by Robin Hobb
“Dragon!”
She swung her attention back to the old woman. “You should leave,” Jani Khuprus cried out in a low voice. Tintaglia heard fear in it, but also a pleading. Did she fear what would happen if the dragon had to defend herself ?
“You should follow the rest of your kind and their keepers, who are turning into Elderlings. Go to Kelsingra, dragon! That is where you belong. Not here!”
“Elderlings. In Kelsingra? I have been there. The city is empty.”
“Perhaps it was, but no longer. The other dragons have gone there, and the rumor is that the keepers who went with them are becoming Elderlings. Elderlings such as you seek.”
Something in the old woman’s voice . . . no. In her thoughts. Tintaglia focused on her alone. Kelsingra?
Go there! As Malta and Reyn have gone there. Go, before blood is shed! For all our sakes!
The old woman had caught on quickly. She stared silently at the dragon, projecting the warning with all her heart.
“I am leaving,” Tintaglia announced. She turned slowly, deliberately back toward the docks. The men in front of her muttered angrily and gave way only grudgingly.
“Let her leave!” Jani’s voice rang out again, and surprisingly, other voices echoed hers.
“Let the dragon go! Good riddance to her!”
“Please, let her pass, with no one killed!”
“Let her be gone, and let us be done with all dragons!”
The men were giving way to her as she moved toward the damaged dock. They cursed her in low voices and spat on the ground as she passed, but they let her go. Within, she seethed with hatred and disdain for them, and she longed to kill them all. How dare they show their petty tempers to her, how dare they spit at her passing, the puny little monkeys! She swung her head slowly as she passed, keeping as many of them in view as she could. As she had feared they might, they closed ranks behind her and moved slowly after her. They could corner her on the dilapidated docks and possibly drive her off into the cold swift river if she was not careful.
She loosened her wings slightly and steeled her will. This was going to hurt, and she would have only one chance. She studied the long wooden dock before her. Loosened planks sprawled at odd angles and yes, two tethered boats foundered there, listing at odd angles as they tugged at their moorings. She gathered her strength in her hind legs.
Without warning, she sprang forward in a great leap. Behind her, human voices were raised in roars of fear and dismay. She landed on the dock, and it gave to her weight. And then, as she had hoped, it recovered buoyancy and began to rise. Not much, but it would have to be enough. She flung her wings open, shrieked in harsh fury at the pain, and drove her wings down hard as she leaped up.
It was enough. She caught the wind above the moving river water and, beat by painful beat, rose into the sky. She thought of circling back, of diving on them and sending them scattering, perhaps even driving them into the river. But her pain was too great and her growing hunger stabbed her. No. Not now. Now she would hunt, kill, eat, and rest. Tomorrow she would fly on to Kelsingra. Perhaps one day she would return to make them sorry. But first she must find Elderlings to heal her. She banked and turned and resumed her painful journey upriver.
“It won’t be long now,” Leftrin said, and felt vast relief at being able to utter the words. He stood on the roof of the deckhouse. The wintry day was winding down to an early close, but he had sighted the first buildings of Kelsingra. They were nearly home, he thought, and then chuckled. Home? Kelsingra? No. Home was where Alise was now, that was clear for him.
The journey had been long but not nearly as long as his first trip to Kelsingra. This time he had not been slowed by the need to hold his boat to the pace of plodding dragons or to stop early every night so that the hunters might bring meat for the dragons and the keepers could rest their weary bodies. Nor had they wasted days in a shallow swamp trying almost in vain to find their way back to the true course. But even so, the thin wailing of the sickly infant had made each day seem to last a week. He was sure he was not the only one to have been unable to sleep through Phron’s colicky cries. Looking at Reyn’s gaunt face and bloodshot eyes, he knew that the baby’s father had shared his unwilling vigil.
“That’s Kelsingra? That scatter of buildings?” Reyn seemed incredulous.
“No. That’s the beginning of the outskirts. It’s a big city, and it sprawls along the riverbank and maybe extends up into those foothills. With the leaves off the trees, I can see that it’s even bigger than I thought it was.”
“And it’s just . . . deserted? Empty? What happened to all the people? Where did they go? Did they die?”
Leftrin shook his head and took another long drink from his mug. The steam and aroma of the hot tea swirled up to join the mist over the river. “If we had answers to those questions, Alise would be ecstatic. But we don’t know. Maybe as we explore the city more, we’ll find out. Some of the buildings are empty, as if people packed all their belongings and left. Other homes look as if people pushed back from the table, walked out the door, and never came back.”
“I should wake Malta. She’ll want to see this.”
“No, you shouldn’t. Let her sleep and let the baby sleep. It will all still be here when she wakes up, and I think you should let her get whatever rest she can.” It would have shamed Leftrin to admit that he wasn’t thinking of Malta so much as his own peace. He doubted that Reyn could wake her without disturbing the baby and setting off another long spate of crying. The child was quiet only when he was asleep or nursing, and he seemed to do little of either of late.
“Is that another dragon?” Reyn asked suddenly.
As Leftrin turned his eyes toward the sky, he felt a tingle of interest from his ship. He squinted, but the only color he could make out was silver. “When I left, only Heeby had made it aloft. The others were trying, but none of them were doing too well. It’s one reason I was so startled to see Sintara a few days ago. Still, it doesn’t seem likely . . .”
“It’s Spit!” Hennesey shouted the news from the afterdeck. “Look at that little bastard fly! Can you see him, Tillamon? He’s silver, so when he’s in front of the overcast, he’s a bit hard . . . there! See him? He just broke out from those clouds. He’s one of the smallest and, to start with, one of the stupidest of the dragons. Looks like he can fly now; but even if he’s smart enough to get off the ground, he’s still a mean little package of trouble. When we get to the village, you’d best avoid him. But Mercor, now there’s a dragon you’ll enjoy.”
Tillamon, her shawl clasped around her shoulders, shaded her eyes with her free hand and nodded to every word. Her cheeks were pink with the chill wind and excitement. And perhaps with something more? Hennesey had seemed more garrulous and social of late. Leftrin glanced at Reyn a bit warily, wondering if the Elderling had noticed that the mate was perhaps just a bit too familiar with the lady. But if Reyn had noticed, his objection was drowned by the sudden shrill wail of his son.
“Damn the luck,” he said quietly, and he left the captain’s side.
The effect of the baby’s crying on the crew seemed a palpable thing to Leftrin. He wondered if it was because it also seemed to distress the liveship. A shivering of anxiety, probably undetectable to some of the crew members but definitely unnerving to him, ran through the ship. Almost as if in response, Spit dipped one wing to circle overhead, dropping lower with each revolution. Of all the dragons that could take an interest in their arrival, Spit was his least favorite. He was as Hennesey had described him: dim-witted when they had first taken the dragons on, and mean since he had acquired a mind of his own. His temper was uneven, and it seemed to Leftrin that he was the most impulsive of the lot. Even the larger dragons seemed to give him a wide berth when he was in a foul mood.
As he watched, Spit left off circling above Tarman and sped off downriver. Leftrin hoped he’d spied some prey and that he’d hunt, kill, eat, and leave them alone. But in a moment, he heard distant shouts a
nd realized that Spit was now circling the Bingtown boat that still stubbornly shadowed them. Leftrin smiled grimly. Not the sort of prey he’d had in mind for Spit. Well, they’d been curious as to what had become of the cast-out dragons that had left Cassarick in midsummer. Let them have a good look at what one of them had become.
Spit descended another notch, tightening his circle so that no one could mistake the object of his interest. Leftrin watched in amusement tinged with alarm as the distant deck of the pursuit vessel suddenly swarmed with human figures. He could not make out what they were shouting. From the very beginning of their pursuit, they had kept their distance from the Tarman, never hailing the other ship or coming close to tie up beside them in the evenings. They had enacted that quarantine, not Leftrin, but he had chosen not to challenge it.
Now, as Spit circled ever closer to them, he regretted the decision. Regardless of their eventual intent, they were fellow Traders and humans. He wished now that he knew who captained the Bingtown vessel and the temperament of the crew. He wished he had seized an opportunity to caution them against provoking the dragons. They were no longer the earthbound beggars they had been.
“I never thought they would follow us this far up the river. I thought sure we would lose them along the way.”
Hennesey had joined him on the roof of the deckhouse. When the baby had begun to wail, Tillamon had hastened to see if she could be of any help to Malta, leaving the first mate to recall his duties to the ship. Leftrin glanced over at him. He’d known Hennesey since he was no more than a scupper plug on the ship when Leftrin himself had first come aboard to share that lowly status. Was there a light in his eyes that had never been there before? Hard to tell. Right now, he stared raptly at the drama unfolding downriver.
“Who could have predicted this? No one.” Leftrin wondered if he were trying to evade responsibility. For onto the other ship’s deck had come a man who now assumed the unmistakable stance of an archer. They were too far away for a warning shout from him to carry to the men on the deck or the circling dragon. They could only watch disaster unfurl.
“Oh, don’t do it . . .” Hennessey groaned.
“Too late.” Leftrin could barely make out the arrow that took flight, but he tracked it by Spit’s response. The dragon evaded it easily and then shot skyward, beating his wings hard to gain altitude.
The fools on the Bingtown vessel cheered, thinking they had warded off the dragon’s attack. But as Spit reached the top of his arcing flight, he trumpeted out a wild summons. A strange thrill shot through the liveship; Leftrin saw Hennesey feel it as much as he did. Before either man could comment, distant answering cries came from all directions. Then, in less than a breath, half a dozen dragons, including gleaming Mercor and shimmering Sintara, hove into view. Some came from the city; some simply seemed to appear in the sky as if the clouds had hidden them. Kalo, black as a thundercloud and as threatening, shot toward the circling, keening Spit.
“Like crows gathering to harry an eagle,” Hennesey pointed out, and in an instant, he was proven right. Instead of one dragon circling the hapless ship, a funnel cloud of avengers was forming. Leftrin was left breathless with wonder. How they had grown since last he had seen them, and how their ability to fly had transformed them! He felt awe that he had walked among such fearsome creatures without terror, that he had doctored their injuries and spoken with them. To see them now, glittering and gleaming even in the dimmed sunlight of the overcast day, transformed them from the crippled and wounded creatures he had shepherded into knife-edged predators of incredible power.
On the ship below them, men were bellowing commands and warnings to one another. Their archer had set an arrow to his bow and stood, muscles taut, ready to fire should any dragon descend within range. Leftrin could hear the dragons calling to one another, wild trumpets, distant rumbles of thunder and shrill cries.
“They’re disagreeing about something,” Hennesey guessed.
“Those dragons . . . can you call to them? Can anyone here persuade one to come to us?” Malta had joined them. Leftrin turned to look at her, shocked that in the midst of the dragons threatening the other vessel, she still thought only of her child. Then he really saw her, and his heart filled with pity.
The Elderling woman looked terrible. The colors of humanity had fled from her face, and the overlay of bluish scaling made the rest of her seem gray, as if someone had ornamented stone. There were lines by her mouth and under her eyes. Her hair had been brushed, braided, and pinned up. It was tidy, but it did not gleam. Life was draining out of her.
“I can’t call them, I’m afraid. But we are close to Kelsingra, Malta. As soon as we arrive the keepers will be able to summon them. Even if we could call one here, it could not land and speak with us. Once we are off the river—”
“Dragon fight!” Hennesey interrupted them. From Tarman’s deck, there were shouts of amazement. Leftrin turned in time to see Spit diving on the distant ship. He seemed luminous, his silver sparkling like a tumbling coin, and by that the captain knew that his poison glands would be swollen and ready. Matching him in his dive was Mercor: as Spit swept over the ship, the golden dragon came up suddenly beneath him and knocked him off his course. The golden dragon beat his wings strongly, bearing the smaller silver up and away before tilting sideways and away from him, leaving Spit flapping wildly as he fell. As he went down, a pale cloud of sparkling venom shone. Just short of the water, the silver dragon recovered, but not well. He flew, his wings flinging up splashes at the tips, to land awkwardly at the river’s edge. The venom fell too, dispersing as the light wind touched it, landing harmlessly in the river rather than on the ship. From the shore, Spit’s vocalizations were savage and furious.
The crew of the other ship bent energetically to their sweeps. It was moving downriver as fast as the current and its oars could carry it. Overhead, the circling dragons took it in turns to feint dives at the fleeing boat, their trumpeted calls conveying merriment and mockery to Leftrin. After a time, he realized that the boat was scarcely their target anymore; they appeared to be competing to see who could dive fastest and swoop closest to it before rising back to join the others. Spit managed to launch himself back into the air, but he did not join the others. He flew laboriously, possibly injured from his collision, back toward the heart of Kelsingra. Leftrin continued to watch the Bingtown boat as the dragons harried it out of sight down the river. He waited, but even after it was out of sight, the dragons did not return.
“They’ve changed,” Hennesey observed quietly.
“Indeed they have,” Leftrin agreed.
“They’re real now,” the mate said. More quietly he added, “They frighten me.”
Day the 27th of the Fish Moon
Year the 7th of the Independent Alliance of Traders
From Keffria Vestrit, of the Bingtown Traders
To Jani Khuprus of the Rain Wild Traders, Trehaug
Jani, as we both well know, there is no privacy to bird-sent messages anymore. If you have anything of great confidentiality, please send it in a packet by any of the liveships that ply the Rain Wild River. I have far more confidence in them than I do in the so-called Bird Keepers’ Guild. I will do the same, save for tidings that must reach you immediately and thus must, unfortunately, be subject to spying and gossip.
Herewith, the bones of what you must know. My messages to Malta are going unanswered. I am gravely concerned, especially since she was so close to giving birth. If you can send me any tidings to put my mind at ease, I would greatly appreciate it.
Other information also too grave to delay sharing: I have finally heard from Wintrow in the Pirate Isles. You may recall I wrote to him months ago to ask if he knew anything of Selden. As is often the case with letters sent through that region, both my message and his response were greatly delayed. He had no tidings of Elderlings but was alarmed at gossip of a “dragon boy” exhibited in a traveling display of freaks and oddities that had been journeying through his territory. Effort
s on his part to learn more were fruitless. He fears that those he has queried have been less than frank for fear of incurring the wrath of the Pirate Queen’s consort. I beg you to use your contacts to ask if anyone has heard of such a traveling exhibition, and where they were last seen.
With great anxiety,
Keffria
CHAPTER SEVEN
City Dwellers
Moving to the city had proved more challenging for the keepers than the dragons, Thymara thought. Kelsingra was a city built for dragons. The broad streets, the immense fountains, the scale of the public buildings all proclaimed that dragons had resided there. Entries were tall and wide, steps were set for a dragon’s tread, and every dimension of every chamber dwarfed humans to insignificance. For keepers who had grown up in the tiny tree houses of Trehaug and Cassarick, the differences were stunning. “It doesn’t feel like I’m inside,” Harrikin had observed the first time he entered the dragon baths. All the keepers had clustered together, looking up in wonder at the immense frescoes on the ceiling far overhead. Sylve, Thymara, Alum, and Boxter had held hands and tried to measure the diameter of one of the supporting pillars. The first night that all the keepers had spent in the city together, they had slept in a cluster in the corner of an immense room, as if the building were a new kind of wilderness in which they had to huddle together against unknown dangers.