by Richard Swan
The Central Line train took them straight to their destination. They got off at Bank, where the sky was black as if night had come in the middle of day. The street lamps were all on, and shone weakly against the darkness. Passers-by were slow and silent, as if daunted by the atmosphere. The five of them walked along King William Street to the Thames at London Bridge, so that they could look downriver towards Tower Bridge and the Tower of London.
At first they could make out nothing, for the gloom extended right over the water and defeated the eyes’ attempts to pierce it. At length they made out the distinctive shape of Tower Bridge, a sharper black outline against the general black of the sky. Hunched at one end, furthest from the Tower, was an irregular shape of inky shadow.
None of them spoke a word as they made their way along the embankment towards the bridge. Melody led, still with Tamar and Ieuan on either side. Only when they came to the river near the walls of the Tower of London did she speak.
‘I think you should wait here. None of you can help me now, and I must go up there on my own. At least you’ll be here to watch and witness, and your presence will strengthen me. Thank you.’
They let her go without speaking, watching as her figure dwindled towards the nearer tower of the bridge. At the far end, up on the walkway, a clump of darkness waited unmoving. To the watchers, it seemed as if nothing moved.
Melody walked into the tower at the north end of the bridge, and began climbing the great staircase up to the walkway. Step after step, one foot and then the next, automatically and without thinking about what awaited her at the top. At the head of the staircase was a large room, from which she could see the glassed-in walkway stretching out across to the south tower. She ignored this, and went across to the door, which led to a smaller staircase, climbing to the very highest level of the bridge. It opened without an effort, and she made her way up, emerging on a narrow steel path that ran across the top of the walkway beneath. Here she was, not in the air, not on the ground, not on water, not on land, and opposite her crouched the shape of a mighty beast.
It was of great size, bigger than anything she had ever seen, but she realised that it was not as immense as it had seemed to be above the house in Ealing. There she had been deceived, for its wings had spread and merged with the surrounding darkness, making it seem infinite. Here it was smaller; it had shape and definition, although it was still vast beyond imagining. She saw that it had no single colour. It was not black; it was not even truly dark. Colours of all kinds ran across its hide, an iridescence of hues that could not be properly discerned or described. It reminded her of the unicorn, and a similar thought came to her mind. In the human world this creature might be perceived as black, but it was no more truly black than the unicorn had been truly white. For a moment she longed to see the dragon in its own world, to see it in its real form and colour, but the thought sank away as she wondered what the dragon’s own world might be. It didn’t belong in this one, but nor could she think of it as a creature of Faërie. Were there other worlds beyond these, which might house dragons and even stranger beings?
More thoughts came to her unbidden. Ieuan had told her that there were only two immortal creatures, dragons and unicorns. Now she had seen both, and she counted herself fortunate beyond all mortals. She might die here, but she would welcome a death that had enabled her to be blessed with these visions of eternity. The beauty of a dragon is not the beauty of the unicorn, she thought, but its majesty was terrible and wonderful and her heart beat stronger for having seen it.
Then the dragon stirred.
It was hardly a flicker of movement, so slight that in any other creature it would have been indiscernible, but with the dragon it was as if the whole world had shifted on its axis and had to realign itself to match the dragon’s new position. Melody had the irresistible belief that it was not the dragon that had moved, but the world itself. The dragon, she thought, would always be stationary. It’s the rest of us that have to adjust. She began to wonder if what she was seeing was the true form of the creature at all.
There was only one way to find out. Without thought, without plan, she stepped forward along the narrow span, a ribbon of steel that seemed like thread compared to the dragon’s bulk. It was inevitable that she would fall. She took a step, then another. She was metres from the safety of the tower, suspended between sky and earth.
She didn’t look down. She kept her eyes fixed on the creature, watching for it to stir again. She was so intent on its body that she almost missed the moment when it raised its head and its eyes fastened on her with an immovable gaze.
Melody took another step forward, balancing carefully, and at the same time she realised that its jaws were opening, a huge plume of fire roaring from its mouth towards her. ‘No!’ she shouted instinctively, raising her left arm to guard her face. Her ring burned gold in answer, and the dragon’s breath stopped short as if at a wall. She could feel the intense heat, a force beyond any a mortal fire could create, but she stood unharmed, swaying on the narrow path.
‘Be still!’ she cried, and her ring burned once more. Whether in response, or through surprise at her temerity, the dragon was motionless, its gaze fixed on the slight form before it.
Neither stirred, locked in a contest of will. Smoke curled around the dragon’s jaws as it breathed, but it didn’t attack again. Yet. Melody watched, waited. She couldn’t bring herself to launch an assault on such a creature, even if her ring would obey her command. The dragon bent its gaze on her, willing her to meet its huge eyes, to fall under the dragon spell. If she even glanced at its face, she was lost. She knew that much. Nor could she look away. She focused on the dragon’s body as she had done before, watching in case it moved any part or sought to tear her with its claws. The silence lengthened.
Infinitely slowly, the dragon opened its mouth. Not to breathe fire again, although Melody was prepared at every second for such an attack, but to speak. Its voice was huge, resonant, holding the depth of ages from which it drew its speech. ‘So,’ it said, in a limitless sibilance, which echoed against the pillars of the bridge. The shock was greater than any she had ever received, greater even than seeing the unicorn for the first time. She had never imagined, never dreamed that a dragon could speak. She did not seek to ask how she could understand it. Yet now the dragon continued, ‘We are well met. Well met, but perhaps not well matched.’
Melody kept silent. She couldn’t think of what she might say in reply to such a being, and feared that any response at all would provoke another assault. It was poised, deadly. She didn’t know if she could withstand it a second time. It was taking all her spirit to stand there unflinching. The dragon seemed to wait for an answer, but there was none.
‘So,’ it said again with the same drawn-out sibilance. ‘You cannot answer, or do not. Is it my strength or your weakness that you fear?’
No reply. Melody didn’t know which would be true anyway.
‘Fear. Fear from Faërie. That land is the source of uncertainty, of dreams. You have been there, I see, and taken both its riches and its loss. What are you now, do you think?’
No answer. Melody fought to understand what was being said, but her conscious mind was too occupied to unravel the meaning of the dragon’s words.
Without warning, flame erupted once more, a fiercer and stronger blast that would have swept Melody from her place, blown like a burning twig in the gale. She didn’t speak, but her ring flamed and held her, motionless, unharmed. The dragon was still once more.
Very slowly, so slowly that only an immortal creature could perceive the change, Melody drew herself up and stood to her full height. Equally slowly, she raised her hand until her ring finger was pointing straight at the dragon’s chest.
‘Enough,’ she whispered, so softly that only an immortal creature could make out the word. ‘Be still. I am a unicorn. What are you?’
Time passed, or stood still. The dragon seemed to weigh her words, unsure whether to speak in answer or whether t
o strike. After an eternity, or no time, it replied.
‘I am a dragon. That is enough. It is what you are that concerns us. You are no unicorn. You are mortal still. Yet your mortality may be what we need.’
Melody’s heart lifted. ‘Need? What are you to speak of need?’
‘I am a dragon. I have said. Yet there are needs beyond those you understand, beyond any you have met. All in all, all in one.’
Melody stared and was almost caught. ‘Not in all, not in one,’ she quoted.
‘No. That is not right. Or it is not rightly expressed. You cannot be separate, cannot be divided. You must be part of the whole, not an individual. Look into my eyes.’
Melody understood what it was saying. She had crossed the boundary. Part of her was human, was mortal. Part of her had taken on the being of the unicorn, the immortal. The dragon wanted her to join her being with its own, to complete the triad, which would form something completely new. It wanted her to give herself up.
‘No,’ she whispered again, only a breath.
‘You must.’
‘I must not. I am Melody of Lichfield. I answer to no other power.’
‘You are needed.’
‘Then I will come. But I will come as myself, not as some other.’
The dragon was silent, as if weighing this up. Melody waited to see if it would challenge her, then continued.
‘Where am I needed?’
‘In the west.’
‘Then I shall come. How shall I find you?
‘You will find me in my place.’
‘How shall I call you?
‘You will call me by my name.’
‘What is your name?’
The dragon paused. ‘My name is Cennen. You will know me when you find me.’
With that it was gone, vanished under the shadow of night as if it had never been.
For a long while Melody stood, unaware of her surroundings, absorbing what had happened. She stood, neither defeated nor victorious, only clear about what she was and who she was. Melody of Lichfield. Not less than that, but not only that. Touched by a unicorn, breathed on by a dragon. What the future would bring she did not know, but she knew that she was herself, alone. The dragon had been wrong. Whatever it was, it did not understand the nature of her being. She had been mistaken too. She had called herself a unicorn, and had contended with the dragon in the belief that that was so, that she was its equal. That had given her the strength to resist it, to combat its fire and order it to stillness. Yet she saw now that it was not so. She had not become a unicorn, as she could not become a dragon. Part of her was mortal always; part of her was always human. The nature she shared and the ring she wore marked her out, but she would remain Melody of Lichfield, her father’s daughter, whatever chance befell her.
Looking up, she saw that the skies had cleared. A bright day shone over London, and the sounds of the city came to her from the river and from the streets below. She made her cautious way back to the bridge tower, and descended the flights of steps that took her to ground level. She emerged into sunlight and the crowded streets, and walked to where her companions waited on the green grass. They smiled as they saw her, and she returned their smiles.
‘So,’ she said, in a conscious echo of the dragon’s greeting. ‘It seems our journey has just begun.’
‘Where are we going?’ asked Tamar.
‘West.’ Melody started out along the embankment, and the others fell in behind her like an honour guard. As she walked, the people she passed shifted aside to leave a gap for her at the margin of the pavement. The buses and taxis edged out towards the middle of the road, then edged back a few yards further on. And Melody moved irresistibly forward along her straight track.
Melody’s adventures continue in Melody’s Dragon and Melody’s World. For further information about the series, and to read an extract from Melody’s Dragon, please visit the author’s website, ferende gæst, at http://rnswan.com/.
JUVENILE FICTION, NON-FICTION, PARENTING
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