The Dragons of Noor

  They wanted the boy who had power to herd torchlight. They wanted Taunier.

  The Damusaun flew Taunier to the mountainside, a sleek blue flame guiding her way as she descended through the layered mist to the ridge of Mount Olone. She landed on a barren patch of rocky ground. Taunier dismounted near a jumbled pile of branches before the queen winged up again to disappear into the fog.

  Hanna huddled with Zabith, waiting. Thriss had brought her message to the Damusaun. Ask Taunier to join me in the high meadow and bring the Falconer’s book. Hanna could barely make out Taunier’s small light in the fog as he made his way through the maze of tumbled logs.

  She lost him for a few minutes until she saw his dark head appear again, gilded by the light burning just above his outstretched hand. The flame went out when he lowered his arm to climb over the last giant trunk between them.

  “You’ve come,” she said simply. It had seemed hours since she’d sent Thriss to the Damusaun with the message for Taunier. She clung to Zabith to keep herself from rushing over and throwing her arms around him.

  Taunier dipped his hands in his pockets. Hanna followed his eyes as he squinted through the swirling mist. Here and there the deyas sat hunched over on their dead trees. They looked like giant marble statues of fallen gods, stonelike figures moving to lift a twig or to lean to the side. The picture was one of defeat. One deya seemed to be washing his face with handfuls of azure needles. He moaned quietly as the rust color dusted his nose and cheeks.

  “Taunier,” she said hoarsely, “this is Meer Zabith. The Forest Meer Miles told us about who sailed here from Othlore last winter.”

  Taunier put out his hand, saw that she was blind, and jammed it in his pocket again. “It’s good to meet you,” he said hesitantly. When Zabith did not answer, he added, “You’ll both be hungry. Meer Eason sent this.” He pulled some dried fish from his rucksack and broke off three pieces. They ate together and shared the water pouch. The liquid cooled Hanna’s throat. She hadn’t realized how thirsty she was.

  “Some of the Cutters escaped in ships,” Taunier said. “Others are hiding out somewhere on the mountain.” He scuffed the needled ground with his muddy boot.

  Hanna read the sorrow on his face. “Who died?”

  “We lost four dragons last night,” said Taunier. “The dragons were burned this morning in ritual fire.” Taunier’s voice was raw. “And we lost Kanoae.”

  “Kanoae?” A thickness came to her throat, saying it. They’d been hit together, fallen together, but she couldn’t imagine Kanoae gone. She’d been so strong, so fearless. Hanna had few tears left; she’d spilled so many with Zabith as the forest fell, but hearing about Kanoae made the loss cut deeper, and more tears came.

  “We brought Kanoae’s body down the mountain,” said Taunier. “She will be buried at sea.”

  Hanna nodded and wiped her eyes. The Sea Meer would have wanted that.

  “The rest of us are all right,” Taunier added, halfheartedly.

  Hanna was fighting to breathe against the blade of sorrow that had slipped beneath her rib cage. She spoke, hoping to salve the wound with ordinary words. “Did you bring the book?”

  Taunier pulled The Way Between Worlds from the rucksack and handed it to her.

  “The mist is thick,” said Zabith. “Give the girl a light to read by.”

  Taunier reared back a little, unused to Zabith’s direct manner; then he clicked his fingers and sparked a small bright flame. It hovered an inch above his fingertips. Hanna flipped open the book to the Oth map showing the way from Taproot Hollow to All Souls Wood. The path was circuitous and not easy to follow; she adjusted her eyes to Taunier’s small light, trying to trace it on the page.

  The Falconer’s map would help guide them once they were in Oth, but it did not show her where to find the Waytree passage here on Mount Olone, for the Falconer knew the mysterious passage never stayed in one place for long. She looked up. “How can we find the entrance with all the Waytrees down?”

  Taunier’s face shone in the beam of his bright flame. He crooked his neck and studied the map. “I haven’t a clue.”

  Meer Zabith hobbled to Evver and leaned against the cracked log to speak to the hunched deya. There was a motherly manner in the way she held herself upright and touched the torn robes, though Zabith came up only to the giant deya’s knee.

  Taunier said, “The Damusaun can’t help you find it. She said she could not come any closer than the cliff, you know, because of … them.” He motioned to the deyas, still sitting here and there on the logs.

  “The law of the Old Magic still keeps them apart,” said Hanna.

  “But the dragons fought to save the azure trees. The deyas should be grateful to them even if they … we lost,” he said, including himself with the dragons. He snuffed out his finger flame so Hanna could not read his face. But that hardly mattered; his voice gave him away.

  Hanna closed the book. “Don’t blame them, Taunier. The trouble is an old one.”

  Taunier scanned the hill. “So many of them.” He seemed to be speaking to himself.

  Evver joined them. He was a good fourteen feet tall, but he stooped to bring his head down closer to their level. “We will leave now. Are you ready, Fire Herd?”

  “Ready?” Taunier looked at Hanna.

  “Didn’t Thriss tell you? We need you to come with us to Oth.”

  “But why am I to come?”

  Zabith grabbed the edge of his cloak. “Bring the boy the torches follow to the heart of Taproot Hollow.”

  Taunier frowned and gently shook her off. “That’s from a game.” He shot Hanna a puzzled look. Was the old woman crazy? Hanna wasn’t sure if she could explain it herself, but she tried. “Evver has promised to try to hold the worlds together from the Oth side if they can find the Waytrees there. If the deyas can do that, we’ll have time to bring Tymm and the other Wind-taken back across to Noor before it’s too late.”

  “We must go now,” said Evver. “We cannot live long without new trees to house us.”

  How long? Hanna wondered. She eyed the rest of the deyas sitting alone or in groups on the logs, sixteen of them. They were all tree-thin, and their once rich garments were threadbare. She scanned their noble faces, cracked now like old bark; they looked as if they’d aged a hundred years in the hours since their Waytrees fell. How far could they walk?

  Taunier snapped his fingers, and the small bright flame appeared again. The deyas hated fire and were loath to burn the branches of their fallen azures, but they could not hope to find the entry to Oth in the thick mountain mist without torches. Evver took up a fallen branch and braved the first flame, then one by one the other deyas followed his example, stooping reluctantly to hold their cracked branches out to the Fire Herd.

  Torches lit, the group made its way slowly through the felled forest. Giant logs littered the barren mountainside, making walking difficult as they headed up the slope. Every once in a while, Evver stopped to lift first Hanna, then Taunier and Zabith, over an enormous log.

  Hanna and Taunier had protested at first, but Evver said it was only right that as he was so much taller, he should help them.

  Placing Hanna back on her feet, he said, “You will find the way in, Kanameer.”

  “But what am I to look for?”

  Evver did not answer her with words. Instead, he stopped now and again to touch the spidery roots at the base of a fallen azure. This grove, his grove, had contained the largest azures of all. When the trees fell, the enormous root balls had left great holes in the ground. Hanna joined him to peer down into the dark. One tree held the way. But how was she to tell which one in this mass of logs? She made her way from tree to tree, looking down the deep root holes, though the sight of the dark maws made her shudder.

  It was nearly nightfall when Hanna stumbled upon a great root hole, and a voice inside her whispered softly, Here. Looking down, she felt both drawn in and repelled, but she stood there all the same and waited for Evver and the rest to
join her. It was the largest root hole she’d found thus far, and she couldn’t see the bottom. She would have to wait for more deyas to come up the hill with their torches.

  A wind crossed the mountaintop, and Hanna pulled up her hood, missing the feel of Thriss underneath as she did so. She saw torches moving up the hill; she felt their warmth across her back as their light spilled down into the hole. Taunier’s boots appeared. Next to them came larger deya feet with snakelike roots sprouting from the ankles. All were gathered in a circle now around the pit.

  Hanna cautiously peered over the edge. They expected her to find the way to Taproot Hollow and All Souls Wood. Everything was supposed to be there: her lost brother, the rest of the Wind-taken, new Waytrees for the deyas. But something was wrong. How could this hole be the way? It looked like a bottomless grave.

  THIRTY

  ENTANGLED

  Seek them there, seek them here,

  before the children disappear.

  —FROM THE GAME BLIND SEER

  The underground cavern seemed endless. If it were day now up above, Hanna could not tell. Time was blind down here. The darkness would have been complete if Taunier hadn’t used his skill to keep the torches alight. Hanna adjusted her damp cloak and tried to ignore the hollow fear cradled in her belly. She wasn’t sure where they were going. Was this the right passage to All Souls Wood, or would the winding tunnel end in a high rock wall with no way out?

  Evver stepped up beside her with his torch. In its light, she could see tree roots dangling from the rocky roof like matted troll hair. They were passing under the remains of the clear-cut forest, trees the Cutters had chopped down, leaving the stumps and roots behind. Overhead, bats opened their wings and closed them again in the torchlight, but none flew down. The rich smells coming from floor, roof, and walls reminded Hanna of Shalem Wood in winter, when the cold wind sharpened the earthy scents.

  They caught up with Taunier. He’d belted his cloak; still, under the cloth, Hanna could see that his shoulders were hunched. He glanced back at Zabith walking with more deyas farther behind them, then spoke in a low tone. “I don’t understand what Zabith meant about me being the boy the torches follow,” he said. “They’re just words from some old game.”

  The whispered comment was meant for Hanna, but Evver was close enough to catch it. “A game?” he said. “You can call it a game. But it’s more than that. We deyas heeded the words. We waited long for the three of you to join us on the mountain before we tried to cross over. Meer Zabith, our Blind Seer, came to Mount Olone, then the Dreamer appeared, and last, you came, the—”

  “I know, I’m the Fire Herd, but it doesn’t make sense.” Taunier drew his fingers through his tangled black hair. “How can a game children have played for hundreds of years be a prophecy?”

  A slow smile crossed Evver’s face. “What better way than a game to pass a prophecy down through the ages? The deyas have watched playing children chant the words in every land in Noor.”

  “But that’s the trouble,” argued Taunier. “Only children play it.”

  Gentle laughter sounded behind them. The other deyas were listening in and seemed amused at Taunier’s frustration.

  Evver moved aside a dangling root. “And why do you think that is, Fire Herd?”

  Taunier didn’t answer. Hanna ventured, “Because … it’s meant for children.”

  “Just so. The Otherworld is a place of magic and dreams. Many adults have forgotten Oth. If the worlds began to break apart again, we would need the children. The Old Magic tells us so.”

  Evver’s words came over Hanna like a soft sea breeze that made her skin tingle. She wasn’t sure why, but Taunier must have felt it, too, for he said, “How does the Old Magic tell you this? Does it speak to you?”

  Evver laughed. “Not in the way you think.”

  As they turned another corner in the passage, Evver talked about the beginning of all things. His words were like ones she’d read in The Book of eOwey, but it was as if she were hearing them for the first time. In the dim passage she imagined eOwey singing the bright stars, the sky, and all the worlds into being. The song went from singing wind to silent air, filling all created things down to their very breath.

  “eOwey’s Old Magic is everywhere,” said Evver. “We deyas know this in our roots. You let the Old Magic sing through you when you herd fire, Taunier, and the Kanameer lets it speak to her when she dreamwalks and when she listens closely to her heart.”

  Hanna thought of the whispering voice that had told her to stop and wait at the root hole. Was that the Old Magic working in her? She’d followed it, hoping it was the way to Taproot Hollow. Now she wasn’t so sure. She feared now that there was nothing but a wall at the end of this long passage. They would have to turn back, defeated.

  Would the deyas still follow me if they knew I wasn’t sure of the way? If they didn’t think I was their Kanameer?

  She cupped Great-Uncle Enoch’s brown bottle in her hand, felt the stopper that held in the tears. The Kanameer will know what to do with them. That’s just it, she thought. I don’t know.

  A buzzing sound drifted through the passage.

  “What’s that?” said Taunier.

  “Bees?”

  “Underground? It’s not likely.”

  She pressed on. She’d come east to rescue her brother, to discover what was killing the ancient forests, and found more than she’d expected to find: dragons fighting to protect the Waytrees, the Damusaun and her clan needing a way home, deyas who must journey with her to Oth or die. She knew she would do everything in her power to help them, whether she was the Kanameer or not. Perhaps the title didn’t matter so much as long as she was determined to give her all. This new thought filled her like good, warm bread and eased the fear that had been growing in her since the dragons first crowned her.

  An hour later they reached a fork in the tunnel with a small entrance to the left and a larger one on the right. Taunier lifted his hand and turned his fingers. This small movement brightened all the deyas’ torches, spilling light on the choices ahead.

  Meer Zabith emerged from the crowd, hobbled up to the front, sniffed the hanging roots, and pointed left. “I see the way.”

  See? Hanna thought. You’re a blind old woman. But she wasn’t rude enough to say it aloud. “The passage is too small that way, Zabith,” she corrected.

  Evver bent down, and peered in one passage, then the other. “What do you say, Kanameer?”

  Zabith kept her bony hand up, stubbornly pointing left. Hanna shifted from foot to foot. The left tunnel might lead to a dead end. If so, they would have to retrace their steps and try the other way. The deyas were tired, and she shouldn’t overwork them. She could consult the map again, but she’d lost count of all the twists and turns they’d taken in the past few hours. She flushed. Stupid! I can’t believe I didn’t keep better track. Now I have no idea which way to go. “I’m … not sure,” she admitted.

  “We’ll go this way then,” Zabith insisted.

  Evver nodded. At the same moment Taunier flashed her an exasperated look. “Are you sure, Hanna?”

  His question echoed her own doubts, infuriating her all the more. “Come on,” she said.

  Hands out, Zabith stepped inside to lead the way. The passage soon narrowed even more, and the abundant hanging roots lengthened. Zabith seemed unusually energized as she and Hanna pushed aside the tangles to make their way through.

  Evver and the deyas had to crouch and lower their torches down around their knees to keep the roots from catching fire. No one complained, but the farther in they went, the more Hanna sensed Taunier’s frustration, which only added to her own. He dragged his feet behind her, coughing now and again as the walkers stirred the dusty air.

  Zabith was a meer of Othlore, Hanna reminded herself, even if she was old and blind. And hadn’t Evver said the game Blind Seer was some kind of prophecy? That there was a reason all three of them were supposed to come? She struggled with her doubts as she
pushed against the roots.

  The buzzing they’d heard earlier had intensified. The deyas began to hum, harmonizing with the sound. Meer Zabith also began to hum. Hanna spied a clearing ahead where the root tendrils no longer hung so low. She raised her torch a little higher.

  Evver hummed louder, and the other deyas followed his lead. The rich sound filled the cavern until it seemed the very walls were singing back. Stepping around a rock, Hanna’s torch spread a veil of light along the high ceiling. What she saw next made her stop cold. Beside a knot of black bats, the roots themselves were moving. There was no breeze blowing through the cave, none that she could feel, anyway; still, they wriggled like giant spider legs.

  “Look,” whispered Taunier.

  Hanna craned her neck and saw the outlines of small human bodies: first one, then two, then more and more children entangled in the swaying roots above. They were lifeless. Their skin looked waxen … dead.

  “Oh,” she cried, leaping back against Taunier. “I shouldn’t have brought you here!” She turned, dropped her torch, and covered her face with her hands. They’d trusted her, and she’d led them to this horrid burial ground.

  “Stop hiding and look,” scolded Zabith. “We’ve reached the heart of Taproot Hollow.”

  Evver said, “The Dreamers have been waiting.” He stepped forward and jammed his torch into the ground. Light spilled across the rocky floor. Long arms outstretched, he began to untangle the roots wrapped about one child. The other deyas followed and did the same, their long, spry fingers parting roots as if they were untying ribbons around large Noorfest gifts.

  “Come on, Hanna,” said Taunier. “They’re not dead. They’re only asleep.” Hanna wiped her eyes, then began to search the cave with Taunier. Most of the sleepers were too high for them to reach, but they found three cradled lower down. They gently pulled the roots away from a girl aged seven or eight, starting with her legs and moving toward her head. She yawned, climbed down, and joined the other children, who were gathering with the deyas. One child was whimpering. Zabith spoke to them all, saying, “Don’t worry, dears. You’ve had a long sleep, and soon we’ll take you home.”