The Stone of the Stars

by Alison Baird

  Ailia had by now reached that state in which a victim abandons fear together with hope. To her dazed mind the number of talons on the dragon’s feet seemed to have some immense significance: she counted them in her head as the beast approached her. Five talons to each foot; it was important somehow that there be five. She stared at them stupidly. Then her eyes strayed to the pillars where the carved dragons coiled and snarled. Imperial dragons: what had Mandrake said about them, about their claws? That they alone bore five talons on each foot . . .

  Tame dragons.

  Ailia lifted her gaze to the meet the dragon’s. It halted a few paces away, watching her. She dared to stir, to rise slowly to her feet, without taking her eyes from the dragon. It did not move; its green gaze was fixed upon her, but without the hostility it had shown the soldiers. The steaming breaths gusting from between its mighty tusks warmed her shivering body: they had a strange sweet smell, like incense-smoke. It had a ruff of thick fur about its neck, she saw now, rather like a lion’s mane, and a bearded chin.

  The beast raised one mighty foreclaw, and she cringed: but instead of attacking her it scratched the side of its neck again. And then she saw that the dragon was chained to the right pillar. There was a loop of heavy black iron behind its head, like a tight-fitting collar. It was this chain, she realized, that had produced the metallic rattle she had heard when the dragon first moved. But who could have done this to such a powerful creature?

  She stepped forward. The dragon watched her approach, still with no sign of anger.

  “You are tame,” she breathed. “He tamed you, didn’t he? You’re Mandrake’s dragon.”

  The great beast clawed at the iron chain, grunting as though it were in pain. The leathery wings upon its back stirred and rustled, then abruptly they burst open. A great double canopy of translucent gold, ribbed with bone, rose in two arches high above Ailia’s head. She gasped. The wings spanned the width of the mountain peak, sixty paces from end to end. For a moment they hung there, quivering, blotting out the sky; then they sagged, collapsed, and furled onto his flanks again. This dragon was earthbound and helpless as any hobbled beast of burden. Mandrake had made him a prisoner. The poor creature. He belonged to the air, to the sky, and only the chain kept him here: he could not break its iron links with his talons or fangs.

  But she could undo it for him. There was no escape for her, not now: but the dragon at least could go free. He had saved her from the Zimbourans, she owed him that much.

  Another remembered voice spoke in her mind: it was Ana’s this time, and she spoke of dragons and earth-magic. “Lying for days upon a hoard of gold and silver augmented a dragon’s powers, giving it the ability to fly and to use sorcery. Dragons did not care for iron, however. Iron is too potent a star-metal: the magic in it is so concentrated that it overwhelms and negates any other sorcery.” So it was no use loosing the chain where it was fastened to the base of the pillar. That would still leave him bound at the neck. Pure, “cold” iron negated sorcery—and dragons flew by sorcery, so Ana had said. If he was to be freed, she must unfasten the collar. There was a clasp on it, she saw, like the one on a necklace, too small for his mighty claws to manipulate. She could undo it. But that would mean going right up close to his gigantic head.

  She approached him, timidly but with resolve, and he seemed to guess her intent: he stood still, lowering his head so that the chain’s clasp was on a level with her shoulders. Reaching out, she caught hold of the chain. She felt his neck beneath her fingertips, and to her surprise his scales were warm and dry: she had thought they would be cold and slimy like a fish’s. She seized the little metal lever that released the clasp, drawing it back. With a clang the iron chain slithered to the stone floor and lay there like a long black snake.

  Shouts arose behind her from the entrance to the stair: the Zimbourans were returning, in greater numbers by the sound of it. “Fly,” she whispered to the dragon. “You can fly away now. Go on!”

  But he did not open his wings again. Instead he stood looking at her; then he folded his forelegs under him, and sank down until his head and neck lay flat upon the rock. For an instant she fancied that he was actually thanking her: it looked very like a bow. But after a moment he rose again, took a couple of steps closer to her, and repeated the gesture, this time with his head lying next to her feet.

  She had a sudden memory of an oddly similar picture: a lady in a graceful gown, with a palfrey kneeling before her. Some horses were trained to go down on their knees so a rider could mount: did tame dragons do the same thing?

  Angry yells filled the air: she saw a whole troop of soldiers running toward them. She leaped for the proffered neck, gripping handfuls of the tumbled mass of the mane. The dragon walked slowly and carefully across the rocky floor, bearing her along on its neck like a Zimbouran elephant carrying its mahout. Ahead of her were the curving horns, behind her the long scaly back and folded wings. She looked down, and saw the creature’s giant shadow striding along beside them on the snow. Behind, the men were standing in a line, arrows taking flight from their bows. The dragon roared as several shafts struck him: she saw the steam of his roar rise up, felt the throbbing in the massive column of his neck. But she was strangely light-headed and not afraid at all. Go on! she urged her strange steed. Fight them, beat them!

  But the dragon strode on toward the portal. And now Ailia saw the cliff beyond, the moonlit ground terminating before a terrible gulf, its depths lost in darkness. The dragon passed between the pillars, up to the very edge, and she gripped handfuls of his mane as the long neck thrust out over the abyss and she found herself looking down on blue deeps of air—down to where the jagged rocks lay, and the forest grew like moss upon the mountainside. Fear came to her again, but still with that odd undercurrent of exhilaration. An arrow flew over her head, and she heard the wind whistle in its feathers, saw it fall into the gulf, down and down.

  There was a creaking and rustling behind her, as of canvas sails mounting a mast. It was the dragon’s wings unfolding again. She felt the huge animal crouch and gather himself. And then the ground was no longer there. The snow-covered rock fell away: there was only the dark rushing up at them, the shriek of the wind in her ears, a blast of cold, a horrid plunge into nothingness that turned her stomach to a bottomless pit. For a dreadful instant they plummeted into the depths.

  There was another sound, a great booming noise like the wind in a ship’s sails: the dragon’s wings were beating. Still, for a moment the iron of the discarded chain on the mountain top worked its malign influence, and they continued to fall. The icy air roared about them. Then the wings beat again, harder this time, with more strength and confidence. They were out of the iron’s range, free to fly with the aid of sorcery. The dragon rose, soaring up to meet the stars, while behind him the crag dwindled away, the figures of the Zimbourans like black ants clustered at its edge between the two tiny pillars.

  Ailia shrieked, not altogether from fear.

  She was flying. Flying!

  The huge wings beat in strong steady rhythm, bearing them both up until the mountain itself diminished, merely one of many that jutted from the earth’s surface. Range upon range appeared, rising one behind the other like waves in the sea, and then there was the real sea in the distance, and the white waste of the ice, and far down below there was the river, running like a thread of silver through the dark tapestry of the forest.

  And still the dragon sought the sky, until the land tilted below them and began to fall away as the mountain had done. From this godlike point of vantage the mountain ranges now appeared as little more than an upheaval of the island’s surface, like the broken earth behind a plow. In a few moments they had passed down the whole length of the river valley—the journey that on land had taken days—and were out over the sea. Ailia looked down and caught her breath at the sight of the rim of white waves, nibbling the shore . . . Something gray poured past like smoke, hiding the view, and then they flew into a cold mist in which Ailia cou
ld see nothing but the vast vanes of the wings, moving up and down. She remembered the cloud that had engulfed the mountaintop. Clouds! I’m in a cloud—

  They burst out into clear air again, above a second sea—a sea made up of white misty shapes, reefs and anvils and mushrooms and mesas poised upon the air. Between these vast masses were strung finer filaments: wispy faerie bridges that spanned great gulfs with dark depths as of water, save that at the very bottom of them she glimpsed the real sea, all diamonded with light, and here and there a glitter of floating ice. She raised her head higher, bracing herself on a horn to look about her, and then she gasped. She could not breathe: her lungs labored and her throat strained. Cold speared her body, cleaving her to the bone, and the cloudscape before her dimmed into a sparked and seething darkness. She sagged back down into the dancing strands of mane—and found her head was clear again. There was air around the dragon, and warmth as well. They wrapped him in an invisible cocoon, an atmosphere that he bore with him as he flew, but its outer limit was only a couple of feet away from his body.

  Feeling dizzy, Ailia shut her eyes. When she dared to look down again it was to find the clouds diminished in their turn, as the mountains had been: they looked to her like clouds reflected in a pool, or like a snowy, furrowed field seen from the top of a high hill. Awe again gave way to terror. She clutched tufts of shaggy mane, wondering how one commanded a mount like this. Were words enough, or did one need magic to guide a tame dragon? How could she get him to fly back down to earth again? As she pondered this there came a blush of fiery color beyond the eastern end of the world—which to Ailia’s eyes now had a perceptible curve—and with the swiftness of a thunderbolt the sun sprang into the sky.

  Ailia and her dragon mount were so high that they had surprised the dawn that lay in wait behind the horizon, and they soared now through a morning not yet come to the lands below. Yet in the sky above her she could still see the stars. As the things of the earth became smaller, so the things of the sky seemed to grow: these stars were not wavering points of light but discs that shone steadily, and the moon low on the rounded horizon was a shining semicircle no longer but a globe half steeped in shadow, while on its sunlit face all its pits and vales and dark mottlings were plainly visible. Almost one might reach out and touch it . . .

  If we fly any higher, thought Ailia, we will be in Heaven itself—

  And then the air opened up in front of them in a blazing tunnel of light.

  21

  The Palace

  DAMION PEERED OUT from behind a stone angel at the enemy below. Ana waited motionless nearby, though her head was bowed now. Greymalkin perched on the parapet gazing down at the Zimbourans, her tail twitching. At the tower door Jomar suddenly went rigid.

  “I hear them. They’re coming up the staircase!”

  The two men began to prepare themselves for combat—not, Damion thought in dismay, that they had much of a chance, with the odds so heavily against them. The Stone, in their possession for so brief a time, was now as good as lost.

  He glanced down over the edge of the parapet. A dragon had flown over minutes ago, surging into view over the western peak: a huge beast, bigger than any he had yet seen, with scales that glittered silver-gold in the starlight. He had hoped that the sight of it would frighten off the Zimbourans, but in vain. It merely soared away into the sky and vanished. The soldiers looked frightened, but none of them fled. King Khalazar waited below, mounted on his horse: a large heavyset man clad in rich robes of scarlet and gold beneath a black fur cloak. His fleshy face sported a full black beard arranged in tight curls. On his head was a tall scarlet headdress, in his hands a naked sword with a long curved blade.

  For Lorelyn, Damion thought. Thank God she wasn’t here: he could almost feel grateful to Mandrake, now, for spiriting her away.

  A red glow touched the undersides of the clouds. What a bitter irony that the end should come for them now, just as day broke—a day whose ending none of them would live to see. Ana lifted her head once more and stared skyward with her veiled eyes, her lips moving as if in prayer. She held the great crystal up before her face, and the blood-colored light filled its heart.

  There was a sound of booted feet advancing up the tower stairs, and Jomar looked down it, raising his sword. “One more step and you’ll be a foot shorter,” he threatened. The boots only ascended faster: Jomar lunged at the doorway, stabbing with his sword, and there was a howl of pain and fury followed by a loud commotion of voices. Jomar laughed wildly.

  “Ha! Come and get it, you Zimbouran dogs!” he roared.

  “Jomar!” came a voice from the stairwell. “You’re already a traitor. Don’t be a fool as well!”

  “Oh, you’re there, are you, Shezzek?” returned Jomar. “Safe at the back as usual! Why don’t you come on up and face me yourself—sir?”

  Shezzek’s voice answered. “Mohara, there is still time. There is no hope for your companions, but if you throw down your sword and come quietly—”

  “All will be forgiven,” Jomar sneered, and made another thrust with his sword. A second yell rang out.

  “Take him, you cowards!” shouted Shezzek, adding a torrent of Zimbouran words.

  And then Jomar leaped back with a terrible cry. To his horror Damion saw the shaft of an arrow protruding from Jomar’s upper back, just under the right shoulder.

  “No!” Damion cried.

  A triumphant shout made him whirl about distractedly; he saw several bowmen ranged in a row atop the broken stump of the western tower.

  “Archers! Ana, get down!” he yelled, then ran to Jomar’s aid. The Mohara man staggered backwards, clutching the arrow’s tip with his free hand: it protruded from his chest. For a fraction of a second his eyes looked into Damion’s, wide and filled with pain. Then his legs gave way beneath him, and he fell.

  “Jo.” Biting back his anguish, the young priest ran to take Jomar’s place at the tower door. But it was too late: a soldier had already leaped through onto the roof, followed by another. Throwing himself in front of his fallen companion, Damion brought his blade down on the first soldier’s with all the fury of desperation. The steel gave way before the gleaming adamant, and the man recoiled in fear. But out of the corner of his eye Damion saw the second man slip past and head for Ana, who still stood facing the sky as though oblivious to the struggle taking place behind her. And now all those behind swarmed out onto the roof. As he faced one attacker another lunged in with lightning speed: white-hot pain shot up Damion’s sword arm, and his weapon dropped from his hand. He ducked under the second, sweeping blow designed to hack off his head, dodged to one side, and succeeded in scooping up Jomar’s fallen sword. Holding it out in both hands, he managed somehow to block the next follow-up thrust, but the sheer force of it propelled him backwards. The parapet was close behind him now, it would only take another heavy blow to send him tumbling over it. Damion’s knees bent under him, and his eyes swam. As he raised his arms again, he saw that his right sleeve was slashed and dyed a bright, shocking scarlet with his own blood.

  The Zimbouran struck at his sword-blade again. He had not the strength, with one wounded arm, to withstand the clash of steel on steel. The sword dropped from his hands. As he collapsed back against the parapet Damion saw Shezzek step out of the doorway. Behind him came a large robed figure: King Khalazar. The latter’s small black eyes went to Ana, still standing motionless with the Stone in her hand. The gem blazed like flame as the rising sun reflected from its facets. Khalazar’s face grew ugly with triumph, the fleshy mouth widening into a wolf’s grin. On the battlement the gray cat shrilled in impotent fury as Shezzek, at an impatient gesture from his king, drew his sword and strode toward the old woman.

  The sun stood above the snowy peaks, and between its light and his tears Damion’s eyes swam in a wavering haze; but he could make out several gleaming shapes hurtling through the air above the Mountains of the Moon. He blinked: for a moment he lost them in the brilliance. They seemed to be flying out of
the sun itself. Huge, winged things, approaching with the speed of thunderbolts. Shrieks of fury echoed from crag to crag as they converged on the summit of Elendor.

  Dragons. Shezzek and Khalazar and the other men looked skyward in fear, arrested in their tracks.

  Damion closed his eyes, dragged a deep breath down into the bottom of his lungs. Then he surged to his feet, ran at the Stone, and snatched it from Ana’s hand. She called out to him, but he ignored her. Stuffing the crystal in his pocket, he swung away from the parapet with its towering angels and ran in the opposite direction: toward the great curving swell of the temple dome.

  The Zimbourans started in surprise, belatedly taking their attention from the flying monsters to the priest. Ignoring the old woman, they turned to pursue Damion—as he had intended. He climbed the curve of the dome on hands and knees, crawling up it like an insect: it was not a proud perfect hemisphere like that of the High Temple in Maurainia, but was more flattened in shape, and the cracked and weathered surface offered him many hand- and footholds. But its upper portion was slippery with snow. Fortunately the archers were focusing all their efforts on the approaching dragons: as he scrambled and slithered up the stone slope he was aware of the huge shapes swooping down out of the sky.

  Cries arose from the enemy. He dared risk one rapid glance backwards, and saw that only two men were after him: Shezzek and one of his soldiers.