Dragonjacks: Book 1 - The Shepherd: A Dragons of Cadwaller Novel

by Vickie Knestaut

  Tyber shrugged. "I didn't really speak to her much. She seems nice enough. I noticed she doesn't carry around that wicked-looking sword she had the last time I was here. That's what I remember most about the first time I saw her. That sword."

  Theola was quiet a second. "She doesn't carry it anymore. The war is over."

  "Tell that to the dragonjacks."

  "They're different," Theola said.

  "Different from the Opplians?"

  "No, well, yes. Yes and no. They're not an organized army. For all the sky, when I've come across them in the past, they usually turn tail and flee. We have them outnumbered three-to-one. And on the rare occasion we catch them, they offer no resistance at all. Their formations fall apart. Their alpha is quickly dealt with. But that attack we had..."

  She shook her head. "I've never seen a horde of dragonjacks that well organized. Or that big. That was a full-sized horde."

  "By the way, what happened to the dragons that absconded? Weren't they supposed to come here? Isn't that why Trysten is the dragon queen?"

  "She's not the dragon queen, Ty. She's the wing master. She is in charge of all the dragoneers. She answers directly and only to the King."

  "But isn't that how Aerona ended up with so many dragons?” Tyber asked. “I thought that's why you came here. Because they had more dragons than riders."

  "She hasn't taken a horde since she lost her alpha. I don't know if she can anymore. But she still has a deep connection to the dragons. She can still tell what they're thinking and feeling."

  Tyber smiled. "She told me that Rius adores me."

  Theola arched her eyebrow. "You don't need to have special powers to see that. Though there's no accounting for taste, is there?"

  "Hey!"

  Nos ran ahead toward a cottage. "Tyber's home!" she screamed. "Come see! Tyber's home!"

  A pang flashed through Tyber as he watched his sister race for the cottage door. Tyber's home. For him, home had been a bunk hall shared with eight other academy recruits for a year. Before that, home was a tiny cottage shared with his entire family in one of the poorer parts of the city. But that cottage was gone now, burned down with most of the neighborhood. This cottage, a new one based on the color of the stone, had never been his home yet it housed the people he loved most.

  Nos' proclamation made him feel more like a stranger than he would have thought possible.

  The cottage door flung back. Jack stared out at him. His face broke into a grin, his eyes wide. "It's Tyber!" he shouted over his shoulder, then rushed past Nos and barrelled into his older brother.

  Tyber laughed and picked him up, spun him around, then held him out at arm's length. "You're a foot taller!"

  "You have a beard!" Jack rubbed at his chin.

  "I'd rather be a foot taller."

  The others rushed out, crying his name. His brothers and sisters gathered around him, clutching his thighs or taking his hand and clasping it tight. They cried out about how much they had missed them, how glad they were to see him. And where was his dragon, could they please go see his dragon? They missed her, too.

  As Tyber looked at the cottage doorway, he found himself watching for Theola to step out, an apron tied around her, as she rubbed her hands on a towel and scolded him for being away long enough to let the little ones miss him.

  But no one was there.

  "Fafa?" Tyber asked Theola as she stood beside him, still in her hordesmen's uniform, the blue and yellow striped sweater of Aerona.

  "He's in there," she said with a nod and a grin. "He still doesn't get around much."

  "Where's Father?" Tyber asked the throng of children.

  "He's at work," Jack said. "He'll be home at dusk."

  "Come on then, let's go see Fafa," Theola said.

  Tyber waded through the children as they shifted and moved around him, chattering, telling him about their cottage and the caravan and the trip to Aerona. Stories of how the mountains fell and dragons came out of the ground.

  "Come on, come on," Tyber said, herding the children back into the cottage.

  Fafa sat in a chair in the far corner of the cottage. Tyber stopped, his attention sweeping over the interior of the cottage, then back again. His mouth dropped.

  "Tyber!" Fafa called, lifting his hand. "By the wilds, it's good to see you, boy! I thought we'd never see you again."

  The children circled around Tyber. A fire burned in the hearth. The fireplace was large enough to have a spit with a cauldron hanging beneath it. And a hob on which a kettle leaked steam. The warmth of the fire radiated out over a room twice the size of the cottage he’d grown up in.

  And it was so clean. His family had always been tidy. Theola insisted on it. But the roof and the walls were free of the residue of years of smoke from burning scrap wood and dried dung. Free of the smear of children's hands, of the grime of living hard in a tight space.

  "Well come in and shut the door, boy! I can't get Etipoe in here to keep us warm."

  Tyber stepped inside. Theola shut the door behind him.

  Fafa leaned forward. His brow crumpled. His eyes grew soft and glistened as he rested an elbow on his knee and nodded. "You look good, son. You look real good. Like a man. An important man. One we can be proud of."

  "He has a beard!" Nos called.

  "And it looks good on him. You look like a hordesman, Tyber. You look like a hero," Fafa said with a nod.

  "Thank you," Tyber said. "How are you? And how is Father?"

  Fafa sat back in his chair and smiled. "Oh, about as well as can be expected. My back still bothers me, but I keep my mind off it. They have a market here, and there are always people in and out of it, passing through. I keep up with my little carvings. We set up a table and put them out and most days we sell as many as we take."

  Tyber nodded again, and then realized he was waiting for an invitation to sit.

  "It's good money, too," Fafa went on. "There's no merchant's market here. Just the one. Everyone shops there and no one thinks you should pay less for one of my spoons or bowls because I'm old. You ain't ever seen anything like it. Aerona is quite a place!"

  Tyber looked around again, his eyes waiting to catch the trick, looking to see how this much space could be crammed into his family's cottage. The little ones went to the fire and brought back toys and dolls to show Tyber.

  "Why don't you sit down," Theola said, laying a gentle hand on Tyber's back. She motioned at the table in the middle of the room. He drifted over, smiling and admiring wooden dragons on wheels, dolls fashioned from cloth and twine. He sat on the indicated bench, laid an elbow on the table, and looked at his grandfather.

  "Jack," Theola said, "get Tyber a cup of tea."

  "That's all right," Tyber said, holding up a palm. "Water's fine."

  "Nonsense!" Fafa spat. "They bring that stuff in here by the bushel! It's a wonder the road ain't paved with it. Have a cup! We'll have some wine with dinner tonight, too."

  "Wine?" Tyber asked, his eyes widening in surprise.

  Fafa grinned. "Sure! I'll send Jack or Theola out to the Fire and Stone. They can get a flagon there."

  Tyber shook his head. "No, really, it's not necessary. You shouldn't be making a fuss over me. I'll be fine."

  "A fuss? Boy, we haven't had a proper chance to show our appreciation for you. Look around at all you’ve done."

  Fafa gestured at the room around them. "This is a palace compared to any other place I've lived, and I’ve lived a long time. See those doors over there? That is the boys' room, and that other door is the girls' room. I sleep in here, near the fire. Your father often sleeps in here as well. Can you imagine that? After all of us crammed into one room in True Gate?"

  Fafa shook his head, then gestured at Theola. "And look at your sister, Ty. For all the sky, she rides a dragon. And she rides it for one of the most important people in the kingdom. And your father!"

  Fafa sat back in his chair and folded his hands over his belly. "I haven't seen your father this happy and
content since he was a young man. Don't get me wrong, he works hard, but rather than mucking out livery stables and feeding and caring for horses, he works as a mason's laborer. He's even been allowed to cut a few stones of his own! He's talking about picking up where he left off when his own father died. And they'll have him, too! They can't build cottages fast enough around here. And when spring is over, once the flooding is done and summer is on us, they're going to build a bridge over the river so that they can start building on the other side, too. They can't get enough help around here. There's nothing that a person can't do if he sets his mind to it. And, we owe this all to you."

  Tyber blinked at his grandfather, letting the words settle around him like snow.

  "I'm learning to read," Jack said.

  Fafa nodded and pointed to Jack. "They all are. The older ones. And write, too."

  "I can count," Nos repeated.

  "Free of charge, even," Fafa went on. "The Strolls, those people in the scarlet robes?"

  "The beggars?" Tyber asked.

  "Yes," Fafa said with a nod. "But out here, they're teaching children to read and write. Count, too. Doesn't matter if you're a lord's child or not. If you got a head, they want to fill it with knowledge."

  Tyber's hands curled into loose fists. His jaw fell slack, and he shook his head slightly. He had tried to help provide for them. It was his efforts to put food on the table that had landed him in this position in the first place. He'd been caught stealing. Caught by Ander. And Ander gave him the choice between prison and the academy.

  "And here you are," Fafa went on. "Not just a hordesman, but a royal hordesman. Serving the King himself. And this..." Fafa swept his hand about. "This is all because of you. Without the silver you earned from the academy, we would never have been able to move here. None of this would have been possible.”

  Tyber's fists tightened and his throat clenched in a knot.

  "Thank you, Ty," Jack said and stepped forward. He wrapped his arms around Tyber's shoulders and drew him tight. Tyber grasped Jack’s wrist and held it.

  "Thanks, Ty," Nos echoed, followed by Bear and Unther. Daramel said nothing, but toddled forward and mashed her cheek against Tyber's hip. She laid her hand over his thigh.

  Theola placed her hand on the back of Tyber's head, and he looked down to the blurred grains of the table before him. It didn't matter why he joined the academy. Whatever his sins were or might have been, they had been erased by his family's love.

  Chapter 4

  A toe nudged Tyber in the rib cage. He looked up into his father's smiling face.

  "Dawn bell just rang."

  "Thanks," Tyber said, then pushed himself up from his bedroll. He ran his hands over his face and looked about the room. It was incredible to see all the space. No children sleeping across the floor. Just himself, his father, and Fafa, who leaned forward in his chair, working up the strength to stand long enough to use a chamberpot.

  "I still can't believe it," Father said. "My son, the royal hordesman. Off to meet with the King himself this morning."

  Tyber smiled weakly, though his stomach fluttered at the reminder. The last time the King had wanted him to do something, he'd lost a good friend, and he'd lost something in himself as well.

  "I'll try and get home earlier tonight,” Father went on. "I want to hear every word of it. Everything the King had to tell you."

  Tyber stood and stretched, raising his arms over his head, arching his back. Either his father had shrunk or he had grown. Either way, he was slightly taller now. That hadn't escaped his father either. His eyes began to glisten again as he studied Tyber.

  "He's just going to send us on another mission. Some errand. I don't know why he needs me, Ren, and Ander specifically, but it can't be a big deal if he didn't ask for the whole horde to come."

  Tyber crouched and began to pack up his bedroll. It struck him that he missed Lambert's snoring. It sounded like they were all together when Lambert snored. It felt like it was where he belonged.

  With his horde.

  "I don't think you understand this," Father said.

  "Oh, he doesn't," Fafa insisted. "That's for certain."

  "The King of Cadwaller has asked for your services personally. He could call on any man in the kingdom. And he already has some of the greatest hordesmen of all to choose from right here, but he asked for my son."

  Tyber tied off his bedroll and stood, ready to ask his father about the tales he'd heard of the mountains falling and the dragons streaming up out of the ground with no riders. Black dragons like crows, attacking the hordesmen of Aerona. Kaylar's hordesmen had spoken of them, and when pressed, Prince Winsom had only shaken his head and said that he had nothing to add.

  It was so far-fetched as to be unbelievable, but everyone in Aerona insisted that it was true. And after seeing what he had seen of Master Groal, little seemed impossible. But his Father's word would be unassailable. If he said it was true, then Tyber’d have no choice but to believe it.

  The door to the boy’s room opened, and Jack stepped into the room. "Can I go with you?"

  "With me?" Tyber asked, a smile on his face.

  Jack nodded once. He pulled the door back toward him slightly so that it covered half of his body, his temple resting against the door's edge.

  What would it have been like to grow up in a home with rooms?

  "I want to meet the King," Jack said. "I want him to make me a royal hordesman, too."

  Tyber's smile broadened, and then fell away as he thought of Fang's body draped over the back of his dragon, the way it bucked, oddly stiff when they finally coaxed Emmah back to the ground.

  "You can join the horde when you're old enough," Father said.

  Jack looked back to Tyber. "But I don't want to be a hordesman in Aerona, I want to be a royal hordesman. Like you."

  Tyber took a deep breath and replanted the smile on his face. "The same still goes. You have to be old enough, first."

  "Can I still go with you?"

  Tyber looked back at his father. "To hear Theola talk, seeing the King out in the lanes is no great deal. I suppose he doesn't have a balcony high enough to be admired on."

  Father shook his head. "He's a different one, Tyber. Don't you dare go in there thinking that he's his father. He's not. You could go right up to him and talk to him. But it's something different entirely for him to ask to see you. And to bring you all the way from the mother city at that."

  "I suppose so."

  Father gripped Tyber around the shoulder. "I couldn't be prouder of you, son. The only thing in this world left for me to want is that your mother be alive to see this, you in your uniform, off to see His Majesty."

  "Thanks. I have to get going. I'm supposed to meet Ander and Ren before going on to the King's cottage."

  "I'll see you tonight. Like I said, I'll do my best to be home early."

  Tyber stepped out of his family's cottage. For a long, disorienting second, he stalled and looked around, expecting to find the square of squalor that his old home had been in, shacks of wood and cloth tossed up in the narrow spaces between the cottages. A courtyard brimming with dirty, ragged children playing hard around a smouldering cookfire crowded with others who couldn't afford a fire of their own.

  Instead, he stared across a lane, past a family walking by, and on to the face of another cottage, its stone still bearing the scars of chisel marks. The thatch on its roof looked new and fluffy, not beaten down and broken by the weather yet. And a steady stream of smoke rolled from the chimney at the top. If the door had opened and a woman in an apron had stepped out, waved, and offered him breakfast, he wouldn't have been a bit surprised.

  It felt as if he'd left the mother city and passed into some alternate world where the people he knew were still there, but everything was different. And so much better.

  He shook his head and hurried on to the Fire and Stone, stopping once to ask for directions. Ander and Ren stood in front of the inn waiting for him. Ren told him that it was
like sleeping in a palace. It was the best night of sleep in his life. And the food was remarkable. The proprietor's wife could teach the academy chef a thing or two. The whole time, Ander was quiet, silently nodding in agreement.

  "I could stay here," Ren said as he looked around, and then eyed a collection of beggars who stood beside the lane in their scarlet robes, little bowls held in their cupped hands, their faces cast down inside their hoods.

  "Even the beggars here look well-fed."

  "It's certainly a unique place," Ander remarked, breaking his silence.

  "I can see why King Aymon doesn't want to go back to the mother city," Ren said. "If I were him, I'd move the capital here. I bet it's a lot easier to rule when you don't have to worry about a hungry mob storming your palace and threatening to eat the dragons and their food."

  "How's the family?" Ander asked, almost cutting Ren off.

  "Good," Tyber said.

  "That's good to hear." Ander nodded.

  Tyber studied the lane before himself as if he might find something more meaningful to say in its packed dirt. His family was better than good. Better than they ever could have been in the mother city. There was no reason to expect that they'd want or need to return to the city where Tyber was stationed, where his dragon was bonded.

  "What in the wilds is up with you two?" Ren asked. "Are we on our way to a funeral?"

  "No," Tyber said with a shake of his head, but it was, in a way. He felt like he was laying to rest any hope that he'd ever have his family close by again.

  He turned to Ander. The former proctor’s face held a far-away look, as if the distance between Aerona and the mother city wouldn't cover even half the distance between his body and his mind right now.

  "Do you know what this is about?" Tyber pressed once again.

  Ander blinked and looked at Tyber. "What?"

  "Do you know what this is about? What the King wants of us?"

  Ander shook his head, then looked forward again. "We'll both know in a few minutes."

  Ren smirked. "That's hardly an answer, and yet it is."

  Chapter 5