Dragon Book, The

by Gardner Dozois

  The softened flesh yielded so easily that the spear sank in until both his hands were up against the flesh. Pus and blood spurted over him, stinking to high heaven, and the dragon reared up, howling, lifting him his height again off the ground before the spear ripped back out of its side, and he came down heavily. Antony hit the ground and crawled toward the wall, choking and spitting, while rocks and dust came down on him. “Holy Juno!” he yelled, cowering, as one boulder the size of a horse smashed into the ground not a handspan from his head.

  He rolled and tucked himself up against the wall and wiped his face, staring up in awe while the beast went on bellowing and thrashing from side to side above, gouts of flame spilling from its jaws. Blood was jetting from the ragged tear in its side like a fountain, buckets of it, running in a thick black stream through the ravine dust. Even as he watched, the dragon’s head started to sag in jerks: down and pulled back up, down again, and down, then its hindquarters gave out under it. It crashed slowly to the ground with a last long hiss of air squeezing out of its lungs, and the head fell to the ground with a thump and lolled away.

  Antony lay there staring at it a while. Then he shoved away most of the rocks on him and dragged himself up to his feet, swaying, and limped to stand over the gaping, cloudy-eyed head. A little smoke still trailed from its jaws, a quenched fire.

  “Sweet, most-gracious, blessed, gentle Venus,” he said, looking up, “I’ll never doubt your love again.”

  He picked up his spear and staggered down the ravine in his blood-soaked clothing, and found the guards all standing and frozen, clutching their swords. They stared at him as if he were a demon. “No need to worry,” Antony said, cheerfully. “None of it’s mine. Any of you have a drink? My mouth is unspeakably foul.”

  “WHAT in stinking Hades is that?” Secundus said, as the third of the guards came out of the cave, staggering under an enormous load: a smooth-sided oval boulder.

  “It’s an egg, you bleeding capupeditum,” Addo said. “Bash it into a bloody rock.”

  “Stop there, you damned fools; it stands to reason it’s worth something,” Antony said. “Put it in the cart.”

  They’d salvaged the cart from the wreckage of the village and lined it with torn sacking and, to prove the gods loved him, even found a couple of sealed wine jars in a cellar. “Fellows,” Antony said, spilling a libation to Venus while the guards loaded up the last of the treasure, “pull some cups out of that. Tomorrow we’re going to buy every whore in Rome. But tonight, we’re going to drink ourselves blind.”

  They cheered him, grinning, and didn’t look too long at the heap of coin and jewels in the cart. He wasn’t fooled; they’d have cut his throat and been halfway to Gaul by now if they hadn’t been worried about the spear he’d kept securely in his hand, the one stained black with dragon blood.

  That was all right. He could drink any eight men under the table in unwatered wine.

  He left the three of them snoring in the dirt and whistled as the mules plodded down the road, quickly: they were all too happy to be leaving the dragon corpse behind. Or most of it, anyway: he’d spent the afternoon hacking off the dragon’s head. It sat on top of the mound of treasure now, teeth overlapping the lower jaw as it gradually sagged in on itself. It stank, but it made an excellent moral impression when he drove into the next town over.

  THE really astonishing thing was that now, when he had more gold than water, he didn’t need to pay for anything. Men quarreled for the right to buy him a drink, and whores let him have it for free. He couldn’t even lose it gambling: every time he sat down at the tables, his dice always came up winners.

  He bought a house in the best part of the city, right next to that pompous windbag Cato on one side and Claudius’s uncle on the other, and threw parties that ran dusk until dawn. For the daylight hours, he filled the courtyard with a menagerie of wild animals: a lion and a giraffe that growled and snorted at each other from the opposite ends where they were chained up, and even a hippopotamus that some Nubian dealer brought him.

  He had the dragon skull mounted in the center of the yard and set the egg in front of it. No one would buy the damn thing, so that was all he could do with it. “Fifty sesterces to take it off your hands,” the arena manager said, after one look at the egg and the skull together.

  “What?” Antony said. “I’m not going to pay you. I could just smash the thing.”

  The manager shrugged. “You don’t know how far along it is. Could be it’s old enough to live a while. They come out ready to fight,” he added. “Last time we did a hatching, it killed six men.”

  “And how many damned tickets did it sell?” Antony said, but the bastard was unmoved.

  It made a good centerpiece, anyway, and it was always entertaining to mention the arena manager’s story to one of his guests when they were leaning against the egg and patting the shell, and watching how quickly they scuttled away. Personally, Antony thought it was just as likely the thing was dead; it had been sitting there nearly six months, and not a sign of cracking.

  He, on the other hand, was starting to feel a little—well. Nonsensical to miss the days after he’d walked out of his stepfather’s house for good, when some unlucky nights he’d had to wrestle three men in a street game for the coin to eat—since no one would give him so much as the end of a loaf of bread on credit—or even the handful of times he’d let some fat, rich lecher paw at him just to get a bed for the night.

  But there just wasn’t any juice in it anymore. A stolen jar of wine, after running through the streets ahead of the city cohorts for an hour, had tasted ten times as sweet as any he drank now, and all his old friends had turned into toadying dogs who flattered him clumsily. The lion got loose and ate the giraffe, and then he had to get rid of the hippo after it started spraying shit everywhere, which began to feel like an omen. He’d actually picked up a book the other day: sure sign of desperation.

  He tried even more dissipation: an orgy of two days and nights where no one was allowed to sleep, but it turned out that even he had limits, and sometime in the second night, he had found them. He spent the next three days lying in a dark room with his head pounding fit to burst. It was August, and the house felt like a baking oven. His sheets were soaked through with sweat, and he still couldn’t bear to move.

  He finally crawled out of his bed and let his slaves scrub and scrape him and put him into a robe—of Persian silk embroidered with gold, because he didn’t own anything less gaudy anymore—and then he went out into the courtyard and collapsed on a divan underneath some orange trees. “No, Jupiter smite you all, get away from me and be quiet,” he snarled at the slaves.

  The lion lifted its head and snarled at him, in turn. Antony threw the wine jug at the animal and let himself collapse back against the divan, throwing an arm up over his eyes.

  He slept again a while, and woke to someone nudging his leg. “I told you mange-ridden dogs to leave me the hell alone,” he muttered.

  The nudging withdrew for a moment. Then it came back again. “Sons of Dis, I’m going to have you flogged until you—” Antony began, rearing up, and stopped.

  “Is there anything more to eat?” the dragon asked.

  He stared at it. Its head was about level with his, and it blinked at him with enormous green eyes, slit-pupiled. It was mostly green, like the last one, except with blue spines. He looked past it into the courtyard. Bits and chunks of shell were littering the courtyard all over, and the lion—“Where the hell is the lion?” Antony said.

  “I was hungry,” the dragon said unapologetically.

  “You ate the lion?” Antony said, still half-dazed, and he stared at the dragon again. “You ate the lion,” he repeated, in dawning wonder.

  “Yes, and I would like some more food now,” the dragon said.

  “Hecate’s teats, you can have anything you want,” Antony said, already imagining the glorious spectacle of his next party. “Maracles!” he yelled. “Damn you, you lazy, sodding bastard of a slave,
fetch me some goats here! How the hell can you talk?” he demanded of the dragon.

  “You can,” the dragon pointed out, as if that explained anything.

  Antony thought about it and shrugged. Maybe it did. He reached out tentatively to pat the dragon’s neck. It felt sleek and soft as leather. “What a magnificent creature you are,” he said. “We’ll call you—Vincitatus.”

  IT turned out that Vincitatus was a female, according to the very nervous master of Antony’s stables, when the man could be dragged in to look at her. She obstinately refused to have her name changed, however, so Vincitatus it was, and Vici for short. She also demanded three goats a day, a side helping of something sweet, and jewelry, which didn’t make her all that different from most of the other women of Antony’s acquaintance. Everyone was terrified of her. Half of Antony’s slaves ran away. Tradesmen wouldn’t come to the house after he had them in to the courtyard, and neither would most of his friends.

  It was magnificent.

  Vici regarded the latest fleeing tradesman disapprovingly. “I didn’t like that necklace anyway,” she said. “Antony, I want to go flying.”

  “I’ve told you, my most darling one, some idiot guard with a bow will shoot you,” he said, peeling an orange; he had to do it for himself, since the house slaves had been bolting in packs until he promised they didn’t have to come to her. “Don’t worry, I’ll have more room for you soon.”

  He’d already had most of the statuary cleared out of the courtyard, but it wasn’t going to do for long; she had already tripled in size, after two weeks. Fortunately, he’d already worked out a splendid solution.

  “Dominus,” Maracles called nervously, from the house. “Cato is here.”

  “Splendid!” Antony called back. “Show him in. Cato, my good neighbor,” he said, rising from the divan as the old man stopped short at the edge of the courtyard. “I thank you so deeply for coming. I would have come myself, but you see, the servants get so anxious when I leave her alone.”

  “I did not entirely credit the rumors, but I see you really have debauched yourself out of your mind at last,” Cato said. “No, thank you, I will not come out; the beast can eat you, first, and then it will be so sozzled I can confidently expect to make my escape.”

  “I am not going to eat Antony,” Vici said indignantly, and Cato stared at her.

  “Maracles, bring Cato a chair, there,” Antony said, sprawling back on the divan, and he stroked Vici’s neck.

  “I didn’t know they could speak,” Cato said.

  “You should hear her recite the Priapeia, there’s a real ring to it,” Antony said. “Now, why I asked you—”

  “Those poems are not very good,” Vici said, interrupting. “I liked that one you were reading at your house better, about all the fighting.”

  “What?” Cato said.

  “What?” Antony said.

  “I heard it over the wall, yesterday,” Vici said. “It was much more exciting, and,” she added, “the language is more interesting. The other one is all just about fornicating, over and over, and I cannot tell any of the people in it apart.”

  Antony stared at her, feeling vaguely betrayed.

  Cato snorted. “Well, Antony, if you are mad enough to keep a dragon, at least you have found one that has better taste than you do.”

  “Yes, she is most remarkable,” Antony said, with gritted teeth. “But as you can see, we are getting a little cramped, so I’m afraid—”

  “Do you know any others like that?” Vici asked Cato.

  “What, I suppose you want me to recite Ennius’s Annals for you here and now?” Cato said.

  “Yes, please,” she said, and settled herself comfortably.

  “Er,” Antony said. “Dearest heart—”

  “Shh, I want to hear the poem,” she said.

  Cato looked rather taken aback, but then he looked at Antony—and smiled. And then the bastard started in on the whole damned thing.

  Antony fell asleep somewhere after the first half hour and woke up again to find them discussing the meter or the symbolism or whatnot. Cato had even somehow talked the house servants into bringing him out a table and wine and bread and oil, which was more than they’d had the guts to bring out for him the last two weeks.

  Antony stood up. “If we might resume our business,” he said pointedly, with a glare in her direction.

  Vincitatus did not take the hint. “Cato could stay to dinner.”

  “No, he could not,” Antony said.

  “So what was this proposition of yours, Antony?” Cato said.

  “I want to buy your house,” Antony said flatly. He’d meant to come at it roundabout, and enjoy himself leading Cato into a full understanding of the situation, but at this point he was too irritated to be subtle.

  “That house was built by my great-grandfather,” Cato said. “I am certainly not going to sell it to you to be used for orgies.”

  Antony strolled over to the table and picked up a piece of bread to sop into the oil. Well, he could enjoy this, at least. “You might have difficulty finding any other buyer. Or any guests, for that matter, once word gets out.”

  Cato snorted. “On the contrary,” he said. “I imagine the value will shortly be rising, as soon as you have gone.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t have plans to go anywhere,” Antony said.

  “Oh, never fear,” Cato said. “I think the Senate will make plans for you.”

  “Cato says there is a war going on in Gaul,” Vincitatus put in. “Like in the poem. Wouldn’t it be exciting to go see a war?”

  “What?” Antony said.

  “WELL, Antonius,” the magistrate said, “I must congratulate you.”

  “For surviving the last sentence?” Antony said.

  “No,” the magistrate said. “For originality. I don’t believe I have ever faced this particular offense before.”

  “There’s no damned law against keeping a dragon!”

  “There is now,” the magistrate said. He looked down at his papers. “There is plainly no question of guilt in this case; it only remains what is to be done with the creature. The priests of the temple of Jupiter suggest that the beast would be most highly regarded as a sacrifice, if you can arrange the mechanics—”

  “I’ll set her loose in the Forum first!” Antony snarled. “—No. No, wait, I didn’t mean that.” He took a deep breath and summoned up a smile and leaned across the table. “I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.”

  “You don’t have enough money for that even now,” the magistrate said.

  “Look,” Antony said, “I’ll take her to my villa at Stabiae—” Seeing the eyebrow rising, he amended, “—or I’ll buy an estate near Arminium. Plenty of room, she won’t be a bother to anyone—”

  “Until you run out or money or drink yourself to death,” the magistrate said. “You do realize that the creatures live a hundred years?”

  “They do?” Antony said blankly.

  “The evidence also informs me,” the magistrate added, “that she is already longer than the dragon of Brundisium, which killed nearly half the company of the fourteenth legion.”

  “She’s as quiet as a lamb?” Antony tried.

  The magistrate just looked at him.

  “Gaul?” Antony said.

  “Gaul,” the magistrate said.

  “I hope you’re happy,” he said bitterly to Vincitatus as his servants, except for the few very unhappy ones he was taking along, joyfully packed his things.

  “Yes,” she said, eating another goat.

  He’d been ordered to leave at night, under guard, but when the escort showed up, wary soldiers in full armor and holding their spears, they discovered a new difficulty: she couldn’t fit into the street anymore.

  “All right, all right, no need to make a fuss,” Antony said, waving her back into the courtyard. The house on the other side had only leaned over a little. “So she’ll fly out to the Porta Aurelia and meet us on the other side.”

/>   “We’re not letting the beast go spreading itself over the city,” the centurion said. “It’ll grab some lady off the street, or an honorable merchant.”

  He was for killing her right there and then, instead. Antony was for knocking him down, and did so. The soldiers pulled him off and shoved him up against the wall of the house, swords out.

  Then Vincitatus put her head out, over the wall, and said, “I think I have worked out how to breathe fire, Antony. Would you like to see?”

  The soldiers all let go and backed away hastily in horror.

  “I thought you said you couldn’t,” Antony hissed, looking up at her; it had been a source of much disappointment to him.

  “I can’t,” she said. “But I thought it would make them let you go.” She reached down and scooped him up off the street in one curled forehand, reached with the other and picked up one of the squealing, baggage-loaded pack mules. And then she leaped into the air.

  “Oh, Jupiter eat your liver, you mad beast,” Antony said, and clutched at her talons as the ground fell away, whirling.

  “See, is this not much nicer than trudging around on the ground?” she asked.

  “Look out!” he yelled, as the Temple of Saturn loomed up unexpectedly.

  “Oh!” She said, and dodged. There was a faint crunch of breaking masonry behind them.

  “I’m sure that was a little loose anyway,” she said, flapping hurriedly higher.

  He had to admit it made for quicker traveling, and at least she’d taken the mule loaded with the gold. She hated to let him spend any of it, though, and in any case, he had to land her half a mile off and walk if he wanted there to be anyone left to buy things from. Finally, he lost patience and started setting her down with as much noise as she could manage right outside the nicest villa or farmhouse in sight, when they felt like a rest. Then he let her eat the cattle and made himself at home in the completely abandoned house for the night.

  That first night, sitting outside with a bowl of wine and a loaf of bread, he considered whether he should even bother going on to Gaul. He hadn’t quite realized how damned fast it would be, traveling by air. “I suppose we could just keep on like this,” he said to her idly. “They could chase us with one company after another for the rest of our days and never catch us.”