The Dragons of Winter

by James A. Owen

  The news of the unicorn spread through the market like the Black Plague, but at lightning speed, and as the companions crested the hill and headed for the Duesenberg, they realized they were now being chased by quite a sizeable mob.

  “Oh, my stars an’ garters,” Uncas exclaimed as they ran, “but I wish Sir Richard was with us!”

  “Burton?” Quixote blurted out as he glanced backward at their pursuers, who were rapidly closing the distance between them. “You think he would have fared any better?”

  “Not really,” Uncas replied, “but he’d give them a bigger target than us.”

  Under the spreading branches of a chestnut tree, the Messenger watched. The sunlight that broke through the clouds above passed through the leaves to form mottled patterns of light and shadow on Dr. Raven’s face, which remained impassive, observing.

  “They seem to be in a bit of a pickle, neh?” a voice said from somewhere above in the branches. “We wonder why you are not helping them to evade their pursuers.”

  Dr. Raven didn’t look up—he didn’t need to, to know who was speaking. “That wasn’t my responsibility. I’m to shadow them, and nothing more.”

  “Lies,” Grimalkin purred as an upside-down smile appeared in the air next to the Messenger’s face. “All lies. You are the Caretaker’s errand boy, are you not? And he is nothing but wheels within wheels, and games within games. You serve a greater purpose, we think, than to simply watch.”

  The Doctor didn’t flinch at the cat’s slight insult, but turned to look at Grimalkin as the badger, the Zen Detective, and the knight disappeared over a rise in the distance. “They’ll do fine without my help,” he said, not caring to distinguish whether he meant the Caretakers or the hapless trio running from the irate merchants of the Goblin Market. “And as to games, methinks you would know something of those . . . cat,” he added with emphasis. “Don’t you? Or else you’d have already told Dee all about me.”

  “We serve our own interests, and none other,” said Grimalkin, who had now begun to vanish again, starting with his half-formed head.

  “Now who is lying?” Dr. Raven said, looking pointedly at the Cheshire cat’s ornate collar. The runes on it glowed slightly, whether or not the rest of the cat was visible. “You serve whom you are compelled to serve, as do I.”

  “Well, of course,” said the voice of the disembodied cat, more weakly now. It was obviously bored, and returning to wherever it spent its time in between appearances. “If we were not compelled, would we choose to serve anyone at all? Even ourselves?”

  Dr. Raven wanted to ask if the cat was including him in that statement, or was still merely speaking with the royal “we” as it so often did. But by the time he opened his mouth to speak, the cat was already gone—as was, he noted with some relief, the Duesenberg. Uncas, Quixote, and the Zen Detective had evaded their pursuers and moved on to the next destination.

  Looking around to ensure that no one would notice his own departure, and assuring himself that he was alone, the Messenger removed the watch from his pocket, twirled the dials, and disappeared.

  If anyone had been watching, they might have noticed that there, under the shadows of the chestnut tree, the silver casing of the watch appeared darker.

  In fact, it was almost black.

  Shakespeare, Laura Glue, and the badger Fred closed the doors and drew curtains over the windows in the small room that was far from where the other Caretakers ventured throughout Tamerlane House.

  “Have we heard anything from them?” Laura Glue asked hopefully.

  “Nothing yet, it seems,” Shakespeare said, dropping the last curtain. “They haven’t returned. And the other Caretakers do not seem overly encouraged that they will.”

  “If the Scowlers are all stumped,” said Fred, “then us figuring out a way t’ help will be impossible.”

  “Nothing’s impossible,” Laura Glue said, folding her arms. “Nothing.”

  “But some things really are,” Fred said sadly. “Like making crème brûlée with a kerosene torch, or teaching Byron t’ fight with a katana.”

  “Everything is impossible until someone does something for the first time,” said Laura Glue. “Half the time I’ve been here the Caretakers are usually discussing why a trump did or didn’t work the way they thought it was supposed to, or how the keep really worked, or all sorts of other stuff that nobody really knows anyway. So I think if nobody really knows how anything is supposed to work, then anything is worth trying, neh?”

  “Neh,” said Fred, tapping her fist with his. “Our unknowledge is our only hope.”

  “‘Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt,’” said Shakespeare.

  “Ah,” Fred said, nodding. “Measure for Measure. One of your great plays.”

  “Well,” Shakespeare said, reddening. “Yes. But that particular line actually did come from Kit Marlowe, thrice curse his eyes. But he spake it while deep in his cups, and I wasn’t going to let it go to waste.

  “So,” he said, wiping his hands on his trousers. “What be our plan, my children?”

  “Our plan be to have their back, neh?” said Laura Glue. “Sometime soon, someone is going to have to go after them, to help them. And we’re not going to let them down. We’re going to find a way, even if every scholar who has ever lived and died says it’s impossible. We’ll find a way. And when they need us,” she concluded, a determined look in her eyes, “we’re going to be ready.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The Sorceress

  The companions dashed through the passageways to where the Sphinx sat, silently watching.

  “We aren’t going to have enough time!” Charles said, panicked. “That was the bravest act I’ve ever witnessed—but they aren’t going to be able to hold him for long.”

  “We won’t need much time,” said Rose. “We just have to let Azer make her choice.”

  “What choice is that, Moonchild?” Azer asked impassively.

  “The one in the riddle,” Rose said. “Here, on the wall. It says we’re to give you a choice. So we discovered your name and woke you. Can you help us?”

  “Help you?” the Sphinx said. “How?”

  “Can you help us go back in time?” Charles asked, getting straight to the heart of their urgency. “Are you able to travel in time?”

  The Sphinx ignored him completely. “There is a price, Moonchild, for all things. Pay the price, and you shall have what you wish.”

  “What do you want?”

  “A Dragon’s heart,” she said, looking at Rose, “to restore me to what I was, long ago.”

  . . . a woman, tall and regal . . .

  with the bearing and manner of a queen.

  “To become a Dragon again?” asked Rose.

  “No,” said Azer, still looking at the Grail Child. “To once again ascend, and leave this world at last.”

  Rose removed the circlet of stone she wore around her neck, which her father had given her when he became the Black Dragon. She looked up at the others, doubtful.

  “Your destiny is greater than just being a Dragon, Rose,” Bert said gently, “and you don’t need that circle of stone to fulfill it. In truth, I don’t think you ever did.”

  “Then I think . . . ,” Rose began—but she was interrupted by an unearthly shrieking sound coming from the passages outside the chambers.

  “Lord Winter is freed,” Burton said, “and this world now belongs to the Echthroi.”

  “Not fully,” Azer said, looking at Rose. “Not if a Dragon remains. The Shadows cannot prevail against a true Dragon. You can choose to stay, or you may give the heart to another and save the world as it is. Or you may give it to me, and return to your own world as it was. The choice is yours.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Rose said in sudden understanding. “The choice is yours.”

  Azer stared at Rose, who held the Sphinx’s gaze, unafraid. A thousand regrets passed through the eyes of the once-Dragon, as she
considered the truth of Rose’s words.

  “He’s coming!” Charles shouted. “Hurry!”

  At last the Sphinx made her decision. She closed her eyes, and below where she sat, the doors set into the arch slid open. “Give the heart to another,” she said, “and go to thy journey.”

  The companions suddenly realized what had to happen—Azer had agreed to give them passage, but unless a Dragon stayed behind, the world would still be lost to the Echthroi.

  “The world must have its defender, it seems,” Rose said sadly. “Maybe this is my destiny. You should all go. I’ll stay.”

  “No,” Burton said, laying a muscular hand on Rose’s shoulder. “Not this time you’re not.”

  Rose began to protest, but the old adventurer shushed her.

  “I served the man your father once was because I believed a grave injustice had been done to him,” Burton said calmly, clearly, “and somehow along the way, the cause I served became as distorted as the man, and I lost my way. But I found it again. I found myself. And I lived to see him redeemed. So this is not a request—this is what I was meant to do. This is the reason I am here. And taking his daughter’s place is the best way I know to honor your father’s memory.”

  Rose nodded in understanding. She handed the stone circlet to Burton, then stood on tiptoe and kissed him on the cheek. He blushed, and pushed them all toward the open doorway, then turned to meet the Lloigor.

  “I never got to see my own daughter grown and married,” Burton called over his shoulder as he strode to the antechamber. “But I can do this thing for you, Rose. For Lord Mor—for Madoc.”

  The Scholar Barbarian stepped into the passageway. Dark Shadows were cascading up against the pyramid, swirling so thickly he could barely make out the features of Lord Winter standing just outside.

  Burton turned and called back to his friends. “Bert, don’t . . . don’t stop looking . . . . Find him. Find our boy.”

  Rose lifted her head, locking eyes with Burton, and answered for all of them. “We won’t, Sir Richard. None of us will stop looking. We’ll find your heir, if we have to travel to the beginning of time.”

  He didn’t reply, but gave a curt nod, then slipped the Dragon’s heart around his neck and stepped out to do battle with the Lloigor.

  Rose looked up at the Sphinx. “I’m ready to make my wish,” she said.

  “Speak.”

  “Take us home,” Rose said. “That’s all. Just take us home.”

  In answer, the Sphinx closed her eyes and nodded once. “It shall be as you desire.”

  Rose stepped inside with the others, and the door underneath the Sphinx slid closed.

  “In another life, in another reality, you were a Namer, Jack,” Burton said, reaching to grasp the Lloigor’s arms. As he grappled with the slender man, Burton’s features, his very form, began to ripple and change. “So, name me now. Name me for what it is I have become because of you.”

  Lord Winter glowered, and his footing slipped. He lurched to one side, and his glasses fell from his face. Where his eyes were supposed to be were orbs of impenetrable blackness. “You are Chaos,” he hissed, steadying his stance and tightening his grip. “You are disorder!”

  “Damn straight I am,” said Burton.

  The air vibrated around him, almost as if it were responding to his will and expanding his presence; and perhaps it was doing just that. He resonated with the countenance of a Dragon, a true, living Dragon—and suddenly the Echthroi that attended Lord Winter trembled themselves—and began to withdraw.

  For the first time in many millennia, Lord Winter felt a thrill of fear run through him.

  “No, wait!” he called out to the ascending geometric shapes. “Stop! Grimalkin! Loki! Do not abandon me!”

  “What,” Burton hissed, eyes narrowing, “did you just say?”

  Lord Winter’s only response was to howl in despair. He was losing—had lost. And he knew it, and so did his masters.

  “Name me!” Burton roared. “Name me, Jack!”

  “You are Dragon!” the Echthroi screeched, as much from the darkness that enveloped Burton as from the throat of the Lloigor Jack. “Dragon!”

  “Yes,” Burton said, almost as a whisper. “And I have made the right choice at last.”

  When the doors of the Sphinx closed behind them, none of the time-lost companions knew what to expect. Certainly, that they might be transported to another time, at least. Edmund and Rose were hopeful that they would end up back at Tamerlane House, although that was longer odds than they could really expect. Bert harbored a secret hope that they might actually end up in the future they were aiming for—with Weena. And Charles simply wanted to get away from Lord Winter.

  “So, uh,” Charles stammered. “Is it on?”

  “Not yet,” said Rose, who had been examining the interior, “otherwise there’d be too much risk of someone else using it.” She didn’t need to say more.

  “This panel,” said Edmund. “The symbols on it match some of those in the Geographica!”

  “It’s how we activate the Sphinx,” Rose said, running her fingers across the engravings in the stone. “I’d bet my life on it.”

  “Actually,” said Bert, “I think we have.”

  “Are there any, ah, instructions?” asked Charles.

  “No,” she replied, “just these markings.” Among them was a crescent moon, set in an indentation within the panel. She pressed it, and instantly they were surrounded by a glow of radiant light.

  “Excellent, Moonchild,” Bert murmured. “You are less and less the student, I see.”

  The light lasted only a few seconds, and then as quickly as it had risen, vanished.

  “Now what?” said Charles. “Is it over?”

  “Only one way to find out,” Edmund said. He stepped to the doors and slipped his fingers between them. Then, with a great effort, he slid them open, and at once the companions were blinded by bright, golden sunlight.

  “Well, Toto,” Charles said in relief, “I don’t think we’re in Camazotz anymore.”

  They stepped out onto a low, grassy hilltop that overlooked a broad, sandy beach. The structure they emerged from was the same as it had been in the future, but there was no sign of the Sphinx.

  “It doesn’t smell right,” said Charles, sniffing. “Not like England smells. But it smells . . . familiar.”

  “I agree,” said Rose.

  “I must confess my ignorance,” Edmund said, “being that my education in these things is more limited than I’d have liked it to be, but aren’t those runic columns over there?”

  They were—and not ancient ones, but freshly constructed, newly painted columns. And farther back, they could see larger structures.

  “Greek temples?” asked Charles. “In 1946?”

  “This isn’t 1946,” said Bert. “I think we may have overshot our mark.”

  “Not really,” Edmund said as he consulted his chronal maps. “We did go back approximately eight hundred thousand years . . . give or take. My chronal map might have taken us back to England in 1946, but it was designed to do that. We came through a different device that couldn’t be set for a specific time, because they had no way of knowing when—or if—we’d use it. And we’ve moved in space as well as time, so something else had to determine why we came here now.”

  “But then how . . . ,” Bert began before the realization struck him and his face fell. “Oh . . . oh, my stars and garters.”

  Charles groaned and put his face in his hands. His shoulders started to shake, and for a moment the companions were concerned for him—until they realized he was laughing.

  “Not determine,” he said, clapping Edmund on the back. “Choose. Someone chose to bring us here. You are correct, Edmund. I don’t even have to see your maps to know that.”

  Rose sat on a boulder, her shoulders slumping forward in misery as she realized what the others all meant. The Sphinx had done precisely as she had asked—she had taken them home. But to her home, her
time and place—not theirs.

  “Can’t we simply go through it again?” the young mapmaker asked, his face eager with hope.

  “Even if we could reuse the Sphinx,” said Rose, “I don’t know what else we’d use to barter with her for passage. We’d also be risking ending up stranded in the future again. And anyway,” she added, looking around at the dunes, “she’s gone.”

  “Look at it this way,” Edmund said, “at least we’re not still in that awful might-have-been future. We’re much closer to home here.”

  “Indeed!” said Charles. “Instead of being stuck a million years from home, we may only be trapped a few thousand years from home. Luck is definitely with us.”

  “Have you ever noticed,” Edmund said to Rose, “that these Caretakers’ view of reality differs widely from pretty much everyone else’s?”

  “All the time,” said Rose.

  Edmund made a few calculations on one of his chronal maps and confirmed that they were approximately somewhere around the era of 2500 BC.

  “If we’re at that point in the past,” Rose asked, “wouldn’t the keep itself still exist? Could we use that to either go home, or maybe even go farther back to find the Architect?”

  “You spent more time there than any of us, Bert,” Charles said, thinking. “Would that work?”

  “It doesn’t have a basement, if that’s what you’re asking,” Bert retorted. “When the Dragons created the doors, it was already standing. I don’t know that there’s any way to use it to go back to a point before its own making. And besides, it burned from the ground up—meaning the passages to the oldest times were lost first. So it may not actually be here at all anymore.”

  “Great,” Charles groaned. “I not only botched up the future, but I’ve retroactively messed up the past.”

  “I want to go home too,” said Bert, “but if we returned now, we’d simply have to come back this way again anyway. Or,” he added with a bit of a catch in his voice, “someone would, at any rate.”