A Crown of Flames

by Pauline Creeden

  “As do I. I will just lay here for a while,” he said. “The ground is sweet. It does not move. It does not want to pitch my poor body down a thousand miles to shatter against the rocks far below. Therefore, I love the ground.”

  They slept there on that island, and then after a short rest flew on again, well before dawn showed in the east.

  The next time they stopped, it was after the sun had been up for a while.

  Dyrfinna got off the dragon, and Ibn slid off and lay flat on the blessed ground.

  “Let me find some food for you,” she said, knowing that they’d have another stretch of flying to do before they reached King Varinn’s keep.

  “That might not be the best idea for me. I beg of you,” he said, putting an arm over his eyes.

  “Understood.”

  The emberdragon flew off to find something to eat.

  “But I can’t waste time lying here, either,” he said, sitting up. “Once I recover, once you’ve eaten, you need to practice your magic.”

  “Here? Now?” Dyrfinna said, walking away to a bunch of bushes.

  “In a short while. The dragon will be hunting, and you need to practice your skills.”

  When she’d returned, Ibn had set a small rock atop a larger rock. “Take a few tries and practice singing it down,” he said. “And please keep your back to me while you're singing. Because I don't want to be blasted, either." She did that successfully while eating some seabiscuits, which made her feel even more accomplished.

  Then he had her cover herself with a magical shield while singing in the softest voice she possibly could. Ibn took his life in his hands by getting up off the ground and standing at her side.

  “You’re certainly not afraid to get yourself killed,” Dyrfinna said wryly.

  “You’re not going to kill me.” He crooked an eyebrow at her. “Possibly set off a huge explosion that leaves me twitching on the ground with a concussion and in much pain. But that’s not death.”

  “Thank you for putting everything into perspective.”

  “Now sing a shield over us, very quietly.”

  Dyrfinna sang as Ibn quietly hummed harmony with her music to help her focus.

  But she didn’t explode anything when she set the shield gently over them both.

  “Very nice,” Ibn said. “I am very relieved.”

  “You and me both,” she said. But a small sense of hope flickered inside her. She really could manage this.

  They practiced small magics, simple enough, until the emberdragon came back into view, licking her lips.

  I would have saved you two a haunch, she said, but it was too delicious and I was too hungry and I ate the whole thing.

  “That’s fine,” said Dyrfinna as the emberdragon landed. “We’ve no time to cook it anyway.”

  "There’s a point to all this practice I’m doing with you," Ibn said quietly, as if trying to keep his mind off the flying as long as possible. "A great deal of it is unlearning what you've already learned, that's the most difficult part."

  "Why are you telling me to unlearn everything?" Dyrfinna asked as they went back to the waiting emberdragon. "You haven't even known me that long and you're telling me to unlearn everything now?"

  "Not everything." Then Ibn gritted his teeth and said “I am not afraid!” as he climbed aboard the dragon. The emberdragon looked over her shoulder at him quizzically.

  "This is something that I have wrestled with, and I too had to unlearn many things in order to sing aright,” Ibn said to her over his shoulder from where he sat. “You are at that place. You like to burst out in song, like somebody jumping from behind a bush to yell ‘surprise.’ Oooh," he added as the emberdragon opened her wings.

  "Up," Dyrfinna called.

  The emberdragon leapt up, and Ibn lay down on the back of the dragon and held on for dear life.

  "So my brand of magic is like jumping out from behind a bush and scaring people?" Dyrfinna asked.

  "You sing at the top of your lungs at everything," Ibn said weakly, barely audible against the dragon's back. He turned his head sideways, his eyes closed. "A more subtle approach will do wonders. You are learning a different way to sing. Not a superior way to sing. Just a different technique. If the magic is there, the power will follow." Then his voice shook too much too continue.

  Dyrfinna patted him on the back.

  “Just. Please. Leave your hand there. On my back,” Ibn said in that sad voice, and she did, patting him the way her little sister patted her arm when she was trying to comfort her.

  After a while, off in the distance, she could see black onyx dragons circling over what seemed to be a mountain through the mist.

  “We’re getting close to King Varinn’s keep,” Dyrfinna said.

  “Oh, thank God,” Ibn said. “I keep waiting to get used to flying, but I never do.”

  The haze of distance lifted as they grew closer, revealing a keep carved into the side of a mountain, surrounded by great walls and surmounted by a gigantic castle. At the very top was a black obsidian pavilion—the dragon stables, a place where the dragons could sun themselves. But right now the black dragons were circling and swirling through the air around the keep. Bright blazes grew and vanished as the dragons dove at the ground, then swooped up into the air again.

  “Do you see any sign of Nauma?” she asked, realizing too late her mistake.

  But he sat up anyway, looking ahead, though she could see one of his hands white-knuckled on the forward strap. “I don’t see any dead dragons aloft,” he said.

  “She doesn’t seem to be there,” Dyrfinna said, disappointed. King Varinn’s dragons were all concentrating their attacks on the ground, and not in the air. Unless Nauma was, inexplicably, fighting from the ground for some unknown reason.

  As they got closer, Ibn pointed at the ocean. The undead were tumbling in the waves below the castle.

  "I hate that sight," Dyrfinna murmured.

  "Food for fishes," Ibn said.

  "Mothers and fathers down there," Dyrfinna said. "Sons and daughters."

  "That is the grief of it," he said.

  "What do we do?" Dyrfinna said aloud.

  Ibn was quiet for a little while. "When one dies on the battlefield, or in childbirth, we laud them as heroes," he said quietly. "All these people. It's not right that their loved ones or the honorable ones had to endure this.” She could hear in his voice that he was fighting to gain his composure. “When we land, and I am glad it will be soon, I will talk to our court magician. All of us should be able to discover some means to free these dead ones."

  "I know a way to undo this enchantment," Dyrfinna said. "Kill Nauma.”

  The next instant, she stood over a bearded, blue-eyed man who was lying on the ground, bleeding out his life through a slash in his neck.

  21

  At Varinn’s Keep

  “Well, that's too bad, isn’t it?” she muttered, shaking the blood from her sword, from her hands.

  Then again, she thought, if that man hadn't come running at her screaming with sword upraised, he wouldn't be dead now.

  She turned to the undead dragon that crouched behind her, its mouth hanging open. "Come over here for your fresh meat," she said, and the dragon obediently limped forward and began eating.

  She looked around as the dragon ate. The weather had turned chilly and foggy. Although only a light fog, even the haze made every sound quiet, muffled. Over the town she'd just left, ravens wheeled and croaked.

  She saw a stirring from around the edges of houses.

  The dead were trying to move, trying to get up from where she’d cut them all down – men, women, and children alike. Even a few dogs.

  She half-smiled. She’d always hated dogs.

  A sudden roar made her turn.

  … and Dyrfinna nearly fell off the emberdragon.

  "What just happened?" Dyrfinna shouted, grabbing at Ibn.

  "You nearly fell off the dragon!" Ibn had turned in his seat and had a powerfully stro
ng grip on her arm, trying to keep her from sliding further. "But if you fall off and drag me down, I'm going to follow you down and kill you myself!"

  Dyrfinna grabbed the forward strap in front of her and hauled herself back up. “I’m tied in. I’m okay. I’m not going anyplace.”

  “I don’t care! You were sliding, right behind me!” A vein beat above Ibn’s eye. She had never seen him this angry.

  Dyrfinna was still half-in the world she’d just vacated, or otherwise she would have been shouting back at him. But in this space, she could see that he was not angry; he was frightened almost out of his mind.

  She caught both Ibn’s hands in hers. She looked into his brown eyes, into that anger in his face.

  “I’m okay,” she said softly. “We are both safe. It’s okay.”

  His face softened into great agony. His hands clutched hers tightly. “If you fell, what would I do with myself?”

  Dyrfinna puzzled, wrinkled her brow. For a moment, his intent gaze never wavered. But then his eyes fell away, down to their hands, and she felt, through her hands, a tremor pass over him.

  Ibn quickly released her hands and faced front. “No falling,” he added for no reason.

  I'm landing, I'm landing, said the emberdragon, and Varinn’s dragon stables loomed up fast, a bunch of stablers gawking up at them.

  From the lands beyond Varinn’s keep, a number of his black onyx dragons flew, and they roared a welcome to the emberdragon. The stables were nearly bare of dragons, except for a few who were drinking and eating with their exhausted-looking dragonriders.

  The emberdragon’s feet hit the obsidian pavement, and they were landed.

  "Thank goodness we are here at last," Ibn said, collapsing over the back of the dragon.

  Dyrfinna unbuckled and slid off the dragon, sat straight down on the ground with her face in her hands.

  Dyrfinna, where did you go? What happened to you just now? the emberdragon cried, her wings coming back out in agitation. You blanked out and you didn't come back until I roared at you.

  "Those were Nauma's eyes I was seeing through," Dyrfinna said, realizing what had happened as soon as the words came out of her mouth. Her hands fell away. "Unless there's somebody else who kills people and tells her undead dragon to eat them.” Dyrfinna’s heart burned with fury.

  "Is that what happened to you?" Ibn shouted, sliding off the emberdragon’s back and nearly falling. He’d returned to his agitated state of mind. "You weren't even paying attention and you just about fell off the dragon and then I had to catch you, in mid-air! When all I want to do is hold still and not die!" Ibn was nearly beside himself. "You are going to have to give me a moment!" he added, storming off on very unsteady legs.

  Hedgehog met Ibn. "Ye flew in on a dragon! Ne’er did I expect to see—"

  "This is not the time!" Ibn said, marching on, his white robes billowing out behind him.

  The emberdragon, very much concerned, twisted her head around to talk to Dyrfinna. So you saw Nauma --

  "I was seeing through her eyes," Dryfinna said. "I don't know how." She frantically searched her memory for some indication of where she’d been. "She'd just slaughtered more people in a town this time. They were dead. Just starting to come alive." Dyrfinna swallowed. "The ravens were gathering." Then she had a thought. "If Nauma’s anywhere near this place, we might be able to see where the ravens are gathering and wheeling. It's a long shot," she said to the emberdragon.

  A long shot is better than no shot, agreed the emberdragon, and she instantly leapt into the air and circled around.

  Dyrfinna sat on the ground, looking around her. The last time she’d been here, she’d fought Corae, her old dragon friend who had saved the lives of Dyrfinna and her sword friends long ago. Corae had held off an army of Danes that nearly had them surrounded, and she’d given her life to do so.

  And Nauma had made Corae undead. She’d made that sweet, happy dragon into a slathering beast, in pain from her wounds, crazed for blood and flesh.

  Dyrfinna could see the stained spot on the stones where Dyrfinna had cut off Corae’s head and released the poor dragon from her sufferings. Her heart broke again.

  And then bitterness burned in her. Nauma could be looking through her eyes this very moment and she wouldn’t know it. Dyrfinna wanted, more than anything, to face her in honest combat. She wanted to put an end to the sufferings of all these people, all those dragons.

  “What are you afraid of, Nauma?” Dyrfinna muttered. “Are you afraid of losing?”

  There was no reply.

  “Yeah. I thought so,” she said.

  Just then King Varinn came puffing up to her, looking worn and harried, but he said "Ah, Ibn, so good to have you back," he said, and they bowed to each other. "Dyrfinna, I’m glad to see you alive and well, because we need help like never before.”

  Just then the emberdragon returned. I’ve seen flocks of ravens, she told Dyrfinna as she backwinged to a landing on the obsidian. The problem is, they’re in every village. The undead roam the hills and the villages are deserted.

  "What is the situation here?" Dyrfinna asked King Varinn.

  Varinn frowned. “Nauma has turned her monsters loose on my land after she brought her undead dragon down in one of my villages and started killing people, and those people killed other people. One of my dragons, after leaving the parley, picked up Gefjun and I, while others brought an advance guard back to my fortress here. We had to explain the situation to my very upset commanders, who had no inkling of what Nauma had unleashed upon our lands.”

  “Nauma must have come here very fast,” Dyrfinna said.

  “She certainly did. She did her damage, and did it very quickly, but as far as I can tell, she’s gone. I’ve been flying out there with the rest of my dragonriders, helping to bring in everybody who’s survived these attacks, and sending as many of the undead as possible back underground. But I haven’t seen her at all. She’s run away, I’m sure.”

  No surprise there, Dyrfinna thought bitterly.

  “We’ve been evacuating and bringing in refugees non-stop ever since we arrived. My shiploads of fighters arrived only last night from the island, and they’re all ready to fight the undead, though I am understandably hesitant to send them out against such a deadly force.”

  “I would suggest that you teach them how to quell the undead through magical means,” Dyrfinna said. “Songs they can unleash from a distance, in small groups. Only a few sing at a time while the others watch for oncoming shamblers. All should be armed with spears, halberds, and arrows. Magical barbs on them, naturally. Singers should be ready to spell each other.”

  Varinn nodded. “I was thinking of something along those lines. My court magician and singer will be on her way to start teaching the right songs. There are a few who have some unusually strong powers.” He nodded. “They stood out when they were all helping me plant a rose bush earlier. I’ll point them out to her.”

  Dyrfinna, though confused, nodded.

  Then Varinn straightened up. "I also need you to come see this. Ibn!" he boomed. "Where did you go?”

  “Right here, your majesty,” Ibn said from behind Dyrfinna. She startled and turned. There he was, leaning on the stable wall behind her in his white robes, his arms crossed, the very picture of composure.

  “How do you do?” he asked her.

  “Well, better, I suppose.”

  “Follow me and look at this.” King Varinn was already walking, very fast, and Dyrfinna and Ibn scrambled to catch up. He pointed over the side of the parapet and the ocean, at the undead tumbling in the waves that Dyrfinna and Ibn had seen earlier.

  “Here’s one group of the undead, though this seems to be less of a issue, since I believe the fish have been eating some of these. But come and see this. It's the ones in the back of my keep that are getting out of control."

  Varinn brought them around to the back. Dyrfinna leaned over the wall to look far down the side of the mountain to see where he was pointing.r />
  “Now look at that,” Varinn said.

  At the foot of his walls, far below, the undead were clambering over each other, climbing up on the trampled bodies of the others crushed under their feet and bodies. So many shamblers were coming in that bodies were becoming stacked like cordwood, giving them a grisly stair to climb. And the piles of bodies were rising higher and higher, bringing the shamblers closer and closer to the top of King Varinn's walls.

  "As you might imagine, I am relieved that my dragons returned in the nick of time," King Varinn said, looking down at the sight of the roiling dead trying to reach up to the tops of his walls.

  The emberdragon shot past overhead in a blaze like fire, and Dyrfinna felt the heat of her passing.

  Let me fix this for you, the emberdragon said.

  Like a shooting star, she dove down the side of the mountain, her jaws opening, and she blasted the undead with a gush of blazing fire.

  The heat that boiled up was intense. Everybody fell back away from the wall as her fire went on and on and on.

  "Well! I think she’s got that taken care of," King Varinn said. "For a little while."

  "What happens next?" Dyrfinna asked Varinn.

  "A healthy meal. Then we’ll send all of you out to save and evacuate our surviving citizens, clean up the undead roaming the land, and to try and track down Nauma," said the king. "Come. We have much to do."

  22

  The Gorm

  They ate a quick lunch, wonderfully made, with the other commanders and Varinn. Gefjun was not there, much to Dyrfinna’s relief and disappointment. Gefjun was out in the field, directing the removal of several sick and infirm citizens while under attack by the undead.

  But Dyrfinna felt very uneasy. She wasn’t sure why. She excused herself, saying that she needed to go to the armory and get her sword sharpened. Ibn volunteered to escort her, since she didn’t know where to find the armorer.