Dragon's Nest

13 - Sweet and Sour

A glorious taste filled Lief’s mouth. Sweet, golden juice ran down his chin. Then suddenly he realised that something very bitter was mingling with the sweetness.

Quickly he spat what remained of the chewed skin into his hand, grimacing.

‘The skin is bitter,’ he said, wrinkling his nose. ‘Oh! It is disgusting! How can Filli and Kree bear it?’

Jasmine grinned and pulled out her knife. ‘They are not as fussy about food as we are,’ she said. ‘I am glad you made the experiment before me.’

She took a fruit from the tree and began to peel it. In moments she was sinking her teeth into sweet, gleaming golden flesh, murmuring with pleasure.

Lief followed her example. And after a few moments of watching suspiciously, Barda did the same.

Soon each one of them was silently absorbed in the blissful enjoyment of a rare feast. The water around their feet was littered with fruit skins and the long, flat seeds they found in the fruits’ centres.

Time passed. The sun was high in the sky. Lief, warm and full, crouched to rest his pleasantly aching legs.

He closed his eyes and began daydreaming of telling the hungry people in the villages about this rich supply of food growing at their very doorstep.

Once they know about it, they can come and gather the fruit each year, he thought lazily. Perhaps they can even flood a field or two, and grow their own trees from the seed. How wonderful that would be! How wonderful …

He became aware that Kree had begun squawking, and Filli was chattering shrilly. His brow creased in annoyance. Why were they disturbing him with their noise?

He opened his eyes, and it was then that he realised, with mild surprise, that he was not crouching any longer, but lying on his back in the water.

How strange, he thought. But he smiled, and did not try to move. The water was warm. There were a few large stones buried in the soft mud on which he lay, but they were pleasantly round and smooth

Like the ones on the path, he thought dreamily, pushing his hand through the mud to touch a stone with his fingers.

As he stroked its warm smoothness, it came into his mind that the stones on the path could have been taken from beneath this soft, warm water. They could have been taken and used by someone who wanted to mark a trail to this place, so that creatures great and small would come here, see the beauty, taste the fruit.

Someone. Or something …

The thought drifted into the golden haze of Lief’s mind like a small dark cloud.

He wanted to brush it away. He was so sleepy, so very comfortable …

But Filli was shrieking now. And he could hear Kree’s cries, and the beating of his wings.

Making an enormous effort to rouse himself, Lief turned his head towards the sound. He saw Jasmine and Barda lying motionless not far away. Their hair floated like weed in the water. Their eyes were closed, their faces peaceful. Their chests were gently rising and falling.

They were deeply asleep. But how was that possible? For Kree was flapping wildly around Jasmine’s head, screeching, his wing tips brushing her face.

He is trying to wake her, Lief thought dreamily. Poor Kree.

Then he lifted his eyes and saw something moving through the trees towards them.

It was a giant bird, as tall as the trees, with a snowy white chest, neck and head, and black wings.

Silently, unhurriedly, the bird stalked through the water on long orange legs, delicately lifting one foot then the other, barely stirring the mirror-like surface.

Its fixed, glassy eyes looked as if they had been painted on to its head. Its neck was like a smooth, white snake. Its orange beak was like a sword.

Lief tried to shout. But his tongue was thick and heavy, and his throat seemed swollen. The only sound he could make was a rasping groan.

And he could not move. His limbs felt as if they were fixed in the mud of the lake bed.

The Belt. The diamond … for strength.

Sweat broke out on his brow as he forced his left hand up to his waist. His fingers moved with agonising slowness to the diamond beside the clasp as his terrified eyes watched the bird reach Jasmine’s side.

Kree flew at the giant, screeching and pecking, but it took no more notice of him than Kree would have taken of a sparrow.

It put its head on one side and regarded the helpless girl with cold interest. Then, without haste, it dipped its sword-like beak into the water and began sharpening it on a stone.

Lief felt a thrill of fear. His fingertips touched the diamond. A tingling rose up his arm, spread through his body. It was as if strength was battling weakness in his veins.

A stone. Throw a stone.

Lief forced his sluggish fingers to curl around the stone they had been caressing. He pulled, and the stone eased out of the mud with a wet, sucking sound.

It came to the surface, mud-streaked and streaming with water. And then he saw what it was.

It was a human skull. Mud clogged its grinning jaws. Long, thin worms dangled from its eye sockets and fell squirming back into the water.

Instinctively Lief recoiled, dropping the hideous thing with a splash.

The next instant, his mind was flooded with terrified understanding.

They had been lured to a killing ground. Like so many before them they had eaten the glorious fruit which made them sleep.

So that at its leisure the giant bird which lived among the trees could come, with its stealthy tread, its snaking neck.

So that the bird could kill and feed, the bones of its prey sinking at last into the soft, warm mud of its domain.

Later, much later, picked clean by worms, polished by the muddy water, the skulls could be used to decorate the path. To make it even wider, and more inviting.

The bird lifted its beak from the water and raised it over Jasmine’s body. One downward jerk of its head, and the dripping, razor sharp point would plunge deep into Jasmine’s heart.

With a strangled cry Lief heaved himself onto his side, picked up the skull again and threw it wildly.

The skull bounced harmlessly against the giant bird’s snowy breast and splashed into the water. The bird paused and tilted its head. Its unblinking eye stared at Lief without expression.

Perhaps it was wondering why this prey was moving. Or perhaps there was no thought in its mind at all.

As Lief scrabbled clumsily for another weapon, as Kree swooped and screeched around its head, it turned back to Jasmine and raised its beak again.

A blur of grey streaked from a branch beside it, and suddenly something was clinging to its long, white neck.

It was Filli—Filli as Lief had never seen him, fur standing up in spikes, tiny white teeth bared. The next instant, Filli had attacked, biting deeply. A bright spot of blood appeared on the white feathers

Instantly the neck writhed, the head turned and the long, sharp beak stabbed viciously.

Soundlessly Filli fell. He splashed into the water and struggled there, a small, feebly moving bundle of draggled grey fur.

The giant bird looked down at him, then lifted a huge, clawed foot to stamp him into the mud.

Lief’s fingers closed around a long bone. He tore it from its soggy bed and threw it. The bone spun through the air and hit the raised foot.

This time the bird felt pain. It made a deep, rattling sound and its foot clenched. Again it turned its head, and again it fixed Lief with its cold gaze.

The feathers on the back of its neck rose in sharp quills. It lowered its bruised foot and began stalking towards him. Plainly it had decided that Lief had become a nuisance.

Lief struggled to rise, struggled to cry out, but his body was still heavy, so heavy, and still he could make no sound but harsh, gasping groans. He had another bone in his hand, but it was small and useless. His sword was pinned beneath him. Even with the help of the diamond, he could not find the strength to pull it free.

The bird looked down at him with blank eyes. It raised its beak to strike.

Then suddenly there was a roar from the bank of the lake and a spear flew over Lief’s body, grazing the bird’s black wing before plunging into the water behind it.

The bird faltered, took a step back. The quills on its neck rose further. Its beak opened.

The roar came again, and then there was the sound of splashing as someone ran through the water towards them.

‘On your way, Orchard Keeper!’ boomed a voice. ‘These people are mine!’

Another spear hurtled through the air, this time scratching the bird’s neck.

The bird decided it had had enough. It turned and began stalking rapidly away. In moments it had disappeared among the trees.

There was a peal of mocking laughter. A shadow fell across Lief’s face. He looked up, dazed and squinting.

An enormous figure in a cap of fur towered over him, blocking the sun. An arm stretched out to pluck the spears from the mud.

‘That was a near thing,’ boomed the voice. ‘One moment more and you would have been dead meat. I have been tracking you since first light—but what a dance you led me with that trick in the stream! If the black bird had not screeched fit to crack the heavens I would never have found you.’

Lief struggled, and tried vainly to speak.

Again the booming laugh rang out. The shadow moved. Long legs bound with strips of leather stepped over Lief.

Lief watched in confusion as the giant stranger lifted Filli from the water, inspected him, sniffed his wet fur, then nodded and placed him gently on Jasmine’s chest.

‘Who … are … you?’ Lief rasped.

‘Why, has your sight grown as feeble as your voice, Lief of Del? Do you not know me?’ roared the stranger, tearing off the fur cap.

Relief and amazement swept over Lief as he focused on the long, narrow black eyes, the straight, black brows and, most unmistakable of all, the shaved head painted with swirling red designs.

‘Lindal!’ he rasped. ‘Lindal of Broome! But how …? Why …? … Oh, it is so good to see you!’

‘You will not think so when you hear the news I bring,’ Lindal said grimly. ‘But that will have to wait. First I must get you and your foolish friends on your feet. We must leave here, and I cannot carry you all.’

She splashed to the nearest tree and picked a golden fruit. Then she returned to Lief and squatted beside him.

‘Eat this!’ she ordered, tearing off some of the fruit’s skin and pressing it into Lief’s mouth.

He choked and tried to spit the bitter stuff out.

‘No!’ Lindal shouted, pressing her hand to his lips. ‘Chew and swallow! Do you want to lie in this boneyard croaking like a frog forever? The skin is the antidote to Sleeper Fruit flesh. You must have eaten some before, or you would be as helpless as your friends.’

When she saw that Lief had understood, she removed her hand and stood up.

‘Now for the others,’ she said, grinning at the faces he made as he chewed the vile-tasting peel. ‘I will have to feed them the antidote little by little—at least until they begin to stir. When you can stand, come and help me. The bird may return in a dangerous mood, and I do not want to have to fight it to the death. It is bad luck, they say, to kill an Orchard Keeper.’