In this last dance of dragons
Our three hearts beat as one
But I must dance without you
For my time is almost done
In this last dance of dragons
I will fly with you no more,
We will never feel the wind
Beneath us as we soar.
In this last dance of dragons
I grieve to say goodbye,
For I will not be with you
When you spread your wings and fly.
In this last dance of dragons
You know I’ll wait for you,
For surely as the sun sets
You must dance with dragons too …
The witching hour of midnight was approaching. High in the belfry tower, beneath an inky sky bright with crushed diamonds, the goblins seized their frost-rimed ropes and the cold brass bells began to swing.
The deep sonorous sound shivered out across Dragonsdome twelve times. The last ringing note fell into silence, marking the end of winter and the beginning of spring. Light and dark, day and night hung in the balance, but light would now gain the ascendancy and the days grow longer.
Then the strangest thing happened. As the waning moons rose high over Dragonsdome, first one, then a second wild dragon flew down to perch on the roof, throwing long blue shadows on the snow. The first notes of dragonsong curled around the chimney tops and up into the frigid night air. Soon there were a dozen, then a score, and then a hundred wild dragons alighted on the steep gables and towers of Dragonsdome.
More and more wild dragons gathered on the dragonpads floating above. In their roosts and stables, Dragonsdome’s remaining dragons and battledragons all turned towards Quenelda’s chambers. Too high for the human ear to hear, the dragons’ notes shivered and sang as they searched out the sleeping girl. Snow slid from the roofs in a flurry of mini-avalanches, and panes of costly glass cracked like caramelized sugar as the eerie notes penetrated Dragonsdome’s thick walls.
Outside, wrapped in his bear cloak, Tangnost watched them raise their snouts, and wept. Anger burned deep within him like a banked fire in the forge, the white heat hidden deep inside. Guilt racked him: he should have defied Darcy. He should have taken Two Gulps and Quenelda to the safety of Dragon Isle, and damn the consequences.
A song shivered out over the glen, to be answered by a thousand scaled throats. Was this his doing? Tangnost wondered. Was this a lament for a life that was now slipping away?
Rising and falling, rising and falling, the notes wrapped themselves around the Earl’s daughter. Sleep had always brought vivid, colourful dreams of times and places she had never seen. Dreams of dragons, explained away as childhood imaginings.
Now, as Quenelda lay unmoving, the yellow scale clenched in her hand, a new dream took hold of her, cradling her in its coils like a hibernating dragon. With a hiccup, her heart changed its rhythm.
Boom boom … Boom boom …’
It was warm and dark. Quenelda felt soft stirrings all about her. For the first time since the death of her father and Two Gulps, she felt strangely at peace.
Boom boom … Boom boom …
Come, said a dragon, warm breath a whisper of wind. You have walked the ways of the Wingless Ones. Come, Dancing with Dragons, let us show you our world. Let us show you your world. Come, dance with the dragons …
She opened her eyes to find herself in a vast dragon-comb warmed by purple flames. She rubbed against other small soft-scaled bodies: her roost litter. Vast coils about them uncurled. Dim light broke into her dark world, revealing an indigo dome pierced by a million stars.
Boom boom … Boom boom …
In her dream, Quenelda now clung to a sheer cliff edge, looking out over the sea. The air was alive with sounds and smells, dragons tending their new-born fledglings. The crush of dragons on the nursery ledges was tremendous, their warm breath curdling the sharp smell of urine and the pungent fishy odour of dragon dung. The cries of great black-beaked eagles filled the air as they swooped and dived, hoping to grab a fledgling. A female Imperial nursed her brood, a clutch of six babies nestled in the coils of her tail. Gently the mother nuzzled them forward, waddling and clumsy, towards the cliff edge and the frothing sea far below. Small wings, creased and untried, were spread.
Come, the dragons called to her. Come dance with us …
Then the mare nudged Quenelda on. In that heart-stopping first moment of flight, Quenelda’s frantic beating heart was replaced by another two, infinitely older, infinitely slower, with different memories. Her red blood cooled and thickened to blue, moving sluggishly through a web of reptilian veins. Pale soft skin hardened into diamond-hard dark scales that clothed her from tip to tail. Bones thickened and strength flowed through her outstretched arms that became vast curved wings, able to ride the winds. She felt heaven’s breath beneath her wings, lifting her, the endless starry night above. Dragonscaled from tip to tail, she swooped down joyfully towards the sea …