The Golden Cage

by J. D. Oswald

  ‘And yet you help me now.’ For a moment Melyn had seen a spark in Frecknock’s eyes, an anger that almost matched his own. It was a fleeting thing, but it cheered him to know she had some life in her. There was no challenge in breaking a creature that had no spirit.

  ‘I have no choice, do I?’ The dragon wilted in front of his eyes, her wings drooping by her sides like dead leaves on an autumn tree. ‘There is no one out there to come to my rescue. My only potential saviour is a monster from my worst nightmares, a feral beast. If I help you I stay alive. If I don’t I die. I’d rather live in fear or in the service of my enemy. I’m not like the old dragons you killed in the village. They had made their choice. They had settled. If you hadn’t found them they would have faded away to nothing in time.’

  They broke through the undergrowth on to the path to find Captain Osgal waiting with the horses. Frecknock fell silent in the company of the other warrior priests, and Melyn wondered if she hadn’t decided to adopt him as her companion anyway. In an odd manner it seemed appropriate. He had answered her call, after all. He had come, as she had requested, and taken her from her life of drudgery, as he had promised. It was almost laughable had there not been that knowledge, right in the forefront of his mind, that there was far more to the dragon than he could see.

  ‘Follow me.’ He swung up on to his horse. Frecknock fell in behind him, keeping up with his swift trot with her own strange rolling gait. For all the world an obedient hound following her master on the hunt.

  Their campsite was an hour’s ride from the clearing where Frecknock had attempted her calling. Night was fully upon them by the time the fires were lit and the evening meal prepared. Melyn sat apart from the men, the dragon curled up by his side as he chewed on charred venison and drank from his water skin. She had not eaten all day, he was fairly certain, and had walked without complaint where they had ridden.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ He took the haunch that still hung on a spit over the glowing coals and tossed it over to her.

  ‘Thank you, Your Grace.’ Melyn returned to his own meal, trying not to listen to the noises of chewing and swallowing behind him, wondering why he had even thought to offer her food.

  ‘This magic book that made all the difference to your spell. It wasn’t yours, was it.’

  ‘No, Your Grace.’ The sound of ripping meat ceased. ‘It belonged to the village elder. Sir Frynwy.’

  ‘He’d be the one whose house was closest to the big hall? Two storeys high?’

  ‘Yes.’ Frecknock’s voice was uncertain as if she were considering her answer carefully. Good, Melyn thought. Far better to know that she values her knowledge. Tricking it out of her will be so much more enjoyable.

  ‘And when you used it, you did so without his knowledge, didn’t you? You knew they’d never let you make such a powerful calling. Not to the whole of Gwlad like you did. That would put them in too much danger, wouldn’t it?’

  Melyn looked over his shoulder, seeing the dark eyes of the dragon staring up at him from her supper. By the look of the haunch, she had been ravenous, but she had not complained. Now she seemed to be struggling with her conscience, as if to answer was to damn herself, to admit that she had been responsible for the deaths of her fellow dragons. Finally, she seemed to come to some resolution.

  ‘Yes, I took it. I needed it. I asked Sir Frynwy time and time again. But he wouldn’t hear of it. He was so old he couldn’t begin to understand my need.’

  ‘Or maybe he was wise. It’s of no importance now. He’s dead, as are all the others. The forest has reclaimed them. But you still live, Frecknock. And as long as you are of use to me, I might just let you stay that way. So tell me. To trap this creature Caradoc, you really need to perform the same spell of calling that you used when you found me?’

  ‘Yes. I might get lucky and contact him with the spell I used today. He’s close by, I can feel it. But to make it so he can’t resist, so he has to come to me straight away, to do that I need the book. I will keep trying, Your Grace. But it will take time.’

  Melyn hauled himself to his feet, crossed to where his saddlebags were propped up against a small tree and reaching inside for the package he had been carrying for months now. It was much heavier than a book its size should be. He carried it back to where Frecknock was now sitting up, her eyes wide, her meal forgotten.

  ‘Would this be your magic book?’ He didn’t need to ask. Her face was answer enough. She hungered for it like an addict for the burning weed. ‘Then swear to me on it. A blood oath binding you to my will. Then I will let you use it, and together we will track down and slay this monster that pretends to be a dragon.’

  Errol sat on the pallet of branches and dried grass he had constructed for himself across the cave from the alcove. After the fire he had insisted that Benfro have his old sleeping area back, and had even helped to gather grass and moss for new bedding. It was a better arrangement. The cave seemed small when the dragon curled himself up on the floor to sleep; at least with Benfro confined to the alcove Errol didn’t feel like the walls were squeezing in on him.

  The days since Corwen’s last appearance had slowly formed into a kind of routine. Benfro would practise flying in the mornings while Errol slept. In the afternoons the dragon would head off into the forest in search of food, usually returning before sundown with some dead beast which he would prepare and cook. Errol spent the hours of solitude either sleeping or studying the lines, trying to tap their power to speed his recovery. He exercised a little, often walking down to the river and swimming in the icy water, flexing his ankles to improve their mobility.

  Come evening, they would eat, perhaps talk a while, and then Benfro would settle himself down to sleep. He never asked for any help, but Errol could see the dragon’s aura relaxing as he drifted off, the knot around that terrible red line untying itself and leaving him open to attack. And so he would sit up through the night, his own aura keeping Magog’s influence at bay.

  It would be dawn soon, Errol realized. He could tell both by the change in the texture of the blackness he could see through the cave entrance and by the change in the colours of Benfro’s aura. As the dragon rose from deep sleep into dreams, so he seemed to change and grow. Sometimes he would turn in his sleep, twitch like a dog or mutter strange words under his breath. Errol was learning Draigiaith fast, but he still didn’t understand its more subtle nuances and understood little of what it was Benfro said as he dreamed, but he could tell that the dragon was experiencing something painful, something he didn’t want to go through.

  Errol leaned his head against the rock, feeling its coolness against his cheek as he stifled a yawn. It was hard to sit up all night, even if he had slept through the day. He had always risen with the sun, even before Melyn had taken him to Emmass Fawr. If anything, his months in the library archives before his birthday had lessened his need for sleep, so that when the time had come for him to take on the mantle of novitiate, it had been no trouble keeping his candle long. He wondered idly whether his small flame still burned in the novitiates’ chapel. Had he extinguished it before leaving with Captain Osgal for Tynewydd? So much had happened since that fateful day he couldn’t remember, but he hoped that it had burned down to nothing, then extinguished itself. He would dearly love to be candled out of the order. Even if he had already been cast into the Faaeren Chasm.

  Benfro rolled over, mumbling in his sleep. He would wake soon, Errol knew. Then he could settle himself back on his comfortable pallet, pull his battered old cloak around him for a blanket and doze off to sleep himself. He wondered whether he would dream of Martha and the group of dragons carrying her off to the vast castle. Every night he drifted off hoping to see her, but mostly his nights were filled with darkness, pain and memories of King Ballah’s dungeons. He could see the rough stone walls, vaulted arches reaching high overhead, echoing his footsteps as he walked down a seemingly endless corridor. Torches hung in sconces at regular intervals, stretching off into the distance, pulling him on
ward.

  Confused, Errol tried to look round for the guards who were supposed to escort him to the torture chamber. But he couldn’t move his head. Nor could he control his feet, and as he realized this, so he understood that he was dreaming. And he wasn’t in Ballah’s dungeons, nor in the depths of Emmass Fawr, though the place bore some striking similarities to the monastery.

  Trapped in someone else’s body, Errol watched the corridor slowly roll past him until, finally, he arrived at a set of stairs winding up in a wide spiral. He paused a while here, as if steeling himself for a long climb, then set off. It seemed both to take for ever and no time at all. Errol experienced the frustration and tiredness of a long and arduous climb, but he was also aware, somehow, that no time had actually passed from the moment he had put a foot on to the first step to the point where he stopped. He could see that he was at the top of a high tower, but frustratingly he could only see a narrow part of the room he guessed must fill the space.

  It was vast, that much he could tell. And it was filled with bizarre pieces of machinery, long wooden benches with their tops higher than his head, piles of books strewn over the floor. He wanted to explore this strange place, but instead he found himself turning, walking to the high arched opening that flooded light into the room. It was filled with vast panes of glass, thick as his hand and yet clear as the finest crystal. They were set into heavy iron-framed doors which reached down to the floor and opened out on to a wide balcony. Errol found himself stepping out, felt the wind tug at his face and clothes as he looked this way and that as if expecting to see someone. But there was no one there. Then he walked to the edge and looked down. His gut twisted in fear at the impossible drop to the base of the castle, and then further into the depths of a chasm. There was no balustrade around the balcony, nothing to stop him plummeting to a horrible death. He looked up again, across to the other side of the chasm. There was something terribly familiar about the rock formations and the shape of the mountains beyond, but he couldn’t work out what it was.

  A noise behind him caught his attention and he turned, walking carefully away from the edge and back inside. He still had no control over his movements: it was as if he was riding someone else’s senses, seeing only what they chose to look at, going only where they chose to go.

  Back in the tower room, he looked left and right, trying to pinpoint the source of the noise he had heard. There was so much clutter in the vast space it was difficult to see over to the other side, but something was moving rhythmically, scraping and squeaking like a mouse in a wheel. Movement flickered in the corner of his eye, and he looked up into the conical jigsaw of rafters and beams that formed the ceiling. More strange intricately wrought devices hung in the gloom, some twisting gently in the breeze from the open window, others glittering and shiny in the sunlight that streamed through the glass. And in the middle, rocking gently in time to the squeaking noise, a cage had been winched towards the apex.

  It was big enough for a large man to stand up in, perhaps twelve paces across and circular in plan. The floor of the cage was stuffed with dried reeds, their ends poking out of the bars like a badly made scarecrow. But what was most striking about the cage was the material of its making. As a novitiate, it had been one of Errol’s tasks to clean the candlesticks and other decorative metalwork in the quaisters’ chapel at Emmass Fawr. More recently he had held King Balwen’s torc in his hands and felt its solid weight. He knew the difference between gold and highly polished bronze. This cage was not made from bronze, and if the thickness of the chain holding it up was a reliable indicator, the bars, each as thick as his wrist, were solid. He couldn’t begin to conceive of the value of such a thing, or why anyone would want to construct a cage so large from such a precious and rare metal. But whatever the reason, it was plain that the cage was occupied. Something was inside it and trying hard to get out.

  Errol thought to get closer, to climb on to something and peer inside, but the eyes through which he saw darted away as he heard another sound behind him. He turned and saw a dark shadow pass the window. A sudden sharp wind buffeted the open doors and, with a lurch that made him dizzy, he was running for the staircase.

  He made it just in time, or so it seemed. He stopped in the relative safety of the stairwell and looked back into the room. There was a noise like the shaking of a heavy tarpaulin, then the oldest dragon Errol had ever seen stepped through the window and into the room, folding his wings behind him as he did so.

  Corwen was ancient, Errol knew. The dead mage had lived for over a thousand years and kept his decrepit form in death. Although less battle-scarred, and presumably still alive, this dragon had to be ten times Corwen’s age. His scales were worn and chipped; around his shoulders and neck they were missing entirely, just wrinkled, leathery skin hanging off his frame in folds. His skeletal head poked forward from his body as if all the fat and muscle had wasted away, leaving just skin pulled tight over bone. As he walked, his skull rocked back and forth like a cockerel strutting in a farmyard. The tufts of hair sprouting from the tips of his ears were white, his fangs blunt and yellow. He carried himself like an old man, stooping, moving slowly on arthritic legs. And yet his wings must have worked well, for he had flown to the room.

  Errol watched as the beast moved through the piles of accumulated junk towards the far side of the room. Old and shrivelled he might be, but he was still huge. Far bigger than Benfro, bigger even than the image Corwen had worn as the memory of his one-hundred-and-fifty-year-old self. How magnificent, how enormous this dragon must have been in his prime.

  He had reached the middle of the room, which was much smaller-looking now that its occupant had returned. The tables and chairs, books and other odd apparatus were perfectly in proportion to the dragon as he reached up and pulled the cage down, tilting it so that he could peer in. From Errol’s position he could still only see the base with its mat of reeds, but whatever was inside the cage shrieked.

  Then a hand, a human hand, pushed through the bars, the arm stretching far enough forward for Errol to see. It was difficult to tell from a distance and against the vastness of the dragon’s own hand, but it seemed to him whoever was in the cage was small, not fully adult, and female.

  To his surprise Errol then heard himself speak in a voice quite unlike his own. It was a quiet exclamation of surprise, spoken under his breath, less than a whisper, but the dragon’s head instantly whipped around, eyes piercing the gloom and staring straight at him.

  ‘A spy?’ he said, and Errol felt even more helpless than before. Fear pinned him to the spot. Pinned whoever it was whose senses he rode. ‘Come, Xando. Oh yes, I know it’s you. No one else would dare venture up here.’

  Errol felt himself backing away into the shadows, ready to turn and run headlong down the stairs to the cellars so far below. But the dragon merely smiled, muttered something under his breath and reached out towards him. A tug with one long taloned finger and he was walking out into the light, powerless to do anything else.

  ‘Curiosity isn’t a sin, boy.’ The dragon’s voice was unusual, at once high-pitched and yet more guttural than Benfro’s or Corwen’s. It reminded Errol of Sir Radnor more than anyone.

  ‘What brings you up to my eyrie anyway? Is it my new pet? Did you want to see her for yourself?’ Errol found himself stepping further into the room, drawn helplessly by the power of that voice. The dragon turned away for a moment, muttering something else under his breath but still tilting the cage, which descended further. As Errol reached the end of one of the huge benches, he saw that the centre of the room was clear. Beyond it logs burned in a huge open fireplace, alongside which had been arranged a reading desk and a pair of vast chairs, clearly designed for dragons to use. The walls were lined with shelves untidily stacked with rolls of parchment, more books and yet more bits and pieces of machinery. He took it all in with a quick glance, his eyes never straying far from the descending cage. The chain clanked over noisy pulleys high up in the darkness overhead, jerking and sna
pping so that the cage came down in a series of bumps.

  Closer and he could see that more reeds had been woven around the bars, as if a nesting bird was inside and not a person at all. For an instant Errol wondered if the dragon had been feeding people to whatever creature he had trapped within. Had the hand merely been the remains of its supper? Then, just as it thudded on to the floor, the dragon righted the cage with his hand as if the weight of it were nothing to him, so that now Errol could see what was inside.

  ‘There you are, young lad. And since you’ve shown yourself spirited enough to serve me, you can start by attending to the needs of my pet. If you can understand the gibberish she spouts.’

  She was half lying, half sitting, shoved up against the bars. Her hair was tangled and awry, fallen across her face, her clothes dirty and torn. But Errol didn’t need to see any more to know who it was, nor to feel her keening sense of despair and hopelessness. She reached out her hand, grubby and bruised, and Errol willed himself to take it. But the boy whose thoughts he rode stayed motionless, petrified, aghast. He could feel himself slipping away, the sounds leaching from the scene as if someone slowly closed a door on the world, the light fading away from the edges inwards.

  Martha reached out to him with pleading in her eyes, and her mouth formed words of desperation. But he could hear nothing, and slowly, agonizingly, she faded away to black.

  12

  In Llanwennog it is called a puissant sword, in the Twin Kingdoms a blade of light or sometimes blade of fire. In Eirawen men called it marwyr or deathbringer. But whatever its name, it is the most terrible manifestation of man’s brutality. The Grym connects all living things; in a very real sense it is all living things. To take from it for such destructive ends is a travesty, an affront to Gwlad, who gives life to us all.