A Dragonbird in the Fern

by Rueckert, Laura

  No. She couldn’t lose out on such an opportunity because of me. “Aldar, tell them I can go to training with Freyad. If no one else has time to guard me, I can help”—he narrowed his eyes at me—“or I’ll just watch. I promise I’ll stay out of the way.”

  Aldar translated. Another smile broke out on Freyad’s face, and she took my arm, saying a sentence that contained the word good. Raffar’s gaze traveled between the three of us, finally landing on Freyad. With a small smile, he must have congratulated her to her new position, because she almost vibrated with excitement.

  After clearing up a few more details, Aldar said to me, “The soldiers are waiting now. For the first day, Freyad will need to concentrate. Matid will accompany you on your walk through town. Freyad will take you to him right away.”

  I nodded, eager to get out of the house and to let Freyad begin her new responsibilities. And since I still hadn’t talked to the Stärklandish prisoner, I’d steer Matid toward the prison.

  Aldar’s lips thinned for a moment. “I hope this will not be too hard on Freyad. Raffar has always put a great deal of trust in her, but some people were not happy when someone as young as she was appointed a royal guard. And now this? Some of the soldiers are twice her age.”

  A hollowness opened in my stomach, but I ignored it. I had made the suggestion, but the king had the final decision. Whoever some people were, they’d been wrong about Freyad being too young to be a royal guard. And now she’d make a fine trainer for the warriors.

  We hustled down the street, and Matid met us as planned. Except that blood dripped from a long gash on his arm. I tried to ask what had happened, but their gestures and words didn’t help. It seemed like some kind of accident. The wound didn’t look deadly, but it obviously needed attention. Matid and Freyad argued, and it appeared he was trying to get her to let me go with him to a physician. My cheeks burned with shame at the lengths they went to in order to be sure I’d have a babysitter. And my stomach roiled as I imagined standing by while I watched his skin being stitched up.

  Freyad met my gaze, and she must have caught my queasiness, because she waved Matid off and pulled me down the street to the western edge of town. Apparently, I’d accompany her to practice today after all. I’d have to be careful. There was no way I wanted to disturb her on her first day. I was running out of ideas on finding the man with the leaf tattoo, but I’d hoped to visit the prison. It looked like that would be impossible today.

  A few minutes later, we were somewhere in the vicinity of the meadow with the butterflies. Voices rose in front of us, and we came upon a cleared field littered with straw targets and lounging people of all ages.

  Freyad yelled two words with a surprisingly forceful voice, considering how softly she always spoke to me. The people—obviously soldiers by the way they jumped to attention—began sorting themselves into different groups: knives, clubs, bows, staffs, spears, javelins, and an area with no weapons, so it must have been hand-to-hand combat. They stood staring at her for a few minutes while she spoke. The trainees’ eyes flicked between one another and Freyad, and darted in my direction a few times too. Freyad shouted harsh-sounding words, and I caught my name, but the soldiers must have accepted her as trainer because they focused on their activities after that.

  There were trainees of all ages, from a couple of years younger than me up to my parents’ age. The older soldiers instructed the younger ones. The sun bore down on my hair, so I scooted into the shadows of a cluster of trees at the edge of the training field and watched as Freyad had a girl prepare javelins for throwing. She stood still until Freyad uttered a single word. Then the girl ran a few paces, her arm blurred, and the javelin struck the target. The rest of the soldiers behaved in the same way: focused and well trained. I fiddled with the blade at my calf, drawing it over and over and sheathing it again. Luckily no one saw me. The youngest child out there was nimbler than I was.

  A tall man with a familiar gait entered the field from the road, and everyone stopped to watch him. Freyad looked up from her post near the javelin-throwing target and shouted a phrase I was proud to recognize—something about making himself useful. The man switched directions. He headed toward me, stopping at the hand-to-hand combat zone, which was made up of trainees under the age of twenty.

  He pivoted, and I finally glimpsed his face. It was Raffar. He must have come to lend Freyad a little support on her first day. He didn’t seem to realize I was here in the dim shadows, and my lips curled into a smile. What was he like when I wasn’t watching?

  Raffar had a discussion with a boy about my age, who seemed to be in charge of his group. The boy nodded and both he and Raffar crouched in a battle-ready stance. The boy rushed at Raffar. With a single sweep of his hands, the boy fell to the ground, his oof echoing across the field.

  Raffar helped him up, made a low comment and demonstrated a twist of his back and hand motions. The boy laughed. Then they flew at each other again, and this time, Raffar landed on his back. The rest of the children paired up and attempted the same moves. Dust clouds rose from all the movement. Black dirt stuck to damp skin until I could no longer tell smears from tattoos.

  After a while, the oldest boy must have grown tired of being beaten, because he laughed and shouted at Raffar, but the only words I caught were Freyad and good. Raffar shook his head, but Freyad called over to him, a cocky grin on her face, “Are you scared?”

  The children in Raffar’s group laughed. He nodded in a mock-solemn manner and muttered. Head hanging exaggeratedly, he went to meet Freyad across from the javelin targets. He’d said she excelled with that weapon, and he shrugged like he foresaw his defeat.

  The girl assisting Freyad affixed a melon-sized leaf to the center of the target with a nail. Raffar laughed and ran a hand over his head as he walked about fifty paces away. With utmost concentration, he jogged and threw his javelin. It slammed into the bottom edge of the leaf. With a satisfied dip of his head, Raffar motioned for Freyad to continue.

  She nodded, her face calm and bland. I crept out from the trees. Two javelins were strapped to her back and one rested in her hand. She walked nearly twice as far away as Raffar had, and she turned to the girl who had affixed the leaf. Freyad winked, and I knew: Raffar didn’t stand a chance. Moving like the wind over a field of grain, Freyad ran, whipping one javelin after the other at the target. All three speared the target, until the leaf was torn to shreds. My husband bowed slightly and clasped Freyad’s shoulder. He shouted his praise so everyone could hear, and the group clapped.

  Raffar pivoted as if to turn back to his hand-to-hand combat session, when he saw me. His head rolled back onto his shoulders, and he laughed out loud. Then he spread out both arms as if being bested in front of his wife couldn’t be helped when it came to Freyad.

  The boy who had fought with Raffar ran up to him, and my heart stopped.

  He was young enough to have only few tattoos, and he was as grimy of the rest of them, but on his cheek was a leaf. And the border was thick.

  My heart jumped, and the second the boy turned away from me, I pointed to him and called, “Raffar!” But then Freyad gestured to me and said something about help. Her voice commanding, she shouted game and Queen Jiara, and the younger trainees whooped and rushed around me, pushing me to one edge of the field.

  “Raffar!” I yelled again, because this boy could be the one, but Raffar’s eyes sparkled, and he raised his hand in a happy wave as he headed for the other side of the field with the older trainees. After that, it was a rambunctious, free-for-all type of fight with me as the prize. Every attempt to communicate on my part was a complete failure. Even if I’d been able to eke out the correct words, no one could hear me over the din.

  The older soldiers were fairly gentle with the younger ones, who mainly dragged me back and forth through the field, swinging clubs and staffs to keep the others back. I kept my eye on the boy with the tattoo as best as possible. Within a short time, the older soldiers had us cornered, and a different
boy on my team jabbered at me, pointing.

  Up into the tree? I wanted to shake my head and give up on the soldiers’ game, but the boy with the leaf tattoo was fighting with an adult down the field. He wouldn’t just up and disappear, so I complied. The bark scratched at my hands as I scrambled up, while the other trainees surrounded the trunk, swinging their staffs. With my cheek pressed against the trunk of the tree, my memory whisked me back to Azzaria, to the time I’d collected the dragonbird feather to ask the gods for help with Scilla. Slowing her descent into madness had worked, hadn’t it? Not including the nasty gash she’d given Raffar, anyway. Blood on the floor, the walls, the ceiling. As soon as this was over, I’d get a hold of that boy.

  My husband stood below the tree. He put on a mock scowl and hollered, “My wife!” like it was a battle cry. He burst through the children, taking a beating to his back and sides. In seconds, he swung up after me, his face glowing. Slightly out of breath, he said, “Good game.” He kissed the top of my head. “Good queen.”

  We had to talk to the boy with the tattoo. “Leaf,” I said, pointing to the spot on my cheek where the boy’s tattoo had been. I shrugged to ask where he was.

  Raffar narrowed his eyes at me, then he shook his head. He gave me a peck on the lips. “I win.”

  Ugh. I shoved his shoulder. “Boy. Leaf. Tattoo. Scilla.” I skidded down the tree, tugging on Raffar’s arm to join me. The name Scilla must have finally gotten through to him. He followed me, shading his eyes from the sun as he searched the field.

  The boy was gone. No!

  “Boy. You . . .” I couldn’t think of the word for practice or fight. I grunted in frustration and made motions with my hands of fighting and falling.

  “Freyad!” Raffar called. When she ran to him, laughing at one of the girls chasing her, he asked a quick question. They spoke back and forth, occasionally meeting my gaze, several times shaking their heads. They clearly knew who I meant, thank the gods, but I wasn’t sure they understood why. Maybe my word for leaf had been incorrect, otherwise, Raffar would have guessed when I’d mentioned my sister. He would have to understand how important it was.

  “Gone,” Freyad said to me, carefully, her eyebrows furrowed. “You and me . . . boy . . . tomorrow.”

  Tomorrow. Impatience boiled in me, but without a lexicon or Aldar to help, I wasn’t getting anywhere. I’d look up the words for leaf and border. We’d find him. Tomorrow.

  Chapter 18

  The next morning, Raffar had already left for a meeting with the Grand Council, and I paced in front of the door while waiting for Aldar, when a hollow, rhythmic knocking echoed from the bedroom. Maybe a bird or other tiny animal had somehow gotten in and was trapped, so I followed it. Cocking my head to the left and then to the right to better locate the source, I shoved our nightstands aside to look behind them, bent to check under the bed. I found nothing.

  The noise stopped.

  Crash!

  The sound came from the sitting room. I rushed there. No animal, no person. But the chair I usually sat in when working with Aldar rose up a few inches and dropped down with another bang. Then it wobbled back and forth, clacking on the floor, first the left legs, then the right, again and again.

  It could only be Scilla.

  Swallowing, I strode to the chair and tried to push it down, immobilize it, but my muscles were no match for the unearthly strength.

  “Stop it, Scilla!”

  The chair leg slammed right down on my foot.

  “Ow!” I cried as the staccato continued.

  Then the second chair vibrated back and forth, in sync with the first, and the crashing noise echoed in my head. I stepped away from the furniture and slapped my hands over my ears. “Scilla, please stop! I’m trying.”

  The table joined the chairs, tipping back and forth in the same creepy, hollow rhythm. With every thud, they crept across the floor, closer to me.

  Crash.

  Bang.

  Crash.

  Bang.

  Hands still covering my ears, the pounding furniture backed me up against the wall. What if Scilla sent them all flying at me at once? She could break my bones, my back, my neck. The corpses of her grandparents had been discarded like dolls, the serving woman had said, and I imagined Raffar or Freyad or Aldar finding my mangled body here.

  Whack! Pain shot through me as a table leg slammed onto my other foot.

  I yelled, but with the wall at my back, there was no place for me to go. I slid down to a crouch, covering my head and trying to protect my feet and hands, trying to make myself as small a target as possible. “As soon as Aldar’s here, we’ll find the boy, Scilla. I think he’s the one. You’ll have your justice—I promise!”

  Simultaneously, the table and chairs rose up half a foot and dropped to the floor with a thud.

  In the silence, my gasps filled the room. It took a few moments before my quivering legs let me stand again. I inched around the table and away from the wall. Nothing happened.

  Hesitantly, I ran a hand over a chair back, terrified it would move again, maybe stomp on my foot hard enough to break bones this time. But it was just a normal, inanimate piece of furniture. For the next ten minutes, I stood near the exit, half-holding my breath.

  A knock sounded at the door and I jumped. But it was only Aldar finally showing up. I dragged him from the room with me. In the hall, I told him about the boy with the leaf tattoo. I’d feared he’d try to force me back into the room and through a lesson, but he said, “Of course. Come on. We’ll find Freyad right away.”

  We had to ask six people and walk through half of Baaldarstad, but ironically, we eventually located her close to the manor, near the elephant bird pens. “Freyad!” I called when I saw her.

  “Queen Jiara?” She turned to Aldar and garbled a question.

  He answered, then said to me, “I told her about the boy. That he might be the one the witness saw.”

  Freyad pursed her lips. “The boy’s name is Leonno. But a tattoo with thick lines?” Her eyes turned upward as she considered. “I don’t think so.”

  “Leonno? That sounds Azzarian.”

  Freyad nodded. “It is. His grandfather was from Azzaria.” She smiled to herself. “Must have been in some legal trouble. He fled the country, traveled up through Loftaria and ended up here. He always used to say he was on his way to safety beyond the mountains of Svertya, but then he met Leonno’s grandmother and couldn’t take another step.” She chuckled. “The old man was a charmer.”

  So Leonno had the right tattoo and a connection to Azzaria. Not only that—an unhappy connection. His grandfather had probably been headed for prison. Maybe he still held a grudge. Maybe he’d put his grandson up to revenge.

  “Take me to him now, please.” If I was right, Scilla could rest easy. I could rest easy, and my entire family too.

  Freyad’s reminiscing eyes caught my anxious ones. “Of course. Right away. But I can’t imagine how he could be involved. He’s a good boy.”

  My guard led us on a half-hour walk out of town under towering trees, springing chipmunks, and chirping birds to where I’d seen the small houses with larger yards on the way into Baaldarstad months ago. At the first building, she raised her hand. “Leonno’s family lives here.”

  A fence surrounded the yard, and two dogs dozed in the sun as chickens pecked around them. “Leonno!” Freyad called. “We have some questions for you!”

  A woman about my mother’s age peeked out of the house. “Leonno will be right back.”

  I nodded. I understood a word or two of most sentences by now, but luckily Aldar translated them all the same. I never knew if I’d miss crucial information without him.

  The woman disappeared into the house again then strode out with a bowl in one hand while she stirred with a spoon in the other. “Queen Jiara, what a surprise! Welcome! It’s nice to meet you. Hello, Freyad. How’s Linnd? What do you need?”

  Freyad smiled at her but didn’t betray my suspicions. “Linnd’s fine
. A little busy with the new stable apprentices, but they’ll settle in soon, like every year.” She gestured to me with her chin. “Queen Jiara watched the trainees yesterday and just wanted to stop by and say hello. Leonno managed to toss Raffar down once pretty good.”

  Raffar. Not King Raffar.

  Both women had a good laugh. I remembered my manners enough to say how impressed I was with his combat skills. Aldar translated, but seemed otherwise uninterested until a boy’s voice echoed from behind the house.

  “Leonno! Come out front!” his mother yelled.

  The tall boy rounded the house, a stack of firewood in his arms. He tossed it in a pile near the dogs, who were so lazy, they didn’t even flinch. “Freyad, did you see how I—”

  Then he noticed me. His eyes widened. Mine looked for only one thing.

  And my heart dove southward. His leaf tattoo was exactly like Raffar’s. No thick line. I turned to Aldar and shook my head, then did the same for Freyad.

  “Queen Jiara!” Leonno said, his face flushing. “It is an honor. Uh, wait . . .” His face screwed up and then he nodded to himself. “Kiss me,” he said in heavily accented Azzarian, his teeth bared in amusement.

  Aldar smacked him on the arm.

  “Ow!”

  “Leonno, what did you say?” Freyad muttered.

  Aldar’s lips pressed together, but Leonno smiled again and continued. Warily, Aldar translated, “It’s the only phrase grandfather taught me before he died, except—”

  “Can I touch your bre—” Leonno ducked his head just before Aldar could slap him in the face this time.

  Apparently, there were still limits for royalty.

  Leonno’s mother frowned at him, but apparently also had no idea what he was saying, since she didn’t appear truly dismayed.

  The juvenile phrases were the least of my worries. I rubbed my eyes. I’d seen the thick lines during training, I was certain of it. “Your tattoos—they looked different yesterday.”

  The boy’s mother gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Filthy boys, rolling around in the dirt. No offense to King Raffar. See—” She rubbed her hand over his bald head—“I wasn’t the only one to notice all those streaks of sweaty mud. I barely recognized you when you came home.”