Of Gods, Trees, and a Sapling: Dragonlinked Chronicles Volume 4

by Adolfo Garza Jr.

  “You did?” Aeron looked at them, but they didn’t have anything in their hands.

  They stepped inside and two small, wooden barrels followed, floating.

  “Golden!” Aeron pointed. “Set them on the counter. The cups are there, so it’ll be easy for people to get drinks.”

  Sharrah and Cheddar arrived next.

  “We brought extra ice for the cider,” Sharrah said. She and Cheddar carried a large bucket between them.

  “Excellent,” Aeron said. “Set it in front of the sink.”

  “And I also brought this,” Cheddar said, lifting a full skin with a wink, “as promised.”

  “Outstanding,” Renny said. “Can I have a sip?” He reached for the skin.

  “Uh, uh!” Cheddar lifted it out of reach. “This is for the toast, later.”

  “Aw, but I helped get the place ready.”

  Aeron chuckled.

  Cheddar handed the skin to him. “Aeron, could you put this somewhere safe until the appropriate time?”

  “Sure. Renny, why don’t you get yourself a glass of iced cider, instead?”

  Renny’s shoulders slumped. “Fine.”

  Liara and Polandra arrived next.

  When Aeron led the two girls out onto the balcony, Renata called out, “Polandra!” then hurried over and gave her a hug.

  Laughing, Polandra said, “Peace, Renata. You’re going to squeeze the life out of me.”

  “You hardly ever come back to the Guildhall except for lessons anymore.”

  “Oh, I’ve complained about that already,” Liara said. “Aside from enchanting shifts, I don’t have any excuses to go over there anymore.”

  “You have definitely complained.” Polandra smiled at her and turned to Renata. “As I’m sure you know, keeping things running smoothly in an organization as big as the desert branch isn’t exactly simple, so I haven’t had much time to get away. It has gotten a lot easier, however, with Fala no longer an issue.”

  Aeron wondered at the crease between her brows. If things were going smoothly, why did she seem a little worried?

  “Have you had a chance to work on a stunt for the show?”

  Polandra looked at Jessip. “Not really.”

  He shook his head. “There’s only a couple of weeks left.”

  “I know. I’ll make the time to practice with the group. I can at least be in the show for those maneuvers.”

  Fillion walked onto the balcony with Gregor. He must have heard part of the conversation, because he said, “You’ll need to practice the ring of doom stunt, too, don’t forget.”

  Sharrah turned to him and laughed. “Ring of doom?”

  “Sure,” Fillion said. “The stunt where we fly through the big wooden ring with fire, you know?”

  “I’m thinking you should do it just like at that one practice,” Gregor said. “Once without fire, which looks golden enough, but then we light the fire, which should get the audience worked up, and then you all fly through again.”

  Cheddar chuckled. “You really like that stunt, don’t you?”

  “Once I was sure it was safe, yeah. I was less than twenty feet away from the test ring when they first tried it, and it was scary-fun to watch.”

  Aeron chuckled. If he remembered right, the first time Fillion used fire on the ring, Gregor had seemed a bit more angry and worried than excited.

  Willem walked over, handed them drinks, and said, “Yes, well, we just need to be sure we’ve got the goggles lowered for that, and have our dragons close both their eyelids when they fly through.”

  “Exactly,” Fillion said, “just like we did it there.”

  There was another knock at the door.

  Aeron turned to Willem. “I’ll get it,” he said and headed in.

  Chanté’s group had grown. Korrie and Terry stood behind Quillan and Elizabeth.

  The boy looked nervous. “I–I hope it’s alright that Korrie and I came.”

  Aeron smiled. “Of course. Come in, come in. I’ll be right back, but”—he pointed—“there’s cider over there and ice. Glasses are on the shelves above. Please help yourselves. Elizabeth, if you could hang on one second, I’ve got something for you.”

  She raised her brows at him. “Okay.”

  He grabbed a mug and hurried into the bedroom.

  Making sure Renny was nowhere to be seen, he retrieved the skin, unstoppered it, and poured out half a cup of wine. He re-corked it and hid it away.

  “Here you go.” He handed Elizabeth the mug and leaned in for a whisper. “A little something for your leg pain.”

  She let out a quiet laugh. “Thank you.”

  He retrieved his own cup. “Let me just replenish this and we can join the others.” He ladled it full and led them out to the balcony.

  Elizabeth walked along using the crutch, followed by Quillan and Chanté.

  Fillion turned to them and his brows rose. “Good grief, ” he said. “What happened to your leg?”

  “A little shop accident.” Looking embarrassed, Quillan rubbed the back of his neck.

  “Unfortunately,” Elizabeth said, “my direct involvement with the investigation will be postponed a few weeks, at the very least.”

  “That’s too bad,” Fillion said. “Though, it’s not as if we were making much headway.”

  “No luck with the recruiter?”

  “None at all. She directed us to another empty building owned by a bankrupt shell company.”

  “Of course.” Elizabeth shook her head. “These people are frustratingly good at covering their tracks. Well, seeing as I can’t be with you over there, you’re welcome to all the notes I’ve made so far. Maybe they’ll help.”

  Fillion shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”

  Aeron drew his brows together. He’d not offered to assist before, thinking they had enough people working on it, but— “Would more people assisting help at all?”

  “Honestly? Not really.” Fillion tapped a finger on the side of the glass. “It’s not a matter of more feet on the ground or wings in the air. We’re finding clues. We just can’t seem to get a break on where those clues lead.” He chuckled. “Besides, you guys here have your hands full deciding what to do about the Departed, right?”

  Aeron chuckled. “That’s true. I guess the Guildmaster spoke to you about it?”

  “She did. And I think Polandra’s idea is prefect.”

  “Yeah.” Aeron glanced at the former manis. She and Liara were chatting with Renata and Jessip. Their conversation looked to be energetic. Good.

  He looked back and saw that Elizabeth was gripping the mug with her free hand while trying to stay on her feet using the crutch in the other.

  “Elizabeth, why don’t you have a seat, there?” Aeron pointed to a chair next to the table.

  “Oh gods, sorry.” Quillan pulled out the chair. “Of course you should sit.”

  “Thank you.” Elizabeth handed her mug to Quillan, then hobbled to the chair and sat. After he passed it back to her, she lifted the mug to him in a kind of salute. She then took a sip and started a conversation with him about wines in Stronghold.

  Satisfied that they were occupied, Aeron turned to Terry. The boy had so far seemed to be enjoying life in the guild. “So, how goes dragonlinked training for you, Terry? Better than life on the farm?”

  “It’s completely golden!” The boy’s face was practically split in two with his smile. “When I first got here, I thought that I would just be learning about dragons. Their health and biology, how to ride them, care for them, just like I did with horses and such. But I’ve gotten to learn so many more interesting things! Investigation Craft, Healing Craft, Leather Craft, Hand-to-hand fighting, and on, and on.”

  Aeron chuckled. Having been in training—hells, having helped develop some of the training—he sometimes lost sight of just how amazing all the things he was a part of actually were.

  “I, personally, could do without the storm drain cleaning,” Korrie said and frowned. “Especially right aft
er a rain. So much mud.”

  “Ha!” Terry scoffed. “Try mucking out horse stalls sometime. We really have it much better, I can assure you.”

  “Eww.” Korrie scrunched her nose. “That’s a very good point.”

  “Try replacing the floors of horse stalls,” Jessip said from the handrail. “A year’s worth of piss and droppings oozing into the clay soil? Once you’re done with a stall or two, you end up smelling ghost piss for days.”

  “Jessip.” Renata frowned at him.

  He laughed. “It’s true!”

  Willem chuckled. “I’ll pass. Sweeping a dragon den is much less, ah, odorific.”

  Aeron had never replaced the floor of a stall, though he had mucked a few. Willem was right. Cleaning a dragon den, which involved just sweeping, was much less smelly.

  With a glance around the people on the balcony, Aeron’s gaze settled on Quillan. The machinist had a half-smile on his face. “How about you, Quillan? How are you liking it in the guild?”

  Quillan glanced at Chanté and his smile grew larger. Looking back at Aeron, he said, “I really do like it here. To be honest, I had no idea what to expect. Master Gella didn’t tell me much about the guild, just that you all fought nahual. Well, that was plenty enough for me. I started the trip here soon after, and I’m glad I did.”

  Aeron nodded and smiled. “Good.”

  Sharrah, sitting on the bench with Cheddar, said, “I take it you’ve run across nahual before, then?”

  A dark look spread across Quillan’s features and he pressed his lips together. “I have.” He glanced at Chanté again, then turned to Sharrah. “Before I became a machine engineer, I was an apprentice blacksmith at Cotters Grove. A nahual killed my craft master one night.”

  Aeron grunted. “You were the apprentice Millinith interviewed.”

  Quillan nodded. “Yes. Not that I was much use. For one thing, I got to Master Retter’s house after the attack, and for another, I was so upset that I just wasn’t much use.”

  “You found his body.” Elizabeth, a softly caring look in her eyes, stared at Quillan. “Of course you were distraught.”

  “Seeing death can have a very strong effect on you.” Chanté’s voice was quiet.

  Aeron nodded. “Absolutely.”

  “Well,” Gregor said in the ensuing silence, “fortunately, we get to see new life as well.”

  “Exactly.” Cheddar turned to Aeron. “I think it’s time.”

  “You’re right.” Aeron stood. “I’ll go get it.”

  After retrieving the skin, he hefted it a few times, trying to judge how much was left. A larger number of people had arrived than he’d expected.

  “Alright,” he said as he returned to the table, “either finish your cider or toss it over the balcony. The cider, mind, not the cups.”

  Renata and a few others chuckled.

  Aeron held up the skin. “Thanks to Cheddar’s assistance, we are going to drink a toast.”

  Sharrah shot a look at Cheddar. The archive journeyman winked at her and chuckled.

  There was just enough to go around.

  Lifting his cup, Aeron said, “Yes, we see a lot of death. But, as Gregor pointed out,” he nodded to him, “we also get to witness new life. Here’s to Zyanya and her three eggs. May they hatch whole and hale!”

  “Whole and hale!” Cups, mugs, and glasses were raised and emptied, and then, amidst speculation on who would be bonded next, people headed inside for more cider.

  “Aeron.” Renny walked over. “I never got to ask you the question I intended to.”

  He chuckled. “I wondered why you wanted to ride with us.”

  Renny sat in a chair next to him. “Watching Zyanya lay her eggs was amazing, but also a little disturbing.”

  “Oh?”

  Renny nodded. “From what we’ve learned, I take it that a dragon’s bond-mate goes through everything their dragon does, and vice versa. Is that right?”

  “During particularly powerful experiences, yes.”

  Renny looked worried. “I couldn’t help noticing that a dragon laying an egg is like a human trying to shit a melon.”

  Aeron burst out laughing. “That is the most ridiculous—” He scowled. “And possibly the most accurate simile I’ve heard.”

  “Oh, gods.” Renny turned a frightened gaze on him. “What if a female dragon chooses me? It really hurts, laying eggs, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes, it does. And not just the laying part. The contractions are excruciating, too.”

  Renny groaned and looked down at the flagstone floor. After a moment, he took a breath and let it out. “Fine. Being bonded is worth it, though, right?” He looked up.

  Aeron nodded at him. “Most definitely. But I think you’ll probably be chosen by a male, anyway.”

  “Really?” Hope shone in Renny’s eyes. “Why do you think that?”

  “I think a human’s mental makeup is also taken into account when a dragon chooses a bond-mate.”

  Renny drew his brows together. “Mental . . . makeup?”

  “A person’s psychological structure. And part of that is whether they like boys or girls or both.”

  “Ah.”

  “From what I can tell, at least romantically, you like girls more than you like boys, right?”

  “Yeah.” Renny nodded. “Not that there’s anything wrong with boys. I like plenty of things about them, it’s just that I like girls a lot more.”

  Aeron nodded. “Sure. And when dragons make their choice, I think that part of a human’s nature is also taken into account. For candidates, the sex of a person they might eventually end up dating reflects on the likely sex of that person’s dragon.” He jerked his head toward Sharrah. “A female dragon chose Sharrah, for instance, and a female chose Korrie.”

  Renny looked at him and twisted his lips. “But . . . Anaya is female.”

  Aeron smiled. “True enough. My bonding was different, though. Like Renata, I was the only candidate available. Unlike Renata, my bond-mate’s sex is not the same as mine. The thing is, I don’t favor one over another as far as boys or girls go, so I think that part of my nature wasn’t even a consideration.”

  Renny looked at his cup of cider. “I see. So I might not have to endure a clutching.”

  “Maybe.” Aeron chuckled. “I’m just guessing about most of that. Even dragons aren’t entirely sure how they make their choice.”

  Renny let out a breath. “What will be, will be.”

  “Exactly,” Aeron said. “And believe me, you won’t give a damn what sex your bond-mate is.” He turned to Chanté, who stood a few feet away. “Wouldn’t you agree, Chanté?”

  The unusual boy had been surreptitiously listening, but Aeron wanted to involve him more in things.

  Chanté cleared his throat. “I–I do. Nantli has been more amazing than I could have imagined. And I think you might be correct about your guesses concerning bond-mate choice. I can’t remember for sure, but it sounds right and certainly makes sense from a reproductive standpoint.”

  A memory of underwater bubbles, enfolding wings, heavy breathing, and pounding heartbeats made his cheeks hot. Before the lake, at their old den, Balam’s neck had been firm, yet yielding, in the grasp of his jaws, or rather, Anaya’s jaws. The big dragon’s heartbeat had pulsed gently like—

  Not that I mind them, but your thoughts are distracting me from looking after Zyanya. Strong humor came through the link.

  Aeron blinked. He needed to get his mind on something else. “Quillan!”

  The poor machinist jumped a little and stared at him. “Yes?”

  “Y–Your project. How is it coming along?”

  “Which one?” Elizabeth’s tone held more than a little sarcasm.

  Aeron looked at her then Quillan. “The, ah, communication devices.”

  Quillan glanced at Elizabeth before looking at Aeron. “We did a test of two full prototypes today, actually, and it went very well.”

  “Really? How soon can we all have the
m?”

  “I can probably have another five or so ready by the Summer Festival, depending on how fast the new caps and masks can be made, or existing ones modified.”

  “Willem can probably help with that.” Aeron looked around for him. He was talking with Terry and Korrie. “Willem! Can you come chat with us when you get a chance?”

  After listening to Quillan’s explanation and looking over Chanté’s cap and mask, Willem said he would be glad to help. “The modifications look easy enough for me to do on our current gear. And I’ll tell saddlery to just keep using these designs for all gear going forward.”

  “Actually,” Chanté said, “Quillan made those from his own gear, which he doesn’t use much.”

  “Yet.” Quillan added, with a smile.

  “Quillan, you modified these?” Willem raised his brows. “This is excellent work. I thought you’d had saddlery do it. Isn’t machine engineering part of Smith Craft?”

  “It is,” Quillan said, “but working with leather is a big part of smithing. And for machine engineering, so are a number of other skills.”

  “Like decoding encrypted magic circuits?” Elizabeth raised a brow. There was a humorous glint in her eye.

  Quillan laughed. “Yes. And I have been working on those devices Master Gella brought me. I’ve even figured out a little more about what two of those circuits do.”

  Elizabeth sat up taller in the chair. “Really? What have you learned?”

  “Well, I quickly figured out that the device isn’t actually activated until the second button is pressed. That button activates the first circuit inside, which I suspected listens to the magic field. What I’ve learned is that it isn’t quite as complex as I initially thought. It is a magic field receiving circuit, but it passes signals from a specific frequency on to the next circuit, which itself searches for a specific trigger.”

  “Ah, yes.” Chanté nodded. “I see.”

  Quillan shrugged. “I’m not certain why it would have a separate circuit just for detecting a trigger, however.”

  “Signals?” Willem drew his brows together. “What are those?”

  “And what do you mean by frequency?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Hmm,” Quillan said. “Well, for simplicity, imagine the magic field is an enormous pond or lake all around us. If you poke your finger into the pond, you will generate a wave that spreads out. Now, if you poke it several times, you’ll generate several waves. You can think of a series of waves as a kind of signal. One wave, or two waves, or three, and so on, and each signal can stand for something. In practice, you would make the actual trigger a mix of received signals to avoid a false detection, so you might want it to be something like, 2, 3, 1, 2, or some-such.”