Dragon Keeper

by Robin Hobb

  “Such as?” A blush betrayed her. He probably thought she was some half-savage Rain Wild primitive. She was starting to think she had misjudged him, but she wasn’t going to apologize just yet. Actually, she was beginning to hope she had misjudged him. Earlier she had noticed how polished he was. She had never seen a man dressed so well as this one was. Now that his color was settling, she realized he was extremely handsome. Earlier, when he had been talking with the Bingtown woman, she had thought him stuffy and horribly ignorant of dragons, not to mention arrogant and rude when he spoke to her. His beauty had just seemed a part of the insult, the power that gave him the authority to look down on her. But he’d followed her and actually tried to help her. For which she’d thudded a spear butt into his belly.

  But now he made up for many of his sins when he gave her a rueful smile and said, “Look, we got off to a bad start. And I don’t suppose I made things better when I startled you. I was insulting when I first spoke to you, but you must admit, you weren’t exactly courteous to me. And you are now one up on me for nearly impaling me on the dull end of a fishing spear.” He paused, took a deep breath, and his color almost became normal. “Can we begin again, please?”

  Before she could reply, he stood, bowed at the waist to her, and said, “How do you do? My name is Sedric Meldar. I’m from Bingtown, and ordinarily my daily work is to be a secretary to Trader Finbok of Bingtown. But for this month, I am accompanying Trader Finbok’s wife, Alise, as her chronicler and protector as she seeks to amass new and exciting knowledge about dragons and Elderlings.”

  Thymara found herself smiling before his speech was halfway out. He spoke so formally yet in a way that let her know he was mocking the formality and the grandness of his work. He was dressed like a prince, with not a hair out of place, and yet his smile and easy ways invited her to feel comfortable with him. As if they were equals, she realized.

  “What’s a chronicler?” Tats demanded abruptly.

  “I write down what she does. Where she goes, the gist of her conversations, and sometimes, when she is doing research, I write down in detail what she learns. Later, she’ll be able to look back over what I’ve written to be sure she is remembering every detail correctly. I’m also a passable artist and intended to do sketches of the dragons, detailed sketches of their eyes, claws, teeth, and well, every part of them. Only today I discovered that I’m not going to be much use to her for the interviewing part of her work. I seem to have offended the dragon, which means that I can’t be with Alise while she is studying her. And even if I could be, I couldn’t understand any of the animal’s answers to Alise’s questions.”

  “Skymaw,” Thymara supplied helpfully. “The dragon’s name is Skymaw.”

  “She told you her name?” Tats was astounded.

  Thymara was irritated at the interruption. “Skymaw is what I call her,” she amended, giving him a glare. “Everyone knows that dragons don’t tell their real names immediately.”

  “Yes, that’s what my dragon told me, too. Only she didn’t ask me to give her a name to use.” He smiled foolishly. “She’s such a beauty, Thymara. Green as emeralds, green as sunlight through leaves. Her eyes are like, well, I don’t have words. She’s a bad-tempered little thing, though. I accidentally stepped on her toe and she threatened to kill and eat me!”

  “Wait, please.” It was the stranger’s turn to interrupt them. “Please. Both of you. You are saying that you talk to the dragons? Just as we are talking right now?”

  Only Sedric didn’t feel like a stranger to her anymore. She smiled at him. “Of course we do.”

  “They move their mouths and the words come out and you hear them? Just as we are talking together now? Then why do I hear rumbles and moos and hisses, and you hear words?”

  “Well—” She hesitated, realizing she hadn’t thought about how she “heard” the dragons.

  “No, of course not.” Tats barged in again. “Their mouths are all wrong for shaping words like we do. They make sounds, and somehow I understand what they are saying. Even though they aren’t speaking a human language.”

  “Did it take you long to learn their language? Did you study it before you came here?” Sedric asked.

  “No.” Tats shook his head decisively. “When I first got here, I picked out my dragon and walked up to her, and I could understand her. Mine is the green female. She’s not as big as some of the others, but I think she’s prettier. Also, she’s fast and other than her wings, I think she’s pretty much perfectly formed. She’s a bit feisty; she says the others say she’s mean and avoid her. She says it’s because she’s fast enough to get to the food first almost every time. They’re jealous.”

  “Or perhaps they just think she’s greedy,” Thymara suggested. Time to take control of this conversation. After all, Sedric hadn’t followed Tats into the woods to speak to him, even if he now seemed to be hanging on every word the boy spoke. “I’ve been able to understand the dragons since they hatched,” she told the Bingtown man. “I was here that day. And even when they weren’t looking at me directly, I could feel what they were thinking, even as they were coming out of their logs. And communicate with them.” She smiled. “One of the hatchlings went after my dad. I had to insist that he wasn’t food.”

  “A dragon wanted to eat your father?” Sedric seemed horrified.

  “They had just come out of their cases. He was confused.” She cast her mind back, remembering. “They were so hungry when they came out. And they weren’t as strong as they should have been or as well formed. I think the sea serpents were too old and not as fat as they should have been, and they didn’t stay encased long enough. And that’s why these dragons aren’t healthy and can’t fly.”

  “Can’t fly yet,” Tats amended. He grinned. “You saw Rapskal. He’s determined that his dragon is going to fly. He’s crazy, of course. But after I watched them, well, I was looking at my green’s wings. They’re well shaped, but just small and not very strong. She told me that dragons keep growing for as long as they live. All parts of them grow—necks, legs, tails, and, yes, wings. I’m thinking that if I feed her right and she keeps trying to use them, maybe her wings will grow and she will be able to fly.”

  Thymara regarded him in astonishment. She had just accepted the dragons as they were; it had not occurred to her that perhaps they might become full dragons as they grew. Now she reconsidered Skymaw’s wings. They had seemed floppy when she had cleaned them, and Skymaw had not been very helpful about unfolding them for grooming. She didn’t think Skymaw could move them much. A surge of envy raced through her; was it possible that Tats’s green dragon might eventually gain flight while Skymaw remained earthbound?

  “But you can understand what they say, word for word?” Sedric seemed intent on dragging them back to his own concern about the dragons. When Thymara nodded, he asked, “So when you said those things to me, you weren’t making them up? You were actually translating what the dragon was trying to say to me?”

  She suddenly felt a bit abashed by how she had spoken to him. “I was repeating exactly what Skymaw was saying,” she excused herself, and felt only slightly guilty for blaming her rudeness on the dragon.

  “So, then. You could translate for me? If I wanted to talk to her, apologize—”

  “No need for that. I mean, you can speak directly to her. She understands exactly what you say.”

  “Yes, she did, and that is exactly how I was getting into trouble with her. But if Alise asks your dragon a question and your dragon answers, you could translate the answer for me? Quietly, off to one side, so we don’t disturb their conversation.”

  “Of course. But so could Alise—I mean, the lady. So could any of the keepers.”

  “But that would slow down Alise’s work. I was thinking that if someone would interpret for me as the dragon talks, I could get it all down. I’m a very fast writer. And I suppose any keeper could do it.” He glanced at Tats. “But seeing as how she is your dragon, I think you would be the logical choic
e.”

  She liked how he kept referring to Skymaw as her dragon. “I suppose I could.”

  “Well then—would you?”

  “Would I what? Just stand there while they’re talking, only tell you what the dragon is saying?”

  “Exactly.” He hesitated, and then offered, “I could pay you, if you wish. For your time.”

  It was tempting, but her father had raised her to be honest. “I’ve already been paid for my time, and it belongs to the dragon now. I can’t sell my time twice any more than I could sell a plum twice. So I couldn’t take your money. And I’d have to ask Skymaw if she would allow you to be near her, and if she would mind if I told you what she was saying.”

  “Well.” He seemed taken aback at the thought she couldn’t accept his money. “Would you ask her, then? I’d be indebted to you.”

  She cocked her head at him. “Actually, I think it would be Alise Finbok who would be indebted to me. After all, she’s bought your time, for you to do this work for her. And if I make it so you can do it, well—” Thymara smiled to herself. “Yes, I think actually she’d be the one indebted to me.” She rather liked the idea of that.

  “So, then, you’ll ask the dragon if I can be around her? And if you can interpret for me what she says?”

  Thymara bent down and grasped her fishing spear to either side of her prey. She grunted slightly as she lifted the heavy fish. She nodded toward it as she answered him. “Let’s ask her right now. I think I have something here that might put her in the mood to say yes.”

  Day the 6th of the Grain Moon

  Year the 6th of the Independent Alliance of Traders

  Kim to Detozi

  I fear you have taken a simple reminder of the rules as if it were a personal rebuke. Detozi, surely we know each other well enough for you to realize that I was only carrying out the tasks of my position when I reminded you of the rules regarding personal messages. I am not the sort of person who would run to the Council with such a trivial complaint. I merely thought that if I reminded you of the rules, I might save you from embarrassment and nuisance if it came to the attention of someone who was petty enough to enforce them. That was all. Sa’s mercy, I am shocked at how seriously you have taken all this! I will, for the sake of our friendship, ignore the unfounded accusations and cruel allegations of your last missive.

  Kim

  Chapter Thirteen

  Suspicions

  He awoke before dawn, cradled in a warm cocoon of contentment. Life was good. Leftrin lay still in the dark, enjoying it for a few long moments before letting his mind start enumerating the tasks of the day. Tarman was as still as he ever got, nosed up onto the mudbank. Sometimes it seemed to him that his ship grew more thoughtful when it was pulled up on the riverbank, as if he were dreaming of other days and times. He could hear and feel the gentle tug of the river’s backwater current on the aft end of the ship, but mostly all was still. It was quieter than when he anchored or tied up in the river, almost as if Tarman himself were dozing on the sunny bank.

  The bedding smelled sweet, of the cologne that Alise Finbok wore, but also of Alise herself. He rolled his face into the pillow and breathed deeply of her scent. Then he grinned at his own foolishness. He was as infatuated as a beardless boy who had just discovered that women were wonderfully different from men. The giddiness that had passed him by as a youth now spun him delightfully, infecting every moment of his day. Thinking of her freckled, speckled face made him smile. Her hair, the color of a hummer’s breast, turned into tiny curls all around her brow when it escaped from her pins. The times she had reached out and taken his arm when something frightened or alarmed her always made him feel as if he were taller and stronger than he had ever been in his life.

  There was no future to it. He knew that in every corner of his yearning, aching heart. When he thought of how it must end, he felt despair. But for now, this morning, on the dawn of carrying her off up the river on a journey that might be weeks or even months long, he was happy and excited. It was a mood that hummed through the ship, infecting the crew as well. Tarman would be very pleased to be under way. Leftrin still considered it a ridiculous mission, a journey to nowhere herding reluctant dragons. Yet the pay the Council had offered was excellent, and the opportunity to take his ship and crew beyond the boundaries of what had been explored was something he’d always dreamed about. To have a woman like Alise not only appear in his life, but suddenly be given him as a companion for the voyage was good fortune beyond his ability to imagine.

  He took another deep breath of her fragrance, hugged his pillow, and sat up. Time to face the day. He wanted to make an early start, yet he would wait for the delivery of the supplies he had specially ordered in the hopes of making her more comfortable. He scratched his chest, chose a shirt from the hooks near his bunk, and pulled it on. He still wore his trousers from yesterday. Barefoot, he padded out of his stateroom and into the galley. He stirred the embers in the small stove and put yesterday’s coffee to reheat. He wiped out a coffee mug and set it on the table. Outside the small windows of the deckhouse, the world was hesitantly venturing toward day. The deep shadows of the surrounding forest still cloaked the boat and shore in dimness.

  He felt a small vibration and then that prickle of awareness. Someone, a stranger to Tarman, was on the deck of his ship. Leftrin stood silently. From a nearby equipment box, he picked up the large hardwood fid used for mending and splicing the heaviest lines. He weighed the heft of it in his hand, smiled to himself, and moved quietly as the cat to the door. He eased it open. The cool air of morning flowed in. In the upper reaches of the forest, birds were calling. In the lower levels, bats were still heading home to roost. He stepped out on his deck and began a noiseless patrol of his vessel.

  He found no one, but when he came back to the door of the deckhouse, a small scroll rested on the deck there. His heart gave a lurch as he stooped down to pick it up. The paper of the scroll was soft and thick; it smelled of a foreign land, bitterly spicy. He carried it back into his stateroom and shut the door. The wax that sealed it was a plain brown blob; no signet press betrayed the owner. He flicked it off and unrolled the small scroll. He read it by the gray light seeping in his small window.

  There are no coincidences. I’ve maneuvered you into place. Lend your support to the one that I’ve arranged to be there. You will know him soon enough. You know what he seeks. A fortune rides on this, and the blood of my family. If all goes well, the fortune will be shared with you. If it does not go well, my family will not be the only ones to mourn.

  It was not signed, but no signature was needed. Sinad Arich. Months ago, he had given the foreigner passage to Trehaug, and almost as soon as the boat had docked, the Chalcedean merchant had vanished. He hadn’t asked for passage back down the river. Two days later, when the Tarman was loaded with cargo and Leftrin had heard nothing from or about the man, they had departed. The foreign trader had left few signs of his passage on the Tarman. There had been a shirt that Leftrin had dropped overboard and some smoking herbs that he’d appropriated for his own use. The crew never asked what had become of their passenger, and Leftrin hadn’t made much noise about his leaving Trehaug that day. The man’s papers had been in order and he’d sold him passage up the river. That was what he intended to say if anyone ever asked him about the merchant. But no one ever had, and Leftrin had hoped he had set that misadventure behind him.

  He’d hoped in vain. He wished he’d never heard of that damn Chalcedean merchant, wished he’d found a way to throw him overboard a year ago. Sinad Arich had haunted his nightmares since he’d last seen the man. After all that time, Leftrin had almost believed he’d seen the last of him, that the man had only wanted to use him once and then let him go.

  But that was what it was to deal with Chalced or any Chalcedean. Once they knew you had a weakness, a secret spot of any kind, they’d hook into you, exploit you until you were either killed in the process or turned on them and killed them. He gritted his teeth toget
her. Only a few moments ago, he’d been doltishly happy at the prospect of traveling upriver with the object of his fascination. Now he wondered who else would be traveling with him, and how relentless they would be in their threats. He wondered if he would have to kill someone on this journey, and if he did, how he would do it and if he would be able to keep it concealed from Alise.

  It saddened him. He suspected that if she knew half the things he’d done in his life, she’d have nothing to do with him. He didn’t like that he had to conceal part of what he was to enjoy her companionship, but he would. He’d do whatever he must to have what little time with her that he could. He was already at an immense disadvantage with such a fine lady. Here he was, a Rain Wild riverman with little more than a boat to his name. She couldn’t even imagine what a unique and wonderful boat the Tarman was. She couldn’t possibly see his ship as his fortune. So he didn’t know why she seemed to like him. He worked hard and expected he always would. He had no fine home to present to her. His clothes were rags compared with the garments of her dandified escort; he wore no rings. Before she had set foot on his ship, he’d had little more ambition than to continue doing what he’d always done: carrying freight shipments up and down the river, and making enough to pay his crew and to have a good meal when his schedule allowed him to overnight in a town. He’d had his chance to make a fortune selling off that wizardwood. He could have been a wealthy man now, with a palatial home in Jamaillia or Chalced. He didn’t regret the decision he’d made; it was the only right thing he could have done.

  Yet he wondered at how small a life he’d been willing to settle for. He wished in vain that he’d foreseen that some day such a woman might walk into his life. If he had, perhaps he would have saved the sort of wealth that might impress her. But what could he have acquired that could compare with whatever her rich husband in Bingtown offered her?