Named of the Dragon

by Susanna Kearsley

  I looked at the rough lane ahead, and the shivering darkness. I never could see well, at night. I knew there were pastures sloping uphill to our left, and straight ahead I saw the long black outline of what must be Castle Farm, but really the only thing I saw with any clarity was the enormous oil refinery across the bay, a web of dull and misted lights that hovered in the starless sky. The other pub, so James had said, lay somewhere round that corner, past the farm. My heart sank. "You're not planning to drag me up there for a nightcap, or anything, are you?''

  "God no, not tonight. I can't drive in this state, and I don't fancy walking any further than I have to. No man," she said, "is worth sore feet."

  I thought her very wise, and said as much. "Besides," I said, "he might have left the Point by now and just gone home. It's getting late."

  "Darling, he's a playwright," she reminded me, as if that meant he had to keep late hours. "And anyway, he's not at home. That's his cottage there, the one without a light on."

  I looked where she was pointing, at the curve of lane behind us, but I only saw a spiny clump of hedge and the suggestion of a roof. As I turned back my heel slipped again on the hard rolling stones and I righted myself with an effort. "We should have brought a torch."

  "I didn't think," said Bridget. "I always forget how dark it gets, out here. But James has torches at the house, I know. He keeps one in his writing-room, in case the power goes off." She turned her head towards me. "And speaking of his writing-room, I must say I'm surprised at you."

  "Why's that?"

  "With all that talk at dinner tonight, you didn't once ask him about his new book."

  "Is that wrong?"

  "Well, it's very restrained for you, that's all." Her voice smiled. "I just wondered if maybe you weren't feeling well..."

  "Very funny. I am on holiday, you know."

  "Agents," she informed me, "don't take holidays."

  "No?"

  "It's a known fact. You don't switch off. Oh, hell," she broke off suddenly. "I've stepped in something squishy."

  "Never mind," I said. "We're nearly there."

  Ahead of us, the two pale shadows that were Christopher and James had stopped beside the gate, to wait for us. The tower rose up blackly at their backs, and Bridget, looking at it, shuddered.

  "God, I'm glad my windows don't look out on that," she said. "I wouldn't sleep."

  Walking with her, silently, I wondered what she'd say if she knew just how much I'd give to spend a single night not sleeping.

  VII

  Or if she slept she dream'd

  An awful dream.

  Alfred, Lord Tennyson, "Guinevere"

  Justin was crying. I heard it again, rising over the harsh wind that swept through the wasteland—a small sound, but one that I couldn't mistake. He was too far away, I thought. Too far. I stumbled and fell to my knees on the endless road, feeling the sting of the sharp scattered stones. And then something brushed past me, a cold thing as black as the night, and I saw it was the serpent, grown enormous from swallowing the river, and I knew that it was after Justin now, that it was following his cries and it would find him.

  "No." I struggled to my feet and started after it, watching that hideous tail slither off in the darkness and knowing I'd never be able to catch it. Beneath me the ground heaved and yawned and I screamed as I pitched headlong into the chasm...

  I didn't hear the sound that woke me.

  One minute I was falling and the next my eyes were open, blinking dimly in confusion at the canopy above me and the heavy draperies twisted round the bedposts at my feet. They looked like two cowled women, standing silent, watching me, and for a moment I felt something close to fear, but then I shook the foolish feeling off impatiently.

  Rolling on to my side, I turned my back to the imagined eyes and burrowed in the blankets, curled against the cold that crept between my sheets despite the fire that flickered on the hearth, not far away. The fire ...

  I raised my head to stare at it, to make quite certain it was real. It couldn't have been burning long—the flames were just now taking hold, their blue-edged tongues of red and gold stretched upwards by the violent draught that drew them up the flue.

  Warily, I pulled myself up to a sitting position against the soft pillows and looked slowly round from the door, its brass bolt firmly fastened on the inside, to the windows that looked out on the sleeping church and village. Through the rippled glass the tower gazed benignly down upon me, and below its walls the estuary glimmered in the dim uncertain moonlight. I was looking at the water when the curtains at the window fluttered gently and became a gown that rustled as its wearer took a step towards my bed.

  "Be not afraid," a soft voice said. "It is but me."

  And I wasn't afraid. It was then that I knew that I wasn't awake after all, but still dreaming.

  The woman came forwards and I saw her clearly by firelight. She was young, and quite slender, and dressed all in blue, her calm features framed by a tightly stretched wimple that gave her a saintly appearance.

  I took a closer look, and shook my head. "I'm sorry, I don't know you."

  "Yes, you do." She stretched one hand towards me, and I saw the small child clinging to her sleeve. A blue-eyed boy of four or five, with tumbled golden curls. "My son," she said. "My only child. I beg you guard his life."

  "Who, me? But—"

  "Please, you must. They mean him harm. They mean to take him from me." She took the boy's hand in her own and held it out, imploringly. "Please."

  The boy looked up in silence, small and trusting, and I shrank into my pillows. "I can't," I told her, wishing there were some way to explain. "I'm truly sorry, but I can't."

  "Then he is lost." Sad-eyed, she turned and slowly led her son away, through walls that melted in the gloom and shifted shape, becoming trees and moonlit fields and one dark road that wound off in the distance.

  I'm dreaming, I thought. This is only a dream. Through the heavy thick mist swirling inside my mind I could just feel the coolness of linen pressed close to my cheek, and I focused on that, bringing all of my concentration to bear on the one simple act of opening my eyes. It took several tries and a great deal of effort, but at length my weighted eyelids moved.

  I lay still for a moment, blinking dimly in confusion at the canopy above me and the heavy draperies twisted round the bedposts at my feet. L felt no creeping cold, I saw no fire... and there was no one in the room but me.

  But I thought I heard, far off, a child crying in the darkness.

  VIII

  Then when he had filled the air with so

  many and so great complaints, new fury

  seized him and he fled to the woods not

  wishing to be seen as he fled.

  Geoffrey of Monmouth, Vita Merlini

  The crows were gathering above the tower. They rose behind the house and skimmed the roof slates in a beating, chattering mass that broke and swelled and closed again in flawless tight formation. Dropping to the tower walls, they clutched a moment at the ancient stones, then loosed their grip and soared and wheeled like blackened bits of dust trapped in a whirlwind. Wherever one settled, another one took to the air, crying harshly, as though there were some limit to the weight the walls would bear.

  Pulling the front door shut behind me, I took a few steps on the wet grass and turned to squint up at the close-curtained windows, amazed that anyone could sleep through this cacophony of crows. As my gaze fell again I saw something I hadn't before—a stone face mounted in the peak above the door. Eyes closed, serene, its nose sheared off and flattened over lips that, although straight, appeared to smile, the long face looked more male than female. I studied it a moment, and I had the oddest feeling that those closed eyes somehow saw me, too.

  Even when I'd turned and started walking, I had the sense of being watched. I squared my shoulders, setting my face to the sea-scented breeze blowing in from the Haven and the moon-shaped bay. Since the nightmares had started, I'd got in the habit of taki
ng a walk after waking, to clear my thoughts.

  And this morning they wanted more clearing than usual.

  The dream had been the same for five years, always the same, the only variation being how long I spent searching through the wasteland for my son. It was, as nightmares went, familiar, and I understood its meaning. But last night it seemed my subconscious had chosen to add a new twist. Psychology wasn't my forte, but I'd read enough books on dreams and dream analysis to know the images and symbols came from somewhere. And I remembered reading something to the effect that a shift in one's dreams was a thing of significance, signalling some sort of change in the life of the dreamer.

  The only change I knew of was the change in my surroundings since I'd come down here from London, and I didn't see how that could have a negative effect. Even daybreak seemed more peaceful here, with the sun still slowly climbing in the soft transparent sky, and my breath making mist in the air, and my crunching footsteps sounding crisply on the gravel drive. Pushing the woman in blue and her golden-haired child from my mind, I walked on.

  One of the cats came to join me—the little grey cat that had jumped to my shoulders yesterday. He kept to heel for several yards, but wasn't keen to leave the property and abandoned me at the gate. Here the drive angled down and became an unpaved road, and the road, in its turn, split itself into two—one part chasing over the little stone bridge that led up the back way to the village, while the other part carried along at the edge of the water, winding steadily uphill until it vanished round a bend in the shoreline.

  I'd been across the bridge already, in the car with Bridget, and I didn't fancy walking through the village, so I chose the coastal route instead, savouring the solitude. The road was rutted deep and soft from recent rain—I had to watch my feet to see I didn't turn an ankle—but I had a closer view here of the fishing boats that bobbed against the bar, ropes creaking as they strained against the tide. And behind them, on the farther shore, a dark green regiment of trees stood solemnly along the curving waterline, to guard the eastern boundary of the village.

  As I rounded the corner, the bay, washed with ripples, stretched wide to meet the bluer Haven, and the breeze blew more expansively. I breathed it in and walked a little faster, past the handful of houses asleep at the roadside; past the narrow pungent strip of beach where coils of darkly shining seaweed marked the progress of the tides; to where the road abruptly ended in the car park of a small white building signposted "The Point House". This was the pub, I thought, that everyone had been talking about last night— the one that only opened at weekends. It certainly wasn't open now. The only signs of life came from the line of laundry hung to dry behind the silent building, and the three Welsh Black cows in the next fenced field over, heads turned to watch me.

  I stopped walking and stared back at them, considering my options.

  A stile bridged the rail fence at the corner of the car park, underneath a wooden sign that pointed me encouragingly up the posted coast path. But the path crossed the field, and the cows barred my way. No, I corrected myself, peering more closely, not cows. Bullocks.

  "Blast," I said. It wasn't that I was afraid of bullocks, really. They didn't have the nastiness of bulls. But they had enough residual testosterone, I'd found, to make them apt to flex their muscles when they thought they could intimidate. And since I was only a puny human being, and a female one at that, I didn't much fancy my chances of making them move.

  Still, I gave it a try. "Oy!" I shouted, doing my best Harry Enfield. Waving my arms above my head, I drew in a lungful of air and tried again, full volume: "Oy!"

  The three black heads stayed motionless, save for the twitching of one ear.

  "Smug bastards," I accused them. "If you had an ounce of chivalry you'd—"

  The nearest bullock interrupted with a sound between a bellow and a snort, and as I watched the three of them spun round and lumbered up the pasture to the farther fence. A moment later I saw what had prompted their move. A tiny blur of white and brown was trotting down the coast path from the opposite direction. Ignoring the bullocks completely, it came across the bottom of the pasture, bouncing through the long grass like an oversized hare with a small wagging tail. It looked like a Jack Russell terrier, short-limbed and sturdy, but its hair was much longer than any Jack Russell's I'd seen, standing all out on end like the hair of some wild mad scientist.

  I crouched to greet the dog as it squirmed underneath the fence rail. "Hello, scrapper," I said. "Where did you spring from?"

  The dog sat back to grin at me, dark button eyes dancing with mischief. I rumpled its ears and my fingers touched leather, set deep in the tangle of hair. It was wearing a collar. "Morgan." I read the brass tag dangling at the dog's throat. "You're a boy, then, are you, Morgan? Are you a boy?" I never had been able to work out why people always said things twice to animals, especially since we were unlikely to receive an answer anyway, but I was just as guilty as the rest. "Go on, Morgan. Go on, lead the way."

  I stood, and let the little dog surge on ahead, across the field, while I hopped the stile, keeping an eye on the wary bullocks. I needn't have worried. They kept close to the fence as my newfound friend darted back and forth around my heels, circling and urging me on.

  "I'm coming," I promised, and with a sharp woof he was off again, leading me up the climbing path that hugged the edges of the fields, while to the right of us a mass of gorse and bramble tumbled steeply down the cliffside to the Haven. It had been years since I had walked a coastal path, and I'd forgotten how incredible it felt to be so high above everything, to look down and see gulls wheeling under me while on the blue sunlit water the tankers and small boats moved leisurely round one another, completely unaware of my existence. Absorbed in watching them, I barely glanced at the lifeboat station when we passed above it. The little dog sniffed round the top of the steps leading down to the lifeboat, but finding nothing to his interest, led me on.

  Some braver souls—or sheep, perhaps—had trampled little paths that sprouted off from time to time and disappeared into the thickening gorse, winding down towards the water, but as I'd always had a healthy respect for the dangers of cliffs I kept my own feet firmly on the main path, only stepping to the grass to round the places where the soft red clay grew muddy, so I wouldn't slip.

  Ahead of me a screen of leafless trees, pale sycamores, rose up to take the place of gorse and bramble, plunging boldly to meet the water swirling white against the rocks, and an old shed, rather run-down and abandoned, stood in silence by the path. I hesitated, looking from the trees to the shed with its gaping smashed windows and rusted tin roof, feeling that twinge of misgiving that I always felt when entering a lonely place. But the dog had already squeezed under the next stile and, unaffected by the change of atmosphere, stood wagging on the other side. I shook my hesitation off and followed him. After all, I reminded myself, as the trees closed around us on both sides and the air grew heavy with the smells of the damp ground, littered thick with campion and foxglove and brown ferns withering between green clumps of wild garlic—after all, this was a public path, and even this late in the year, there must be ramblers trekking up and down it all the time, especially on a Saturday. If something happened to me here, I cheered myself, at least my body wouldn't languish undiscovered.

  The dog perked up his ears and stopped. Sniffed the air.

  "What's the matter, Morgan?" But I had heard the footsteps, too. The squelching steps of someone coming down the muddy path. Tucking my hands in my pockets, I turned my gaze deliberately away to watch the glinting water of the Haven flash between the sycamores, trying hard to look carefree as I walked on. I only caught a glimpse of the man as he came through the trees—a dark man, not tall, wearing denims and boots. The dog, head bent low, started forwards to investigate, and I whistled for him sharply. "Morgan! Come here, boy!"

  The man stopped short, and blocked the narrow path. He watched the little dog approach.

  "It's all right," I told him, "he's perfe
ctly friendly." Snapping my fingers, I made my tone firmer. "Come on, Morgan, do as you're told."

  Folding his arms, the man lifted his eyebrows and shot me a withering glance. "His name's Chance," he informed me, in a rough-edged Welsh-accented voice that held no trace of humour. "And just for the record, I don't often come when I'm called."

  I recognized him, then. Not his face, so much, as his voice and his movements, the way he was holding his head. And the name on the dog's collar, of course. "Sorry," I said. "I read the tag, you see, and just assumed ..."

  Gareth Gwyn Morgan said shortly, "Well, now you know differently."

  It was the patronizing tone, I think, that set my teeth on edge. I never had liked being spoken to as if I'd only half a brain. Clenching my fists in my pockets, I lifted my chin. "Most people, Mr. Morgan, put the dog's name on the collar, not their own, so you needn't act so damned offended."

  His dark glance flicked me, unimpressed, and without a word he whistled for the dog and started walking round me. I felt my eyebrows rising and irrationally I looked towards the trees, seeking a witness to his rude behaviour.

  I couldn't hold my tongue. "And a bloody good day to you, too." Turning sharply on my heel, I set my back to him and carried on the way that I'd been heading, up the path. Bloody writers, I cursed silently. And I'd thought Bridget was difficult...

  I felt his gaze burning a hole in my shoulder blades, and his voice followed after me, clipped and unfriendly. "You're a fool to go that way. The coast path's no place for a woman alone."

  He whistled for the dog again, and I heard the crackle of bramble and twigs as he started away, and unable to help it I stopped and spun round.

  "As an exit line, that lacks a certain logic, don't you think?"

  He paused. "What?"

  "Well, you can't say I shouldn't be out here alone and then leave me alone. That just doesn't make sense," I told him, drawing satisfaction from his tightly exhaled breath. "I'd have expected better dialogue from someone with your talent."