All of this musing flashed in my mind in a second, vanishing as I saw the bodies and the faces of the terrified humans below. I had meant to scare my father’s knights a little, by asking Paxala to swoop over the marketplace and stop the riot. I had meant to make the people lift their heads up to see what a real dragon was, and could do.
Instead, the only impact we were having was terrifying everybody, Knight, civilian, and clans’ warrior alike.
At least they weren’t fighting each other anymore, but I felt more than a little guilty. Still, it had to be done if I wanted to keep either the kingdomers or the clans from attacking each other and ending a truce that stood in the form of my mother down there.
“Skreeayar!” Unable to contain her similar exultant joy to my own, Paxala snorted a breath of fire as she stretched out her wings to catch the thermals, swooping low over the marketplace and passing just meters over the rooftops of the nearest houses.
“Dragon! Dragon!”
“It’s gone mad!”
Snatches of shouts and wails reached us as we passed, and people ducked, jumped, ran for cover by the side of buildings and carts. With a noise like the snap of sailcloth, we passed high above the mountain gate, our turn of speed incredible as we climbed high into the cold morning air.
“Neill?” I hazarded a look behind me, to see him grimly clinging on, his form low to the back of the Crimson Red. I hated to admit it, but he was a better rider than I was – but then again, he’d had a lot more time to brush up on his riding skills on the flight up here.
“Okay!” I saw him hold a thumbs-up more than I heard the shouted word, as the Crimson Red banked and banked in a slow, graceful arc in the air to return to my father’s town.
“Again?” she asked, clearly enjoying herself. How could I refuse her?
“Char!” Neill was tugging at my robe as Pax beat her wings to gain speed as she carefully repositioned herself. I spared another glance over my shoulder to see that he was pointing frantically down towards the marketplace that I was trying to disrupt.
Well, it was certainly disrupted, I could see that. The central space was mostly cleared of people now, and the knights had broken their formation and scattered back to the side streets. The clans’ warriors had taken, mostly, to surrounding my mother in a thick knot of people. There were arms gesturing, shouts, and a whole lot more chaos. But no fighting.
Paxala started to beat her wings faster, angling her snout downwards as a diver might buck their arms and body down into a pool.
“Char!” Neill was pulling again, as we started to tip towards the ground.
“What?” I shouted in frustration, but his words were stolen by the rising wind. All I could see was that he was pretty angry with me. Why? My father had tried first to marry me off, and then poison my dragon! Neill was the one my father had imprisoned. As we started to dive once more, I saw Neill pointing frantically at the market square below, and I finally saw what he was referring to.
The civilians. Not my father’s knights or the proud warriors of the clans, but the everyday mix of both, who had either come to send off the clans or to sell their wares at the mountain gate. They were cowering in fear at the sides of their stalls, just as they would if there were ever a mountain dragon attack.
Instantly, my enthusiasm chilled. How could I take out my anger with my father against them?
“Paxala, no. Please, no – pull up,” I asked her quickly, but it seemed as though it was too late.
“Why?” I could sense the anger and frustration like a hot coal inside the dragon beneath me. Even though she had not made me privy to her thoughts this time, I could still sense the shape of them, like seeing the shapes of fish underwater. They poisoned her. They trapped her, they trapped her friends. What do we owe them?
“Because they are my people too…” I tried, as we dived faster and faster, screaming towards the marketplace as fast as a hunting eagle.
“I thought we were family, Char and Paxala?” the Crimson Red said with a sudden cough of angry flame, before she beat her wings to suddenly correct her flight. Instead of careening into a low dive-bomb of the market (like we had done the first time) we were veering much higher over the houses, past the Queen’s Keep itself.
“Thank you, thank you, Pax.” I breathed a sigh of relief, but I could still feel the dragon’s skepticism at my change of heart, and now her weariness, as one of her wings shook under the immense strain of the speeds we were traveling. She was still a little groggy, a little ill as I was – and I guess that was why we had both been so eager to listen to our anger first, rather than to Neill.
“I will make it up to you,” I said to Paxala, although I had no idea how, apart from landing soon to let her eat her fill. And I would make it up to Neill, as well, somehow. I felt smaller and weaker than I had done just a little while ago. I may be Lady Char Nefrette, one of the few dragon friends left in the world, but sometimes I felt as though I was still just as foolish as I had been when I was younger. I should never have believed that my father would look after the Crimson Red, I scolded myself, as we banked over the town. We were right in front of the keep itself now, and we were turning southwards, back towards Mount Hammal.
There was a sinister low whistle and a narrow shadow shot along the earth below us. I saw a dark arrow-like log falling away to the rooftops and streets below, splintering as it struck beams and walls. What was it?
PHEWT! PHEWT! Another, and another. Was my father firing at us? I thought, as Paxala screeched in rage and beat her wings faster. Looking behind, I could see that from the forward turrets of the Queen’s Keep there were some of the largest-looking bows that I had ever seen being readied and fired. They were more like harpoons, each one pulled back on a winch by two men, and standing almost as wide as I was tall.
“They’re firing at us? At me?” I said in alarm as we cleared the town and then the southern gates. More black darts cut into the air behind, but the powerful beats of wings and swishes of tail disrupted their flight, causing them to tumble from their trajectory, and splinter against buildings and street. I didn’t see any injuries, but I was still shocked by the callousness that my father displayed.
Would he kill me, just to bring down this dragon? Had my father learned nothing about dragons since seeing Paxala up close?
Feeling disheartened, we screamed over the walls and the wide road, sending flocks of sheep and goats scattering as we fled my father’s keep. Even though I was happy to be free, I wondered now if I had just managed to make everything worse for the dragons of Mount Hammal. How would anyone in the north ever see them with admiration and fondness, now?
Beneath me, whatever Paxala thought about my human worries she kept locked in her mind.
CHAPTER 22
NEILL, WHAT WE TORVALDS DO
The flight back was not as glorious as I thought it was going to be. It wasn’t being on a dragon (riding a dragon, I had to pinch myself to realize every time) or the flying that was upsetting. In fact, I found that being in the air always helped to lift my spirits and to make me feel alive again.
No, I hated to admit it, but it was Char.
She appeared pensive and upset, and didn’t talk much about what we had just done – nor what we had seen back there at her home. Not that I could blame her; last year I had got myself screwed up into knots thinking about what my father wanted of me, and how my brothers viewed me.
It was a terrible thing, finding out how different you are from your family, to realize you didn’t belong where you thought you did. I wondered what I could do to help her.
We had passed the town of Faldin’s Bridge yesterday evening before making camp for the night. This would be our second day of flying. Char had wanted to fly fast and far (and how could I blame her for wanting to get away from the Queen’s Keep?) but despite that, she had suggested we stop several times to let Paxala rest, and to fish. By my reckoning we were about another day away from Mount Hammal.
The Crimson Red also seeme
d subdued on her flight, and I wasn’t sure if it was all to do with the poison that Char’s father had given her. She appeared less affectionate than she usually did with Char, which wasn’t something that I was expecting. Even standoffish, in fact (although that was gradually lessening as we spent more time together, and traveled farther south).
“How do you know?” Char yawned as she stamped down the little scratch of a fire that we had made last night. We had camped on a rocky bluff overlooking a river, and down below the dragon was, predictably, fishing.
“How far we’ve got?” I said, deciding now was as good a time as any to broach the subject, since Char was bringing it up and all. “Well, I don’t know exactly, but I’ve been thinking about this on the way up and back,” I said, by way of introduction. As Char had been so silent, I had a lot of time to think. She looked at me, eyes wide. “And, well – we want the other students to ride the dragons, right?” I stated.
“To make friends with them,” Char clarified.
“Yes, of course. But to do what we do – to work with the dragons together,” I pointed out.
“Uh-huh,” Char said.
“Well, when we were flying up here, all I had to rely on was Paxala’s connection to you. I just had to trust that she didn’t lose the scent,” I said.
“Or get sick, like at the keep,” Char agreed.
“Precisely. So – I think that we need a way for the human riders to navigate up there. How do they do it on ships?”
“The stars, I think. My father once told me about the sea convoy he made as a young man. They used the stars and the winds.” Char thought for a moment. “Actually, it’s the same thing that we use in the mountains. We navigate at night, not during the day.”
“Well, that’s all well and good, but remember when we were so high up there in the sky? So high that we could see the stub of Mount Hammal above the clouds?”
Char nodded.
“Well, I was trying to measure how far we’d come by using vantage points. How much we travel in a day compared to how far away some landmark is,” I said. “And that got me thinking about having lots of humans on dragons in the sky.”
“Lots…?” Char asked dubiously.
“Well, you and me, Lila, Sigrid maybe, Dorf, Maxal…” I thought of all of the likely candidates amongst the students who might be able to bond with a dragon. “If you think they could, I mean.”
“I don’t see why not,” Char said. “They seem eager to get to know the dragons, on their own terms, as well.”
“Great! Well – we’re going to need some way for the riders to communicate with each other whilst we’re flying, not just letting the dragons take us wherever they want to go, but to actually work together.” I thought of watching my brothers at their war games and practices, mounted on the tough little ponies they could wheel about and flank each other as if each rider formed a graceful whole together with the others.
“It’s a good idea,” Char said, a little distantly.
“But you’re not convinced?” I said.
“No, it’s not that– I just…” I watched as Char struggled with her own despondency. “I keep thinking about the crown, and the strange dream that I had about it. It was like the crown could break apart walls, could command the stones themselves…. And all of it comes from dragon blood. From baby dragons.”
“Skreyar!” A sudden shriek came from below, as Paxala burst from the river, shaking herself off and stalking around in circles, like a worried cat. I waited for Char to continue.
“It’s bad magic, Neill,” she said at last. “That’s what I think. And we’re going to give it straight to Zaxx, because if we don’t, someone’s going to die.” She sounded depressed. “What good will come of that? How does that change anything at the Order? Won’t Zaxx just be more powerful? And the Abbot Ansall too?”
“We can’t let that happen,” I said quickly, and fiercely. I was just as horrified as Char about our grisly discovery of the source of the Draconis Order’s magic. How could we let that continue?
“But how can we stop it?” Char said. “I guess part of me was hoping we could use my father’s position to help us defeat the Draconis Order. Maybe reveal to all the lords just how cruel they were – but now that I know my own father only wants the dragons for himself, and how we escaped…” Char shook her head. “It seems that I’m failing everyone. I’ll fail the dragons by bringing Zaxx the Great Crown and making him stronger, I’ll fail the other students, and I’ve even failed my family.”
“You haven’t failed me,” I pointed out. “I might have rotted down there in your father’s cells if you weren’t brave enough to break me out of there. There was no one else with you. Just you. And I saw you argue for Paxala and defy your brother, your king. I wouldn’t call that failing at all, Char,” I said, wondering at how differently she saw what she’d done. To me, our escape from the Queen’s Keep had been a success – a difficult success, granted, especially as I had to remind Char of the civilians – but it was a success. Maybe because I had been raised to war, and strategy. Successes could be hard-won, and complicated.
“Do you really think so?” Char asked.
“I do.” I nodded, before another thought struck me. “And we are going to expose the Draconis Order for what they are. And we won’t let anyone stand in our way,” I said with great finality.
“But how?” Char asked, her mood already darkening.
“I am going to teach you how to fight,” I said. “It is what we Torvalds do, after all.”
It would take longer to get back to Mount Hammal, but I figured that considering that the Abbot was used to having his messengers and news travel by horse or by foot, and that Paxala was a fast flier, then we had at least a handful of extra days to train, before the rumors reached the monastery that we had flown.
We started by sparring on the ground, first after the morning campfire, our noon meal, and last thing at night. It was something that my father had made me, Rik, and Rubin all do as young lads to teach us not only the different ways to block, attack, and win a fight – but also how to toughen our bodies, and learn to ‘think with our bodies’ as he had put it. Prolonged exercise built memory into your actions, it allowed you to be strong no matter if you were tired, hungry, or your vision diminished because it was night time.
“Ow!” Char said, as my wooden branch swung first high, and then low to take out her legs. It wasn’t that strong a strike (not like the beatings I took from my brothers, that left me black and blue), but Char flinched all the same, making me feel terrible.
“Point,” I said miserably, stepping back out of the practice circle to allow her a chance to get her breath back.
“H’yargh!” Char jumped at me, clobbering me over the shoulders with her thin branch so hard that the branch snapped.
“Hey!” I lurched and stumbled, rubbing my aching back. “What did you do that for? I had stepped out of the practice ring!” I pointed to the rough circle that I had made in the clearing with leaves and twigs.
“Maybe you should have been paying more attention,” Char said with a gleeful smile. “I am betting that there won’t be any nice practice circles if I ever have to fight for real.”
She was right. Damn. She’s better than I had thought. I couldn’t very well continue to be angry at her if she was right. Wasn’t that also something that father said? ‘Fierceness wins a fight. As does cunning, but fierceness will always win.’
The training continued on, with Char growing in confidence at her own abilities with every passing league. It helped that she had already had a good, strong basis in hunting from spending time with her mountain kin. It was that dedicated mindset, the willingness to be rough and to have scrapes. By the time we started sparring and training, Char was already a passable fighter from learning it on her mother’s side, all I did was hone her skills.
What surprised me the most was, on the eve of the second day after our noon sparring, Paxala reared her head from where she had sat, cu
rled up on a large slab of rock.
Char looked first at the dragon, and then at me in a sort of wonder as I felt that pressure behind my eyes that I felt every time the girl shared thoughts with the dragon.
“What is it?” I asked, eyeing the Crimson Red slowly unfolding herself from her coil, and look over at me with expectation.
“She says that it looks fun. She wants to join in,” Char said. “Is that even possible?”
That was when it clicked within me, I think. All of my thoughts about how to navigate and organize a team of humans on dragons. “Yes!” I said, the image of flights of dragons with their human knights flashing through the sky in my mind. I could almost hear them, it was so clear.
“Remember at the Queen’s Keep? The way that you asked Paxala to fly?” I said, imitating the gestures with my hands, back and forth, downward sweep, upward climb…
“Yeah, I was there, remember?” Char smiled at my enthusiasm.
“That is how we do it!” I said. “How bird’s fight! A dragon and their rider could dart and dodge like that, but if they added long, sweeping climbs, curves, and dives—” I held my hands out as if they were wings, imitating what I saw in my mind. “The dragon has to turn away from the fight to gain height and momentum, but the human riders can advise it what is happening behind it, can suggest better angles to take, when to turn. So, say I’m a dragon and I see something there—” I pointed out a place on our practice circle-- “and I swoop in, it gives my rider a chance to shoot, or to call allies, or change tactics, or whatever…”
Dragon Dreams (The First Dragon Rider Book 2) Page 21
