“Alas, we do not remember the hearths being shaped that way,” Nagura said. “Perhaps our sister altered it after our last parting. This ‘throne room’ of yours, is it the largest chamber inside, roughly central to all other ones?”
I thought about the cathedral-like space inside. “If there is a bigger room in the palace, I’ve never seen it.”
“Then we must beg for a boon from the current ruler.” Nagura swept her head down in a supplicating gesture before the Regent. “Might we see our old family quarters? This would mean a great deal to us, for it might dissolve away eons of slumber and replace them with kind memories.”
Magnus smiled for the first time. “I know much about the need to wash away old, unpleasant memories. As I am but a caretaker of this place, I shall serve as your guide.”
“And I shall return to my Guild,” Zenos said. “There is much updating I must do to our prophetic texts, and the future waits on no one!”
The Regent watched, amused, as the old man hobbled off, leaving a faint trace of pipe smoke in his wake. Magnus addressed me one more time. “Dame Chrissie, I shall keep her Majesty company for the moment. In the meantime, I charge you to remain in the courtyard. Your three knights have returned, and I have summoned them here to meet you.”
Without further ceremony, he turned and gestured for Queen Nagura to follow him. They made an odd-looking couple that could only have originated in Andeluvia. A centaur wizard-king in human guise, leading a centuries-old wyvern monarch. I noticed how easily Nagura followed him inside, and realized that the high-arched doors all over the palace were – of course – perfectly sized and shaped for wyvern bodies.
“Dayna,” Liam called. “Our fellow members from the Order of the Ermine approach from the opposite end of the courtyard.”
“They seem no worse for wear,” Shaw observed. “‘Tis my hope that they bring news to save the Order.”
I sighed. It would be nice to get some good news for a change.
For once.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Sirs Exton and Ghaznavi approached along one of the outer walkways. Both men still wore a mixture of plate and mail armor, which glittered brightly in the sun. Sir Quinton followed, though he still moved with a pronounced limp from his healing sprain. The three men bowed as one before they started in with a bevy of eager questions.
“Are the rumors true?” Exton began. “The court is abuzz at the news of your capture of a wyvern queen!”
“We hear that she’s ferocious!” Ghaznavi exclaimed. “Truly, a fell beast that is more dragon than wyvern!”
“And besides capturing their queen,” Quinton added, “We heard that you exterminated an entire hive run by that horrible beast.”
A dark frown crossed Galen’s face. Liam simply wore an outraged expression while a feline growl came from deep within Shaw’s throat. The three men looked shocked at the reception of their words, so I quickly intervened.
“There’s a lot you don’t know yet,” I stated flatly. “First, we didn’t ‘exterminate’ anyone. The wyverns there were the victims of an attack using a device from my world. They inhaled a gas that burns the insides of your lungs as effectively as any fire.”
“Aye,” Shaw said darkly. “‘Tis as dishonorable a way to kill a foe as any I’ve seen.”
“Second, we didn’t ‘capture’ a wyvern queen. Her name is Queen Nagura, and she surrendered to us without a fight because she was slowly starving to death.” My voice grew slate-hard as I went on. “Third, she’s no ‘horrible beast’. If you hear of any knight or lord who’s looking to make a name for themselves by harming the Queen, let them know that she is under my protection. Everyone at court seems to know the price of angering me, so that should handle things well enough.”
I got a trio of amazed stares at my little rant. Finally, Exton spoke up.
“Does…does that mean wyverns are no longer our enemy?” he asked.
Shaw answered, sounding a little defensive. “Nay, not exactly.”
“Nagura is the Queen Mother of the Hakseeka, or intelligent wyverns,” Galen explained, with a clop of a hoof in emphasis. “The Hakseeka developed writing and architecture eons before your species or mine. But as time progressed, they reverted to the feral forms we see today. Dame Chrissie has since learned that the Ultari hosted a flight of these feral wyverns and used them in the assassination attempt on King Fitzwilliam. Thus, Queen Nagura, as the last of her kind, is more deserving of our succor and mercy than hostility.”
“Thank you, Galen,” I said. “That sums it up perfectly.”
He inclined his head. “I seek to be unfailingly salubrious to one and all.”
“This is a lot to take in at once,” Lord Ghaznavi said, stroking his rich black beard. “Yet by magic or mercy, Dame Chrissie has again shown me the depths of her power.”
Sir Quinton sighed. “Perhaps we have missed a challenge for real knights, then. But all three of us have done as you asked, even though we are marked as ‘touched in the head’ by many, not in the least my father.”
“In truth, even our carpenters are puzzled by the idea of ‘bee houses’,” Exton admitted. “After all, even sited where they are, no bees are coming near them. How are they supposed to be lured inside to claim these strange wooden boxes as a hive?”
That stumped me. After all, I didn’t have experience in this area. Any experience. At all.
“As far as I know, it’s just chance,” I admitted. “Bees who are looking for a home usually find the hives and set up inside.”
“But…” Quinton said hesitantly, “Our fortunes are tied to a very tight deadline. What if they don’t come?”
In answer, the Protector of the Forest stepped forward and made a grand sweep of his antlers. “If ‘chance’ bothers you, then what you need is a dose of luck. And when it comes to luck, you need a fayleene.”
The revelation came as a ‘Duh! Why didn’t I think of it before’ thunderclap. One almost as big as figuring out that there were wyvern markings all over the palace.
“Of course,” I breathed. “You’ve ‘talked’ to insects before. When we were staking out the Nystrom house. Can you enlist some queen bees to colonize our beehives?”
“I certainly can,” can the proud reply. “Though, it will take a little time. At each location, I’ll need to use my magic to summon their foragers. These in turn will bring along their queens. And where the queens settle, the rest of the hive will follow.”
I considered. The day wasn’t anywhere close to over yet, and time was of the essence.
“Galen, can you transport Liam and our knights to each of their demesnes today? I know that it’s a lot of travel, but it may make all the difference.”
The Wizard suddenly looked uncomfortable. “I’m more than willing, Dayna, but we’ve just traveled the huge distance from Keshali to here, and with a larger creature than I usually transport. I don’t think I will have the magic available for the rest of the day.”
In answer, I took out my silver chain necklace. The amulet Galen had given me almost a year ago glinted in the sunshine. I pulled the chain over my head and pressed it into his palm.
“This has to take top priority,” I insisted. “You’ve charged this fairly recently. Think it’ll give you enough of a ‘boost?”
The Wizard clenched his hand. He closed his eyes, murmuring an incantation under his breath. He smiled, but his expression was more grim than happy.
“This will be sufficient,” he admitted. “But given all that has happened recently, I mislike leaving your side.”
Now it was my turn to place a reassuring hand on the centaur’s shoulder. Actually, I placed my hand on his forearm, as his shoulder was much too high for me to reach. But the intent was there.
“Things have been…well, interesting,” I admitted. “But if you’re worried, then I still have a griffin warrior at my side. And if I need magic for some reason…your uncle is a Wizard of your caliber, isn’t he?”
Galen let
out a sigh. “It appears that I have been bested logically. Very well, we shall depart.”
Liam trotted over to stand next to the centaur, while the three knights gathered around. They looked more than a bit apprehensive at the prospect of travelling by magic, but I didn’t hear any objections. Shaw raked the turf and called out to Galen.
“Do not fear, friend Wizard,” he said. “A griffin hath enough strength to handle any challenge that dares present itself.”
Galen raised his hand, allowing the amulet to dangle freely by its chain. It glowed bright emerald as he recited the transport spell, then with a bang, his group vanished in a flash of white sparks.
The loud noise of transport echoed off the courtyard walls for a moment, slowly vanishing, only to be replaced by the patter of running feet. A familiar towheaded boy wearing a tunic the color of a blue-dyed Easter egg dashed up to us.
“Percival!” I exclaimed. “Hold on, catch your breath before you try to give us your message.”
The young page nodded, and did a quick three-count breath the way I’d taught him. Once he’d stopped the worst of his hyperventilating, he gasped out a short message.
“Dame Chrissie,” he wheezed, “Come quick! The Regent says that he needs you in the throne room immediately! It’s something about the wyvern queen!”
Just my rotten luck. What could have gone wrong now?
I set off across the courtyard at a run, with the page on one side and a griffin warrior at the other.
Chapter Thirty-Six
I pushed through the throne room’s heavy doors, Grimshaw and Percival followed right behind and almost ran into my backside as I came to a stop. The first thing I saw upon entering the dimly lit, cavernous space of the throne room was Magnus’ hand. He held it palm-out, in a gesture that clearly meant ‘wait there’.
Before any of us could say anything, he brought his index finger to his lips. Again, the message was crystal clear: Keep Quiet.
A small blond head looked around me on one side, while a big white eagle’s head peered around me on the other. All four of us watched as Nagura walked slowly along the far side of the room. The wyvern queen ran her bronze-colored wingtip along the edge of the wall, stopping only when she reached the dragon-mouth hearths.
Nagura gently touched one of the dragon-head nostrils, studying it intently. A low murmur rumbled in my ear, and I realized that it came from the wyvern queen’s throat. She wasn’t exactly talking, but emitting something akin to a cat’s purr.
“She’s been doing this since I brought her here,” Magnus whispered, though he didn’t take his eyes off the big wyvern as he spoke. “If I speak to her, she answers vaguely, as if her mind is on other things. Which it most assuredly is.”
I watched for a bit longer before quietly adding, “She seems…happy? Nostalgic?”
“I suppose that she might be. Anyone would feel some shade of ‘happy’ when arriving at a place one knew so long ago. Imagine waking up a couple of millennia into your own future to find that your childhood home was still standing.”
He has a point, I thought. Granted, it’s been modified slightly by tenants who’ve moved in and made themselves at home in the meantime.
“Strange as it may seem,” the Regent added, “I sympathize with her.”
“Thou dost?” Shaw asked, amazed.
Magnus turned to look at the surprised griffin. “Yes. I too was separated from those I cared about for a lengthy time. Not for the centuries that Queen Nagura has been away, of course. But long enough that I understand a little of what she feels. And it was only until just recently that I was considered someone monstrous, fit only for a quick death.”
Shaw stared at the Regent for a second before turning away.
Nagura stopped her purring and lowered her wings. The wyvern queen’s warm amber eyes refocused on us as she turned in our direction, scribbling on her whiteboard as fast as she could.
“We may be wrong. We may be wrong!”
“Wrong about what?” I asked.
“We may not be the last of our line. We sense something here, something far below this part of our old home. We wish to search for it. But we are not sure…”
“Nor am I,” Magnus said, his formerly contemplative face taking on a harder edge. “Let us speak frankly, Queen of the Hakseeka. Neither you nor I are the true masters of this place. You have a long-faded line of ancestry here. I am a mere caretaker who serves at the behest of an oath I took to Dame Chrissie. So, I must ask: are you going to make claim to this place?”
Percival let out a gasp. My stomach tightened into a knot at the Regent’s words. Sure, I trusted Nagura not to eat anyone out of hand, but had I just opened up a wyvern-sized can of worms? All I needed was for an ancient queen to claim birthright over my liege lord’s seat of power.
Nagura lowered her long, spiky head to Magnus’ level. She exhaled sadly, making a sound like a cooling iron stove. Her voice held traces of both regret and tightly leashed hope.
“When Dame Chrissie showed us mercy in the ruins of Keshali, I asked her not to use my title of ‘Majesty’. Our time of rule is over. We rule nothing and claim nothing. All we wish to do is to learn whether our future contains a ray of hope, or if it leads to nothing but desolation.”
“Thou senses thy kind’s eggs, then?” Shaw asked.
“Eggs of my kind. Or maybe dragon-kind. Our kin are entwined and related.”
Another kink got added to my stomach knot. Given my history with dragons from the Andeluvian Air Cavalry – not to mention Sirrahon – I wasn’t happy about that. Not one bit.
My brain decided to pile on with another cheery thought. Could that have been why the hearth was designed to look like a dragon head, not a wyvern’s head? Could Teyana have fallen to the dragons after Nagura’s hive went into hibernation?
“What if you’re right?” I asked, as I stepped up to Magnus’ side. “What if you find eggs below this palace? Then what will you do?”
The wyvern queen thought for a moment before answering. “We would wait and speak with the ruler of this place, to ask for his permission. If he wishes us to leave, then we would remove the eggs and depart this land, never to return.”
“And if he says otherwise?”
“We would gather what traces of the young remain. Then, we would curl wing and tail about them to sleep the deep slumber of time once more. Realms rise, realms fall. We would take the chance that in the future, we would wake into a time of light, not darkness.”
If I had any doubts that the Hakseeka were cousins to the Seraphine, that statement erased it. Once again, it was a reminder that I was dealing with a species which thought and acted very differently. Understandable, as they did not live within our own scale of time. Hunkering down and waiting for entire kingdoms to rise and fall simply wasn’t an option for mere humans.
“I believe that King Fitzwilliam would be satisfied with your answer,” Magnus said, with an air of finality. “You have my permission to search. Dame Chrissie, Grimshaw the Drake, and I shall accompany you.”
“And what of me, my lord?” Percival asked timidly.
“I’m afraid that you have the most difficult, thankless job of all. Go keep an eye on the wastrels that make up the nobility in this place. If you overhear them planning to do anything stupid…well, exceptionally stupid, come tell me.”
The little blond page brightened. “Right away, my lord!”
Percival bowed to all around and then dashed out. I had long ago given up wondering if the kid had any different speeds besides ‘walk’ and ‘breakneck run’. In the meantime, Magnus swept his hand out, indicating the entire room.
“Where might we start our search, Queen Nagura?”
“At the lowest point within this palace. We sense magical spoor related to what we seek emanating from deep below.”
The Regent hesitated, looking uncomfortable. I immediately knew why.
“The lowest point would be what Fitzwilliam now uses as the Royal Dungeon,” I
said, hoping to shift the group’s focus away from Magnus. “Follow me, I know the way.”
Once through the throne room’s antechamber, I led our foursome along a little-used corridor lit by torches held fast in sets of iron brackets. In passing, I noticed that each bracket had been forged to look like a scaly serpent in flight. Yet more wyvern art that I’d never noticed before.
We passed under an unnervingly sharp iron portcullis as we descended four flights of spiraling stone stairs. Nagura’s thirty-foot long form posed no problem for us. Her thin, snakelike body easily bent around sharp corners and curves with ease. Finally, we emerged into a large square chamber, one that looked as if it had been carved right out of the solid granite making up the palace’s foundation.
The room had been set round with yet more torches, which filled the air with the smoky scent of charcoal. At the far end lay a door flanked by stout pillars depicting wyverns coiled in battle or courtship. It was hard to tell. A pot-bellied guard in a spiked helmet and dark leather surcoat straightened to attention as we entered.
He squinted at me. “Dame Chrissie? Back again so soon?”
I’d asked for this man’s name after my last visit. “Yes, Jaseck. I’m here yet again.”
“Are you here to let someone else loose?” he asked, in his gravelly voice. “Or put someone in? I’ll tell you right now, I don’t have any leg irons that would fit the wyvern you’ve brought down here. Though I suppose I could have some chains forged that would loop around her–”
“She’s with me,” I said quickly. “I’m not, ah, making a deposit. Or a withdrawal. We’re on a…well, a treasure hunt you might say.”
“You do credit to your job,” Magnus said to the guard. “But there is no need of your services at present. Hand Dame Chrissie your keys, for you are dismissed for the day. Visit the royal kitchens and tell them to serve you a round of ale, courtesy of the Regent.”
A quick salute, and Jaseck left the keys with me before heading up the stairway.
A Warrant of Wyverns Page 18