And landed on top of someone who let out the most ear-splitting scream that ever shattered a man’s eardrums.
They tumbled in the path, Lionheart ending up on top, squashing the slender person, who kept screaming for all she was worth. “Oh, hush!” he cried. “I’m so sorry! I beg you, please, quiet!”
Her screams increased, and he had no choice but to clamp a hand over her mouth. He still had not seen her face, but he could tell she was a young woman, hardly more than a girl. Poor thing, he must have terrified her; but then again, she wasn’t increasing his peace of mind either.
She wriggled in his grasp, still screaming into his hand, though the sound was muffled. “I say!” he hissed between his teeth. “Really, I’m sorry. I had no idea you were down here. Terribly rude of me, I know, but I can’t help making an entrance, it seems, no matter how I try.”
He felt her relax a little in his grip as he spoke, and the screaming stopped. Hoping against hope that it had ended for good, he allowed her to sit up. “Are you quite calm?”
She nodded.
“All right, I’m going to let you go. Please—”
The moment he loosened his hold, she pulled free of him and leapt to her feet, whirling around to face him. In the last glow of the sunset he got his first good look at her. It was the maiden from the garden, her braid messier than ever, her eyes wide with terror.
She was, he noticed, quite pretty.
But she was drawing breath for another great bellow.
Without stopping to think, Lionheart flung himself on his hands and knees before her. He spread out his hands and cried in a voice of despair, “Please! Can you forgive this lowly worm, O gentlest of maidens, for his unforgivable rudeness, dropping in on you, so to speak? Will you forgive him or strike him dead with a dart from your eyes? Oh, strike, maiden, strike, for I deserve to die— No! Stay!”
She stared as he rose to his knees and covered his face with his hands, wailing, “I do not deserve such a death! Nay! It would be far too noble an end for so ignoble a creature as you see before you, to die from the glance of one so fair! No, name instead some other manner for my demise, and I shall run to do your bidding. Shall I cast myself from yon cliff?”
Leaping to his feet, he sprang over to a statue on a pedestal a few feet away. It was the figure of a king looking over his shoulder in stern scrutiny of the world. Lionheart clambered up onto the pedestal and put his arm around the stone king’s waist. “She says I must die,” he told it, indicating the girl with a sweep of his hand. She stood with her mouth open, hardly seeming to breathe. “Will you mourn for me?”
The stone king scowled. Lionheart turned and gazed with great melancholy across the garden, pressing a hand to his heart. “Farewell, sweet world! I pay the just price for my clumsiness, my vain shenanigans. My grandmother told me it would come to this. Oh, Granny, had I but listened to your sage counsel while I was yet in my cradle!”
He made as though to jump but paused and turned to the girl. “Farewell, sweet lady. Thus for thee I end a most illustrious career. The Siege of Rudiobus was hardly a greater tragedy, but then, Lady Gleamdren was not such a one as thee!”
He gathered for another spring, catching hold of the stone king’s fist at the last moment. “I don’t suppose my end could be put off until tomorrow, could it?”
The girl started to speak, but afraid it would turn into a scream, Lionheart interrupted with a hasty, “No! For you and your wounded dignity, I must perish at once. Go to, foul varlet! Meet thy doom!” With a cry, which he dared not make too loud, he flung himself from the pedestal, turned a series of neat somersaults, and stopped in the path just at the girl’s feet, flattened like a swatted fly. He twitched once, then was still.
Silence followed.
He opened one eye and peered up at the girl, who was staring down at him. “Satisfied, m’lady?”
To his huge relief, a smile broke across the girl’s face and she laughed out loud. At the sound of that laugh, Lionheart, for the first time in his life, fell in love.
It wasn’t all that difficult, the whole falling in love business, Lionheart thought later on as he sat in a tiny room in the servants’ wing of Oriana, darning his jester’s motley. Inconvenient, to be sure, but not difficult.
The girl, it turned out, was a princess. Of course she was. He should have known the moment he set eyes on her that she could hardly be anything less. Princess Una of Parumvir, only daughter of King Fidel, out for a stroll on a fine summer evening, alone with her thoughts and a book of poetry.
And a fine opal ring gleaming on her finger.
Just like the oracle had said. Lionheart’s face hardened into a scowl as he focused on his stitching. “You will know this ring by two things: its stones, fire opals, as hot inside as a dragon’s flame; and its giver, a princess who will fear you at first, but later will laugh.”
So the ring was found. That was well done, and about time, after months of weary travel.
But Una was a different matter altogether. Lionheart had never once considered, from the moment he crawled from the oracle’s presence, that the princess in question would be so sweet, so pretty, so ready to laugh. She was nothing like Daylily. Certainly not as beautiful, but that was no great disadvantage on Una’s part. Una laughed. Lionheart could not recall ever hearing Daylily laugh save in the most affected manner. What’s more, Una thought he was funny.
There was something most appealing in that.
Don’t forget your chosen dream.
Lionheart licked his lips and put a knot at the end of a seam. He snipped his thread, knotted it, and started another patch.
You will be Eldest of Southlands. You will deliver your people.
“I haven’t forgotten,” he growled.
Then take the ring, my darling, and be on your way.
“I can’t just take something from her. She trusts me. She got me this job . . . didn’t even ask to see my papers.” He finished another seam and knotted his thread again. “I’m not going to betray that trust.”
A snip and the thread dropped free. Lionheart, standing before a dusty little mirror, put his jester’s jacket back on, buttoning it slowly as he regarded himself. He certainly didn’t look a prince anymore. Neither did he look a boy. Five years of exile had passed, taking with them the last of his childhood. Lionheart gazed at a reflection he scarcely recognized; he gazed into a man’s face.
Beneath a jester’s hat.
“I don’t even know who I am anymore.”
What a wretched time to fall in love.
Don’t forget your dream.
“Maybe my dream can grow,” he said, tugged one last time on his shirt, picked up the lute he had been loaned for the evening, and stepped from the room.
He had a performance to give.
King Fidel, at his daughter’s request, had agreed to take Lionheart—once more under the name of Leonard the Lightning Tongue—on trial. If he performed well tonight, he might find a place in Oriana, at least for the time being. That was a place he sorely needed if he was going to figure out a way to get that ring. A kind way, of course, nothing sly or underhanded. He wasn’t going to hurt sweet Princess Una, not after she had done so much for him already.
He made his way from the servants’ quarters down a twist of passages to the king’s favorite after-dinner sitting room. The whole build and style of Oriana was so different from the Eldest’s House. The walls were white, for one thing, the moldings much simpler, more discreet. But there was a richness to the simple lines of Oriana that appealed to Lionheart. He came to a hall of portraits, which he had glimpsed earlier that evening when Una led him through the palace.
One of the portraits had caught his eye. He stopped before it again.
It was a small piece in a very old style; a storytelling style intended to convey a certain truth of the tale without specific accuracy to the characters. There were three men with the same face, two of them chained together, the third one crowned. There was a woman in the c
enter of the piece, and she wept beside a gold stone, an altar, on which lay a figure that was like a man and yet, horribly, like the Dragon.
Lionheart shivered when he saw that image. He knew it was the Dragon, knew it as surely as if it had been painted with scales and wings and flames. A bile of hatred rose in his throat.
“I’m going to kill you,” he whispered to the painting.
Don’t forget your dream, whispered the Lady in his head.
“I haven’t forgotten,” he said. “And I’m going to kill him.”
Then he veiled his face in smiles and entered King Fidel’s sitting room.
King Fidel, a middle-aged man with silver in his beard, looked up from a doze when Lionheart walked through the door. “Ah, yes,” he said. “I’d almost forgotten. I asked you to entertain us tonight, didn’t I?”
“Quite so, Your Majesty,” Leonard replied. He bowed and backed into a quiet corner to tune the lute, glancing about the room as he did so. The king remained seated in his comfortable chair near the fire. At his feet sat the crown prince, Felix, a gangly young fellow who pretended to have no interest in a jester but who was obviously curious.
Across the room sat another prince; a visitor, Lionheart had been given to understand. One Aethelbald of Farthestshore. A suitor for the princess’s hand. Lionheart spared him no more than a glance and decided, in that glance, that he didn’t like the man.
He avoided looking at Princess Una, though he knew just where she sat. To his great pleasure, she rose, plopping a fluffy orange cat on the floor as she did so, and stepped over to greet him.
“I told you I’d get you a job, didn’t I?” she whispered. Her smile was sweet. Inconveniently so.
“Don’t count unhatched chickens,” he whispered back. “Your father has declared little need for a full-time Fool, and I may yet find myself out on my ear.”
What a bashful schoolboy he was acting. Look her in the eye and be a man!
“But I should not even have this opportunity were it not for you,” Lionheart continued, smiling back at the girl. “I hope I can properly repay your kindness. He would not have given me a chance but to please you.”
“It does please me,” the princess said. “But make him laugh and you’ll be hired on your own merit.”
“I shall endeavor to oblige, m’lady.”
“Una,” King Fidel said around his pipe, “come sit by me and let the jester play.”
Una obeyed. Lionheart quickly finished his tuning, stepped into the middle of the room, and struck a harsh minor chord. Then he was singing, a foolish jester’s ditty he had written during his travels. It was grand to play it for an audience who understood the language. His voice was not beautiful, but he sang with enthusiasm and an expressive face, and soon had the princess, her brother, and her father laughing out loud. Even the quiet prince in the corner chuckled as Lionheart swept to a grandiose final chord.
“Excellent,” King Fidel declared when the chord had faded away. “Sir Jester, we are glad indeed to have you among us. If you are half as skilled mopping floors as you are at spinning stories, we may just find ourselves at an agreement.”
Mopping. Lionheart’s face hardened, though he managed both a smile and a bow. Here he was, so near to his goal, and reduced to a household drudge.
He caught Una’s eye. Her face was alight with laughter. In that moment, it made him sick. He excused himself with another bow and hastily exited the room. The lute slapped against his side as he went. The hall outside was dark with only a few of the candle sconces lit, illuminating some of the paintings. Lionheart marched to the end where that small painting rested and gazed once more upon that white face, that face he hated so.
My darling—
“Lionheart.”
The sound of his own name startled Lionheart so badly, he thought his heart might stop. He whirled and saw someone approaching through the gloom of the hall. It was the Prince of Farthestshore, that man who visited Oriana to court Princess Una.
Lionheart swallowed, then bowed deeply. After all, he was only a jester and an extra mop. “I beg your pardon, Your Highness,” he said in what he hoped was a cool voice. “May I help you?”
“Lionheart, I know who you are.”
Lionheart straightened up and found himself gazing into the Prince of Farthestshore’s eyes. They were kind eyes, though perhaps a little sad. But they gazed right down into his soul, and Lionheart did not like that.
“I . . . forgive me, Your Highness. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The Prince of Farthestshore would not break his gaze, and struggle though he might, Lionheart at last had to look away. “Maybe you’ve mistaken me for someone else,” he said. “I am Leonard the Lightning Tongue, jester to kings and emperors.”
“Yes, you are,” said the Prince. “But you are also Prince Lionheart, exile of Southlands. And you seek to defeat the Dragon.”
Lionheart felt his face paling. His whole body went cold. He licked his lips and tried to speak again. “You . . . you are mistaken—”
“No, prince, I am not.” The Prince of Farthestshore’s voice was gentle. It irked Lionheart no end. He wanted to run, to escape those kind eyes, to never again hear that voice. “Why,” asked the Prince, “have you not returned to Southlands? Why have you not returned to face the Dragon?”
“I . . . I am from Southlands,” Lionheart admitted. “But there’s no use in facing the Dragon. He cannot be fought.”
“Not if you do not face him,” said the Prince. “And even then, there is only one way he can be defeated.”
Lionheart thought of Una’s ring. He’d seen it gleaming on her hand again as she clapped and applauded his performance. Strange that something so small, so insignificant should hold so much power. But the oracle had spoken, and Lionheart did not doubt her words. He remained silent.
The Prince of Farthestshore said, “You will have to die.”
Lionheart shot a quick look at the Prince’s face. Still those kind eyes burned into his. A thousand words rushed to his mouth. How dare this stranger come lecture him! Had he not suffered enough these last five years? The labor, the humiliation—and it only promised to continue. Did he need to have this upstart, who knew nothing of the trials Lionheart had experienced, telling him what to do? Speaking so blithely of things he couldn’t possibly understand? Had he gone to the oracle in Lunthea Maly? Had he sought out hidden Ay-Ibunda? Had he, with his fine clothes and fine manners, any idea what it meant to suffer the Dragon’s work?
And here he was, courting Princess Una, who by all rights should have been Lionheart’s to pursue. If the world were fair, if the gods were just, he, Lionheart, should be here as a prince with a rich retinue to seek her hand. Yet here he was, a floor-scrubber and Fool, barely permitted to lay eyes upon her. In that moment, Lionheart believed he hated the Prince of Farthestshore.
“I can help you,” said the Prince. “If you will follow me, I will help you defeat the Dragon.”
Lionheart’s face was as stone. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, good Prince,” he said. “If I did, perhaps I could help you. I am nothing but a humble jester, however, and these things of which you speak are beyond my knowledge.”
He bowed again and, though he knew it was unendingly rude, turned and marched down the hall, leaving the Prince standing beside the Dragon’s crude portrait. His heart was racing so fast with fury and determination, he thought he might explode. He wished the Dragon was before him right now and that he was armed with a sword. He would hack the monster limb from limb with hardly a thought!
The Lady enfolded his mind in her arms.
He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. How could he possibly? You know what you’re doing. You have a dream to follow.
“I know what I’m doing,” Lionheart growled. He tore the jester’s hat from his head and mangled it in both hands.
I will not let you die. I will see your dream fulfilled.
“I’ll kill the monster yet. And I’ll sit on
the throne of my fathers. Silent Lady help me!”
She won’t help you, sweet prince. I will.
8
THE NETHERWORLD
CHANDELIERS HUNG FROM THE DARKNESS, perhaps attached to a ceiling too high to be seen, perhaps suspended from shadows. They were gold and wrought in curious shapes, and held hundreds of black candles at a time.
The dragons moved below.
They entered the Hoard of their Father and gathered beautiful treasures. Gowns of purest silk from ages long past, crowns of purest gold that had belonged to kings and princes. One great dragon woman, whose fire burned more fiercely than that of all the rest, plunged both hands into a chest full of rubies and strung these through her long black hair.
Thus adorned, they filed back to the center of their Village, where the chandeliers glowed. The candlelight gleamed on their riches and their eyes. Beautiful yet unsmiling, they stood gazing out across the Dark Water. They had never seen this lake before. But this was the world of their Father, and he would shape it as he willed. They stared across the water, expecting something, though they knew not what.
“Dance,” said their Father.
They turned, each taking a partner, and began to dance. There was no music here, but there was rhythm. They were graceful dancers, and though there were hundreds of them, each couple moved as though in a world of their own, like so many stars dancing their silent steps in the sky. Not one of the dragons looked into his or her partner’s face. They were absorbed in themselves and could not bear to look at another.
The floor heated and writhed beneath their feet.
In the flow of the dance, a certain yellow-eyed dragon with a sallow face and lank hair came with his partner to the edge of the Dark Water. His empty eyes gazed out across the darkness and caught sight of something. He snarled and stopped the dance.