by Robin Hobb
Silence flowed in to follow his words. The black dragon regarded him intently. Rapskal continued his obeisance, his face lifted fearlessly. At last the creature spoke. ‘IceFyre am I called by humans. At least one here recalls the old courtesies of your kind!’ His gaze swept over them all, dragons and humans. ‘By treachery, I am poisoned. Humans have done this to me, luring me with fat cattle filled with death. If you have Silver, then lead me there. But I did not come here seeking Elderling praises or even Silver, though I welcome both. I came to see if any dragons still live who are worthy of that name, if any would rise to avenge me against the ones who seek to kill dragons for their flesh. ’
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Rapskal stood and lifted his spear high. ‘If no other rises to serve in that glorious cause, I will go. Fearless Heeby and I will take to the skies and slay any who have dared to lift a hand against dragons. ’
Mercor spoke. ‘I will lead you to the Silver and you may drink your fill. Then we dragons will speak of vengeance, when you are rested and all are gathered. ’ The golden drake’s gaze swept over the gathered Elderlings and came to rest on Rapskal. ‘Do not speak for dragons, Rapskal. Not even Heeby. ’ His tone was severe. ‘Dragons alone can judge the gravity of the offence, and dragons alone will determine if it is an uprising against dragonkind, or foolish herdsmen seeking to claim grazing beasts as theirs alone. ’
Instead of calming the black dragon, Mercor’s words seemed to focus his anger. He lifted his head high, eyes whirling as he stared at the golden dragon. ‘Humans knew where I hunted, and deliberately put out poisoned cattle. When I ate, I slept, and awoke sickened and weak. Then they came out with nets to snare me, and spears to let my blood flow and basins to catch it. They did not seek to kill me because I had eaten cattle. They put out cattle in the hopes that a dragon might become prey for them! But I was not as weakened as they thought. Many I killed! And many more will I kill!’
‘Only if you live,’ Mercor pointed out calmly. ‘First, we must give you strength against the poison. This way to the Silver. ’
Mercor wheeled and walked away. IceFyre let his gaze wander balefully over the gathered humans, Elderlings and dragons. Then he turned to follow Mercor. The other dragons fell in behind them, and the keepers parted to let the procession through. Heeby looked at Rapskal and then trailed after the others. Rapskal remained standing where he was. He looked mildly stunned.
The vortex of circling dragons shifted, and Thymara suspected they would land near the Silver reservoir and hold their council there. The keepers were left standing, looking at one another uneasily. Into the silence and stillness, Tintaglia descended. The blue queen had recovered most of her strength, but still lacked flesh. As she landed, Malta hurried to meet her. Like her dragon, the Elderling Queen was still recovering, but Thymara had to smile at her impeccable grooming. She wore not a tunic and trousers as most of the keepers did but a flowing gown with draped sleeves. Her face was still thin, but her hair had been dressed in meticulous curls heaped high on her head and framing her scarlet crest. Her face shone with welcome for the dragon who had saved her child.
Tintaglia accepted the welcome as her due. She looked after IceFyre’s vanishing procession. ‘He made no cry for vengeance when I was the one who was dying,’ she observed sourly to her Elderling. ‘Yet let them succeed in giving him a bellyache, and he will melt all their cities with venom. ’ She snorted in disgust, and added, ‘Vain as he is, he is right. And so I will tell the rest of them. The time has come. The city of Chalced must be destroyed. ’ She looked at her Elderling and added, ‘You should stay here. Dragons alone will decide what we will do next. ’ Malta halted, startled, and Tintaglia strode away from her.
‘We have to take action!’ Rapskal was undeterred in his effort to rally them. ‘We must begin to ready ourselves to ride to war now!’
Thymara sighed, and Tats took her hand. Harrikin lifted his voice. ‘We know nothing of war. Is this our vengeance to take?’
Rapskal shook his head as he turned to confront him. ‘It’s as I told you! It’s not revenge. It’s self-preservation. They’ve given us no choice!’
‘I’m afraid he’s right. ’ Thymara was shocked to hear calm, sensible Alise taking that stand. The Bingtown woman’s face was grave rather than fired with enthusiasm for war as she added, ‘You heard what he said. This wasn’t about a dragon preying on herds and cattle owners becoming angry. This is humans hunting dragons for meat, scales and blood. We have all heard Malta’s tale. We have seen Tintaglia’s suffering. The Chalcedeans we hold have admitted it is why they came, and now that they have failed, others will be sent. It cannot be ignored any longer. ’ She was not speaking in a loud voice, but her words were clear and the keepers had begun to gather in a circle around her. Thymara thought that Leftrin looked as surprised as she herself felt, but he did not interrupt or contradict Alise. ‘I cannot speak for the dragons and what they will do, but at the least, humans should speak out against what the Chalcedeans are doing. ’
‘They will not respond to people speaking. When has Chalced ever listened to us asking them to respect our boundaries and to stop preying on our ships?’ Hennesey stood with his arms crossed on his chest.
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‘So, it’s war! Who goes with me?’ Rapskal asked. He looked around at them all. Did anyone breathe? Thymara knew she did not.
He pulled something from his pouch, shook it out and dragged it on over his head. A head covering. A helmet that shaped to his head, making him appear far less human as it capped his skull with overlapping scales. He gave his head a shake and a crest like a parrot’s stood up on the helm. Thymara was torn between a desire to laugh or to gasp in horror as he became even more foreign to her. ‘All of you who desire to be warriors must follow me to the armoury, to see what weapons we can repair and what armour will fit you all. Some of your dragons will accept harness and be willing to bear you. ’
‘And others won’t,’ Tats predicted sourly. He stepped forward. ‘Rapskal, we are not warriors. I am good at hunting, and if a man lifts a hand to me, then I will stand up to him. But you are speaking of attacking a city, days and days away from here. A city full of people who have never even thought of coming here to prey on dragons. It’s a completely insane idea. And the dragons have not yet said that they wish to go to battle. They told us, clearly, that it was their decision. ’
Rapskal cocked his head. He appeared to listen for a time, then took a breath and looked around with confidence. ‘IceFyre has finished drinking. He believes he will soon be fully recovered. And the others have decided to take Tintaglia’s advice. Strike at their main city, where their duke rules. Remind them that dragons are not river pigs to be slaughtered as they wish, but the Lords of the Three Realms, Earth, Sea and Sky. ’ He looked at Tats and said in a voice that was more Rapskal’s than Tellator’s, ‘Tats, will you ride beside me?’
Tats hesitated, looked at Thymara and clasped her hand tightly for a moment before he let go of it. ‘I can’t let you go alone, my friend. I’ll go with you. ’
The dragon doors to the baths swung open and Kalo sauntered out. He looked fresh from the baths, but a strand of gut still dangled from the side of his mouth. Thymara reflected that for all their superior claims, not one of the dragons could groom well without a keeper’s aid.
‘Davvie!’ the immense blue-black dragon bellowed. ‘Davvie, fetch harness for me. We fly tomorrow at dawn. ’
Davvie stepped forward, eluding Carson’s reaching hand. His eyes were wide but he did not seem altogether unwilling as he objected, ‘Kalo, we cannot be ready that fast. There are weapons to repair, and so much to learn. ’
The dragon snorted disdainfully. ‘Begin now and you will be ready when I summon you. Those who come with us will learn on the way. IceFyre has drunk from the Silver. He is recovering swiftly. Once he has hunted and eaten, we will take vengeance to the Duke of Chalced. I fly with him. R
eady yourself or do not, as you please. This is dragons’ business. We fly at dawn. ’
Davvie stared at him. ‘I thought you were going hunting after you bathed …’ he objected weakly.
‘I am fed well enough for now. To the armoury and quickly. I wish to be first to make a choice of the colours there. ’ With a fine disregard for his keeper, Kalo strode away.
Sintara watched the others as IceFyre drank from the Silver well. Tintaglia eyed the black dragon speculatively, as if measuring him against the other males. He was definitely larger than the others but she knew that was not the best criterion in selecting a mate. She lifted her eyes and looked back toward the baths, watching for Kalo. Sintara copied the older female and compared him to Sestican and then looked at Mercor. High summer was the time for mating, but it was never too soon to assess one’s choices.
IceFyre lifted his head at last. His muzzle dripped Silver in languid drops. He stepped away from the well, stretched and then sprawled out on the paving stones. He curled his head and his tail toward the centre of his body, and was abruptly asleep. Mercor advanced a step toward him and sniffed the air around him. ‘He was sickened but he will recover, and quickly,’ the golden dragon announced.
He looked around at the others. Sintara tried to remember the last time they had all gathered in a group. Even when they had been on the other side of the river, they had seldom convened. Cassarick, she thought. Back in the days before we were true dragons. When we were caught at the edge of the river, living in mud, feeding on carrion. Then Mercor had rallied them and together they had concocted the plan that would persuade the humans to help them find Kelsingra. They had thought they were lying when they hinted at a storehouse of Elderling wealth in Kelsingra. Little had they realized that, to humans, the whole city was a vast treasure.
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She thought of the days and distance they had travelled, the changes they had undergone. They had made their keepers into Elderlings, learned to feed themselves, to fly and to hunt. They had become dragons. And tomorrow?
‘We go to battle against humans,’ Mercor said gravely. ‘Truly, there is no choice. ’ He looked at Tintaglia. ‘You have done this before?’
She gazed at him oddly. ‘I have, and in my own life. But dragons have all done this before and more than once. You have no memories of this?’
Sintara kept silent. She possessed no such memories. Mercor was thoughtful for a time, his eyes whirling as if he spun his way back through years and lives. ‘A few,’ he conceded. ‘But our memories are incomplete. We were too short a time in our cases, and you were but one dragon spread among many serpents when you helped us to spin them. You did what you could, but we are not dragons as you and IceFyre are. And our Elderlings are not as you recall them. They are newly made, and still discovering the memories of those who went before them. They will not know how to fight, or how to aid us in fighting. ’ He looked at her gravely and asked, ‘How dangerous is it to make war on humans? To ourselves and to our keepers?’
The large blue queen looked astonished that he would ask such a question. ‘We cannot worry about that!’ she snapped. ‘Humans have risen against us. You saw my wounds! I nearly died of them. IceFyre was poisoned, but even before that, humans had attacked him, with nets and spears. They do not fear us as they should, and while they do not fear, they do not respect us. I have travelled far and had much to do with humans. Some cannot understand us at all when we try to speak to them; they think us dumb beasts, no different from a lion or a wolf. Or a cow, awaiting slaughter. Others are so overwhelmed at the sight of us that they are idiotic in their worship. You have been fortunate in the ones they chose to send with you when you left Cassarick. The changes they had already undergone seem to have readied them to be fit companions to you.
‘But of the humans you will encounter where we must go? They are nothing like the humans you have known. They will try to kill you. They will not greet you or speak to you first. They will feel no wonder, but only the awe that is based on terror. Fear will motivate them and killing you is all they will think of. And you can be killed by them. Do not think of them as puny or stupid. They are sly and treacherous, and they will kill you if they can. ’ Her gaze raked over the assembled dragons as if they opposed her. Her own words were enflaming her anger.
‘You can stay here and hide from them. But the longer you wait before you make them recall their proper place in the world, the more resistance they will give you when you find you must defend yourselves. They will discover the places that we must use, the nesting beach, and the clay banks that we must use to spin our cases to change from serpent to dragon. They will find them and they will fortify them against us. Do you want to wait until you have to fight for them? Wait until they come in and devastate our nests and the unhatched young?’ Her colours had brightened and Sintara could see her poison glands working.
Mercor spoke his question calmly. ‘Our keepers. Our Elderlings. If we take them into battle with us, the other humans will try to kill them, also?’
Tintaglia looked amazed at the stupidity of Mercor’s question. ‘Of course they will! And they will most likely shoot first at them. Your Elderlings will be more vulnerable to their weapons, too, as well as to our own venom. Our attack must be coordinated. One dragon attacking a city can do as it pleases. But when we fly to war together, then we must consider the wind, and what targets we wish to destroy, and how to keep venom from drifting onto another dragon or his Elderling. So. If you bear your keepers into battle, you must have a care for them, if you wish them to survive. ’ She paused as if thinking. ‘But they are useful to have in a battle. If you are caught on the ground, they will fight alongside you. When your eyes are fixed on one enemy, they can spy another one behind you and give warning. They can only slay one at a time, but they are useful. ’ She paused and then added, ‘Sometimes it is kinder to take them with you than to leave them alone. If you do not return, they will mourn and then die anyway. ’ She walked forward to the Silver well. As she bent her head to drink, she added, ‘It is a decision all dragons must make. ’
‘They fly at dawn,’ Leftrin told her. He and Alise were leaning on Tarman’s rail, drinking tea and looking across the ever-restless river. ‘And I think we should leave tomorrow, too. ’
She looked at him in astonishment. ‘Tomorrow?’
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He nodded. ‘My dear, Reyn has sent his last bird, but news such as this cannot depend on those little wings. Nor do I think it was well trained, for when he set it free, it seemed to fly off randomly. No. When the dragons take flight, Tarman must leave as well. The dragons all say it is dragon business, but Chalced may very well view it as a strike by Bingtown and the Rain Wilds. We need to get to Cassarick and warn them, so they can send on word from there. The Traders must be given the chance to prepare for whatever may come. ’
The sun was setting on a day that had shaken Alise’s world to its foundations. Yesterday, her life had had a routine. She had Leftrin in her arms again at night, a fascinating city to study, and a lifetime of useful tasks before her. Then IceFyre had arrived, a dragon such as dragons had once been. His accusations of human treachery and his call for vengeance had fallen on fertile soil. She had been willing to admit that something must be done, but was horrified at how quickly the dragons had decided to destroy Chalced. For that was their avowed ambition. Alise and Leftrin both suspected that Tintaglia had already been preaching the necessity of war to the other dragons, just as Rapskal had been trying to stir the keepers. And the keepers! How willingly the youngsters had leapt at the chance to ride off to war. They had raced one another to the armoury, selecting armour and battle colours, working earnestly to repair ancient weapons. Sylve had come to her, begging her to come and help them make sense of the dragon harness and armour. And so she had gone, taking her sketchbook of all the ancient murals, and using her drawings as examples of how dragons were once garbed for battle. She had been
torn between fascination at making her sketches come to life, and dismay that she would help the young Elderlings ride off to risk their own lives.
And to kill.
It made no sense to her. When had the keepers become capable of killing? Did they not understand what they were going into? Her own memories of the Chalcedeans invading Bingtown flooded back into her mind. She smelled again the stink of the burned-out warehouses in the days that had followed the raids and looting. Her mother’s sister and her entire family had perished in the first attack, slain in their nightrobes, even the youngest girl, a child of three. Alise had gone with her mother, to find the bodies and bring them to their house on a cart and wash them for burial …
‘Alise? Do you agree we must leave tomorrow?’ Leftrin took her hand and tugged at it gently to turn her gaze to meet his. She had been silent and thoughtful for too long. He was worried that she was wandering in her stone memories again. She would not tell him she had been somewhere far darker.
‘The dragons are right. The old saying is true. “Sooner or later, there is always war with Chalced. ” It is all they know there. And better that we take war to them than that they bring it to us again. Leaving tomorrow isn’t a problem, my dear. I have little enough to pack. I’ve spent so much time on Tarman lately that most of my things are already in your cabin. ’
‘Our cabin,’ he said, and grinned. ‘Our home now. I wish I could offer you a more pleasant voyage than what is before us. The crew will rig shelters on the deck, and more than half of the slaves have decided to build new lives here. The other slaves want to be taken back to Trehaug. But even leaving some behind, the galley will always be crowded. I’m glad the weather has turned milder. Half our passengers are going to have to sleep out on the decks. ’
‘I’m sure I will be fine. As long as I can retreat to the cabin and have a bit of time alone with you, I can manage. And I’m looking forward to journeying with Tarman again. He will show these “impervious-ship” sailors how a true liveship runs the river. ’ She ran her hand along Tarman’s railing in a caress, as if she stroked a dragon. Leftrin shook his head in wonder as he felt his ship give a shiver of pleasure. Her hand stilled as she added in a lower voice, ‘But I’m not looking forward to being around Hest. I know I must see him, and so must you. Pledge to me now that you will not let him provoke you to violence. ’
