The Erth Dragons Book 1: The Wearle

by Chris D'Lacey

  ‘Some of you, I know, have been deeply unnerved by what you have seen. I have heard foul whispers that the Tywyll has risen. Such talk will not be tolerated. We go forward with facts, not superstitions. Based on what we have learned, I have reached the conclusion that the first Wearle was drawn into a conflict like ours – and the result was mutual destruction. We have been more fortunate. We have lost many dragons, among them a brave De:allus and the old per, Grogan, whose name we restore and whose memory we honour for his valiant attempt to warn us of these dangers. But our quest to seek Godith in all creation survives. We will continue to explore this planet and its mysteries. The Wearle is everything; the Wearle goes on.’

  There were roars of approval all round, the loudest from a family on a nearby hill. Ren was among them, flanked by Gariffred and Gayl. It still hurt Ren to move any limb, but he rested a hand on each of the wearlings and gladly accepted their nuzzles and licks. He was happy for them, truly happy, but he ached to go home and find his mother. The report of fires in the settlement had troubled him. But for now, a return would not be possible. Grynt had given the order that Ren should be kept within the Wearle until he healed. A show of kindness, perhaps, but Ren felt there was some shading in the Elder’s words and was already counting the days when he might have to fool the sweepers again and cross the line in the opposite direction.

  Nurtured by Grymric’s powerful herbs, he was growing stronger with every day. Strangely, now, his scales came and went, but he could feel Grystina’s auma always and no longer needed the aid of a stig or Gariffred by his side to call upon her power. Soon he would be ready to run if he needed to – and Gabrial seemed to be aware of it.

  As they listened to the last prayers for Galarhade, the blue said, ‘Do you hate us, Ren, for the death we have brought on your kind?’

  Not hate, thought Ren. Hate was too strong a word. He flicked away a blade of grass. ‘I miss my pa.’

  ‘Pa?’ said Gabrial. This was a Hom word new to him.

  ‘Tada – father,’ Ren translated.

  Gabrial nodded. His claws pressed a little tighter to the ground, churning gentle furrows in the erth. ‘I lost my father in battle.’

  Ren looked up into the great blue eyes.

  ‘He was here with the first Wearle,’ Gabrial said.

  Far below them, Galarhade’s body caught fire. The sudden whumph made Gayl cry out in fright. Gariffred sat up as if he’d seen a star fall out of the sky.

  ‘Come,’ said Grendel, ushering him to her. She gathered both wearlings under her wings.

  Ren picked a small flower, leaving enough of the stalk to twirl in his fingers. ‘Dint know about yer pa. I’m sorry.’

  The blue let a quiet moment pass. ‘He was a mapper,’ he said.

  ‘Muh…?’ Ren said.

  Gabrial pronounced it again, more slowly. ‘Map-per.’ Ren’s grasp of dragontongue was fast improving, though some expressions still bounced around his ears like muddled growls.

  ‘Map-per,’ the boy repeated.

  ‘Hrrr,’ said the dragon, meaning ‘good’.

  Ren smiled and looked at the flower in his hands. It had six pink petals and a black centre. It made him think of the pink-coloured crystals that had turned some dragons into goyles. What if Gabrial’s father…?

  He shuddered, not wanting to go where that thought was taking him.

  ‘Are you cold?’ asked Gabrial.

  Ren shook his head. ‘No.’

  Gabrial lifted a foot, flexing his claws to be rid of the dirt. ‘We must go, both of us.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘To Galarhade.’

  A small sigh betrayed Ren’s thoughts. It was a long walk down the hill from here.

  ‘You would honour the Wearle if you did,’ said Gabrial.

  Honour. Of course. Ren stood up and threw away the flower. He sighed again as he measured the distance.

  Gabrial tilted his head in query.

  ‘Long way,’ said Ren. He made walking movements with his fingers.

  The dragon’s eye ridges narrowed. He tried to move his claws in the same way as Ren’s fingers; the Hom had some strange abilities, he thought. He bent his knees, dropping his wings to a comfortable height.

  ‘REALLY?’ gasped Ren. They were going to fly?!

  ‘Swiftly, before Grendel burns my ears,’ said the blue.

  Ren did not need a second invitation. He scrambled up the stairway made by the wing bones and sat astride Gabrial’s giant neck. The warmth from the dragon’s body was amazing, even if the scales were uncomfortable to sit on. ‘Does this hurt?’ Ren asked, taking hold of two stigs for balance.

  Gabrial snorted and put out his wings.

  ‘Waah!’ cried Ren, gasping and laughing as the dragon rose up.

  ‘Ready?’ said Gabrial.

  Ren tightened his grip. In his best broken dragontongue, he gabbled, ‘One day, we will fly to my home and make peace between skalers and the Kaal.’

  Gabrial’s eye ridges creaked again. Ren’s words were like raindrops tossed in a storm. But the beat of the boy’s heart told its own story. Gabrial matched it with a positive hrrr!

  And they took off into the crisp blue sky.

  A boy and a dragon, at peace.

  But peace was not on everyone’s mind. On the far side of the scorch line, Mell, wife of the tragic Ned Whitehair, was sitting alone by the river, idly making a chain of flowers. Behind her, dying columns of smoke still marked the invasion of the skalers and their war.

  So lost in her thoughts was Mell that she did not hear a whinney approaching, until it was blowing its warm breath over her.

  She looked up, cupping her eyes against the sun. ‘Do I know you?’ she said, even though the rider was a stranger to her.

  He smiled, but did not reply at first. His hair was thin and its colour blacker than the nose of a mutt. It fell in curling strands to his shoulders. He was wearing a robe the kind of which Mell had never seen before. Sleek, it was, like the fur of a hopper, but shining here and there like a skaler wing.

  Odder still was his ride.

  ‘What kind of whinney would that be?’ she asked.

  It was white, the whinney, with a flowing mane and a spiralling horn protruding from its forehead. There

  was a strange and distant light in its eye, a light the colour of an evening sky that would herald sunshine on the dawn.

  ‘I found it so,’ said the man. ‘I seek shelter, woman. Will you give it?’

  ‘I would, if I had it to give,’ said Mell. ‘The skalers have burned what was mine, what was Kaal.’

  The man reined round and stared at the mountains. ‘I have no love for skalers,’ he said.

  Mell bowed and felt a tingle of joy. She liked this stranger’s sureness of heart. ‘You have the eyes of someone I knew,’ she said. ‘A brave man, a farmer, now resting with the Fathers. He went by the name of Waylen Treader. Are you kin to him?’

  ‘I have no kin,’ said the man. And now, Mell noticed, his eyes for a moment glowed the colour of those that defined his whinney.

  ‘Nor I,’ she said, throwing her flower chain into the river. She fought back a tear as it floated away. ‘Our leader, Targen the Old, is dead, along with half our men. My man and my boy are both gone.’ She gestured at the mountains so the stranger knew her meaning.

  ‘Then join me,’ he said.

  ‘I might,’ said Mell, stroking her hair where it fell across her shoulder. ‘First, I will need a name to call you.’

  The stranger extended his hand to her. ‘I have only one name,’ he said. ‘Tywyll.’

  Acknowledgments

  I’m going to do this right, for once, and put Jay at the top of the thank you list. Frankly, without her, The Wearle wouldn’t be half the book it is. Someone once told me there a
re as many ways of writing a story as there are people out there doing it. Our way is a painstaking collaboration of ideas, something that doesn’t stop after the initial idea is mooted, but continues on through chapter after chapter, edit after edit, rewrite after rewrite. I always knew it would be an interesting challenge to write an anthropomorphic saga about a dragon colony, but I wasn’t sure this level of fantasy would suit my writing style. It was Jay who insisted it would. But for her dedication and enthusiasm, the project might never have taken flight (sorry). So, reader, if you like the story, praise Jay for her tireless hard work, as I do here.

  Another huge enthusiast was Sarah Leonard, my editor. She was new to me at the start of this project and also new to Orchard Books. I have to pause at this point to offer tangential praise to Orchard’s publishing director, Megan Larkin. It was Megan who directed me towards Sarah, because their new acquisition was not only a talented up-and-coming editor, but also loved dragons. Sarah’s thorough, insightful and passionate comments have helped add an extra dimension to the book and I eagerly look forward to our next Erth encounter. Staying with Orchard for a moment, I also owe a huge debt of gratitude to their recently retired MD, Marlene Johnson, not just for this book, but for all my books with them. Better late than never, eh, Marlene?

  And then there is the lovely Bethan Hughes, my ‘tame Welsh librarian’. Over the years, many children have asked me how to speak dragontongue. My reply has always been that the nearest human language to it is Welsh – not that Welsh gave rise to dragontongue, you understand, it was clearly the other way round, and both languages have since evolved in slightly separate ways. Even so, you will find a number of places in the text where a word or two of the ‘old tongue’ has crept in, and I am deeply grateful to Bethan for finding her fire within and translating the text as near as possible to the dragons’ intended meaning. Any liberties, mistakes or ambiguities are all attributable to me.

  And finally, I want to thank the thousands of children (and adults) who have written to me over the years in praise of The Last Dragon Chronicles. You won’t find the likes of David or Gadzooks in this book, but I hope you’ll discover a whole new set of reasons to renew your passion for dragons. Hrrr!

  Glossary

  Auma – the lifeforce or spirit of a dragon, derived from an ancient word for ‘fire’. When a dragon dies and sheds its fire tear, its auma is believed to return to the creator, Godith.

  Bleater – Hom name for a goat (and sometimes a sheep).

  Blether – to speak nonsense, as in: ‘What blether are you saying now, boy?’

  Buzzer – Hom name for a fly.

  Caarker – Hom name for a crow. Crows are deeply revered by the Hom and thought to be the most intelligent of birds. Hom women will often wear black crow feathers in their hair, while men might string the claws around their necks to bring them luck in hunting.

  Cold flame – under certain atmospheric conditions, dragons are capable of producing a cool flame (pale blue in colour) that would cause skin burns but not ignite combustible materials such as wood.

  Commingle – a ‘coming together’, usually of minds. All dragons develop the ability to communicate telepathically, i.e. using thought alone. A deeper extension of telepathy is commingling, in which a dragon focuses its awareness to such an extent that it is able to meld with another dragon’s consciousness and read or know all of that dragon’s thoughts. Commingling is invasive and banned by Ki:meran law unless both parties consent. (Courting dragons, for example, might commingle to explore their love for one another.) During colonisation, an elder highly skilled in commingling will meld with a variety of life forms on a planet to determine their level of intelligence or their potential threat to the colony.

  De:allus – a highly-intellectual class of dragon whose lives are devoted to understanding the wonders of Godith’s universe. De:allus are scientists or problem-solvers, characterised by their bright yellow eyes. It is not known how their eye colour developed, though it’s often said (somewhat disparagingly) that their optical triggers have become impaired because the De:allus like to look too long at small things.

  Domayne – any parcel of land claimed by a dragon; their home territory. The term can also describe a large region of land mapped out during colonisation.

  Drake – a young male dragon (sometimes also called a weardrake). A dragon will usually lose this tag around its second turn.

  Dreyas – Hom women, practised in the art of ‘magicks’. A sick person might go to a dreya for a healing potion.

  Elder – a senior dragon (usually male) whose role is to steer and advise the colony. Three Elders would usually accompany a large Wearle: one to maintain law and order, one to attend to the spiritual needs of the community and one designated as the overall leader or Prime.

  Erth – home planet of the Hom.

  Eyrie – an ancient word of dragontongue meaning ‘high nest’. Now more commonly used to describe a superior cave or settle, such as that of a queen or the Prime dragon.

  Faah! – a shocking or vulgar exclamation.

  Fanon – a word from the old dragontongue meaning ‘a female yet to have young’.

  Fhosforent – pink crystalline mineral found in Erth’s volcanic rock. In small quantities it improves a dragon’s flame by causing a rapid enlargement of the fire sacs, allowing more fire to be produced and delivered.

  Fire star – a portal in time and space, called a ‘star’ because of the flash of light emitted when something passes through it. Among the many abilities dragons possess is the means to manipulate the fabric of the universe to create ‘holes’ or openings in space, through which they might travel vast distances. To i:mage a fire star requires an enormous amount of mental energy (two or three Elders commingling to produce it), but once an opening is created, space ‘remembers’ the point. It is then a relatively simple matter for a competent dragon to open and close a fire star at will.

  Fire tear – a single tear cried by a dragon at its death, said to contain its auma in the form of a spark. How a fire tear develops is one of the great mysteries of Godith’s universe. When the tear is shed, it is drawn below the surface of a planet by the pull of the fire at the planet’s core (this is known as the ‘calling’ or the ‘calling of Godith’). The moment the fires combine, the dragon’s body will begin to dissolve, leaving no visible remains. As a mark of respect, and because the calling of a dragon can take several days, a dead dragon might first be cremated in the flames of its peers. In extreme circumstances a dragon might die without shedding its tear. In this case its primary heart will turn to stone, along with the rest of its body if it is not burned. To die and not be called to Godith is the worst fate that can befall a dragon.

  Flapper – Hom name for a bat.

  Flutterfly – Hom name for a butterfly.

  Frenhines fawr – ‘great queen’ in the old dragontongue, an expression of deep respect, usually reserved for a female who has given birth to two or more sets of wearlings.

  Glamouring – a rarely-used word which describes a dragon’s ability to mesmerise others (usually prey) with a stare.

  Goyle – in their early years wearlings were sometimes told a traditional tale about ‘Goyle’, a dragon that emerged from ‘the wrong end of his egg’. Goyle was alleged to be so unsightly that to look upon him would make a dragon shudder so much its scales would drop off. Over the generations it has come to mean anything ugly or grotesque.

  Growler – Hom name for a bear.

  Guardian – a male companion who protects a matrial and her wearlings (see laying cycle).

  Heart(s) – dragons have three hearts, closely linked. The largest, the primary heart, drives the body and is concerned with power and strength; the second, about three fifths the size of the primary heart, controls love and emotional reactions; the third, which is small and just hidden by the second heart, gives a dragon its spirit
uality.

  Hom – an early form of the human race.

  Honker – Hom name for a goose.

  Hooter – Hom name for an owl.

  Hopper – Hom name for a rabbit.

  I:mage – the ability to create external structures from mental images. There are two types of i:maging, physical and natural (see also phasing). A natural i:mage is a floating three-dimensional picture (a kind of hologram) that fades as soon as it outlives its usefulness – a map, for instance, or the memory of an event. Physical i:maging is used to create more permanent objects or to alter the parameters of existing matter. It can take a lifetime of dedicated study to reach even a modest level of competence.

  Isoscele – the triangular scale at the end of a dragon’s tail, primarily for balance but also a useful tool in battle (sometimes called the ‘hidden claw’) and commonly used to point or gesture.

  Kaal – a tribe of humans. The origin of the name is thought to derive from ‘cave’ and refers to the Kaal’s preferred choice of habitat: any mountainous region near water.

  Ki:mera – the homeworld of dragons, created for them by the breath of Godith. Literally meaning ‘place of fire and light’.

  Laying cycle – the process of giving birth to young. During their lifetime all healthy female dragons will enter at least two laying cycles, and sometimes as many as four. Dragons give birth by the process of parthenogenesis. A female can produce, lay and hatch her eggs without the assistance of a male. It is only after the young are born that the male becomes a vital part of the bloodline. A male that successfully bonds to a female is called her companion, a position he must fight for. As guardian to her young, he also earns the right to call himself ‘father’. Only when the female emerges from her nest with her young does she discover who the father will be. The next few months are crucial, for it is during this time that the young dragons imprint themselves on the father, and the necessary hormonal and behavioural changes take place which establish them as part of the father’s bloodline.