Dragonswood

  She put out her greedy hand, ordering in a whisper, “Give it to me.”

  She does not see Tess, condemned witch girl. She sees a messenger. “The letter is not from Prince Arden,” I warned, “but I’m here in his cause and yours. You can help him, if you wish to.”

  “Of course I wish to help him!”

  A pox on her. My hand went for my knife belted by the scroll. Attack me and she’d feel my point. I pulled the scroll from my belt. She unrolled it, pinching the strange greenish page between her fingers, never having felt a dragon’s scale, I guessed.

  Her lip curled. “What… is this?”

  “Later,” I said. “Read it. We haven’t much time.”

  The lady sat again and read. Moans increased to bursts of fury tightly leashed by teeth and tongue lest the Gray Knight come in and catch us together. I could tell by the sounds what part of the letter she was reading. Later she put her hand to her mouth and rocked to and fro.

  I was well aware Lady Adela would have dropped the page and strangled me if Lord Kahlil had not forced me to rewrite the letter multiple times. Shredding the first eight drafts, the scale growing smaller after each shredding, he’d handed it back saying, “Again, Tess. More to the point. Less angry spleen.”

  By the last draft I’d managed to refrain from addressing the intended reader as Lady Pustule, Lady Leech Mouth, Mistress Cesspool, Demon Torturer, and such. In this way the dragon scale had been torn down to a tidy page the witch hunter read now, both front and back.

  She turned it over to read a second time. There was a lot to take in. I was sure she’d believe the news of her uncle Sackmoore’s part in her abduction now his knight held her prisoner here. The back side of the letter she read now was a list of demands. She must read them aloud to the messenger (myself), swear by them, and sign the bottom of the scale if she wanted to see Prince Arden.

  Adela stood, trembling. “I will swear by all.”

  I made her kneel to read the words on the back side aloud. I was proud of the demands I’d laid out with the dragonlord. She read them in a hurried whisper lest the Gray Knight hear:

  “I, Lady Adela agree to abide by the demands below.

  “First, I swear that if I am taken by this escort to Prince Arden, I will tell him the truth about my uncle, Lord Sackmoore, that he had me abducted and maimed to cut me from Prince Arden’s affection, and later sent me away from my former life at Pendragon Castle, and funded my witch hunts. I will also tell Prince Arden of my uncle’s gross misuse of the royal treasury before it was taken into safekeeping, using the king’s money to fund a secret army of his own to back his attempt for the crown. I will tell him my uncle organized raids on Dragonswood, done in the prince’s absence, which were against the law.

  “Second, I will persuade Prince Arden to free his younger brother, His Royal Highness Prince Bion, from the tower and drop all charges against him. Lord Sackmoore says Prince Bion stole the royal treasure to crown himself king. Prince Bion only guards the Pendragon treasure to keep it safe from Lord Sackmoore. He vows to return it when Prince Arden’s crowned, my uncle jailed.

  “Third, if I should win out and by good fortune marry Prince Arden…” She stopped here, choking up with emotion, then took a breath. “And by good fortune marry Prince Arden,” she said again, “and become queen of the realm, I swear to put an end to witch hunts on Wilde Island.” She frowned a little here, but went on. “Finally, I swear to convince King Arden to adhere to the laws set down by Queen Rosalind and King Kye, regarding Dragonswood protecting all those who sanctuary there.

  “I swear by Almighty God, the Blessed Virgin, and Holy Trinity to adhere to all listed above, doing right by all on our fair island where human, fey folk, and dragons are bound to live in peace. May God have mercy on us all.”

  She looked up at me.

  “Do you swear?” I asked.

  “I swear. Hurry, now,” she whispered. “Take me to the prince.”

  “Sign it first,” I insisted. Her humility, honed from need to see her lover, kept her at my feet. I thought of the pitiless torture she’d put me through, the hardship she’d pressed on me and my friends. She should beg for my forgiveness. Ah, I’d have kept her kneeling there a good deal longer if I could have. But I had Bion to think of, so I placed the dragon scale on her writing table.

  On her knees, she signed.

  Snatching the document, I rolled it up and said with leaden voice, “Follow me.”

  “What then?” she asked.

  “You will see.”

  “Do you have a ship?”

  I didn’t answer. We crept downstairs and out the kitchen door. The boy and dogs were far away on the lawn as we slipped past the fountain and out behind the maze.

  I pointed to the stand of evergreens. “Run.”

  She raced, her cloak flying, her limp more pronounced than ever as she ran. I feared the dogs would spot her, but there was little space between garden maze and woods. She made it to the trees.

  Following, I found her facedown on the ground where she’d fainted at the sight of the dragon. Her arms were spread out wide as a holy pilgrim come to confess at the altar. I would have liked to leave her there with her face planted in the earth.

  Eetha said, “You should have warned her, Tess.”

  I turned Adela over and slapped her cheek to wake her. Next I caught her startled scream inside my hand.

  “Hush,” I whispered. “This is Eetha. She’s known Prince Arden and Prince Bion since they were babes. She is here to help us.”

  Lady Adela stood and brushed the grass from cloak and gown. Her face was despoiled with mud.

  “Forgive me, Eetha. I was… startled.”

  “I forgive you. I am large and impressive,” Eetha said immodestly.

  I laughed. Then the she-dragon lowered her long neck that we might both climb on. Adela was frightened, but I did not help her clamber up behind me.

  Over sea and under stars, Eetha flew us back to Wilde Island. When she landed by the cave on God’s Eye we dismounted, shivering in the fog that always cloaked the little isle. Eetha urged us both into the cave, where a warming fire waited, before she flew skyward again to hunt.

  Inside, Lord Kahlil offered food and wine. The steaming turnips were bitter, but I ate hungrily, knifing them and slipping bites under my veil. I’d no wish to shed my facecloth before my enemy, and was glad to have a knife in hand with her close by.

  The lady was exceedingly nervous before the dragonlord. It was gratifying to see my enemy so undone. Silent in his den, Lord Kahlil watched us, smoke curling from his nostrils. Lady Adela’s eyes flitted from teeth to talon and back again. Was she expecting torture? She deserved it.

  Anon Eetha returned with her kill. Breathing fire, she roasted the venison outside before serving Lord Kahlil. The dragonlord ate first, then Eetha. Last we were served. Adela, still too fear-struck to eat, left her strip of meat and steaming turnip on its stone.

  Meal done, Lord Kahlil picked his teeth awhile before pointing a damp talon at me. “Leave us, Tess.”

  I jumped up, the name Tess reverberating in the cave. Adela glared. I quit the den. How dare he reveal me to my enemy? Hadn’t we agreed I could keep my disguise as long as I liked?

  I was by the pond huffing when Eetha came out after me. We were close enough to the cave mouth to hear the voices within, one deep and rough as cinder rock, the other higher pitched and wavering with fright. Leaning in with my good ear, I still couldn’t make out what they were saying.

  “Come, Tess, tomorrow’s coronation day. If things are going to unfold as planned, you’ll need your rest.”

  “I can’t sleep.”

  “Then you can rest while I sleep,” she snapped. I followed her to a grassy spot. Things had happened so quickly since I’d arrived on God’s Eye. I could hardly believe Wilde Island would have a new king tomorrow. Eetha lay under a yew tree, patting the ground beside her with her claw. Agitated, I sat near her warm body.

  “Why s
o angry, Tess?”

  I supposed it was easy enough to read my mood. “Adela’s a demon.” How much would Eetha know about the witch hunter, having lived on Dragon’s Keep? I told her all the terrible things she’d done to me and my friends. Eetha listened, breathing softly; her exhale made a whistling sound like songbirds in a far-off wood. “I don’t trust her. What if she sides with Prince Arden and Sackmoore and keeps Bion locked up in the tower?”

  “Didn’t she agree to our demands?”

  “Swore to them and signed the scroll.”

  “Then why would she go against her oath?”

  “I told you, she’s a bloody fiend!” I curled my fingers round my thumbs remembering the pain.

  “Lie down, Tess.” Eetha rested her wing over me, shielding me from the gusts coming up off the lake. On my back, looking up at her elegant wing scales that held the same filigree patterns as I’d seen on the undersides of leaves, I wrangled with my thoughts. How could I help Bion escape if Lady Adela betrayed us? If I made it back into the tower with the last of my sleep potion, and opened a way for Bion, would he even come? I looked at my companion. Her eyes were still open.

  “Prince Bion’s still in danger, Eetha.”

  “Bion knows what he’s doing, Tess. Be sure of it. He was fearless as a boy. I’m the one who named him Bash,” she added proudly. “Such a ferocious toddler he was, always climbing up my leg to slide down my tail. Before he could lift a sword, Bash sparred with us, using nothing more than a stick, the little imp.” She gave a low chuckle. I thought of him fencing with Ore in the cave as she went on. “Lord Kahlil took him flying when he was but five years old. They both got a scolding for it.”

  I laughed. “Who scolded them?”

  “His mother, Queen Lucinda, of course.”

  I sighed and folded my hands across my belly. “One night at the hunting lodge, Bion showed me his mother’s pearl necklace. He put it in my hand so I could hold it up to the window in the moonlight.”

  “He did?” Eetha sounded impressed. Her eyecup swerved to look a little more closely. She kept it on me as I told her of our ride south together to fetch Alice, of the time he’d climbed a tree to sit with me until I was ready to come down.

  “Tess,” she whispered. “The man loves you.”

  Her quiet words ghosted up over God’s Eye. I remembered the feel of his fingers on my neck, the lightest touch like a passing breeze. Eetha’s words had sent a river through me.

  “How can you know something like that?”

  “Read his actions, Tess. He climbed the tree to speak with you, told you openly about his sister on Dragon’s Keep,” she said. “She’s dear to him. He doesn’t share his love for her with just anyone.”

  “I didn’t know she was his sister back then.”

  “Then he risked even more to speak of her that way.”

  I’d never had a sister who’d lived more than three weeks, but I’d loved the little ones fiercely and would have done anything for them.

  There was a long silence. So long I thought she’d drifted off, but as the yew creaked in the wind she said, “There are few of our kind left, Tess. Our numbers dwindle even with Dragonswood sanctuary and our caves on Dragon’s Keep.” She paused. “In her long life, a female dragon might lay only two clutches, Tess. I’m ready to have my own clutch. My first,” she admitted. “I have chosen Shiraz, a fiery orange dragon from Persia, though he does not know it yet.”

  Together we gazed up where a small rent in the mist revealed black sky, a star. “We dragons are not like the fey; we mate for life.”

  Eetha did not ask if I loved Bion. She did not have to.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  AT FIRST LIGHT, I sat up under Eetha’s wing. The fourteenth of November. Coronation day.

  I tapped Eetha’s side. She roused and shook herself awake. We hurried to the cave for a last word with Lord Kahlil. Eetha went in, but Lady Adela stood at the mouth of the cave barring my way. Her face was streaked with dirt and tears.

  “I hope you will forgive me, Tess.”

  I was speechless.

  She eyed my chin now I was unveiled. “Who did that to you?”

  “No one. I did it myself. I slipped on the ice.” Why even answer her? I didn’t have to.

  “Who doctored you?”

  “The fey,” I said with some pride.

  “Lucky for you they did the work. I’ve never had any trouble with the clever glass eye they made especially for me.”

  I didn’t like to think the fairies had willingly given her the gift. She did not deserve their help, in my opinion. But then, they’d fashioned Adela’s fey eye before she’d become a witch hunter. Perhaps they didn’t know she’d use it to cower the population and frighten poor innocent girls out of their wits?

  She was peering much too closely at me. “The fey know how to speed up healing. Such fine thread. What did they use?”

  “Flit silk. I doubt you’ve heard of it.”

  “Well they’ve done their job. I can see the stitches are ready to come out. Let me do it.” She reached for the small pouch hanging from her waist. “I have some skill with wounds.”

  “Skill with wounds?” I snarled, backing away. “Don’t touch me.”

  Her velvet waist pouch was already half open. “Are you sure? It will only take a moment.”

  “Leave me alone.”

  “Let her,” Eetha called from inside the cave. “She’s right. The stitches should come out.”

  Maybe so, but the witch hunter didn’t have to do it. “Have you a mirror?” I asked. She might have a small one in her waist pouch. “I’ll take them out myself.”

  Adela shook her head. “We left the solar too quickly for me to think to bring a mirror or a brush.” She fingered her tangled hair. “I have only what I use to trim my nails.”

  In the end I insisted Eetha come out to watch.

  “Chin up,” said Adela.

  I sat stone silent as she clipped and pulled the threads out. Our eyes met. Hers were blue as water hyacinth, the glass one slightly darker than the real. I looked straight into her fey eye. Let her see me for what I was. I welcomed it. Her hands were steady tugging the flit threads with such care it did not hurt at all after the first stitch. Her tenderness stupefied me. Was she hoping I’d forgive everything by this?

  As soon as she was through, I jumped up, gave no thanks, and marched inside to Lord Kahlil. Adela spoke to my back as I left. “I hope you can someday forgive me, Tess.”

  Someday? When Satan sits at the right hand of God.

  In the cave, I shouted, “God’s teeth! What did you say to her last night?”

  “That is between the lady and myself,” the dragonlord said. “It does not have anything to do with you.”

  “It does!”

  “Not everything concerns you, Tess.”

  Eetha stepped inside and tipped her head. “She’s as wild as Bash.” Both the dragons laughed. I turned and was halfway to the entrance when Lord Kahlil called me to a halt. “Wait, Tess. Bring the lady this.”

  He handed me a large blue velvet bag. I looked at it suspiciously. “What’s inside?”

  “Bargaining chips.”

  I opened the sack. A king’s crown and scepter winked up at me from the dark maw. “Why would you entrust a witch hunter with these precious things?”

  “She wants to bring them to the coronation.”

  “Of course she does! I won’t hand them over.”

  “It’s time to go,” said Eetha.

  Sack in hand, I followed Eetha out. Lady Adela was crouched over the pond washing her face. Her cheeks were blotched when she looked up. “He hasn’t seen me since the day… I don’t know if I can show Arden my face. What if he—”

  “You are not completely unsightly,” I said coldly. I clutched the velvet bag. The crown and scepter had not gone with the rest of the stolen treasure, it seemed. Bion had stashed them here for safekeeping until coronation day.

  Lady Adela’s face still
dripped. “My glass eye,” she said, pulling back her hair, then letting it fall down again. She turned her back. Her shoulders were hunched.

  “We will be late if we don’t leave soon.”

  She wiped her eyes. “Yes. All right, I will come. We must be brave, mustn’t we?”

  “Do as you like,” I snapped.

  WE WERE LATE. Almost too late. Spying down from a rent in the dark clouds, I saw the amphitheatre already full to bursting with the population. The ceremony had begun. Prince Arden was enthroned center stage under the colorful cloth awning. The bishop and his priest were there with a handful of knights and Lord Sackmoore. Just below and to the right of the stage, Prince Bion stood with armed guards at his back. Not far from him I glimpsed my father and the fey delegation dressed in their finery.

  I saw all in an instant, for just then Eetha called, “Hold on,” and knifed through the clouds. A storm broke with our coming as if she’d winged in the rain. Showers hit the stands where frightened people jumped up screaming at the sight of the dragon. They crushed one another on the steps trying to race down.

  Prince Bion shouted, “Stay, people. Do not be afraid.”

  His voice carried up through the amphitheatre. Some still ran down the stairs and out, but others stayed. On stage Lord Sackmoore waved his arms. “Get back, dragon!” He and his knights drew their swords shouting more threatening warnings.

  Eetha landed smoothly and lowered her head just long enough for Lady Adela and me to climb onto the stage. Then Eetha stepped off the platform. The crowd in the stadium seats climbed higher, so only Prince Bion with his guards, and the fey guests stayed at ground level with the dragon.

  The knights encircled Prince Arden, swords up to protect the future king. Seeing Lady Adela, Arden called, “Wait! Don’t harm them!”

  Adela went boldly forward. I followed, keeping her in my sights. We’d delivered her as promised. I was here to make sure she kept her word.

  “I have your king’s crown, Your Royal Highness,” she said, trembling. Adela reached for the velvet sack in my arms. We had it between us now, my hand on it and hers.