But what if this was some secret test? I bit the end of the quill once more. What if this was how the Dragon Monastery chose who was to be a Mage?
No. It couldn’t be, no one else had started to complain of hearing dragon voices inside their heads. And certainly no one else was raising a dragon from an egg. The Draconis Monks barely let us do anything even related to the dragons, except for watching them through the windows of the towers and reading about them. Wouldn’t the Draconis Order warn us if this was something that was going to start happening all of a sudden to the students? Was it just between me and Paxala? Or was it something that only happened to some people, like a cold? I mused as I watched through the open window down to the main courtyard below. I could see the forms of the boys and girls sparring with their practice wooden batons and sticks. It was an unofficial training contest, organized by Lila, and a lot of those training down there were the girls who had been denied the opportunity to become the Protectors, the warrior-monks. Just like I had been denied. I rolled my eyes in disgust. The Raider girl had asked me to join in her impromptu training lessons, but what with Paxala, and the need to keep my father informed of everything that was going on I just didn’t have the time.
“Char, you could help the rest of the girls out if you joined,” Lila had said, her dark eyes steady and serious as she had cornered me after lunch. “I see that you are good with a spear, and with a bow. Your father taught you well.”
“It was my mother, actually,” I had said, which had only pleased the Raider girl even more.
“Excellent then. You know how important it is for us women to stick together – come be my assistant trainer.” Lila had offered me her tattooed hand to grip. “We have to teach each other, if they won’t teach us.” But I had to refuse, as much as I had wanted to be there.
“Fine. Lay down like the rest of them.” Lila had scolded me, and led her troop of would-be warriors out to the practice field. How she had managed to convince the Draconis Monks to let her raid the practice stores for weapons was beyond me.
I watched them knock and bash each other for a bit in the cold, admiring how good they were getting already, with just a bit of dedicated practice.
Anyway, back to the letter…
“Dear Sire, I have news which may interest you…” I then wrote, but how would my father know it was from me? I almost crossed out what I had written, but then I realized – of course—my father would surely recognize my handwriting. Just write it, I thought. Get the words out there and into the open.
I bit the end of the quill once more, trying to find the appropriate way to say ‘I have started to hear dragons in my head’ when I heard a shout from out of the window. The group of ‘official’ warrior-monks had come out of one of the storerooms, and had stopped to watch Lila’s unofficial group. I heard laughing and mocking voices.
Great, I wondered, leaning forward to try and get a good look at what was going on. Lila was a Raider’s daughter from the furthest south, and so that meant that her family had an on-and-off war with Terrence’s father, Prince Griffith the Kind. I knew this because on occasion Prince Griffith had asked my father, Prince Lander, for aid (but never, it seemed, did he ask his other and closer brother, Prince Vincent).
Lila will kill him if he makes fun of her, I thought, tucking the note back into my things and shoving it under the bed. I needed to mull over how to best explain to my father what was happening. In a way that wouldn’t make him think I’d lost my mind.
Terrence called something out to the Raider girl, and I saw her bristle, pull herself up straight and turn around, slowly advancing on the other group of boys.
“No! Wait!” Someone was breaking away from Terrence’s group, it was the boy from black curly Gypsy hair, the one whom I had seen just yesterday in the Library. Torvald. What was he doing?
I saw him step between Terrence and Lila, who both looked at him in contempt. He was trying to reason with them. Good luck with that, I thought.
All of a sudden, the dragon pipes blew.
Chapter 15
The Parade of Dragons
“Stand aside, Torvald.” Lila was growling me, and I could see her testing the weight of the wooden baton in her hand. She had been training with her unofficial warrior group for the best part of a watch when the rest of us finished our class on strategy and tactics and went out to get some fresh air. I hated being lumped in with Terrence and the rest of his cronies, I hated even being thought of as anything like them. But luckily enough, they seemed happy to just ignore me and suffer my presence amongst their ‘elite’ number.
It’s okay. I consoled myself. I was just playing a game, after all. I was here to find out what I could and go home – all I had to do was just ignore the looks and off-handed comments thrown my way until then.
But when we had got to the courtyard, and I had peeled off to spend time on my own, Terrence and his lot had immediately started whooping and calling at the ‘girls who couldn’t even hold a stick right!’
It made me feel sick. Maybe that was why Terrence’s father was called the Kind Prince, as he was too lax with his own son?
“A fight would only be bad for everybody,” I said to Lila, “so I can’t stand aside –unless you put that weapon down.”
“Why? Do you not think that I couldn’t take him and the rest of you with my bare hands?” Lila growled, letting the baton fall with a heavy whump to the cold floor. “Now stand aside, Torvald, while I teach that Terrence a lesson in manners.”
“And for what good?” I hissed at her. “So, the Draconis Order can kick you out? So that your family has to fight another war with Prince Griffith?”
“Better that then suffer his face every morning,” Lila snapped back.
“You insolent girl!” Terrence called out. “You don’t even have any royal blood in your veins…”
“Terrence, cut it out.” I was tired and exasperated with him. He was a pig, but what was worse was that he really believed what he said.
“What did you say to me, Torvald?” The prince’s son rounded on me too. “I should have known that a Gypsy and a Raider would team up against us Three Kingdom folk!” he said haughtily.
“That’s it…” Lila grunted, balling her fists and stepping forward. An ugly smirk bloomed across Terrence’s face. His remark had hit home, and he had proved to his posse of yes-men that he was right. That we were all degenerates, and not worthy of being monks or Three Kingdom folk.
“Lila, come on,” I stepped in the way, dreading the punch that I knew that she was going to give me, but willing to take it if it meant that she didn’t start a war.
BWAR! BWAR! BWAR! The dragon pipes blew, and Lila halted. That meant that it was time to feed the dragons, and it was one of the most important rituals of the day. Immediate compliance, seriousness, and respect were demanded of us all when we heard the pipes.
“Ugh!” Lila kicked the floor instead, sending up clods of dirt and stone chips in her frustration. “This isn’t over, Terrence,” she whispered at him.
“I’m sorry, Lila, but some of us have very important duties to perform…” He smiled, rushing to get changed, as were we all.
“Hurry! Hurry, students.” Quartermaster was standing at the rear gate with his little book and pen, ticking off our names as we emerged from the main halls, washed and wearing our plain black robes. We followed the other, fully-fledged Draconis Order monks as they wound their way out of the gate and up onto the mountain beyond. I had been expecting to feel nervous the next time I went up the mountain, thanks to the long hours I had spent slowly freezing to death, but strangely, this time I felt curiously lighter, freer as I walked. The last time I had been up here I had been met by my uncle, and by the strange Jodreth. I knew that the monastery wasn’t such an isolated place, and that there were others that thought favorably of me nearby.
If anything, it’s down in there that’s more dangerous to me, I thought, casting a look back at the monastery walls.
“
Torvald,” the Quartermaster narrowed his eyes as I went past. “Good to see you in such fighting fit shape,” he said with a sneer. “I do hope that you don’t get into any more trouble up on that mountain.”
“Ignore him,” someone whispered after we had passed, and I turned to see none other than Char Nefrette in line behind me. I nodded my thanks, turning and keeping my eyes focused on the back of the student in front of me. Outside the walls we were all handed a long metal goad, with two ‘tines’ at one end like a cattle prod.
“Do not antagonize the dragons,” Abbot Ansall voice called from where he was watching over us as we marched up the shingle and stone paths to the ridge. Next to him stood none other than the Prince of the Middle Kingdom, Prince Vincent dressed in all of his dark finery. I wondered if I could make out anything different about the Abbot, something that would really prove that he could be hundreds of years old. Nothing, as far as I could tell.
“You know that the Draconis Order serves the dragons, and today will be your chance to truly appreciate the glory and the might of what we strive to preserve,” he called. “We shall feed the mighty dragons and demonstrate your courage to the prince here.” The Abbot gestured toward Prince Vincent. “For the glory of the Three Kingdoms!” he cheered.
“For the glory of the Three Kingdoms,” we all chanted, although I wondered how many were really chanting for all Three Kingdoms, and not just their own particular clan, chief, or kingdom.
We made our way along the single-track trail, every five students led by a Draconis Monk. My group of five, consisting of me, Char, Dorf, Sigrid, and Maxal, was led by the angry-seeming Monk Olan, who shouted every few steps, “Stand back! Back!”
After about the twentieth time, Char whispered, “All right, all right! As if any of us want to fall down there!” but we did as we were told. None of us wanted to fall into the crater with the hungry dragons.
“We’re becoming a gang,” I whispered conspiratorially to the others, as our group waited to be sorted and correctly spaced around the crater.
“You do know that prince’s daughters aren’t supposed to be in gangs,” Char said with a mischievous grin, and Dorf and Sigrid sniggered. I felt stupid, as if the others – Sigrid and Dorf – were laughing at me. Why was I so worried about what they were thinking? I was here to do my fathers will, not care about the others….
But I do care about what the others think about me, I thought. Or these others, anyway. I’d felt that way ever since seeing Char and Sigrid and the girls get picked on and berated by Greer for no reason. It was unfair. It wasn’t how things were supposed to be. Maybe it was so recently spending time with Uncle Lett – I missed his honest, simple companionship and humor. I missed having people that I could trust.
Collections of black-clad monks and students crisscrossed the skyline like strange new trees, and it seemed that every monk was on edge.
“Right, don’t embarrass me, okay?” our own angry-monk hissed. “And pay attention. I’m here to make sure you learn a few things about the dragon offering and don’t die in the process. Look there…” He pointed to where the two taller forms of the Abbot and the prince stood. The Abbot took a step forward, raising his hands.
“Mighty Zaxx the Golden! Accept these gifts!” he called down to the crater below.
There was the sound of rumbling from below, and a shape lifted its immense bulk from the largest of caves. A snout the size of a room, a head the size of a tower, and the golden scales of the old bull-dragon flashed in the sun. There was a rattling croak of a sound as the Gold slowly raised himself and finally stretched his long neck to regard the Abbot, face to face. The thin figure beside the Abbot – Prince Vincent – stepped back a little, and I grinned at his apparent trepidation.
Serves him right.
“Mighty Zaxx,” the Abbot said as he gestured forward with his hands. The large hunks of meat resting at his feet lifted from the ground and floated in the air between them, and Zaxx opened his mouth, for the food to drop in.
“First question you lot,” Monk Olan hissed at us. “Why does Zaxx the Golden have to eat first?” He kept one eye on the Abbot as he asked us our first direct dragon question. “Anyone?”
Maxal Ganna raised his hand.
“I know you know the answer, Maxal, or if you don’t then you should by now. Dorf?” The monk quickly dismissed Maxal’s offer.
“Because uh, because Zaxx is the lead dragon.”
“Bull dragon it’s called. He’s the bull of all of the others down there. What does that mean, Sigrid?” the monk asked the questions fast.
“Uh, that, that he gets to eat first.” She shrugged at the obviously circular logic.
“Fool,” the Draconis Order monk said. “That he is in charge of the others. He gets mating privileges, and he is the first to hunt, the first to a kill, and all the other dragons protect him and keep him safe.”
“How old is Zaxx the Golden?” I asked the monk, watching as the last of the food tumbled into the great Gold’s gullet, who gave a contented grumble and sank down to the ledge, giving a strange rumbling call, that seemed to indicate the other dragons could now come and be fed. He moved slowly, in the way that I imagine a mountain would move if it had scaled legs.
“Did I tell you that this was open questions, Torvald?” Monk Olan glared at me and I decided to shut my mouth, in fear of receiving another mountaintop punishment. He kept on looking at the Abbot and the prince, as if he were waiting for the next instruction. But I noted that he still answered my question. “No one knows for sure. Five hundred years? A thousand? He’s probably the oldest dragon there is. He might even be the father of every dragon in all of the realms.”
“We have wild dragons. Dark, midnight blue and black, but much smaller. Is Zaxx their father as well, then?” Char asked not-so-innocently.
“No more questions,” the monk snapped, as the next group of dragons rose from the pit. These ones were similar in form to Zaxx the Golden, with barrel-like bodies, squat arms, and broad heads, but they were a shockingly clear white. They were also the next largest of all of the dragon sizes.
We watched as they rose to the lips of the crater, but the Abbot gestured for the next group of monks and students to feed them. So that is what the goads are for! I saw, as the very next group started to use the goads to spear the lumps of meat and hurl them down into the pit, where the great White dragons started to snap at them and swallow them whole.
“These are the White dragons. Can anyone name their qualities? And no, not you, Maxal,” the angry monk said.
We were all quiet for a moment, until Dorf had another go. “Strong. Lots of stamina. Can fly for leagues and leagues.”
“Good.” The monk nodded. “They are also very good Den-mothers, and often act as matriarchs to whole clutches, looking after many hatchlings for the bull at the same time.” The Draconis Order monk congratulated Dorf.
Before the next group to be fed came up to the lip, there was a squabble, and a burst of fire from below. “Stand back!” the monk took up his goad in worry, peering below.
“Skreech!!” There were more calls and shouts, but the next group to climb up the terraces of rocks were the stocky green dragons. They were even smaller versions of Zaxx the Golden and the Mighty Whites, but still as large as a barn. They were apparently fiercer, however, as they snapped and hissed at each other. We watched as the next group of students threw their food (a little more frantically, it had to be said) and the Draconis Monk lectured us on how dangerous the Vicious Greens were.
“Is that why they were fighting?” Sigrid asked, causing another scowl from the monk.
“Of course. They wanted to be the next to get the food.” The monk turned back to look, keeping an eye on the nearest dragons in case they did anything unexpected.
“But I thought that they were fed in strict size dominance?” Maxal surprised everyone by saying suddenly.
“Yes.” The monk nodded. “Good observation, Maxal. The Vicious Greens are the n
ext-largest dragon, and so they are the next to eat.”
“So, there are no other dragons that will be larger than the Greens, but smaller than the Whites and Zaxx?” Char asked, frowning deeply.
“That’s what I said, wasn’t it?” Monk Olan said.
“But what about the Crimson Reds?” Maxal asked. “In the Library, it talks of a larger breed than the Vicious Greens, as red as blood and fire, and not as aggressive…”
“All dead, I’m afraid, Ganna.” The monk looked uncomfortable. “We did have two, but they caught a sickness and died. Sadly, one of the pair had been brooding a small clutch of eggs…”
“What sickness!?” Char looked alarmed beside me.
“Nothing catching, Nefrette, don’t look so worried, now…” the monk pointed to where the Greens had finally had enough, and the next set of dragons to come where the Sinuous Blues, long-necked and long-winged, with tails that wouldn’t stop twitching and thrashing as they boiled up from below. Technically, I thought that they had to be longer than the Vicious Greens, only not as broad. “So maybe that is why the Greens were fighting? Because it was usually the Crimson Red’s turn to go next, and it caused conflict in the, what do you call it?” I wondered to Maxal.
“Size dominance. It’s a dragon classification system by Justos the Philosopher, a Draconis Order monk of the third century,” the small boy said seriously.
“Just who is doing the teaching here, Ganna, you or me?” the angry monk spat.
I don’t think you’re doing any teaching at all, are you? I thought as we all looked down, and this time Char was called upon to name the qualities of the Sinuous Blues: speed, cunning, agility as yet another group of students and monks fed them.
As the dragons decreased in size and the other groups of students were called forward, I began to wonder, why hadn’t we been picked to feed any dragons yet? It seemed there was some method, some order to which the students were grouped. We watched as the Yellows scrambled, eager and apparently friendly compared to their larger cousins the Southern Desert Orange. Another group of students fed the Earth Dragons, a wingless breed of large lizard really that barely qualified for dragon other than their size (that of a cart horse). Their qualities were loyalty, and having large stomachs.
Dragon God (The First Dragon Rider Book 1) Page 13
