Crown of Renewal

by Elizabeth Moon

  “Evil enemies” had a familiar sound, a sound that belonged in tales. “If I have words,” he said, “then … I can think.”

  The dragon made a strange noise, almost like a kettle hissing. He remembered hearing a kettle hissing. “Words alone do not make thought,” the dragon said. “Good thought makes good words.” Again that cock of the head and a flicker of red tongue. “Tell me, Prince … are you wise?”

  Almost, the question made no sense. Wise … slowly his mind retrieved the concept. He stared at the scars on his bare legs. “Was it wise to fight one against many?” he asked.

  “It depends,” the dragon said, “for what reason you fought.”

  “I do not remember.”

  “You were trying to save a treasure from being stolen when everyone else was enchanted and could not respond. And you were afraid your brother might be hurt.”

  “My brother—” He scowled, struggling to remember. “I have a brother? Where is he?”

  The dragon sighed. “He is far from here; the people there had no way to save your life. So he let me take you away, since I have skills in healing they do not.”

  “I should go—?”

  “No. Not as you are. Let us see what wisdom comes to you, Camwyn. Consider a king—your brother—who loves you well and has seen you sinking near to death. He is offered a chance to save your life—and possibly but not certainly your mind—at the cost of sending you away with a stranger and very likely never seeing you again. Was that wise?”

  Camwyn looked a long moment at that dark face and then down at his own hands. “If I loved a brother … if it was his death … but it would be hard.”

  “It was hard. But was it wise?”

  “It was love,” Camwyn said. His eyes watered; he did not try to brush the tears away. “I don’t know about wise.”

  “A good answer. Now, imagine that king again: his brother is away, he hopes finding healing. His kingdom is in peril, and to save his people he must not sit worrying about his absent brother but act—act quickly—to save them.”

  “Yes …” Camwyn looked at the dragon again. “Is that what is happening?”

  “I am here, not there,” the dragon said. “But he expected trouble to come. Let me go on. That king, say, in that time—when perhaps trouble has come or perhaps is only nearing—what will it mean to him if his brother comes back, still weak, still with no memory? What will it mean to the kingdom?”

  “He will be happy,” Camwyn said. “But … he will want to be with his brother and think only of his brother.” He scowled, thinking hard. “And … a king … he should think of his kingdom.” In his mind, a vague shape appeared … a crown, he finally realized. “My brother … you said he is a king. And loves me. But … I cannot see his face. I cannot … I do not know … his name.”

  “No,” the dragon said. The dragon’s voice was soft.

  “He would worry about that,” Camwyn said. “About me. And if there is danger … he might not be fast enough. He might … he might die. And the people.” He scuffed his feet—bare, pale—and looked down his thin scarred legs at them. “It would be … wise … not to go. Until I remember.” He looked back at the dragon. “Will I remember?”

  “I do not know, Prince Camwyn Dragonfriend,” the dragon said. “But I know you just said a wise thing. And you still have a good heart. And you will be a fine king.”

  “I don’t want my brother to die!” Camwyn said. “I can’t be king until—and I don’t want him to die!”

  “That throne is not the only one in the world,” the dragon said. “I know a throne that needs a wise prince—yes, even a prince who cannot remember all his former life. No one need die for you to sit on it.”

  Camwyn scowled. “Wasn’t there a king before?”

  “Yes. An unlucky and not well-loved king and a Chancellor who broke faith with his oath.” The dragon tilted its head. “You are young, but you are not a liar nor a fool.”

  “I hope not,” Camwyn said. He touched the heart-side of his head. Under his hair, he felt a ridge.

  “You have a scar there,” the dragon said. “From a wound you took and the treatment that healed it. It is why your memory is gone, and it is why your healing took so long.”

  “How long?”

  “A full season,” the dragon said. “But now, it is time for you to strengthen your body more than you could do walking the bounds of this cave. We must go elsewhere.”

  He wanted to ask where, but astonishment took him instead as the dragon stepped out into the air and changed before his eyes, then uncoiled a long red tongue back into the cave. “Stand on it,” said the voice in his mind. “You have ridden this way before.”

  Camwyn did so, and the tongue drew him in.

  “Sit down and face the outer world,” the voice said.

  He had a vague memory of some previous ride, when he stood up with … with someone else beside him … but he sat down on the warm dry tongue, solid as a plank, and gazed out. The cave entrance shrank—was distant—he could see the entire mountain and the small dark mouth of the cave, and then the dragon turned, and he was looking along the side of a mountain range larger than he had ever imagined.

  “Is this the Dwarfmounts?” he asked.

  “No. They are sunrising of here. We go north.”

  North. He was unsure of that word and its meaning, but as the dragon flew along the line of mountains, he breathed in the crisp air that came into the dragon’s mouth. To his heart-hand, the land fell away into the pale tones he had first seen from the cave—another, smaller, line of mountains rose from beside a salt-white plain, and in the distance yet another. Rows of mountains, with nothing green between them. A streak of white fire moved across his vision.

  “What was that?”

  “A young dragon,” the dragon said. “They are all fire and no wisdom.”

  Another streak, another—and this one came nearer.

  “Will it hurt you?”

  The tongue beneath him trembled; the dragon sounded amused as he said, “No. I am elder.”

  From the safety of the dragon’s mouth, he watched as the fiery being came nearer yet; he could just see the outline of what might be bones within it as it matched speed with the dragon for a short time; then the dragon pulled ahead.

  Camwyn did not mean to sleep, but he fell asleep on the dragon’s tongue, and when he woke, the dragon’s tongue was sliding out of its mouth onto grass. “Rise,” the dragon said.

  He stood a little unsteadily and walked along the tongue until he could step off. The ground was firm under the grass; all around were great rounded hills with outcrops of red rock. Most had clumps of trees here and there. He could just see the jagged tops of mountains beyond one hill. When he looked more carefully, he saw animals … large animals … grazing some distance away. One lifted its head, then another. Several moved toward him.

  He thought he should know what they were … but he couldn’t think of the word until one of the animals whinnied and another broke into a trot. Horses. These were horses.

  When he turned around again, the dragon had transformed once more into a human shape. “Come,” the dragon said, holding out his hand. “There is a place for you.”

  They walked some distance; Camwyn had never been so far from a city and had no idea how far away things were. Around an arm of the nearest hill, the dragon led him along a path beside a creek, into a grove of trees, and finally to a low house built of stone. “Who lives here?” Camwyn asked.

  “At this time, you do,” the dragon said. “You need to regain your strength. Here you have space and time to finish healing.”

  “Alone?”

  “Not … entirely. We will go inside.”

  The small house seemed larger inside than it had looked outside. One large room with a table, a bench, several chairs. On the table, a cluster of dishes, pots, cooking tools … and a stack of papers and books. A fireplace at one end, and beside it a door into another, smaller room. In that room a narrow
bed, and beneath it a pot.

  “Sit here,” the dragon said. Camwyn sat down, glad to be off his aching legs. The dragon sat as well in his guise as man. “You will live here awhile, Camwyn, with no duties but to grow stronger and wiser. You will have food and water, and you will have instruction from those I send. For the first, eat well, drink deep of this water, which is pure and healthful, and walk about daily until your legs bear you without effort. Will you do these things?”

  “Yes,” Camwyn said. He felt dazed and uncertain, but his mind had grasped the use and names of table, bench, chair, bed, dishes, and pots.

  “Good.” The dragon stood, but when Camwyn stirred to rise, he put out a hand. “Wait here. I will return shortly with someone who will help you.”

  The room was cool and dim when the dragon left; Camwyn tried to order his thoughts, but they ran through his mind like … like sheep, he thought finally, with a vision of woolly backs flowing down a slope like water.

  “Well, lad!”

  A different voice. Camwyn jerked, having dozed off without realizing it. Before him stood an old man, one arm crooked, withered, the hand clenched into a nest of sticks, but with bright, unclouded eyes of green. “Sir,” he said out of a dry mouth.

  “You’re my new neighbor,” the man said. “And hungry, I’ll wager.” He turned away and set something on the table with a thump. “I’ve bread, cheese, onions, sausages—enough for a start.” He looked back at Camwyn. “Been injured and sick, I hear. Need feeding up, the dragon said, and so you do. I’m Mathor—not a common name where you’re from, so dragon said. Never mind, it’s the name I came with. A fire, that’s what we need. A hot drink will do you good.”

  Camwyn sat watching as the man bustled about, building a fire, fetching water in a pot, setting it to boil. From a leather pouch, the man took a handful of dried leaves and twigs and dropped them into the water as it heated. Camwyn’s nose remembered the smell as it steeped but not the name.

  “Sib,” Mathor said, as if he knew Camwyn’s confusion. “Sib and a touch of something my gran knew.” He handed Camwyn a mug whose contents steamed.

  Camwyn sipped; the flavor startled his tongue and seemed to clear his mind. “Sir,” he said. “Thank you.”

  “There’s no sirring or lording between us,” Mathor said, but without heat. “You’re Camwyn, I’m told, and I’m Mathor.”

  “Thank you … Mathor,” Camwyn said. The unspoken “sir” sat on the end of his tongue like a bur. He could assign it no meaning but custom.

  “You finish that and I’ll have some food ready for you. Take a stroll outside if you like.”

  He was outside with a mug in his hand before he knew it. Behind him the door closed, but he could hear Mathor humming to himself inside. He looked around. Under the trees, wildflowers sprinkled the ground; the sound of the creek gurgling and splashing soothed his ears. A bench—he did not remember that bench—sat beside the house. He did not sit but moved toward the water, drawn by the sound.

  Stones had been piled to make a low dam; behind it was a pool just larger than a bathing tub. Camwyn walked upstream to the dam and looked at the pool. Where it was not edged by rock, a fringe of mint and flowers surrounded it. As he watched, something wet and glistening threw itself off the dam into the water … his mind groped and came up with frog.

  When Mathor called him back to a room filled with the smells of delicious food, Camwyn sat across the table from the man and ate eagerly. Mathor had opened shutters Camwyn hadn’t noticed before, letting light and air into both rooms. He showed Camwyn where the jacks was.

  “The pool,” Camwyn said. “There’s a dam, and—”

  “Oh, that pool.” Mathor nodded. “Looks the right size for a splash, doesn’t it? But that’s where I get the water. Splash there and you’ll have grit in your teeth when you drink. I’ll show you a place you can splash later—tomorrow maybe—but meantime, you’ll bathe from a tub.” He nodded across the room, and there was a wooden tub hanging from a spike in the wall. Camwyn didn’t remember it from before. “There’s water heating in the fire—” A tall ewer and buckets to fill the tub. Camwyn didn’t remember those, either.

  He slept that night under blankets that had not been on the narrow bed when he first saw it, windows he had not seen either stood open to the night air, which Mathor pronounced healing. “This is a safe place,” he said as he left for his own place, one Camwyn had not seen. “Nothing here will harm you.”

  Next morning Camwyn woke when something tickled his face. He opened his eyes to find a horse’s head hanging over his bed … a long milk-colored forelock and mane, bristly whiskers, a soft muzzle. After the first startled jerk, he lay still, fascinated. Was it a wild horse, like the others, or Mathor’s? It seemed to wink at him, stiff golden lashes coming down across a deep brown eye, then pulled its head back out of the window. Camwyn sat up just as he heard the sound of ripping grass. Out the window were three horses: the cream and gold one that had wakened him, a red chestnut mare, and a foal whose spindly legs were spread wide as it sniffed at something in the grass.

  Camwyn got up, not surprised to find a chest in the room that had not been there before and clothes hanging on pegs. He dressed, took the pot from beneath the bed, and took it out to the jacks, where he emptied it and filled in that section of trench.

  “Well met, Camwyn.” Mathor was coming down the path, carrying a basket. “We have eggs this day. And some greens.”

  After breakfast, Mathor urged Camwyn to take a short walk. “Here’s bread and cheese and a jug of sib. Go where you please for a time. Nothing here will harm you.”

  That set the pattern for the first hands of days. Waking early, usually with a horse face in his window, breakfast with Mathor, then walking—slowly and in brief stretches at first, then longer ones. He ate whatever Mathor prepared with good appetite and slept without dreams he remembered. Mathor gave him the names of local plants, and his own mind restored many words for his thoughts, though try as he might, he could not remember much of his past. Was that face a brother? A father? An uncle? A friend? Was that other room—so different from this—a place he had lived or only visited?

  One morning he made it back down to the main valley, where he found more of the horses grazing at the near end. They all raised heads and looked at him. Several approached, including the one with the milk-white mane. He put out his hand, and a muzzle brushed it; he could not resist stroking that golden neck, that silky white mane. The horse gave a soft sound, welcoming, and he kept stroking. His fingers caught in the mane—and the horse moved away, pulling gently. He walked with it, through the herd, out the other side.

  When the horse dropped to its knees, Camwyn stared. What did that mean? Did it want to roll? He stepped back. The horse snorted. Camwyn had the impulse to climb onto that sloped back … but he had no saddle, no bridle—those names came to him, but so did the memory of riding. He had ridden. If the horse didn’t mind … the horse snorted again, expressing, he was sure, impatience.

  He came forward and gingerly—feeling the stretch in his muscles—clambered onto the horse’s back, clutching a double handful of mane. A lurch that nearly cost him his seat, and another, and the horse stood. He felt dizzy for a moment, then his head cleared. He was riding—or sitting, he corrected himself—on a horse. A tall horse, for the ground seemed impossibly far away. The horse took one step. Camwyn tilted but recovered. Another step; this time Camwyn was able to stay upright. The horse walked off, and Camwyn first struggled to adjust to the back and forth, the sideways sway, and then found it no effort. The horse walked around the herd—all watching, as if to critique his riding—and then stopped again and shook its head.

  Dismounting was harder than he’d thought it would be, but the horse stood patiently as he squirmed his way off, landing off balance and falling. The horse pivoted neatly and leaned down to blow gently in his hair. Camwyn sat up and put a hand behind its head. “Thank you,” he said. He took a handful of mane; the horse lifted its
head, helping him up. When he let go of the mane, the horse walked off. Camwyn stood for a time watching the horses, then trudged back up the hill to his house.

  Every day after that included a ride. Usually it was that horse, but sometimes one of the others. Often he had to walk half the length of the valley to find them, though they usually ended the ride closer to the house. As he grew stronger, the horses quit kneeling for him to mount, at first standing near a rock or stump on which he could climb but then on lower ones, and lower ones, until he was finally mounting from the ground. Their behavior once he mounted changed, too—from a slow walk to a faster one, to a comfortable gait for which he had no name but fast enough to put a breeze in his face, then a trot. He fell from time to time; the horse from which he’d fallen always stopped while he got up and mounted again.

  One day when he returned to the house, he found two others with Mathor. The man was taller than Mathor, with long-fingered, ink-stained hands, and the other was a woman, yellow-haired and gray-eyed, with a merry grin. She had a ring of silver on her brow.

  “Dragon says you’re well enough to start learning wisdom,” Mathor said. “And you won’t learn that from me.” He laughed. “Master Kielson is a scholar and judicar; he’ll help you with this—” Mathor gestured to the pile of papers and books on the table. “And this paladin will help you regain your fighting skills.”

  Camwyn’s memory nudged him. At one time—he thought—he had been able to read and fight. The scars on his legs and what Dragon had told him proved the latter. He nodded to them; Mathor had a meal ready, and they all sat down to eat.

  Reading came back to him quickly—the papers and books taught him about something called “House of the Dragon”—a bard’s tale, he would have thought, tracing the story of that house from “Camwyn Dragonfriend” to a time when the king and his sons all died and left the Dragon Throne empty, in the care of a man who proved a fool.