Named of the Dragon

by Susanna Kearsley

  Below me, the man's shadow stopped in a hard square of windowlight, head turned to listen. And then I saw the angle of it change and knew that he was starting to look up, that any second now he'd see us, and I couldn't let that happen.

  I slipped sideways through the open door that blew again and sharply banged behind me with a force so great it shook the shed's four walls. And then the wind, as though it tired of the game, released the door and let it swing back slowly, creaking, sealing me in darkness. There were no windows here, and the air had the thick, musty smell of a cellar. Forced to grope my way into the tangle of furniture, I curved my body round Stevie's to give what protection I could, holding him with one arm while the other strained forwards, my hand feeling into the blackness.

  I might have been moving through some sort of nightmarish forest, with creatures and trees grabbing at me from all sides. Hard corners stabbed me and upturned legs pummelled me, bruising my ribs as my fingers raked surfaces greasy with dust. At one point I touched the face of a carved beast—a lion, I think—and I snatched back my hand without thinking, only to have something slash at my shoulder, a searing swift pain like the pass of a knife. I cried out and caught myself, biting my lips into silence.

  He was coming.

  I heard the hard ringing footsteps on stone climbing steadily closer, unhurried. And then he was there, at the door, and with a silent prayer I crouched and huddled in among the table legs, cradling Stevie warm against my heart.

  The door creaked open.

  In the moonlight he was featureless, the outline of a man and nothing more, but I could tell it wasn't Christopher. I felt myself relaxing and I might have called his name if someone hadn't done it for me.

  "James?"

  He turned. "Up here."

  More footsteps, this time running, and another shadow joined him in the doorway. "What are you doing?" That was Christopher. Panicking, I tried to scuttle deeper into my hiding place as James spoke again.

  "The shed door was open. I thought that I'd better.,. hold on, did you hear that?"

  I froze in my awkward position, not daring to draw back the leg that had just kicked the corner of something.

  Christopher listened. "It might be a cat."

  "Where's your torch?"

  The beam clicked on smartly. It found a wardrobe up against the farther wall and steadily, methodically, began its sweep towards me. My mouth dried as I looked from the light to the shadows that held it, knowing if I could see them, they'd see me when the torch swung my way. I couldn't think of anything to do. Dear God, I couldn't think of anything ...

  Already the beam was beginning to broaden and dazzle, the edge of it misting against the cold darkness. I saw the wooden lion's head gleam briefly on a newel-post, and then for an instant the shape of a dragon flashed sharply in silhouette, wings furled behind it and talons outstretched. I flinched before I saw the thing for what it really was—a sheet metal ornament perched on the top of a weather-vane. Feeling the wetness of blood soaking into my sleeve from my now-throbbing shoulder, I realized that this must have been what I'd bumped against, slicing myself on its razor-like edge.

  The light left the dragon's contemptuous sneer and came on, growing brighter. I was turning my head from it, closing my eyes, when it suddenly stopped.

  "There," said Christopher. "That's your intruder."

  The little grey jumping cat, pinned in the torchlight, arched up with a plaintive meow. "Bloody nuisance," James pronounced it. "Come on, then, we're wasting time."

  He switched off the torch and the darkness rushed in once again to fold round me as my forehead slowly sank to rest on Stevie's. I heard them shuffling round the door, and heard the door swing shut.

  And then something rattled. I lifted my head as the padlock shot home with a small, final click, as though someone had just cocked a gun. It rattled again as he checked its strength, locking us in.

  "And remember," said James, fainter now, "I don't care about Elen. It's Lyn that we're after."

  Their footsteps moved off, down the stairs to the East House.

  Blind, I felt the flutter of hysteria rise steeply in my chest, and pushed it back. No time for that. I had to think. From the dark came a scrabble and thunk as the cat, unperturbed, leapt down on to the floor, padding past me on soft, certain feet. A square of moonlight flashed low in the door and I watched the small pale form slip through before the flap slapped down again.

  On cramped legs, I cautiously felt my way forwards, gritting my teeth as I shifted the baby's weight on to my uninjured arm. The cut in my shoulder was deep and still bleeding. I could smell the blood now, feel it sticking warm against my skin, feel it running down my arm to trickle wet between my fingers. I bumped the door and leaned against it, letting it support me as I slid down to the ground again, my knees against the cat flap.

  In my right mind, I would never have attempted it. Even with the enlargement that Owen had made, it still looked a very tight squeeze. But I wasn't in my right mind, I was running still on instinct, and I knew we couldn't stay here trapped and freezing in the shed.

  I pushed the flap out a few inches and listened.

  A dim sliver of light angled through the square hole, touched a small chest of drawers not two feet from me. Struck by a sudden idea, I shifted the baby again and reached with my good hand to yank one drawer free, skidding it over the ground till its edge nudged the door to one side of the cat flap. Wrapping the blanket more tightly round Stevie, I lowered him carefully into the small makeshift cot. Safer for me to go first, if I could, and bring Stevie out afterwards.

  I dropped to my belly and, pressing my cheek to the flap, looked out towards Elen's house. Nothing was moving. It had to be now, I thought Reaching both arms out, I forced myself into the hole. The rough wood scraped painfully under my arms as I thrust myself through, and my shoulder caught fire. Gasping, I managed to slide six more inches ... and stuck.

  Below me, a light went on in Elen's kitchen window. They were searching the house, I thought. Looking for me.

  With one last desperate surge I exhaled all the air in my lungs and kicked out with my legs. Something scraped at my hip and I felt my legs sting as I laddered my tights and tore the softer velvet of my dress, but I'd come through the hole. I was out.

  Scrambling round on my knees, I reached back for Stevie. My hands shook as they closed round him, easing him out. I nearly had him through when at my back the night exploded with a sudden boom, like cannon-fire, and a flash of red set fire to the sky above the Haven. It startled me so badly that I lost my grip and fumbled to regain it. Stevie slipped sideways and bounced against the hole's edge, but he didn't wake. He didn't make a sound.

  Pulling him on to my lap, I looked down at his face in the light of the flare. Surely it couldn't be natural for a baby to sleep so soundly. Whatever drug they'd given Elen, they must have given some to Stevie, too, so that he wouldn't wake and start to cry. His breathing sounded normal still, but that no longer reassured me. I knew how quickly things could take a turning for the worse, without a warning.

  I had to get him somewhere safe, and soon. Gareth, I thought, on a rush of relief. I could trust him, he'd know what to do. I'd take Stevie to Gareth.

  Lifting the baby and holding him tightly, I turned and picked my way across the drive. Without shoes, I would never be able to run fast enough on the gravel. I'd have to get into the field. The fence by the dovecote was easy to climb. As my feet came down soft on the grass of the pasture, the sound of a second boom rolled down the hill and a second flare traced a bright arc through the sky, but I paid no attention.

  What worried me more were the sounds I could hear from the back of the house now, the human sounds—voices and footsteps, confusion.

  I ran.

  I might have been back in the dream, racing over the field with the child in my arms, only this time I knew I had no hope of waking. The danger behind us was real. Behind Gareth's cottage the warm amber light of the Globe Hotel shone like
a beacon to show me the way, spinning a shimmering thread down the length of the long wire fence at the foot of the pasture and guiding me over the obstacle. Then, stumbling over the pebble-rough lane and through shivering grass I ducked round the stone wall into Gareth's back garden.

  Panting, I flung myself hard at the door, pounding on it like a madwoman. Hurry, I silently urged him. Please hurry.

  But nobody came.

  Biting my lip, I half-turned on the doorstep and noticed the window a few feet away, with the light seeping out at its edges behind the thick curtains. Surely that was the room we had sat in, the one where he did all his writing. He must be in there, and unable to hear me because of the wind.

  I banged on the glass. Called his name. No one answered.

  But I did hear a sound, rather faint, from behind me. The roar of a car motor revving to life. Glancing over my shoulder, towards Castle Farm, I saw headlights flash at the top of the drive. They dipped towards the tower and I held my breath. Perhaps they'd go the other way, across the bridge...

  The headlights reached the gate, and turned.

  "Oh, God." They'd see me if I tried to run. I left the window, shifting Stevie higher on my shoulder as i darted through the shadows of the garden to the shelter of the wall. Crouching there among the bins, I wrapped my body round him, closed my eyes and turned my face against the frozen stone to listen as the Merc came crawling down the lane towards us.

  XXXII

  One refuge only remained.

  Thomas Hey wood, The Life of Merlin

  It seemed an age before I heard the rolling crunch of tyres I approaching. Twice the sound slowed almost to a stop and then came on, as though the car itself was hunting me, a predatory creature pausing now and then to test the wind for any scent of fear.

  I didn't dare to breathe. I hugged the stones of Gareth's garden wall and screwed my eyes shut tighter as the rolling tyres drew level with us ... slowed again... moved on.

  At the end of the lane they turned into the village street, and I could hear the motor thrumming past the front of Gareth's cottage heading back towards the bay. I was so busy listening, marking their progress—they'd just passed the church, now—that I didn't notice any of the noises in the garden, and I nearly jumped a mile when the wet nose nudged my hand, inquisitive.

  "Jesus," I whispered. "You scared me to death."

  Chance sat back on his haunches, a ghost in the moonlight, and tilted his head. He looked first at Stevie and me, then the cottage, and back again.

  "Where on earth is he?" I asked the dog. "Where's Gareth?"

  At the sound of his master's name, Chance sneezed with a force that brought him up on all fours, tail wagging helpfully. Turning, he trotted off a short distance and stopped to look round. We'd played this game before; I knew he meant for me to follow. But I hesitated, huddled in among the bins.

  I could no longer hear the Mercedes. They might have turned off somewhere—down through the houses and over the bridge, round the rim of the bay, or the other way, up the hedged road towards Pembroke. But they wouldn't go far. I was running on foot, in the dark, with a baby. They would know that I'd still be close by.

  Whatever choice I made involved some risk. I could stay here hidden, waiting for Gareth to come home, but he might be hours yet and in the meantime I would freeze and Stevie's health might take a turn. Or I could follow Chance, and pray that he would lead me to his master, and that nobody would see us.

  The little dog wagged again, whining, deciding the matter.

  I'd been afraid that he would lead me out along the village street, beneath the lamp and in full view of anyone who might be watching. But he didn't. His legs moving briskly, he guided me out of the garden and into the fields again, taking the longer route up and behind the next house. There were more fences here. Chance squeezed under and waited while I struggled over them, every movement of my injured arm an agony, but then I saw the warm light gleaming in the darkness and I knew where he was leading me. The light came from the paddock, from the window of the little shed where Gareth stabled Sovereign. He was there, I thought, and seeing to the horse.

  The wind stole my sob of relief as I summoned the strength to climb over the last fence and into the paddock. No longer caring if anyone saw me, I gathered up Stevie and ran for the light. A woman's voice called from the gate by the road, but I didn't slow down. All that mattered was getting to Gareth.

  I must have looked a perfect sight, bursting through the shed door with my torn frock and laddered tights and bleeding shoulder, like the lone survivor of a horror film—but there was no one there to see me. Only Sovereign. The black mare glanced warily over the boards of her stall, hooves rustling the straw as she stepped sideways, tossing her head in alarm. Whether it was recognition of my scent or seeing Chance run fearless rings around my ankles that reassured her in the end, I don't know, but her ears came slowly forwards, and she calmed.

  I barely noticed. I was looking round bewildered in the bright lights and the sudden warmth, refusing to believe the shed was empty. ' 'Gareth?''

  There were footsteps behind me, too light to be his.

  Dilys wasn't a woman accustomed to running. Her breath came in gasps. "I shouted," she said, "from the gate. You didn't hear." And then she seemed finally to focus on me, see my true condition. "Oh, my dear. What's happened?" Her gaze fell to the quiet breathing bundle in my arms. "The baby? Is the baby all right?"

  The warmth had made me groggy, slow of thought. ' 'I must find Gareth."

  "My dear, you're bleeding. Let me see." She took charge, Sister Casualty again, turning me into the light with a nurse's firm touch.

  "Gareth..."

  "He'll be out with the lifeboat, I expect. The signal just went up, didn't you hear it?"

  The cannon booms, I thought. The flares. So that's what they had been in aid of—calling all the lifeboat men to duty.

  "This is deep," Dilys said, of the wound in my shoulder. "You'll need to have it stitched. Have you had an injection for tetanus?"

  I couldn't remember. Even the simplest thoughts were becoming a struggle.

  "And you're sure that the baby's all right? Is that blood on his blanket?"

  I tightened my arms round him. "Mine."

  "Your blood? Oh yes, I can see. It's all over your hand, poor dear. Still, he should be home in bed, shouldn't he?" She was still Sister Casualty, brisk-voiced and practical, reaching to take Stevie out of my grasp. And then, for an instant, I saw something flash at the back of her eyes.

  "No." I backed away sharply, and startled the mare. Her quick sidestep rattled the door of her stall and Chance perked up his ears.

  "Don't be silly," said Dilys. "I'm not going to hurt him. Now give him to me."

  She looked perfectly normal now, so normal I might have imagined the thing I had seen, like the slip of a mask, but I kept shrinking backwards, my arms hugging Stevie. I was feeling peculiar. A line of black mist had begun to rise over my vision, and my heart sounded loud in my ears. Vaguely aware that someone else had joined us in the shed, I tried to turn my head towards the door.

  "That's enough." Owen's voice. He came forwards, a half-shadowed shape behind Dilys's shoulder. Above the black mist I could see his hands, outstretched and waiting. "It's all right now, lovely. I'll take him."

  I was sinking in a sea of mist, sinking ... and suddenly where Owen's face had been I saw the wise and weathered features of the old man from St. Govan's. His knowing eyes met mine. He smiled. "It is time," he said. "Give me the child."

  The black mare pawed behind me like the creature from my nightmares and in panic I thrust Stevie towards the old man, into his hands, and then the sea of mist surged higher and my head began to ring and I was falling ... falling ...

  Strong arms caught me, held me, drew me clear of the abyss. Gareth, I thought. He had come. I was safe. I leaned against his body while the world swirled round and steadied.

  But when my eyes came slowly open, he was gone.

 
; I'd never fainted in my life; I had no frame of reference, no idea how much time had passed. I blinked into Owen's face, hovering close to my own. "There lovely, there now, you're all right now, aren't you? Just sit here a moment, that's right, keep your head down." Still squatting beside me, he turned on his wife. "What the hell were you think-ing?"

  Sitting on a bale of straw, she seemed to have grown smaller, though her voice still held defiance. "I was thinking," she informed him, "of the boy."

  "You're mad."

  "She isn't fit to raise a child."

  "And you are, I suppose." His tone was acid. In my dazed confusion, it took me a moment to realize they weren't talking about me. Folding my arms round my knees, I leaned my head to one side, watching Owen as he straightened and stood facing Dilys, holding Stevie close against his chest. "You surely can't have thought I'd go along with this," he said.

  "I'm not a fool."

  He looked at her, frowning. "No," he said, after a moment, "you're not. You didn't mean for me to know at all, did you?"

  She stayed silent, but her eyes supplied the answer.

  "But if you didn't plan to take the baby home, then where ... ?"

  His voice trailed off, his eyebrows lowering. "I should have bloody known. Where is he?"

  "Where is who?"

  "Our son. That priceless piece of work you raised. He'll be in this mess up to his neck, if I know him."

  I saw Dilys bristle, defending her son. "He only wanted to help."

  "I don't doubt it," said Owen. "What price are they paying for babies, these days?''

  "It isn't like that. He knows a couple who've been coming to the clinic, a nice couple—professional people, good people—who can't have a child of their own."

  "So you thought you'd let them have Elen's."

  She refused to be shamed. "I've told you, I was thinking of the boy. What's best for him."