Finally, they arrived at an iron door of the sort that makes signs saying “don’t even bother without a key, I’m impenetrable” redundant. Two elfs in armour that flashed in the torchlight saluted the Cardinelf as he approached.
“Open the door,” the chief priest commanded.
After a moment’s inaction, one of the guards said, “We’re under orders not to let anyone enter, Lord Cardinelf.”
“Yes, to enter here is certain dea…” the other began before cutting off the final syllable at a flash of the old man’s eyes.
“Certain death?” Bill said. “Seriously? You’ve brought me all the way down here to kill me? Couldn’t you have saved us all some time by doing it outside?” Despite the obvious peril of the situation, Bill’s Pisstakenometer had reached capacity.
“Do you wish to understand?” the Cardinelf asked.
“What? Well, frankly, I wish to stay alive, thank you very much.”
“Do you want to save your machine friends and the one in your pocket?” the old man said, before whipping his arm out and snatching Sebaceous.
The two guards jangled their bling menacingly as Bill stepped forward.
“Because if you do, step inside that room. If you survive what lies behind the door, then I will answer all your questions and the elfs shall help in any way they can.”
Bill sighed. There was nothing for it, he would have to brave the room. He quietly summoned the flame into his hands, prepared to hurl fireballs at anything that lay beyond the door.
The door creaked open and a gilded arm shoved him inside before, with a thunk that echoed in the darkness, it was slammed shut behind him. Wherever he was, it was dark and wet and, if the echoes were anything to go by, large. A cavern carved out of the heart of the mountain, in all likelihood. He puffed his chest out in a gesture of defiance and, to his surprise, he felt courage swell within him. What a long way he’d come in a year. He was no longer Bill Strike, incompetent rural charcoal burner. Now he was Bill Strike, firecaster, and, as flame poured through his veins, he was confident he could handle anything this cavern held short of a fully-grown dragon.
He cast a fireball into the air, illuminating this part of the cave. It was full of black space and, in the middle there lay, regarding him with reptilian patience, a fully-grown dragon.
“Of course,” Bill said.
In the gloom, Bill could see that the dragon was, if truth be told, a little moth-eaten around the edges and looked about as mobile as a sloth with lumbago. “Oh for the love of gold, not another one.”
“What?” was all Bill could manage.
“Wait a minute,” the dragon rumbled, “you’re different. I can smell it.”
“Sorry about that,” Bill said, giving his armpits a quick sniff, “it’s been quite some time since I took a bath.”
The dragon made a noise that sounded like a particularly gripy stomach after a lentil curry. “You’re not an elf, are you?”
Bill looked himself up and down as if to check whether his appearance had changed. No, he was still a lanky human with a mop of black hair. “No,” he said, “I’m not.”
“But you have the whiff of elf about you.”
“As I said, I haven’t washed in a while.”
“No!” The cavern lit up as if illuminated by the dragon’s anger roaring like an avalanche and then subsiding. In that moment, Bill had, for the first time, seen all that occupied this dark space beneath the mountain. In the centre of the cavern sat the dragon on what looked like some kind of nest. The dragon had clearly seen better eons, but the pile of gems, trinkets and gold beneath it was untarnished. The light reflected off the walls caused flashes of white, red and green to play across the inner walls as if driven by some beat. Unbidden into Bill’s mind came images of men with beards and white suits imploring him to concentrate on stayin’ alive (stayin’ alive). It would, he knew, be a tragedy, but words were all he had to get himself out of here - and he had no idea how deep was this cave.
The echoes of the dragon’s anger ceased. “You are not an elf, and yet elfen blood flows through your veins,” it rumbled.
“Oh, yes,” Bill said, relieved to get a grip on the dragon’s meaning, “my mother was a faerie.”
In the darkness, Bill could hear the tumbling of trinkets as the dragon stretched out its neck towards him. It took all his nerve for him to remain in place.
“What is a faerie?” the dragon said.
How long had it been down here? The faeries had been created hundreds of years ago by the great (and now late) wizard Minus. Could the dragon be so old it was born before this? “It’s just another word for elf,” Bill lied. He was, by inclination, an honest young man, but he suspected that the truth, on this occasion, would see him turned into an instant kebab and, on balance, he preferred to stay unroasted.
“I knew it,” the dragon rumbled. “You are part elf and so you have dragon blood in your veins.”
“What?”
A guttural laugh rolled around the cavern. “You did not know? Elf, dragon, draconi - three forms, one people,” it said. “But what else are you? I smell warm blood. You are not from the Dragonrealm.”
“I am mainly human,” Bill said, operating almost entirely on auto-pilot. “In fact, until very recently, I considered myself entirely human.”
“Human? What is that?”
Bill thought for a moment before opting for a biological answer. “We’re a sort of hairless ape that has swapped fur for clothes and trees for houses.”
“Ape?”
Bill knew he was digging his hole deeper with each answer, but like the pizza you discover in a microwave two days after you had a takeaway, it just had to be ventured. “A big tail-less monkey?” he said. “And before you ask, monkeys are a bit like tree rats. I’m sure you have those in this world.”
“Ah, yes. So you are a naked rat?”
“Yes, and dragons are big kleptomaniac snakes”, Bill didn’t say.
“I guess that’s not a bad summary,” he admitted.
The dragon harumphed. “I am called Beryl, and I have lived beneath this hill for ages uncounted.”
“I’m Bill, and I’ve lived for 20 years,” Bill said and, unaccountably, felt the need to bow. “I am pleased to meet you and to be in the presence of such wisdom.”
The cavern, which seemed to respond to the dragon’s mood, lit up again, but this time the glow was a subtle yellow. “Oh, it’s a pretty boring life, to be honest. Just sitting here, brooding.”
“Brooding on what?”
The light turned red and Beryl’s angry voice rolled around the cave like summer thunder. “What do you know of my egg?”
“What?” Bill managed, as he backed away towards the firmly closed door. He imagined pointy elf ears pressed against the other side. Smiling, probably. “I just meant what have you been thinking about?”
There was an embarrassed silence and the illumination vanished. “Oh. I thought you had discovered my egg. It’s quite magnificent, you know. Would you like to see?”
Beryl’s mood swung like a pendulum with a broken governor, but Bill decided that his best chance of leaving the cavern with his limbs uncharred was to swing along. “I’d love to.”
The dragon pulled her long neck back and Bill was struck by just how much she looked like a huge snake with legs. Or, indeed, an enormous draconi. He approached the nest slowly, accustoming himself to the dragon’s rather rich odour, until he was at the foot of the pile of gems.
“Steal nothing,” hissed the reptilian voice from above his head. “I know the number and type of every precious object in my trove and I shall incinerate you if you take one thing.” It lifted itself, causing a cascade of gems to run down to Bill’s feet.
Bill gazed at the objects embedded in the creature’s underbelly and then looked up into the creature’s red eyes. “I wouldn’t dream of it,” he said. “Your trove is one of the wonders of the world, oh great one, though I imagine it doesn’t make for a comfortable bed
.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Beryl said, sighing. “Sitting here has been nothing more than six centuries of agony. Dragons are martyrs to their piles, you know.”
The dragon continued to rise further and beckoned Bill to climb the trove. He briefly wondered if this wasn’t some elaborate attempt to lure him in close so she could squash him but he decided he was in for a penny, in for a hoard.
“Behold, my egg,” Beryl said. “You are not only the first tree rat to see it in centuries, you are the first living being.”
Bill rather suspected that the likelihood of him remaining in that state depended on what he said in the next few seconds. He reached the top of the pile and gazed into the small crater below where the dragon had been. He was terribly aware of the warm, moist smell wafting over him as Beryl brought her mouth alongside his ear. “What do you think of my precious?” she said.
Luckily for Bill, he didn’t need to fake his response. “Wow!” There, between his feet was what looked, at first glance, like a solid mass of diamonds and rubies. As he squinted in the half-light, he could resolve a shape.
“It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” he said, as the dragon rumbled appreciatively. “But I didn’t know dragon eggs were shaped like cubes.”
Beryl seemed to glow as she rumbled appreciatively. “She is unique - why else would I sit here, century after century, awaiting her birth?”
“She?”
“Oh yes, no male could be so beautiful even before birth.”
Bill’s eyes were adjusting to the light and he thought he could see a faint radiance coming from the cube, as if it were warmed from inside. “Talking of males, do you mind if I ask where the father is?” he said, peering into the gloom beyond the trove as if expecting a possessive dad dragon to storm up the side of the gem mountain and demand to know what Bill’s intentions towards his … cube … were.
“That is part of the miracle,” Beryl said with, perhaps, a tinge of sadness to her voice. “She was laid when I was alone. I was brought down to this cavern as a young dragon and shown this magnificent pile of gems. In the morning, I woke to find I’d laid my egg. The Cardinelf explained everything to me, how lucky I was to have laid such a unique egg and how wonderful the dragon that hatched from it would be. He told me to be patient, and I have been.”
“And you’ve been here, alone, ever since?” Bill was beginning to feel a sense of looming dread as the penny began to drop. From a great height.
Beryl nodded her enormous, careworn, head. “Yes, though occasionally I am visited by the Cardinelf of the day. More often condemned prisoners are sent to me, though I get little joy from the chase these days. And, once or twice over the centuries, a warrior has found his way into my cavern and attempted to steal my egg.”
“Well, I’m not here to steal anything,” Bill said. “In fact, I’m not sure why I was sent in at all.”
“Oh, it’s to receive my judgement,” Beryl replied with a yawn. “I’m an excellent judge of character, you see, nothing gets past me. So far, everyone I’ve seen has been very guilty indeed, but I think you are different, Rat Bill. There is something about you, something dragonish. But I am reluctant to let you go entirely, you are such very good company.”
Bill stepped back from the crater containing the jewelled cube. “But I have to go!” he said, panic rising in his throat. “There are people who need me!”
“I need you,” rumbled the dragon. “You will stay until my baby is born, and then I will need your company no longer.”
Chapter 26
ACCORDING TO IGNIS, THE MOST stupid thing Chortley could do right now would be to go to Montesham to confront his sister. In fact, the alchemist had said the only way he could be more moronic would be to take with him the known criminals in his gang. Chortley had decided, therefore, to do both.
It had been barely a week since he’d been goaded in Ignis’s living room. In the meantime, he’d hiked back to the forest camp (which he’d found in open mutiny), gathered his men and headed into the city. Shep the Lep had insisted on coming with them, for some reason, insisting that his particular talents for clearing a room on entering it might prove useful.
Chortley, McGuff and Clegg had disguised themselves as an up and coming merchant and his retinue and had taken lodgings in The Hard, a particularly disreputable corner of the town wedged between Dullwitch (home of the bureaucratic classes) and Totteringham, an entertainment district famous for its cock parties (etc). All three places had once been independent villages, long since swallowed up in the urban sprawl as Montesham had expanded until it filled the tongue of land formed by a bend in the course of the river Monty. Shep had been left to malinger through the streets as a vagrant.
Sitting by the grimy open window of the room they shared (there was only one bed, so McGuff and Clegg slept on the floor), Chortley watched the street below. They’d arrived earlier the same day, footsore and hungry, but a couple of pints of Bland and a Meet Pie had served, if not to sate their appetite, then at least to give hunger and thirst less room for manoeuvre.
“It’s quiet,” Chortley said, watching as a couple of old soaks wound their way along the street. “The streets are usually full of pub crawlers by this time of a Friday evening.”
Chortley was worried. He’d seen the evidence of Aggrapella’s excessive behaviour in the villages they’d passed through, or around, on their way here. Farms and cottages burned down, local militias disbanded and the constables imprisoned in the big lock-up in Montesham itself. Here and there were gory testaments to what happened to any who resisted - gibbets squeaked as they swung in the wind and they’d come across the remains of more than one bonfire. Chortley was glad Velicity was safe with Ignis although, come to think of it, he wasn’t sure what the witches had planned. It didn’t seem entirely plausible that they’d simply hide in Bel’s woodshed until Chortley had dealt with his sister. He just hoped that whatever they had in store, they’d stay well away from Montesham and the surrounding countryside. It seemed to him that the closer to the city he got, the greater the excesses he witnessed.
It was with great reluctance that Chortley sent McGuff and Clegg out to gather intelligence in the Crooked Giblet, the nearest tavern, but it was far too risky for him to go with them. Though there was precisely no chance of any of the courtly classes frequenting such a low rent establishment, their food servers and arse wipers had to drink somewhere, and they might recognise Chortley, even in disguise.
The only silverish lining in this particular cloud was that Clegg’s IQ would, more or less, balance out McGuff’s - together they ought to be able to hold a safeish and sensibleish conversation.
After they’d gone, Chortley sat at the window and watched the uncharacteristically quiet night pass. He’d worked out an escape route if they were rumbled, but he’d reached the point where he would almost have welcomed a little violence. His sword hand was getting itchy.
He was woken from a doze by the sound of footsteps on the stairs. Chortley leapt up and pulled his sword from the scabbard that lay on the bed.
A voice leapt into song. “Oh, the astrologer said he was brainless, that’s not a star it’s Uranus…”
Chortley relaxed, stepped to the door and opened it to see a greasy cap wobbling up the stairs. “Be quiet, McGuff!” he hissed.
“I’ve told him, sir,” Clegg said from somewhere behind McGuff’s rising form. “But he insists on singing what he considers the funniest song in the universe.”
McGuff halted and looked up at Chortley. “But it is … funniest song. ‘S all about a ‘prentice astrolologer. Thought ‘e could see ‘is future girlfriend in the shtars.”
Chortley leaned into the stairwell, grabbed an arm and hauled McGuff in. The exasperated Clegg followed his intoxicated former sergeant and helped Chortley manhandle him onto the floor where he collapsed and began snoring instantly.
“Well, I hope you learned something, Clegg,” Chortley said, “because there’s ev
ery chance we’ll be booted out of here tomorrow.”
Jonathan Clegg responded with the sort of look a dog gives when discovered next to a steaming pile on the carpet while the cat sniggers from the sofa. “I told him to slow down, sir, but he wouldn’t listen to me. He said he needed to fit in with the regulars.”
“Did you learn anything?” Chortley said, the end of his rope having been reached several hours previously.
Clegg nodded wearily. “Yes, sir. It seems the information we were given by Master Bel was accurate. All the talk was of the hunchback with the staff - some of them are calling him the puppet-master. Things were bad, apparently, before he turned up, but now they’ve become plain ruination.”
Chortley sat on the bed and gestured for Clegg to take the one chair in the room. So, it was as bad as Bel had suggested, and if it went on much longer, the county of the Fitzmichaels would cease to exist in any meaningful way. But why? What was the end game?
“Who’s in charge of the army?” he said. “I can’t imagine General Balustrade putting up with all this.”
“No indeed. Word is that Balustrade is incarcerated, along with all his staff. Sebastian De Grey is her ladyship’s general now.”
Chortley opened his mouth, but swallowed his exclamation, drew his hand across his eyes and sighed. “Of course. If someone wanted to ruin the Fitzmichaels, appointing that idiot to high office would do it.”
“There’s something else, sir,” Clegg said, leaning forward. “Some of the more, shall we say, free-speaking of the patrons believe her ladyship is being held against her will. Some say she looks half-dead and doesn’t say a word that hasn’t been whispered in her ear.”
Denizens and Dragons Page 14