The Last Dragon: Book One

CHAPTER SIX

Twin, the newest and youngest mage in the palace, knew my name, and his use of it tied my tongue in a manner that didn’t happen often. He scared me. I pulled to a stop and peered up at him while trying to remain calm in my outward appearance. Twin topped me by a head. His features were sharp and thin, his skin pale. The fingers holding a book were long and delicate. My fear of him discovering my small-magic prevented me from remembering how to properly address a royal mage. “I am in a hurry to complete an important task for Lady Elizabeth, but of course if you only need a moment.”

He reached out and gently took my hand in his to shake. The long finger wrapped all around my hand, as a parent grasping the hand of a child. He said in a friendly enough voice, “I have long hoped to spend some time with you. There are good things people say about you and would appreciate your input on a variety of subjects.”

The idea that a royal mage, even if he was the fourth in palace seniority, wanted my input on anything, released my tongue. With a spur of conversational inspiration certain to impress him, I said while raising my eyebrows in surprise, “Really?”

“Yes, really,” He smiled warmly, finally letting go of my hand. “You’re in a hurry, but do you have a time that we might meet and discuss a few items of mutual interest?”

All very proper and innocent, or so it seemed. However, no matter how much friendliness he projected, he was a mage and therefore, not to be trusted. I said as if lathering soft butter on warm bread, “If you give me a hint of the subjects, I can come to our meeting prepared.”

His eyes swept the hallway in both directions making sure nobody else was within hearing. Then he moved closer, and his voice grew softer as he leaned to whisper in my ear. “What do you know about dragons, Damon?”

The book he held in his hand tilted forward as he bent at his waist, perhaps an accident, but I didn’t think so. There was an illustration on the page. It was a sketch of a dragon. “They do not exist. At least, not anymore.”

“Wyverns?”

I said, demonstrating my new knowledge of the subject, “Those are not true dragons. If you wish to know about them, you might ask Princess Anna, who is from Mercia and has first-hand knowledge. What little I know pales in comparison.”

“How would one go about contacting this princess?”

“Oh, she is visiting here in the palace, staying in the east wing, I believe. She will be here for a few more days, but I’m not certain about that, and you might wish to hurry to speak to her before she departs.”

Twin placed his right hand on my shoulder and gave me a little squeeze as if I was a puppy who had peed outside the house for the first time and he was rewarding it with his gesture. He said, “We will meet soon and discuss things again.”

“Soon,” I lied. He would never corner me again in such a dangerous manner. My shoulder quivered where he’d touched me, and with my small magic, I understood it was more than a simple touch. The surge of magic I felt from his hand almost made me faint in reaction. Since it was not intended for me to feel, I couldn’t and didn’t react, or he would wonder, but that made it no less real.

Twin had transferred intense feelings to me with that gentle touch. After it, a person was supposed to like him, to trust him. The problem was that the mage might not even know or understand what he’d attempted. Or, he might. He may have learned as a child that people responded positively when he touched them in such a certain way while allowing his thoughts to run free.

Which brought up another idea. If he didn’t like a person, would his touch increase that dislike? For the ten-thousandth time, I cursed the restricted ownership of books about magic that might reveal such information. The mages and sorceresses kept a firm hand on them, and nearly all were guarded with spells to prevent others from reading them. My small magic might enable me to read them without issue, but I didn’t know for sure and being caught would tell them I was more than I wished for them to know.

My feet fled down the hallways, ignoring people who turned my way. My eyes centered on the floor, and my legs churned. They slowed when reaching more familiar grounds nearer my home because arousing speculation by my haste would be criticized. Elizabeth would have to hear everything—and she would have questions, comments, additions, and conclusions to be drawn. The evening would be hard for me and was sure to end with a head-pounding headache.

Hardly had I begun to explain when Elizabeth railed, “Twin? You allowed him to speak to you alone?”

“It wasn’t my fault. Besides, listen to what he said. He asked me to meet with him and discuss what is known of dragons.”

Her lip curled in distaste.

“My suggestion for him was that dragons do not exist, and he might wish to speak with Princess Anna about wyverns if he is interested. The book in his hand was open to a page with a dragon illustration.” I took a well-deserved breath and waited.

Kendra’s normal sweet smile had vanished and been replaced by a tight-lipped snarl. She perched on the corner of a table near Elizabeth, ready to leap to her service, and she clearly didn’t like what I had to say, either. Her dark eyes smoldered, and her olive skin flushed. Our similarities continued to astonish me.

Both of us had the same dark brown hair and eyes, our skin was darker than most, and our features were long and thin, in a way that we believed were noble in appearance. The little I remember of our parents was the same, both were dark and handsome.

Elizabeth had taken us in when we were about ten, as close as we can determine. We were living on the streets, stealing what we needed and fighting for scraps. Yet, we could both read, and our math included mastery of basic algebra and some geometry. What we didn’t have were parents or many memories of them.

Both of us had vague images in mind of our pasts and our parents but believed they had been absent from our lives for a couple of years when we found Princess Elizabeth—or she found us. The remembrances had been quickly fading with the demands of survival of everyday life without a family. Neither of us had specific information about what had happened, other than the impression of violence.

Believing us extraordinary from the beginning, Elizabeth had gone to her father when she was thirteen and asked for a reward to be posted for information about my sister and myself. She convinced him that we may be the children of wealthy traders or even royals of another kingdom, and they would be indebted for our return. After several interviews he had with us, he also was convinced there was more to us than could be explained.

He quietly posted rewards in foreign lands for information about a pair of missing children. He hired discrete investigators and had one of his best manservants control the flow of information. Wythe was appointed to follow up on any leads without alerting anyone in the palace. If word of us spread locally, some might take the opportunity to use that knowledge to lie and increase their own means. The man who gathered the information, Wythe, was an elderly man of considerable learning and a respected scholar. Until he died a year later, he prowled the seaports near Mercia seeking information from common seamen and captains alike, as he too was convinced we were from afar and that is the only port in the kingdom of Dire. His documents and conjectures disappeared with his death, although there was no reason to believe them missing and his death had any connection. Nor, did it directly involve us at our young ages.

Of course, anyone aware of the reward who offered information, real or false, in hopes of collecting a portion of the gold was gone, as was the documentation. The killers probably believed that Wythe had the reward money in his possession. Those rewards turned his search into such a well of poisoned water and false claims.

The king eliminated the reward. Instead, he relied upon simple conversations as his best means of investigation, and he sent several people in search if our beginnings, all without success.

After Wythe’s death, the subject seldom came up. We just accepted our fate. What was there to complain about? My sister and I lived in a beautiful palace, ate the best foods, and if we didn’t live exactly like royalty, we were only one step away. However, now and then one or the other of us would blurt out something we shouldn’t possibly know. Those instances were becoming rare, but we sometimes discussed them when alone.

Elizabeth snapped her fingers to draw my attention back to her and the present. She obviously had asked me something during my musings—and I’d missed it. She snapped, “Anything else?”

“Three things of interest.” I hurriedly answered. “Lady Tam intercepted me at the fountain.”

“Is this going to be painful to my ears?” She asked with a sharp smile because she knew about Tam’s feelings for me and of our prior meeting under the stars. Honesty is the foundation of our friendship, so I’d told her all.

“She mentioned she had a deep secret she was willing to share, so I refused to allow her to tell it to me and place me under her obligation.”

“Naturally.”

“During our benign conversation, she did mention all the people leaving her wing of the palace.”

“More of them than we suspected. The same information came from another’s loose lips, so she confirms the rumor.”

I then told her about the wife of the fur trader in the window observing Tam and me.

“A common gossip,” Elizabeth muttered as I was speaking. “Someone should take the time to shut that woman up before she hurts Tam or you.”

I filled her in on changes to the note, and of the conversation with the fur trader and his wife in case Elizabeth was ever asked about the mythical investigation. Elizabeth’s response was that such an investigation should be undertaken, and she would mention it to her father if the king became well. That way, if it ever came up, he would be aware of it and slough off any suspicion. In addition, if the rumor of Lady Tam and myself was ever circulated, Elizabeth would go directly to the fur trader and his wife and remove their royal commission.

I sat back and waited. A lot had occurred in a single day. A certain dread told me that there was more was to come. Both Elizabeth and Kendra had a glint in their eyes that concerned me. Not a concern of fear, but that they knew something else. Neither had reacted to the information in the way I expected, and that said there were things afoot.

Kendra’s two extended fingers were again held at her side, our signal for a private meeting, and she used them as she pointed to the alcove by the door. A stack of traveling bags and hard-sided luggage was piled there. My leather case was there, and Kendra’s three were piled with Elizabeth’s ten.

On the small table beside the luggage sat a hard-leather case made especially for me. Well, not for me, but for my deadly toys. A few generations ago, crossbows had been introduced to the kingdom, but they were crude and inaccurate. Still, a soldier-recruit could use one with almost no training, and they were more effective than bows in some situations.

They were also large, cumbersome, and ugly. Real warriors hated them because the unskilled could win battles with them. I’d become fascinated with their possibilities a few years earlier. I surreptitiously gathered the various parts from castoffs and broken crossbows, and eventually assembled them into a working weapon. The three of us spent an afternoon mastering its use until we’d either broken or lost the five bolts I’d stolen from the armory. We were interested because there seemed to be a future with a smaller, modified weapon. She allowed me time from my duties to build another.

After adjustments, refinements, and additions, we had one that satisfied our needs. Emeril, the blacksmith who fashioned the king’s weapons, was commissioned with a few of Elizabeth’s coins. He created parts made to my specifications, without knowing their eventual use, but he probably guessed despite our attempt at secrecy. My biggest complaints about crossbows were the weight and size, built for bulky soldiers with little fighting skill. The lack of mobility and the crudeness of construction didn’t help either. A military crossbow could barely be lifted into firing position by a woman. However, when fired, the bolt could penetrate and kill three men before stopping. I questioned why one needed that much power.

Sparing the details of my hundreds of failures, I constructed a smaller weapon, a quarter the size of the military issue. The result was a one-handed weapon with the power to penetrate one man instead of three. It could be cocked quickly; extra bolts hung in small quivers from the waist within easy reach. The tiny crossbows were accurate within twenty paces, no more. Ten paces away were perfect. Kendra had a feel for the new weapon from the first. Elizabeth and I practiced until we equaled her speed reloading and her accuracy.

Returning to the initial subject, I nodded my understanding to Kendra. The leather case meant peril. It contained our three crossbows.

Elizabeth had more maps unrolled on her desk, and I knew at a glance we were traveling west, to the city and province of the same name. Mercia. As if the seven gods of knowledge read my mind, a frightened shout followed by a scream from outside in the courtyard aroused us. I turned to open the door to the terrace as other frightened shouts rang out.

The three of us crowded against each other on the small terrace for a better view of the sky while people outside stopped whatever they were doing to watch. Some pointed upward. A few puffy clouds in that direction drew my attention first, then, off to one side, my eyes spotted movement.

A dragon.

I’d never seen one and wasn’t personally certain they really existed until that moment. However, there was no doubt of what it was. It flew high and far away, the wings pumping up and down in an almost lazy motion despite the immense size of the creature. The body hung low between the massive wings, and as it turned slightly, we saw two legs, no more. A barbed tail swung from side to side. A wyvern. However, to me, it was a dragon and would remain so.

It flew northward, the serpentine neck twisting and turning slowly as it watched the ground below. It never once looked in the direction of the palace. That was until it did.

The head suddenly turned on the end of the long neck and peered directly at the palace. The body shifted until the creature flew directly at us. I had the feeling it looked at me, and probably everyone else in the palace with his or her head tilted to the sky felt the same. The people outside panicked and ran in terror. Within a few heartbeats, the streets were empty. We remained on the terrace, transfixed.

Kendra poked me in my ribs with her elbow and whispered in awe, “A dragon.” She said it as if it was somehow my fault for the thing being there, or at least, that’s the way I interpreted her tone. We had been too stunned to speak. Her poke brought me back to reality.

“Wyvern,” my loose lips automatically corrected her and earned me another jab.

Elizabeth said, “He’s right. Only two legs. And smaller than real dragons.”

“Smaller?” Kendra squealed, her hands raised to cover her mouth in wonder. “That thing is as big as a house.”

“A small house,” Elizabeth answered slyly, just as the beast opened its mouth and roared so loud every bird within half a day’s walk took flight as one. Most people covered their ears and cowered as they watched from the protection of windows set into the stone walls. The dragon searched the ground, then its attention turned back to our terrace.

It shrieked, then turned abruptly away and increased the pumping rate of the wings, looking like a scared small dog when it unexpectedly came up against a larger dog. The dragon turned to look at us a few times while it flew away as if ensuring we were not flying after it. It disappeared from sight after a few moments. The people emerged into the courtyard below, almost shyly. It seemed every person in this wing of the palace had managed to catch at least a glimpse of it, the first wyvern to fly over in memory, and possibly ever.

Kendra said in a wondrous voice, “Princess Anna claims the sky is often blackened with them where she lives. It was beautiful.”

It was not beautiful, but I held my tongue, so I didn’t get jabbed with an elbow again.