The Pygmy Dragon

by Marc Secchia

  Master Kassik had whispered to her that Silver’s cell was watched by a Dragon’s eye–a secret, magical means of spying undetected. The eye was linked to a guard station at the ground level.

  Her every word with Silver would be monitored.

  Pip eased down the steps, holding her stomach. Her half-healed puncture wounds ached. Her slippers whispered on the warm stone. At least this was not a damp, rat-infested dungeon. The underground volcanic activity kept the temperature comfortable. The staircase led to a single, narrow tunnel, with other tunnels branching off it, leading to the individual Shapeshifter holding cells.

  Following Kassik’s instructions, she took the third tunnel to the left. Her lamplight winked off tiny, silvery veins in the dark stone walls. She would not want to be trapped in a place like this. It was no place for a Pygmy from the jungles; no place for a Shapeshifter Dragon. The weight of ancient rock pressing down upon her was palpable. But that was not the reason for her dry throat, or the tripping of her heart. What if she had to fight that treacherous sense of connection with him, which threatened to tear her heart asunder?

  Pip saw light ahead. On an impulse, she shuttered her lantern.

  The cell was a simple hollow carved at the tunnel’s end, barred with a solid metal grating somehow fused into the rock. There was barely room for the door to swing open and a narrow bench for sitting on. The cell was no more than ten feet by five. Inside, Silver lay on a narrow bunk, very still indeed. The Lavanias collar peeked from beneath the neckline of his plain, white linen shirt. His left wrist was chained to his waist, the right remained free.

  Pip paused to observe.

  At length, he said, “I can hear you. More questions, Kassik?”

  “Islands’ greetings, Silver.”

  His body jerked as though she had struck him. To her consternation, Silver immediately hid his face in his pillow-roll. “You.”

  “I … uh, came to see how you are, Silver.”

  “So, they’ve sent in the big weapons at last?” he said, a breathy, fearful whisper.

  “Oh, yes, humungous weapons,” said Pip, an edge creeping into her voice. “The deadly mouse.” When he made no reply, she added, “I’m here to talk, not to roast your rump as you deserve.”

  Still, Silver would not look at her. Pip leaned against the bars, fighting back a Dragonish surge of irritation. She had even dressed up for him! Fine. Unshuttering her lantern to improve the light from the single lamp hanging from a hook on the wall, Pip seated herself on the bench. She could wait.

  She had barely managed three circles of her dangling feet before she realised she would be the first to grow impatient. She said, “I’m done trying to kill you, Silver.”

  “You shattered my ribs,” he mumbled. “It took a team of five healers two days to find all the pieces.”

  “Your cowardly attack with the Heripedes killed fourteen of my friends, and nine soldiers. That’s the kind of person you are, Silver–attacking hatchlings, trying to get me eaten, sending monsters in the night–”

  “Kassik and I talked about that attack,” Silver said. “Hasn’t he briefed you? I had nothing to do with it.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’m not lying.”

  Wasn’t he? Pip’s gaze burned the back of his neck. “Why are you afraid, Silver?”

  He shuddered again. At first, she had thought he was playing some kind of game. Now, she was not so certain. Extending her awareness as best she was able in her Human form, Pip listened–and knew his pulse was elevated and his breathing uneven. A slight, rancid sweat exuded from the region of his neck she could see, below his left ear. He was terrified.

  On an impulse, she switched tactics. “Yes, Kassik ordered me down here to interrogate you with my Pygmy magical powers,” she said, watching his reaction minutely. “We’re skilled in the ancient arts. You see, beneath the Human part of you is the animal, the habitation of the base passions, instincts and fears.” She smiled grimly. Yaethi would be delighted by her use of their recent conversation to scare Silver witless. Just look at him curling up on the bed. “I can creep amongst your darkest, most primal fears, Silver, and–”

  “You do already!” His shriek brought her up short. “All I see is your black eyes burning through my dreams, day and night, and I can’t sleep. I can’t close my eyes but that you’re there. How do you do that, enchantress? Torturer.”

  Pip bit back an aghast laugh. This was what he thought of her?

  He moaned, “All my mental powers have come to nought in the face of your assault, the power of your … the insatiable, ravaging power of … it’s a perversion!”

  Pip reeled at his words, those verbal punches to her gut, to her mind, bruising her feelings. She gasped, “What? Islands’ sakes, what are you talking about?”

  “You. I can’t even say …”

  Perversion? Her? “You’re so ralti-stupid,” she shouted. “I’m not doing anything to you!”

  Finally, he turned to face her. His eyes struck her as shadowed, full of suffering. He said, “There you sit, just a pretty girl from the primeval jungle. You’re so tiny, it fools people into thinking you’re harmless. A Pygmy in a cage–ay, we knew all about that. Know your enemy, they said. My father warned me. You are the weapon. And I don’t mean resisting my mental dominance or breaking all of my ribs–which still hurts, you wretched little rajal–or even bringing me low, to this place.”

  Suddenly, words seemed to be spilling out of him, like a suppurating wound which had been lanced. “All I knew, you broke with your sweetly brutalising insights–you, my torturer. What is the honour of a hatchling-killer, I asked myself? Why are we clearing the Island-World for the inevitable elevation of the Shapeshifters, who are born to rule? What do I know of friendship? Nothing. All I see is your black eyes, endlessly accusing. I can’t get you out of my head. You dwell in my thoughts. You judge. I can’t think anymore, but you are there.”

  Oh no. Pip’s hands twisted in her lap. She saw the answer, and it made her want to run and jump off the Island …

  “Everything was simple before … you.” Now he was pleading, sitting up, gazing at the stone floor between his bare feet. “I shielded. You can’t possibly have known I was in Shimmerith’s roost.”

  “The attack lacked intelligence.”

  “But–”

  “I thought Prince Ulldari was you, Silver. And, it just made sense.”

  “There it is. Magic. Your hold over me.” Pip stared at the top of his head, thoughts flocking in her head like migrating birds come to rest beside a terrace lake, unsure again. What did he mean? “There, in Shimmerith’s roost, you stayed my hand by this power. I had a sword to your throat–explain that to me? A week before, I would have beheaded you without a thought.”

  “You hesitated. You wanted to capture me.”

  “Capture or kill,” he said. “I failed.”

  “Silver, look at me.” Pip raised her chin, trying to iron the severity out of her smile. “Why are you shaking? Look at me.”

  He shook his head. To her astonishment, a tear splashed near his foot. “I don’t understand, Pip. How can you … shiver my Island like this? Provoke me? Terrorise me? Turn all the glory to regret, and the sweet taste of victory to ashes in my mouth? I had all my defences prepared. Every eventuality covered. Every possible artifice, every–”

  Inanely, an image of Nak’s lecherous grin entered her mind. “Except for a glimpse of a Pygmy’s nude backside? Which unravelled a mighty Silver Dragon?”

  Silver’s shoulders shook with a spasm of laughter. “You …”

  “Silver–”

  “You’re incredible! Even now, you sting me, you confound and madden–”

  Pip decided she was too embarrassed to continue that line of attack. “Silver,” she interrupted. “Since you know my history, why don’t you tell me yours? Who is your father? This Marshal from Herimor? Why are you killing Dragons?”

  The tension around his mouth morphed into a silly, engaging gri
n. “Are you telling me, little Pip, that your magic is the mysterious, inescapable power of femininity?”

  “Mighty little me?” That was all she trusted herself to say.

  “Well, then you really are a weapon.”

  Mercy. Now there was a backhanded compliment if she had ever heard one. Silver’s eyes, which had been lacklustre before, now brimmed with the intricate, hypnotic gleam she had come to recognise as magic. The Lavanias collar was supposed to damp his magic, she thought, her heart fluttering with panic. But now it was her turn to drop her eyes from the flashing twin blades of his gaze.

  Thankfully, Silver chose to begin telling her about his life in Herimor, as if by speaking he sought to keep her at bay. Pip listened in growing fascination to his description of an unfamiliar world of political intrigue and assassinations, of great families of Dragons and Shapeshifters embroiled in ever-shifting rivalries. Poisonings seemed to be a pleasant pastime in Herimor. A ‘gilded greeting’ was a euphemism for a pretty, ornate dagger between the ribs–preferably tipped with a toxic cocktail of poisons to ensure the job was done right.

  Growing up, he had always thought his father was Marshal Re’akka. Re’akka was a White Shapeshifter, a Dragon with a particularly powerful hailstorm attack, aside from storm powers, winter’s ice and a strange power Silver called ‘cold fireballs’. But he was ambitious, cruel and cunning. Silver had grown up in a nursery with umpteen other brother and sister Shapeshifters. Deaths were not uncommon. They were encouraged. Only the strongest came out alive, and Silver was not the biggest, only the most cunning. He had been the sole survivor of a nursery battle to the death.

  “But when I entered the Marshal’s service–for he never suffered to be called father,” he said, “I discovered there were ten other secret nurseries in operation. I was not special.”

  Pip said, softly, “But you served him.”

  “With honour,” said Silver. “I would have given my left wing for a kind word from him, Pip. He demanded that kind of loyalty. A twisted kind of love.”

  Re’akka had, through assassination, alliance and attack, built himself into one of the most powerful Marshals in all Herimor. Then he became obsessed with finding a First Egg, believing that it would grant him and his lineage the ultimate power. He spent years and thousands of bars of gold trying to find an Egg. His interests suffered. He survived eight assassination attempts. The Marshal’s enemies gathered with the enthusiasm of windrocs mobbing a dying animal.

  At the time Silver emerged from his nursery, Marshal Re’akka’s territory was invaded by the rival forces of Marshal X’arth, who put his armies, strongholds and Dragons to fire and the sword. They retreated to Re’akka’s great stronghold at the Island of Eridoon.

  “Then, I don’t know what happened, exactly,” Silver admitted. “Re’abba never told me more than just enough. I recognise that now. Suddenly, overnight, the Marshal’s magical power multiplied. I don’t know which came first–the First Egg, the Dragon of Shadow, or the plan to invade the Islands north of the Rift and establish a new territory ruled by our family.”

  “So, genocide was the acceptable strategy?”

  Pip winced as her words emerged with a deep undercurrent of malice. Mercy, could she not just have told him what Leandrial had revealed? But she realised that she was not yet prepared to share that knowledge with Silver. The issue of trust was so complex, so fragile.

  But Silver only bowed his head, seeming not to know her fragmented thoughts. “He made it seem glorious and right. I was not aware at first of the Shadow Dragon’s appetite for the magical life-force of Dragons. The Marshal defeated X’arth’s forces, and from among them, recruited many Dragons. They emerged from the depths of Eridoon changed. Night-Red, deadly, unswervingly loyal to the Marshal. Six armies gathered against us, vowing to cast Marshal Re’akka into exile. He took the Island-World in his paw, tearing Eridoon Island off its foundations, and levitating it across the Rift.”

  “You speak as a victim of forces outside of your control.”

  His smile assured her he knew her question was meant as a test. Pip was grateful for her dark skin to hide the heat which entered her cheeks. Flying ralti sheep, this supposed interrogation was turning against her; his smile, making her insides resemble pulped tinker-banana. Treacherous thoughts of flying exultant, twisting loops in the sky together with a Silver Dragon filled her mind … he had to be manipulating her. It was his gift.

  The dungeon seemed to hem her in. Pip wanted nothing more than to flee. Waterfalls roared behind her ears, her Human and Dragon emotions churned into a fearful, frothing mess.

  “Certainly,” he said. “In part, it was like a glamour of concealment, so beloved in Herimor. I do feel I have begun to wake from a sleep; that I’ve been sleeping all my life. But Pip … I would not deceive you. I knew what I was doing. I loved to command others, twisting their minds, doing exactly what you accused me of doing to Shimmerith and her hatchlings. I revelled in my service, in being the favourite, in being loved by helpless minions, in being the one certain to earn a place in my father’s third heart.”

  “You also say that?”

  “The third heart? Ay.” She sensed his mesmerising gaze upon her person. She begged inwardly, ‘don’t, oh please, don’t say it …’ He said, “Pip, you’re a dark thunderbolt. Three days of sitting in this stupid dungeon and I’m still no closer to working out what you did to me. I detest what I have been. I hate myself. And I’ve no idea who or what I am any more.”

  “You didn’t order the attack on the dormitories?”

  “No.”

  She whispered, “How can I ever trust you, Silver?”

  “You can’t.”

  The new voice startled them both. They turned to see Telisia standing in the entryway of his Shapeshifter cell, holding a tray of food.

  “Telisia,” said Pip, through clenched teeth. How much had she heard? “What are you doing here?”

  “Bringing the traitor a meal,” she said, lifting the tray.

  There was a soft tzoing! Something punched Pip in her ribs just beside her left breast. Clutching the spot instinctively, she brought her fingers away wet with blood. A crossbow bolt, she realised. Oyda’s body armour had saved her life. The flexible, light metal chain had turned the bolt aside from a deadly connection with her heart. In the cell Silver rose to his feet, shouting.

  Telisia dropped the tray. Beneath it, she had concealed a half-size crossbow, which she centred on Silver’s torso. “I suppose it’s too much to ask you just to drop dead, traitor?” she snarled. A second bolt punched him in the gut. Silver folded up as though he had been gutted by a sword.

  Pip’s limbs seemed to have turned to lead. As Telisia swung back toward her, already reloading the weapon, she slipped a forked dagger from her belt and flipped it, instinctively, at the girl. Telisia parried it with her cloaked arm, a dull thud informing Pip that she wore some kind of armour. The Pygmy warrior lunged across the cell, striking with the second dagger. Grunting, Telisia parried once, twice. Pip stabbed her right thigh deeply, just below the hip.

  Telisia’s armoured forearm smashed into the side of her head.

  Pip spun into the bars. So strong. Again, like Prince Ulldari … maybe she had even recruited the prince. “You’re the assassin,” she gasped. “You let the Heripedes into the girls’ dormitory.”

  “A job the Marshal couldn’t trust that idiot Silver to do,” said Telisia. Ignoring the dagger sticking out of her thigh as though she felt no pain, her fingers worked the mechanism of her small double crossbow. “Of course I did. But you didn’t die, Pygmy Dragon.” To Silver, she said, “You fool. He never was your father, nor is he mine. He just used you. Serving with honour.” She spat in his direction. “I bring you the Marshal’s final, gilded greetings.”

  She needed to get up. Dizzily, Pip pushed to her knees. Why was she so weak? There was something terrible radiating from the wound in her breast, growing shards of ice deep into her body.

  Telisia�
��s face was serene as she regarded them both, her beautiful brown eyes, coolly assessing the situation. Her boot swung and kicked Pip back against the bars. “Does it hurt, Pygmy scum? To be slaughtered like the animal you are?” She kicked her again for good measure. “All that pathetic pretending to be Human, that can stop right now. You’ll never be one of us. Never.”

  “Wait,” Silver called. “Telisia, please …”

  “Please, nothing. You’re done. The Marshal never wants to see your worthless hide again.”

  She levelled the crossbow at Pip, bracing the weapon on her left forearm.

  “Yah!” she shouted, striking with the razor ribbons.

  A streak of fire scorched her ribs, in almost exactly the same spot as before. Telisia shouted as the turquoise ribbon sliced deeply into her fingers. The second ribbon dagger whispered against her neck, wrapping around it in a flash. Pip yanked hard. But Telisia stumbled forward, lessening the tension on the deadly ribbon. That simple movement saved her neck. Pip tried to roll to force the cutting edge to bite, but she was up against the bars.

  Slowly, the crossbow came into focus again.

  One bolt was still loaded.

  Telisia’s bloodied finger tightened on the trigger. “Go burn in a Cloudlands volcano, Pip.”

  The bolt caught her beneath the right collarbone, half an inch aside from the shoulder strap of her body armour, piercing her so powerfully she distinctly felt the bolt’s metal point chip the rock beneath her body.

  There was a rumbling nearby. The soldiers were trying to collapse the tunnel.

  “Later,” said Telisia. A small hawk occupied the space where she had stood. The ribbon dagger slipped to the ground, useless. Her empty clothes slumped to the ground. The bird darted up the passageway and out of sight.

  “Pip!” Silver shouted brokenly, clutching her between the bars. “Pip, I can save you.”