The Ghosts of Strangers

by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  Almost to the town was a narrow tunnel, hidden under a hollowed stump. It was human-sized, too small for any but the youngest dragon to get into. No one stayed there except during mating season, but they had all been drilled on how to get in while they were growing up. Every human in the village knew about it; each family took turns restocking the supplies they kept at the far end of the tunnel where it opened into a cavern with its own small spring.

  Most of the children ran into the cave. Tira and Elexa went on toward the village, keeping under the trees. They ran to the center ground, to the roofed frame that held the alarm bell. The dragon Nil was there, meeting her bondchild Kase. Both looked over when Tira grabbed the striker and struck the bell. "What is it?" Kase called.

  "We saw a wild dragon kill a strange human," Tira yelled. People ran out of the tavern and some of the houses, keeping to paths under the eaves where they couldn't be seen from the air. Nil lifted her head, stared at the sky. Kase hung a string of small dead animals around her neck, and Nil raised her wings and plunged upward.

  A human ghost passed Elexa, and she snared it without thinking, wove her mental net tight and small, and compressed the ghost so she could hang it at her waist.

  Tira rang out the pattern that warned of trouble from the sky. All children had practiced this, and the patterns for fire and flood and other concerns such as strangers or celebrations, on handbells when they were small. They had never expected to have to use this one.

  Elexa ran on to the gatherhouse. She glanced inside. Empty; Headman Yan would be helping with the planting.

  Father was tending the dragons' herd today — where had he taken the goats and sheep? They had been grazing along the east sides of the lowest hills, where sun struck the grass soonest, but someone had said at supper last night that those grasses needed time to recover, and Father was going to move the sheep. Which pastures?

  It would be foolish for her to look for Father and Kindal. Father would hear the bell. He would bring the sheep in. Kindal was out hunting dragon food, but no one went beyond the range of the bell; they were all supposed to return and hide. He would hide or return...if he understood the meaning of the series of changes Tira was ringing. No one had rung this alarm except in practice in all the years Elexa could remember.

  She went back to Tira. They should run to the shelter. Or they could stay, and keep sounding; they could shelter in the mountain god's temple, which was closer than the tunnel. The temple had a room beneath it where adults worshipped in secret ways that were taught when the children turned into adults, at fifteen. Elexa and Tira weren't supposed to know how to open the door to that underground, but they had found the hidden latch. They could hide there for a while.

  When Tira's arm tired, Elexa took over, letting Tira explain to the people coming back from the fields and forest what was going on.

  Headman Yan entered the center ground. "Who raised the alarm?" he yelled as he strode across to the bell.

  "I did," Tira said.

  "Why? If this is a prank, Tira Weaver — "

  "No, Headman!" she said. "A stranger dragon, green and yellow, flew over us while we were gem-hunting! It carried a human in its midclaws!"

  "A screaming human," Elexa said. "While we watched, the dragon broke the human."

  "What?"

  "There was a crack," Elexa whispered, "and the human stopped screaming."

  Yan studied their faces, then rushed back into the center ground, hurrying everyone toward the shelter. He checked through the common buildings to make sure everyone was out of them, loaded whoever was still in the village with supplies, and sent them off. He kept his voice low and firm. One boy argued and got cuffed for his trouble. "Get to the shelter," Yan said. The chastened boy ran off in the right direction.

  After he'd gotten everyone moving, Yan came to the bell and took the striker from Elexa. He continued to tap the alarm rhythm on the bell. "Any hints of whether the wild dragon will be back?" he asked.

  "Couldn't tell," said Tira. "This fell off the human when the dragon flew over us." She fished the gold armband out of her pouch and handed it to Yan.

  He studied it with narrowed eyes, then muttered a curse. "It's Likushi," he said.

  Elexa and Tira glanced at each other. Tira shook her head. Elexa frowned. The ghost at her waist struggled.

  Yan realized he had lost them. "The city two days' ride over the passes," he said. "We get some of our metal and much of our grain from — Never mind. This just means we're in for more trouble. Go to the shelter. I'll summon my dragon mother and ask her if she knows more."

  Elexa and Tira ran toward the shelter, hiding under the trees, stepping in the muddy footprints of everyone who had gone before them. Behind them, Yan blew the horn he usually wore at his waist, a strange, rough cry. Dragon shadow raced across the road past them from the direction of the village toward the mountain, and Tira and Elexa clutched each other and crowded against the trunk of a big tree. Two more shadows followed the first, a rush of wings above. Elexa pressed her mouth into Tira's shoulder, forcing the screams back down her throat. After a horrible, petrified time, Tira shook her shoulder. "They're gone," she whispered, when Elexa looked up. "Come on."

  Basil Shoemaker waited at the tunnel entrance, a hand on the hollow stump that could hide the hole in a moment.

  "Have you seen my father?" Elexa asked him. "My brother?"

  "No, but I haven't been watching the door for long. Fonsee Weaver is taking stock of who's here and who's missing," Basil said.

  Tira's mother. So at least she was safe, and busy. Tira's fingers worked the sign for a blessing. "Is Miri here?" she asked.

  "Is Kindal?" asked Elexa.

  "Go in and see for yourselves. Are any following you?"

  "Yan is talking to his dragon," said Elexa.

  "That fool," Basil muttered. "He hasn't designated a successor. He has no right to take such chances. Go in now, girls."

  Elexa and Tira fled past him into the dark passage.

  Elexa trailed her hand along the smooth strip of wall to her right, where hundreds of hands before hers had trailed, a way to keep steady in the dark. Presently she saw flickering light ahead, people and their shadows cast into silhouette against a gatherhouse-sized fire.

  The din in the bigger cavern was deafening. Some had brought their dogs, sheep, goats, and chickens, and the animals didn't feel like being quiet. Elexa searched for her father but didn't see him, nor Kindal. She moved her fingers in a protect sign.

  Tira rushed to her mother, was folded into a hug. "Miri and your father are here," Tira's mother told her; Tira waved to the rest of her family by the fire.

  Elexa followed slowly, searching faces as she went. She tugged Fonsee Weaver's sleeve. "Have you seen my father?" she asked.

  "No, Lex. I'm sorry," said Fonsee. "He's not here."

  "My brother?"

  "No, Lex. Sorry." Fonsee kissed her forehead. "You're last in. Do you have any news?"

  "They sounded the alarm," yelled a deep male voice. "I hope you had a reason, you rascal girls."

  Tira told the story of what they had seen again. Garbled versions had already traveled through the group. Everyone except the animals quieted and listened. Questions and speculations were flying by the time Yan joined them.

  "I've spoken to Plesta," he said in his strident voice; everyone shut up to listen. "She says a wild dragon family has taken up residence on Fourth Terrace, a male and two females, one heavy with eggs. Our dragons have warned them not to hunt in our valley. Jex and Moss and Vevey are watching them and have promised to fight them if they violate our covenant, but the male is very big, with fighting spines. The one you saw was the egg-free female, Tira. She was gone for two days, Plesta says, and they didn't know she'd gone hunting humans. Most of our mothers are in no shape to fight. Plesta will come down at sunset with a better picture of what's going on up the mountain. Till then, I want everyone to stay inside."

  The cave was damp because of the spring. Elexa
had helped make the last pile of thin, dried-bedstraw-stuffed mattresses, one for every child and adult in the village, which they renewed every winter. She grabbed a mattress and took it to a dark corner, away from heat and light. Tira took a mattress and followed. They might as well sleep if they were going to be cooped up here, or at least lie beside each other and talk.

  Sanric and Jezo, his best friend, followed them. "How was your hunting?" Sanric asked. He snatched at Elexa's loot pouch. She batted his hand away, but he had hold of one of the leather ties and didn't let go. Her pouch untied and opened, spilling gems across the floor in soft thuds and bounces. Sanric knelt and snatched at stones.

  Fury swamped Elexa. She dropped her mattress and slapped his face, a sharp crack in the darkness. All her jewels glowed to her special sense, but she couldn't see them with her eyes. "You unbonded blister," she whispered.

  He punched her hard in the chest. It drove the breath out of her, left her collapsed and wheezing.

  "What are you doing, San?" Jezo whispered. "Stop it!"

  Sanric kicked Elexa's leg before Jezo grabbed his arm and dragged him away.

  "What happened?" Tira asked.

  Elexa wheezed, sucking and searching for breath. "He hit me in the chest," she said in a flattened voice, her words interrupted by whistling inhalations. "He kicked me. He spilled my gems!"

  "I'll get some water. Want me to tell Yan?"

  "No. Not yet."

  Tira ran away. Elexa stood her mattress on edge, curved it around her, a small fortress. Gradually her breathing slowed and eased. She felt her pouch to see if it was torn. Only the string that held it closed was broken; the shape of it was intact. She pursued all the dropped gems, their scents and ghost colors clear to her in the darkness, returned them to her pouch, knotted the string, and tied the pouch shut again. Several were missing, including her best find of the day, the blue-violet gem. Sanric must have taken it. She would plead for hearing later, try to get it back. Yan might believe her, or he might not.

  She cradled the loot pouch in her hand. Still enough gems to buy them a scythe and sugar.

  She noticed the unhappy ghost at her waist. In all the confusion, she hadn't had time to find out who he was. She loosened her mental net to let him take the shape he was most comfortable with. Most of the human ghosts she had caught took the shape of who they had last been in life. One of the bonded women from the village, the midwife, had taken a shape like her dragon, though smaller, as though the bond had infected her with dragon spirit. She had joined her dragon joyfully.

  In the dim light of the cavern, Elexa saw the ghost more clearly than she would have by daylight. He did not have the colors of a live person; he glowed and flickered with a pale all-over light of his own. He was taller than anyone she had known alive, and he wore strange clothes, a drape of pale cloth that covered most of him, belted at the waist with gold. He had large hoop earrings. His hair was light and thick and long enough to touch his shoulders. He wore gold bands on both arms. One of his armbands looked just like the one Tira had retrieved after the dragon flew over.

  "Who are you?" Elexa asked.

  "It's me, Tira," said Tira from behind her. "No one would give me a lantern, but I brought you some water." She sat beside Elexa and handed her a stoppered gourd.

  "Smudu Kush," said the ghost. "Who are you? What's happened to me?" His words had an accent she remembered hearing from the grain peddlers.

  "You're dead," Elexa said. She drank, comforted by the slosh of water in the gourd, the shifting weight, the wash of wet across her tongue and down her sore throat.

  "What?" asked Tira.

  "I remember," said the ghost. "I remember. Great Sytha." He hugged himself, dropped into a huddled ball beside her. "First the long fear and flying, and then the jerk that broke me. Sytha protect me!"

  "I'm not dead," Tira said. "What's the matter? Are you having a nightmare?"

  "I'm talking to a ghost."

  "What?" Tira's voice was alarmed.

  "The dragon snatched you," Elexa said to Smudu. "What were you doing when she snatched you?"

  Tira pressed the back of her hand to Elexa's forehead. "Are you sick?"

  Elexa brushed her off. "Stop it."

  "I was on the way to the council house. We were to discuss allocating more archers to guard duty, and one of our armorers made a new shield with sharpened spikes around its edge we thought people could carry with them to fend off dragon attacks — you could hold it over your head and cut their talons if they grabbed you. We were going to discuss producing more of those.

  "There were reports of dragon attacks on some of the outlying farms, and we were wondering whether to summon the farmers into the city until we could find a dragon fighter to deal with the problem . . . I was snatched crossing the market square." He straightened out of his huddle, glanced over his shoulder. "It was horrifying. The dark shape descending, the screams of everyone as we ran. The claws cut me. The ground rushed away from me, and the dragon held me up against its burning belly. I could smell my own flesh cooking. The pain was so bad I think I fainted. The cold air woke me. I — where am I?"

  "We are underground," Elexa said, "hiding from the dragon who killed you."

  "Underground where?" asked Smudu.

  "Elexa," Tira wailed.

  "Mountainknee Village," Elexa said.

  "The village called Dragonhome?"

  "I don't know. We don't call it that, but we are home to dragons. Our dragons don't snatch and kill people, though."

  "You say I'm dead," said Smudu slowly. "Are you a deadspeaker, then?"

  "I don't know."

  "Is it dark where we are? You are only a voice to me."

  "We're in a cave, and it's quite dark in this corner." She glanced over her shoulder toward the gather fire. People were standing there, dark silhouettes against the flames, their heads bent toward each other. A murmur of conversation carried, though not the words.

  Tira tugged on her sleeve. "Elexa. Elexa, what are you doing?"

  "Open your ghost eyes, Tira. I caught the ghost of the dragon's dead, and he's telling me who he was before he died."

  "You caught a human ghost, Elexa? You can't do that."

  "Why not?"

  "It's wrong. Besides, people don't have the same kind of ghosts that animals do. We go somewhere else when we die. You're upset. You have a fever. Did Sanric kick your head and scramble your brains?" Tira tried to touch Elexa's forehead again.

  Elexa slapped her hand away. "Tira, stop it! I am not sick. When did I ever lie to you?"

  "You lied when you told me you and Maro weren't meeting secretly behind the temple."

  "That was two years ago, and you and I weren't really friends then."

  "We were until you started lying to me."

  Elexa scrubbed her hands over her face. Her chest ached, her throat was still sore from vomiting, her thigh throbbed where Sanric had kicked her, and her blood had been racing since she heard Smudu's death scream. She was tired now. She didn't want to think about the time when she and Tira had been enemies. Maro had abandoned Elexa as soon as their secret meetings were known. For almost a year after that, she had had no living friends; she had sought human ghosts to talk to. "Please, Tira. Please," she whispered. Where was Father? Where was Kindal? Had they heard the alarm? Was the wild dragon even now circling from the sky, ready to drop down and kill her father and her brother?

  Tira rubbed her shoulder. "I'm sorry. I'm just worried."

  "Your friend is not a deadspeaker," Smudu said.

  "Can you hear her?"

  "Dimly. It is strange. Your words are clear to me, but hers come to me on a river of sound that beats as blood used to in my ears."

  "What is he saying?" Tira asked. She settled on the mattress beside Elexa and looked in the same direction Elexa did, apparently determined to pretend she believed her friend.

  "His name is Smudu Kush, from Likush — is that right, Smudu-sir?"

  "Likush, yes."

 
"He was a councillor there, and he was snatched from their center ground."

  "Elexa?" Yan's voice cut through her murmured recital. She glanced around and saw his shaggy-haired shadow standing between her and the fire.

  "Headman?" Elexa hugged herself.

  "Are you in truth talking to the dragon's dead?"

  "I am," she whispered.

  "How long have you had this deadspeaking skill?"

  "Since I was six," she said, then wondered if she should have told him. She did not trust Yan, even though old Peder had.

  "You're the one Plesta spoke of?"

  She shrugged and huddled in on herself. "I don't know what your dragon told you."

  "She said one of the village children brought village ghosts up to the terrace to join their dragons in relife. It's an old tradition, she said, but never one as well tended as it has been since you started this practice. For the gifts you've given us, I thank you."

  There was a tone in his voice that worried her, a sharp edge of irritation that didn't match the words he spoke. She hadn't told anyone in the village of her encounters with human ghosts. Yan was the last person she had wanted to tell. Too late to keep it to herself now.

  "Ask the man what he knows about the dragon who took him."

  "Smudu-sir, did you hear what the headman said?"

  "What do I know about the dragon? I know nothing except that it came down from the sky and took me, and though I screamed and struggled, I could not stop it. We knew there was a village here in the mountains where people and dragons live together, but all we know of dragons from our own encounters is that in bad years they come and steal our stock and sometimes our children. We fear them.

  "Once when I was riding in the mountains I saw three of them crouched over a kill, snapping at each other, hissing, sending out rivers of flame that charred the meat and sent smoke rising — horrifying creatures, large and hard to fight. We are fortunate they are scarce.

  "We have not had enough attacks in Likush to focus all our energy on fighting them, but lately they grow bolder. Our armorers have worked on steel-tipped arrows, but our archers can only kill dragons when they hit the throat just at the base of the neck; all other parts of the dragons' hides are too hard to pierce. Not all of our archers are skilled enough or strong enough to strike a killing blow. The lord's war wizard has been working on smokes to stun them, but we don't have enough specimens to experiment on. We would like to get hold of a young one we could control so we can test our weapons on it, but no one knows how. Some have suggested we send — " Smudu suddenly turned away, put his ghost hand over his ghost mouth.