The Shadow Isle

by Katharine Kerr

  “What’s wrong?” Rori said.

  “Naught.” Her bright smile came back, but he noticed the knife trembling in her grasp. “I just be so weary, Da, and so sad, too, thinking of my Dougie dead and gone.”

  “No doubt! Well, the prince of the Westfolk sent me off to scout for Horsekin. I’m to meet him at a place called Twenty Streams Rock, which is—” He paused to work out how long the journey would be for a caravan rather than a dragon. “Well, five or six days away rather than thrice that number. I’ll escort you there, and then we’ll decide what to do next.”

  “My thanks.” She walked over to him and with her free hand stroked him on the jaw. “I always did think I’d run to my da’s arms one fine day.”

  “At the moment I don’t have any, alas. But here, don’t look so distressed. Someday mayhap I’ll become a man again. There are powerful sorcerers among the Westfolk, and they tell me that they might be able to discover how to reverse the spell.”

  Berwynna flinched, looked away, looked back, then suddenly turned and ran back to camp. As she climbed the hill, she passed Mic and a Cerr Cawnen man, who came on down to greet him. Mic introduced the fellow as Richt, the new caravan master.

  “My master in the craft, Aethel,” Richt said, “he be dead, alas.”

  “That saddens my heart to hear,” Rori said. “Now, I owe you my thanks for saving my daughter’s life.”

  Richt made an odd noise, half a laugh, half a yelp of terror. “Ye gods!” His voice shook. “It be true, then. Our Berwynna, she be a dragon’s spawn.”

  “Not precisely,” Mic said. “I’ll tell you the tale later. For now, I’m more interested in what we’re going to do next.”

  In her grief over Dougie and her terror of Horsekin raiders, Berwynna had quite simply forgotten about the dweomer book. While Richt and Mic conferred with Rori, she ran back to camp. She noticed Laz’s men standing in a tight knot between the two trees with Laz in the center of the group. They were arguing about something, but she couldn’t understand a word of their language. They ignored her, as did the muleteers from the caravan, even when she began searching through the pack panniers, hoping desperately that her saddlebags had turned up on one of the returning mules. She never found them.

  When she asked the muleteers, none of them had seen a pair of tan leather saddlebags with dwarven runes upon them. She went through every pannier and sack again—still nothing.

  The mule she’d been riding had galloped off into the wilderness and never returned. She forced herself to admit that the magical book, which may well have been her father’s only hope of returning to human form, had disappeared. And I’m to blame, she thought. She knelt in the dirt among scattered packsaddles and panniers and cursed herself. Why had she taken it? Why? It could have been safe on Haen Marn instead of wandering through the wilderness on the back of a panicked animal.

  Wolves would doubtless find the mule and pull it down to eat it. The book would be lost forever. In sheer frustration she began to weep. When she heard someone walk up behind her, she twisted around and saw her uncle, looking at her sadly.

  “Ai, weeping again?” Mic said in Dwarvish. “Mourning your Dougie, no doubt! Ai, my poor little lass!”

  “Worse.” Berwynna scrambled to her feet. “Uncle Mic, I’ve got to go hunt for my mule, the one I was riding, I mean. I had my saddlebags on the saddle, the ones Grandfather Vron gave me, and in them—”

  “No!” Mic shook his head vigorously. “You are not going out there, whether it’s alone or with a guard. Wynni, we’ve got to get out of here.”

  “But Da’s here to protect us—”

  “He can only do so much. For all we know, there’s a whole army of Horsekin around here somewhere. We’ve got to get off this road and start south today.”

  “But I had—”

  “Hold your tongue!” Mic laid a heavy hand on her shoulder. “I won’t hear it. You could be killed out there. Ye gods, you nearly were! Those men who tried to grab you—do you want to end up raped and a Horsekin slave?”

  “No, no, of course not.”

  Now was the moment, Berwynna realized, that she should confess, tell her uncle that she’d taken the book and lost it again. But no one else knows, she thought. Maybe I’ll never have to tell Da or anyone else. Yet such would be a coward’s trick, she realized, one unworthy of her Dougie’s gift.

  “Wynni, are you listening to me?” Mic said.

  “What? I’m sorry, Uncle Mic. What did you say?”

  “I said, here come the men to load the mules. Come along, let’s not get in their way.”

  Mic grabbed her hand; she pulled free.

  “You don’t understand,” Berwynna began. “Do let me explain.”

  “Here, what’s all this?” Laz walked up to them, with his men close behind him. They walked warily and kept their hands on the hilts of their weapons. When they formed a half circle behind him, some of the men turned around to keep watch, as if they expected another attack at any moment. The man called Faharn stood next to Laz and glowered like a winter storm.

  “Wynni,” Laz said, “I know your heart aches for your Dougie, but—”

  “It be not only Dougie!” Berwynna drew herself up to her full height, not that it amounted to much over five feet. She spoke in the Mountain dialect so Laz could understand her. “It be the book, that book with the dragon on it, the one Dougie did bring to Haen Marn. I did carry it in those saddlebags, and now it be gone.”

  Laz did the last thing she would have expected: he laughed. “So you did steal it,” he said, “and here I thought Mara had just mislaid it.”

  “I did, and I know not why. It were sitting on a bench among the apple trees, and somehow I did feel there were a need on me to have it. It did will me to pick it up.”

  “Wynni!” Mic said with a groan. “Be honest, now! Books don’t will people to do things.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.” Laz’s mood changed to the utterly serious. “I’ve had that experience myself, with things that had dweomer upon them.”

  Berwynna felt a thin sliver of hope that she’d not disgraced herself. “Be that true?” she said.

  “Very true.” Laz held up his hands with their stumps of fingers. “This is the result of listening to a pair of wretched dweomer crystals. The book might well have influenced you. I know that the wretched thing could move itself.”

  “It what?” Mic’s voice turned feeble. “That’s impossible.”

  “But, Laz,” Berwynna said. “There be no dweomer in my soul.”

  “Very true. That’s what makes you so vulnerable to it. Mic, that book is crawling with guardian spirits. I’ve no doubt they could move the thing and bend Wynni to their will. The only question is why they wanted to.” Laz frowned, thinking. “Well, here, let me scry for it.”

  Laz turned a little away. Berwynna could see the change in his face: a slackness, a loss of focus about the eyes. After a moment he shrugged. “I suspect it’s still in the saddlebags. All I see is a vague impression of darkness. How were you carrying it? Did you have those oiled wrappings around it?”

  “That, and one of my dresses.” Berwynna felt like weeping in frustration. “I did wish no harm to befall it.”

  “Alas, unless someone finds it and opens the bundle, I’m blind to it.”

  “What about the mule? Could it be that you can scry for it?”

  “I never saw your mule, so I cannot. But don’t be too harsh on yourself, Wynni. For one thing, we don’t truly know what was in the wretched book. For another, its spirits were in charge, not you.”

  “My thanks. Yet my heart does ache with shame—”

  “Tell your heart to hold its tongue.” Laz flashed his knife-edge grin, but she saw no humor in his eyes. “Mic’s right about one thing. You’ve got to get this pitiful excuse for a caravan moving again.” He hesitated, then shrugged. “As for me and my fellow outcasts, we’ll be leaving you.”

  “What?” Mic said. “Why? Are you daft? Those Horsek
in outnumber you.”

  “It’s the dragon,” Laz said. “He hates me, you see. I don’t know why, but he does, and he’ll kill me. My one chance is to try to slip away. I’ve told my men that if he comes after me, they’re to run like the hells are opening up under them. There’s no reason for them to perish miserably with me.”

  Berwynna spun around and looked for her father. A good distance away, Rori was sitting on his haunches like a giant cat, his tail curled around his forelegs. He was looking off to the east, most likely watching for their enemies.

  “But the Horsekin!” Mic repeated.

  “We’ll have to take our chances with them,” Laz said. “I don’t suppose any of us will be much of a loss should they catch us, after all, since we—”

  “You saved our lives,” Berwynna interrupted. “Let me go talk with him.”

  Berwynna took off at a trot before Mic or Laz could stop her. She ran to the edge of the barrow, scrambled down the side, and hurried over to the dragon. He lay down with his front legs stretched out in front of him and lowered his head to speak with her.

  “Is somewhat wrong?” Rori said. “You look troubled.”

  “I be so,” Berwynna said. “Da, you do know that we did nearly die, all of us, when the Horsekin did attack the caravan.”

  “I do, truly. And?”

  “Know you why I didn’t die?”

  “I don’t, though I was wondering about that.”

  “Some Horsekin, they nearly did capture me. I did fight and nearly get free, but in the end, they would have taken me. There were three of them, and I were cut off from our men. But just then, rescuers did ride up, men we’d not seen before, men who be outlaws among the Gel da’Thae because they worship not the demon Alshandra. They did ride and fight and save us, but two of them, they were slain, Da. They did give their lives to save mine and Uncle Mic’s and the rest of the men, just like my Dougie did die fighting to save us.”

  The dragon opened his massive jaws in surprise. “By every god,” he said at last, “then those men are heroes to me, outlaws or not. I wish I had some splendid boon or gift to give them, but alas! All those old tales about dragons having treasure? They’re not true.”

  “That does ache my heart, Da. But truly, there be a boon you could grant them.”

  “Indeed? And what might that be?”

  “I do fear to ask for it, lest you say me nay. There be danger in the asking, you see.”

  The dragon rumbled with laughter. “Wynni,” he said, “I’m as sure as I can be that you’re my daughter. You’re as crafty as a dragon hatchling, aren’t you? You want me to promise this boon before I hear what it is.”

  “Well, that be true, Da.” Berwynna heaved what she hoped was a pitiful sigh. “The boon, it would cost you so little.”

  “Oh, very well.” Rori paused to rumble again. “I hereby most solemnly grant your boon.”

  “Da, you be so wonderful!” Berwynna would have thrown her arms around his neck, but they would have reached a bare quarter of the way. “I always did dream that my father would be so grand.”

  “Enough flattery, hatchling! What’s this boon?”

  “There be a Gel da’Thae man with us named Laz Moj. He does tell me that you hate him, and he fears you would slay him on the spot. Please, Da, he did save my life and Uncle Mic’s. Please don’t harm him.”

  “Laz Moj?” The dragon’s silvery brow furrowed. “I don’t recognize the name.”

  “He be a mazrak, a raven mazrak, from here in the Northlands.”

  The dragon growled, a huge sound like a hundred dogs. Berwynna stood her ground and laid a gentle hand on his jaw. When she stroked him, he stopped growling.

  “Of all the wretched dweomermen in the blasted Northlands,” Rori said, “it would be him. It’s a good thing you wheedled that boon out of me.”

  “But, Da, you’ll not kill him, though, will you?”

  “He’s safe from me. I gave my word, and I promised you a boon, and you shall have it. Huh! You remind me of another sister of yours, one you’ve not met. Alas, you won’t meet her, either, because she’s gone to the Otherlands. Rhodda, her name was, and she could charm anything out of me when she was a little lass.” He growled again, but it was a wistful sort of sound. “It’s just as well you can’t join forces against your poor old father.”

  “Poor old father? And you a dragon?”

  “I wasn’t a dragon back when Rhodda was young, and it’s a pity, too. She might have been more tractable.”

  Berwynna felt a cold touch of regret, that she’d never be able to meet this sister. She’d just found out that Rhodda existed only to hear that she was dead. Just like Dougie, she thought, and to her horror the memory picture of his broken body rose again in her mind.

  “Here!” Rori said. “What’s so wrong?”

  “I did just remember how the man I did love so much died.” Berwynna gasped for breath and managed to choke back her tears. She refused to let her father see her weep. “I’ll be going back to camp and telling Laz that he be safe from you.”

  When Berwynna climbed the barrow wall, she saw Laz and his men saddling their horses. She ran over to them and caught Laz by the arm.

  “It be safe,” she said. “He did promise me that he’d not slay you, Laz, because you did save my life and Uncle Mic’s. So don’t leave.”

  Laz stared at her.

  “When I did ask,” Berwynna went on, “he did grant me a boon, that he’d not harm you.”

  Laz laughed, one good whoop of laughter, and shook his head in amazement. Faharn stepped forward and spoke urgently in their language. Laz shot him a disgusted glance and answered in the same.

  “He’s telling me I shouldn’t trust you,” Laz said to her. “By the black hairy arse of the Lord of Hell, I owe Haen Marn too great a debt to go around accusing its daughter of lying to me. Very well, Wynni. Let’s go talk your father. He needs to know that the book’s gotten lost, and since he’s promised not to harm me, I’d best be the one to tell him. Don’t say one word about it until I do.”

  “Laz!” Faharn snapped in the Mountain dialect. “Be not a fool!”

  “That advice comes too late,” Laz said. “Let’s see, I was born some thirty years ago now, and so it’s thirty years too late.” He laughed again, and his eyes gleamed with excitement. “Let’s go, Wynni. I want to see if your father keeps his promises.”

  Faharn began talking fast in their language, but Laz slipped his arm through Berwynna’s and marched her off across the barrow with Faharn trailing miserably after them. The dragon lay where Berwynna left him, waiting for them. When they climbed down from the barrow, Rori raised his head and growled, but only faintly.

  “So,” the dragon said. “You’re the mazrak, are you? Laz Moj, is it?”

  “That’s my name, truly,” Laz said. “May I ask why you’ve always hated me? I honestly cannot remember ever doing you harm.”

  The dragon considered him for a long cold moment. “Mayhap you don’t,” he said at last. “But I do. Listen to me, Laz Moj. I made my daughter a promise, and I’ll keep it as long as you treat me and mine as well and faithfully as you’d treat your kin and clan. But if you ever do me or mine the least bit of harm, then the promise ends. I’ll crush you without a moment’s thought.” He lifted one clawed paw from the ground. “Do you understand me?”

  “I do, most decidedly.” Laz took a step back. “I promise you I have no intention of doing them any harm.” He held up his maimed hands. “Do you see these? Berwynna’s twin healed them. Your woman Angmar gave me the shelter of her hall. I owe them and, through them, you a great deal of gratitude. Doing them harm is the farthest thing from my mind.”

  Rori slapped the ground with his tail, then switched it back and forth like an angry cat. “Good, but you don’t know who else I consider mine. Prince Dar and his royal alar, indeed, the Westfolk, all of them—not one small bit of harm, Laz Moj, not by dweomer, not by the sword, not at all, naught, nothing.” Rori thrust his huge
head forward. “Do you understand that?” His upper lip curled to show fang.

  “Ye gods, I’ve never even met these people! Why would I harm them?”

  Their gazes met and locked. The dragon’s tail slapped the ground again as if it had a life of its own. Berwynna felt afraid to so much as breathe as they stared at one another. He was terrifying, her father, when he wanted to be. Somehow she’d not expected this when she’d longed to find him, that in an instant he could turn so frightening, so wild. With a toss of his head and a half-turn of his body, Laz looked away at last.

  “Good,” Rori said softly. “I think me you do understand.”

  “I do,” Laz said. “I understand in the marrow of my soul, albeit that marrow’s more than a little frozen at the moment. In terror, that is.”

  Rori laughed, his deep good-humored rumble. Laz took a deep breath and managed to smile, then turned to Berwynna.

  “Wynni,” Laz said, “you have my undying thanks for this.”

  “You owe her your life,” Rori said, “just as she owed you hers. The debt’s been repaid. Remember that.”

  “Oh, fear not! I shall.”

  “Good.” The dragon lurched to his feet. “Now that we understand each other, Laz, you’d best get your men and what’s left of that caravan on the road. Richt knows where we’re heading. We can talk more later. I’m going to go look for those Horsekin now, so both of you, get back on the barrow. These wings can knock a man over when I take flight.”

  Berwynna opened her mouth to ask about the book, but Laz caught her eye.

  “Come along,” Laz said. “We’ll talk more tonight, just like your father wants. I agree that we need to get on the road. We’re giving you a horse to ride, Wynni. It wears a thing called a bridle, and you should be able to control it.”

  “I be glad to hear that,” Berwynna said. “Not that I know how to ride.”

  “You’ll learn,” Rori put in. “You have to. Now go, both of you!”

  Rori waited until Laz and Berwynna had gone a safe distance away before he took to the air. He soared high over the barrow and the camp, then turned and headed back east. He saw no sign of the Horsekin raiders on the road except for tracks leading into the forest. When he flew over the trees, he used the road as a guide, still saw nothing, then began to swing back and forth at angles to the road. In the thickest part of the forest, hiding among the old-growth trees, he could just make out a few large shapes that might have been horses.