by Marc Secchia
“A day came when my grandfather grew seriously ill with the deadly withrusal fever, which attacks the heart, and the brothers clashed more fiercely than ever before. Chanbar went to my father and demanded the throne. He demanded evidence of his future accession to the rulership. Shan-Jarad – well, he may have rubbed in the fact that the Uxâtate had absolutely no intention of passing the succession on to the older son. They fought viciously, right there over my grandfather’s sickbed, and it was rumoured ever after that their fighting caused his weakened heart to seize up and he died of grief over of the brothers’ quarrelling. Shan-Jarad tried to have Chanbar thrown out, appealing to the rights of succession signed by my grandfather upon his deathbed. Chanbar of course argued that those rights were stolen by Shan-Jarad, and the kingdom was on the verge of civil war when my mother, Talrishana, intervened. She told Chanbar she did not love him and never could, and that she was already secretly betrothed to Shan-Jarad – although, the declaration of engagement would later show otherwise. Maddened with rage, Chanbar departed screaming that he would have his revenge upon them all, that the dishonour of her betrayal was unbearable. Shan-Jarad moved swiftly and was crowned after the customary month’s mourning.”
“I see,” Asturbar mused. “But, Chanbar had already –”
“Yes, Mister Impatient. Chanbar’s plans regarding the Mistral Fires were already far advanced by that time, for as you know, he likes to lay plans within plans. He had embezzled money from the treasury to buy his way into the command of a mercenary unit. Once he was thrown out of the Uxâtate, and having failed to return before his brother was crowned, he assumed public leadership of the House. Your House, which he had already tacitly been leading, through a trusted proxy, since years before.”
“At least a decade!”
“Yes. After some years passed, the Uxâtate Shan-Jarad tried to reach out magnanimously to his disgraced older brother. He invited him to attend family events and suchlike.”
“Which grated even worse?”
Nyahi nodded her gleaming muzzle. “Uncle Chanbar attended certain notable events and celebrations – such as my birth, I understand – but always looked as if he rather wished to be gnawing out his own liver. He could not let go of the fact that his younger brother had stolen the Uxâtate and Talrishana from him, leaving him estranged, the Marshal of a mercenary House. As I remember him growing up, he was always the black dragonet, this slimy creature that seemed to emerge from nowhere, casting his long shadow and poking his greedy fingers into affairs of state. I believe there was even a plot to kidnap my mother that was never quite traced back to Chanbar, although it had his fingerprints all over the design. Of course, that ruined whatever small reputation he might have clung to in Yazê-a-Kûz; some suggested contrariwise that this plot had originated with my father instead, and was a thinly-disguised scheme to discredit Chanbar. It was only when I was in the dungeons that I heard his side of the story from my mother – who, thinking back upon it now, never seemed to have stopped loving Chanbar. But she, too, had made her choice.”
Asturbar shook his head slowly. “I never understood the man.”
“Few, if any, did.”
“And … the campaign we fought for Yazê-a-Kûz?”
Nyahi nodded. “Politics. Chanbar was trying to wangle any form of favour he could with the people, by his own admission, in the hope that he might be able to gain enough leverage to overthrow Shan-Jarad.”
“Makes sense.”
So many pieces fitting together, like ragions arranging themselves in hexagonal patterns beneath an Island. Asturbar marvelled at his lack of understanding, and equally, at Iridiana’s insight into the whole affair. She had received training in rulership, he realised, feeling a slight pang of jealousy himself. She saw the connections and the implications of Human behaviour, of the ways of the heart, unlike a bluff soldier.
“When it came to you, all those old feelings of jealousy, inadequacy and vulnerability resurfaced,” she continued quietly. “He said that he sees you as powerful and capable – a man’s man, if you prefer, or one who effortlessly earned the respect and even the love of all of your soldiers, which is an accolade I loved to hear – and the fact that you received the Dragon’s approbation while his honour was on the line for a theft he could not have anticipated nor ever had any control over … to him it was a replay of Shan-Jarad’s treachery. His words, not mine. So he determined to despatch you to the most devious fate he could concoct, telling himself that this was the justice you deserved. For what it’s worth, he regrets what he did.”
Asturbar exhaled through his teeth.
Nyahi whispered, “Death at the paw of insane Iridiana …”
“Hmm. Who’s that? Don’t know any actually insane girls, nor any mad Shapeshifters either,” he joked, before falling silent again as he contemplated Chanbar’s tale. A small sin of favouritism. Consequences that toppled Islands.
“Boots, I’m being serious.”
“As am I.”
Raising her dragonet-form to his lips, he puckered up only to have her squeak, “Don’t you know how huge your lips appear from this perspective? It’s terrifying!”
“Ha! Here’s a smacker for you, then.” Mweh!
“Ew. Practically swallowed me alive – don’t you get any ideas, mister!”
He opened his mouth wide and feinted toward her. “Well, I was thinking that while you were inside, you could just fetch out the Jewels of In-My-Gutty – what say you?”
“Surgery from the inside?” Nyahi flexed her pin-sized talons beneath his nose, appearing most pleased when Asturbar coughed in alarm. “Cut out a few of the crusty, socially unacceptable bits while I’m at it? Remodel your –”
“Enough!” Carefully, he tickled her beneath the chin, realising that his forefinger was thicker than her entire torso in this manifestation. Still a perfect little dragonet, however, complete with blazing orange little eyes and pinprick fangs. She really did have a range of impeccable transition maps at her disposal. Shame so many misfired! “I can’t believe Chanbar actually wanted to murder me – and thought you were seen as his perfect instrument. That’s …”
“Twisted,” she supplied.
Twisted indeed. Devious, and utterly beyond the pale of honour or simple decency. “What do we do with Chanbar now?” he asked.
Nyahi said, “He’s your subject. Why don’t you order him to brief us on what has been happening in the years since my exile, and the months since yours?”
“I just don’t think I could be half as terrifying as you.”
Nyahi giggled and pulled a couple of poses. “More fearsome like this, or like this?”
“That’s so cute!”
Her reflexive swipe opened a thin cut on his upper lip. “Oh – stupid Dragoness temper! Sorry, Boots.”
“Cute, but a wicked little tyrant.”
* * * *
In the evening, Asturbar and Iridiana took a dinner of dried fruit, nutty breads and water that was beginning to show signs of long storage in hot conditions, together with his new subjects, who to his astonishment and creeping sense of alarm, seemed quite willing to cooperate. Not surly. Positively forthcoming. Eager to give answers. If he continued to enjoy power like this, it would likely develop into a nasty rash.
After two hours of them talking, he or Iridiana throwing in the odd prompt, and Yazina trying not to fall asleep from sheer teenage boredom, Asturbar decided to bring matters to a close, Commander-of-the-Infantry style.
“So, to summarise. The Star Dragoness fell from the sky, disappeared for a while – apparently into the Gladiator Pits where she summarily set about trouncing the greatest champions of the age – then she escaped by blowing up Tahootax the Terrible and tearing down an entire warded Pit in an implausible feat of impossibility, then swiftly recruited Marshal Huaricithe to her cause, started a storm that spanned ten thousand Isles, raised a massive Dragon army with a flick of her incomparable talons and raced through the Straits of Hordazar to attack the leg
endary Yellow-White Shapeshifter Thoralian and his armies, who by the bye also have ravaged untold Islands in the realm of Herimor … and, her Shining Majesty has not been heard from since? And, give or take, the entirety of Herimor is at war, either for or against the Star Dragoness and her allies, over the minor but suns-striking matter of a legendary First Egg of the Ancient Dragons which has been missing since the days of the Dragonfriend herself?”
He stared around the table, expecting denials.
“Excellent summary,” said Chanbar, wincing as he eased his arm in the sling. Asturbar spitefully hoped it hurt like a Dragon chewing his entrails.
The Steersman made an assenting noise. “That’s the gist of it, Marshal.”
Even Nyahi essayed a firm nod. “Good work, Boots.”
Well, that was rather deflating. He folded his arms across his chest. “Good. Plenty to think about.” Such as, how to survive Azhukazi’s inevitable revenge, and then how the House might profit from a world at war. Such times were made for mercenaries. Only, was that what he wanted?
Suddenly, he felt as if a Bulk Dragon sat upon his shoulders.
Asturbar said, “Rest well tonight. Plenty of hours of pedalling left on the morrow.”
Once he had cleared his head of this Star Dragoness nonsense, Asturbar decided, he would make a long, detailed and comforting list of all the things he needed to ask Chanbar about being a Marshal, and the running of a House, and suchlike. Preparation. Always preparation. He scratched his neck thoughtfully. Something told him that when they arrived at House Chanbar – now House Asturbar, he supposed – there would not be a great deal of time to think.
Not much time at all.
* * * *
By the fourth day’s travel away from the oasis, Asturbar and Chanbar had talked themselves hoarse. Nyahi was restive. The beginnings of a plan simmered inside his brain, but his greater concern was his itchy girlfriend’s predilection for turning into large, fiery columns or sparky Dragoness forms. That could be lethal. They needed fuel for the final leg of the journey. Reluctantly, he decided to set course for Mount Morgu-Zayê, one of the few actually rooted Islands in the realm of Wyldaroon, and home to many diverse dracoflora species that created a cannibalistic ecosystem as legendary as it was deadly.
Not a place to go for a jaunt in the jungle.
The hierarchy-dominant species, the Asjujian Emoflits, did however keep a very active trading post atop their mountain. Primarily their interest was in trading for diamonds, which they consumed as a delicacy and then exuded in delicate filaments for personal beautification, but Chanbar had a trusted agent in place who could procure supplies on House credit.
Perfect.
As the day wore on, the first scattered Fringe Islands hove out of the heat haze shimmering over the brilliant white Cloudlands like primal beasts sporting in a vast, dazzling lake. At first there were flotillas of mostly barren boulders floating mid-air – an incongruous sight even to one who had lived all of his life in Wyldaroon, Asturbar thought, for he was accustomed to the far greener, more fertile Islands farther North. These climes seemed blasted by the Doldrums weather, and perhaps even by sunlocusts. The Steersman took manual control of the Dragonship to guide them over or around these unmapped boulders, which could easily snag or tear a Dragonship’s air sack.
Their course now lay a mere point above pure Northwest. This stop should take them no more than two hours off their schedule, but the additional fuel would allow them to make up treble that the time over the following day.
Steersman Rekhoil guided the dirigible airship to greater heights over the following two hours, allowing them to avoid the trailing scythoragions so prevalent in these parts. Their filament-like underparts trailed up to two thousand feet beneath the Islands they infested, like great hanging veils of mauve vines or creepers, and were sharp enough to slice material like a keen knife. Since the fragments and Islets in this region ranged between a mile and three and a half miles above the Cloudlands, this created great hanging barriers that might have been fun for a Dragon or dragonet to fly, but not a far more unwieldy Dragonship. Soon, greenness and life were literally bursting from the Islands, a strangely lush corner of Wyldaroon compared to some of the tan and brown regions that flanked this realm of tropical jungle.
Toward the humpbacked massif of Mount Morgu-Zayê, an irregular oval measuring some fifteen leagues wide and thirty-three long, it was as if they passed over a strange, interlaced garden of flowering sprays of jungle foliage, a garden tended by the breathtaking variety of dracoflora and dracofauna that inhabited these parts. Great swarms of green and grey miniature dracomantas worked around the gardens, fertilising, pruning and tending, while the colourful, frilly-winged pollinators drifted like swarms of fish from one flower farm to the next, pollinating the flowers and collecting nectar for their hungry brethren. Great white Harvesters drifted beneath the Islands, milking the unique varieties of ragions and snaffling up any leaves or branches that might fall in their direction. Less flattering descriptions of Morgu-Zayê styled it ‘Wyldaroon’s greatest dung heap,’ and as they neared that immense mound of vegetative abundance, the powerful, acidic-humid pong certainly suggested as much.
“Yuck!” Yazina screeched, her eyes watering.
“No references to the smell when we’re down there, daughter,” Chanbar warned her. “It’s highly offensive in dracoflorian cultures. Not even a wave toward the nostrils.”
“What, am I just supposed to drip?”
“You can dab at your eyes and nostrils with a scented cloth. That’s acceptable.”
Nyahi winked at Asturbar. “And I thought soldiers’ boots were foul!”
“Drippier is better,” he deadpanned.
Both girls stared at him in disbelief.
He waved a hand at the organic treehouse city slowly emerging from the jungles ahead. “Welcome to the realm of runny mucus.”
* * * *
Set amongst protodraconic floral giants that grew up to four thousand feet tall in places, the ‘trading post’ was a city by Human size or standards, until one considered the immensity of its denizens, the Asjujian Emoflits. The first time Yazina saw one, she screamed and covered her mouth in shock. Like a walking wall of timber spikes, the bulky arboreal creature waddled away beneath them, at least ten times the length and breadth of their Dragonship. Its every footstep shook the jungle. A pair of crimson eyes set deep in its deep brown, woody exoskeleton behind its head – they had twelve eyes apiece – glared balefully back at the visitors. A throbbing roar like two draconic trees engaging in full-scale warfare announced their arrival, summarily deafening every Human on board, while a twin waves of steaming khaki mucus erupted from spiracles upon its back, inundating the foliage either side of the creature.
Iridiana promptly collapsed into one of her floral forms.
Chanbar popped a plug out of his left ear. “Sorry, forgot to warn everyone.”
Asturbar said to Yazina, “I’ve always wondered at the ‘flits’ part of their name. Seems an Asjujian Emoflit ought to flit between flowers. Since they weigh in at around three thousand tonnes for a fully-grown male, that’s not the impression I get.”
A smell like burning sulphur mingled with rancid sherbar onions drifted back on the breeze. Yazina covered her mouth and turned purple. Every nose aboard immediately started tingling madly, while their eyes streamed uncontrollably. Asturbar was convinced that having his nostrils cauterised with a red-hot poker would have been a more comfortable and less painful experience. He had forgotten the delights of Morgu-Zayê.
“Lower the hands, darling,” said Chanbar. “That was the Asjujian equivalent of a scented invitation.”
She wheezed something unintelligible.
“Yes, my dear. Learning about other cultures is an enormous privilege, isn’t it?”
They made port on a bustling wooden platform set high amongst the jungle giants. Asturbar counted at least five hundred other Dragonships in as wide a variety of designs as their ports an
d realms of origin, from great conical balloons to the classic multi-compartmented Sabukar warships, bristling with weaponry. Sakubarians were one of the most aggressive peoples, and conversation with one of them was widely likened to slamming one’s own forehead repeatedly with a hammer – less painful and more likely to yield a good result, ran the joke. Great inverted cones and trumpet-like flowers hung from the ‘branches’ all around, although those branches were actually living Dragonkind and the azure and delicate pink flowers were their reproductive organs, Chanbar gleefully informed his teenage daughter, to her vocal revulsion.
Descending through a hole in the platform, they found themselves looking out over a very active marketplace specialising in the trading of dracoslugs, the primary food source of Asjujian Emoflits, which were kept in broad open pits. The price of a dracoslug being dependent upon its olfactory properties and secondly upon the perceived strength of the hallucinogenic mucus gleaming in splendid, shimmering bands upon its ovoid, fifty-foot body, this was the point at which Human noses gave up rebelling and just tried to quietly drop off their faces. Only Nyahi was immune, but Asturbar did feel her petals might be wilting at the stench. He popped her carefully in a pocket.
He said, “Alright, Chanbar. Let’s go find Grandutakkator.”
