Today, looking at her half-burned paintings, it seemed as if the little runes made sense, as if she could almost remember what they meant, like a song she’d forgotten the words to. Her art was trying to speak to her.
Suddenly, a big gust of wind plundered the apartment, soaring in through the giant hole in the wall and throwing everything about. Most of what she had gathered up blew away again. As Alaythia watched the ashes of her life fly about in the wind, wondering how she was going to make herself feel better, she looked up to see two figures in the doorway.
Simon and Aldric were relieved to see that the strange white fire was gone, and with it, any trace of the White Dragon. The firefighters had not put the blaze out. None of their water or special chemicals had done them any good. The fire just suddenly disappeared. As if it had gotten bored with burning and retired for the night.
Alaythia told the whole story to her visitors, who said they had come back to help her.
“It was good of you to come,” she said, looking over her ash-filled home.
Simon could see Aldric looking intently at her face, as if he found it hard to look away.
“We just want to help,” Aldric said, picking up the pieces of an old picture frame.
“You know, you look familiar,” Alaythia said to the Knight. “I feel like I saw you…. I mean, before the fire—I just can’t remember where.”
Simon was looking at the odd runic symbols in Alaythia’s paintings, strewn about on the floor. He began to wonder what else might be hiding in the ashes.
Strangely enough, the only things left perfectly untouched by the fire were the paintings by the man in white. Somehow they’d survived without a scratch. As Alaythia marveled over this with Aldric, Simon saw something glint in the ashes by the giant broken window. Careful not to get too close to the window, where wind was still whistling into the room, he dug into the ashes and pulled out a couple of quarter-sized coins marked with unusual writing.
He turned to Aldric. “What’re these?”
Each coin had a hole in it. Perhaps they were meant to be medallions, but their leather straps had been burned away.
Aldric came over and took hold of them. Slowly his face became rigid and pale.
“Do you recognize them?” the boy asked.
Aldric did not answer. He ran his fingers over the markings and turned the coins over. On the other side was an image of a flying Dragon.
“Is it something important? What does it mean?”
Still his father did not reply.
“Do you remember that deal we made yesterday, about you going back when we stopped the White Dragon?” Aldric asked at last.
“Yes.”
“Well, I’m about to break that deal.”
The look in his eyes gave Simon a chill.
“This is a Dragon’s medallion,” he said. “Dragons used to give these to others as tokens of friendship, in ancient times, when they made alliances.”
“What does it mean?”
“I’m not sure,” said Aldric, and he moved closer, away from Alaythia, who was combing through the rubble on the other side of the room. “Each of these was marked with a runic message of goodwill on one side, and on the other there was a special emblem signifying the Dragon the medallion had come from.”
“It’s kind of pretty,” said Simon.
“This one,” Aldric said, “has the mark of the White Dragon. But this one,” and he lifted the other, “I’ve never seen before. It doesn’t come from any known Dragon in the book.”
Now things got very quiet.
Simon could feel the cold fear in the room.
“The Book of Saint George lists all the Dragons in creation,” said Aldric. “All of them, every last one. When a new Dragon is born, its name appears in the book with its deathspell. It is an ancient, infallible magic. All the Serpent bloodlines are in the book. I have hunted them all. They should all be gone.”
Simon tried not to shiver.
“There is another Dragon out there.”
The words hung in the air. The sound of street traffic floated inside, and gray ash stirred on the floor.
“What is a symbol of friendship from one Dragon doing with another?” whispered Aldric in frustration, staring at the medallion.
Simon’s voice shook. “They were working together?”
“To do what? It just doesn’t happen. These creatures hate each other. They don’t collaborate, not anymore. I don’t know what this is doing here, but we need to find out.”
Simon could see that his father was scared. And that chilled Simon even more. A danger that is known is one thing. An unknown danger is another.
“There is no one we can go to for help,” said Aldric. “There is just you and me.”
Simon’s mind froze, and he couldn’t think of what to say. For a second, he wondered what Alaythia might be thinking of this strange conversation, but then he heard her moving distantly in the apartment and was relieved.
“Good God, we won’t even have a deathspell for him…,” Aldric said. “I’m going to need you. I’m going to need another tracker.”
Simon liked the sound of it. But he did not smile. He gripped his sword hanging at the belt under his coat, and he knew he would use it soon. He was a long way from Ebony Hollow.
In the space of a minute, the world had become a darker, colder place.
Out there somewhere, a great evil was roaming free.
Chapter Eleven
A HIDDEN EVIL
THE SHOCK OF WHAT they had just discovered had barely settled in when Alaythia approached them. “Is something wrong?” she asked Aldric. “You look pale.”
“I feel terrible we couldn’t save more of your things,” he answered.
“Oh, but you saved my life. Whatever caused this fire wasn’t your fault. Things can always be replaced.”
“Fair enough,” said Aldric, barely listening, and he began moving toward the door. Simon could see he was distracted, his mind on the medallions in his pocket.
“Except my artwork,” said Alaythia, looking around. “Can’t replace that, of course, though I don’t know who’ll ever miss it.”
“Well, we won’t keep you from it,” said Aldric, pulling Simon toward the door. “It’s best you get right back to work.”
“On what?” she asked.
“On rebuilding, something new,” mumbled Aldric. “Maybe all of this will be an inspiration.”
“I thought you said you were going to help me pick things up,” called Alaythia.
“We did,” murmured Aldric, going out the door. “We picked up all sorts of things.”
And they were gone.
What they had picked up were artifacts that could change everything they knew about the world of Dragons. As soon as they were on the sidewalk, Aldric took the unknown medallion out of his pocket and examined it again.
“You could’ve been a little nicer to her,” said Simon.
“We don’t have time for niceness,” said his father, squinting at the medallion. “I was in a hurry to get out of there. I don’t even know what I said.”
Well, that’s obvious, Simon wanted to say, but didn’t. Have you ever spoken to a woman before? Because it didn’t look like it.
Aldric wouldn’t have listened anyway. His fingers were tracing the shape of the Dragon on the medallion. “Very good craftsmanship,” he murmured.
The image of the Dragon caused terrible memories of the real thing to come flooding back to Simon. A whisper came out of him. “I can’t do this.”
Slowly, Aldric brought his gaze to bear on the boy.
“Can’t?”
There was an edge in Aldric’s voice, and Simon didn’t meet his eyes. “I just…I don’t know what I can do…,” he said.
“Look,” Aldric said quietly. “There is no running away. This thing is out here. And it will be coming for you. No one will understand, no one will believe us. I am the only one who can protect you, but if I should go down fighting, you will
be the only one who knows their secrets. The only one left to stand against them. You have to learn their tricks, and how to fight so that it counts. We have this power. We must use it. There’s no choice in the matter. It is as God wills it.”
He put the medallion in the boy’s hand.
“We have to find him—before he finds us.” Aldric’s voice left no doubt. Simon had taken on his profession.
“It’s kind of, you know, sort of artistic,” Simon said sadly, peering at it more closely. There were many strange marks on the medallion. “It sort of looks like her artwork.”
Aldric was deep in thought. “What?”
“The writing on the thing. It looks like her paintings, the ones up—”
“There you are,” said a woman’s voice.
Simon turned. Alaythia was following them, coming down the street with a confused look on her face. “I’m wondering if I look stupid to you.” She caught up to them and sighed. “I mean, it’s obvious you two are concealing something—you’re acting completely strange.”
Aldric looked annoyed. “We just felt we were in your way.”
“I feel somewhat certain that you took something from me,” said Alaythia, not sure how to confront them.
Simon gripped the medallion behind his back.
“What’s that?” wondered Alaythia, and she coolly cocked her head to one side, trying to see Simon’s hand.
Simon stammered, “It’s just a thing…a souvenir thing.”
But she snatched it away efficiently. “Hey, it looks like it’s been burned,” she observed. “Did this come from my house?”
Simon swiped the prize back, but Alaythia’s eyes had locked on to its curious writing. “What is that? That writing?”
Aldric took the piece from Simon. “It’s nothing of your concern.”
“Oh, I think it is,” she said, staring back at him. “I know that writing, I’ve seen it before.”
“That’s impossible,” said Aldric, but even as he said so, she held up some small scraps of paintings she’d recovered from the fire. Right there on her canvas tatters was the exact same writing.
“I’ve been painting those symbols since I was a child,” she said, “painting them everywhere, all the time, drawing them on paper, on old newspapers, on cereal boxes, etching them into the wood of my desk, seeing them in my dreams—if you think you can just wander off out of my life after tossing something like that in my face”—at this she motioned to the medallion—“you’re out of your mind.”
Aldric still did not say anything, brooding with his arms crossed, thinking.
Simon was amazed. Somehow she carried off all this ranting with a quiet and confident grace. Even when she was pushy, she was delicate.
“You painted these?” Aldric asked her.
“All my life.”
“Do you know what they mean?”
“No,” she sighed. She stopped, staring intently at the medallion now.
“This is a gilt-edged coin,” she said, pointing to the gold around its edges.
Aldric looked at her.
She looked back, curious. “This coin is meant to look old, isn’t it? A replica? I’ve heard of artists who do work like this, fine art coins. This kind of engraving is very distinctive.” She took it from Aldric, turning it over in her hand. “Cross-thatches on the edge. Lots of little scratches, looks like a secretive maker’s mark.”
Now it was Aldric who was coming closer. “Would you know where it came from?”
“Well, I don’t know exactly, but the style is Italian. It was popular there a few years ago, in certain weird little circles. There’s a school of artists that I know of who do this kind of metalwork. Except for the edges, this is pewter. It’s a dead giveaway. You know where you get work like this?” She smiled knowingly, making him wait. “Venice.”
Simon watched his father’s eyes rise to meet hers. “That confirms my suspicion,” said Aldric. Simon saw his father was lying. He clearly didn’t trust the woman yet. “Can you say anything else about it?”
“I can say it’s the most fascinating thing I’ve ever seen. Whoever made this is using my abstract symbols. And I never show anyone my work. Where did you get it?”
“I’m a collector, too,” said Aldric vaguely, taking it back. “And my fortune is tied up in this particular piece.”
She looked back, trying to figure him out. “You want to know where this came from. And so do I. Well, I would imagine the rest of the mystery lies in Venice.”
“That’s where we’re headed,” Aldric replied. Simon’s heart jumped. They were leaving America?
“If you want to know where that coin medallion came from, you need someone who knows the art world. Give me some time to pack,” said Alaythia.
“We’re leaving now,” said Aldric. “And I don’t think we need a third.”
“I can’t leave the rest of my paintings and those Venemons up there in that apartment!”
“I can,” said Aldric.
As his father pulled him down the street, Simon looked back sadly at the woman, who seemed to have given up so easily. Then, all in a rush, she went after them, crossing in front of Aldric.
“I’m a part of this. I want to know where that coin came from, too,” she said.
“We don’t know what we’ll find,” said Aldric. “It could be dangerous.”
“I owe you for saving my life, and I’m going to pay you back one way or another. I’ve never owed anybody anything. You’re taking me with you.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” said Aldric, but his face was softening now.
“Let me pack some clothes. I need something warm.”
Simon thought she seemed prepared for any possible climate. She was wearing a light dress but a big, burdensome coat, with a scarf tucked into a pocket. Aldric glanced at her outfit.
“Warm enough,” he said, and kept walking.
Alaythia took a deep breath. It was now or never. In a moment, the boy and his father would be around the corner, gone, vanished. Something inside her settled. She didn’t even look back at her apartment. She just went forward. Like she always did.
Simon grinned when she joined them. Now he wouldn’t be alone with his father’s crazed ramblings. “I’m not going to worry about my apartment,” said Alaythia. “We have some kind of destiny together. Truth is, I’ve never been one for logic anyway. What is logic? It’s an excuse for wallflowers.”
Simon looked at her. Wonderful. He’d be traveling with two crazies.
Chapter Twelve
A SHIP MADE FOR ONE
NEEDLESS TO SAY, ALAYTHIA was not happy to discover that she had been hunted by the White Dragon of Manhattan, or that she had invited him over for roast beef. She was even more disturbed to learn that there was another Dragonman out there in the world and that they were on their way to see him. A Serpent in Venice.
Sitting around the table in the ship, with Fenwick puttering about the kitchen galley like a short-order cook, she realized she had to be prepared to accept anything.
“I ought to be terrified of you two,” she told Aldric and Simon, “gallivanting around the oceans with your fox and your horse and some total insanity about hunting Dragons—but I’m not sure you are crazy. I’ve seen things in the past few days I don’t fully understand, fires that appear and vanish, pieces of dreams that come true. I’ve had a feeling inside I can’t quite explain. Like something big is going to happen, all over the world, and you two are involved in it somehow.”
Simon nodded gravely. “I know exactly how you feel.”
“Well, you’re in this now, too,” said Aldric in a low, hushed tone. It was as if they were talking and conspiring against something that could hear them everywhere on earth. “That language you’ve been writing is Dragonscript. They’re ancient rune-words the Dragons used in dealings with each other.”
Alaythia remained doubtful. “I thought it might be Celtic or something. Why do you think I’m writing it all the time?”
>
Aldric shook his head. “I’m not really sure. Some people are very sensitive to the forces around them. It’s likely you’ve encountered Dragons before, perhaps in childhood. You might have been living next to one for years. Its power seeped into you in some way, probably from long-term exposure. I don’t know, but it would be of some assistance if you could read the language. Not that I’m happy you’re tagging along,” he added crustily. “I don’t need another mouth to feed.”
Simon rolled his eyes at Aldric’s customary rudeness. But Alaythia seemed to find his gruffness amusing. “Speaking of mouths to feed,” she said, gliding to the kitchen, “I plan to earn my keep around here. It so happens I’m an excellent cook.”
She was, in fact, a horrible, dreadful cook, but she insisted on making their meals all the way to Venice. There was no getting her out of the kitchen. Simon was dazzled by the number and manner of ways that a simple dish like eggs and bacon could be mangled beyond all human recognition. She did things to eggs that were simply terrifying. There was so much smoke in the ship’s galley that Fenwick took to sitting on one of the masts, as far from the smell of her cooking as possible. But for whatever reason, Aldric allowed Alaythia to fill up the ship with her smells.
Simon welcomed the food, but not for the taste of it. Alaythia’s edible disasters were proving to be highly entertaining. At least she had a sense of humor about her fiascoes, and her endless determination to do something right cheered them all up. The nightly gatherings were bringing them together, and though he grumbled, Aldric found one or two reasons to laugh now and then, Simon noticed.
He had little enough reason during the rest of the day. His mind was clearly on the mystery ahead. Aldric refused to believe the White Dragon was working with the Serpent of Venice, but whoever the Venice creature was, he had probably tangled with the White Dragon, which meant he was powerful. They would have to find him and cast him down. Aldric spent his time practicing in the stables with sword, shield, and bow.
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