The Language of Power

by Rosemary Kirstein

  Five steps, at a run, and Rowan was in the hole with Willam.

  He looked up, startled, then terrified. She clutched his shoulder. In a whisper: “Don’t move,” and again, without voice: Don’t move, don’t move . . .

  Then the dragon was directly behind them.

  It was taller than Rowan. She stood frozen as it eyed her, head cocked.

  No. It does not really see me, Rowan told herself, it does not, it does not . . . Its action was part of its script. It would not attack—as long as they stayed inside the hole.

  Willam was down on one knee, motionless, the captive dragon limp beneath him. The blocking dragon wove its head, took a step, and another, toward them.

  Rowan glanced over her shoulder. Ahead, a dragon as tall as her shoulder looked her way. It hesitated, rumbled in its throat, and shifted slightly aside.

  Making way. The hole was about to move, inward.

  Rowan shook Willam’s shoulder, urgently. He glanced about, eyes wide, then pushed his captive forward on the ground, following the two hesitant steps Rowan took.

  The dragon behind still approached, sparing a hissing whistle of annoyance at another that had crowded too near.

  Two dragons behind, now.

  In the other direction, a small dragon prodding at the ground with its nose lifted its head, startled, made to flee, hesitated.

  There was nothing to frighten it, no threat here. But with sudden urgency it scrambled away, paused, and looked back.

  Its head was cocked, one eye centered directly on Rowan. Then the head tilted farther, and the eye was watching, tracking—nothing.

  The hole was still moving. It was large, Rowan and Will were still within it, but not for long.

  Rowan reached down and back, blindly, trying to find Willam, to pull him forward. But then his hand was on her shoulder; he was already standing. She did not look behind. She stepped, and he stepped with her: forward, into the focus of the dragon’s garnet eye.

  The small dragon watched, warily; Rowan watched it watch, kept herself where it saw her, step by step. She walked, and Willam walked, walked, as slow as the great dragon whose empty space they inhabited.

  Then the small head tilted sharply in the other direction, at something on the dragon’s far side. The creature twisted, scrambled away, and was gone.

  And the steerswoman was surrounded by dragons.

  Small bright ones, half-slithering, half-walking. Larger ones, rambling about, eying each other. The largest, lying down, or standing with heads weaving, moving, slowly, with the smallest dragons scrambling away from the swing of heavy tails.

  Rowan smelled them, a scent like hot iron, and oil, and the air before a thunderclap. It was hot in among them, then cool, then hot as their bodies shifted, blocking and admitting the breeze. For one moment the tang of the mud flats by the river appeared, like a voice calling freedom; then it was gone.

  The hole was still moving, it must still be moving—but where?

  There: were those two dragons studying each other? Or something invisible between them? Or that one, there, moving—away from her, or toward something else?

  She tried to look everywhere, tried to catch the dragon-glances, tried to see paths being cleared for her to follow.

  There was an empty area ahead, but no dragon seemed to be watching it.

  Will’s hand on her shoulder urged her forward. Rowan managed one quick glance back.

  Willam had hoisted the captive dragon across his shoulders, and was standing half-turned, one hand on her shoulder. The copper gaze was wide, and frightened, but moving, scanning the dragons behind.

  She had forgotten about him. She could not see everywhere, all the time; but she had eyes behind, Willam’s.

  Beyond Willam, a moss-green dragon was approaching, whipping its head sideways, and Rowan felt she could see the ghost-tail of her ghost-dragon flailing, the creature behind dodging it. She realized then what she had not noticed before: the dragons never actually touched each other.

  But this was all she had time to note. The dragon drew nearer, and Willam’s hand told her again to move.

  She moved, forward, into the gap ahead of her.

  Where next? How could she guess?

  Motion: only motion mattered. Only motion was information.

  The steerswoman forced herself to stop glancing about wildly. She gazed steadily ahead, watching with the whole of her vision, ignoring shape, ignoring detail. She noted only movement: flicks and flickers in the corner of her eye, shifts of large forms ahead and around, sinuous shapes close to the ground, and the glints of light on garnet eyes.

  A flick on the right, which was the tilt of a dragon’s head, its gaze tracking her; she followed the track. Quickness, down on the ground: small dragons hurrying out of her way.

  She moved; Willam moved with her.

  And it seemed to the steerswoman now that she entered some sort of perfect state, where, like a dragon, she saw only motion; where, like a bird’s, her task was simple, and clear, and without options.

  She seemed to herself to be hardly present. There was only motion, the sum of all visible motion, a mathematical operation that could not complete, unless she moved.

  She moved when she must; paused when she must; waited; and moved again.

  She did not know why she felt so very cold, in this heat; but she was cold.

  She moved.

  At intervals, the pressure of the hand on her shoulder told of the motion that she could not see, told her how to complete the sum, saying: Move left. Pause now. Move back. Move back again. Move back.

  They reversed positions. The ghost-dragon had altered its route. Rowan led again.

  They passed among dragons. They paused at the approach of large dragons. Small ones retreated from them.

  It went on, and on. The steerswoman did not know for how long; time vanished. She moved as she must, feeding her actions into the pattern, reading the sum.

  And then, the movements ahead: they did not give way. The sum of all motions told Rowan to move back.

  She did so, with slow steps that lifted with a wet sound.

  The hand on her shoulder said, No. She stopped.

  But before her, little motions, low to the ground: small dragons. Not retreating. Approaching. Rowan stepped back from them again.

  No. Rowan looked behind.

  A shape, approaching, without hesitation.

  Left: another shape, huge, not moving, not watching, giving no clue. Right: no pathway being cleared.

  Front and back, all motion slowly closed in. The hole was shrinking around them, vanishing.

  Willam’s hand pulled, hard. Off-balance, Rowan fell to her left—and then she was half sprawled, half leaning, directly against some great, dark object.

  Her focus broke.

  Dragons, everywhere.

  The blue of the sky above, and the green and silver of light on dragon scales, flashing, large and small dragons moving, slowly and quickly, claws and faceted eyes gleaming, all around. Their hides creaked as they moved; they hissed, whistled, and shrieked at each other. The air consisted only of the scent of them: Rowan saw, heard, breathed dragon.

  Her shirt was wet with sweat, and she was trembling: not with cold but with a battle taking place in her nerves and muscles, the need to flee fighting the knowledge that flight would be suicide. Her very bones wished to run. Her heart banged like a fist against the walls of her chest. There was a sour taste at the back of her throat.

  Willam was beside her, leaning back, panting and shuddering. He had shifted the weight of his captive dragon slightly off his shoulders, and onto the curved surface behind him.

  The dark green, scaled surface.

  They were leaning against a dragon.

  The steerswoman made a helpless sound through her teeth, quelled it instantly.

  The dragon’s cold, hard form was motionless against her back. Its scales, under her left hand, were streaked with dust. Half-crumbled leaves lay in the fold of its forel
eg. A small drift of ash had accumulated against its nose.

  No breath stirred the ash.

  It was the corpse of their own ghost-dragon.

  It reclined, head on forelegs. It must have died in its sleep; the pattern must have included it walking to this spot, lying down, and sleeping.

  The hole had not vanished. It was here. Will and Rowan were safe inside it.

  For how long?

  How long before the dragon was scheduled to wake, and the empty hole would move?

  How long was the full cycle of the pattern, how long before the hole again reached the edge of the herd, how long before Willam and Rowan could escape?

  How long had they been among the dragons?

  She might guess the hour by the angle of the sun—but she could not spare the attention. She had lapsed, she had lost that perfect state of pure observation of the sum of all motion. She must get it back.

  Do not look at individual dragons. Do not identify them as dragons. See motion. See only motion.

  Motion beside her, as Willam wiped sweat from his face, leaned his head back against his burden—

  Heavier than they look, he had said. How long could he carry it?

  Don’t think about that; see motion.

  Details faded. Living dragons became, slowly, only shapes, then blocks of mass.

  The masses moved. Movement was everything.

  She saw waves, ripples of response. Eddies that swirled, then dispersed. Little jumps. The parting of great shapes.

  And, some unguessable time later: movement away from the dead dragon’s head, making way—

  Blindly, she found Willam’s hand. Together, they sidled around the corpse. When the hole left the dragon behind, they were in the moving gap once more.

  They went on.

  The shapes grew more numerous, and closer together— many more shapes, crowding close now.

  Good. More motion: more cues.

  In the grip of pure logic, Rowan walked, paused, backed, turned, moved.

  Motion ahead, shifting the shapes. Motion approaching. Rowan stopped, waited; it grew nearer. She tried to back up.

  No, Willam’s hand said.

  No opening to either side; and the movement ahead, a scrambling, still coming near. She tried again to back. No.

  She glanced behind. One large shape, that was standing still, not giving way.

  The movement ahead became commotion; there were dragon-whistles, and hisses. Then it froze, and small glinting eyes turned on her, turned away, turned back.

  Then the shapes ahead split, moved to each side, quickly, fleeing.

  From nothing.

  There was a gap directly ahead, and Willam’s hands, both of his hands, on her shoulder, urging her forward. But Rowan refused; she stood solid; she tried, by stance and resistance, to tell him that the gap he saw ahead was not theirs to enter.

  It was the second hole, the second ghost-dragon. Rowan was no longer the only missing parameter in the equation.

  She could not guess the sum. She could not tell which cues belonged to her. She did not know what was happening, what should happen next.

  The sum of all motions was failing her.

  But the list: these actions were on a list, designed to look natural. If the dragons could act freely, what would they do? What would they do now?

  Her dragon was large. The other dragon was smaller. It should defer to her, and back off.

  But no: no such sign was visible. Instead, it seemed to her that the other ghost moved even closer, slowly.

  Yes, it was smaller; but it was more aggressive. She had seen that, watching its path before. It would confront her.

  And now, flickers of movement, the glances of garnet eyes, as the animals all around looked first to one ghost then the other. Wondering about the outcome.

  The second hole was a negative presence; she could not see its limits—until mid-sized dragons at the edge of the crowd whipped their heads back to avoid a flail of the second ghost’s tail.

  Tails moved for balance. The invisible dragon was moving left. Rowan shifted to the right, felt Willam shift with her; and from the corner of her eye she caught the motion of the dragons behind as they shied back from the swing of her own heavy tail.

  She had seen confrontations; she knew how they went. Her adversary would now search, head weaving side to side, seeking an opening.

  She turned slightly, adjusting Will behind her, remaining face-on, not allowing her flank to be exposed.

  The crowd startled; the ghost was making its move. Not to one side, by the watching eyes: straight on.

  Which way should she move?

  No!

  She was huge, she was the second largest dragon in the field. The audacity of this small, vicious animal—how dare it?

  In her mind, she reared. She rose tall on hind legs, screaming hatred; she flailed with her front claws, threw back her head and with one great breath sent a gout of white fire into the blue sky.

  And all around, like a wave moving outward, green and silver flashed as dragon heads dropped, as dragons shied back, as dragons cowered from her, from her fury, from her power—

  From nothing.

  Through it all, Rowan had remained motionless, tense and silent, with Willam’s hands damp on her shoulders. Merely two human beings, standing in emptiness, at the heart of a horde of dragons.

  And the second emptiness before them, where the other ghost should now drop its head, retreat—

  The creatures beyond separated like wheat stalks, turning their heads to watch the flight of the vanquished dragon.

  Gazes flicked back to the victor. By hint and inference, Rowan saw her path.

  She walked, and Willam walked, through dragons that hurried to make clear the way.

  But ahead, jittering motion, a dragon with no room to retreat. It hissed, twisted, whistled fear, then found an opening and backed off. Another shape, close to the ground, startled at Rowan’s approach, and scampered urgently away.

  This was familiar . . .

  Two shapes, side by side; abruptly, both looked back at Rowan, hesitated, and separated. Rowan led Willam between them, where a small writhing on the ground stopped, then spread out ahead: half a meter away, a pause, then another meter.

  She knew this. The pattern was repeating.

  Behind Rowan, Willam’s steps now shuffled. His hand on her shoulder was heavy. She reached up and laid her hand over his, pressed down firmly, trying to communicate that he should put more weight on her.

  He did so. He used both hands. She felt herself heavier; but she had been walking unburdened all this time. She would manage.

  And she could remember now, from this point on, many of the movements the hole would make. She had been watching. She no longer needed Willam’s eyes behind.

  She led him on.

  Later, at last, ahead, in the path that would be theirs: scuffed earth, footprints and claw marks left when Willam had first captured his dragon. And beyond that, when just one more dragon shifted aside, there was only open land from Rowan’s feet all the way to the safe perimeter.

  The hole in the pattern, the absent presence in the list of all actions, moved, as it must, to the edge of the dragon herd.

  But although she could not see it, Rowan knew: the second hole was again not far away; other dragons were retreating from it, along the edge; one of them would soon move, as it had before, to close off the path to the perimeter. When the time came, Rowan and Will must move very quickly.

  The time came. Rowan turned, pulled Will by the arms, hard, saying without sound: Run!

  They tried. They were slow. Willam was too heavily burdened, his strength too spent.

  They made it to the end of their ghost-dragon’s space, but they staggered, and stumbled, and Willam was down on one knee. And the hole moved back into the herd, leaving them behind.

  And there it was— the one dragon that before had cut off their escape, now standing between them and the herd, not ten feet away, facin
g left.

  They were in full view of its glittering eye.

  Dragons saw motion. For the space of three heartbeats, Rowan and Willam remained, frozen.

  But the steerswoman saw from the movements within the herd, and knew from memory, that when this dragon was gone, others would be there, more of them: many bright, jeweled eyes to catch the humans’ last break for freedom.

  Rowan said, between her teeth: “Run.” And she ran, herself— left, away from Willam.

  The dragon saw her, head twisting to follow the motion, then turned its snout toward her.

  She dodged, right. A wash of heat and light beat to her left. When the flame stopped, Rowan placed herself in the hot air of its passage, and ran up that corridor, straight ahead, straight toward the creature’s blind spot.

  Her sword was in her hand. She reached the dragon as it turned its head, and she swung with all her force directly at the glittering eye.

  The eye shattered, cascading red shards, spitting sparks from within. The dragon writhed, backed, flamed again with no aim, twisted its neck.

  She ducked under the head, struck at the second eye, missed. The creature saw her, tried to turn, to flame, but the blade caught on the edge of the eye.

  Rowan held tight, and the dragon’s own strength pried the entire garnet dome free of its face. Blinded, it froze, then collapsed, senseless.

  But the pattern still moved, and now other eyes were watching. Rowan straddled the fallen dragon, holding its place in the pattern for the single moment she needed, raised her sword, dropped its point behind her head, used both hands, and flung it: up, high, arcing out over the herd.

  Bright metal flashed twice in the low sunlight, spinning, then descending. Heads lifted and turned; from a dozen sources, flame fountained up—

  Willam had her by the arms, stopping her flight. “You’re clear, you’re clear!” She did not recall having run. She looked at him, stunned and speechless.

  They were outside the perimeter.

  Willam was pale, and shuddering, his shirt drenched, his eyes wide; Rowan thought that she must look the same herself. He smelled of sweat, and oil, and mud; she thought she smelled of dragon-fire.

  They stood, shaking and gasping. Then Willam said suddenly, in a wild voice, “What were you doing?”

  And because it was a question, the steerswoman discovered that she could answer immediately. “Distracting them.”