by E. M. Foner
“So you found all of this gold in New Land?”
“There is plenty of gold to be found south and west of here, but most of my hoard is from Old Land. I doubt there has ever been a treasure fleet as rich as mine,” Gwyneth added immodestly. “Are your memories beginning to return now, child?”
“But why did you block me?” Meghan demanded.
“You weren’t even ten years old when you threw yourself off this very mountain so you could transform into a dragon and avenge your father. Ten years old! Narl would have taken you and locked you in a tower like a fairytale princess until you were old enough to be his mate. You were extraordinarily strong for a child, even for one of my descendents, but not nearly strong enough to beat the dragon who killed your father.”
“And why didn’t you do something about those dragons fifty years ago when—wait. How can Narl have killed my father at the time the traitors sold the king to the assassin prince? I just turned eighteen!”
“Dragon children age slower than normal humans. And I had Hadrixia put you in a long sleep after your mother chose death, in part to give the other dragons a chance to forget about your existence. If anybody had seen you that day you transformed, who knows how many dragons would have shown up here trying to claim you.”
“But you could have defended me. You burned Narl and his brother out of the air like they were moths!”
“They were distracted with chasing your young man,” Gwyneth replied. “Dragons my age who take care of themselves, and there can’t be a dozen of us left in the world, are very powerful. But speed is another issue altogether. The only way for me to catch one of Narl’s generation is to take him unawares.”
“Did you even try?”
“No, child. I chose to shake my mountain instead, bringing down rockslides and pretending to be dead. I thought it was the surest way to keep you safe, and my time for getting involved in the day-to-day affairs of men is long behind me. You may not believe this, but the old king who was assassinated was no prize. His main occupation was leading his people in wars against the natives for the sake of glory. It only took a few hundred years for the exiles to develop the same society that they had rebelled against and fled.”
“There’s going to be a change,” Bryan predicted. “Now that the dragons are out of the way, Rowan will beat the king for sure, and I’m going to help him. Maybe he’ll even stop laughing when I explain how governments work where I come from.”
“He may hire you as the court jester,” Gwyneth chortled. “Rowan will be a king, like his father before him, but after a half a century of life as an orphan, a soldier, and an actor, at least he’ll have a better understanding of the common people.”
Chapter 93
“I’m not jumping,” Meghan insisted, turning away from the ledge and returning to the comforting depth of the cavern. “You jump, turn into a dragon, and then you can come back and get me.”
“Come on, you’re going to make your grandmother embarrassed,” Bryan pleaded. “You did this before you were even ten years old.”
“That just goes to show how dumb I was. What do you care if Gwyneth is embarrassed?”
“Well, she saved my life, for one thing. And she created these pendants and had her agents hide one for me, not to mention my sword, my flying suit, the dragon instructions, and Rowan’s ring.”
“Me, me, me. I know why you want to kiss up to Gwyneth. It’s her hoard.”
Bryan glanced back to where the giant silver dragon was snoring up a storm. “Well, she is your closest relation, and I thought that dragons were pretty old-fashioned, so there could be a dowry and all.”
“Keep it up and I’ll jump just to get away from you,” Meghan warned.
“That’s the spirit. She told you that your fear of heights was just part of a safety she added to your block, to keep you from getting into a situation where you might accidentally fall and transform. Don’t you want to put that behind you?”
Meghan pursed her lips and took a step towards the disguised opening in the cliff.
“What’s the worst thing that can happen?” Bryan continued. “If you don’t transform, you’ll be dead before you know it.”
“Argh, you make me nuts!” Meghan took a step backwards again, but a strong, warm breeze lifted her off her feet and propelled her into space. “Brryyyaaaannnnn!”
“Way to go, Grams,” Bryan yelled over his shoulder at the amused dragon, then he dove after Meghan, arms spread wide. He didn’t actually remember what it took to become a dragon, and he had a sudden moment of doubt when he recalled that he had fallen from the castle tower without transforming, but of course, Meghan had interfered that time.
“Where are you?” he heard Meghan ask in his mind, just before the air caught his newly formed wings. He sailed off to the side barely in time to avoid colliding with a cute, copper-colored dragon that was climbing awkwardly.
“You look beautiful,” he sent to her, swooping alongside for a closer look. “Are you over your fear of—open your eyes, already. You’re going to fly into a mountain that doesn’t have a hidden opening.”
One of the copper dragon’s eyes opened to just a slit, then the other. “Hey, I’m flying!”
“You’d be smooshed by now if you weren’t,” Bryan reminded her. “Shall we go check up on Rowan?”
“It’s a long way,” Meghan said. “I don’t think I could go that far without eating something. I’ve never been so hungry.”
“Now you’re getting it. Let’s go back and see if Gwyneth keeps anything around.”
“I can’t believe I just caught myself thinking about those cute sheep we saw earlier,” Meghan admitted. A feeling of guilt transmitted clearly with her words. “I don’t think I could just eat a living animal.”
“I was figuring on killing mine first.”
Chapter 94
The two young dragons landed a short distance from the player’s camp overlooking King’s Island and resumed human form. All of the fighting-age men were missing, but the children were playing around the wagons and the women were preparing a picnic, so they obviously weren’t expecting trouble.
“What’s happening, Bethany?” Meghan asked as soon as she spotted her friend.
“Meghan! We knew that Bryan was supposed to turn into a dragon, but I never would have guessed that you’d be brave enough to climb on his back and fly off. You even got sick riding in the wagon.”
“I kept my eyes closed and I still got sick,” Meghan admitted. “But never mind about that. What happened with Rowan and the king?”
“After the big silver dragon toasted his allies, the king saw it was over, and he took Rowan up on the offer to flee. The fleet sailed for Old Land this morning, royal guard and all. Was that dragon really Gwyneth, like everybody is saying?”
“Yes, and she’s been secretly watching everything from hiding, though I’m sure she slept through plenty.”
“Did you say that you knew I was a dragon all along?” Bryan asked.
“That’s what Isabella told us before you arrived with Laitz. I guess she was in touch with the people who raised you, Meghan. Everybody around here has been keeping so many secrets that it’s giving me a headache.”
“Do you have any secrets?” Meghan asked.
“Well, you knew that my grandmother was the one who rescued Rowan when the old king and queen were killed. Right?”
“How would we know that?”
“It’s why I always get that part in the play. My mother had it before me.”
“And did all the players know that Rowan was the son of the assassinated king?” Bryan asked.
“Uh, let me think,” Bethany replied, bouncing Davie in her arms to calm him. “Yeah, I guess.”
“So why didn’t the king, the one who just fled, I mean, kill Rowan while he had the chance?”
“How would he know who Rowan was?”
“All of the players knew and nobody talked?”
“Why would they talk?” Bethany asked
in puzzlement. “Besides, Isabella would have known if they weren’t trustworthy. She sees into people.”
“So where are all the men?” Bryan continued.
“They’re over at King’s Island choosing soldiers for a garrison. Rowan said he’s not moving into the king’s castle this winter. Our cabins in the mountains are warmer.”
“So when the king and his retainers fled, the people living there brought all the boats back to this side?”
“No, I think the owners went over the bridge this morning to find their boats and sail them home.”
“What bridge?”
“The ice bridge that Storm Bringer and the other shamans made. Didn’t you notice it flying in? I think that was the plan all along, to use ice bridges, and the shamans wanted to get credit for showing up and supporting Rowan, even though they weren’t needed in the end. Are you guys going to come back to the mountains with us? We’ve never had a dragon in the players before.”
Bryan and Meghan looked at each other. “We haven’t really planned that far ahead,” the girl admitted. “You don’t think we’d make everybody uncomfortable?”
“Why? Oh, you mean the way Bryan eats? Everybody is used to that.”
“I sort of flew back on my own,” she said, watching Bethany out of the corner of her eye to see how her friend would react to the hint that Meghan herself was a dragon as well.
“We kind of guessed that you might be a dragon yesterday,” the young mother told her. “Narl wouldn’t have gotten himself killed over a young mage, even if you did turn a castle into a pile of rubble with a single word.”
“All I did was catch Bryan!” Meghan protested.
Bethany looked the couple up and down and nodded in agreement. “So now that you’ve caught him, what are you going to do with him?”
“We’re thinking of a magic show for children,” Bryan said. “I’m going to be her assistant.”
From the Author
My goal for “Meghan’s Dragon” was to write a humorous story about young people discovering themselves in a magical world without having the fate of mankind resting on their shoulders. I also wanted to build a world where, unlike the near-omniscient Stryx in my EarthCent Ambassador series, nobody has access to perfect information and characters frequently misinform each other because they don’t know any better. If you’d like to try a space opera series that presents the beginnings of a brighter future for humanity, the first book of the EarthCent series is “Date Night on Union Station.”
About the Author
E. M. Foner lives in Northampton, MA with an imaginary German Shepherd who’s been trained to bite bankers. The author welcomes reader comments at [email protected].