by J. D. Oswald
‘He’ll live, but for how long I cannot say. There is a splinter lodged dangerously close to his left heart. I am not sure even I can remove it without killing him.’ Myfanwy turned away from Benfro as she spoke, surveyed the room and the kneeling warrior priests. ‘You men. Leave. Go back to your stolen monastery and never darken my door again.’ Her words were backed with such a powerful compulsion that Errol had to fight to stop himself from obeying them too. The warrior priests stood as one, then filed out of the room, heads bowed. Only Melyn remained, motionless and mindless.
37
Nothing is more important to a dragon in death than that their body be burned in the Fflam Gwir, the true flame. Without this ritual, the jewels that are the core of their being will remain unreckoned and they will not become one with the Grym. But to reckon a dragon’s jewels requires both Fflam Gwir and mortal remains, so what of those poor unfortunates who fall prey to accident far from home? What of the jewels collected by men, unreckoned and raw, the bodies that carried them left to rot to dirt?
Theirs is the most terrible of fates, for without bone or scale the Fflam Gwir cannot work its magic. A dragon’s jewels left undisturbed in some distant corner of Gwlad will slowly leach away into the Grym until all trace of their existence is gone, and this is the preferred fate. For if the jewels are disturbed, then they will latch themselves on to whatever living thing is close by, be it dragon or man or beast, and seek to live again through whatever host they can.
In the masterworks of the greatest mages there are hints and suggestions of a way an unreckoned jewel might be set pure with Fflam Gwir alone, but none admit to knowledge of the method. Even the Llyfr Draconius, that ultimate distillation of all dragon knowledge, is silent on the matter. It can be done, the mages say. But none will tell us how.
Corwen teul Maddau,
On the Application of the Subtle Arts
The first thing Benfro noticed was the warmth. Sunlight played across his scales, soothing his battered wings and warming his aching muscles. He could have just lain there, fallen asleep and slept for a thousand years, but something buzzed away at the edge of his hearing, demanding his attention. With a weary sigh, he focused on the noise, recognizing who was speaking.
‘Dragon fall from nowhere. Benfro not well?’
Something landed on his head, and when he opened his eye it was to the view of an upside-down red furry face, big white teeth and long quivering whiskers. A frown of concern wrinkled the squirrel’s face.
‘Malkin?’ Benfro struggled to remember where he had been moments before. How he could be here, now. It didn’t really matter in the end. The squirrel’s presence could only mean one thing. He pushed himself wearily upright, not quite trusting himself to stand, and looked around to see where he was. Ancient trees formed the edge of a dark forest not far off, but he sat in the soft grass and wild flowers of a peaceful meadow that was somehow familiar. This was where he had woken after his first encounter with the mother tree, a patch of grassland in the midst of the great forest of the Ffrydd. Not far off there would be a river full of fat stupid salmon ripe for the catching. The thought of them made his stomach rumble; it was too long since he had eaten, and he had breathed so much fire.
The memories clattered into place, each one a weight on his shoulders driving him back down on to the ground. How had he come to be here? Why?
‘I brought you here, Benfro. To thank you for breaking the spell that cut me in two.’
Benfro turned slowly at the voice. He knew who spoke and was expecting to see a strange, pale creature. Or perhaps Ammorgwm the Fair. In this incarnation the mother tree was neither, and both. Her form shifted constantly, shimmering in the sunshine like a heat haze. Aware he was staring, Benfro dropped his gaze, but he couldn’t help himself from thinking that she looked unwell.
‘I am healing.’ The mother tree settled into the form of a dragon not unlike Benfro’s mother, then knelt beside him. ‘It hasn’t been easy though. For a while I thought the strain might break me. It was a risk worth taking though.’
Benfro looked up into dragon eyes. ‘Risk?’
‘Gog and Magog caused so much damage with their warring, and then they caused even more with their infernal magics. The Grym was stretched and twisted to their ends for so long, there was a chance it might never recover. Fortunately for all of us there are still great mages in Gwlad who understand the balance needed. Earith and Myfanwy, Merriel and the girl Martha too. Others have played their part, and now I can hope that the Grym will once more flow unimpeded.’
The mother tree fell silent as a gentle breeze toyed with the grass, swayed the red poppy flowers and blue speedwell. Benfro would have been content just to sit there with her for all eternity, but he knew there was a reason she had brought him here.
‘It’s not over though, is it?’ he said.
The mother tree shook her head. ‘I am sorry, Benfro. You have given so much already. But there is still a disturbance in the Grym. Gog and Magog are gone, their jewels finally reckoned. They cannot hurt me any more. But the one who taught them still lurks out in the darkness. His malign influence still spreads through the Llinellau like poison.’
‘But I got the bone and the jewel. I breathed the Fflam Gwir. I reckoned his jewels.’
‘Magog’s jewels, yes. But there are others still unreckoned, and hiding within them is the one who began this all.’
Benfro saw them then, thousands upon thousands, locked away in cells like the jewels in Magog’s repository at Cenobus. Only those had been clear and pure; these were red and dangerous. Still reaching out to any who would hear them, still threatening to twist the Grym so that they might live again.
‘But what can I do? Their bodies are long since gone to dust. Surely the true flame will have no effect on them.’
The mother tree sighed, and the air in the meadow grew colder as clouds slid across the face of the sun. She looked at him with sad eyes, and Benfro understood then as he always had, really.
‘There is a way.’
‘Who holds the key to the chamber? Where is it now?’
Beulah burst into the chamberlain’s office, startling the handful of black-cloaked clerks of the Candle who were working away at their ledgers. Newly appointed Seneschal Ioan appeared from the far doorway, which led through to a more secluded office.
‘Your Majesty. This is most unexpected. How may I be of service?’
‘The key to the chamber beneath the Neuadd. Who has it?’
Ioan frowned, then bowed his head. ‘I do not know, ma’am. Your sister did not entrust it to my keeping when she left, and neither was it in the door. I merely closed it. I do not know if it is locked. Surely the magics of the House of Balwen will protect it, locked or no.’
‘We shall see. Come with me.’ Beulah turned and left the room, meeting Clun coming the other way. He walked slowly, still weak as he recovered from his injuries, and she had outpaced him in her impatience to find the seneschal. Now she was beginning to regret having elevated Clerk of the Candle Ioan to the position. The man was as dry as the parchments he was so clearly in love with, and slow to react to her order. She left them both behind in her haste to get to the chamber, but stopped before she descended the narrow spiral stairs, uncertain whether she dared go in alone. Far from being protected by ancient magics, she could see the door stood ajar as if the treasures within were now so sullied that no one would even dream of stealing them.
‘Your Majesty, please. You must not rush off like that. The palace is no longer the safe place it once was. There could be allies of your sister anywhere.’ Seneschal Ioan was clearly too self-important to run, but he had developed a method of walking that covered the ground almost as quickly while preserving his dignity, at least in his eyes. He bowed again as he reached the queen, Clun not far behind and followed by Captain Celtin and a dozen warrior priests.
‘And I suppose you are all going to want to go down there with me. For my own safety.’
‘The doo
r is open, my lady.’ Clun took a moment to catch his breath. ‘Who knows who, or what, may have entered?’
‘Very well then. Follow but touch nothing.’
Beulah led the way down the narrow stairs and into the chamber beneath. It was changed from her last visit, although at first she couldn’t tell how. The carved stone columns were still draped with the coverings her sister had used to prevent the people of Candlehall from seeing their greatest treasure. As she stepped into the space between the columns and the cavern wall, she could see the shape of the rock as it arched overhead towards the centre, where the huge pillar supported the mass of the Neuadd and the Obsidian Throne above. And that was when she realized what was different.
‘My lady, the jewels have been moved.’ Clun stepped forward to the nearest shelf, pulling at the curtain that had been draped over it. Nearby the alcoves still held their collections of blood-red jewels, but towards the centre they were all empty.
‘Only the white ones. Are they stolen?’ Beulah started forward, but Clun caught her by the arm and stopped her.
‘Not stolen, no.’ He turned back to Celtin. ‘Captain, fetch the dragon Frecknock. And place a guard on the entrance upstairs.’
Beulah shrugged off her husband’s hold, annoyed that he had the nerve to touch her in front of the common people. Something called to her from the centre of the room at the base of the pillar. The light there was different, brighter and pale where she was used to a hellish red tint whenever she visited this chamber.
‘What do you mean by bringing the dragon down here?’
‘My lady, something has changed. Not just here but throughout Gwlad. It involves dragons, and Frecknock knows more about her kind than any save perhaps the inquisitor himself. We should be cautious. The lure of the jewels is far more intoxicating now than it was before.’
Once he had said it, Beulah could sense exactly what Clun meant. Before, the jewels had been a source of power, but undirected. She had been able to tap them, use them to augment her own magical skills. Now it was as if someone else was in the chamber with them. Someone or something. And it was lonely, needy, desperate even. It called to her in a voice she couldn’t understand, but which was insistent all the same. Like the incessant wailing of an infant. Unguarded, she had been completely open to its influence. Now she closed down her mind as tightly as she knew how.
‘We should check the hidden tunnels.’ Clun set off around the edge of the cavern, one arm held aloft just inches from the rock surface. Drawn by the pale glow at the centre, Beulah had to force herself to follow him, Seneschal Ioan just behind her like an obedient dog. At the point where the first tunnel entrance should have appeared, nothing happened. It was the same for the second and third, but the fourth hazed into existence as she touched the wall. Beulah stared into the dark tunnel beyond, sniffing the air. She could smell nothing but damp earth and chill.
‘This is not as it should be.’
She looked over to where Clun stood by the fifth and final entrance. It lay open, and by the way his blond hair drifted about his head a good breeze was passing through from the other side.
‘How is it still open? Surely only the touch of royal blood can reveal these portals.’ Seneschal Ioan stared open-mouthed at the tunnel entrance as Beulah joined her husband.
‘Something more powerful than the blood of kings is at work here,’ Clun said.
‘It is the hoard, sire. Can you not hear them?’
Beulah turned swiftly to see Frecknock emerge from the doorway at the bottom of the spiral steps. She looked around the cavern like a mouse scanning the sky for predators, timid and careful. Beulah hated her more than anything, but she couldn’t deny the dragon had more knowledge than any of them. If only Melyn would return, but then Melyn was changed.
‘The hoard?’ Clun looked towards Frecknock with his cloudy eyes, head tilted questioningly. Then he turned towards the centre of the chamber and the thick pillar rising to the ceiling. ‘Yes. Of course.’
‘What is it, my love?’ Beulah followed his gaze. There were no drapes over the stone columns on this side of the chamber, and she could see down the nearest aisle to the base of the pillar at the centre. Except that where she would have expected black polished stone to merge seamlessly with the cavern floor, now there was a heap of glittering white jewels piled high around the column.
‘How can this be?’ She started towards the pile, but once more Clun stopped her.
‘Do not go too close, my lady. Such a concentration of jewels is not something to be approached lightly. There is good reason why they were all kept apart.’
‘Good reason for men, perhaps, but it was an abomination for dragons. A hell. This is how they should be.’ Frecknock fell silent, and Beulah fancied she could hear whispered conversations in Draigiaith fluttering through the air like nighttime moths.
‘It was a man called Dafydd. A prince, by all accounts.’ Frecknock paused again. ‘He came through here not more than a couple of days ago. They opened the portal so that he could be with his wife at Nantgrafanglach.’
‘They?’ Beulah asked, although she had a feeling she knew to whom the dragon was referring. Frecknock opened her mouth to answer, but before she could speak, Clun let out a sharp cry of pain. Whirling, Beulah watched as he pulled out the amulet from inside his robes, its chain still hanging around his neck. An artfully wrought silver disc etched with the markings of the full moon, it was set in the centre with a single amethyst and imbued with deep magics accessible only to those of royal lineage. As he held it up with trembling fingers it shimmered in the light from the jewels, but then disappeared. Clun held up his hands, an expression of horror spreading across his face. The ruby set into his wedding ring, King Balwen’s ring, flared brightest red, and Beulah felt the heat of it wash over her face. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them it too was gone.
Clun let out a low grunt of pain, ever stoical though the burns must have been agony. ‘I don’t …’ he started to say, then stiffened as if someone had slid a blade into his heart.
‘My love? What is the matter? What ails you?’ Beulah rushed to his side, catching him as he slumped to the ground. ‘Dragon. Help me!’ she shouted over her shoulder, then turned when Frecknock did not immediately come to her aid. The dragon was a good distance off now, walking towards the pile of jewels as if in a trance. No help when it was most needed.
Clun began to tremble, the convulsions growing ever more violent as Beulah struggled to keep a grip on him. ‘Hold his legs before he breaks them again,’ she snapped at Seneschal Ioan, who was standing like the useless idiot he was, wringing his hands. Soon he would start flapping them about and running round in circles like a headless chicken.
‘Pull yourself together, man.’ Beulah sent a compulsion with her words, meaning to calm the seneschal enough for him to function, but the Grym surged as she tapped it, feeding far more power into the hapless man than he could possibly control. With a stifled yelp, he too slumped to the floor. With no one to catch him, his head bounced off the stone with an ugly crack. It didn’t matter; he was dead before he hit the ground.
Beulah held Clun close to her breast, squeezing him tight as she tried to quell the fits passing through him in waves. Glancing across the chamber, she saw Captain Celtin emerge from the doorway, backed by a couple of warrior priests. They hurried towards her, and it occurred to Beulah that they should have been with the dragon, Frecknock. What had kept them? Or had she travelled to the chamber along the lines, the way Melyn had told her was possible?
‘About time, Captain. Take his legs, hold him down lest he do himself more damage.’
Unlike the useless, dead seneschal, Celtin was a trained warrior priest, battle-hardened and competent. He set about his task swiftly, but even so, Clun thrashed and convulsed with far greater strength than he had shown earlier. Beulah tried to hold his head still, looking about for something to wedge between his teeth lest he bit off his own tongue. She couldn’t bear the th
ought of never hearing him speak again. As her fingers brushed his cheek, a spark of Grym shot between them. She had a momentary glimpse of something in his mind. Fire and pain and utter terror, the dying moments of a god. And then he fell limp.
‘Is he …?’
‘Breathing still, ma’am.’ Captain Celtin, bent low, sliding his hands underneath the prone form and lifting Clun up with considerable difficulty. ‘We must take him to Archimandrite Cassters. Get him away from here, for starters.’ He looked around the chamber nervously.
Beulah nodded, was about to speak when a low, sobbing groan interrupted her train of thought. Turning, she saw Frecknock on her knees, head in her hands. The dragon looked like she had been gut-punched and was retching on the warm stone floor. Then she slumped sideways, tucking her tail around her as she looked straight at the queen with eyes of deepest purple.
‘He is gone. The blood oath is broken.’
Beulah felt a chill in her heart. ‘He? You mean Melyn? What do you mean gone?’
‘I do not know, Your Majesty. He was there, like he is always there, in my mind. And then he was gone. The blood oath I swore connects us, but now that bond is severed. I cannot sense him at all.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘I … I do not know.’ Frecknock bowed her head, surrendering herself to her fate.
‘Then you are no longer of use.’ Beulah reached out into the Grym, feeling the power that surged through the chamber into the central pillar. With a simple thought she conjured a blade of fire, clean and white. It drove the shadows from the empty stone alcoves and turned the remaining red jewels black as she advanced on the supine dragon. Frecknock did not move, seeming to accept that her time had come. Rage consumed Beulah. The thought that Melyn might have died before she could confront him about his affair with Queen Ellyn, that both her beloved Clun and this hated creature had felt his passing where she had sensed nothing at all, fuelled her anger far more than Frecknock’s pathetic nature. The dragon had always been weak, despicable. All her kind were alike, two-faced and thieving. Had they not stolen magic from men? She would hunt them down, kill them all.