Starsong

by Annabelle Jay

  The human shrugged. “We will take you to his house, but we’ll not follow you. No one has left that place unscathed in many, many years.”

  MERLIN’S NEW “home” turned out to be a large cave beneath the house where he had lived with Lup until Lup’s death. Walking through the simple home where they had spent their lives was strange, because the house was more museum than abandoned structure. Everything was as it had been before Lup’s passing, including his cup of coffee, still steaming, on the dining room table.

  “Magic,” the chosen guard explained when he caught me staring. “But be sure not to touch anything—he’ll know immediately, and you might not live to tell the tale of your first meeting with the great Merlin.”

  Pictures of the men when they were young lined the hallway to the bedroom. In the hallway bathroom, two sets of toothbrushes, toothpaste, and soap sat exactly where they had last been put down, as though the men had just left the house for a party or a Council meeting. The last room, the bedroom, was the only part of the house in disarray.

  The pillows and sheets had been thrown to the floor, and where the bed had been now lived a hole at least ten feet wide. That hole led down into the ground, so deep that I could not see the bottom.

  “That’s where Merlin lives?”

  “Yes, and where he seems to plan to remain until his next death.”

  The man backed away slowly from where I stood near the hole.

  “I must go now. I’m sorry, Princess…. I hope you find what you’re looking for down there.”

  With that, he disappeared, leaving me alone with the empty house and the hole where the greatest sorcerer of all time had buried himself alive.

  Nothing left to do but drop, I thought, and stepped over the side. Ten feet of tunnel rushed by me, and then I hit the soft ground below and rolled off the impact. No light guided my way, so I felt for the walls and found the only direction forward with just my hands. Like most half dragons, even as a human, my other senses were stronger, and I could hear a slight breathing noise drifting down the passageway. I followed the noise until the tunnel fed into an opening, where I found Merlin, or the large blue dragon who was Merlin, waiting for me. At least that cleared up the question of whether he was a bone dragon or not. Besides him, the lair was completely empty save for a magical book cast aside in the corner.

  Compared to the size of a Dramanian bone dragon, Merlin was humongous—almost twice the skeletal size, plus the flesh and scales that we did not retain when transforming. His claws were caked in mud and sand from the floor, and the same substance sealed the space between his scales like caulk. His face was turned right toward me, and when I stepped into his room, his eyes opened.

  Hello, Princess Nimue.

  “Do you know me, Merlin?”

  He nodded his dragon head toward the dirty book.

  The Eternal Book tells me about you from time to time. Until this moment, I did not know why. But here you are, a little girl who’s come all the way from Draman to ask something of me. Merlin shuffled his large form around so that he no longer faced me. Why can’t everyone just leave me alone?

  “I’m sorry about Lup,” I said, and he stopped shuffling. “I know how hard that must have been for you.”

  Oh, do you? Even his telepathy dripped with dislike. And how could a young princess know what it’s like to lose a partner when she’s never even been in love?

  He had me there.

  “How do you know that I’ve never been in love?”

  I told you: the book.

  “Well, the book seems so determined to show you my life; did it happen to include the part where robots came from your home planet and captured my father, by any chance? Was the destruction of Draman in Chapter Four, next to what I eat for breakfast and my body weight?”

  I had his attention now. Though he remained turned away from me, his spine stiffened and his ears perked up. Apparently it had been a while since he’d peeked into that magic book of his, and a lot had happened in the meantime.

  “Listen, I don’t care if you spend every day until your death down here sulking and waiting for reincarnation. That’s your right. But these robots have chased your people all the way across space, and they’re not going to stop at Draman; they’re coming for you. Help us defeat them, for your own sake, if not for ours.”

  And if I refuse?

  “You won’t,” I said, feigning confidence.

  Merlin let out a very human sigh.

  Very well. But only because Lup wanted revenge on those robots until the day he died, and because they killed many people I loved, including my mother. For them, I will help you.

  Is Merlin unstable? I wondered as he began his transformation, something he had probably not done in years. I’ve met more resistance from dressmakers who didn’t want to bring a hem up.

  Not unstable, it turned out, just old and too tired to argue. Merlin’s bones creaked and cracked into place, and in the meantime I found a dirty robe near the hall to cover those pale, wrinkled limbs—apparently not all half humans could take their clothes with them when they changed. His hair grew into a white beard and down his back like a cape, while his claws became dirty feet.

  After his change was complete, Merlin waved and the book flew into his robe pocket. He muttered something, and a walking stick appeared in his hand. On the very top of the stick was a wolf figure, howling at the moon with its eyes closed in joy or pain or loneliness.

  Chapter FIFTEEN

  SARA LEE

  DESTINY.

  As I watched the stars and planets between our ship and Balu flash by, I could not get that word out of my mind. Did I even believe in such an abstract concept, especially after what I had seen in my short life? Stories of the chasm between Earth’s factions, people destroyed by the robots the humans had created, Draman attacked and many of our people probably dead, Nimue… no, I couldn’t let myself think of her, or I would never complete the Mother’s mission.

  Soon Balu appeared out my window, interrupting my musings, and then we shot toward the ground in a freefall that made me grip my armrests in fear. Just when I thought we would crash, creating a spaceship-sized crater, Dawn pulled up and piloted us parallel to the ground.

  Below us land more bountiful than Draman’s farmers could ever dream of stretched in all directions, cultivated by the legendary Igreefee people’s natural powers. In the distance were sparkling blue towers, and beyond that, the towns in their suburban splendor. Nimue had told me stories about their Mansion on Earth, a huge house where the Council and all of its workers lived, which had apparently been replaced by a similar set of blue towers on Balu.

  “Is that a robot ship?” Bando asked as he pointed to a metallic thing parked on the border of the Council’s lands.

  “We’re too late,” Dawn said, dismayed. “They’ve already taken Balu too. And we don’t have enough fuel to do anything but land and wait for our executions.”

  I saw the robot ship with my own eyes, and yet I felt no fear. Instead, I felt a different presence, one familiar and yet impossible on this strange planet.

  “I can’t explain how I know this, but it’s not the robots,” I said, interrupting Bando and Dawn’s debate whether they should try to hide the ship in the distant mountains or just fight to the death right away. “It’s Nimue.”

  “Who?” Bando asked. Next to me, Skelly allowed themselves a half smile.

  “Our princess.”

  “And you know that robot ship was taken over by a Dramanian princess and flown all the way here because…?”

  “I told you, I can’t explain it.” After my run-in with the Mother, my sense of Nimue’s location seemed to have sharpened immensely. No longer were her whereabouts a hunch; I could actually see her emerging from a hole in a bedroom behind an old man with a walking stick topped with the image of a wolf. “Just trust me.”

  Bando looked at Dawn, who shrugged. “We have to land anyway,” she said. “What difference does it make if we follow dragon
girl’s intuition?”

  Using the clues in the mental picture of Nimue, I guided us beyond the robot spaceship to a nondescript house in the human side of the landscape. Dawn found a field nearby that was large enough for the ship, then released the ramp so we could exit.

  From only a hundred feet away, Nimue appeared, trailed by her new friend. When the princess saw our ship, she stopped and, after trying several times to speak, stared at me in silence.

  “Do you know these people?” the old man asked Nimue. “Or should I turn them into a delicious snack for a hungry dragon?”

  Instead of speaking, Nimue ran toward me and embraced me in a hug. As soon as her body touched mine, something strange happened: instead of seeing the world behind her head, I saw the world behind mine. I saw Dawn and Bando’s ship, and Skelly, and the Council’s new Mansion buildings in the distance.

  “Whoa,” Nimue said as she let go of me. “What just happened?”

  “I have no idea. I thought you did that. It was like I was seeing the world through your eyes instead of—”

  A chuckle from the old man stopped my speech. First he laughed softly, and then louder, so loud that his voice echoed through the empty streets.

  “Did you do that, Merlin?” Nimue asked.

  “Merlin?” I stared at the old man. “This old lunatic is the famous Merlin?”

  But Merlin was too busy reveling in his hysterical laughter to respond.

  “Merlin!” Nimue said sharply, and the sorcerer stopped in the middle of his merriment.

  “I’m sorry, it’s just so funny.” Merlin wiped at his teary eyes with his robe’s sleeve. “In our world, that only happens when you touch the person that you love. And not in the close bond of friendship or maidship or whatever you two lovers have been doing in your free time. This is the real deal.”

  “But we can’t be in love,” Nimue reasoned. “We’re both girls.” She rolled her eyes in my direction, silently asking me to get in on the joke, but I couldn’t move.

  Of course I’m in love with Nimue, I realized. I had loved her since the day I first met her, and every day since. She was a huge part of why I regretted choosing the red robe, and why sometimes, late at night when no one stirred in the halls, I had snuck into the robe room to wear a black robe, even if the change was just temporary. I didn’t want a different color robe; I wanted her.

  “It’s ridiculous. Right, Sara Lee?”

  I looked down at my shoes and moved dirt from one side of my foot to the other.

  “You’re in love with me?” she asked incredulously. Then her face transitioned from surprise to another emotion, and it wasn’t happiness. “How can you do this to me? I trusted you, and you turned around and developed a forbidden crush on me instead? I thought we were friends.”

  “We are friends!” I protested, but Nimue didn’t seem to want to hear my defense. Instead, she stormed back across the grass into town, leaving behind Merlin and my very surprised shipmates.

  “This is what happens when you fall in love with a princess,” I joked, but inside I felt something tighten. Like usual, the only person Nimue cared about was herself.

  “Don’t worry, she’ll come around,” Merlin said, comforting me with an absent pat on the arm. “These things take time, especially when you’re the princess of an entire planet and its very stubborn populace. Trust me, she’ll be running back here before you know it.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked, seeking more assurance.

  “Oh, I’m very sure. There’s a robot ship entering our atmosphere as we speak, and she’s not going to fight them all alone.”

  Because he said these words in such a nonchalant tone, they took a minute to sink in.

  “Did you just say robot ship?” Bando asked.

  “Indeed. We need to go gather everyone in the Council’s new Mansion; it’s the most heavily protected place on the planet, with new spells invented by our oldest wizards to stand as obstacles against the robots.”

  We sprang into action.

  “Skelly, you get the Igreefee,” Dawn ordered. “Sara Lee will get the remaining Dramanians off the ship if they haven’t already settled in, and Bando and I will get the humans. Merlin, you’re in charge of the wizards and any other magical creatures I might have forgotten.”

  “Well said,” Merlin mused, then snapped his fingers and disappeared into thin air.

  “And Nimue?” I asked, earning me one of Dawn’s vicious glares.

  “There’s no time to chase down a petulant princess. When the robots start shooting, she’ll find her way back.”

  I protested, but Dawn, deaf to my pleas, took my arm and pulled me along the path toward the ship. Apparently, if Nimue needed finding, it would have to be after the Dramanians were safely hidden.

  For now, she was on her own—just like she wanted.

  Chapter SIXTEEN

  NIMUE

  I RAN through town until, exhausted and out of breath, I collapsed on someone’s porch bench. Luckily they weren’t home; I wasn’t in the mood for a confrontation. In front of me, their plants were in bloom, beautiful red and pink flowers unlike anything I had ever seen on Draman. The color reminded me of a woman’s robe, which made me suddenly want to pluck the petals from the stems in frustration.

  How could Sara Lee do this to me? I gripped the armrest of the bench and squeezed my toes into the tops of my shoes so hard that they cramped. The need to destroy something, anything, was more dragon than human. If I didn’t watch myself, I would accidentally transform.

  My thoughts raced, and though in the distance I heard frantic calls, I ignored them.

  What did Sara Lee expect me to say to news like this? I was the Princess of Draman, for goodness’ sake. What about royal duty? Did she expect me to just give up my throne so that I could live happily ever after in a maid’s hovel while the entire village mocked us? I could barely make it through a royal dinner without escaping to my bedroom, let alone an entire life of ridicule.

  …Or if she didn’t expect me to say anything, did that make things even worse? Did it mean she knew I cared more about my crown than the people I loved?

  Did I love her?

  I thought back to the innocent days when we’d chased each other around the castle, but for some reason, they didn’t seem so innocent now. We’d been too old for such games, and yet Sara Lee had picked me up and spun me around or tossed me onto the bed in a wrestling match well into my late teens. Those times had been thrilling, my only taste of true adventure and freedom inside the castle walls; yet maybe I’d misread the rush of adrenaline coursing through me whenever we touched. Maybe—

  “Faster! They’re right behind us.”

  The calls near me got louder, and then a sea of humans passed me on the main road. At their helm was the child Sara Lee and the others called Skelly, the one who had gotten me into this mess in the first place. Their followers looked distraught, and each carried a bag of belongings on his or her shoulder. Their parents were among them, though even in this dreadful hour, they did not run near Skelly.

  “What’s going on?” I asked one of the humans near the back.

  “Robots,” he said as he looked up at the sky fearfully. “They’re coming for us after all of this time. We’re heading to the Council, where hopefully the wizards and that crazy old man will protect us.”

  All of my anger evaporated as he spoke. Instead of being furious with Sara Lee, I was instantly worried about her. Was she safe with Merlin, or, like the child, was she shepherding a group across Balu to the Council’s Mansion? What if she didn’t make it in time?

  Quickening my pace, I reached the front of the group.

  “You there,” I called out, and the child turned while continuing to lead the group forward.

  “Yes, Princess?” Skelly asked timidly.

  “Do you know where Sara Lee is?”

  “Last I saw her, she was headed to get our people from the ship.”

  Without even thanking them, I turned in the opposit
e direction and began to run.

  BY THE time I reached the Dramanian ship, Sara Lee had apparently managed to wake all the Dramanians and gather them in a group outside the ship, but she had not moved them anywhere. As dragons our race was fierce, but in our human forms, we were slow-moving and cautious.

  “Everyone in dragon form now!” I called as soon as I was within hearing distance. “If you don’t get to the Mansion before the robots get here, you’re going to die on this foreign planet and never get a chance to find out what happened to your loved ones on Draman.”

  “You heard the princess,” Sara Lee echoed. “Transform now!”

  As one, all of the bodies began to grow and mutate. Sara Lee and I did the same, and when we pushed off the ground and began the flight to the Council, an entire flock followed us. Dramanians did not typically fly in large groups, or even small ones for that matter; dragons were often solitary creatures. But at that moment, the press of so many wings behind me offered me the feeling of hope I had lost when I left my father behind. Maybe, just maybe, we could win this battle.

  Then, just as we landed on Council grounds, the robot fleet flew into Balu’s atmosphere. As one unit, they blocked out the light from the sun and cast a shadow over all of the land.

  Take cover! I ordered, and the dragons scattered. Some transformed back into humans and ran for the Council’s doors; others flew up along the building’s exterior, then landed on the very top of the building and entered through the balconies there.

  We need to find Merlin, Sara Lee said when we were alone. He’ll know what to do.

  But before we could move from the Mansion lawn, the robots flew closer and fired their first shot. A single beam of blue light blazed from one of their laser guns, connecting with the protection spells of the Mansion in a fireworks display. The spell held this time, but in the place where the laser had hit, the power of the wizards’ magic seemed thinner.