“Yes,” Stammel said. “And so did Count Arcolin.”
“Don’t worry, Mikeli—sir king,” the prince said. “If there is a dragon, Camwyn Dragonmaster will protect us.”
“We’re Girdish, Cam.” The king’s voice sounded as if he were trying not to laugh.
“And the man’s name is Camwyn. Maybe he is Camwyn Dragonmaster.”
“Your name is Camwyn, and you’re not … Cam, of all the great saints, we know the least about Camwyn. Gird we know lived, and he is our patron. Falk we are fairly sure of. But Camwyn—”
“Our father named me Camwyn for a reason,” the prince said. Stammel could easily imagine the impetuous young prince; rumors had said for years that he was wilder than Mikeli had ever been. He heard Mikeli sigh.
“Sergeant, the Count says that you know about the gnomes that came to him as refugees and their claim that this dragon drove them from their land and insisted on changing the boundary with Pargun.”
“Yes, lord king. The gnomes are living underneath the stronghold now. When the dragon came to Count Arcolin, the dragon told the same story the gnomes had.”
“And he told you all about it?” A tone between doubt and disapproval.
“Not all, but much of it, lord king,” Stammel said. “We’re up there to defend the border; captains and sergeants and all needed to know.”
“Are you—” The king cleared his throat. “Are you staying in the Company, Sergeant?”
“Now that I’m blind, you mean? Not as a regular sergeant, no, lord king. But the Count sent me on this mission and, I’ve no doubt, will send me on others. I’ve been in the Company long enough people recognize me as part of it, not someone who might’ve stolen the uniform.”
Several people came in; he could smell more food now. The king said, “Cam, are you still hungry?”
“I’m always hungry,” the prince said from a slight distance. “Especially if those are ham pies.”
“Yes, lord prince,” a woman’s voice answered. “And custard tarts with farron.” Stammel’s mouth watered. Farron, the most expensive of spices, very rare in the north and uncommon in Aarenis. He’d tasted it only once in his life and remembered it still.
“Guests first, Cam,” the king said as the servants laid out the food, with gentle thunks and clinks on the table. Then they left, and a moment later the man who had brought Stammel said, “Sir Camwyn, sir king, as you requested.”
Stammel saw the fire-filled man-shape move to his side. The man bowed slightly, and the fire swirled within. “Sir king,” the man said.
“You are Sir Camwyn, known to Count Arcolin. I am Mikeli, the king; this is my brother, Prince Camwyn. Will you sit and take refreshment?”
“I will sit, but I am not, at this moment, hungry,” the dragon said. “Grant me leave to let others eat in my stead.”
“As you will. Sergeant?”
“Thank you, lord king.”
He knew the foods put on his plate only by the sound they made and the smells. Ham pie … redroots … a custard tart with the heady aroma of farron. He fumbled a little at the table and found eating utensils, including a dagger-sharp knife. In the mess hall, a ham pie—a rare treat—would be picked up and eaten in hand, but he heard the clink and scrape of knife and fork from the king and prince and hesitated.
“I eat ham pie out of hand,” the prince said. “Except at formal dinners, when a third of it’s lost to the plate.” The sound of the crust crunching; the prince chewing, swallowing. “Though there’s no way to eat redroots in honey sauce with your fingers without getting sticky.”
Stammel picked up the ham pie and bit into it. Ham, mushrooms, onions, other tastes he didn’t recognize. A tangy sauce. With his last bite, he heard the soft sound of another being slid onto his plate.
“As I am not eating,” said the dragon, “there is no need to let food go to waste.”
Stammel had never imagined himself eating in the palace, let alone in a private room with the king and prince. And of course a dragon. He had not felt this kind of excitement for a long time. He loved the Company; he had enjoyed everything about his life there. But it had, he now realized, become so familiar that the joy was all in the familiar. He had forgotten the joy of the new. He had forgotten the joy of not knowing what was coming next.
“Count Arcolin said there was a dragon,” the prince said.
“Cam!”
“Sorry, Mik—sir king.”
“I would have waited until you had eaten, Sir Camwyn,” the king said. Stammel picked up the second ham pie. “But since you are not eating, and that was the essence of Count Arcolin’s message, I’m curious … I had thought dragons were gone from this world long ago. Then came a rumor out of Lyonya and then this—”
“Dragons exist, sir king,” the dragon said. The flames Stammel saw shivered inside, as if chuckling. Perhaps they were.
“And you have seen one yourself?”
“Yes,” the dragon said.
“I wish I could,” said the prince. “A great flying monster breathing flame … You must know, with your name, about Camwyn Dragon master taming the dragons forever …”
The flames fell and leapt high; to Stammel’s nostrils came the hot-iron smell for a moment, and then it vanished.
“That is not … quite … how it happened,” said the dragon.
“I thought so,” said the prince.
“Cam—” The king’s voice held warning.
“But he does know,” the prince said. “I’m sure of it! Please, sir, tell us—you are Camwyn Dragonmaster yourself, aren’t you? Come to capture or kill that dragon? You’ve ridden on a dragon’s back, you’ve put a bit in its mouth—”
“No.” The word came out with the tongue—to Stammel’s eyes a long curling flame; he wondered what it looked like to the others—and something breakable shattered on the floor.
“You—!” That was the king; Stammel heard the sssh of a drawn sword.
“My pardon, sir king. I would not have caused you this distress. But I am, in fact, a dragon, taking a man’s shape to move among men, and only because of great need. If you lay steel to me or cause it to be laid, I must defend myself, and that will bring more damage than one broken goblet.”
“You’re … a dragon?” The prince, his voice more full of awe than fear.
“I am. And named myself Camwyn as a jest, for a dragon should be master of himself ere he venture into lands humans know, lest he cause such harm as cannot be mended.”
From the king came a sort of grunt, then the sound of the sword sliding back, the quillons snicking against the scabbard. “So … you are a dragon who can take a man’s shape, and you bring word that I must yield territory to you—”
“Only because of the danger,” the dragon said. Stammel noticed, and was sure the king noticed, the lack of honorific. In the moment’s tense silence, Stammel found and bit into the custard tart. King, dragon, and now sweet fragrant farron-flavored custard …
I am not best pleased with Count Arcolin,” the king said after a long pause. “Telling me he was sending proof of the dragon’s existence is not the same as telling me he was sending a dragon itself.”
“He did not send me, king,” the dragon said. “A dragon does no man’s bidding. I knew I must meet you, lest more harm come, and thought you would not willingly meet a dragon. Few men would.”
“You … influenced him?” the king said.
“A dragon does commonly influence humans who encounter him,” the dragon said. “But yes, in addition to that, I was in his office as he wrote you, and I helped choose his words. Tell me, O king, are you wise?”
“Wise? That is something no man should claim for himself,” the king said.
“Prudence is not all of wisdom,” the dragon said. “I am not a courtier, king, or fond of false modesty. Are you wise?”
“I spoke not lightly,” the king said. “So I was taught, that men should not claim wisdom for themselves but, as judgment is the duty of a king, see
k to judge rightly as they can.”
“And what are the elements of right judgment?”
“To judge rightly, one must know what came before, as much of the issue as men can know of facts and character and all circumstances, and then think ahead to the consequences. Elves, we were taught, by living long see long behind and before alike, but we humans cannot remember all or see so far ahead. Still, we must try. It is easier to judge rightly material things—craftsmanship, artistry, the quality of a fruit or an animal—than issues of conflict or love.”
“And you—have you made difficult judgments yet, in your time of kingship?”
“Yes,” the king said. “Before my reign began, when I was yet a prince, a peer of the realm tried to assassinate me, and later attacked my brother here, and me again on the day of my coronation. And since—it has not been an easy year.”
“Difficult situations, and as you are still alive and king, you must have made sound judgments. Tell me what you consider the most difficult.”
“When I attainted the Verrakai family, all but one, for their conspiracy to kill me and my brother … and when I let that one live, after she committed a crime punishable by death.”
Stammel knew who that had been: Captain Dorrin. “Because she saved you,” he said, surprising himself.
“Yes,” the king said. “And because she did not defend herself. She asked no mercy; she spoke of the law with respect; she would have accepted death as a just punishment. For all that I pardoned her.”
Stammel heard in the king’s voice some doubt that this had been a wise decision and wondered what had changed his mind. He took another bite of the custard tart to keep himself from speaking in Dorrin’s defense. The dragon spoke instead.
“And yet you doubt that was a wise decision. Why?”
“I cannot tell you,” the king said. “I have reasons … not to believe she is harboring treason, but to think she is a danger nonetheless.”
“But so far you have not taken action against her?”
“It would not be fair,” the king said. “When she had done us such service.”
“So you are withholding judgment until you know more?”
“Yes.”
“Then I account you wise in part, at least. And you, young prince?”
“Me? I am not wise, I am told often. I am hasty and rash and excitable.” The prince’s voice sounded resentful.
“Hasty, rash, and excitable is, indeed, not wise. But I was not asking for wisdom from a boy, prince, but what you thought of this person your brother pardoned.”
“Duke Verrakai? She’s wonderful! She was one of Phelan’s captains, and now she’s a duke, and she’s fought in real wars, and—”
“Cam!”
“Well, I like her, Mikeli! And so does Duke Marrakai. I know what you think about Beclan, but Gwenno Marrakai said Beclan was already being less full of himself when it happened—”
“Cam! Where do you hear such things?”
“Aris. Gwenno writes him letters, you know, things she wouldn’t say to Juris or her father …” The prince’s voice trailed away. Stammel swallowed a grin along with that bite of tart. Some of Kieri’s squires had been like the prince, rattlemouths who realized only afterward what they should not have said. “Gwenno likes Duke Verrakai,” the prince went on more quietly. “But is it about the—?”
“Cam! No more.”
“That you have secrets is certain,” the dragon said. Stammel could sense amusement. “But your very concern for secrecy reveals wherein your secrets lie; they flare in your mind like torches in the dark. Your brother speaks of someone … this Duke Verrakai? Do you think this person seeks a crown?”
The king’s sigh was that of defeat. “No. She brought me a crown that her family had concealed. But I think that the crown seeks her. And if it is her fate to be crowned, I do not want it to be here, to bring division and war to my kingdom, to my people.”
“You would seek peace?”
“If it is possible, but it may not be. Pargun invaded Lyonya before Midwinter—that had not happened in living memory. I hear of trouble in Aarenis, over the mountains; I have been warned of a war-leader there who wants to rule all. If invasion comes, then I must meet it. But if I can prevent division here, civil war here, then that is what I want.”
“Indeed, you have more wisdom than I hoped. And your brother prince, I think, may have heart-wisdom, which the young often do before they develop adult judgment.”
“What do you want of me?” the king asked.
The dragon sighed. Stammel fished around on his plate with the fork and found something; he stabbed it. A redroot in sticky sweet sauce. “You are in haste, I perceive. Well, then, I came to apologize that I must take some of your land for the safety of all, but mostly your realm. It is like to be perilous for the rest of your life and perhaps more, but I swear to return it to your heirs once that is possible.”
“You are a dragon … you have powers I cannot imagine … and you apologize?”
“Discourtesy is not wisdom. Come, king, I would have agreement with you.”
“Agreement that you can take what you have already taken? That I will not mount an army to take it back? Fine—I agree.”
“More than that. For your courtesy and wisdom, for your yielding of this land for a time, I will grant you a boon each hundred years—”
“Hundred years!” said the prince. “We’ll be dead in a hundred years!”
“But someone will be king. Or queen. I do not know how long the land must be forbidden you. I have seen mountains rise and fall, the sea withdraw and return; I will not forget what I owe.”
“Very well,” the king said. “Then I agree that I relinquish claim on that land as long as you say it must be. And my heirs shall collect what boon you grant. Shall I call scribes to write the agreement?”
“No,” the dragon said. “Dragons seal agreements differently. We must touch, life to life, essence to essence. Let us go down to your palace courtyard.”
The king said nothing more but rose and went with the dragon, the prince offering Stammel an arm as he followed. Once more there was silence.
In the palace courtyard, nothing stirred. “I must change,” said the dragon. “Stand there.” Stammel saw again the strange expansion of the flames as the man-shape vanished and the shape he thought of as dragon curled around them. “For our bargain to be sealed,” the dragon said, “you must touch your tongue to mine, king.” A line of red stretched out; Stammel could feel the heat along his right side; the king stood to his left.
“With my tongue,” the king said, as if bemused. He did not sound at all frightened. Stammel heard the rustle of the king’s clothes as he moved two steps forward and knelt, heard the prince’s indrawn breath beside him. He could imagine how the waves of heat felt on the king’s face, remember his own terror. The dragon would speak in the king’s mind, he knew. Then the line of fire retracted; the king, he could hear, stood.
“Let me!” the prince said. “Please!”
“Camwyn!” the king said.
“You would go where Camwyn Dragonmaster went?” the dragon asked.
“I—yes, if I could. I know you said the stories aren’t right, but—but he did fly with dragons, didn’t he?”
In Stammel’s mind, the dragon’s fire-shape brightened almost to white. “In a way, but not in the way you think. What would you have, prince? Think well before you speak.”
For longer than Stammel expected from such a boy, the prince was silent; the king also said nothing. Then the prince said, “My brother needs me, or I would ask to go with you. I have wished dragons still lived since first I heard of them and saw pictures … I was named for the Camwyn in the stories and dreamed of being like him, a hero who drove away peril and rode a dragon. Now I see that you are not that kind of dragon—if that kind of dragon ever existed—and so I will not again dream of killing dragons or taming dragons, but I still—I still want to be where dragons are. To fly, if it is possibl
e. Only Mikeli is my brother and my liege, and I am his heir. I cannot go. Only—if it is possible—could I ride on your back and maybe you could fly just a little way? As high as the palace wall?”
“Dragons are not birds, prince, and we do not fly as birds fly, but by powers given us at the world’s beginning. Feel my scales.”
Stammel heard the prince step forward.
“They’re—slippery—but not wet or greasy—it’s like glass over them—”
“What you touch is not really my scales but the space in which I fly, prince. If you would fly with me, it must be in my mouth.”
“You mean you will—? You’ll let me?”
“If you touch your tongue to mine, as your king did.”
“Cam!” the king said. “Don’t—”
“Please, Mikeli! Don’t forbid me! It didn’t burn you, did it? And Sergeant, isn’t this how you flew with him?”
“It is, lord prince,” Stammel said.
“Then please, Mikeli!”
“I need him back,” the king said to the dragon. “And he is my brother, whom I love.” And to Cam, “If the dragon agrees, you have my leave.”
“I have no time for a long flight,” the dragon said.
Stammel heard the boy’s clothes rustle as he knelt. “It didn’t burn!” the prince said a moment later. “Now how do I—”
“Sergeant,” the dragon said. “Come onto my tongue. When I have returned the prince, we must away at once.”
“I’ll help,” the prince said, grabbing Stammel’s arm. Unnecessary; Stammel could see the fiery shape of the tongue for himself, but he let the boy lead him; he stepped first onto the firm surface, and they were drawn inside. He heard the king gasp.
“Put your hand on his arm,” the dragon said in Stammel’s mind. “He is over-young and excited.” Stammel gripped the prince as if he himself were frightened. Sure enough, after a moment the prince tried to take a step forward, but Stammel held him back. Cool air blew in; Stammel guessed the dragon had kept its mouth open to let the prince see out. He did not feel them rise, but he felt the prince’s excitement.
“It’s beautiful!” the prince said. “I never imagined it would look like this—I can see almost to the—oh.” That last in disappointment; they must be descending again. With a little bump, they were on the ground; Stammel let go of the prince and patted him firmly on the back. “Thank you, sir dragon,” the prince said. “And you, Sergeant.” He moved away; Stammel had just time to hear him say to the king, “Mikeli, it was wonderful! I could see everything!” and then he was sliding once more into the soft nest where he’d been before.
Echoes of Betrayal Page 30
