by Jo Beverley
Over the next hour, as her procession wound through the packed streets of Castletown, then out along the road to Dragon’s Rock, the cheering men’s faces all looked avaricious. It wasn’t even that they desired her; she was simply key to a greedy dream.
Her first glimpse of the rock gave only relief. Soon this would all be over.
As it grew closer, however, foreboding trickled in. The dark rock humped so strangely in the grassy plain, like a slumbering beast that might stir and growl. No one knew how it came to be there. No rock of similar type had been found elsewhere.
No one knew why it so strongly attracted dragons, and why only every eight years. In this case, seven years. Or why an offering of SVP blood here would send the marauding dragon back to Dorn.
When they knew so little, when things were already amiss, how could anyone be sure this ceremony would go as it should?
The chariot drew up where the coiling steps began. The spot was in the shade, but that wasn’t why Rozlinda had to fight shivers as she extracted herself, shedding blossoms, and took her father’s arm. He looked somber, too, but perhaps he was playing his part—the sorrowful father giving up his beloved daughter for the good of his people.
Rozlinda looked up at the blunted mound. It didn’t seem so big until you were close, but now it loomed. The steps cut into it spiraled out of sight then reappeared as they reached the flattened top.
“Right, pet?” her father asked and she nodded and walked forward, aware of knights, carriages, and mounted gentlemen forming a circle a short distance from the base of the rock. Soon they’d circle it entirely, but they’d be little use if she truly needed protection.
Of course she wouldn’t, and Jerrott would be with her. The Captain of the Guard was also Keeper of the Chain, so he was waiting on foot, the delicate silver chain looped around his arm. His visor was up. She thought he smiled slightly in encouragement.
Or anticipation? He had to know how she felt. She smiled slightly back. Tonight, we will dance.
The Priest of the Blood led the way up the stairs. Rozlinda followed, telling herself there was nothing truly to fear.
Except breaking her neck.
The stairs were worn with age, and her thin-soled slippers were aptly named. They gave no grip. Thank heavens for railings on both sides, but she didn’t have a third or fourth hand to manage her skirts and veil. No wonder Aurora’s dress was stained. Silk kept snagging on wood and rock and she had to let go to free it. She felt her father behind her, trying to help, but he couldn’t do much. The green rock already coated her hands.
White is the silliest color for this, she fumed. Once back at the castle, she was going to insist on changes. It really couldn’t matter. Dark green would be sensible. A narrow skirt. Gloves and sturdy shoes.
When the spiraling stairs took her to the other side of the rock, a wind made everything worse. It flapped her skirts and whipped her veil around her face.
Her father gripped it from behind. He meant well, but her hair screamed a protest. She carried on up the stairs, tears springing from the pain, from the general, impossible awfulness of this, which was not mentioned at all in the Princess Way.
When she reached the top she stopped in blessed relief, but also because the handrails ended.
Her father nudged her. “Move on, Zlinda.”
She didn’t want to step out onto the rough, flat top without support. The wind was whipping her veil so hard that she’d already had to put a hand to her crown for some relief. If it got under her skirts, she felt she might fly away.
It had to be done, however, so she picked her way forward over the uneven ground. Her father took her arm and patted her hand. “Not much more now, pet, and Reverend Elawin is waiting.”
She nodded, wishing the priest wasn’t waiting so close to the edge. One hand on her crown, she let her father guide her, but kept her eyes on the tricky ground. She noted that the large dents in the rocky surface were grooved.
“Are those . . .”
“Marks of dragon teeth, yes, Princess,” the priest said, and she looked up to find she’d arrived at the spot. “The dragon took a particularly large bite last time. A good omen.”
He fell silent, doubtless remembering that last time had been Aurora’s dragon.
Rozlinda stared at a huge, crescent bite. She’d known that the dragon bit off the part of the rock that had virgin blood on it, but . . .
“If your highness would kneel?” the priest prompted. He had the blade ready in his hand.
Rozlinda wasn’t sure if her sudden quaking was because of the size of a dragon’s bite, the wind or the knife. Other men had followed up here—princes of the blood, the royal council, and the male elders of Castletown. All watched her, eyes implacable. If she tried to run, they’d stop her.
“It’s the wind,” she said, trying to excuse her shivers.
“Aye, it’s sharp today,” her father said, pushing her down into the kneeling position, “but we’ve not lost a princess yet.”
It was a joke, but Rozlinda couldn’t wrench her mind from the dark, distant days when the king had brought a daughter to Dragon’s Rock to truly sacrifice her to the beast. She glanced at the iron stake to which she’d be chained. Despite every attempt of will, her throat glued itself with dryness and her heart began to panic.
“Highness?”
She looked back at the priest and found he was offering a goblet. The traditional hralla tea. She took it, drank and could breathe again. Blessed hralla. She’d only had sips before when ill, but now she drained the cup.
All cares drifted away, yet her senses expanded. She fancied she could pick out faces down below and almost catch quiet comments made there. She heard music on the wind, perhaps even the song of distant birds. The few flowers still clinging to her gown gave off perfume.
There was another aroma, as well, neither noxious nor sweet. It came from the very rock.
The priest cut the ribbons that cinched in her enormous sleeve and pushed it up to expose her arm, to rub a cream there. To numb it.
Her father held her arm while the priest gripped her wrist. Compelling her, but she didn’t mind.
Here came the knife. How beautifully the light played on the long blade. How prettily her blood shone as it swelled and then dripped. Big, glossy drips that the rock drank in, turning black.
Her veil swirled and picked up a touch of blood, as if licking it. She caught it in her free hand. Mustn’t steal any from the dragon.
The dragon she could sense. She looked toward the horizon. Nothing there yet, but she knew where it was just as it knew her, knew her blood. Was drawn to it. She’d wondered sometimes if she really had the blood; how anyone could tell. Now, she was sure.
“There, highness. A goodly amount.”
Rozlinda looked back to see the priest wrapping a bandage around her arm. It quickly showed a line of red. The dark stain on the rock was quite large, but it didn’t seem enough to appease a hungry dragon.
Enough to make her lightheaded, however.
She staggered slightly as her father helped her up, making jolly, soothing remarks. Around her and below, the crowd roared. She supposed it was a cheer, but it sounded wild. Or perhaps the wildness in the air was a thrumming that she recognized as dragon.
As her father guided her to the stake, Rozlinda’s mind continued to explore realms beyond her ordinary senses. How funny, she thought, with a real temptation to giggle, if the dragons were drawn not to her blood but to the enormous amount of hralla in it.
But that made no sense. Hralla came from Dorn. Hralla, dragon eyes, versuli, mother stone. Hralla, dragon eyes, versuli, mother stone. It became a song in her mind. . . .
“The dragon!” The call rose all around like a flock of startled birds.
“That’s quick,” said her father. “Let’s get you chained up, love. Don’t want anything
to go amiss at this stage.”
Jerrott had the long chain already threaded through the loop at the top of the stake, and he and her father wrapped it round and around, lightly binding her arms to her body and her body to the iron.
Not a real chain, she reminded herself. It was as delicate as one she might wear around her neck. Just a symbol. But as a distant shadow took fluid shape, so like a bird but not, Rozlinda strained against her bonds.
“Courage, Princess.” It was the merest whisper, but it came from Jerrott. A break with protocol, but so welcome. She met his eyes.
Thank you. Soon.
The lock clicked. Her father and Jerrott retreated. All the men retreated to be as far away from the dragon’s bite as possible. But she saw Jerrott pick up his spear. If the dragon tried to eat her, he’d defend her. Even so, as the beat of mighty wings pulsed through the air, ghosts of princesses past, princesses chained here in truth, shrieked warnings.
The horns!
The scales!
The vicious teeth!
Rozlinda clenched her hands. She would not shame herself.
But the beast grew larger and larger. Could a bit of blood be enough? She could see that horned head now, and the crimson-and-gold eyes, fixed hungrily not on the bloodstained rock, but on her! Rozlinda tried to break free then, and found she couldn’t. Even such fine chains held tight.
She clutched the iron rod behind her as the beast circled over-head, blotting out the light and beating down stifling, acrid air. Dust swirled to choke her, to sting her eyes. She closed them, screaming in her mind. Eat and be gone! Go away! Go away!
She heard the crunch. Felt it in the rod as if the whole rock trembled. Perhaps she heard distant cheers and trumpets of delight, and then the air calmed.
She let go, blinking dust from her eyes. The dragon still circled but up high, as if waiting for something. For more?
Please go.
As if obeying, it beat its wings and soared, but then curved back, flying lower—heading straight for her!
Spears arced up from below, but the knights and men down there were too far away. Jerrott was braced to throw, but waiting.
Throw now, she screamed in her mind. Throw now!
The dragon’s mouth was a crimson maw, its gray teeth curving blades. Rozlinda fought the chains again, but knew she was about to die.
Then the dragon collapsed across the top of the rock with a thud that shook the earth. Coughing in the storm of dust, Rozlinda stared at wicked talons only feet away, then up at a small mountain of crimson, green and gold scales.
She was saved.
Jerrott had saved her!
She turned to thank him, but he stood, frozen, spear still in hand.
Who, then? Who?
Who, she suddenly realized, would she have to marry?
A man appeared on the fallen dragon’s neck. It was the man from her vision—the one with the bone-white hair and the pale amber eyes.
His voice rang out in the suddenly silent air. “I claim my princess bride.”
Chapter 3
The king silenced the hubbub with a grim roar. Amid settling noise and dust, he asked, “Who are you, sir, and what are you doing?”
The man climbed nimbly up to the peak of the dragon mountain. “What does it matter who I am?” he called out in a strong voice, meaning to be heard by all. “Am I not the savior of the Virgin Princess?”
He spoke in a slightly guttural accent, using complex vowels where simple ones would do.
It must be the remnants of hralla in her that made this seem so unreal, Rozlinda thought. This couldn’t truly be happening. Where had he come from, just like that?
Then she knew.
He’d ridden the beast—as a Dornaan warrior would. A pale-haired Dornaan warrior . . . but the Dornae didn’t kill dragons. They revered and adored them. This had to all be a hralla dream.
The man turned on his gold-and-crimson hill, looking like a dream himself. His bare, dark arms were outstretched and glinted with gold as he addressed the Saragondans, but especially the powerful men up here on the summit.
“Does not your sacred tradition say that any man who can lay low the dragon and put his foot upon its neck may claim the sacrificial princess as his bride? I claim that right in recompense for the dragon stolen from us seven years ago, against all rules of harmony and honor between our peoples.”
“Sir,” called her father, “we apologize most sincerely for that and assure you it will never happen again. But there must be some other recompense.”
The Dornaan turned to face Rozlinda. To her, he said, “None.”
Jerrott cried out, “May I not challenge this rogue, sire?”
“Be silent.”
Her father’s tone made Rozlinda quake. This was all real, and she suddenly understood her situation.
The royal family of Saragond existed because the princess blood was essential to peace, harmony and prosperity. Aurora’s selfishness had threatened disaster. To refuse this man now could ruin their house.
Nor did she think her father was moved solely by that. He truly believed this ritual was essential. And so, she realized, did she. Despite internal rebellion, she had faithfully followed the Princess Way for seven long years because she believed.
Stillness hovered over rock and plain as everyone waited for her father to speak. In this, his word was law. At last he said, “Captain, give this man the key.”
The Dornaan ran down the dragon’s leg and strolled toward Rozlinda. She remembered that easy walk. She remembered that enormous dragon eye on his chest. Up close, it seethed in the sun like a bubble of molten rock.
It was real.
He was real.
This was really happening.
Perhaps this was another ritual, Rozlinda thought frantically. A symbolic marriage important to his people?
Or perhaps the dragon needed more blood.
She could do that.
A cup or two more wouldn’t kill her.
As he came closer, those cold eyes stole her breath.
I’ll give you some fingers and toes, even, she desperately thought.
He extended a hand, and Jerrott stiffly put the key in it. When the Dornaan reached for the padlock, Rozlinda couldn’t help but flinch away. Heat beat out from him, as if a fire burned within his dusky skin. Or perhaps the heat came from that dragon eye. She felt that if she were to touch it, it would not be cold like a stone, but hot enough to char her skin.
He turned the key, tossed the lock aside and loosened her chains, unwinding them until they tinkled to the ground. Then he took her hand and led her away—toward the dragon.
She jerked back. “Don’t. Please don’t feed me to it!” It came out as a pathetic squeak.
“I won’t.”
Of course not. The dragon was dead.
“Not here, at least,” he added, with a touch of grim humor.
Other dragons. Thousands of dragons. In Dorn.
“Come.” He tugged and she had to follow, for no one was making a move to help her. It was as she’d thought. In the end, these men would sacrifice her if it suited their own ends.
She stumbled along, one hand holding up her overlong skirts, her veil blowing around her face and trying to smother her. The wind shifted and cleared her face, seeming to clear her mind. She twisted back to look at her father, at Jerrott, at the councilors and lords. “Help me!” she screamed.
Some twitched, but then they looked away.
What could anyone do? Even Jerrott couldn’t save her by killing the dragon. The dragon was dead. They could kill the man, but that, she was sure, would mean war. Abruptly hopeless, Rozlinda let him take her to the corpse, as accepting as a dumb animal to the slaughter.
The fallen dragon still gave off heat and a pungent odor of burnt rock and blood, but its fate
touched her.
“I can’t believe you killed it. You, a man of Dorn.”
“You like dragons, Princess?”
“No, but you should.”
“I do.”
She turned on him. If no man would fight for her, she would fight for herself. “Then why? You can’t want to marry me, sir. You must prefer women of your own type.”
“You, Princess, are the bride I want.”
“Why?”
“Your blood is highly valued in Dorn.”
She thrust out her bandaged arm. “If it’s blood you want, take more.” When he didn’t respond, she protested, “You can’t drag me off to a foreign land that I know nothing of! I don’t speak your language. I know nothing of your customs. How can I make you a good wife?”
He looked down briefly, so briefly that she might have missed it if she hadn’t been staring so fixedly at his face.
“I regret any discomfort, Princess, but it must be so. Some of the Dornae speak Saragondan, and you will learn our language as you learn our ways. Seven years ago, the conditions of peace were broken. This is the only means to mend them.”
The words reduced her rebellion to dust. Refuse, he said, and there will be war. Armies of dragons will again stream over the Shield to wreak disaster on Saragond.
Desperately, she looked to her father for help.
He looked older by a decade, but said, “He’s right, Zlinda. If he insists on this, by our own laws, there’s nothing to be done.” He turned from her to the Dornae. “Sir, do you promise to treat my daughter well?”
“Your Majesty, she will have all honor and respect in my land, as the vessel of the blood and as my wife.”
“And who are you in your land, sir? I must know that.”
The demand was bluster, but the Dornaan answered. “I am Rouar, Guardian of the Queen, third maj of the second council, Seyer of the Dragon’s Womb.”
