The Dragonslayer Series: Books 1-4: The Dragonslayer Series Box Set

by Resa Nelson

  Norah pondered Taddeo’s words. Ever since he’d set her free, no one had harmed her. Instead, they’d helped her. “Safe as here?”

  “Yes,” Taddeo said warmly. “Wherever you go, we will always do everything within our power to make sure you are as safe as you are here.”

  Norah reconsidered. She didn’t like leaving her nook, but she remembered her relief and joy on the day Taddeo set her free. She would very much like it if she could help another dragon feel free, too.

  * * *

  Leaving Norah behind in her niche, Taddeo paced through the twisting walkways of the cave, its walls open and airy, made of stone strands interwoven like vines. He caught a faint scent of fish that grew stronger while he wound his way down to the lowest level where shallow pools of water dotted the cave floor. Stripping off his clothes, Taddeo transformed himself into a dragon and slid to the bottom of a pool, resting below the water.

  He never relished lying, especially not to his own kind. Although he could have sent Astrid with Norah, Taddeo planned a better time for their paths to cross again. Norah despised all Scaldings, including Astrid. These things had to be handled delicately.

  After many fruitless attempts, Taddeo had lied to Norah as a last resort. It had become clear that Norah didn’t care whether she lived or died, but she had to make her way to the Dragon’s Well. She was tied to Astrid in the same way that Taddeo was tied to DiStephan, dragon to dragonslayer. While Taddeo had the strength to survive DiStephan’s death, Norah had been weakened by years of imprisonment on Tower Island. If anything happened to Astrid, Norah would die. Likewise, if Norah were to die first, her death would make it impossible for Astrid to survive.

  All promises led to consequences, and these conditions were the consequences of a promise made generations ago.

  And now that Drageen and his alchemist were safely locked inside Dragon’s Head Point, Astrid’s survival became critical. Taddeo imagined the howls of the Scaldings who would soon be chased from Tower Island.

  CHAPTER 16

  Astrid knelt by Sigurthor’s prone body, ignoring the stench of his death while she studied everything surrounding him. Already, his gray skin had paled to a faint blue. She stared in fascination at the indentations her fingertips left behind on his dead flesh.

  “What happened here?” Astrid whispered to the ground surrounding the merchant’s body. “Who killed Sigurthor? And what happened to Starlight?”

  She struggled to tap into the new skills she’d learned as a dragonslayer. In childhood, she’d been Temple’s apprentice in his smithery, learning the language of fire and iron. She’d first mastered the art of starting and maintaining a good flame, paying attention to what the different colors and types of smoke conveyed. She’d witnessed how long it takes for iron to heat before it can be smited or welded, each requiring a different amount of time in the fire. She’d learned the different colors of iron—black and brown, red and orange, yellow and white—and what those colors indicate with regard to how the iron could be shaped and for how long. She’d spent many years working at her trade in the smithery, and the knowledge had come to her slowly but surely.

  But being a dragonslayer meant something entirely different.

  No master had trained Astrid. DiStephan’s ghost helped where he could, but it didn’t compare to serving an apprenticeship. Instead of working along the side of an expert and watching how he worked, Astrid had jumped headfirst into the work of a dragonslayer, stumbling to learn quickly. She learned mostly from her own mistakes, and she’d been lucky that no mistake had been severe enough to cost her life. Although DiStephan had given her some guidance, she’d had no real training with weapons—mostly, she followed her instincts every time she used a sword, dagger, or ax.

  And she’d realized on her own that the world had the power to talk to her in its own language—she just had to learn how to speak and understand that language.

  The patch of grass between Astrid and the body suddenly lit up. Looking up, she saw a narrow beam of sunlight spilling between a break in the cloudy skies above and landing near her feet. Not knowing whether it might be the influence of DiStephan or the gods, Astrid smiled her thanks and turned to study the sunlight patch of grass. It wasn’t where she’d found him lying on his back, nor was it where she’d flipped him over on his stomach. But she recognized this to be a place where he or someone else had laid, maybe earlier today.

  Unlike the rest of the ground, covered with frost-crisp brown grass, this must have been where Sigurthor had fallen to die. His body would have been warm at the time it fell, and that warmth had melted away any frost, leaving the ground softer and more receptive to holding the imprint of anything that touched it, like the fingerprint indentions now left by Astrid’s touch on Sigurthor’s bluish skin.

  No. Astrid frowned. That couldn’t be right. The ground would have warmed after Sigurthor’s body had lain there, so the only imprint would have come after he’d been dead, which was impossible.

  Unless someone had turned his body over after it had warmed and softened the ground beneath him.

  Sitting cross-legged, Astrid propped an elbow on her knee and rested her chin in her hand, letting her gaze drift across the sunlit patch of grass. What could she be looking at?

  Slowly, as if standing out of bed and stretching toward the sky to begin a new day, a blade of grass un-kinked itself and straightened, revealing an indentation in the ground.

  Astrid leaned forward, twisting her head to get a better look while keeping her hands free of the grass. The indentation looked smaller than the palm of her hand. It rounded smoothly into the dirt underneath the grass, wide at one end and narrowing to a point at the other.

  It had the same shape and size as Starlight’s pommel.

  Instantly, the sunlit patch of grass made sense. Astrid could see where Sigurthor had fallen onto his chest. If he’d worn Starlight in its sheath by his side, the pommel could have slipped easily in front of his belly, and the weight of his body would have pressed it into the softening ground. Scanning the patch, she could make out where his elbows, knees, face, and feet had landed.

  But why had he been killed?

  Astrid shrugged at her own question. A better question might be, why ask why? Merchants often told stories of wars breaking out across the territories they traveled, and no one walking or riding the roads could count on staying safe from attack by brigands. Having just ended one leg of his trading route, Sigurthor would have left Guell weighed down with wealth and goods, used to traveling this leg of his annual journey with DiStephan at his side for protection.

  Of course. Taking another look, Astrid saw none of Sigurthor’s goods or any of the silver he’d worn.

  Astrid’s heart sank with a new realization. She remembered how upset Sigurthor had become when he learned she’d replaced DiStephan and refused to accompany Sigurthor back to his homeland, which DiStephan had always done. “Sigurthor was more afraid of brigands than dragons,” Astrid said softly.

  She took her time studying the ground and finding subtle new clues in the twist of a grass blade and a scrape in the dirt below it, as wide as a sheath. She read the ground and whispered, “They left him here for awhile. Maybe his horse ran free and they chased it down.”

  At the thought of such a possibility, Astrid looked up and sighed in relief at the sight of Blossom where she’d left him, still grazing by the road.

  Returning her attention to the task at hand, Astrid kept talking through what she saw before her eyes. “When they were ready to go, they took one last look at Sigurthor. Maybe to make sure he was dead. Or maybe to make sure they’d taken everything worth taking. If he’d been wearing his cape and if Starlight had laid flat on the ground, they wouldn’t have known he had it until they turned him over.”

  Brigands probably would have grabbed the sword without unsheathing it, not even realizing they had stolen a dragonslayer’s sword, something far more valuable than an ordinary one because of its unusual strength and flexi
bility.

  Astrid covered her face with her hands, not knowing what to do next. She’d promised everyone in Guell she’d spend the winter in the village and perform blacksmithing work until the next dragon season began. Lenore and Donel and even Trep must be worried—she’d vanished early this morning from the village although they were expecting her to be there. She’d made a promise, and she needed to keep it.

  But how could she let Starlight go? Temple had guided her while she made it, and it had become DiStephan’s favorite weapon. Starlight helped her remember their voices and faces and the way they smiled and frowned and laughed. It represented the last connection she had to the two men she’d loved most, and without it she feared forgetting them. She loved Starlight as much as she loved any living person.

  Pressing her fingertips against her closed eyes and forcing them to stay dry, Astrid choked back her tears, refusing to let them well. “Blacksmiths don’t cry,” she whispered to herself. Glancing back at the path she’d traveled, she said out loud, “I’ll come back to Guell as soon as I can.”

  She returned her attention to the body and looked for more indications of how Sigurthor had been killed. Other than matted and bloody hair, there seemed to be no wounds elsewhere on his body. Following a few spots of blood, Astrid found a rock nearby and discovered blood on its underside. She pursed her lips, wondering if they’d intended to kill Sigurthor or simply knock him out so they could rob him. The signs were unclear.

  She circled the body slowly, studying the ground in front of her many times before taking a new step onto it. She stared at the sight of an odd footprint.

  Astrid knelt by a soft patch of wet ground near Sigurthor’s head in which a strange impression had been left. At first glance, it looked like the print a man’s leather shoe would leave behind: a single impression several inches long and a few inches wide. Astrid noticed a small crescent of ground left unchanged, suggesting the arch of a foot.

  But the impression of claw marks startled her most: five at the end where a man’s toes would be and one at the other end where one would expect to see his heel. No lizard had left this mark. Lizards dragged the tops of their feet along the ground every time they walked and then plopped them back into place, leaving long trails of claw marks.

  There were no indications of dragging feet, only remnants of sharp tips digging hard enough in the ground to leave cone-like holes as big as Astrid’s fingertips. She kept staring at the strange footprint, trying to make sense of it. For months now, she’d learned to read the tracks of lizards, deer, bear, wolves, and all of the smaller animals in the woods. The hooves of deer were pointed like a small plow. Wolves left prints illustrating the group of round pads on which they walked. Although bear feet were more similar to those of men, they were enormous by comparison and clawed.

  Astrid jumped at the cawing sound of a crow flying overhead, its outstretched wings looking tattered as it soared above her. Cautiously, she gazed all around, wondering if whatever had left this print could be watching her from the cover of a copse of trees on the nearby mountainside. Gingerly, she ran her fingertips across the footprint, trying to understand it with her touch. She could find no other footprint.

  No man or bear or wolf or deer or even lizard had left this behind. Not even a dragon could have made this footprint.

  It had been made by an unknown, undiscovered monster. And for some reason that Astrid found impossible to fathom, that monster had stolen Starlight.

  CHAPTER 17

  For the next few weeks, Astrid drove Blossom and the cart through the mountain pass. She’d left Sigurthor where she’d found him but piled stones on top of his body to keep lizards or any other animals from making a meal of him. Even though he’d stolen Starlight and lost it to the monster that killed him, at least she should give the man a decent burial. Despite her disappointment, she saw him as a fellow countryman. Astrid believed it her duty to treat any countryman with respect and honor.

  The Northlands had been fortunate to keep its own peace, but these were turbulent times in other parts of the world. And no one could predict when that turbulence might travel and threaten all Northlanders.

  Astrid had hesitated to keep traveling through the mountains instead of going back to Guell. It seemed like an impossible task: if a monster had stolen Starlight, how could she ever hope to find that monster? A footprint in the muddy ground indicated a creature made up of part man and part beast. She didn’t know what the monster looked like. But clearly that monster had taken Starlight, even though she couldn’t imagine what use a monster could have for a sword.

  Astrid cast a backward glance over her shoulder at the sound of a thump breaking the solitude of Blossom’s clopping steps. As she suspected, Fire fidgeted in his sleep, curled up between his brothers.

  Among the food and water Lumpy had packed into the cart, Astrid also found a neatly folded cape made of black wool and fur along with two simple wool cloaks, apparently making sure she wouldn’t freeze to death in case winter arrived with a vengeance. Climbing higher in the mountains, she wore the wool-and-fur cape every day and used the two spare cloaks in the cart to create a small nest for Smoke, Fire, and Slag.

  The young lizards were growing, even though they still spent most of their time asleep. Astrid had discovered more than one adult lizard stretched out and sunning itself on a large rock. She imagined lizards migrated south because the Northern winters were too cold for their taste, and she suspected cool air made them sluggish and sleepy.

  Although she questioned her own wisdom in taking care of the young lizards, Astrid still suspected they might be dragons. Taddeo had tested her before—what if he now tested her by putting baby dragons in front of her to learn what she would do with them? After all, he’d been the one to point them out to her in the dragonslayer’s camp. She didn’t know what she would do with them yet, but leaving them alone in the mountains to die would be heartless.

  One day, the road eased down gradually while the mountains cascaded into foothills. Astrid cried out for joy at the sound of seabirds screaming in the distance and the thick scent of saltwater. She traveled through a stretch of farmland, already harvested and resting as if hibernating in anticipation of the approaching winter. Finally, the road led to a coastal town below.

  Astrid paused, studying the view of the bustling village. A long and wide walkway of wooden boards ran parallel to the sea. On the port side of the walkway, ships bobbed where they were tethered to the dock like cattle feeding from a trough. Crates were set up on the dock in front of each ship, apparently selling goods brought by sea.

  On the other side of the walkway, rows of wooden houses jammed next to each other. Even from Astrid’s vantage point on the mountain road behind and above the town, she could hear the voices of hundreds of people crowding the walkway, bartering for goods.

  The monster that stole Starlight from Sigurthor wouldn’t have come to a town like this. Even though Astrid had spotted more of its tracks along the mountain pass during her travels, she suspected the monster had left the road and taken refuge somewhere along the way, maybe in these low-lying hills behind the town.

  The thought sickened her. Winter crept closer every day, and hunting a monster in these hills and mountains would be an impossible task.

  It was one thing to hunt lizards: often, she simply kept her eyes on the skies for the carrion birds that quickly found kills made by lizards. The birds typically showed up in time to scoop the bones stripped clean by the lizards, fly high and drop those bones on rocks below to break them open in order to eat the marrow inside. Even if Astrid arrived after the lizards had left the scene of the kill, tracking them came easily.

  Other times, Astrid visited villages, heard accounts of recent lizard sightings, and had no problems picking up the trail.

  But lizards were so large and cumbersome that they could go nowhere without leaving plenty of evidence. Broken branches and trees made it easy for Astrid to imagine the lizard that had done the damage. And l
izards always dug trenches to lie in wait for prey to come along—those trenches yielded plenty of information. Not to mention the deep, scarring claw marks left in the ground, as obvious as furrows dug by a plow in a field.

  But the monster that had stolen Starlight must be different, appearing far smaller than a lizard and leaving little evidence behind. In fact, Astrid had already wondered if the monster might be a dragon that had taken the shape of a man. Like Taddeo.

  But Astrid had sniffed every track of the monster she’d found, and it didn’t smell like Taddeo or any other dragon she’d ever encountered.

  She suspected it to be an unfamiliar monster, which meant she probably wouldn’t recognize the monster when she saw it. How could she track a monster if she didn’t know what to look for?

  “What now?” Astrid said quietly, looking up at the cold and clouded sky. Winter threatened to begin soon. Maybe she should turn around and head back to Guell before the onslaught of the first snowstorm.

  Astrid shuddered at the sensation of Smoke pouncing upon her shoulder. The tiny lizard crawled underneath her shirt and poked his head out at the end of the sleeve. Lately, the lizards had become more active for a short time each afternoon, crawling from their nest in the back of the cart to sit next to Astrid and eventually crawl into her lap and sleep. Sometimes they crawled on her, exploring the terrain of her body and keeping balance by wrapping tails around her neck or arm. It surprised Astrid that she didn’t mind, even though she suspected they only wanted to soak up the heat from her body.

  She shook Smoke gently from her sleeve into her hand and dropped him next to his brothers in the nest behind her. “I should go into town and get supplies for the return journey.” Her ax, Falling Star, and other daggers were the only items she could trade, and she hated to part with any of them. But food and water mattered most.

  However, Smoke jumped out of the nest and onto her arm, and the other lizards followed suit. More and more, they sought warmth, and Astrid decided they’d be safer with her than exploring on their own. She wrapped cloth around her chest, tightly enough to stay in place but loosely enough to create folds in which the lizards could nestle while drawing upon the heat of her body. Happily, the lizards slipped into the folds of the cloth and safely out of sight.