by J M Sanford
Commander Breaker was the first of the others to move, dashing from the room and hurtling down the broad icy staircase, shouting orders to the golems who had been serving the drinks. Rose, abandoned by her prince, rushed after him in a rustle of silk skirts.
Meg turned to Amelia with a mad and desperate smile. “Shall we?” and she crooked her arm as if they were about to take a turn around the gardens. Warily, the guests made their way down to the atrium. By this point two golems stood behind the great grey doors, at the ready with their swords, and stone footsteps echoed through the chambers of the ice palace at a run as more came to swell the meagre defences. The doors swung silently open, a chill wind rushing in and drifting snow onto the mosaic floor. Out there on the road stood the white dragon, its scales cracked and gouged from battle, its broken horns bright with the first flush of moonlight. And, seated on its back, an armoured figure. Amelia’s heart leapt – it couldn’t be… The broad-shouldered figure wore the insignia of the white lamb. As she looked closer, the dragon’s rider brushed his thick brown hair from his eyes, looking over the assembled crowd until his gaze alighted on Amelia. Harold.
Prince Archalthus stood before dragon and rider, almost invisible in their shadow, almost inconsequential. Rose darted to her fiancé’s side, clutching at his hand. He said nothing. It was a blessing not to be able to see the look on his face. Amelia braced herself for the expected flash of fire as the furious prince took dragon form… but nothing happened. Nor had he fought Regeltheus before, she remembered.
Harold jumped down from the dragon’s back, turning a stumble into a courtly bow. He turned to the dragon. “Your Highness,” he said, and gestured to Amelia, “the White Queen.” He looked so unlike her Harold. All the lessons in manners and sword fighting in the world surely couldn’t have taken the sweet boy who had wanted to rescue her and turned him into the dragon knight standing before her. Amelia’s blood ran cold: had he betrayed her?
But the dragon, too, bowed low in submission. “I wish to apologise for my earlier behaviour,” he said. “Had I known I was in the presence of the White Queen, I would have shown due respect, naturally. Can you forgive me for my rough conduct, my Queen?” And he smiled in the way that only a dragon can.
“O-of course, Your Highness,” Amelia stammered, barely thinking about it, her thoughts whirling like a storm, and in the eye of that storm the one glorious fact of Harold being alive and here, the answer to her prayers.
“And you, brother?” said the dragon, turning to Archalthus. His look was sly. “I bring you this ring as a token of goodwill.” He opened his great fanged jaws and spat something out into the snow, something that glinted gold, brighter than anything else in the world. “Will you forgive me my dreadful ill manners?”
The Red Prince’s stance and expression were stiff. “But of course,” he said with icy politeness, retrieving the offered gift. His eyes were vicious as he glanced at his Commander. “I fear there have been a number of misunderstandings. Much to… explain.” He held his fists tightly at his sides. “Sheath your swords,” he ordered the golems. “Let my brother through.”
At his word, the golems drew back in unison. The white dragon came into the atrium, careless of the beautiful ice carvings as he passed his brother, who took a step back in spite of himself. Archalthus was visibly shaking with rage, trailing red-hot sparks as he followed Regeltheus up the stairs and back to the great hall.
Harold hesitated to follow, and when the two princes had disappeared from view, Amelia threw her arms around his shoulders, the floodgates of her tears opening. Carefully, he put his arms around her.
“He told us you were dead!” she sobbed.
“Here, don’t cry,” he said, gently, “I’m not even hurt.”
Amelia pulled back, wiping her eyes with one hand as she searched for her handkerchief.
“We thought you had a plan,” said Meg, sounding more put out than relieved. Harold had thrown away any advantage of surprise, coming right up and knocking on Prince Archalthus’ front door.
Harold watched the golems disperse, returning to whatever tasks they’d been drawn from. “We have.”
“We?” Meg stared at him in disbelief. “You and the dragon?”
“Better not talk about it here.”
“Well then,” said Meg. “Let’s join Their Highnesses, shall we?”
In the great hall, the white dragon had made himself at home and lay in front of the hearth like an enormous cat, soaking up the heat and blocking anybody else from that comfort. Archalthus perched on the edge of the largest grandest chair in the room, one hand gripping a wineglass, the other clenched around the end of the chair’s arm. At the sound of approaching footsteps the two mismatched brothers had fallen silent and both turned to stare at the door. Amelia faltered, then felt a hand close around hers. She glanced to her side: Harold. Around them, the others moved into the room, keeping a respectful and cautious distance from the dragon. Harold gave Amelia’s hand a squeeze, and they went forward together.
If the gathering had been an uncomfortable one before, it was ten times worse with Regeltheus there. Amelia wanted to wrap her arms around Harold and never let him go again. Instead, she had to settle for telling him a carefully abridged tale of what had happened while he’d been gone: the errant sun, the Archmage’s triumph over it, the upcoming wedding. She couldn’t mention Morel’s theft of Sharvesh or the skyship’s lucky escape, or the black dragon beneath the ice. Not here, not now. “He told us you were dead!” she whispered, tears welling in her eyes at the mere thought of it, and she gripped both his hands tightly as if to prove to herself that he was real. “He said the dragon killed you! How…”
Harold shook his head. “I’ll explain soon enough.”
The white dragon’s head turned on its long snakelike neck until its ice blue eyes fixed upon Amelia. Amelia, unfamiliar with the rules and tactics of such gatherings, hadn’t yet learned that although putting yourself in a corner might limit the directions from which unwanted attention can approach you, it also allowed the opportunity for another guest to pen you in and impose their company upon you. And nobody could beat a dragon for such an approach. Harold dropped Amelia’s hands in a hurry when he saw the white dragon rise fluidly and wind his way towards them. Amelia felt like a little mouse, transfixed by that stare.
“Miss Lamb?”
She forced herself to nod, and managed a wooden curtsey. “Pleased to meet you, Your Highness,” she said.
“Paladin, I wish to speak with the lady alone,” said the dragon imperiously.
Harold bowed stiffly and walked away. The dragon’s glimmering white coils shifted in closer, cutting Amelia off completely from the rest of the group. He held a large glass of red wine daintily in one clawed hand, and Amelia wondered why he didn’t transform into a shape more suited to socialising. If Archalthus could do it, presumably so could his brother.
“You are more beautiful than I could have imagined,” he said. Then he lowered his head to within mere inches of her ear, and whispered, “We shall win back your Crown, my dear.”
Amelia flinched from the heat of the dragon’s breath, hearing the reptilian hiss of his words but barely registering their meaning at first.
“We’ve tried that,” she said. Of course, we didn’t have a full-blooded dragon on our side then, so that could probably tip the balance.
“We will win,” said Regeltheus again. Either the White Prince had a cast iron plan, or else he simply didn’t believe in a world where he could fail. Was that arrogance a trait of all dragons, or just this family? She glanced over at Harold, alive and safe, beyond the boundary of the white dragon’s coils. She hadn’t forgotten her deal with fate – how could she?
“You’ll make for a lovely dragoness,” Regeltheus whispered, showing his long fangs in a conspiratorial smile. “Just as soon as my wedding ring is on your finger.”
Amelia looked up at him in surprise. “I don’t…” She didn’t understand. How was she to be a
dragoness? Was he speaking in metaphors? She really hoped he was speaking in metaphors.
“Don’t be afraid.” He smiled again, not the slightest bit reassuring. “The transformation will be swift and painless as a bud blossoming into a rose.”
“But you don’t have the ring. You gave it to your brother.”
“Have no fear: I can take it back whenever I please.”
Amelia felt fate prodding at her, reminding her that she had an obligation to fulfil, a price to pay for Harold’s safe return. She’d wanted a sign, and what was more a sign than this? But she didn’t want to be a dragoness…
Rescue came from an unexpected quarter: Rose Hartwood. The Red Queen approached, smiling a white and winning smile. “This is your first meeting, isn’t it?” she said, passing Amelia a fresh glass of wine. “And here you two are alone in a quiet corner. Where is your guardian, Miss Lamb?” she said, with a laugh that suggested she’d made some sort of joke.
Feeling helpless, Amelia glanced to where Harold stood. From the thunderously unhappy look on his face, she thought he might have guessed the nature of the conversation between White Prince and White Queen. “He’s watching,” she said. And then, because the intimidatingly beautiful girl was nothing when standing next to a dragon, Amelia asked, “Where’s yours?”
Rose arched her perfect eyebrows in surprise. “Scarlet looks after me. And of course the servants are always watching,” she said, gesturing to the room behind her, because servants had always been at her beck and call and she couldn’t imagine their absence. Most of the stone gentlemen she’d indicated were busy with other tasks, though, far from the scintillating gathering in the grand hall. Bessie had found a niche in chatting with the only golem in sight. She’d stopped him from circulating with his tray of drinks to bend his ear on the subject of calligraphy, for some reason, and she was happily filling his stone head with unfamiliar terminology and inconsequentialities.
“Come to think of it,” said Rose, “Your mother must be somewhere about the place. Although having to rely on one’s own mother as chaperone is rather…” she trailed off, her mouth twisting into an expression of distaste. “Darling, why couldn’t you have brought a handmaid? She could have been a friend for Scarlet. Does Miss Castle do your hair? Do you do each other’s hair?” The questions rattled on so fast that there was scarcely a gap for Rose to draw breath, let alone for Amelia to wedge any kind of answer into the one-sided conversation. “Did you grow up in the same neighbourhood? Oh, of course not, you’re from somewhere out in the sticks, aren’t you?”
“A country house?” Regeltheus asked. “Do tell us more.”
“It– it’s not… I wouldn’t call it a country house,” said Amelia, and took a nervous gulp of her wine, almost choking on it. “It’s more of a tower, although it is in the country, I suppose. Does that… does that count?” she asked, risking a glance first at the dragon, whose expression was naturally difficult to read, then at Rose, whose smug smile spoke volumes.
“How many acres of land?” asked Regeltheus.
“I… I don’t know. Father has an enormous library, though,” she said, catching on to that one fact in defence of her beloved home, though she couldn’t help thinking it paled in comparison to the library she’d seen in the palace. “He was a professor, before I was born.” And before Meg ran away. Careful not to mention that.
“A professor?” said Regeltheus. He was not so close now, which was a relief.
Rose had fallen silent, smirking just a tiny bit behind her own wineglass.
Amelia nodded. “Of geography, I think. I don’t remember where, exactly…” She should have been bragging, making a good impression on her White Prince. Fate had brought Harold back, and it could just as easily take him away again, if she didn’t hold up her end of the bargain. So, where to begin? What were her best attributes? She’d been an early and avid reader, devouring books since the age of four; she could knit and sew like nobody’s business; she was getting rather good at magic. None of this was going to impress a prince. Amelia had never thought to practice balancing books on her head, something Bessie apparently had to do in her lessons. Proper ladies had their clothes sewn for them by maidservants. And Amelia didn’t want to draw attention to her conjuring rings, although her fidgeting hands and the candlelight had probably done that just fine. She swallowed her pride. “Your hair looks so beautiful,” she said to Rose, in a gesture of conciliation. “Is Scarlet as good as your handmaid at home?”
She hardly listened to the answer, but it was the push Rose had needed to start talking again, and once Rose began, she was an avalanche of words and tinkling laughter. Her audience could have been a row of dolls, for all she cared. Prince Regeltheus listened politely as Rose talked of her beautiful home in Iletia, how her father had once taken her along on a business trip and allowed her to pick out all her favourites from the cloth in some exotic bazaar. The dragon’s ice blue eyes flickered to the crown on Rose’s head more than once, but it was hard to tell what he was thinking. As a dragon, immense and powerful, he could easily pluck the crown from her head and probably fight his way out of the palace with Amelia in tow, but his plan must be more subtle than that. She only wished he would share it with her. And why didn’t he take on human form? Of course, his scaly hide was criss-crossed with bloody wounds, and Amelia feared such injuries would be even more terrible on a human body.
“Your Highness,” she ventured, when Rose next paused for breath, “You’re wounded – is there anything I can do to help? My mother’s a very good witch, and I’m sure she can give you something for the pain, if nothing else.”
The dragon dipped his head in a graceful bow. “Your kindness does you credit, my lady.”
~
There had been no talk of using the tiny bottle of Healall on the dragon, but the hothouse in Scarlet’s kitchen garden provided a surprising array of medicinal herbs, so that Meg had easily been able to whip up something non-magical for the pain and to speed up the healing. Regeltheus barely made a sound as Meg and Amelia worked to clean and tend his many wounds. Scarlet, her attention only half on the pot of water warming on the stove, watched nervously. She’d never had a dragon in her kitchen before, and she clearly didn’t like it, but she’d been in no position to refuse.
The white dragon, now that he was not snarling and hissing in rage, could be considered a handsome beast in his own right. Like a lion, Amelia thought. Fierce, but noble in his way. Amelia pondered as she worked whether it would be so bad to be the dragon’s queen, if it ensured the safety of her family and friends. Royals didn’t marry for love, not in the real world. Bessie had told her all about that. It was just… well, she knew it was selfish and vain of her, but she wanted to see what Regeltheus looked like in human form before she decided if she could bring herself to marry him. Just one glimpse, just to satisfy her curiosity. Having her imagination running wild was the worst thing. Maybe the White Prince was as hideous as his brother was beautiful. He was certainly bigger, and maybe he didn’t carry his weight well in human form, or he might be bald, or have a huge crooked nose… She just didn’t know. But she could resign herself to any physical flaws for the sake of peace.
She rinsed out the bloody cloth she was using, before dabbing tenderly at a cut beneath the dragon’s eye. “That must hurt terribly,” she said, quite genuinely. The sweep of the blade had skirted perilously close to the shining liquid surface of the blue eye. And to think that it may well have been Harold’s sword which had dealt the blow… The thought made her shudder.
“A mere scratch,” said the dragon. “Every drop of blood shed for you is worth it, my Queen.”
“Oh, thank you. Would you –” Amelia paused, uncertain. “Would you mind terribly turning your head to the light?” she said, abandoning her real question at the last instant. Regeltheus obliged, and Amelia cursed herself for not having the nerve to make what she was sure was a perfectly reasonable request. She only wanted to see what he really looked like. “Thank yo
u,” she mumbled again. “I couldn’t see what I was doing there.”
“Speaking of that: what are you doing here?” Meg asked Regeltheus, bluntly.
“Putting my brother’s mind at ease,” he said. He turned to smile slyly at Amelia. “Meeting my Queen.” Then, more seriously, “Seeking to put an end to the absolute farce that the Queen’s Contest has become. Where are the grand armies of the Three? Where are the powerful Mages?” Neither Meg nor Amelia saw fit to mention the Archmage who had enslaved him. “Ah well. My brother may have had the element of surprise on his side before, not to mention that devious creature Morel, but this time there’ll be no hiding in the shadows, and my brother will find I’m a great deal stronger than he is when we fight dragon to dragon.” Then he stole another adoring look at Amelia. “My Queen deserves so much more than this.” It seemed only right to attempt a curtsey, which Amelia did, blushing as the dragon smiled all the more. “You really will be the most splendid dragoness,” he continued. “You will outshine diamonds and opals. I do hope you’ll keep that beautiful colour to your eyes after the transformation, though. Such a priceless hue should never be lost.”
Meg had stopped what she was doing to watch this exchange, glancing from girl to dragon and back again before catching Amelia’s eye and giving her a look that suggested this was the first she’d heard of any transformation.
“This… this transformation business,” said Amelia, looking down at her hands, the finger where the gold of a wedding ring would shine against her skin, though it was currently occupied with part of her conjuring set. “You say it’s painless?”
“Completely. Have no fear, my Queen.”
Amelia nodded, eyes down. Demure. Thinking.
Meg had seen the look on her face, of course. As soon as they were out of the kitchen and on their way back to the guest parlour, she hissed in her daughter’s ear, “I forbid you from doing what you’re thinking of doing.”
