Meghan's Dragon

by E. M. Foner

  “I told you I was brought up by a healer from the age of ten,” Meghan replied.

  “A healer. Not THE healer. Hadrixia is a legend, some say she’s immortal, but she disappeared when I was a child. What castle did you say you were from?”

  “Refuge. But everybody knew her. Well, I guess they all called her ‘Healer,’ except for Phinneas when we were alone, and she did warn me not to use her name in public.” Meghan stopped suddenly and then added in a small voice, “Could you forget I said that?”

  “Don’t worry,” Faye replied. “Your secret is safe with me, and it explains quite a few things. Frankly, I think there are too many secrets in this world, but I get the feeling that we’ll all have the opportunity to share them soon enough.”

  Chapter 85

  “What?” Bryan asked, not bothering to look up from the striped bass he was carefully dissecting.

  “Rowan is telling our hosts about you, and I think the duke may ask you a question,” Meghan replied. “You have to pay attention.”

  “I am paying attention,” Bryan retorted. “Do want me to choke on a bone?”

  “They’re looking in this direction. At least pretend you weren’t raised in a barn.”

  Bryan set down his knife and looked towards the head of the table, just in time to see the old duke laughing and pounding the table with his fist. Rowan looked rather pleased with himself and made a little circle with his forefinger when he saw Bryan looking in their direction, the troupe’s hand-sign for “Be alert.”

  “I don’t believe it,” the White Duke exclaimed when he finally recovered his breath. “Is he some new kind of jester or bard?”

  “The duke is very interested in your ideas about governing,” Rowan called down the table to Bryan. His raised voice caused the other conversations to taper off, and the young man realized that everybody was waiting for his reply. Meghan gave a little head shake and an expression that he interpreted as meaning he should offer a polite retraction. Instead, he resigned himself to eating cold fish and rose to the bait.

  “I’m just saying that everybody should have a vote. This whole business of kingdoms, with dukes and barons who get the job from their fathers, it’s not fair.”

  “Not fair to who?” the duke enquired.

  “To everybody who isn’t a king, a duke, or a baron. I mean, I’m sure you’re a great guy and everything, but why should all these people have to do something just because you say so?”

  “I hope I put more thought into governing than just saying things, but somebody has to be in charge,” the duke replied. “Do you have an alternative system we should try?”

  Meghan tried to make herself as small as possible as her ears turned bright red from embarrassment, but Bryan wasn’t the least bit daunted.

  “Elections, to start with. Let everybody in the kingdom vote for a new king every four years. We could select new dukes and barons at the same time.”

  The players were used to Bryan’s odd notions and didn’t let the discussion keep them from eating, but the duke’s household retainers dissolved in laughter. The duke struggled to keep a straight face as he tried to restore order, and eventually he was able to resume the conversation without shouting.

  “Is everybody in the kingdom allowed to stand for this election?”

  “Yes, I mean, not all at once,” Bryan replied. “You need to have, uh pre-election votes to choose the, uh, candidates for king and the other jobs. I guess you could have local people choose representatives, and then those people would vote for the king, maybe.”

  “And where would the new king, the new dukes, and the new barons get their castles?” the White Duke asked.

  “The way it worked where I come from, the castle goes with the job,” Bryan told him, watching sadly out of the corner of his eye as the last piece of honey cake was devoured by Theodric. “Besides, Storm Bringer says that if everybody lived on farms and in villages, we wouldn’t need castles and the taxes to pay for them.”

  The shaman leaned around Rowan and said something to the White Duke, who again fell into a fit of laughter.

  “Quit while you’ve a head,” Meghan muttered to Bryan.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I meant exactly what I said. Laitz spent three months in a dungeon for making fun of a duke. You just suggested taking away our host’s family inheritance.”

  Chapter 86

  “Why are we sneaking around if the White Duke is on our side?” Bryan asked.

  “He’s on Rowan’s side and we’re on Rowan’s side, but that doesn’t mean the White Duke is on our side,” Meghan explained. Once the words were out, she realized it wasn’t likely to satisfy Bryan and she tried again. “The castle and the water park belong to the duke. He might think that anything hidden here belongs to him as well, and we can’t take that chance.”

  “It’s not that I mind doing it this way, I always liked fooling around in the dark. I’ve been thinking about the whole ‘water falls on its right’ thing,” he added to Meghan’s surprise. “It could be either side, depending on how they sell wagon parts here.”

  “Are you kidding?” Meghan asked, halting on the barely visible white pebble path that led to the artificial waterfall. “What do wagons have to do with anything?”

  “Well, it’s the best example I can come up with in this language, so let’s say I needed a new sideboard for a wagon. Is the left sideboard the one to the left when you’re sitting in the wagon, or when you’re looking at the wagon from the front?”

  “Are they even different?”

  “Sure, just like fences. The smooth side faces out.”

  “I’d bring the wagon to the carpenter and show him what I wanted replaced.”

  “That’s not the point. One is a left sideboard and the other is a right sideboard, it just depends on where you’re standing. It’s the same with this waterfall thing. If water falls on its right, it depends whether the riddle means when we’re looking at the waterfall, or when we’re looking out from whatever it is.”

  “And you say that I’m the one who makes everything complicated,” Meghan complained. “The waterfall is close enough that we’re shouting. I don’t know what ‘from the first bite’ refers to, so look for something you might eat. You should be an expert on this.”

  The waterfall was actually the overflow from the elevated aqueduct that brought the castle’s water supply from the nearby hills. The aqueduct was intentionally oversized, and the water that wasn’t diverted into the castle fountains and other uses fell from the high wall into the park just outside. The cascading pools and aquatic plants were considered one of the wonders of New Land, but neither of the trespassers saw anything that reminded them of food.

  “Do you think it could be in one of those frogs?” Bryan eventually asked. “There used to be a fairy tale about a frog that had a treasure—no, wait. It was a frog that was a prince. You have to kiss it to break the spell.”

  “I know you just made that up to try to get me to kiss a frog, but I’m not that gullible. Maybe what we’re looking for is actually underwater.”

  Bryan sat down and began wrestling off his boots. “You may as well do the same,” he advised loudly. “I know they’re waterproof, but that won’t keep them from filling up.”

  “One of us should keep dry just in case.”

  “In case of what?”

  “An emergency,” Meghan yelled back, though she couldn’t think of one. “Anyway, you’re the expert swimmer.”

  “These ponds won’t come up to our knees,” Bryan asserted, stepping over the stone boundary. His foot kept going down, and he fell in and disappeared with a splash that was inaudible over the background noise of the waterfall. A moment later he surfaced, looking annoyed. “It’s full of slimy plant stuff,” he shouted, treading water with difficulty.

  “Don’t tear it all up,” Meghan hollered back. “Just come out if there’s nothing obvious. Maybe we’ll need to return in the daylight to look around.” />
  An area of the pool’s surface around Bryan began to glow a dull red. “How about that?” he shouted boastfully. “Underwater fire. Do you see anything now?”

  “Don’t heat the water too much or the plants will boil,” she warned, scanning the pool for anything they had missed. “Is there something near the surface in the white water by the side there?”

  Bryan half paddled, half waded in the direction she indicated, and then stopped and shouted something she couldn’t hear over the roar of the water. “What is it?” she asked in her head, hoping that Bryan hadn’t removed his pendant for some reason.

  “It’s a bronze salmon,” he replied the same way. “I guess it’s supposed to be leaping into the falls. You’ll have to come in to do your untying spell thing.”

  “I’ll try it from here,” she replied. “Be ready to catch something if it drops out.”

  He didn’t say anything, but she caught a hint of a surly thought from her pendant. Turning all of her concentration on the dimly lit salmon, she went through the motions detailed in the scroll.

  “Did anything happen?” Meghan asked in her head.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “Check it with your fingers. Maybe a hole opened up in the side.”

  Bryan obligingly ran his fingers over the large fish, shook his head, and then as an afterthought, checked in its mouth. “Got it,” he said, slipping a large ring onto his finger. “Fix the salmon and we’re out of here.”

  Chapter 87

  “I can’t believe we’ve found all five of the objects and none of them were for me.” Meghan pulled the signet ring back off her middle and ring ringers, which together, had still made a loose fit. She tossed it back to Bryan. “I guess it’s yours. Let’s get some sleep.”

  “It’s too big for me, too. Can’t you say something and make it resize to my ring finger?”

  “I already tried that when I had it,” the girl admitted. “It has some sort of charm on it that I can’t figure out. There wasn’t much in the baron’s library about working out unknown spells, it’s sort of a specialty among mages.”

  “Maybe it just needs a good jolt,” Bryan replied, and before she could stop him, the bones in his hand showed through the skin as he let the energy flow into his clenched fist. “Ow!”

  “What happened?”

  “It got hot. Real hot,” Bryan complained, rubbing his palm. The ring lay on the ground where he’d let it fall, glowing dully. “It burned me pretty good.”

  “Let me see.” Meghan took his hand and peered at the palm like she was reading his fortune. “That’s funny. I’d swear that’s the same dragon glyph that you had on your forehead when Rowan smashed you with the hilt of his sword.”

  “Pommel. It stings pretty badly. Can you fix it?”

  Meghan mumbled some basic burn-healing encouragement under her breath while gently rubbing the red mark with her index finger, and gradually it blended in with the surrounding skin. “All better?”

  “Thanks.” Bryan bent to pick up the ring again and Meghan flinched, but apparently it had cooled down. “I guess that is the same dragon mark as Rowan’s sword. Maybe the two are some kind of set.”

  “Did you check the ring for an inscription?”

  “You’re the big reader in the family,” he said, flipping the ring back to her.

  Meghan steeled herself for the catch, but the metal was barely warm to the touch. She kindled a small glow light that wouldn’t draw attention to their campsite in the castle’s park grounds and examined the band.

  “At least it’s in standard mage-script for a change,” she said, flipping the ring around so the words wouldn’t be upside down. “One ring to rule them all and in—Ha! Got you.”

  “I never should have told you about that book,” Bryan said ruefully, embarrassed by the fact that his eyes had popped out of his head. “What’s actually inscribed?”

  “Please return to King’s Castle. Reward.”

  “Come on, what’s it really say?”

  “That is what it really says,” Meghan replied, cocking her head and staring at the inscription. “And it wouldn’t give an address as simple as ‘King’s Castle’ if it wasn’t royal property that everybody should recognize. I wonder how it got here?”

  “I wonder what the reward is.”

  “We’re on the side revolting against the king. Remember?”

  “Yeah, but maybe we could get the reward first and then be on the other side. You know, like spies.”

  The girl shook her head. “Not unless you ask Rowan first.”

  “Alright,” Bryan said, looking around in the dark. “I think his tent is over there.”

  “Not now, you goof,” Meghan almost shouted. “In the morning!”

  Chapter 88

  The road which paralleled King’s Highway headed down a gentle slope towards a large section of fields covered with the stubble of harvested crops. The expeditionary force sent by the White Duke was deployed in advance of Rowan’s players, but they came to a halt when another column of men and horses emerged from the woods across the fields.

  “Are we going to fight them?” Bryan asked Rowan, fingering the hilt of his sword. “There are four, no, five mages in hoods riding with them, and we only have the two mages from the White Duke.”

  “Well, we’d better avoid fighting them in that case,” Rowan replied complacently.

  “That’s it? Don’t you have to issue orders or something?”

  “My voice is a bit hoarse today, chill from last night. Do you think you can make yourself heard to all of our men if I tell you what to say?”

  “I’m ready when you are,” the young man responded, cupping his hands around his mouth, as if that would help with magical amplification.

  “Don’t attack our allies,” Rowan said.

  “Don’t attack our allies!” Bryan shouted, employing the barker technique he had learned from Jomar. His amplified voice rolled through the valley like thunder, and was answered by laughter from hundreds of men on both sides of the field.

  “That was really impressive,” Laitz said, slapping Bryan on the back. “Lighting and announcing makes you a double threat. If you can learn some weather control from Storm Bringer, you’ll be the most valuable man among all the player groups.”

  “So they’re really joining us?”

  “It’s only chance that we’re meeting here,” Rowan told the chagrined young man. “All of our people are making their way separately to the shore, and I hope we can convince the Blue Duke to declare his neutrality. There’s no advantage to grouping up before we get there, just ruins the roads.”

  “But this is really it. You’re moving against the king.”

  “The false king,” Laitz interjected.

  A hawk appeared from the north, descending in a shallow dive, and the shaman materialized at the front of the wagon train to catch the bird.

  “That’s not the same hawk,” Bryan said accusingly, as if Storm Bringer was trying to pull a fast one.

  “No, this lovely bird is the companion of a friend of mine who lives on the coast overlooking King’s Island.” The bird perched on the shaman’s shoulder and the two stared into each other’s eyes, Storm Bringer occasionally nodding his head. “It’s as we thought. The king’s men have been collecting all of the boats on the south shore within a day’s sailing of the island. They’re trying to defuse the revolt without having to call on the dukes for troops.”

  “If we were coming from the north it would hardly matter, but the river on the south side must be more than a thousand paces wide,” Laitz pointed out.

  “I thought you claimed walking on water amongst your many skills,” Rowan needled the illusionist.

  “Also,” the shaman continued after further communion with the bird, “there’s a delegation of the royal guard on the way. They must have left several days ago and ridden hard, because they’re almost here.”

  “Go inform the White Duke’s men to let them through when they
arrive,” Rowan instructed Theodric, who immediately began jogging forward.

  “That reminds me,” Bryan said. “Meghan and I, uh, found this ring in a fish, and it says something about returning it to King’s Castle in the inscription.” He groped around in his pockets and eventually drew out the large ring and passed it to Rowan.

  The leader of the players looked truly surprised for the first time Bryan could remember. “You got this from a fish?”

  “A metal fish, in a pool,” the young man explained. “Next to a waterfall.”

  Rowan peered at the inscription and then pulled the hilt of his sword forward to compare the engraving on the pommel with the relief on the ring. “Well, well. This comes at a good time,” he said. “I think I’d better talk things over with my wife before the delegation arrives.”

  “It said something about a reward,” Bryan called after him hopefully. Not receiving an answer, he went to find Meghan to complain.

  Chapter 89

  When the royal guard delegation arrived, the players were just finishing up lunch and getting ready to start out again. Rowan signaled for everybody to take an extended break and carefully eyed the six approaching horsemen, who carried no visible weapons other than the sword no self-respecting soldier would be caught dead without.

  “What do you think?” he asked his companions.

  “If any of them are mages, they’re doing a better job hiding it than I’ve ever encountered,” Storm Bringer replied. “The senior fellow there obviously isn’t used to long stretches in the saddle.”

  “I’d say five guards to fulfill court protocol and one of the king’s inner cabinet,” Isabella said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he was picked for this job because he’s the farthest thing from a mage among them. Somebody is trying to put us at ease.”

  Theodric and Hardol stopped the horses on the road and exchanged a few friendly words with the guardsmen. Jomar appeared with a short wooden stepladder and helped the older man dismount from the large warhorse. The messenger almost fell over when he reached the ground, and spent some time vigorously rubbing the backs of his thighs before slowly straightening. Then he steeled himself and managed to convey a certain degree of limping dignity as he approached the waiting players.