but he started off anyway. Inside March there was nothing left except sheer determination and love for his friend.

  It was midday and the sun was high and hot when they finally arrived at the pool. March spent a few moments picking the splinters and dried bark out of the gashes in his palms while cleansing them in the cool water. Then he focused all of his attention on Bren.

  By nightfall, he was a little mor
e confident in Bren’s chances. He had thoroughly cleansed away the dirt and grime from his friend’s wound. He had forced it to bleed and then opened the cut wide enough to cut away all the yellowing pussy sections that had formed there. He even stitched it in several places but he wasn’t sure if he had done it right. They still had a long, hard journey ahead of them. March could only hope that he had done enough.

  The wound was staying closed, but Bren still had fever. March hoped that his condition would change if they rested through the night. He had made a broth by placing the last of their dried beef in the pot and boiling in some gable roots he found. Bren woke just long enough to drink a good portion of it. He was pale and weak from loss of blood and couldn’t manage the strength to speak. He did manage to drink most of the aromatic liquid. Then he was off again, back into a fitful slumber.

  March figured that if he rested for a while he could get them down into the valley by the following afternoon. There he would break apart the litter and burn it before the sun went down. If a farmer or shepherd didn’t respond, he would run like the wind and return with a cart or a wagon. He was determined to have Bren in Prominence proper by dawn. It was a sound plan and it relieved him to have at least that much.

  While Bren tossed and turned, March fingered the medallion he had found. He wasn’t certain, but at one point he thought that it might have been causing his palms to tingle. It wasn’t long before he too fell into slumber. He slept heavily and had vivid dreams that eluded him when the sound of a curious scavenger woke him in the predawn light. When he reached over to shake Bren awake his heart slid up into his throat. Bren had died in the night. His body was cool and stiff.