The Redundant Dragons
Page 7
Chapter 6: Treasure
Like the others, Verity had been fixed on the heavily barnacled chest, but when the ghost cats began surrounding it and sniffing at the edges of the lid, she watched them closely then said, “Let’s see what’s in there.”
Captain Lewis tried to open it, but the lid didn’t budge. Mr. Funnel offered a hammer and crowbar, but the lid remained firmly attached to the box.
Legs, the rigger, was also the bartender from Changelings Cabaret, and was as much octopus as it suited her to be in any given situation. She snaked out a tentacle and wrapped it around the chest.
“Oh dear. How disappointing. Well, then, I’ll just take this down below and put it back where it belongs again, shall I?”
“Don’t you dare!” the captain said, smacking lightly at the tentacle.
“But Captain, the ghost ship…”
“Had the unmitigated temerity to lay—hull—on the Belle and her crew. You all do remember who I am, don’t you?”
“You’re the captain, sir or ma’am, as you prefer.”
“I am. And the captain is what on his ship?”
“Absolute authority—sir or ma’am, as you prefer.”
“And don’t you forget it,” Captain Lewis said. “Get me a damn pry bar. Has it escaped everyone’s attention that whenever the box moves, it jingles?”
With a lot of grunting, groaning, and a prodigious display of colorful language, the chest was at last forced open. The sight that met their eyes was almost too good to be true. It was filled with gold, silver and copper coins. The captain picked up handfuls and let them clink through her fingers. The crew crowded around and did the same before she pushed them aside and shut the lid.
“Well, me hearties. Cargo be damned. We’re plenty wealthy enough now to pass it by and deliver Verity here to her aunt, who happens to be a great friend of sailing folk. You all know of the Sailor’s Spa and Bawdy House?”
A cheer arose, loud enough to wake the dead, had there been any, in the wreck below.
“Now, stow this in my cabin and let’s waggle our rudder and make way for Madame Erotica’s.”
The Hunter, the Traveler, and the Singer
The enticing smell of blood lured the dragons across the former battlefield, where wildflowers softened the contours of pox-like craters across the face of the earth.
A man stood outlined against the large carcass hanging from a tree. He carved a big piece of it off and spitted it over a fire.
3336 had no frame of reference to inform him as to what kind of a beast the meat had belonged to, but he didn’t need to know that. His stomach rumbled, and sparks glittered in his nostrils. It was food, enough food for him and Smelt both.
And this man had better not try to stop them.
Auld Smelt followed, wobbling along behind him.
The young dragon growled menacingly, a growl intended to convey, “Hello, man. As you can tell, we are dragons, and we are very hungry, so you’d better forget that this is your kill and give it to us or we will be forced to use our fire in ways other than productive labor.”
It was a menacing growl indeed. Very menacing. But the man looked up from turning his spit and grinned broadly, welcomingly.
“By the moon and stars, if it isn’t a dragon! No—wait—there’s another coming—a pair of dragons! Marvelous! I could use your help if you’d be so kind. I’ve no taste for raw elk. If you’d grant me the boon of a fire to cook a small portion of this for myself, you may have the rest if you like. Someone shot it—from the train, I suspect, and I was fortunate enough to happen on it as it died. But I couldn’t pay the troll toll at the bridge, so my matches got wet in the crossing.”
3336 looked to Smelt, who said, “You do it, laddie. My fire is trained to melt iron ore. I need to retrain it. I would incinerate our dinner were I to fire the meat.”
After hearing about all the warrior dragons, 3336 really wanted to respond ferociously to the man, to show him that dragons were not just for cleaning up miners’ messes, but he wouldn’t have actually hurt him. There was no reason to do that. Unlike almost every human the young dragon had ever encountered, the man spoke respectfully, even deferentially.
He also seemed to understand dragon speech, for he cut off a hunk of the carcass and laid it on a rock, then backed away with a low bow and a graceful wave of his hand, involving a fascinating twirl of the wrist. Well, if he was even going to do tricks for his guests, he must be a good sort of man.
“If you could just char the hair off, please, great one?” the man asked.
3336 had in the course of his work used his flame for a number of delicate tasks inside the tunnel, where a blast such as Smelt routinely created would have charred all of his co-workers, seared off the hair as requested. Then using his claw, he flipped the haunch and with a low medium flame broiled the meat.
As the man ate, he said, “I was hoping by coming to the Battleground of the Blazing Bog I might meet one of your kind. I really need a dragon’s response to my new song. It’s—er—about dragons, you see.”
Once more, even as he and Smelt made short work of the meal, 3336 noticed that every word the man spoke was clear and made perfect sense. Probably because as a mine dragon, he had listened to humans all day long and had learned to understand their speech, although mostly in a work context.
“We don’t care about your song, man,” he said, still not quite willing to give up his newfound ferocity. “We cared about the meat, and it was smart of you to give it to us willingly because—because otherwise we might have had to eat you.”
He was rather proud of how tough and threatening he sounded, but then felt he should explain. “You see, all of the other dragons were loosed from the mine and they’ve all had first pick of the beasts around here and we were very hungry indeed.”
“Yes, I suppose you would be,” the man said. “But now that you’ve eaten your fill, I trust you are more content? Be my guests, do. Pull up a—well, I suppose you’re used to sitting without pulling up anything, but make yourselves comfortable, and please, give a listen to my song. This is a time of great import in Argonian history and in dragon history, to be sure, and it is incumbent upon those of my profession to commemorate it accordingly.”
“What do you think, boy?” Smelt asked.
“He doesn’t seem to be armed,” 3336 said. “There’s just that box thingy.”
The box thingy proved to have a sweet voice of its own, and as the man held it and stroked it so it accompanied him as he sang.
“Once upon a time in the days of ‘ere
When people were feudal and dragons were rare
And fiery and fearsome when they went on a tear
They torched down the cities
And scorched the green fields
So the people were homeless
And the crops would not yield
Then warriors developed a fireproof shield
And scale piercing swords and really sharp spears
And dragons holed up in their caverns for years.
When they came out, there were less than before
Some befriended the humans
And helped them in war.”
The man stopped and scratched his head. “I can’t seem to come up with another verse.”
Auld Smelt burped courteously in the direction of the fire, brightening it for a moment with his sparks. “This is a good place to sing about the Dragon Heroes of the Great Flame War. That field there is where we fought the Battle of Blazing Bog. Many a brave dragon died or was mortally wounded.”
The man nodded. “That’s why I came here. For inspiration.”
“When the battles were fought, and the smoke had all cleared
The price of the winning was worse than they feared
For dragons, who once more went hungry again
When they tried to find food
People offered them chains
‘Just work at these jobs
And get something to eat’
Instead of good meat.”
3336 said, “Wait a minute. I have trouble believing this part. You should explain why such brave heroes would settle for jobs in the mines and kibble when they were used to glory and flying wild and killing their own prey.”
Auld Smelt shot a bolt of flame halfway across the clearing. “Because they were worn out, that’s why. Weary, many of us—them—lame or maimed. Any food was welcome, and the livestock and wild things were consumed by the marching human armies. We thought they were playing some cruel joke when they offered us that kibble at first, but then were surprised to find how satisfying it was. It calmed the rumble in our guts and left us feeling peaceful—a feeling we weren’t familiar with but oh, it was sweet. So when we tried to get more, and they said, ‘Sure you can, old beasts, but first we need you to do these little things for us—’ we didn’t take much convincing.”
“Brilliant!” the man exclaimed, pulling a feather from his hat and picking up a book to scribble in. “What was it like, being there, sir? I mean, your dragonness? I mean…”
“Smelt will do me fine,” Auld Smelt told him. “What was it like? Not nearly so quiet as it is now, and you couldn’t see the stars for the flames slashing the night like the aurora gone rogue.” He licked his muzzle. “No darkness, then, and the air reeked of blood and seared flesh, soldier flesh, horse flesh, dragon flesh. Our side had a unicorn standing by over in the shadow of the hills to heal the injured, but I heard halfway through the battle its horn went transparent, all the magic drained away, and it died of exhaustion.”
“Ah, I need to put that imagery in somewhere. Excellent detail. Thank you, Smelt.”
He rearranged the verses, adding the detail, strummed through it a couple of times, then added some flourishes on the strings of the instrument and began to sing.
Halfway through the song, something strange happened. Smelt leaned away from 3336 with a wild look in his eyes. Even the man noticed and stilled his strings.
“What is it?” 3336 asked. “Smelt, what’s wrong.”
“You,” his old friend said. “What you’re doing there. You’ve never done that before.”
“I was…” 3336 started to say, “just listening.”
“Singing,” the man said. “He was singing. Weren’t you?”
“Was I?” It seemed to 3336 that he was just enjoying the music. There wasn’t a lot of music in the tunnels. Sometimes one man or another would start a song. Sometimes someone joined in, and on the ones the men called dirty, sometimes a whole shift would join in the choruses. But most of the miners didn’t sing as sweetly as this man.
“I can’t be sure because I’ve never heard a dragon sing before or even heard of it happening. Is your family musical?”
“No,” 3336 said at the same time Smelt said, “Yes, his mother was.”
“Was she?”
“Oh yes. Your mother could sing the mountains down and did so to bury invading troops back in the day. But she had lived with a female human and before the woman died of old age, the two of them toured the country, the woman singing and your mother accompanying her—because the humans didn’t understand what she did as singing. I—admired her, you know.”
“I wonder what it would sound like if you sang with your wings spread, or if you could get different effects by pumping them?” the man said.
3336 tried, and when the man made another little suggestion, tried again. The man was delighted, but no more than 3336 at finding a skill he didn’t realize he possessed.
Sometime during the conversation Auld Smelt curled his tail around his nose and fell asleep.
When the man stopped singing, 3336 did not realize it for some time. His eyes were closed in sheer ecstasy. He loved this. He had been a quiet, modest, subdued creature all of his life, trying not to look big or fierce to the men who worked in his tunnel. He had no wish to frighten them.
But his tail lashed in time with his voice and whumped like a drum with the beat of his lyric, sung with throat and breath. He felt so wonderful when he sang, he could have sworn he felt his wings growing. The swish, swish of them added a treble percussion to the bass whump of his tail.
He thought he was still singing with the man and that the other voice he heard inside his head was the human’s. He didn’t realize that echoes existed even in these wide-open spaces. He was hearing his own mighty voice bouncing off the distant mountains!
When 3336 finally ran out of sound, Smelt, undisturbed, was still sleeping, but the man had set aside his stringed box and regarded him with something like fear, but not. “I’m astonished! You’re amazing. Magnificent. I had no idea dragons were so musical.”
“Nor did I!” 3336 said. “Why, if I had sung like this in the tunnel, it would have collapsed on top of me!”
The man placed his steepled fingers against his chest and bowed low, saying, “Fate has brought us together, my friend, for I, the great Casimir Cairngorm, troubadour and talent scout extraordinaire, am just the coach and teacher to help you realize your great potential. With whom have I the honor of sharing my meal and music?”
“I’m 3336 of Tunnel Twelve,” the dragon replied. “You already met Auld Smelt.”
“A number? A mere number is pitifully inadequate for a singular artist such as yourself.”
“I’d prefer a name, and Smelt and I discussed it, but he didn’t like any of the ones I came up with and actually, I didn’t think they sounded right either.”
“Naturally you must have a special name, a worthy name. A bard’s name, but one suitable for a dragon. Hmmm, it’s on the tip of my tongue. I know such a name, but I can’t quite—Devent!”
“Excuse me?” 3336 said. In the tight tunnel, courtesy was very important to keep the workplace from becoming hostile.
“Devent! It means bard, so you will be Devent, the Dragon Bard. Frankly, at the moment you dragons need good press…”
“Good press?”
“Reputation! Words of praise sung in your honor throughout the land. With my help and guidance, you shall be an ambassador for dragonkind!”
“Me?”
“You indeed! With my help, of course.”
“And Smelt’s?”
“Most certainly, if Smelt will not be put out when you are suddenly a celebrity.”
“Oh, I don’t think he would be. Why should he?”
Their conversation was interrupted by the low moaning cries of the train dragons as the locomotive rumbled past on its way north from Queenston.
“Were the train dragons not freed when the rest of us were?” 3336—Devent—asked the man. “I thought all of us were on our own now.”
“As it happens, the railroad dragons prefer their work to unemployment, and the railroads are happy to continue running uninterrupted,” Casimir said. “Their dragons have always been well-treated and enjoy a certain esprit de corps with the other employees, engineers, conductors, brakemen, firemen/dragon wranglers and such. I suspect our splendid repast was probably shot by a railroad man hunting for the dragons’ next meal.”
“They travel,” Devent said. “I want to do that too. Before now, I only saw Tunnel Twelve.” The thought of what he had missed for so much of his life momentarily saddened him. “I want to sing more.”
“Your wish is my command,” Casimir Cairngorm said with another bow.
Smelt did not wake, and soon Casimir also slept, but though 3336 sang less loudly, he continued singing while he watched the moon travel across the sky and the stars twinkle brighter and brighter. He was amazed. He had never seen either, although he had heard of them.
When Smelt woke, he said, “We should find food,” and Devent fell in beside him, walking in the direction of the Majestic Mountains, where Smelt had his hoard.
They had not gone far when the man called out to them, “Wait! Devent! What about your singing? Remember, you need my help. I will come with you.”
Devent started to say that he could sing wheneve
r he wanted by himself. He hadn’t really believed Casimir when he spoke of singing before men and making them think better of dragons. That sounded very complicated for a newly freed tunnel dragon. There was so much to experience before he settled into one course or another. And he liked walking with Smelt.
The older dragon answered Casimir. “Come if you will for a little way, perhaps. But we are going where only dragons go.”
“Meanwhile you’ll meet other men. I could be useful to you as an interpreter.”
“How did you come to speak Dragonish?” Smelt said, suspicious.
“I was brought up around dragons,” he said. “Wild ones. Free.”
Smelt whipped his head around to face Casimir. “Really, and where was that? You are not as old as I. When would you have had a chance to meet wild dragons?”
“Oh, here and there. A bard gets around, you know.”
Smelt snorted and faced the mountains once more. “I did not know any were left.”
Casimir didn’t seem to hear. He’d begun to whistle as he walked, then, rather slyly, to sing—about the former 3336!
“Devent the dragon flew over the hills
Singing his ballad compelling
I whistled as he sang
Till the mountains rang.
People watched as he flew past their
Dwell-el-el-lings.”
Chapter 7: Casimir, Agent of the Underground
The traveling had all sounded very nice, but the reality was less pleasant, a fact that did not surprise Smelt and was not too unexpected to Devent, but which seemed to astonish Casimir.
“It was only one little ewe!” he complained when they were finally able to slow their pace again, feeling sure they were out of rifle range of the shepherd whose wandering charge had been their dinner.