Dragon Talker

by Anderson, Steve

  “You scare me,” Melanie fired back.

  Tail Biter went next to Xeron and sat down. Xeron put his hand on his head and absently scratched him behind his ears.

  Melanie suddenly had an idea on how she could trust him enough to leave with him. She took a deep breath and said, “Give me your dog.”

  “What?” Xeron sat up straighter in the chair and Tail Biter stood up at his sudden movement, looking around the room to see what had caused the change in his master.

  “Give me your dog - bind him to me, or do something so he listens to me. And I will test that. Do that, and I’ll lead you out of here.”

  “You are crazy. I could just walk out of here and figure it out. Instead, I found someone who wants to leave. I’m offering you my services, which are considerable, in leaving this place, and you want to negotiate?”

  “I know what’s here,” she said angrily. “I don’t know what is out there with you. It could be much worse.”

  Xeron sank back into the chair. “All right. I understand. Does the fact that I’m talking to you, a chambermaid, like you are a real person mean anything? I could just order you around but I’m not.”

  Melanie seethed, “I am a real person.” That created a quiet spot in the conversation.

  Finally, after a lengthy and awkward amount of staring, Xeron said, “Okay, you can have my dog, for as long as the binding lasts, which is usually around two to three weeks. Is that enough time to get us to the roads near Perantium?”

  “Yes, and what exactly is ‘binding,’ anyway?”

  He explained, “There are ways to connect leaving things, for healing, torture, and communication. Usually, it’s people to people, and the bond lasts four to six days, but animal-person bonds follow the same principles and have a longer duration. Forced, and yet, if the bond worked out to each’s advantage, a real, non-magical connection can remain.”

  “What, exactly,” she asked, “will happen?”

  “Physically, I wrap a vine around your arm and his,” he nodded at Tail Biter, “front leg. The magic is more complex, but you will be bonded together. As you’re human and he’s a dog, you’ll be the lead. But you will get to experience a little of what he is going through, too. If he sees a deer, your heart will race. When he’s hungry, you might think you’re hungry. You will get used to it pretty quick, at least I always have.”

  “So how do I know his bond to me is stronger than his bond to you?” Her voice dropped as she asked the question.

  Xeron paused before answering. “We both know the answer to that.” He made sure he had eye contact with her, and said, “You’re going to have him attack me once you’re bonded.”

  She held his gaze, her voice back to regular volume, “Yes, I am.”

  Chapter 37

  Yuri watched as the woman held a crystal over Bernard’s broken leg. The crystal lit up as she quietly spoke in a language Yuri had never heard before. Both the swelling and the redness went down as Yuri watched. He sighed in relief.

  “Oh no,” the woman said, “we’ve just done the easy part.”

  “That was easy?” Yuri asked.

  “Listen,” she looked up at Yuri, “bleeding first, that’s the rule if you don’t have magic. I slowed down his heart rate the second I saw him. That thigh wound almost killed him, and we need to deal with it. I just didn’t want to deal with it and a broken leg at the same time. And a broken leg…”

  “Is apparently easy.” Yuri finished for her.

  “What’s going on?” Stone interrupted.

  “Your little brother was hurt in two spots, his lower leg and thigh. We took care of the leg. Now we have to take care of his thigh.”

  “What can I do?” It was a question, but the tone was one of a command.

  “There is something you can do, but it is dangerous.”

  “Wait,” Yuri didn’t like where this was going.

  Stone ignored Yuri. “I’m ready.”

  “I can tie your strength to…”

  “Go ahead,” Stone interrupted.

  She continued, “You will absolutely be bone tired by this, and you may even get wounded yourself. Then we would have two boys to take care of.”

  “I don’t care.” Stone looked at Yuri to warn off any counterargument. “Let’s heal my little brother.”

  Yuri shook his head, “Okay, Stone, I’m way out of my league here.”

  “Too true,” she said, not unkindly. “This is life and death. Lay down next to your brother and hold his hand.

  Stone did as told, whispering something to his brother that Yuri couldn’t hear.

  “Those scales,” she pointed at his chest, “strength, obviously, speed, too?”

  “Yes, though I haven’t really tested it, besides now.”

  “Time for another. Do you know what honeysuckle vines look like?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you pass any on your way here?”

  “I wasn’t looking.” Yuri looked for and noticed plants he could use. Honeysuckle was not on the list, though it was a vine that grew around the dragon field.

  “It’s only good fresh for what I’m going to do, and there are some live vines back the way I came by a stream. You can’t miss it, unless you miss the stream.”

  “Run to stream, get vine, got it. How much?”

  “Six arm’s lengths ought to do.”

  “I’m on it,” Yuri stood up and turned to start running down the trail.

  “Hey,” she stopped him, “Don’t just go in yanking. Tell the plant what you’re going to do, why you are doing it, and be gentle.”

  “Talk to a plant?” Yuri wouldn’t have blinked if she said talk to an animal, but plants?

  “You have a chest covered in scales. Are you going to tell me what makes sense and what doesn’t?”

  Yuri thought for a moment. “No. Be right back.” With that, Yuri took off without looking back.

  Stone looked up at her, seeing Bogdan, and asked, “Why does he think you are a girl?”

  “I think those scales went to his head,” she answered.

  That answer was good enough for Stone. He lay back down, holding on to his brother’s hand. As Stone rested by his brother, the woman who called herself Samantha wondered what to do about the young man who could see her for who she was. While it would be nice to be herself, she couldn’t do that and let these boys know the truth and live. Yuri was going to be trouble. She could try to kill him, but what do those scales mean? And if she failed, then what? She would try a few magical tests after she healed Bernard to see if she might be able to wipe out his memory.

  I’ll figure that out later, she thought. Time to focus on this boy. The vines were roughly an hour’s walk away. She figured that gave her roughly fifteen to twenty minutes before he returned. She didn’t imagine he could run that fast. Opening one of the chests in the back of the wagon, she pulled out a small jar. Inside it, leeches swam around slowly.

  Most people had tried using leeches for medicinal practices. It took a mage to realize the true significance and uses of a leech’s body. They were basically natural blood containers. They needed only a small magical push to take a section of leech body and use it to repair or strengthen damaged veins. The difficult part was keeping the person alive who had a damaged major vein or artery. They usually bled to death quickly, which is why Samantha cast a spell that slowed Bernard’s bloodflow the moment she saw him. She had kept another person in that state for 6 hours once, so the 30 minutes that had transpired so far didn’t concern her.

  Her knife, more poultice, and a leech pinned to a block of wood were set up beside her when Yuri returned with the vine. He had returned in less than ten minutes. “You are fast, now let’s see what you have.” She took the vine from Yuri, inspecting the entire length. “Good work. This will do.”

  He nodded his head and asked, “What can I do to help?”

  She noticed that he wasn’t breathing hard and filed that piece of knowledge away before answering him, “Not
hing, but stand there and stick around in case I need you.” She didn’t want to say it out loud to scare Stone, so she nodded her head to Stone and motioned with her arms for Yuri to hold Stone down. “But not until it’s necessary.” Yuri nodded back.

  As she wrapped the vine around Bernard’s and Stone’s arms, she talked to Stone. “This will connect you and let Bernard use your strength. You may feel what he is feeling. If you do, it’s going to hurt, but I need you to remain still. If you break the vines - well, it’s not good. Are you up for this?”

  “I’m ready. I won’t move.” Stone had looked at her while speaking, but turned his head and stared skyward as she finished wrapping the vine around both their arms.

  After saying a connection incantation, Samantha took a deep breath and relaxed her body. Once fully calm, she started cutting Bernard’s bandage free. Soon, she had the wound free of all material. His thigh was white and cold to the touch, both from loss of blood and the magic slowing his bleeding. Looking at Stone, she saw him grimace. The connection was strong, and that meant the sooner she got this done the better it would be for both of them.

  Magic works best alone. When magic mixes, there is no way to know for sure what the combination will do. That doesn’t stop people from trying, even have great success, but Samantha knew one area where you did not want to mix magic is around healing. Sometimes, the negative consequences don’t show up for years. This meant that she would have to release the spell slowing down Bernard’s bleeding before applying the leech tail. There would be blood and pain, and a lot of both.

  “This is where I need you, Yuri.”

  Yuri had one hand on Stone’s shoulder and the other on his thigh. She hadn’t seen him get in position, and was pleased that he was thinking ahead. “Because of the vine, Stone’s the one who will feel the most pain and react. That’s good because it will keep Bernard mostly still, but you need to keep him from thrashing too much or he may break the connection. Are you ready?”

  “Yes, let’s get this done.”

  Samantha released the spell on Bernard. Yuri watched as the vine tightened around the boys arms. Stone started moaning and moving immediately. Even in pain, Stone’s small body was no match for Yuri’s new strength. He did his best to hold him down as gently as he could, which wasn’t easy. Though he was in pain, Yuri could tell Stone was doing his best not to move his arm that was connected to Bernard.

  Samantha took the inch of leech’s tail she had just cut off before releasing the spell and brought it to the vein, which had started to bleed profusely again. As she placed the leech against the vein, she could see it naturally engulf the vein. Without its mouth, though, there was no way form a proper seal. Magic did that. She had no intention of burying a leech head in someone’s leg. That would lead to disaster.

  She watched the vein for a few moments to make sure that it held. It did, and she could see the leech changing color to match the vein. The magic was working. Blood was now flowing normally through Bernard’s thigh, and because she had worked on his broken bone, that blood wasn’t now just leaving him through another place. She sprinkled more poultice in the wound before sealing it with needle and thread.

  “Needle and thread?” Yuri asked.

  “Magic works with what is, Yuri, and if you knew how much magic I have been casting about this morning, you would understand not wanting to add more to it, to this boy.” Samantha was tired, and that weariness came across in her tone.

  “Hey, you are the boss. Just surprised, that’s all. This magic stuff is new to me.”

  “After I check on Stone, I’m going to take a nap. You and I will talk after that, okay?”

  “Yes ma’am - Sir!” Yuri smiled. “I am grateful, whoever you are.”

  Samantha gave a weak smile back. “Stone, nap, talk. Now don’t speak for a while. I need to finish this.”

  Yuri watched in silence as she stitched up Bernard’s wounds and wrapped his legs in bandages. After seeing that both boys looked like they were going to be okay, Yuri was glad for the break that followed. He knew responsibility - having a younger brother like Hental made that a mandatory requirement of being in the family, but this was different. For this, he was on his own, no mother and father for backup. Samantha went to the front of the wagon and slept on the front seat. Yuri moved off and leaned against a tree where he could still see the boys, keeping an eye on them while otherwise unfocused and content to not be thinking.

  Eventually, he fell asleep. He realized this as he woke up to the sound of Samantha lifting Bernard out of the wagon and laying him on the ground. He saw that Stone was already on the ground. Yuri stood up quietly and walked toward the wagon. When he was a few feet from the wagon, he said, “I thought we were going to talk?”

  Samantha jumped. “You’re supposed to be sleeping for another hour, at least.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Yuri asked, wondering if she had cast a spell on him.

  “Apparently nothing.” She stared at Yuri. “You are a strange man, blue scales.”

  “I think you’re the stranger man, don’t you?” Yuri smiled at his own cleverness.

  She smiled back. “You may have me on that one, but scales rank up there, too.”

  “So we both are special.”

  Samantha interrupted, “Stop. Yuri, you put me in a spot. What you know…”

  Now Yuri interrupted, “I don’t know anything.”

  “What you know is enough. If you were a fla…a normal person, I would erase your memory and be gone, but magic doesn’t work on you, or at least has no staying power if your response to the sleep spell is any indicator.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve tried three different spells on you since I met you and two flat out didn’t work and one lasted about ten minutes instead of the two hours it was supposed to. You are protected, Yuri, not just from physical harm.”

  “I’m not that protected.” Yuri rubbed his arm where Hental had stabbed him and wondered what Hental was up to and what would happen to the scar now that he had the scales.

  “Yuri, you’re from a dragon village, obviously, but tell me what you know of mages.”

  “The standard, I guess. Powerful, rule cities, make people work for them, do things they normally wouldn’t. ‘Take the best and leave the rest.’ And they are all men.”

  “And how do they treat women?” she asked.

  “’Take the best and leave the rest.’”

  “That’s true enough for most of them. So, what do you think they would think about a woman with their power?”

  “I don’t know…They wouldn’t like it, I guess.”

  “There’s as many types of magic as there are dragons, Yuri. Even fla…regular people can touch magic at times.”

  “That’s the second time you started to say, ‘fla…’ What’s a fla…?”

  “Sorry, ‘flats’ is a term for non-magical people. It’s not a compliment.”

  An edge crept into Yuri’s voice, thinking of his family of “flats,” “Aren’t you an exalted person to lower yourself and work on those boys.”

  “Yuri,” Samantha sighed, “it’s not fully like that. What would your fine villagers do if a mage was found in your town?”

  “Kill him, if we could.”

  “Yes, so imagine a woman mage. W…I have to protect myself from everyone because everyone could betray me. You put up walls when you live like that.”

  “How many woman mages are there?”

  “See, that kind of question answered could get us both killed.” Samantha looked into Yuri’s eyes, hard.

  “Don’t,” Yuri replied.

  She relaxed, just a little. “Don’t what?”

  “Think about killing me. I won’t let that happen and I don’t think you could.”

  “I figured that,” she said and silently wondered if his scales could protect him from poison. “Tell me about the scales.” When Yuri hesitated, she added, “With what I told you, you owe me. Make things a little more eve
n.”

  “I am a dragon talker. You know how dragons have a sick sense of humor?”

  “I’ve heard the tales.”

  “If my dragon is any proof, the tales are true. When I met it, it came in, they don’t really use words, it’s more intent and images.” Yuri didn’t know why he was calling Samora it, but something said it wasn’t his place to share her gender. He continued, “…feelings about what they mean. So, it lands, comes up and sniffs me hard, like it’s taking in everything, and I think it was reading my mind, too. Anyway, it’s all nothing to me. I can barely think straight, but then this feeling comes, like an order, to live. It’s not ‘to live,’ though, somehow I know the real meaning is ‘don’t die. Then, it leaves, I think it’s over, and her tail comes and sends me into a boulder.”

  “Dragons’ tails. The people killed by those must be legion.”

  “I’m not one of them, though everyone thought I was. I was a wreck, but healed by the time we made it back to the village. I seem to be getting stronger, too. Heal faster.”

  “Okay, but what about the scales?”

  Yuri thought back to the sound Samora made removing the scales. There was something primordial about it, and he instinctively knew this was not information he or Samora wanted shared. “I got them later, for added strength.

  So magic wasn’t enough for what she wanted, Samantha thought but kept it to herself. This young man, she started to realize, may have more potential power than anyone else in the world, and he hadn’t realized it yet. “Why?”

  “Huh?” Yuri was still thinking about Samora’s scream, and the black blood he had seen.

  “Why do all this for you? Why do you need these gifts to be the talker? What the hell is this dragon planning on saying to the world?”

  Yuri was floored by that thought, which led to the realization he might not just be asked to talk to his village. They both sat in silence, each trying to figure out the potential consequences - Yuri to his village and Samantha to mages.

  A stray thought entered Samantha’s mind, “How do I look to you?” She wondered how Yuri could see through the disguise. She had the bulk of Bogdan while the spell has held. “Do I look fat to you?”