A Crown of Flames

by Pauline Creeden

  Dyrfinna shook her head angrily. “How do we have this magic, but we don’t know how to use it against the undead?”

  They landed near the old mead hall, which was even more overgrown than it used to be. After Thora had died, the place had fallen into disrepair. A few guards hung around, sitting outside the hall under the shade of the trees, smoking pipes and swapping stories. “Hello there,” Hvamm said, sitting up, while the others put on their helmets and looked fierce.

  “It’s just Skeggi, Rjupa, and Dyrfinna,” said the guard, and they all relaxed again.

  They nodded to the guards as they dismounted. “Do you have a goat for the dragon to eat?” Dyrfinna said.

  “We have a herd out back,” said one of the guards. “Let me whistle one up for her? him?”

  “It’s a she,” Rjupa said. “Thank you.”

  Oh, good. I am famished, said her dragon.

  “Make that two goats, if you can,” Dyrfinna said.

  Rjupa’s dragon rubbed her head on her side. I love talking to humans, do you know that? If you couldn’t understand me, I would have only gotten one. And I’ve been working so hard out there, she added plaintively.

  “You’re a good dragon,” Dyrfinna said, hugging the dragon’s neck even though it felt something like hugging a hot stove.

  They all (except for the dragon) went into the mead hall. “We’re cooking lunch,” one of the guards said. “It’s not much, but you’re welcome to have some if you’d like to join us.”

  “That would be lovely,” Rjupa said as she sat down at the big table. This was the old mead hall where once great Vikings from the past had gathered, and the kings and queens would give away golden arm rings to their valiant warriors, and they’d have great feasts here and occasionally see great fights. But the present queen or the king before her had built the great keep as people of other countries did. This particular king was rich and was greatly impressed by Bavarian kings, and so the old mead hall had fallen out of use. Thora, the queen’s daughter, used to spend time at this old hall reading and praying and meditating, and the sword friends would visit her and have exciting mock battles. Then they’d eat, and Skeggi would sing songs.

  The guards brought out a little goat meat and bread and cheese and some vegetables, a very nice meal. Dyrfinna took only a tiny piece of goat so the guards would have enough, and got a little bread and cheese.

  “What kind of song magic can stop the undead?” Dyrfinna asked.

  “Not the kind we were using,” Skeggi said ruefully.

  “And not the kind that I can use,” Dyrfinna said, “unless I want to explode everything, including myself.” She was still somewhat unsteady from the last explosion she had triggered.

  “Skuld told us to go to rescue Gefjun and King Varinn,” she said. She shook her head. “But we decided to do the honorable thing and ask the queen release us from our oaths to defend her. But now all the ships are impounded, and she has taken my crew and sent me a letter of exile, and I’m to be beheaded if I return to Skala. Which I did anyway. And that’s why I was blasting myself out of the castle, because Egill was about to…”

  Dyrfinna fell silent, as if her mouth simply decided to stop working.

  Skeggi set down his skewer of meat. “About to what? Finna?”

  She couldn’t speak. She simply looked at him with her mouth open. Such concern in his eyes.

  At the concern, she was able to speak. “He jammed a black hood over my head and was taking me to be executed. I started singing. My song went out of control, and I blew everything up.”

  Skeggi, wordlessly, took her hand, his eyes never leaving hers.

  “Your papa tried to kill you?” Rjupa clenched her fists. “I can’t believe him! I hate him!”

  At the mention of his name, Dyrfinna suddenly started to cry. “This is stupid. Why am I crying? Why am I crying for that damn bastard!” she wailed, squeezing her fists together.

  Rjupa leaned up against her side. “Because he’s your father. And he kind of, I don’t know, tried to kill you? I can see where you’d be a tiny bit upset over that.”

  This show of sympathy only made her cry even harder. “This is stupid,” Dyrfinna said again. “I have no reason to be crying over him. None. I hate him and everything he’s done to my family.”

  Embarrassed, she wiped her eyes with her napkin and blew her nose.

  “The queen is sure acting different, too,” one of the guards said, gently trying to divert the subject.

  “Yeah, but I figured she’s acting like that from grief over her baby girl.”

  “Thora was not a baby,” Dyrfinna said. “She as about our age when she died.”

  That had been a terrible day as well. Dyrfinna rubbed her eyes dry with the heel of her hand. Too much grief. Too many terrible things happening to too many people. She breathed and calmed herself.

  Then Dyrfinna explained that Nauma was calling up undead dragons from the dragon cemetery, the holy place where lay the dragons who had died. She explained that Gefjun and Varinn were up there, having gone there to stop Nauma. “The goddess Skuld told me that Gefjun and Varinn were safe there, but they were under an enchantment. So we need to gather a force, go up there, stop Nauma from raising the dead, and free Gefjun and Varinn.”

  “Nauma has a much larger army now,” Rjupa pointed out. “As you saw just a little while ago.”

  “Yes.” Dyrfinna sighed. “I want, more than anything, to go out there right now and try to find a way to stop Nauma and her undead army. But without the force of numbers behind me, my attempts are going to fail. I hate to say it, but it’s true.”

  “That’s fine,” Rjupa said. “It’s better for all of us when you slow down. Sometimes you move so fast that I can’t keep up.”

  Dyrfinna laughed but blushed. “It’s just who I am,” she said.

  Skeggi and Rjupa chuckled, and he tore a piece of bread off from the loaf for her.

  “But what happened to you two?” Dyrfinna said, accepting the bread. “When I came home from the dragon isle, no news had arrived from the battle or your ships, though I checked as often as I could. Later on, Gefjun told me you had both died. But then again, she was rather mad at me at the time.”

  Skeggi frowned and looked down.

  “Gefjun was on the ship when we were thrown overboard, wasn’t she?” Rjupa asked.

  “Yes,” Skeggi said. “Our ship had been captured by Varinn’s men. They began throwing the wounded who couldn’t row over the side. They threw Rjupa over the side, so I jumped after her. She was too badly burned to be able to swim. You were barely conscious,” he told her gravely.

  Rjupa covered her mouth with her hands. “Is that what happened to me that day? I was in so much pain that I didn’t know what was happening.”

  “I was not going to leave you out there, alone.” Skeggi’s eyes flashed. “And I hope those men burn in a thousand fires for what they did to you. Anyway, the captured ship sailed on with Gefjun and everybody, leaving us and all the rest of the wounded to die in the water. There was plenty of ship debris floating around, so I got everybody up on something that would float, and I kept everybody up as the best I could. Then, after what seemed like an eternity, Rjupa’s dragon came back to us and brought a ship to pick us up. It wasn’t very long, actually. But she saved us. I lost a few people who were in too bad a shape to stay afloat. It was a difficult time. I wanted so much to tell Gefjun that I saved all her people, but once we got back to safety, I heard news that she had been captured by King Varinn.”

  His arms stole around Rjupa and held her tight, as if thinking of something awful.

  “What happened then?”

  Skeggi shrugged. “They took Rjupa to the castle and the queen’s magician worked on her burns to heal her, since she was a dragonrider and they needed her in the field as soon as they could.”

  “They did well,” Dyrfinna said. She had wondered how Rjupa had healed so quickly. She was glad the queen’s magician had worked to help heal Rjupa. Bu
rns were slow to heal, and extremely painful. But Rjupa seemed like she had healed well since she’d seen her last. Dyrfinna was glad for it.

  Lunch was over, so they helped the guards clear everything away, and then the guards went back to their duties. The three sword-friends went outside to join the dragon. She was stretched out, full length, in the grass, and sleeping most pleasantly, soaking up the heat of the sun. Her feet and muzzle twitched as if she were dreaming.

  Skeggi sat down next to a large, sun-warmed boulder near the dragon, stretching his legs out in the grass. “We still have a lot of catching up to do, but we just came from a battlefield where an undead army destroyed most of our forces, and we need to decide what to do next. Finna, what do you say?”

  Dyrfinna opened her mouth to answer and then stopped.

  She seldom balked on the battlefield. She usually just rushed in and started attacking. She’d always been fearless. And when she made decisions, she would take time to deliberate, but again, she seldom balked.

  Not this time.

  Now, when she needed to make a decision, she was balking.

  Because she did not want to face the undead again.

  She got a hold of herself. “I want to call on the emberdragon, but I can’t do this until her eggs hatch. She’s already had somebody steal her eggs. I won’t let that happen a second time. And I need to go to the dragon’s burial mountain as the goddess Skuld commanded, but the shiploads of people that were to go with me have all been taken out of my hands. Skuld wants me to go to the dragon burial ground and stop Nauma at the source of her power. But I don’t know how. All I know is that I can’t do it without those shiploads of fighters she told me to take,” she said glumly.

  Might I put in a word? Rjupa’s dragon asked, yawning and raising her head from where she’d been sleeping.

  Dyrfinna, startled, said, “Sure. Go ahead.”

  The dragons have been calling to each other over the miles, said Rjupa’s dragon. We need to parley. What is happening to you is also affecting us, and the bodies of our hallowed dead. Dyrfinna, once we decide on how and where we are going to meet, we want you to join us. We want you to be our human representative.

  Dyrfinna’s eyes went wide, and she bowed deeply. “I would be honored,” she said. “Skeggi, Rjupa, the dragons are asking me to attend their parley and try to get some idea of what they’re going to do to fight this. A council of war?” she asked Rjupa’s dragon.

  It could be considered as such, really, she said.

  “How do you understand what my dragon is saying?” asked Rjupa. “I’m jealous.”

  “I made a sacrifice of my flesh and blood to the dragon,” Dyrfinna said. “Blood will work just fine. I should have thought of this in the first place,” Dyrfinna said, getting to her feet. She pulled her dagger and handed it, handle first, to Rjupa. “Cut your hand a little on this and offer the blood to your dragon.”

  Oh good, said Rjupa’s dragon, getting to her feet.

  “I’ll do it,” said Rjupa fiercely, reaching her hand out to the dagger. “Just show me how. Skeggi, honey, you do this, too.”

  “Ooh,” Skeggi said uncertainly, looking at the knife.

  “Don’t pass out,” Dyrfinna joked.

  “I could just cut myself and then translate for you,” Rjupa said.

  “No! No, I’ll do it.” Skeggi pulled a face.

  “Don’t look, honey,” Rjupa said, bringing the knife to her hand, and he quickly looked away.

  Rjupa cut her hand and held it out to the dragon. “I hope this works, my dear,” she said to the dragon.

  The dragon licked her hand. Rjupa hissed in pain, and then looked at her hand in surprise. “What! Why, it’s … it’s healed!”

  I hope that’s better, said the dragon, lowering her face to Rjupa’s.

  Rjupa’s face brightened. “Ah! Dragon! I can hear you!” she cried, and threw her arms around the dragon’s face. “My sweet dragon, I can hear your voice!”

  I’m so sorry I couldn’t save you out on the water, the dragon said, leaning her face against Rjupa. I should have blocked those flames from you.

  Rjupa leaned back and looked into the dragon’s eyes. “Oh, my dear, it’s not your fault. I don’t even remember what happened. It’s not your fault at all. I love you so much, my kind, sweet dragon.”

  Rjupa and the dragon continued talking.

  Skeggi sidled up to Dyrfinna. “Now I really do feel jealous.”

  His eyes accidentally met Dyrfinna’s. Just as quickly, he looked away.

  “I don’t hold that against you.” She couldn’t meet his eyes either, though she longed, as she always did, to throw her arms around him. But then she shook off her lovelorn gloom. “So, are you going to shed your blood for the dragon? You all three should work as a team. Don’t leave anybody out.”

  “Ugh,” was Skeggi’s response.

  She handed him her dagger, her eyebrows raised.

  Skeggi grimaced a little.

  Rjupa’s dragon looked at him now. Be strong! she said, though Skeggi couldn’t hear. Rjupa hid her smile.

  Skeggi accepted the dagger and delicately jabbed himself in the hand.

  Dyrfinna rolled her eyes but grinned as a single bead of blood welled up.

  The dragon accepted his sacrifice, licking Skeggi’s hand. He hissed as well but then looked at it with surprise and showed his hand to Rjupa. “Look at that! It stopped bleeding.”

  Now we can understand each other, the dragon said.

  Skeggi laughed a little to hear the dragon’s voice at last. “This is amazing. Thank you for sharing this with us, Finna.”

  Dyrfinna shrugged, putting the dagger back in its sheath.

  “What’s your name?” Rjupa asked her dragon.

  The dragon told her name, but added, But don’t call me that around the humans. Some of them… well, you have to be careful around humans with your name. Especially right now.

  “What should we name you?” Rjupa rubbed the dragon’s nose, gazing into her eyes.

  You can call me Fluffy, she said.

  “What!” Rjupa and Skeggi shouted at the same time.

  It’s what the other dragons call me, she said. It’s because I have something on my head that looks like hair.

  Rjupa squinted. “There’s maybe a single tuft of feather-like something up there,” she said. “So they call you Fluffy?” But she hugged the dragon around her neck. “Okay, Fluffy,” she said, and the dragon made a noise very much like a chuckle, a rumble deep in her chest.

  “Rjupa and I need to go back to Skala,” Skeggi said. He ran his hands through his hair. “We’ve seen a lot of terrible things today, but we need to find a way to help our people, those few who have survived that battle and who are still coming home.”

  Dyrfinna wanted very badly to go back to Skala with them. But she wasn’t going to put her friends in danger.

  “Should I call the emberdragon?” she asked Rjupa’s dragon.

  I’m not sure, she replied. I guess she was waiting on some eggs to hatch, but I haven’t heard any news on whether they’ve hatched or not.

  “Go on back to Skala,” Dyrfinna told her friends. “I’ll cool my heels here.”

  Skeggi, for once, met her eyes, thinking. “Actually,” he finally said, “come with us. I think I have a way to get you into town without being noticed, so you can be in on these decisions.”

  Dyrfinna frowned. “Are you trying to get me killed? Somebody tried to lop off my head earlier today, you know.” She cleared her throat before the tears could return.

  Skeggi put up his hands. “This is only if you are tough enough. I have a charm that’s better than your face charm. The best part is that you can lounge on a dragon … er, Fluffy … the whole time and not speak to anybody. They’ll never know you’re there.”

  10

  Invasion

  While they were in flight, Skeggi had put that secret skill of his to use: He had made Dyrfinna invisible. Again.

  “There,
” he said as Dyrfinna looked down at where she used to be. “Now you can listen in on everything and they can’t catch you.”

  “Do you know how disturbing it is to look down on yourself and see you’re not even there?” she cried. “Especially when you are on a dragon’s back!”

  “It would be more disturbing if they lopped off your head,” Rjupa pointed out.

  “I feel like my body fell off this dragon,” Dyrfinna said, looking down at her invisible self and frantically feeling her arms, torso, and legs to make sure they still existed.

  If you fell off my back I’d certainly let you know, Fluffy said dryly.

  By the time the three friends and the dragon had reached Skala, the few remaining queen’s ships had been spotted on the horizon. The surviving dragonriders of the queen had already arrived from the battlefield, trembling, spent, and telling horrifying stories of the undead soldiers that had attacked them, how they’d ripped into their dear friends and comrades.

  While all this was going on, Rjupa’s dragon landed in the heart of the city with the other dragonriders. Dyrfinna had undone her straps before they landed, so nobody would notice that a set of straps were wrapped around some invisible person. She stayed on the dragon after Rjupa and Skeggi slid off, because now the streets were milling with people, all in the same state of consternation and panic. As an invisible person, Dyrfinna was not going to jump into a crowd of people and let everybody crash into her all at once and figure out she was there. Rjupa’s dragon sat down, tucking her tail out of the way, and Dyrfinna sat on her shoulder, resting her back on the dragon’s neck.

  “Love love,” she told the dragon quietly.

  Love love, Fluffy replied.

  The dragonriders were all gathered around Egill in the street, telling him about the horrors they’d seen on the battlefield.

  “Dragon, could you walk closer to the rest of the group so I can hear what they’re saying?” Dyrfinna said softly.

  I’d be glad to. Come with me, I’m taking a little walk, the dragon said to Rjupa and Skeggi as she started forward. They looked at each other, clearly excited to be able to hear the words of a dragon, and then followed as she moved carefully through the crowd.