The Rose Cord

by J. D. Oswald

  ‘Seize her,’ Melyn shouted to the remaining warrior priests. To their credit they only hesitated a moment before leaping at the girl. But when they met at the point where she had been standing, she was no longer there. Melyn was almost too slow in reaching for the sight, but he thought he saw a flash of light pulse along a great trunk-like line that ran between his legs and out of the door into the great hall of the Neuadd. He shivered involuntarily, spinning on his heels in time to see the girl reappear close to the Obsidian Throne.

  ‘Quickly, to me.’ He ran across the hall, extinguishing his blade of light as he went, taking its power back into him. The queen stood before the throne, transfixed. Clun, who had been at her side, stepped into the space between the two young women. He held a short sword, but its point wavered as the inquisitor neared. He seemed torn between his duty to the queen and something deeper.

  ‘Martha?’ Clun said.

  ‘You’re under a glamour, Clun Defaid,’ Melyn heard the girl say. ‘But don’t worry. I’m not here to do either of you harm. A child should have both its parents.’ She looked around the hall, up at the ceiling and across to where Melyn was approaching at speed. It was as if she was looking for something. Then her eyes lit upon the throne.

  ‘Ah yes, of course,’ she said.

  ‘Kill her, Clun!’ the inquisitor yelled. ‘Run her through, boy!’

  But Clun seemed powerless, standing like a gently swaying statue between the motionless queen and the slight girl as she walked past him like she might a stranger in a busy street. She stood before the throne as Melyn leaped the steps on to the dais; climbed on to its massive seat as he ran across the short distance. He pulled another ball of fire out of the air, hurling it ahead of him as she stepped back into the dark recesses of the chair and disappeared. The flame erupted with the inquisitor’s rage, illuminating the interior of the massive throne for all to see.

  The girl was gone.

  Benfro trudged downhill through the snow-silenced night woods, following the sound of the stream that rilled through the trees nearby. Away from Mount Arnahi and Magog’s retreat. He couldn’t fly; one wing was damaged from his fall, and little shocks of pain pulsed through his back and shoulder with each misplaced footfall. He had extended a loop of his aura to try and support it in a makeshift sling, but as he grew ever more tired, so it was harder and harder to concentrate.

  He didn’t dare sleep. Magog was waiting for him in his dreams, he was sure. He’d find himself back at Cenobus, sorting out jewels and putting them into their hideous little stone cells. Feeding Magog’s power. Letting him grow. Sleep was not an option. He had to find the clearing. Corwen would be able to help him.

  The Llinellau taunted him as he stumbled through larger and larger trees. They were everywhere, would take him in an instant wherever he wanted to go, but he was too tired to focus, his mind too full of confusing images and memories. There was nothing for it but to walk, thanking great Rasalene for the full moonlight that showed him the path.

  The second night was even harder than the first. Sleep dragged at him, pleading with him to just sit a moment, catch his breath, lean his wounded wing against a mossy tree trunk. Despite his impromptu magic sling, the pain in his damaged joint grew slowly more persistent. He could see, just by looking, that his aura was fading as his strength ebbed away. All his effort of will went into keeping the sling tight and warding off the devil that wanted to evict his soul. Frequently he knelt by the stream and splashed his face, hoping the cold wetness would shock him awake. Even then it was almost too much to stand again.

  At one point he caught himself staring at his reflection in the water and couldn’t remember how long he had been there. He could almost hear the whispers in his mind, calling him to sleep and delightful oblivion. The realization shocked him awake again and he staggered to his feet. Dawn was once more lighting the sky as he lumbered away, shaking and fearful.

  At times he forgot who he was and what he was doing. All he knew was the stream. He had to follow it. That was all. And he must not sleep or stop for rest. Sometimes he would almost drift off as he strode, but each time his wing jarred him awake. It became a game of anticipation, waiting for the next wave of agony to come and drag him back to the real world.

  Somehow it was night again, though he couldn’t remember the transition from day. The moon rose, lighting the forest with an eerie white glow, as he walked ever on. He fancied he could see ethereal creatures hopping from tree to tree, keeping pace with him. They flew like fireflies, hovering over the Llinellau which criss-crossed the land, flashing in and out of existence. Fascinated, he watched them, trying to guess where they would appear next. He held out his hand, and one swooped through the air before landing on an outstretched finger like a tame bird.

  But it was no tame bird; it was a dragon in miniature, a perfect simulacrum of pale, ghostly white. It hopped along his arm and on to his shoulder in a manner that reminded him instantly of the squirrel Malkin.

  ‘Who are you?’ he asked, but the creature made no reply. It simply sat beside his head, keeping him company. It was a reassuring presence, a friend when all else seemed dangerous and threatening. He was so happy just to have it on his shoulder it was a long time before he realized that he wasn’t tired any more.

  Around the dawn of the fourth day the tiny creature leaped into the air, circled his head once and then disappeared. Benfro wondered if he had lost his mind. If he had, it was a more pleasant way to go than Magog had offered. He stooped to the water, took a drink, then stood up again. He had grown so used to the stream that he had stopped looking at it properly. Now he saw a familiarity about it that brought joy to his hearts. He knew this place, had hunted in the woods around him and caught fat fish in the very waters from which he drank. Straining his ears against the dawn chorus, he could just make out the distant roar of a waterfall.

  Were it not for the pain in his wing, he would have run. As it was, he jogged as quickly as he could. In minutes he had left the trees and was standing on his old launch pad high above Corwen’s clearing. He was home.

  He scrambled down the slope to the track, noting with pride how his stone pen had stood up to the winter. The logs still stood piled on either side of the cave mouth, and without a backward glance he hurried in.

  The wizened old dragon sat beside the fire as if he had not moved since Benfro’s sudden disappearance months earlier. He didn’t look up to greet his charge, just poked at the burning logs with a stick.

  ‘You took your time,’ he said gruffly.

  Benfro stopped. Corwen’s tone was all wrong. Surely he should have been pleased to see him? Didn’t he know what had happened, what trials and tribulations he had been put through? No, of course he didn’t. And everything had changed. There was no way they would be able to go back to the simple cosy existence he had known before.

  ‘I got lost,’ Benfro said, which sounded like an understatement. Corwen put down his stick and looked up. There were tears in his eyes.

  ‘I thought I’d lost you too, Benfro. I’m sorry. I underestimated Magog’s power. I underestimated his malevolence’

  There was a strange smell in the cave that Benfro couldn’t quite identify. It made him uneasy and brought an undercurrent of anxiety, grief and helplessness to mind, a bit like he had felt under Magog’s influence, but different, older.

  ‘We tried to help you,’ Corwen said. ‘But you were so far away.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘He arrived here a few days ago. Says he has met you before,’ Corwen said, and his eyes were looking past Benfro to the bed of dried grass. Slowly Benfro turned to see, though he knew already what was lying there. The smell said it all. Less pungent, less reeking of its own ordure, and overlain with the stench of festering wounds, nevertheless it was the same smell he would always associate with his mother’s murder. A man.

  He lay there on the bed, dwarfed by its size and souring the grass that Benfro had collected for himself. He was scarcely alive and so fast
asleep as to be almost unconscious. His ragged appearance and terrible injuries were almost pitiable, except that Benfro had no place in his hearts for the people who had brought him so much grief. He wanted to lash out, to kill this pathetic scrap of skin and bone. He could feel the frustration and anger of the past year building in him. Even the emptiness of his stomach could not stop the flame he was conjuring. Hate alone, madder even than Magog, would bring about the start of his vengeance.

  Then he felt a hand on his arm. He looked round to see the face of the old dragon tense with concern, and everything drained out of him as if he had been punctured by a kind knife.

  ‘He saved your life, Benfro,’ Corwen said. ‘Don’t give in to Magog after all you’ve been through.’

  Benfro was suddenly very tired, as if the willpower that had kept him going had suddenly run out. He had struggled against all the odds to get back to this place of sanctuary, hoping that Corwen would know what to do. And now he was faced with something he just didn’t have the energy to come to terms with.

  ‘What is he? Who is he? Why is he here?’

  ‘His name,’ Corwen said, ‘is Errol Ramsbottom. He’s the true heir to Queen Beulah’s throne, though he doesn’t know it. As to why he’s here, well, he was sent here by a dragon’s memories, much as you were. And he’s fleeing the persecution of the warrior priests of the High Ffrydd, much like you. I’d say the two of you have a great deal in common.’

  Acknowledgements

  This book may have burst forth, alien-like from my lone, feverished imagination – perhaps aided by too much late night cheese and a rush to complete my Welsh homework – but an army of people have helped take it from those first strange ideas to the finished product you hold in your hands (or the words on your electronic reading device of choice, I’m not fussy). Thanking everyone individually would be another 130,000 words, but one or two deserve singling out for special praise.

  First off, my agent, the indescribable Juliet Mushens. Without her persistence I doubt Benfro would have flown beyond my self-published efforts. Thanks too to Alex Clarke, my editor at Penguin for these and the Inspector McLean books. He and the rest of the team have put a lot of effort into honing my words, and a lot of faith in my little dragon.

  A big thank you to all the e-book readers who took the time to contact me when I self-published this book. Especially those who pointed out typos and other continuity errors. Since then the text has been professionally edited, so hopefully this edition is error-free. If any still remain they are entirely my fault.

  Thanks too to Stuart MacBride, who persuaded me many years ago that sheep would not make believable villains, even in epic fantasy. I think he’s probably right on that one.

  And finally, the biggest thank you to Barbara, who first suggested that Sir Benfro would make a good name for a dragon.

  1

  Cuckoo-child in a nest of thieves

  Bastard heir to mage’s line

  Stealer of souls, taker of lives

  Harbinger of the death of worlds

  The Prophecies of Mad Goronwy

  Silence blanketed the world like an invisible fog. Even the trees gave off no sound, though they waved and flexed in the stiff breeze. Underfoot, the grass was wet with dew, but he could feel nothing of its texture on the soles of his bare feet. A shiver ran through him, but it wasn’t the chill of the wind on his face, rather an aching leaching cold that he instinctively tried to get away from.

  Not knowing how he had got there, Errol hunkered down between two large tree roots, pulling his cloak around himself and shivering. He was tired, but somehow sleep eluded him. Was he waiting for someone? He couldn’t be sure, but he felt like he had been here before. His ankles ached at the thought of moving; he had no desire to stand up, no desire to do anything but huddle in his frozen hollow and try to sleep.

  If only he could sleep.

  She came to him as a scent. He could still hear nothing, not even the beating of his own heart, but the aroma plunged him back into happy memories of sun and warmth, holding hands, a lingering kiss. Everything was tinged with a deep comforting green, and for a moment he even forgot the cold and the pain.

  From his dark hiding place Errol watched the path as it wound its way through the sparse ancient trees. He saw her first a good distance off, moving carefully, sticking to the shadows.

  Closer now and he was sure. It was Martha as he had last seen her: serious eyes concentrating on the task ahead, dark shoulder-length hair pulled back and tied simply at her neck, still wearing her boot-length forest-green travelling cloak. She picked her way along the edge of the path, keeping as much as possible beneath the wind-swirled canopies of the great trees. Every so often she would look up at the sky, scanning the grey undersides of the clouds as if something terrible lurked there.

  Errol tried to call out to her. Martha. But his voice was silent, echoing only in his head. Somehow he wasn’t surprised. Neither did it alarm him that he couldn’t move. He knew what was going to happen next.

  For about two hundred paces she had to cross open ground, a natural clearing in the forest where a rocky outcrop rose out of the ground. She paused at the edge, glanced once more at the sky, then stepped boldly into the light. She didn’t run; that might have drawn too much attention. Instead she seemed to draw in on herself until she almost disappeared. Almost, but not quite. Errol could still see her, shrinking as she moved steadily across the clearing. And others could see her too.

  In the silence they were impossible creatures. They appeared from nowhere, four great beasts with wings a dozen paces from shoulder to tip. Their landing should have shaken the earth, but they sank on to huge taloned feet without a tremor, surrounding her. Trapping her.

  Errol could only watch, paralysed by something beyond fear. But Martha was not afraid. She stood among the dragons as if they were no more than placid cattle in a summer field. She looked at them each in turn, her mouth voicing words that had no sound. She held out her hand and a tiny sphere of light blazed forth, hovering above her palm. One of the dragons took an involuntary step back at this, slumping on to his tail as if in astonishment.

  Martha must have taken this as permission to pass, for she boldly stepped out of their circle as if to continue to the other side of the clearing. Errol watched in astonishment and hope as she moved one step, two steps away while the four dragons merely looked at each other. Maybe this time she was going to make it.

  This time?

  Everything came crashing together. The dragon who had stepped back whipped around, grabbing Martha around her waist with one massive claw. Errol tried to wrench himself out of his hiding place even as he knew that there was nothing he could do. The dragons launched themselves into the air, the one carrying Martha clutched to his scaly breast struggling hard to clear the treetops. With a final wasted effort, Errol wrenched himself free, tripped over a root and plunged headlong.

  He hit the ground much sooner than he expected, and with the impact, sound washed over him: the echo of running water over rocks, the chatter of early-morning birds. His nose filled with a dusty spicy smell, making him sneeze then scramble to his feet. Pain shot through both ankles and he fell back on to the low bed of grass and heather that he had rolled out of in his sleep, his dream. Martha.

  Errol rubbed the grit from his eyes and shivered at the cold. The ragged cloak that was all he had for a blanket lay twisted at the end of the bed, as if he had fought demons as he slept. Instinctively, he reached out for the lines, drawing enough warmth from them to push the chill from his bones. As they warmed his chest, he felt a moment’s tightening at the scar where Beulah had stabbed him to the heart. Where Martha had healed him. Then he shifted his focus down to his ankles, trying to wash the pain out of them, wishing them to heal faster.

  ‘They will get better. Give them time.’ Errol didn’t need to look up to know that the old dragon Corwen had joined him in the cave. Instead he leaned down and massaged first one ankle then the next, feeling t
he flow of the Grym through his fingertips. Finally, when he thought he might be able to cope with the pain, he slowly stood up, crossed to the fire and put some twigs on the ashen coals.

  ‘You’re up early, Errol. Bad dreams again?’

  ‘Not dreams, just a single dream.’ Errol shuffled towards the cave mouth and glanced out across the clearing. It was still, and the dawn light lit the scene only dimly. ‘It’s always the same.’

  ‘Then it’s likely she’s trying to tell you something important.’ Corwen was by his side, a presence, but also nothing at all. ‘You must concentrate, try harder to communicate with her. Perhaps if you were to ask—’

  ‘Benfro? He doesn’t like me. Why should he? My kind murdered his whole family.’ Errol looked across the track to the small stone corral with its makeshift roof of branches, bracken and dried grass. It was so desolate he could almost taste the misery of the dragon who slept within.

  ‘Besides, he’s got trouble enough with his own dreams.’

  ‘Your Majesty, you’re not well. You should stay in bed.’

  Queen Beulah looked up at her chambermaid with a mixture of contempt and weary resignation. Yet another sleepless night, and now she felt like her head was going to explode, shortly after her stomach had done so. At least this girl had some spine, unlike the other simpering maids, who stood in the doorway ready to flee from her wrath. Useless women, what did she need them for, anyway? She’d learned how to dress herself when she was two.

  ‘I’m not my father. I won’t rule the Twin Kingdoms from my bed.’ Beulah hauled herself out of her pillows, wincing as the pain stabbed through her head right between the eyes.

  ‘May I at least send for a physician?’

  Beulah was surprised by the question; it was as if the woman was actually concerned.