We are come to a time when, no longer cowed by the old earth-powers, men must rise and take what we need from the ancient race of monsters.
—Letter to Modin
Urk, King of Kragrom
Kaeldra, wait.”
Jeorg moved toward her, tried to stop her; but Kaeldra pushed past him to kneel by the thing on the ground.
It was Synge. Kaeldra drew her fingers along the dracling’s throat, seeking the life she knew must throb there. She felt beneath a filmy wing, seeking the breath she knew must rise there. Synge was still, too still. Gently, Kaeldra turned her onto her back and saw the bloody slit that cleaved the dracling’s belly.
No.
Embyr and Pyro nudged at Synge as though trying to wake her. Embyr turned to Kaeldra. 〈Gone,〉 she said, puzzled. 〈All gone.〉
“Kaeldra.” Jeorg’s voice was hoarse. “By all the gods I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” Kaeldra felt the rage pushing up inside her. “You did this! You always meant to do this!” She rushed at him, pounded his chest with her fists. “You’re not sorry! Don’t say you’re sorry when you’re not!”
Jeorg did not try to stop her; he encircled her with his arms. Kaeldra twisted away, sobbing.
“I didn’t do it,” Jeorg said. “I followed the birds and found her here, found Modin. He was—” Jeorg hesitated. “He had cut out her heart. He was eating it.”
“You’re lying.”
“There is a legend that eating a dragon’s heart makes a man invulnerable to the sword. Modin knew it and believed it.”
“Then where is he?” Kaeldra demanded. It couldn’t have been Modin. She had trusted him; she had left Synge in his care. “Why are you here and he is not?”
“When I came, he laughed at me, and ran away.”
“Why would he run from you if he were invulnerable?”
Jeorg swiped at the hair in his eyes. “I—I don’t know. Kaeldra, can’t you see? I care for Synge. I care for you.”
Kaeldra did not want to hear. She knelt and laid her head on Synge. The draclings sidled up to her, whining; she threw her arms around them.
She had failed. She had called the dragons, and they had not come. She had left Synge, and now . . .
The draclings’ sorrow pulsed against her own, a tremulous humming that reverberated in her bones. Something broke loose; there was a roaring in her ears.
Kaeldra looked up.
The horizon was moving. It tumbled toward them in a great long line, darkening the afternoon sky. The birds surged to meet it and the line broke into chunks, became a cloud of separate things.
“Dragons,” she whispered. “They came.”
They were every shade of green and red. They wheeled through the air in twisting spirals like enormous pennants set free from their moorings to swirl across the sky. They swooped above the island, circling, trailing wind spouts that thundered in the trees.
Above the bluff the circle of dragons tightened. A chaos of birds soared about them, squawking, twittering, screeching. The dragons hovered, waiting.
Waiting for us, Kaeldra thought.
She jumped to her feet. 〈Let’s go!〉
Embyr and Pyro cowered behind her legs. She scooped them up, one under each arm, and staggered toward the embankment, fighting the wind, ducking flying branches and debris. She clambered up, ignoring the rocks that cut her feet and banged against her knees. The draclings squirmed fiercely; Pyro wriggled free. Kaeldra slipped on a patch of loose pebbles and Embyr bolted from her grasp.
〈Come here!〉 she called, but the draclings fled from her.
And the dragons spiraled higher, banked to the north. Were they leaving?
“Wait!” Kaeldra scrambled to the top of the slope. She ran toward the dragons, shouting, waving her arms.
One by one they saw her. They swiveled their heads to regard her, then twisted back toward the bluff in a long, curving stream.
The wind had abated. Kaeldra, heart thumping, knees weak, pounded across the highland toward the dragons.
There were twenty of them at least. They hovered in a circle that nearly spanned the bluff. Their scales glinted in the sun; their wings glowed with a pearly translucence; their bodies rippled in shifting currents of air. The largest dragon, long as a ship, so dark green as to be almost black, peeled off from the circle and sculled the air above Kaeldra. It glared down, its eyes vast, emerald pools, and she felt the power of its voice.
〈Who called Fiora?〉
It was a lightning bolt, a ball of fire, the beating of an enormous gong. Kaeldra fell to her knees, her hands covering her ears. Her head throbbed with the after-ring; she thought her skull would crack.
The dragon drifted nearer, spat out a whip of blue flame. Its breath-stench scorched her lungs. 〈What is the death I feel?〉
“Stop it!” Kaeldra cried. “You hurt me and I cannot think to speak.”
The dragon lashed its tail; wind roared in Kaeldra’s ears. 〈If you would parley with dragons, you must pay the price. What—〉 The voice broke off. There was a humming sound, a strange vibration in her bones. Kaeldra looked up. The dragons had turned to regard something behind her. Their throats trembled; their wings fluttered rapidly. Kaeldra followed their gaze. Jeorg, one dracling tucked under each arm, stood at the edge of the highland. Gently, he set down the draclings.
〈Come,〉 Kaeldra called.
Embyr and Pyro looked up at the hovering dragons, then back at Kaeldra.
〈Come.〉
Slowly, Embyr tiptoed across the plain, muscles tense, eyes flitting back and forth between Kaeldra and the dragons. Pyro scuttled behind Jeorg and crouched in the shelter of his legs. Jeorg stepped away and nudged him with his boot; the dracling scampered to catch up with his sister.
The humming sound grew louder as the draclings approached Kaeldra. They flicked their tongues and wound around her legs, eyeing the dragons fearfully.
The green-black dragon dipped down, smooth as rippling water. Kaeldra held her breath as the massive slotted eyes surveyed the draclings. At last, the dragon rose a little, let out a steamy sigh. It turned to regard Kaeldra.
〈Tell,〉 it said, its voice harsh but no longer quite so painful. 〈Tell about these.〉
Kaeldra was not aware of telling a story in the usual way. She felt it flowing out of her in shifting patterns, like clouds that formed and combined and reformed and then were blown aside to make room for more. It began with Lyf’s illness and moved through all that had happened since, until the pictures broke up and cleared from her mind, and she was aware, once more, of the dragon’s gaze.
The dragon spoke. 〈You have brought us the little ones; we are in your debt. For that, I offer my name: Byrn.〉
Byrn turned toward Embyr and Pyro, who still twined around Kaeldra’s legs. Kaeldra felt but did not understand the current of thought the dragon directed at them. Still, she sensed the tone of it, the tone of a she wolf’s growl to her cubs, of a falcon’s call to its chicks.
The draclings uncoiled from Kaeldra’s legs. Tentatively they stretched their long necks upward toward Byrn, then all at once the air was rent by a high-pitched musical tone.
The draclings shuddered, then froze.
“What—?” Kaeldra spun round to find the source of the sound, of that shrill, continuous note. A file of soldiers marched out the fortress gate. They were led by a man on a horse. Some were armed with crossbows; others held something to their mouths. Pipes. Small silver pipes like the tone pipe Jeorg had. Kaeldra started to flee, but the stream of soldiers split; she stopped, confused. They marched no longer at her, but around her, forming an enormous encircling arc.
Far across the bluff, Jeorg let out a shout. He ran toward her, pointing up.
Kaeldra looked. Still hovering, the dragons seemed sleepy. Their eyes were hooded, their wings slack. Slowly, as if dazed, they drifted toward the ground.
The man on the horse rode toward her. His mount pranced erratically, shying from the dragons; the man lashed it fiercely. It was Modin, she saw. Jeorg, still running, yelled at her; she could barely make out his words. Something about pipes. Something about a dance? No, a trance.
A trance. Kaeldra recalled the tale Jeorg had told about Porphy, the man who had momentarily tranced a dragon by means of a tone pipe. But these men had many pipes, and the tones would not be disrupted when one of them ran out of breath.
The bowmen were fitting bolts into their crossbows. They paused, bows aimed, as though waiting for orders.
“Embyr, wake up! Pyro! Listen to me!” Kaeldra shook the draclings, but their glazed expressions did not change; the cool, relentless pipe tone held them in its thrall.
“Byrn!” Kaeldra screamed. The big green dragon blinked when Kaeldra uttered her name, and she felt a stirring of hope. But then Byrn’s eyes clouded again; she continued slowly to sink.
Modin reined in his horse beside Kaeldra. The stallion danced sideways, wild-eyed, nostrils flared. It snorted and tossed its head.
“What are they doing?” Kaeldra cried. “Tell them to stop!”
“My dear, I do regret this. It’s nothing against your dragons, I assure you. It’s just that we are losing the war against Vittongal and it would aid us greatly to have a corps of invincible men.” He shrugged. “Unfortunately, this is the only way. Perhaps you should go elsewhere until it is done.”
“No! Make them stop!”
“Stop? Now? After the days and nights I’ve spent plotting for this moment? After the years I’ve spent groveling before that sentimental fool Landerath?” Modin laughed, a short, hard bark. “No, my dear. I used you, but it might have been worse. Now if you’ll just move out of the way—”
Kaeldra threw herself at Modin. His horse bucked and whinnied; Kaeldra stumbled and fell to the ground. Across the plateau she saw Jeorg wielding his sword against a group of soldiers. Then Modin yelled, “Loose!” and a hail of bolts swarmed upward, embedded themselves like tiny needles in the belly of a scarlet dragon. The dragon plunged to earth, grunting with pain, spurting blood; still it did not rouse from its trance.
A cheer went up from the bowmen. But the pipers did not join in; the piercing tone continued undiminished. There was a ratcheting sound as the men cocked their bows again. Kaeldra ran to the draclings, grabbed them, turned, careened into a soldier. He pried the draclings out of her grasp and flung them down. Clamping his arms around hers, he dragged her away. Then Jeorg’s sword flashed against the man who held her; she was free.
“Loose!” Modin called.
Another rain of bolts; another dragon crashed down. Overhead, birds screamed and soared.
Kaeldra made for the draclings, but a soldier flung her down and sat on her. She lifted her head in time to see Jeorg rushing at Modin with his sword. “Fool!” Modin said. “I ate the lame one’s heart. Your sword is powerless against me.” Jeorg lunged at Modin. Modin laughed, and in that instant, when the older man let down his guard, Jeorg grabbed for the stallion’s reins. He jerked hard. The horse screamed and reared, throwing Modin. Two soldiers seized Jeorg, knives at his throat.
“Wait,” Modin said, struggling to his feet, his face flushed. “If he’s so blessed fond of the beasts, let him watch.” He turned to the bowmen.
“Loose!”
More bolts; another dragon fell.
They’re slaughtering them, Kaeldra thought. They’re going to kill them all. The draclings . . . She squirmed to free herself from the lout who sat on her back, but he was too heavy; she could not budge.
〈Embyr! Pyro! Wake up!〉 Kaeldra reached with her thoughts to find them and felt her mind sucked down through a silvery vortex of pipe sound. The world slipped away, a dim, echoing tumult of crashes and shouts and twitterings. She hurtled through a tunnel of bright, clear sound; she felt the draclings ahead—
“Kaeldra!”
She was wrenched away, and the draclings were gone. Kaeldra blinked. She was on the highland; Jeorg was calling her name. Modin stood by the draclings, glared down at her. Fear, for the first time, showed in his eyes.
“I can’t allow you to do that,” he said. He drew his sword from its scabbard, pointed it at Embyr’s neck.
She must bring them back.
〈Embyr! Pyro!〉 Kaeldra plunged into the mind-tunnel again, seeking the draclings, bending her thoughts toward them through the shrill pipe stream.
〈Embyr! Pyro!〉 Why could they not obey her, just this once? She called again and felt an answering nudge; then the pull of the current tugged them away. Again she called, swirling deeper and deeper until she reached them and touched them and would not let go. She broke through to a bright, soaring place where her body felt light and her breath tasted of smoke and her throat burned liquid-hot.
And a voice was calling . . .
“Kaeldra!”
It was calling . . .
And she was jerked backward through the stream, and the draclings came with her. The current surged and parted around them as if they were boulders in a rain-swollen rill. Then the draclings fell away; she felt the pressure of the soldier’s knee against her back and the stab of a sharp rock beneath one arm. She heard Jeorg’s voice:
“Kaeldra!”
And the draclings were rearing up at Modin.
Kaphoom!
A blaze of light engulfed him. He screamed horribly, consumed by flame. The pipe music thinned, broke, resumed in sporadic bursts, then ceased altogether as the soldiers gaped, aghast, at their leader.
A wounded dragon let out a piteous bellow; the others began to rise. Through the flurry of birds Kaeldra saw the flash of dragon eyes, no longer glazed, but enraged.
Flame whooshed past her cheek. Kaeldra screamed; the soldier who held her fled. Flame rained in jagged ribbons from the sky. The soldiers were shouting now, running. There was a beating of air overhead. Kaeldra gathered the draclings to her, felt the rapid heartthrobs in their throats. They were all right. Modin had not harmed them. She must have found them more quickly than it had seemed.
The throng of soldiers dispersed around her. They were racing, Kaeldra saw, for the fortress, pursued in the air by flaming dragons. Three dragons lay dead upon the bluff. Blue smoke wafted up from the place where Modin had stood; it swirled away in the wind.
Then Jeorg stood beside her, apparently not badly hurt. Embyr and Pyro nuzzled him and flicked their tongues.
Slowly, Kaeldra stood. Her ears pounded; the ground felt unsteady beneath her feet. “I’m sorry for what I said before,” Kaeldra said. “Your calling—it brought me back.”
Jeorg nodded. “They say it is possible for a dragon-sayer to get lost. Do you know where you were?”
Kaeldra gazed at the dragons, who had driven the soldiers inside the ruined fortress and now circled, flaming, above it. “I felt what it is to be a dragon,” she said.
Jeorg offered his hand; she grasped it and held tight.
A spray of bolts spewed up from the fortress and clattered harmlessly upon the ground. With a burst of flame, the dragons turned in a twisting current and soared across the sky to hover above Kaeldra and Jeorg and Embyr and Pyro. Byrn dipped down and eyed the draclings. Again Kaeldra could not understand what she said, but a soothing tingle rippled through her mind.
Gingerly, Embyr stepped forward. She stopped, turned toward Kaeldra.
〈Go,〉 Kaeldra said.
The circle of hovering dragons tightened. A vibration rose around them like the hum of a thousand bees or the liquid sound of harp strings in the hills. Embyr looked up toward the dragons, then back again at Kaeldra. The dracling stepped away, puffed up, and floated into the air.
Pyro coiled around Kaeldra’s legs. 〈Go,〉 Kaeldra said. Pyro whined and flicked his tongue. 〈Go!〉 Slowly, he uncoiled from her legs. He looked back in reproach. Kaeldra pointed sternly at the dragons. Pyro puffed up and bobbled upward.
The dragons glided down to welcome them, thrumming. Two green ones twirled in the air beneath the draclings, creating little swirling updrafts on which Embyr and Pyro bobbed like nutshells in a stream. A red dragon, Kaeldra saw, had gone down to find Synge and clasped the dracling’s limp body in its talons. It laid Synge beside one of the fallen dragons. Then the others, mingling breath with blazing breath, set fire to their dead.
Kaeldra stood still, watched the luminous, blue flames lick the sky. Above the roaring pyre she heard the dragons keen: a singing ululation, steeped in sorrow. She blinked against the drifting smoke; tears streaked down her cheeks.
Then the dragonkyn began to spiral overhead. The wind picked up as they planed off in a great fluid sweep for the north.
Kaeldra felt Jeorg tug her hand. She watched the draclings shrink in the darkening sky. She strained to hear them, but could only feel the pulsing bone-throb of the dragonkyn in flight.
“Kaeldra, the soldiers. They may pursue us.”
She let him pull her down the embankment and through the trees. When she looked over her shoulder, the bluff blocked the draclings from view. At last Kaeldra and Jeorg emerged on the road. Looking back, she could barely make out a dark, curving line on the horizon. And a familiar voice drifted, whisper faint, within her ken.
〈Hungry,〉 it said.