It was the sticks who complicated things and what was worse, tonight, I had helped them.
Thunder from the aviary as Stonecrop burst out of the doors, wings wide and he immediately took to the sky. Thankfully, I saw no flash of silver in the moonslight and he spiralled over the farm again and again before becoming no more than another star in the night. Stumptail next, an old dragon who couldn’t fly and he lumbered away from the aviary in his odd, lop-sided gait. Despite the rain, flames were travelling swiftly across the winter grass and he leapt into the flooded oryza fields like a water dragon. I watched the moons gleam off his scales until he too disappeared in the darkness.
A whoomph from the aviary and I turned to watch as it began to glow. Soon, flames leapt from the doors and sparks rushed from the open mesh roof. Gavius had set it on fire. I didn’t know why, I didn’t understand so I waited patiently for him to come out, to lay a hand on my head, to drag the dead drakina to the flames and dispose of her body with honour but he never did. He never came out and the aviary stones sizzled and popped under the heat.
A final boom from the farmhouse as the rains began anew. Papers floated down on the night breeze, edges bright, centers black, and I recognized the charred sketch of a dragon soaring across the moons.
I remembered tasty grub mash and silverstone reflections, soft kisses on my cheek and songs at midnight. I laid my chin down across the sketch and did not move for the rest of the night as the wet fields boiled all around me. Ash rose on the night breeze up to the sky where it looked like floating stars.
Ash and stars and my father, Draco Stellorum. I was very sad and I realize now that I was mourning. I didn’t know it then. It was a strange sensation, huge and empty and sharp and heavy. I had never mourned before, not truly. I had never mourned the loss of my aerie or my freedom or Summerday or even Rue but now, wave after wave crashed over me until I thought I would drown in sorrow like the ocean.
And so I mourned for all of them now, covered in blood and ashes and wishing life were very different for dragons and the sticks that ruled them.
I barely felt it then, when other sticks came sometime the next morning. They dug through the wreckage and pulled me from the ash. They freed my wing from the wedge of tin, put a band around my throat and threw me into another cart. I never saw Gavius, his children or his fields again, nor any of the dragons that had lived or died there.
Truth be told, I did not miss the dragons.
Chapter 8
THE DEATH DRAGONS
There was a plague in the town of Bangarden, and therefore great need for funeral dragons. Because of my colouring, I was a perfect choice and the price for me this time was well over fifty denari, although it made little impression on me then. I understood now the apathy of dragons. What little pride was left in my young body was quickly being turned to ash, my fledgling imagination to stone.
The smell of death was my constant companion in this place on the plains and I learned about the many rules of city life. Working carts like plaustri and carpentri were pulled by noxen, whereas finer carriages like ciseri, bennai and pilenti were pulled by dragons. Those dragons on the right side of the road had their harnesses fixed at steep angles, whereas those on the left side (going in the opposite direction) were fixed level. It made a certain sense, for dragon wings are wide whereas streets are narrow. It was a very common site for drivers to halt mid turn and lower the traps before changing direction but it made the streets even more congested than they already were.
My new owners were a family of funeral practitioners, run by a patriarch, Allum and his three sons. They ran a fleet of death carts and I had to admit, in this plague town, it was a lucrative business. They drove around the city on Death Days, calling for corpses. Sticks motioned to them from their houses, and they would carry out dead slaves, servants and unloved relatives, tossing them on the back of the carts before moving on. People paid for this service and were told that the bodies were taken for communal burial. I can assure you that they were burned in Allum’s furnace, where the ashes were sold to other sticks for use in fertilizer, soap and silver polish.
That was the way of business in Bangarden.
Now I had been sold as a funeral dragon and as such, didn’t pull the death carts like others did. I was reserved for those who paid for a private burial. Then, Allum would take out his best carriage – an elaborate roofed vehicle made of ebony wood. We went out several times a week to the Banners, neighbourhoods in Bangarden reserved for politicians, businessmen and their families. (I learned much about stick society in Bangarden. Whereas powerful dragons nest up, powerful men nest large.) Once there, we would wait for the rituals of death to end. Then, a party carried out the dead to lay them inside the funeral carriage and we would head off to the burial grounds, followed by a throng of wailing sticks. I was allowed to fly low during these times, for given my size and spectacular colouring, all traffic would stop and allow us to pass. The mourners apparently liked this and I believe Allum was paid well for this service. I had my own pen at night because the other dragons were unhappy and it was feared that they might damage my valuable pelt.
That, I realized, would not be good for business.
Day after day, I waited for the rattle of the harness that would allow me to be out in the wet winter sun. I never had realized how much I loved the sun until Bangarden. Well, truthfully, until the Under Weathers and the advent of the rainy season but at least there, I could be outside in the air and fly, even if pulling a plow or a tiller. Here, I stayed in my pen until an important stick died, necessitating the services of a funeral dragon. My pen was not open to the sky as in the Under Weathers, but roofed and dark, without even a window to see stars or moons. I slept more often than not and grew deaf to the incessant chatter and squeals of the other dragons.
My new name was Hallowdown and I must admit I liked it. A combination of Hallow Fire and Hell Down and I thought it fitting for a drake of my colour and stature. I was a year-and-a-halfling now, and growing larger every day. There were four others all under two, which is the perfect size for pulling a cart. I could only imagine what happened to the death dragons over the age of three. I admit that I don’t remember seeing any older in my brief time in the markets, nor in my days on the streets.
I sometimes wondered how one would kill a three year-old dragon. By then, our horns are in, our necks are fully maned with spines and the spikes on our throats are strong and hard. A simple slit of a blade would not do it. I did remember relative ease of dispatching Ruby with a few strokes of an axe and it made me sad when I realized how I knew this. I had helped to kill the indigo dragon and in doing so, I had helped to kill Ruby. My obedience and my integrity had cost the lives of two dragons. Although I tried not to think of it, I must admit that there was little else to do but think.
That line had been crossed so subtly. With all the indignities I had witnessed in my short life, I had found it easy to lose myself in the service of sticks. The moment I’d smelled the firestone, I had made a choice. I could have feigned ignorance. I could have flown away the moment the band had been removed. I’d thought I was better than other dragons, smarter, more respectable and therefore not subjugated by the sticks whose only weapons were mesh and whips and dreaded metal bands.
It was apathy, I realized, as I lay there listening to the other dragons quarrel and fight. As selfish as they were, the sticks understood how to work together to accomplish a task. Dragons don’t think much beyond themselves and their own needs.
I believe I grew quite cynical and esoteric in those days as a funeral dragon. Time and death, it appears, does that to a dragon.
I was also growing hard in my spirit. I had been free for less than one sixth of my life and the memories of the sea and the stars and other noble things condensed into small stones, like lumps of coal that simmer and grow cold. I thought often of Rue and Tacita, Summerday and Ruby. Freedom and loss and beauty and pride; my early world crushed to embers under the formidable iron
wheel of life.
I also thought often of the no-faced man, of Gavius and his axe coming down on a defeated Ruby, of dragons bought and sold like fish, dragons in pens and under harness. I only needed to call these things back to mind, and those coals would blaze anew. It was a different kind of fire, one that had no need of arcstone and thrived in spite of the silver band at my throat.
Or maybe, it thrived because of it.
“Come now, Hallowdown,” came a familiar voice and I opened my eyes to see a young man entering the dark aviary. “Who’s the finest funeral dragon in all of Bangarden?”
I rose to my feet and shook the straw and chaff from my scales, reached my wing-talons out before me and stretched long in the spine and tail. The pen wasn’t large enough for me to fully extend my wings. In that respect, Gavius’s aviary was considerably superior, but I was the only dragon to have a solo pen, so I couldn’t complain.
I was happy to see it was Junias the middle son, rather than Kellas or Nonus or even their father, Allum. All were experienced dragoneers but Junias had kind hands, and with the new head-harness I was wearing, that kindness was an important consideration. He entered the pen and I bowed, curling my wings in and lowering my head in respect.
That, I learned, was what working city dragons did.
The death dragons began to shriek when he slipped a hand into his pocket and pulled out a sliver of dried goswyrm. I took it, shredding it slowly as to savour the taste on my tongue. I had learned that respectful behaviour usually went well for me, all things considered. And since I was a dragon with integrity, I always gave respect until a stick or dragon lost it. Then, I have to admit my pride would reign and those little coals would flare and grow white hot. Character flaw or simply life, I cannot say. Or perhaps, more truthfully, I would not.
Junias checked the silver carter-bolt band at my throat, ran his hand along my neck and scratched the maturing horns. They itched terribly and I released a long rumbling sigh. Back feet were awkward for scratching and more than once, I found myself envying their hands.
He laughed, lifted the head-harness with the wedge of metal that I now wore in my mouth.
This, to dragons, is the ultimate indignity. Such glorious, majestic and powerful creatures controlled by a slip of metal between our teeth. It was called a ‘bit’ and I will admit it made controlling us much easier, for as large and powerful as we are, our heads sit at the end of our very long necks. As such, they are easily turned and where a dragon’s head goes, so goes his body. I had been wearing bits for months now since being brought to Allum’s aviary, so I opened my mouth and accepted it, bristling at the sharp tang of iron on my tongue and the grate of the curb against the roof of my mouth. With Junias, his kind hands meant less friction and therefore, a much more pleasant drive for me.
I always hated the sound of Kellas or Nonus’s sandals on the floor. I would rarely be able to eat on the nights after they drove because my tongue and palate would be bruised for days. If I had hands like the sticks, I would push the metal into their mouths. But if I had hands like the sticks, then I would be a stick and all things would be reversed.
As you can see, I had much time for thinking.
Junias led me out past the other dragons, their shrieks and hisses bouncing harmlessly off my night-black pelt. I secretly yearned for the days at Gavius’ though, when Stonecrop and I would play bite-beak between the mesh, or I would happily watch Stumptail’s acid spit-wads streak across the pens. Dragons don’t do well in confinement. We were made to fly in open skies. Something the sticks apparently did not understand or appreciate.
Maybe the Dragon Flights understood that. Maybe that’s why I thought of them so much.
The black carriage was waiting in the courtyard, its ebony wood polished to gleaming and its fittings painted a liquid gold leaf. I took my place in the traces, standing quietly as he fastened the harness across my back and under my wings. This carriage also had a wooden brace for my feet and I found it very useful to press against while keeping the momentum forward and low. It also had a T-shaft, a groove beneath the carriage for my tail, eliminating the need to bind or dock it as with other death dragons. All in all, it was a well-designed vehicle, I thought, but when the only other things I knew were plows and tillers, skiffs and dorries, I was no expert.
The poles next, affixed to both sides of the harness. There was none underneath. I was an experienced cart-dragon now with no need for the fixed brace. I had often wondered if I could carry the thing upwards to the stars given the inclination, but I’d never had the inclination, so I never tried.
Lastly, the draw-reins. I hated the draw reins. They ran from the bit through rings on the breastplate and up to the drivers. Draw-reins allowed them to pull our heads down to our chests, making for an attractively arched neck when pulling a carriage. It was uncomfortable to fly with head tucked into my chest and by the end of the day every muscle in my body ached from the unnatural position. I never knew if there was another function for the draw-rein. They never spoke of it, just attached it and drove. Once again, I was thankful for Junias and his kind hands.
He climbed aboard and rolled a black canvas awning over his head. It was the end of the winter season and that meant a lighter rain from morning to night. As a dragon, I welcomed the water as a friend, an ally, a kindred spirit but after so many months, I longed to see the sun once more. I never saw the moons or my father, Draco Stellorum. In the rainy season, there were far too many clouds.
With a flick of the rein we were out into the city.
Bangarden meant ‘Fine Garden.’ It was a city built for high-born Remoan politicians and their servants. Streets cobbled with worn stone, palms on every corner, cedars in every fine yard. Travertine homes, limestone walls, marble statues. Here, there was politics and there was the plague and as a result, there was also civil unrest. Both took their toll on men and dragons alike.
This rainy morning, I saw another funeral carriage pulled by a drake named Towndrell. Towndrell was a grey with a faint pattern of indigo stripes across his back and legs. His tail had been docked just below the rump and to me he looked like a winged nox. He had a large, kind eye however and was as fine-tempered as any dragon I had ever met. I had liked him the moment we’d met, carriage to carriage at a large family funeral. He was respectful and earnest and longed to serve his driver to the best of his ability. His driver, Philius was an angry man – harsh with the bit and harsher with the whip. I often wondered if the stripes across Towndrell’s back were not a coat pattern but rather scars left by a lifetime of angry men. I would believe it had he language to tell me.
I also believe I once saw Summerday. This was a city that prided itself on wealth, position and appearance, and truthfully, nothing could be finer than a golden dragon pulling a golden pilentus. She had the draw-reins pulled tight so her neck arched magnificently, and her spines looked like the rays of Selisanae, Dragon of the Sun. Unlike Towndrell, her tail had been coiled and bound, mirroring the arch of her neck and she flew without blinders under the constant cracking of a golden whip. I called to her but her drivers were hard and if she heard, she had no opportunity to respond. Or perhaps, she cared not to. The no-faced man had hated me, and she had been devoted to her master.
Such was the life of dragons.
Back to my story.
This morning, I saw Towndrell in the town square flailing against the braces. His cart’s rear wheel was wedged in a rut in the cobbles. The streets were old and well-worn and even in the finer areas of town, there were large gaps between the stones. In the rains they filled with mud and became treacherous sinkholes for wheels. We tried to avoid them but sometimes our drivers did not pay attention. The road rarely obliged even the most diligent of dragons.
I watched as Towndrell struggled to pull the wheel loose, watched the whip come down across his back again and again, making stripes in his leathery coat. Blood from his knees splashed into the puddles and ran between the cobbled stones like a river. In the carria
ge seat behind me, Junias muttered a curse. He hated poor treatment of dragons but he was a junior driver and usually kept his opinions to himself. Now, there was a crowd of spectators gathering around the carriage, some shouting at the driver, others shouting at the dragon. This was Bangarden. Everyone had an opinion. Everyone was to blame.
The rain came down, the traffic had ground to a halt when Junias surprised me by leaping from the driver’s seat, leaving me stranded on my side of the road. Without a word, he tromped through the rain and pushed through the crowd, reaching Towndrell’s carriage and leaning his back into the wheel. The driver cursed him and shook his fist, but within moments, a second man appeared and then a third. Together they worked the wheel free from the sucking mud and the crowd cheered as they finally placed it on steady ground.
He laid a hand on Towndrell’s neck.
“Go easy on him, Philius,” he called up through the rain. “He can’t get his weight into the trace with the draw-rein so tight.”
“Oh forgive me, wise Master Junias!” snapped the driver. “But you’ve forgotten what it is like to work hard. Not all of us have night dragons to impress the senators.”
“Treat your dragon well and you’ll impress the senators, Philius.”
Junias turned but Philius brought the whip down behind him with a crack. The crowd shrunk back, waiting and wet.
“You’ve forgotten your rank, Junias Allum,” Philius snarled. “You are new money and proud show. The Prefect will remember those who have served him long after night dragons lose their fashion.”
The crowd parted as a thin-haired man in a fine cloak stepped out from among them, a servant holding a nox-skin parasol over his head.
“The Prefect is an imbecile,” said the man. “He remembers nothing. But the senators; well, the senators are another matter.”
Dragon of Ash & Stars: The Autobiography of a Night Dragon Page 8
