Dragon and Phoenix

by Joanne Bertin

  “Virienne!” he said. “This is Maurynna! Remember her? The Maurynna who broke your favorite, and very expensive, Assantikan teapot when we were ten years old? Don’t do anything fancy for her. Please. I think she’d finally break down and cry if you did. Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I wanted to hug Breslin.”

  And I owe him on my own account as well. He decided it would be best not to elaborate. Let Virienne think it was by chance he came when his father wasn’t here.

  “Breslin?” Virienne echoed in astonishment. “That ill-mannered little—why on earth? I’d have thought you more likely to bloody his nose for him.”

  Raven nodded. “So would I. But when we made port, Rynna’s family behaved as though some stranger had come among them, some princess of the realm that they couldn’t even approach. Not one hugged her, and Kesselandt even began to bend the knee to her. I thought Rynna would burst into tears right then and there. But that’s when Breslin saved the day, may the gods bless the obnoxious toad. The moment he saw her he started a fight with Rynna as though nothing had changed—especially Maurynna.” Raven grinned at his stepmother, knowing how she hated puns.

  This one did not slip by her. She grimaced. “Maurynna—Changed. Raven, that one was truly awful, even for you.” She swatted him.

  Dodging, Raven said, “Friends again, Virienne? Tell Honigan I want to see him, that I’m on his side in this, will you? I—I lost my girl; I don’t want to lose my mother and elder brother, too.” It had been close, too close to happening. The thought stuck in his throat.

  She drew his face down to hers and kissed him tenderly on the forehead as any mother would. “I’ll see that you won’t, dearest. You’re returning to the Erdon enclave? It might be for the best, at least for tonight. I’ll try to reason with your father. Go with my love.”

  He kissed her cheek. “Thank you,” he whispered and hugged her hard before letting her go.

  Raven let himself out of the small solar and walked slowly through the house, still trying to lay a finger on what was wrong about his home. It felt too small, as if it had somehow shrunk while he was away. He paused by the door to his sleeping chamber. What would he find if he looked? An empty room, his father having ordered even the memory of the wayward son wiped away? Or had his father turned it into a storeroom for wool bales in revenge? After a moment Raven gave in to temptation and peeked inside.

  It was just as he’d left it, still smelled of leather oil and sweet woodruff. He sagged against the doorjamb in relief; a thousand memories came back in a rush. The window hangings were open; the last rays of the sun lay like bright fingers across the black and green blanket on the narrow bed, the blanket Virienne had woven for him when she’d first married his father. There was the clothes chest at the foot of the bed, his saddle resting on it, waiting for him to finish repairing the broken stitching. He saw the table desk by the window, the account book he’d been working on the morning he left still open upon it. By the book were a quill and a bottle of ink. He wondered if the ink had dried out; as usual he’d forgotten to stopper it. Everything the same. It all felt so familiar and yet … different.

  How can it feel strange, he mused, leaning against the frame, when nothing’s cha—

  He was off the doorjamb like a stone from a sling and into the room. Where were his horses? The shelves along the far wall that held his childhood collection of carved wooden horses were empty. He began searching.

  It wasn’t long before he found them. It was plain they’d been swept off in a fit of temper. They lay on the floor, hidden from sight on the far side of the bed—or, rather, what was left of them. The proud herd was now nothing but bits of splintered wood fit only for tinder.

  Dropping his cloak, he knelt by the sorry little pile. Tears stung Raven’s eyes as he touched a leg here, a finely carved head there. He knew them all, had a name for each of them, had loved them through the years. The dust was thick upon them—and only them. This had been done some time ago and left as—What? A warning?

  His favorite lay at the bottom, a stallion carved of some dark wood that had aged over the years to blackness. It looked, he realized with surprise, much like Shan. Or it had, once; now it was slivers. Clearly this one had borne the brunt of the destroyer’s temper.

  Da’s temper, a voice said in Raven’s mind. He wanted to name the voice liar. He knew he couldn’t. Not without naming himself liar as well. And that I will not be.

  Raven was up and moving for the door. He wanted nothing more than to get out of this house; this house that he could never come back to.

  This was not home. Not now.

  At the end of dinner, a servant came in and whispered something to Uncle Kesselandt. He nodded and dismissed the woman with a quiet, “Thank you.”

  When she was gone, Uncle Kesselandt said, “The Mousehole is now ready for you. Your belongings have been brought over; I trust that is satisfactory, Your Graces?”

  “As long as I didn’t have to pack the stuff, it certainly is, Master Kesselandt,” said Lleld with heartfelt fervor. “I always forget how much I hate that part of traveling.”

  Kesselandt smiled.

  “Thank you, uncle,” Maurynna said.

  “You’re welcome, my dear.”

  It was a little stiff; she could almost hear the unspoken “Your Grace” that her punctilious uncle no doubt felt he should add, but it was much more like the Kesselandt she knew than the man who had greeted her on the dock. Someone must have spoken to him.

  She thought she could guess who. A glance across the table confirmed it; Linden was nodding in approval at Kesselandt. She wished she dared thank him. But this was not the time or place to try Kyrissaean’s forebearance.

  Ah, well. She would “thank” him later, she thought, and drank to hide her smile.

  Now her uncle looked around the table. It was a small family dinner by Erdon standards: only a dozen or so kin and the travelers.

  “Raven isn’t staying here with you, Rynna?” Kesselandt asked.

  Heads turned this way and that as everyone looked for the young, red-haired Yerrin.

  Taren, who had been silent for most of the meal, said, “He told me he was going to his family’s house, Master Kesselandt. That was late this morning, just before he left.”

  Otter glanced over his shoulder to look out the window. “He must be staying there; it’s near dusk now.”

  Maurynna heaved a sigh of relief. Otter’s right. Thank the gods; Master Redhawk must have finally come to his senses.

  Kesselandt said, “Shall I show you to the Mousehole now?”

  The Dragonlords looked at each other and nodded. “That would be well, Master Kesselandt,” Lleld said, her gaze lingering on Taren. “It’s been a long day for us.”

  Kesselandt rose and went to the door. The Dragonlords, Otter, and Taren followed.

  As the sun slipped beneath the horizon and the air grew colder, Raven wrapped his arms around himself and called himself nine kinds of an idiot for forgetting his cloak. A tree trunk against one’s back did little to keep one warm. And to add aggravation to annoyance as the saying went, he was growing cramped, sitting here watching Stormwind crop the grass. Ah, well; the long ride back to Stormhaven would warm him up and ease the kinks in his muscles.

  Raven stretched out his legs and groaned. Damn; worse than he’d thought. To compound his misery, his stomach growled, protesting that he’d ignored it all day. But even that wasn’t the worst of it.

  He felt lost. He hadn’t realized how much, deep inside, he’d counted on being able to return home. Was this how a baby bird felt when it was shoved from the nest?

  No, he had to admit, he’d not been shoved. He’d jumped—and jumped without looking. What was done was done. His life was his own now. The thought scared the daylights out of him.

  It was time to face up to that new life. First he had a thing to see through, and then … Well and well, he’d see. Time enough to worry later.

  He rose stiffly to his feet, Stor
mwind’s bridle in hand. As always, the sight of it made him look twice; he still wasn’t used to a bridle with no bit.

  Stormwind’s head came up. At the sight of the bridle, he trotted up to Raven and tugged a lock of his person’s hair.

  “Give over, you big lump,” Raven said, laughing. At least my horse still likes me, he thought as he tweaked the stallion’s upper lip. It made him smile.

  “A bit different from your garret room?” Linden teased as he and Maurynna turned around and around, examining the sleeping chamber assigned to them.

  It was large and airy and spoke of refined wealth. The walls were of pale wood, the panels matched so carefully that the joints were barely visible. A painted border of vines ran along the walls below the ceiling. They were so cleverly done that at first glance Linden thought them real.

  All the furniture had the understated elegance that spoke of money freely spent. The woven hangings on the bed alone must have been a small fortune, he thought.

  “Gods, yes,” Maurynna said. “Not having much business with any guests of the family, I’ve rarely been inside one of the Mouseholes, and never to the upper floors. As Lleld would say, ‘Coo!’”

  Linden caught her around the waist and pulled her to him. “The bed looks comfortable—think we have time before meeting with Lleld and Jekkanadar to find out just how comfortable?” he whispered in her ear.

  She laughed and said, “We’ll make the time.”

  He swung her up into his arms. They’d make the time; they had so little of it left together.

  They galloped most of the way, the stallion moving light as a cloud along the pale road. The first stars glittered in the evening sky. Raven gave himself over to the pleasure of the ride, laughing aloud as the wind whipped the hair back from his face.

  But all too soon the gate to the city lay before them. Stormwind slowed and pranced through it at a more decorous pace. Not far now … .

  “Damn,” he whispered.

  “You’re late,” Virienne said as Redhawk and Honigan entered the room where she waited at the table, the meal arranged before her. “Everything’s cold.”

  “Nothing wrong with cold chicken if there’s plenty of green sauce to go with it,” her husband said as he took his seat.

  She studied him as the little table maid served his dinner. His manner was a mix of well-pleased and distracted, for although he smiled, now and again a tiny frown creased his brow as though something nagged him. Honigan’s demeanor, on the other hand, was unalloyed pleasure. It would seem something had gone well today.

  Let it be so, she thought. That will make what I have to say go down easier.

  She decided not to tell Redhawk about Raven’s visit until the meal was over. Instead she listened as husband and son celebrated the good price they’d gotten for the wool from one of their flocks. A flock, she remembered with pride, that had been Honigan’s idea to bring in at considerable expense from the highlands of Yerrih. Although Redhawk had been skeptical at first, Honigan had talked his stepfather into importing the little sheep with their long, blue-grey fleece.

  Now the gamble had paid off, it seemed, for Honigan said, “Best of all, we’ve a ready market for it. Mistress Parmale said that she would buy all the wool we could produce. She weaves the cloth for the temple of Duirin, and it’s just the color they want for their robes. It will save her the trouble and cost of having the wool dyed, she said, now that old Watt the Dyer is gone and his son Derenel’s careless with the work.”

  “Fool ruins the cloth more often than not,” Redhawk said around a mouthful of cold chicken. “Pity to see a good business go to waste like that.” A crafty gleam came into his eye. “Tell you what, Honigan—I’ll wager anything Der-enel’s eager to sell; Watt’s been in the grave less than a month, and folk are looking elsewhere already. In a few months’ time the business will be worth nothing. I’ll buy it now, then we’ll set you up in charge of the dye works, and Raven in charge of the wool end of things, and we’ll grab a fine chunk of the market. What do you say, eh?”

  Honigan looked down at his plate. He said softly, “But I’m not interested in the dye works … .”

  “Nonsense, boy!” Redhawk said, his voice hearty but with an edge beneath it. “I’ll buy the damn business, you’ll run it, and once Raven’s back—”

  This was not how she wanted to do it, but the memory of Raven’s words and now the disappointment in Honigan’s face tricked the words from her tongue. “Raven is back,” Virienne said.

  A silence like the pause twixt thunder and lightning fell over the table. At last Redhawk said, “What? How do you know Raven’s back? I heard nothing of it.” His voice shook with barely contained anger.

  “Have you heard about the Dragonlords?” Virienne countered.

  Frowning, Redhawk said, “Aye—there was talk in the market today that Maurynna and her soultwin, the one they called the Last Dragonlord, arrived yesterday. Was Raven with them? No one said anything to me!”

  “I heard there were two other Dragonlords besides them,” Honigan said, catching Virienne’s eye. “Who would notice Raven with Dragonlords about?”

  “There are two others,” Virienne confirmed, “as well as Otter and someone else. As to how I know … He came here, Redhawk, earlier today.” She took a deep breath. “He’s … not here to stay.”

  “Of course he is.” A priest declaiming his god’s will from the temple stairs could not have spoken with more authority. Or more rigidity.

  Virienne sighed. “He said he’ll be traveling with the Dragonlords when they move on.”

  Redhawk slammed his hand down on the table with such force that the plates and silverware jumped. A vein beat in his forehead. “I’ll see about that.” He stood up.

  Maurynna had not meant to eavesdrop as she returned from a late-evening raid on the buttery for a jug of ale and some spice cakes. But her bare feet made no noise on the wood floors as she passed the open window; those standing outside had no warning of her approach. Even so, the voices were low enough that had she been truehuman, she could not have recognized the voices, let alone made out the words.

  But a Dragonlord’s acute hearing was hers now, and she recognized both voice and words. It was Raven.

  Even as she thought How odd; I thought he’d gone home candlemarks ago, his words penetrated her mind.

  “I can’t go home, Master Kesselandt.” The words were slurred as if with emotion and exhaustion. “Please …”

  “No,” a crisp voice said. It was not Uncle Kesselandt.

  Maurynna’s lips drew back, baring her teeth. Uncle Darijen had never been friend to her or Raven. Remembering how he’d nearly convinced Kesselandt she was too young for a captain made her hot with anger all over again.

  “With all due respect, sir, I asked the Head of this family—not you.”

  Despite his exhaustion, there was steel in Raven’s voice. Maurynna silently cheered him.

  “Insolent pup! I’ll see you broken for that.”

  “Master Kessel—”

  Uncle Darijen cut him off. “You set those sails yourself, boy, now live with the course you’ve chosen. You’ll find no help here.”

  Oh, gods, what that sneering voice brought back. Memories burned through her, all the slights and indignities this uncle had heaped upon her throughout the years. Maurynna set the tray with its ale and cakes down on the floor. Then she took a deep breath and went to find a door.

  Linden was wondering where Maurynna had gotten to with the promised ale and cakes when he heard the sound of a horse’s hooves rapidly approaching. A late guest? Not likely. Curious who would be visiting at this candlemark and in such haste, he went to the window and twitched the embroidered hanging aside, peering out into a night lit only by stars and a quarter moon.

  A servant appeared as the rider pulled up in the central courtyard before the houses. In the light of the torch the servant held, Linden saw the visitor was a man of perhaps forty or so. Every movement, from the way he threw th
e reins at the groom who came running up, to the angry jerk at the hem of his tunic spoke of fury. Linden wondered anew who came in such haste and such anger. Surely not a dissatisfied fellow merchant?

  Lleld joined him at the window, fitting neatly under his raised elbow. “Who is it?” she asked.

  “I’ve a suspicion, but I’m not certain. I can’t see his face.”

  Jekkanadar came to peer around his shoulder. As they watched, the servant pointed at the Mousehole.

  Linden looked down at Lleld; she still stared out of the window. Then her eyes met his for a brief moment, eyebrows raised in speculation.

  Once again Linden looked out the window. Below, the torchlight played over the man’s hair as he crossed the courtyard. At that distance and in such poor light, only a Dragonlord’s unnaturally sharp vision could have caught the glint of red. “Oh, hell,” he grumbled and let the curtain drop. “I know who it is.”

  Lleld caught it, peered outside once more; a moment later she said, “That’s Raven’s da, isn’t it? He looks as mad as a bear with a burr up its butt.”

  “Doesn’t he just, though?” Linden said. In fact, he’d never seen anyone meet the old hillman’s description so well. “This will not be pretty.”

  “But why is he here? Raven left this morning to go home,” said Jekkanadar.

  Linden, too, wondered about that.

  Maurynna skirted the moth garden with its sweet-scented flowers. Though it was late in the season for them, a few of the gauzy-winged insects still tended the blooms. They fluttered through the pale moonlight as they paused at one blossom after another, paying court to the white flowers that dotted the shadows.

  When she was younger, Maurynna had often sneaked out of her garret room to play in the garden. On soft summer nights when the moon was full, it was a magical place, a place where anything might happen.

  But now she strode past without even seeing it. A trailing vine of moonflowers brushed her shoulder. She pushed it aside. Her goal was the knot garden on the far side of the honeysuckle hedge. She hoped she was not too late; the closest door had been on the opposite side of the house from where the three men argued. Under her bare feet the brick walk was rough and scratchy, and the sharp, dry scent of the baked clay contrasted with the sweetness of the flowers and the soil’s rich fragrance. The cool night air slid along her cheek like silk.