Dragon Avenger

by E. E. Knight

  “Wistala is speaking already,” Mother said.

  “Which is she, again? The thick one?”

  Thick one? Yes, she was bulkier than Jizara, who was all neck and tail.

  “Greet your Father, hatchlings.”

  Auron extended his neck and peeped, a bit clumsily in his twitchiness.

  “Hello, Father,” Wistala said.

  “Wel’ome home, Faszer,” Jizara added.

  “Was your hunt successful?” Mother asked, to break the silence.

  “Not very. A sheep and a tired goat. I’m going to have to try in the foothills east.”

  “That means men,” Mother said.

  “I remember,” Father said.

  He reached out with his foreleg and dropped the carcasses. “You have the sheep, Irelia. The hatchlings can divide the goat.”

  “I’m full up on slugs,” Mother said. Wistala only remembered Mother eating one slug, the slimy creatures that ate the cave moss, bat droppings, even dragon waste. “Let them eat. Eat, you three.”

  The hungry hatchlings tore into the bled-out feast. Not a trace of warmth was left, but their appetites were such that it didn’t matter.

  “I’m for sleep,” Father said, winding himself around a towering stalagmite. But his tail still thrashed and his teeth ground.

  “What’s the matter?” Mother asked. “I’ve no appetite, honestly.”

  “It’s not that.”

  “What, then?”

  “There weren’t any grays on my side of the family,” Father grumbled.

  With that they fell into an argument over Auron’s merits.

  Wistala couldn’t think of many, unless being a nuisance counted as a merit. Mother changed his mood by praising him for siring two males—the skulking copper counted, as he seemed to be surviving on his own somewhere in the cavern. As Wistala understood it, all the males fought after their hatching until one became the champion of the nest. She and her sister were afterthoughts.

  Auron finished his gorge and then, hearing the copper at the base of the egg shelf, jumped down to chase him off.

  Perhaps Mother read her mind. She brought her head close to Father’s, began to clean him behind his griff, the armored fans that descended from his horn-crest.

  “Oh, of course,” Father said. With that he disappeared into the darkness beyond the moss light. When he returned, he had a bulge in the side of his cheek.

  “Here you are—”

  You can do better than that! Wistala overread Mother think. “—my little treasures,” Father continued, a little lamely. He dropped some things before them that rattled as they fell. “Gems for my gems.”

  They glittered enticingly. They were stones of a dozen different colors, cut and polished to catch light and throw it back broken into dozens of pieces. Jizara squealed in delight. Wistala thought them marvelous, and she joined her sister in placing them into colorful spiral patterns.

  Father sagged with weariness, his smell no longer sharp and strange but a comforting shield between them and the forbidding shadows of the cavern. She would grant the Gray Vex that much: he plunged into the darkness readily enough, despite his lack of protective scales.

  She and Jizara encircled the dazzle their father called gems, lying snout to tail-tip to form an unbroken wall of hatchling between jealous world and hoard. As they nodded off, Mother sang:

  Daughter, daughter, shining bright

  Precious jewel within mine sight

  Oh, if I could soar with thee

  As you seek your destiny.

  To see with you the caves and skies

  Vistas grand beneath your eyes

  Taking wing to horizons new

  Let us wonder who waits for you.

  A dragon bright?

  A dragon dark?

  Victor of duels with battle mark?

  A dragon strong?

  A dragon keen?

  Singer of honors and triumphs seen?

  Red, Gold, Bronze, and Blue

  To your lord you shall be true,

  Copper, Silver, Black, and White,

  Who will win your mating flight?

  For in your hearts our future rests

  To see our line with hatchlings blessed

  And for those who threaten clutch of flame,

  To feel the wrath of dragon-dame.

  Chapter 3

  The last fragments of eggshell disappeared, and in time the gems did, as well.

  Mother neither ate nor slept, as far as Wistala could tell, save for a slug or two, and a whole horse Father brought back along with a dirty-smelling monster Mother insisted was a human. To Wistala he smelled like a two-day-dead sheep not properly bled and gutted. Auron got the honor of hunting and eating him.

  Wistala watched the Gray Vex disappear with Father. “Auron’s crest must be made of gold, the way you favor him,” Wistala said to Mother.

  “Don’t whine, Tala,” she said. “You and your sister have a whole horse to share. That’s ten times a man or more.” Mother had already consumed hers, and was licking the last runnels of blood from her teeth and lip-line. She sighed, and her golden eyes brightened. “Eat those metal rings from the saddle. They’re good for you.”

  “I’d rather be hunting that man,” Wistala said.

  “You’ll be hunting on your own soon enough,” Mother replied. “Practice on slugs.”

  “They’re a bore. Tell us more of the Upper World,” Wistala said. “Fish leaping at waterfalls!”

  “I want to hear about Father’s mating song again,” Jizara said. Jizara liked to imitate the tunes, and even Auron admitted that she had a gift for song. “Did he really cause an avalanche?”

  Mother’s stories always entertained. She mixed words and pictures and sense-memory so skillfully, Wistala felt as though she were living it.

  “No, you shall have a lesson.”

  Both sisters drooped at that. Lessons came only through Mother’s words, and one had to form one’s own imagery and sensations. Learning about The Hatchling Who Cried “Dwarf ” or The Geese That Saved the Seven-Egg Clutch couldn’t compare.

  “Since you’ve both seen and smelled a man today, I’ll tell you about the Great Betrayal. A man had a hand in that.”

  Jizara closed a nostril at Wistala. She stifled a snort and tried to clear her thoughts so she might summon her own mind-pictures.

  “As you know, the Age of Dreams ended when the ravenous Blighters appeared. The Four Great Spirits of Earth, Air, Water, and Fire each gave a gift to Dragons to make them supreme over the Upper and within the Lower Worlds to tame the foul Blighters. But while fighting over their reward for this deed, they created the Dwarves, Elves, and Men who now come to kill us. Men are the worst. Men, who breed so fast that a single female in a dragon’s lifetime can produce a nation, like a small rock falling from a mountain’s height can knock two that send six rolling that create a landslide. All of that horde seek to kill us.

  “But it wasn’t always so.

  “For a time, the hominid races were just as terrified of us as the blighters were. Now back in the Age of Sky-Kings, all blighters did was grovel and worship before dragons, but the other hominids helped the dragons build great palaces and towers. The greatest dragon hall of all the kingdoms was Silverhigh, built out of leftover pieces from the creation of the Moon, so white it shone night and day.

  “Now the Dragons of Silverhigh were oh-so-pleased with themselves to be living in such glorious palaces. The older, battle-scarred dragons who remembered taming the blighters and cowing the men, elves, and dwarves became fewer and fewer. Their hatchlings grew up thinking the luxuries Silverhigh offered were theirs on account of their being born such fine fellows, forgetting that anything worth the having is worth the effort. They painted their scales and wings in magnificent designs but hardly ever flew anywhere with them, as there was no finer place in the world than Silverhigh.

  “Flying off to fight battles and so on does interfere with stuffing oneself with grain-fattened s
wine and golden coins brought in tribute. So the later Dragon Kings of Silverhigh looked for someone else to do their fighting for them.

  “Blighters are quarrelsome, and only a skilled leader can unite them. Dwarves, though resolute fighters, are stumpy and slow moving, and are not given to taking orders without a good deal of back-talk and complaining, and only by the harshest measure can they be cowed for a brief time. Elves, though dragonlike in their intelligence, will stop in the middle of a campaign to feast and sing and praise each other for deeds they’ve still to do, and forget about battle altogether. But men are easily trained and pop out young like heated corncobs, so they are well-suited to fill armies.

  “Thus the Dragons of Silverhigh trained a grand army of men to go and do their fighting. This gave them even more time for play.

  “Now there was one man who was particularly useful to the Dragons of Silverhigh. His name was Prymelete, and he was not a famous warrior or a great builder or even a man skilled at bringing delectables from near and far to tempt dragon appetites. Prymelete was a soothsayer. He praised the Dragons of Silverhigh even more than they did each other. Many a high vault and gold-walled nesting chamber saw his presence, as he read flattering oracles predicting future greatness.

  “Prymelete’s tongue arts admitted him to the deepest councils of the Silverhigh Dragons, places no famous warrior, great builder, or clever trader were allowed. They even gave him a seat at the Firepit. Now I’m told the most renowned of the Silverhigh Dragons spat fire into the Firepit when making judgments and rules to show their mind had been made up. So much dragonfire went into the Firepit that it burned night and day. Of course, Prymelete outdid himself with praise for the dragons who met around the Firepit; his tongue left them so muddle-headed, they didn’t know tailvent from nostril.

  “Then one day Prymelete lingered, watching the fire after the dragons left. He took from his vast cloak a thick steel vessel such as human warriors wear on their heads and dipped it in the dragonfire. Then he ran like a hoard-filch. He left Silverhigh and went to a dark council of men, elves, and dwarves, carrying his dragonfire.

  “The dragonfire had cooled by the time he met this evil gathering, and he filled the wine cups of the hominids assembled there. They all drank from it, and it put dragonfire into their hearts that made them brave enough to challenge the dragons. The hominids marched on Silverhigh and threw down its perches and vaults and galleries, and suffocated its deeps and wells and chambers.”

  “Why didn’t the dragons fight?” Wistala asked.

  “Some say it is because they’d forgotten how,” Mother answered. “Others say Prymelete returned from his trip and put more folly in their heads, pronounced doom and despair at the approach of warlike men, elves, and dwarves, so that they did not go and fight with the parts of their grand army of men who remained loyal to their oaths. Then when the abandoned men were destroyed, Prymelete redoubled his predictions of disaster. The dragons were so used to abiding by the soothsayings of Prymelete that they panicked and fled, or hid in deep holes to be hunted and killed one by one.”

  “What happened to wicked Prymelete?” Jizara asked.

  “There are different stories, but I shall tell you this one: Other dragons from the far side of the world heard about the destruction of Silverhigh and came to seek after their relatives. Finding them slaughtered, they learned the story from some blighters and sought out Prymelete. Since he places himself above dragons, they took him to a high mountain and hung him there by his fine girdle to be pecked at by the great carrion birds who ride the winds of the thin-air heights. When his body fell apart and went down the mountainside, they brought the bones back to the high ledge to give the carrion birds another meal, and there they sit, cold and exposed.”

  “Tales and terrors, that’s a horrible story, Mother,” Jizara said. “Dragons hunted and killed in their own homes. I’m scared.”

  “I tell it to you so you will always be on your guard. Ever since that awful day, the hominids have had fire in their hearts to kill dragons. And so it will be until the happy day, as my mother used to say, when all the hominids kill each other off and the dragons may return from hiding. But I fear that day is far, far off. That is why I’m always listening.”

  Chapter 4

  If you’re patient enough, and keep still, out of sight and smell, the prey will feed itself right up to you.

  Mother’s words echoed in Wistala’s memory as she waited for a slug above the cave moss. According to Mother, it was spring above ground, and snow was melting and finding its way into their cave, feeding flush new growth of moss. And with the moss came more slugs.

  She clung, upside down, content to just roll her eyes as she searched for a pale, slow-moving back. Sometimes you could hear the soft slurp, like dragon tongue against the roof of one’s mouth, but with water dribbling and dripping into the cave from a hundred inlets, hunting by ear was impossible. With so many old trails criss-crossing the cavern floor, the nose was useless unless one came upon a still-slimy trail. So that left watching.

  Of course, she had more to worry about than being able to properly push off, turn, and land near enough to the slug so she could catch it on the drop or the first pounce. The Gray Vex was prowling and snuffling around near the waterfall whose pool fed her slug. It would be just like him to come blundering through in that off-kilter leaping style of his, scaring every slug away until the next scale-shed.

  “With every day closer to drakehood, he’ll be more restless,” Mother had said. “Then he’ll wander out and never return. Or your father will drive him out.”

  “How many more days?” Jizara had asked, probing the hole left by a missing scale where Auron had pounced on her.

  “You’ll think differently when he’s gone. I know I did with my brother Culekin—Wind Spirit knows what’s become of him.”

  Drakka usually stayed closer to their home caverns until a new clutch of eggs came, or so Mother predicted. But Mother needed at least a year in the Upper World to get her strength back, during which she’d teach them much huntcraft. Then she’d fly with Father—

  Snick-snick-snick-snick came the sound of Auron’s claws as he tore through the moss patch, nose held to the ground and griff half extended. Probably following the copper’s scent again.

  So much for hunting.

  She aimed, kicked off, and dropped. Twisting as she fell, she landed in a patch of cave moss with half a mind to pounce the Gray Vex, but by the time she gathered herself, his tail-tip had disappeared toward the pool. Whatever else might be said of her brother, he was fast.

  Wistala turned, and froze.

  Two hard eyes the color of flowing blood stared into hers. The copper!

  They stood nose-tip to nose-tip, the copper a trifle smaller and a good deal lighter. His scales had come in small and crooked, and his maimed sii had turned in toward his body, though he propped himself up by the forejoint.

  He lowered his griff a claw-breadth or two, pulled back his lips to reveal his rows of teeth. She backed up, sidestepped, and he advanced, matching her, nostrils opposite hers as though she were playing a game in the cavepool, trying to outwit her reflection.

  “What’s my name?” he asked.

  The question, put in simple Drakine, stunned her so she hardly understood what he said. He may as well have spoken one of the more obscure Elvish dialects to her.

  “Wha—?”

  “What’s my name?” he asked again, and this time she found an answer.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Out of my way or I’ll kill you,” he said.

  His eyes kept flicking in the direction Auron had taken.

  Wistala didn’t know what he expected to accomplish. He was smaller than she, and Auron was bigger still, at least in length. Auron had bested the copper in every contest they’d had. She should bleat a warning, scream and have Auron come running as he did when they came out of their eggs.

  But the Gray Vex had a big enough head. A bite or two would
do him good.

  She ate a few dead dropped bats on her way back to the egg shelf, upset for some reason. They made slugmeat taste like fresh horse, but her gut needed something to work on beyond vague worry.

  She climbed up onto the eggshelf. Jizara was matching herself against Mother’s tail-tip, standing up when it stood, rolling when it rolled, a prrum in her throat.

  “Mother, I was hunting slugs, and—”

  “Earth Spirit,” Jizara said. “You get any thicker, and your tail will disappear!” Jizara proudly displayed her long, lean tail, and she never tired of matching her extremities to those of her stumpier sister.

  “Jizara, don’t tease. Wistala, you’re all latent wingbone, as I was, and short limbs are the stronger for it.” Mother, despite the more plentiful meals since the melt began, was breathing audibly from the effort of the tail game.

  “Mother, the copper is after Auron.”

  Mother stared, long and slow, out into the depths of the cave. “I’d hoped he’d left. Auron may kill him. Your father never knows when to back down either.”

  “Maybe they’ll do each other in,” Jizara said. “We’ll have more food and a little quiet.”

  “Every hatchling is precious,” Mother said. “There are few enough left, and it’s the rare drake who grows to dragonhood these days.”

  “If there are fewer drakes, that means fewer songs sung to dragonelles,” Jizara said.

  “Well, in the North—”

  “Mother! Mother! Mother!” came a hatchling’s shout. “Others!

  Assassins, dwarves, here in the cave.” Auron jumped clean to the egg shelf, his stripes hard and black against his skin and blood running from behind his crest. Wistala heard metal ring against stone somewhere in the cave, felt her scales rise.

  Mother swept her tail around Wistala and her sister, putting her body between whatever approached and her daughters. “We are discovered?”

  Auron turned this way and that, going in three directions at once. “They’re here. With spears, Mother.”