The Summer Dragon

by Todd Lockwood

  Why wasn’t I on my cot in the winter stable? Where was Keirr? I froze halfway to sitting up, my skull thudding as if a boulder rattled within it. I swung my legs over the side of the bed with a groan.

  “There you are,” said Father, from a chair in the corner. He put down a book.

  Suddenly I remembered why I was here, and my pain sharpened. “Was there a memorial?”

  “Yes. His wingmates wanted to inter him together with his mount on the side of Zurvaan, where they fell, but Rov wouldn’t allow it. ‘Too many man hours,’ he said. So he was buried in a place of honor on the Temple grounds. They left his dragon on the mountain, though. A sad waste, that.” Father’s eyes were red and weary, the corners of his mouth crooked. “His name was Daarm, and his dragon was Timsah.”

  “Where’s Keirr?”

  In answer, her head poked through the open window. “Hey, Maia. Up.”

  “She wouldn’t let us close the window. Or the blinds, or the shutters.” Father’s grin made his eyes less harrowed.

  “No wonder it’s so cold in here,” I said with a smile. I swung my feet to the floor carefully, then stood to cup Keirr’s chin and let her nuzzle my face. “Hey, baby.” Her tongue was too wet and too hot, but I didn’t have the energy to push her away. “Oh Gods, I hurt.”

  “You’re grounded, you know.”

  I turned too fast and winced. “You’re not going to let Rov keep us off the mountain, are you?”

  “As a matter of fact, I am. I bear responsibility for what happened, too. I should have been there. I should have taken you to those high crags myself, though I didn’t know you were ready. I should have known you were ready. I should have considered that we don’t have the caves secured yet, and we don’t know what we face.”

  “I—”

  “But that’s not why you’re grounded. Bellua grounded you because you injured your head in one of your blackouts, and he grounded Keirr because of the gash in her side. He treated that without need of graving, by the way, and closed the hole in her wing.”

  Keirr nudged my head affectionately. “I knew that monster snagged her. Poor baby. I suppose I owe Bellua thanks.”

  “The way I heard it, he owes you thanks. As soon as you’re fit again, I’m going to do a better job of teaching you how to control your bloodflow. If it’s any comfort, I’m grounded too, while Shuja recovers from his wounds.”

  “What wounds?”

  “Burns on his paws and in his mouth, like what you described before, how the Horrors burn with cold. He tore the thing apart, but he paid a price.”

  I sat on the bed again, holding one hand up where Keirr could reach it with her tongue. “I remember you putting ice on my head, trying to keep me awake. How long did I sleep?”

  “Two nights and the day between. You’ll rest today, but tomorrow you go back to training.”

  “I thought I was grounded.”

  “You are, but I’ve had your bow and Darian’s for a couple of weeks now. I should have given them to you sooner.” He gestured toward the corner where a brand-new bow and quiver leaned against the wall. “Another in a long list of things I should have done. Darian’s already returned to training—with Fren. I should also tell you that I’ve had every fletcher within a day’s flight making arrows for me. There’s a cache in the manor, the winter stable, and the ice vault. I’ll show you once you’re up and about.”

  I felt no elation at the gift. I was grateful, yes. Relieved more than that. But not elated. It was a beautiful compound bow with cams and pulleys that increased its range and power—a proper adult weapon like Father’s or Tauman’s. But I knew why he gave it to me with such grim practicality. Before yesterday, he’d allowed Darian and me time to grow with our mounts, but now he felt guilt over the delay and wondered if Darian’s bow or mine could have saved a pair of lives.

  We trained with a desperate sort of resolve. What remained of the forest behind the manor yard served as the backdrop for our hay bale targets. We shot from the bridge, in full sight of Bellua and Addai and all the gathered soldiers. Except for Fren’s commands, our workouts were hushed. We didn’t speak of Asha or religion, dragons, or lumber, or even the weather. The silence between Fren and me hurt, but I didn’t want any more riddles or sparring over how little he had to say. I only wanted to learn this, and well.

  “Don’t aim,” Fren would say. “Feel the arrow. Feel the target. Feel the truth of their connection. Allow the arrow to inform you of its intent.”

  It sounded crazy, but I considered my connection to Keirr, which wasn’t something I thought my way into. It came from the center of me, or even from outside of me. Father sometimes called Shuja his “other self.” I understood that now. It wasn’t the same, but it was similar. An arrow wasn’t a conscious thing, but it had intent, nonetheless, and habit and range and deadly purpose.

  “That’s good, Maia,” Fren told me. “You have the right mind. You are relaxed but strong. You learn quickly.” Darian kept up as best he could, but I was simply better at this. It bugged him, but I didn’t care. It had nothing to do with him. I would never be caught without a weapon again.

  One day, my eye seemed flawless. My first arrow hit the center of the target. Then the second. Then the third. Then the fourth and fifth in a tight cluster. I knew each arrow and saw its path as if it were a silver cord. The sixth and seventh and eighth. The ninth. From somewhere on the barricades behind me came a low whistle of appreciation. Fren observed and said, very quietly, where only I could hear it, “You’re touching Asha now, Maia. Remember this mind.”

  While Keirr’s wound healed and I recovered, I listened carefully whenever the dragons talked. It kept me from listening for the voice of the Edimmu.

  I listened especially for the repeating patterns, like echoes added to a sound. There were a lot of those. But then there were the other noises, the whistles and chirps and barks. What did they mean? One step at a time, I told myself. First find one word. A single word.

  At feeding time, I took Keirr into the storehouse, where we could be alone together. Before we ate, I sat her down and waited until I had her attention. I tried clicking or purring or rumbling to the best of my ability. Nothing seemed to prick her attention. Then one day I tried imitating Darian’s whoop of joy the way she had, almost a season ago, “WHOOHOO, woohoo, woohoo, woohoo . . .”

  She looked at me. Cocked her head sideways and lashed her tail in amusement. “No,” she said.

  Then she repeated the sound as perfectly as before, multiple echoes perfectly rendered: “WHOOOHOOO hooHOOoo hooHOOoo hooHOOoo . . .”

  I closed my eyes and trembled when I felt the cliffs to either side of me. “How do you do that?” I said. “You amazing creature.” I tried the imitation again.

  “No,” she said. Then, “CLICK clCLickCK clCLick ck.” She cocked her head the other way.

  I shook my head. “I couldn’t do that in a million years.”

  Keirr stared at me for several long moments. [Rumble] she said, her voice lowered. “C’n you sssay?” Then she reared up, wings spread wide, “CLICK. click. click. click.”

  She’d asked me to repeat a phrase. Before I could move beyond my astonishment, she dropped to her belly and tucked her wings close, forelegs stretched out in front where she could set her chin on her wrists. “TICtictictictic.”

  I was so bewildered I could only shake my head.

  She sat up straight again, faced directly toward me with an eyebrow lifted. When did she acquire that mannerism? Did I do that?

  I tried again. “CLICK. click. click. click.” My weak tongue-clicks would never match the sharp noises she made deep in her throat.

  “No, no.” She shook her head. “CLICK. click. click. click.”

  “Isn’t that what I said?”

  She straightened her head. Her tail stopped lashing. She shuffled her front feet impatiently. “No.”
>
  Now I was frustrated. “I don’t understand.”

  She repeated the whole pantomime—raised up again and spread her wings wide. “CLICK. click. click. click.” Big CLICK, followed by diminishing clicks, like echoes. I got that. Then she hunkered down, wings drawn in, head on her paws, making herself small, and said, “TICtictictictic.” Then she sat up and looked at me, head tilted to one side.

  Oh, my. I understood. I rolled the storehouse door open, faced outdoors, spread my arms wide, and shouted “CLICK!” I heard my echoes: first those that rang sharply off the nearby buildings, then distant answers from the cliffs. Men on the rooftops turned to stare. “CLICK. click. click. click,” I said to her. “Big space, right?” Then I closed the door again, pointed around the storehouse, and drew my arms in close. “TICtictictictic. Small space. Right? Big and small spaces!”

  She tilted her head the other way. “B—bing.”

  “BIG,” I said, arms spread wide. “And small,” with my hands close together.

  “B-Guh,” she said, testing out this new word. “Smaw. Bi-g, smaw. Yes.”

  But the sounds she’d made, the ones that seemed so real, were like the big sounds and the little sounds overlapped. Layers of meaning, in a series of sounds. “You mix them, big clicks and little tics, to make—not a word, but a sound that other dragons perceive as a picture.”

  She cocked her head at me again. Picture was a whole new concept that might take endless explanation, but I knew this was it. It made sense. I looked at her in wonder. There were no words to be learned, only pictures to be sent and received. As if I could speak a painting. If there was a language within, it was probably beyond human comprehension.

  She lashed her tail and nodded. Then, at less than a year in age, she demonstrated that she understood my language better than I would ever understand hers.

  “Fish now, Maia,” she demanded.

  FORTY-ONE

  LIGHTNING CRACKLED in the sky outside when the first clutch was delivered. Rain hammered the roof of the winter stables. A year ago, our three dams together produced twenty-four eggs, our biggest number ever. Father had told me that a big clutch was a sign of troubled times ahead.

  I was anxious to know the count. I didn’t want it to grow.

  Athys dropped eight mottled gray eggs in the fresh wood chips of her birthing nest, one more than last year. Father, Tauman, Jhem, Darian, and I took turns as they were delivered. Each was wiped dry and inspected for damage, then weighed and checked for signs that the qit inside was well. We wrote the parents’ initials and the delivery-order number on it with a grease pencil. We entered the weight and number into a ledger. Then we wheeled the leathery jewel to the broodhouse where Rannu waited to provide warmth in a bed of fresh, dry straw. Athys joined him when she’d delivered the last egg. She was soon asleep, purring deeply like a gargantuan cat with Rannu watchful at her side, their new clutch between them.

  We waited for the next mother to go into labor as the rain continued to pour down. At one point, Darian and Aru came in from stretching their legs. He sidled up to me. “Cairek wants to talk to you about something,” he said quietly.

  “What? What’d he say?”

  “That he has something he wants to talk to you about.”

  “What?”

  “How should I know? Talk to him. Find out. Something he wants to ask you.”

  “Oh, no.” It sounded ominous. Two thoughts entered my head at the same time: He wants me, and No, please. I recalled his fantasy about a life in an aerie, and the warm feeling it had given me. The dragon he’d carved for me lived on my nightstand. I’d stared at it more than one sleepless night, wondering if it was wrong to consider a husband so soon. I barely knew him. I barely knew myself. I didn’t want to hear this. My world was complicated enough. I shook my head to dislodge the thoughts. “When? Now?”

  Darian shrugged. “Whenever.”

  He left me standing there, red and tingling with an infuriating blend of embarrassment, longing, and fear. It would have to wait. Coluver’s labor pushed all other issues aside. The sun went down and the thunderstorm receded to a hard, steady drizzle before she finished. Ten perfect eggs would await her with Audax in the broodhouse, exceeding last year’s count by two.

  That left only Grus. She was larger than Athys or Coluver, and always delivered last. Father and Tauman took turns pacing the stable floor. Darian slept on his cot, but I was wide awake. I had seen it all before, of course, but Aru and Keirr would be ready to breed in another year, so I was especially interested. I sat, my arms on the back of a chair turned backward, and watched as Jhem weighed the last of Coluver’s eggs.

  Calm settled into me, crowding aside my disquiet, if only for the moment. Grus rumbled softly. Father hummed to himself. Tauman paused to embrace Jhem from behind, and she turned her head to receive a kiss on the cheek. He’d been more patient and loving lately.

  This was where I wanted to be, right here, in the aeries, bringing little qits into the world. These broodlings would be Aru’s brothers and sisters, and Keirr’s by extension. A smile touched my lips for the first time in days. I wanted to hold to that fantasy as hard as I could and not think about other things.

  Tired but smiling, Jhem turned a chair backward next to mine and rested her head on her arms to look at me. “You know, I think this might be my favorite time—when the eggs are newly laid, and the aeries are filled with this quiet expectation. I like all of it, but the quiet times suit me best.”

  Even though her ruddy hair was bedraggled and tangled, and weary circles darkened her eyes, she glowed. Relaxed. One of those moments when she felt more like a sister to me than anything. That had been part of the fantasy, too, the idyllic picture of my life breeding dragons. Hold that fantasy, I thought. It was almost within grasp.

  Her smile faded. “What’s the matter?” she asked.

  I didn’t think it showed. Bellua. Addai. Horrors. Edimmu. Staelan’s Barrage, leering soldiers everywhere. Being grounded. Where to start? I nodded at the eggs. “Look at them, Jhem. They don’t know anything about the world they’ve entered. How many will have good lives? Most will die on a battlefield somewhere. Doesn’t that make you sad?”

  A strand of hair fell across her face. “Sometimes. Yes. But everyone serves the Empire in their way, don’t they?”

  “At least people get to choose.”

  “Do they?”

  I looked at the cart where Coluver’s last three eggs stayed warm beneath a blanket. “I suppose not. Not very often. But dragons? Never.”

  “We’re lucky,” she said. “Even with the Horrors, the Edimmu, the killing machines on the roofs of the aeries, we get to do this.” She brushed hair back from my face. “You should take advantage of the time. Work on your dragon language some more.” She smiled.

  “It’s real,” I said. “You only have to listen for it. You’ll start to hear it, too.”

  “I have been listening for it. I think you may be on to something.” She jumped up and gave me a peck on the forehead. “I have to go. One more delivery. Keep working on it. You’ll need to teach me one day.” She winked, then wheeled the cart with Coluver’s eggs out the door.

  Bellua strode in and closed the door after her. My belly squirmed. I hadn’t seen him since the day on the mountain. What was he doing here?

  He turned to us. “If you can believe it, I have seen this part of the process only twice. I’d love to observe if I might.”

  Father eyed him briefly. “Stay out of the way.” Then he continued pacing.

  Tauman and I sat. Darian slept. Jhem returned after a stop at the manor for more blankets, hot water, and towels so warm they steamed. She eyed Bellua and made herself busy with her back to him.

  Eventually, he approached me. “Maia,” he said, with a brief bow. “I owe you thanks for your aid on the mountain. For my sweet Zell and myself, my deepest gratitude. She is
my oldest and dearest friend. I don’t know what I would have . . .” He struggled to find words.

  I shrugged. “I did what I had to do.”

  “Oh, more than that. More than that.” He let go a deep breath. “I’m not good at this sort of talk, I confess. I speak too passionately sometimes, and I know that my emotions get the better of me. But I’m not an evil man, Maia. The underlying point is this: I’m aware you could have let the monster have us. But you didn’t.”

  I was tired. I ached. I should have been in bed. I didn’t want to have this conversation. But I nodded.

  Our eyes met, but he averted his gaze with a hint of embarrassment. “It might surprise you to know how much we have in common. My father was a quartermaster with the Dragonry during the subjugation of Tammuz. He was a hard man, like your father is. Long on responsibilities but short on compassion, with more expectations than time.”

  I didn’t want to listen to this. He had my father wrong, for one thing.

  His frown deepened. “Maia, like you I lost my mother when I was young.”

  I bit my lip to keep from speaking out.

  “Tammuzi fighters stormed our village, butchered many of my neighbors before my eyes. My mother, sister, and I hid outside the warehouse as they ransacked our offices, but before they spotted us my mother took up an axe and went after them.” He paused and looked at me. “I watched the Tammuzi slash her repeatedly as she struggled first to stand, then to remain upright on her knees.” He swallowed. “I looked away before they took her head.”

  He stood motionless for a minute with his mouth turned down, staring at his fist wrapped around the back of a chair. I didn’t want to know any more, didn’t want one shred of sympathy to dilute my anger at him. “Why are you telling me this?”

  He looked at me sideways, his brows tightly furrowed, his expression haunted. “I know you want me to leave. But we have to make the best of the situation. And so I want you to understand me.”