The Last Dragon: Book One

CHAPTER FOUR

I strolled into Elizabeth’s apartment with the confidence of one who has accomplished a goal and is eager to spread the word. I threw the bolt with a solid clank of iron to draw their attention and then sat on the small sofa facing my sister and the princess. My expression was intended to give away the swagger in my bragging of a job well done. Manipulating others was becoming as easy for me as it was the two sitting across the room who manipulated me daily. No, that generous lie didn’t even fool me. They were far better.

Elizabeth said, “I hope your self-satisfied expression tells us the mages have departed the palace, and you have also confirmed a clandestine audience for Princess Anna with the King.”

“Both.” Sometimes a single word is more powerful than many. At least that’s what Elizabeth had told me ten days ago. Since then, I’d tried using fewer words and hadn’t noticed any concrete positive results but would continue trying.

“Care to explain?” She grinned at me, which seemed to be in complete opposition to her earlier advice. As she grew older, she often seemed to say one thing and then contradict herself later. At first, I’d thought she was testing me in some odd manner. Lately, I’d decided she said one thing to win a specific point, then made another absurd observation and backed it up with whatever nonsense was required to make her right again. There was no consistency. Worse, my sister seemed to be doing the same thing.

I’d learned to never ask about it for fear of both of them attacking me in unison. In short sentences, I told her what and how I’d discovered each tidbit of information, probably with more than a little pride in my voice. She didn’t compliment me directly, but she didn’t criticize, and that spoke volumes. Kendra wore her faint smile that said she knew something of value, which reminded me that she’d given me the signal she wanted to speak in private and I’d forgotten.

Never one to listen to my own advice, I asked, “Where does this leave us?”

Elizabeth wore that same expression again, the one that indicated she had lost faith in my ability to act like an adult and reason things out for myself. She exchanged a knowing glance with Kendra before telling me, “Princess Anna crossed our entire kingdom to deliver a message to the king, something so important only a royal could be trusted to deliver. So important, she was granted an audience to a man too ill to receive guests.”

“Th-there must be more,” I stammered, confused again.

“Of course, there is,” she smirked. “Consider the timeline. Princess Anna arrived after the mages departed, but where did they go? And how did the mages know when to leave? They departed to Mercia because they were somehow informed of a pending emergency—one so significant it required the intervention of three mages. That is unprecedented.”

“You’re drawing a lot of conclusions from a minuscule amount of information, Elizabeth,” I cautioned.

She smiled and scooted her chair closer so we could share a moment and she could instruct me. “Only because you have not verified their destination. You know they departed, but not their reason or where. You do not know why they went there, but that is too much to ask—and too dangerous a question to pursue. However, it would answer most of our questions.”

Kendra said, “Wyverns fill the skies in Mercia, the book about dragons says. That is the one item different about Mercia than anywhere else in the world, so pure logic indicates near-dragons are at the heart of this matter.” She crossed her arms over her chest as if she’d solved one of the great mysteries of the world.

I wisely did not correct her misuse of the word, dragons, or that it was the first I’d heard of wyverns being called near-dragons. There are no more dragons, only wyverns, the smaller, related beasts with only two legs. That is what the book had said, without her embellishments. It did not match my beliefs in the nonexistence of dragons of any sort. If a dragon flew over, I might believe. Maybe.

Elizabeth still sat knee to knee with me. “Do you believe you can find out where the mages went? And just as importantly, without anyone knowing you are trying to find that information. Lord Kent already mentioned the spies in the palace, and my information says he is somehow involved, although he has not departed. Avery also knows something we should. Therefore the Heir Apparent will know it too. Yes, he’s my brother, but will hold his tongue on state secrets. However, you must stay away from him at all costs. Do nothing that will reveal your interest.”

That was perhaps the longest instructions she had given since we were ten years old. Sure, we had talked, discussed, argued, quarreled, and debated other subjects. This was different. The element of danger was forefront. “But you want me to find out where the mages traveled without asking.”

“Yes.”

Her simple statement had me on my feet and ready to investigate without arousing suspicions for the third time in one day. My mind reviewed everyone in the palace, their duties—official and unofficial, and how to get them to talk without asking them to do so.

The answer came easily. Horses, sheep, cows, pigs, and goats are a favorite food of wyverns. In the eastern part of the kingdom, they were watched over by shepherds carrying bows to ward off wyverns. At night the herds and flocks were gathered safely into barns or above-ground basements beneath homes. All domestic animals were in danger in Mercia from the dragons.

Leaving without another word, my heels clicked on the hard surface of the hallway, sounding like a series of twigs breaking. The image didn’t impress me, and the cobbler would soon face my wrath. I wanted boots that sounded like boots, those that a general might wear to impress his troops, not a pair that went Tic-Tic-Tic as I walked. The sound desired was Bam-Bam-Bam and I’d either have that or a new cobbler.

The meager sound of my footwear was still foremost in my mind as my angry hands shoved the stable doors open. There was no small gift for the stablemen as was my normal routine, but since I did own a mare who was kept there my presence was well known, expected, and welcome. My beautiful horse had been a gift from Elizabeth years ago when it was a bay colt on wobbly legs.

Her name was Alexis, the prettier and smarter sister in the ancient story of the old gods. In those stories, Alexis always outdid her sister Elizabeth, in everything. Some people always manage to win at all they undertake, but it takes looks, intelligence, or personality to be that successful, which was the point of the story. In them, Alexis had them all. Her sister did not.

Of course, Princess Elizabeth had given me the horse the year before she studied classical history and heard the story. A year later my life almost became forfeit when Elizabeth finally figured out the reason for the horse’s name. We were about fifteen, equal in stature and weight as that was before the summer my height shot up to present. Now I towered over her, but not then.

Others had thought the name Alexis was cute, funny, and even disrespectful. Some thought my mare properly named but didn’t say so aloud if they knew the old stories. All of us understood that the day would arrive when Elizabeth discovered the joke. When she did, I found myself in front of the stablemen, the horse-apple cleaners, the trainers, and a portion of the mounted military. She had charged into the stables, and quickly had me pinned to the floor on the straw, her arm locked around my head as she ordered me to capitulate in front of everyone.

I didn’t know the meaning of the word capitulate and refused. She also refused—to let me up. We rolled around in the muck and straw, me kicking and her screaming, until the King’s Weapons-Master entered the barn and grabbed her collar to pull her off me. She twisted around and stuck like a snake, and he suffered her headlock. She led him around in circles to the shocked expressions of the others watching, as well as mine.

She was a royal. He couldn’t use any of his skills to break her hold or punch or stab her. She held on for longer than the tale takes to tell, and then he slipped out and backed away faster than she could move. The rumors spread around the palace for weeks, and many involved his retirement and her taking over his position as Weapons-Master and trainer for the fighting men of the King’s Army.

It was about three years before I learned the entire incident had been staged between her and the Weapons-Master. Everyone else in the palace knew the joke played on me. Elizabeth had the last laugh, as always.

The older stableman’s eyes now located me while walking across the barn, and he whistled a sharp, piercing sound. Within a small herd crowded into one corner of the corral a single horse’s head lifted, her ears perked and twitching. Alexis spotted me and trotted her way to me. There are those who would swear she wore a grin, but everyone knows horses can’t smile.

“Saddle?” the stableman asked as he came my way, an apple hidden in his palm. He slipped it to me.

“Not today, but I have a question.” This was where care needed to be used and the questions directed at the same time. “Princess Anna arrived here in a carriage.”

“That’s true,” he readily agreed.

“Well, I met her briefly and heard she is from Mercia where dragons fly and kill deer and eat them.”

“More’n just deer. They kill sheep, elk, and yes, even horses. In the old days, dragons enjoyed a good meal of horsemeat.”

My eyes shifted to the small herd. Three mages were missing. They might be connected. “Are we short a few horses?”

“Nope.”

Odd. There seemed to be no deception in his eyes, so there must be something I missed or asked my question incorrectly. Powerful mages do not walk anywhere. The horses in sight were only part of the herd kept at the palace, so there must be another way to ask my question.

The stableman then relented with a chuckle and said, “You might have thought that because you missed seeing a few of the saddle horses. There are five new ones here that we’ve just brought over from Fleming to replace those the mages and others required. Speaking of Mercia, that’s where all of them were heading, you know. Mercia, different days, same destination. None mentioned why, but all the subterfuge got me to wonder.”

To distract him and the direction the conversation was heading, and to make sure he didn’t know of my interest, I asked quickly, “But what about the dragons there? Won’t they eat the horses?”

“My words, exactly. Damon, I’ll tell you one thing, no damn dragon had better eat one of my horses, or a mage might find out he isn’t as powerful as he thinks.”

Alexis demanded my attention now that the apple was gone. She nuzzled me, and my hand reached for a halter. She always enjoyed going outside where she could run and walk. While I formed the loop, she leaned close and stuck her head through. Alexis knew what was coming and enjoyed the time we spent together. We had more than enough time for a long walk because I already had all the answers needed, all freely supplied by the stableman without any questions being asked. Nothing beats having talkative friends.

As we walked, I anticipated Elizabeth’s next move. She would arrange to be alone with Princess Anna, and they would have a discussion. We now knew who went where, and when. But not, why. Lord Kent might know, and he also would find himself answering Elizabeth’s indirect questions.

I walked to the side gate of the corral and outside, taking Alexis through another gate and down a winding pathway. We went through a portion of the new forest that had sprung up after the forest fire that occurred before my birth. Usually, I rode Alexis. Today my mind was lost in thought, as we walked.

Something unusual and important had taken place at the other end of the kingdom or was going to. It was important enough to disturb an ailing king in the middle of the night and to force, not just one, but three royal mages to travel to the most distant part of the kingdom, a trip of days in length. My imaginative mind couldn’t create a scenario to fulfill the known facts.

My mind was so lost in thought that I didn’t even look up at the sounds of an approaching horse. When I did, Avery sat upon a horse with bulging bags across the rump, the sort of bags a traveler taking off on a long trip uses. His surprised eyes locked on mine. He was surprised because he was taking the back way out of the stables where there shouldn’t be anyone to see him, yet he had stumbled upon me.

It was the second time today my presence had been unknown to him. For the briefest moment, he appeared as if he might demand my silence, but that passed. Wordlessly, he rode by, while I noticed the heavy cloak he wore was sturdy and without ornamentation. The sword he wore was functional, a version of those the army used. His clothing suggested he might be a farmer more than an important servant to the second most powerful man in the kingdom. Even the horse he rode was not the usual Andalusian or Fairmont. Today he rode an animal more suited for pulling a plow.

He rode down the old road behind Crestfallen, hunched over in response to the awkward gait of the animal. By the time he reached Mercia on that horse, others might feel pity for Avery, for I was certain that was his destination.