The Dragonstone

by Dennis L McKiernan

Egil shook his head. “I just wondered what they were, for like you, I have not seen such a bird.”

  He fished up a spoonful of beef and sat in thought a moment, then tipped the meat back into the bowl. He got up from his bed and went to the window and looked out over the courtyard and downslope at the fjord beyond, two longships at dock. “The Queen of Jute,” he said.

  “What?” responded Arin.

  Egil turned. “They say she is mad, my engel, just as was her ancestor.”

  “Mad? How?”

  “I know not.”

  “What of her ancestor? Mayhap there lies a clue in the past.”

  Egil shrugged. “The tales say she once…um.” Egil stopped, as if reluctant to speak further; his eyes were downcast in embarrassment.

  “Say on,” Arin urged. “Whatever thou knowest, I would hear.”

  Egil looked up at her, then took a deep breath and blurted, “They say she once took a horse to her bed.”

  Aiko raised one eyebrow skeptically as Egil turned back to the window, unwilling to meet Arin’s gaze.

  “Um,” mumbled Egil to the windowsill. “There’s even a chanty about it.”

  Aiko sighed. “Has it come to this, that we are to believe the ribald songs of sailors?”

  “Many songs are rooted in truth,” said Arin, then asked, “How old is this song?”

  “Ancient,” replied Egil. “That Queen of Jute is long dead. But they say that madness runs in families, especially in that royal line,” responded Egil.

  “Has there always been bad blood between Fjordlanders and Jutlanders?”

  “Aye, but—”

  “What is to say this is not but more bad blood?”

  “Nothing, my engel. Nothing at all…. But true or no, rumor or no, she is the only mad monarch I have an inkling of.” Egil turned and faced her again.

  “Is there more?” asked Arin.

  Egil shrugged. “Only this: they say animals roam in the royal gardens at the court of Jute, yet whether or no any of these are rutting peacocks, I cannot say.”

  * * *

  Evening fell, and Egil slipped into slumber. And even though his fever was gone, once again in the middle of the night he suffered ill dreams.

  * * *

  Days passed and days more, and each day Egil’s wounds were better than the day before. Every day, Thar came and watched as Arin laid poultices and medicks on Egil’s face and marveled at how fast he mended, swift by the healer’s standards, slow by Egil’s own.

  Every day as well, members of the ship’s crew came and visited awhile, including Captain Orri, who always brought laughter to the room.

  But every night, Egil woke up weeping, calling out men’s names.

  There came a day, however, when he sat in a chair facing Arin and said, “My engel, I would tell you what I can of the vile Wizard Ordrune.”

  CHAPTER 33

  I cannot…there is…” Struggling to speak, Egil shook his head, confusion in his eye. He took a deep breath and slowly let it out and stared down at his hands.

  Arin drew her chair close, until she sat knee to knee with Egil.

  He looked up at her and gritted, “I remember all he did to us in his tower, in his dungeons, in his…pits, but as to…concerning”—a look of fierce concentration drew over Egil’s features—“the other…before…after.” Egil slammed a fist onto open palm. “He stole thoughts. Took memories. Left confusion. Cursed me.”

  Remaining silent, Arin reached out and took his hand and gently unclenched his fist, and held it softly while smoothing out his fingers.

  Egil watched, as if somehow detached from his own hand, yet slowly he relaxed. After a moment he took her fingers in his and lightly kissed each one. She lowered her eyes, and he released her, yet she did not draw away, but instead she reached out and took his hand again. They sat in still comfort, neither speaking. Through the open window they could hear the cook calling for the yard boy to bring more wood, while within the room there sounded only the whisper of whetstone against steel as Aiko sharpened her blades. At last Egil took a deep breath and slowly let it out, and then quietly, calmly, he began again. “This I do remember.”

  “Ragnar! Ragnar!” Egil scrambled down the slope toward his armsmate. The young man stopped and waited as Egil came scurrying. Egil dropped to the footpath, calling out, “We have it!”

  Ragnar’s eyes widened. “Your father’s ship?”

  Egil laughed hugely and shouted, “Yes!”

  Ragnar whooped and clapped Egil on the shoulders. “By Garlon, at last! A ship of our own.” Suddenly, Ragnar grew sober. “Your father, is he…?”

  “It’s the ague. He can’t seem to cast it off. But he said he didn’t want to miss the raiding season altogether, so he gave me command of the ship. ‘You are only twenty summers old, my son, yet I was no older when I built her. Besides, ’tis time to see if you can fly on your own.’ That’s what he said, Ragnar—fly on my own—and me with four unblemished raids under my belt. Ha! I’ll show him just how well I can fly. I’ll swoop like an eagle, my friend, for is it not my name?”

  “Hai, Egil, like hawks and falcons and other such we’ll all swoop down upon our prey, and no matter how they twist and turn we’ll run them to ground.” Ragnar paused, then said, “Your very own ship at last.”

  Egil grinned. “At least for one raid. Come, Ragnar, let us go look her over.”

  Egil and Ragnar set off down the path toward the docks below, where tethered was the Sjøløper, a modest ship by Fjordlander standards—being just seventy feet long and carrying but fifteen pairs of oars—yet to Egil and Ragnar she seemed the greatest of all the Dragonships sweeping across the seas.

  They strode along her length, stepping over thwarts, examining the overlapping oaken strakes that yielded the hull its serpentine flexibility, causing the craft to cleave sharply through the waters, giving the ship a nimbleness beyond that which its narrow keelboard could bestow alone. They scrutinized the mast and unpacked the square sail from its protective tarpaulin, unfurling and inspecting the dyed cloth, along with the beitass poles. They checked the steerboard and each of the spruce oars racked amidships in oaken trestles, the oars trimmed to differing lengths so that when plied in short choppy strokes they would all strike the water simultaneously.

  Having gone over the ship from stem to stern, Egil said, “She needs a minor bit of work, but the crew will make short shrift of that.”

  Ragnar leaned against a wale and looked out over the water as if to see lands afar. “When do we sail?”

  “As soon as we can,” replied Egil.

  Ragnar now turned and leaned back, his elbows on the wale. “Where are we bound? What shores? Leut? Thol? Jute? Where?”

  Egil shook his head. “Father says those places are already picked over. He suggests West Gelen.”

  “Ungh,” groaned Ragnar, his face twisting sourly. “Fisher villages. We’ll find naught but old men to fight and cod to win.”

  “My thoughts exactly, Ragnar. But you see, I have a plan.”

  “A plan?”

  “Aye. To go where Fjordsmen have not been.”

  Ragnar cocked an eye at Egil. “Where?”

  Egil glanced ’round. No one stood nearby, though a few lads fished from the end of the dock. He slipped his jerkin loose and reached under to take a flat oiled-leather pouch from his belt. From the packet he extracted a tattered fold of parchment, doubled over several times, and said, “I bought this from a seaman in Havnstad in Thol.” Slowly he opened the parchment, fanning it out on a thwart. It was a map, rather large.

  Ragnar’s eyes widened as he scanned the unfamiliar shores. “Where are we going? What will we do?”

  “What else, Ragnar, but raid, that’s what: towns, towers, ships, villages—we are Fjordlanders! Wolves of the sea! As to where…? Here!” Egil stabbed a finger down on the map.

  * * *

  Egil and Ragnar rounded up a crew, mostly younger men, men of their age, men eager for adventure, for Egil would not
reveal where he was bound, and many of the older warriors would not go without knowing the destination. Yet the young men had no qualms about setting out on a venture with nought more than the promise it would be exciting. Besides, Egil had named them Hawks of the Sea, though Young Wolves of the Sea would have been more accurate. Hence, with nought but promises of adventure and of deeds of derring-do and of fortune awaiting, Egil and his Hawks set sail on a midsummer’s day, leaving behind a puzzle as to where he was headed, and only Egil’s father knew whence ship and son were bound, a destination he kept to himself.

  * * *

  In the dark, moonless night, clouds covering the stars, the Sjøløper slipped through the blackness to come alongside the unwary craft, and Egil and his Hawks quietly clambered over the wales and up.

  * * *

  Filthy and athirst, with whips flailing against their backs, all the men stumbling in chains, Egil and his crew were driven along the twisting passageway through thick, stone bulwarks and into the courtyard beyond. Behind them, hinges shrieking, the massive main gate slowly swung to and slammed shut, and a huge bar ponderously rumbled across to thud home in a deep recess embedded in the high, buttressed ramparts. And with gears clattering and ratchets clacking and iron squealing, a mighty portcullis screeched downward in its track, its iron teeth grinding down to bottom out in deep socket holes drilled in the stone pave below.

  Straight before the captives stood a large, dark building—the main hall—a hundred or more feet wide and three storeys high. To the left and against the stone bulwark were stables and a smithy and outbuildings. To the right, in the northwest corner and abutted against the wide ramparts stood a tall tower. Little of this did Egil get to see as he was shoved forward by his Drôkken guard, yet he saw enough to know that he and his Hawks were caged.

  They were driven shuffling across the courtyard and into the large building and down, their chains rattling and manacles clacking, as down the narrow stairwell they floundered to come at last to the foul mews below.

  * * *

  “So, you are the captain of the raiders.”

  Egil remained silent.

  The Mage turned from the window and stared at Egil. “And you would have the wealth of my ship?”

  Again Egil said nothing.

  “Fool,” hissed the Mage.

  Egil had been wrenched from the cell and shoved roughly up and across the courtyard and into the tower. Up a spiral stairwell round the walls he had been driven, two Drôkha and a swart man taking turns ramming a prod into his back, sniggering as they did so. They had driven him up the twisting stairs and into the room at the top, the room where awaited the Mage. Tall he was and gaunt and pale, with no hair whatsoever on his head— neither locks nor eyebrows nor lashes nor moustache nor beard. His nose was long and straight, and his eyes dark, obsidian, his lips thin and bloodless, and his fingers long and grasping and black nailed. He wore a bloodred robe.

  This was the Mage whose ship Egil had boarded.

  This was the Mage who had caused his defeat.

  And now they stood in a room high atop the tower in the strongholt of the Mage, in the fortress where Egil and his crew had been dragged in fetters.

  The Drôkha and the swart man had chained Egil to a ring in the floor and then had left him alone with his captor, and now Egil and the Mage faced one another—one silent, the other sneering.

  “I am Ordrune, Captain. And your name…?”

  Egil said nought.

  “Your silence is of no moment,” said Ordrune. “I will have your name shortly. You will be eager to speak.” The Mage turned aside and made his way across the room.

  The chamber itself was completely circular, perhaps thirty feet in diameter, and here and there stood tables laden with arcane devices: astrolabes and geared bronze wheels and alembics and clay vessels, mortars and pestles, clear glass jars filled with yellow and red and blue and green granules, braziers glowing red…with tools inserted among the ruddy coals. Small ingots of metal lay scattered here and there: red copper, yellow brass, white tin, gleaming gold, argent silver, and more. And ’round the walls there were casks and trunks and cabinets of drawers and a great, ironbound, triple-locked chest, and desks with pigeon holes above, jammed with scrolls and parchments and papers. And four tall windows equipped with drapes were set in the stone at the cardinal points. Elsewhere, tomes rested on stands; books resided on shelves. Here and there were chairs, equipped with writing flats, with pens and inks and vellum sheets alongside.

  This was Ordrune’s laboratory, his alchemistry, his arcane athenaeum. This was his lair. This was his den. This was the heart of the Wizardholt.

  And here in the very core stood Egil, shackled to the floor, his own heart beating as Ordrune slipped a dark glove on a long-fingered hand and from among the fiery coals of a brazier he extracted a searing pair of tongs shimmering yellow with heat.

  Ordrune turned and faced Egil. “Your name…?”

  Egil paled, but said nought.

  A smile played about the corners of Ordrune’s bloodless lips. “Fool.” With his free hand he took up an ampoule and released a drop of liquid onto the blazing pincers, then stepped toward the young man, the tongs sizzling, sputtering, tendrils of smoke rising up.

  “What better lesson can you learn than the one I teach you today?”

  Egil braced himself, ready to fight, for even though he was shackled to the floor he had the freedom of movement to the end of his chain.

  And then the smoke from the sizzling tongs reached him, and his will to fight vanished.

  Ordrune stepped before him, raising the burning pincers to Egil’s face. But suddenly Ordrune’s lashless eyes widened in delight, and a smile creased his hairless face. He lowered the tongs. “What better lesson? Oh, my. I do have a better one, indeed.”

  * * *

  Guards marched Egil down and out from the tower and across the courtyard to the main building, where he was allowed to bathe and groom himself and given clean clothes. Then, shackled once more, he was escorted down and through a labyrinth of passageways to a chamber. Circular it was, similar in dimension to the room atop Ordrune’s turret, and so he deemed he was in an underground hold directly below the tower. There he was again manacled to the floor, yet this time he was set at a table piled with sumptuous foods and breads, with wines and pure water to drink.

  Although round like the laboratory atop the spire, this room was no alchemistry, but a chamber of horror instead, for it held manacled tables and hanging, man-sized iron cages and fetters dangling down on chains and chairs equipped with leather straps, and tables aclutter with pincers and knives and mauls and screws and nails. There were slender, round wooden poles embedded in the floor, their upright sharp points and shafts stained rust red, as of dried blood. Braziers of burning coals, metal boots, wheeled racks, iron slabs like massive leaves of a book, and other such hideous instruments set ’round the walls. A large vat filled with a drifting liquid stood off to one side, and across the room, from behind an iron door barred with three massive iron beams there came the sound of slow monstrous breathing and the stench of carrion.

  All this did Egil take in as he drank water and ate great chunks of bread and meat. “When at war, my boy,” had said his father, “eat your fill every chance you get, for you never know when the opportunity will come ’round again.” And so in spite of the putrid malodor, Egil, clean-bathed and -clothed, stuffed food down his gullet as he waited alone in silence.

  * * *

  Ordrune came first and then they dragged in filthy, disheveled Klaen, and the young man’s eyes widened at the sight of his well-groomed captain sitting at feast. They shackled the Fjordland raider to a dark, thick slant-board, and Ordrune turned to Egil. “Where shall we start first, Captain? The hands? Oh yes, let’s do.”

  Ordrune sauntered to a table and took up a massive hammer, then stepped to Klaen’s side and held the spike-faced maul up before the young man’s gaze. “I use this…tool to make meat tender for my”�
�he glanced at the barred door—“pet.” Klaen’s eyes filled with terror and a moan escaped his lips, and he struggled against his bonds, to no avail.

  Egil leapt to his feet and called out, “Egil! My name is Egil.”

  Ordrune looked back at Egil and shook his head and smiled. “Too late, I’m afraid, Captain Egil.” Then he turned and smashed the hammer down on Klaen’s shackled hand, the iron maul splintering bones as blood flew wide. “No!” shouted Egil, but his cry was lost under Klaen’s shrieks of agony, the screams slapping and echoing ’round the chamber. And from behind the iron door came a snarling wail, and the door thudded, the beams rattling, as something monstrous slammed against it from within.

  Laughing, Ordrune moved to the other side of Klaen, and once more showed the heavy hammer to the shrieking man, the maul now stained with blood, bits of flesh clinging to the dull spikes. Klaen’s screams rang out hoarsely and again he struggled, and Egil shouted “No!” but Ordrune merely smiled and shattered the other hand. As the iron door thudded and rattled, Klaen’s shrieks climbed in pitch, and then stopped altogether. He had fainted, and only moans leaked from his lips.

  “Fear not, Captain Egil,” said Ordrune as he moved toward a table, “for this”—he took up an ampoule—“will revive him, and then we, you and I, shall start on his feet.”

  * * *

  Egil wept and pled and lost all the food he had eaten, as Ordrune slowly destroyed Klaen, breaking bones with the iron meat-hammer, working inward from the extremities, the young man shrieking in agony, Ordrune’s vials keeping him awake and aware. And all the while something behind the iron door roared and smashed at it from within, as if some enormous caged monster were being driven mad with blood lust.

  And when Klaen finally was dead, his broken body was carried by lackeys from the room, and moments later there came the grisly sound of something eating something behind the barred iron door.

  * * *

  If the top of the tower was the vile heart of the holt then the bottom of the tower was its foul soul, for over the next forty days, Egil witnessed the destruction of his entire crew: Bram, Argi, Ragnar, the others, all the young men who had followed him. By fire and knife and caustic potion, by rending and crushing and slow bleeding, by evisceration and impalement and other penetrations they died. One by one. One each day. Always with Egil now forcibly bathed and groomed and dressed and sitting before an extravagant meal.