Highland Dragon Master

by Isabel Cooper

  “May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace,” said Marcus. He stepped back, dropping his once-folded hands to his sides.

  They all lingered for a while, in the same awkward silence that attended funerals everywhere. The Eternal had touched that place and the people gathered there, if only for a time; taking up worldly duties felt alien, as a familiar house did on returning after long travel. One walked around then, looking at furnishings, until the sound of feet on that particular floor became familiar once again. With burials, there was that time of shifting, of clearing throats and looking from one to another.

  “Franz has found a few rocks we could move for one side of a shelter.” Samuel was the one to finally speak. “And the cliffs could be the other wall. The lot of us could likely shift them.”

  “Do what you can while we’re getting the supplies,” Toinette said, and the thickness in her voice vanished gradually as she spoke. “If there’s need, we can—” She waved a hand in the air.

  “Yes, Captain,” said Samuel.

  “Good work, all of you.”

  That got smiles. A few of them were guilty, and others turned that way quickly. Erik knew that part of things too.

  He’d been present at a great many funerals. Eventually, unless they shut themselves away from the world entirely and early, all the dragon-blooded were.

  * * *

  “Two holes in the hull,” Toinette said. She spoke aloud, more for her own benefit than for Erik’s, though he stood on the deck beside her and listened. “Too small and too high for risk just now, but nothing I’d want to go to sea with. Broken railing in places. And the mast, of course.”

  “Can you repair it?”

  “I’m no shipbuilder, but—yes. We can. It’ll be clumsy work, but it’ll likely hold together until we reach a civilized port.” She glanced over at Erik, and tried her best to phrase what came next gently. “You know we can’t go onward.”

  He was silent. Toinette braced herself to make her case: sharp words, hard facts, the lives of her crew. She’d marshaled almost all of her forces by the time Erik spoke, only to have them scattered by what he said. “We may not have to. The island’s in the right position, as near as I can tell.”

  “You think the Templars landed here?”

  “If they landed anywhere. If they existed at all. I’ll know more when I can look around the island, but—aye, if this isn’t it, then we’ll not find it this trip. Even Artair would say we’ve done more than enough in service of this mission.”

  “That does indeed absolve us of everything.” Toinette turned to the hatch. “The supplies won’t be growing legs any time soon.”

  They both needed to go below this time: corpses were easier to carry than barrels. Toinette went first down the ladder after an awkward pause when she realized that Erik was letting her go ahead on account of her skirts. His voice drifted down to her along with his feet. “I would think that you’d look on him more kindly, considering.”

  Toinette stopped, hands on a barrel of dried peas. “Thank you,” she said. “I’d almost forgotten I was a poor relation—other than the relation part.”

  The hold was dim, but dragon-blooded saw well enough in the dark that she knew Erik had the good grace to flush. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean that as it came out.”

  “As it happens,” Toinette went on, pushing the barrel over to the bottom of the ladder, “I’m quite grateful for what he did. I’d have come without the debt, but it did weigh in my thinking. I believe he’s a good man. Good men still act in their own interests first. You were always surprised by that. Take hold of the top and pull. I’ll push from below.”

  Between the two of them, the barrel wasn’t heavy, only awkward. Neither of them spoke until they’d gotten it onto the deck; it took too much concentration to keep the thing steady. An injury wouldn’t kill one of them, nor render them unfit for work as long as it would a human, but having one’s foot broken was far from a holiday.

  They went silently down into the hold again. Toinette pushed a splintered crate to the side and stepped around its contents—formerly dried bread and now neither dry nor bread in any real sense. She picked her way around the floor and pushed another crate out, this one holding salt beef.

  Erik was standing at the bottom of the ladder. “I wasn’t always surprised,” he said. “I knew there was evil in the world.”

  “Yes, but…you always seemed to expect more from people. You called Artair heartless once yourself.”

  “Did I?” Slowly his face changed from half-friendly argument into something more fraught, his eyes darkening and a slow smile coming to his mouth. “Ah. Aye, I did, once.”

  That recollection might have been a mistake, Toinette thought. She wasn’t thinking of their argument any longer. She was remembering herself at sixteen, and the lanky golden-haired boy who’d taken umbrage to sending her away. She was remembering the feel of his mouth against hers, urgent and seeking. Toinette had hoped the kiss would be better than those she’d known when she’d barely come to womanhood, the attentions of spotty youths and old drunks who’d taken a bastard girl for fair game.

  She hadn’t realized how much better it could be until she’d kissed Erik. And he’d been an untried youth then, and her own practice scarce and largely unwilling.

  “You were very much the young knight, as I remember,” she said, her voice low and sensual.

  “I tried. Though there are those who’d say I failed that time.”

  “Best pay no attention to small minds. Besides, I gave you little choice in the matter. Assaulted your purity, mayhap.” Toinette met his eyes, which shone in the darkness of the hold, and let her mouth curve up in a teasing smile.

  “Hardly an assault,” he said huskily.

  “So speaks the warrior. Of course, I know little of such things.” She stepped toward him, letting her hips sway. “No surprise I didn’t do it right. If I were to have a demonstration of the proper way, now—”

  Then he grabbed her—had grabbed her, really, for she didn’t realize he was going to move until she was crushed against his broad chest, with one of his hands at the small of her back and the other tilting her face up toward his. Erik took her mouth with bruising force, not asking for a response but drawing one as the moon draws the tides.

  Desire made Toinette’s head swim. Opening to Erik, urging him on with lips and tongue, she clung to his shoulders just to stay upright, until he shoved her back against the wall of the hold. Then her hands were free to roam. She could dig into his back with her nails, or cup his arse, or snake one hand around to the thick bulge in his hose, tracing fingers down the side to make Erik’s breath hitch.

  He was none so bad at leaving her breathless either: rough, yes, but in a way she welcomed. The hard pressure of his hands at her breasts was just what Toinette needed then, like the weight of his body pinning her to the wall and the scrape of his unshaven jawline against the tender hollow of her neck. When he pinched her nipples through her gown, she cried out into the silence of the hold.

  “God’s wounds, you undo me,” he muttered against her neck, the words short bursts of heat. His hands left her breasts, slapped hers away from his cock, and Toinette could feel him struggling with the laces of his hose.

  As she reached for her skirts, the boat swayed. A creak from above heralded a shower of sawdust, as well as a larger chunk of wood that hit Erik between the eyes.

  “Mannaggia!” Toinette swore in the Italian of her birthplace. Erik kept his silence, but he pulled back, rubbing at his forehead.

  However the wood might have wounded him, it had punctured their embrace like a dagger in a wineskin, and lust drained rapidly. “We can’t,” Erik said, panting. “We’ll no’ be safe staying here so long.”

  Toinette thought about asking him how long he thought it would take, but r
estrained herself. His eyes were still glazed, and warmth lingered between her legs. Teasing was asking for trouble. “There’s that. And if the ceiling does fall on us, best we look respectable when the men come to our rescue.”

  “Aye.” He turned away to take hold of the crate. Toinette made no immediate move to follow him, though she did let her eyes linger on his tented hose. Her nipples ached for his touch, and her sex felt nigh as damp as the waves that lapped against the hull.

  When she did move, she grabbed the other end of the crate and was glad of the strain on her muscles. Hard work was the cure for lust. So she’d always heard, and so she prayed would be the case.

  Eleven

  Whatever the merits of hard work, there was more than enough to go around.

  They dragged the barrels and crates of supplies up the shore and stacked them against the cliffs. The night guards had specific instructions to keep an eye on them against the predations of either animals or gluttons. They’d about a fortnight’s worth left of beef, bread, and turnips. Dried peas and cheese had taken more of a blow. Toinette estimated a few days there, carefully rationed. Yet the men had already caught a fish or two, and John thought he’d seen mussels off the shore. Rations were not their only option.

  As usual, water was going to be the problem.

  Their supplies, mixed with wine, would last roughly a month—but it would take a month to get back, perhaps longer. To aid in conservation, the ruined sailcloth that hadn’t become shrouds, as well as the fabric of the dead men’s sleeping pallets, became rain collectors: pierced and tied to sticks, they formed small basins around the camp.

  After clearing out the Hawk, helping place wood and stones, wrestling with stakes and ropes, and digging out a pit for the fire, all on short rations, Toinette was at least able to push her awareness of Erik to the back of her mind. She slept by the fire at night with the dreamlessness of exhaustion and later a sense of satisfaction with work that progressed well.

  Rain would have found them in good shape after the first day. Driftwood and rocks had let them form a cozy sort of artificial cave against the cliffs, with enough space and air in it for a fire pit. Toinette and Erik had gotten the hide sacks off the Hawk, so there was bedding, although the dry sand was pleasant enough for most.

  Rain would have been fine—if it happened. Toinette knew from long experience not to expect it; counting on the weather was only slightly more foolish than counting on men.

  The trees on the island were tall and thick above the cliffs. She very much doubted that they depended entirely on rain.

  “I’ll wager there’s a spring up there,” she said to Marcus on the morning of the third day, “and I say we should go and find it, or at any rate the stream it births. We’ll need to get wood for the repairs, and half a damned tree for a new mast, and I’d not mind fresh meat for dinner. Squirrel or rabbit would do.”

  “Well,” said Marcus, “at any rate it’s not likely you’ll be dinner. Take a few of the men. I didn’t see you sprouting extra eyes in your other shape, and you might need hands.”

  Since the first few revelations, he seemed to have taken Toinette’s dragon form as he did any other piece of news: factoring it into calculations of risk and reward, mentioning it as he might have done a wounded shoulder or a good following wind. Toinette had no idea what his actual feelings might be. She would have felt like a gawky stripling asking, and so she was simply glad for the practicality.

  “Best leave m’lord here with us,” he added. “Should aught go amiss, you’ll want reserves, or we protection.”

  It was a wise suggestion. Nothing about Marcus’s expression, nor his tone, suggested any more than that. Still Toinette wondered. The two of them had been friends for many years.

  The only real response either way was not to ask, to believe that he’d had nothing behind his words but what lay on the surface. Even with friends, Toinette had learned, it didn’t do to look too deeply.

  “Right,” she said. “We’ll sort the men accordingly too.” If she could pretend that Erik was another of them, or just one more asset to be used where he’d do the most good, it would relieve her mind immensely—not to mention taking the strain off other parts.

  * * *

  Toinette took Raoul, Sence, and John up the cliff with her. Going with the new men was less strained than it might have been. She had far less of their previous behavior to look back on, and so far fewer changes, or possible changes, to raise questions in her mind.

  They trooped up the steep path from the beach, walking two by two. None of them spoke. All kept their eyes open and their hands on their swords. Just before the outing, Toinette had taken her belt dagger and slashed the skirt of her blue gown up to her knees. If any of the men took it amiss, they hadn’t let her know by word or act—and most of the old hands had seen women in far less regardless. Her lower legs felt terribly exposed, but she’d be damned if she’d spend the whole journey tripping and getting caught on brambles out of modesty that was frankly laughable on her at any rate.

  She’d also taken Gervase’s sword before they’d buried him. Again, it had been only practical—but it felt worse than the short skirt did.

  The trail was white and rocky at the start. As they climbed farther up, they began having to push their way past brambles and duck under low-hanging branches. The plants pressed in on either side. They were a darker green than those Toinette had seen in Italy and elsewhere, more like those that had lined the Scottish hillside. She even made out the pale-pink flowers of herb Robert springing from the mass of green, along with darker pink blossoms she’d never seen before.

  Shortly after they reached the top of the cliff, Raoul grunted in recognition and held up his hand. The party paused for him to bend and pull up a broad-leafed plant, wincing as he did so, and sniff at it. “Nettles, Captain,” he said. “We can eat them, if we boil them first—or even if we don’t, if we’re desperate enough.”

  “I’ll feel a bit like a goat,” said John.

  “You should always,” Sence told him, half in jest.

  “If it wasn’t for sailing home,” Toinette put in, “I’d trade any of the lot of you for a good nanny in milk right now. But I’m glad to know of the nettles, Raoul. We’ll come back and get more later, when we’ve gloves and bags. Meantime, keep an eye out for anything else we can eat, all of you.”

  “How much do you think we’ll need?” John asked. “That is, how long d’ye think we’ll be here?”

  “No longer than we can help it, but I’ve no notion how long that’ll be.” She saw their faces as she spoke and half wished she could have brought herself to lie to them. “And we’ll have a journey ahead of us when we do go. Best have the stores as full as we can, no?”

  With those more or less encouraging words, the best Toinette could do, they went on. An occasional rustling in the undergrowth suggested small animals or birds, but none broke from cover. Toinette tried not to think of roast partridge.

  “We can get the bows from the ship and come back,” Sence said after the second time.

  “Or set traps,” said Raoul.

  “Both, likely,” said Toinette, “and if there are birds, we can find their nests.”

  John chuckled. “I did that plenty as a boy. Was always running off from chores for it too, and getting my hide tanned as often as not. And now look at me.”

  “Wouldn’t your tutor be surprised?” Raoul said.

  “Old Father Henry? Oh, he always knew I’d come to no good.”

  “We haven’t yet,” said Sence.

  “Indeed,” said Toinette. “Think of the stories we can tell when we return.” She stopped and looked around, searching for the glint of light on water. Nothing met her eye, but she was hopeful. “The place couldn’t get this green on rain alone,” she said, half to herself. “We can dig a well, if we truly must.”

  “Can you dowse?” Sence
asked.

  Toinette shook her head. If the magic for finding water did exist, it was a peasant’s art, like healing stock or taking off warts. Artair’s instruction to his kin, even his ward, had concerned loftier matters—or martial ones. It seemed rather a pity now.

  “We’ll trust to Providence,” she said. “If we must.”

  * * *

  “If you can fly,” asked Samuel, sharpening a slim driftwood stake, “why did you bother with a ship in the first place?”

  “Even birds need to land.” Erik leaned back on his elbows and looked out to sea. The day was cloudless and the horizon a misty band of pale blue above the darker waves. He couldn’t see a trace of land anywhere. “We’re not albatrosses, not even close. It takes strength to get us aloft and keep us there. More than most birds, I’d reckon, though I doubt any man’s made a study of it.”

  “Ah.” The other man’s brown eyes lit with curiosity. Here, Erik thought, was one who might have been a scholar had his birth allowed as much. “What’s the furthest you can fly?”

  “That’d depend on the winds,” Erik said.

  After the first bustle of activity, the remaining camp had settled into near idleness in Toinette’s absence. Marcus and Franz fished, though Erik suspected that they might be drowsing in the process. He and Samuel were keeping watch, whittling spears for fishing and cooking, and talking. The men spoke to him more easily now. For all the revelation of his nature, the wreck had stripped away a few of the boundaries rank and payment implied.

  Turning the stake in his own hand and scraping the wood with the knife, he thought it over. “I spent a whole day aloft once. I was young, and one of my cousins had dared me to do it. Could barely move for the next week.” He chuckled with the memory. “My uncle gave me no sympathy at all. The chambermaids, on the other hand…”

  He and Samuel laughed together. “I tried to ride my father’s best stallion once,” said the other man, teeth flashing white in his dark face, “by way of impressing the goldsmith’s daughter. I was lucky to get away with only bruises. Dad said, if Leviathan had left me able to sit down that night, he wouldn’t have—which was more than a bit embarrassing at sixteen.”