The Dragon of Despair

by Jane Lindskold

  "Thanks, Mom," he said. "When I'm dreadfully important, I'll steal you from Prancing Steed Stables and keep you to do all my paperwork and handle my social obligations."

  Vernita laughed.

  "And who would keep your father in line?"

  "Let Dami," Derian suggested, breaking the red wax seal with its imprint of an eagle inside an eight-pointed star. "She's smart enough, when she isn't being useless."

  Damita stuck her tongue out at him, but she was too interested in what the royal missive might contain to sass him as she might have at another time.

  After the usual formalities and greetings, the letter was brief:

  Firekeeper has returned and we know something of your journey west. We had wished in any case to consult you on other matters. Could you call on the afternoon following the date of your arrival to discuss these and other matters?

  It was signed by the king himself, though the rest of it was written in another hand, probably that of Farand Briarcott, the king's confidential secretary.

  Derian showed the letter to VernitaùDami dancing up to look when he didn't tell her not toùand asked:

  "Should I send an acceptance, or would that be ridiculous? I mean, does anyone turn down an invitation from the king?"

  Vernita glanced up from the letter, a hundred questions about everything it didn't say in her eyes.

  "It never hurts to be polite," she replied, "even with a king. I don't know how nobles handle such things. Answer according to the manners of your class and while some self-important person might fault you for ignorance, no one will fault you for rudeness."

  Derian smiled his thanks.

  "Can I borrow your desk and writing materials? I'd better answer right away if they want me by tomorrow afternoon."

  Vernita waved in the direction of her office.

  "Help yourself, but don't smear dirt all over the contracts. Damita, put on shoes and a nice frock. You can run your brother's letter up to the castle. Get Brock to walk with you."

  Damita, comfortable in open sandals and a loose smock, looked as if she might protest, thought better of it, and ran upstairs. By the time Derian had finished sanding the wet ink, she was down again. She'd even taken the time to twist her brilliant red-gold hair up and fasten it with the doe clasp that had been her mother's gift on her last birthday.

  Derian gave his sister a courtly bow, aware of his own road dirt, but relieved to have this responsibility dealt with.

  "You look lovelier than ever, Dami," he said. "I am delighted to have you as my courier. The guards at the gate won't be able to say they forgot your coming and so fail in their duties."

  Damita turned bright red, snatched the sealed letter from his hand, and scurried out without another word.

  Derian looked after her with fondness.

  "She's really getting pretty," he said to his mother. "Is she still in love with Uncle Jeweler's apprentice?"

  "I'm not sure," Vernita said. "She's not at an age to confide in her mother. Maybe you could learn something before you vanish once more."

  Derian stared at her.

  "Do you know something about my plans that I don't?" "Many things," Vernita said, a trace of Derian's own flippancy in her tone. "But in this case, no. Just a suspicion."

  WHE NEXT AFTERNOON, Derian headed up to the castle, determined to be on time. He'd dressed up for the appointment and was stifling in the vest and jacket. He found himself wishing that his best shoes were better broken inùespecially after weeks wearing nothing but his more comfortable old boots.

  Since Derian knew what a nuisance navigating a horse through the streets could be he'd waved off his father's offer of a riding horse from the stables. Even so, as Derian made his way up the hill he found himself wishing for a mount or better yet, a carriage.

  He wondered if some sort of hired service could be contracted for and distracted himself from the pinching of his shoes by working out some of the details for such a business. It interested him more than he thought it would, and when he arrived he filed the matter away for discussion with his parents at some later time.

  A runner escorted Derian through the corridors despite Derian's mild protest that he knew his way perfectly well. Derian knew that such an escort was a matter of protocol and that whether or not he thought himself worthy of such treatment didn't matter a whit if Steward Silver decided that he did. The castle staff would more willingly cross the king than his steward over such matters.

  The king's private receiving room had been moved to another location in the two moonspans' length that had passed since Derian had last attended on Tedric. In this room, no fire burned. Vases of cut roses filled the hearth instead, their red, yellow, and orange making a glow of their own. Windows were wide open, curtained with muslin that let in the breeze while keeping out most of the insects. The stone floors and walls that had seemed so dank before now seemed welcomingly cool.

  Blind Seer evidently thought so. The wolf lay flat on the floor near one of the open windows, his belly and chin pressed against the stone. Last winter Derian had envied the wolf his thick fur. He didn't this afternoon.

  Firekeeper, sitting on the floor next to the wolf, wore her usual combination of vest and knee-length trousers as if the weather were no warmer than before. This set was cleaner than the ones he'd last seen her in, so Derian guessed that someone in the castle had been assigned to maintain a wardrobe for the wolf-woman. It might be unusual, given Firekeeper's comparatively low rank, but it certainly beat having her grubby and smelling of sweat during her unanticipated visits.

  Princess Sapphire, gowned in something loose and flowing, didn't seem any happier than Blind Seer about the summer heat. She might have been a bit rounder through the middle, but Derian wasn't going to look closely enough to be certain; Sapphire didn't look like she was in the most affable of moods.

  Otherwise, the crown princess looked very well indeed. Vernita had told Derian that the castle had given out that the princess was over her morning sickness. Derian had wondered if the announcement was merely good politics. Looking at Sapphire he was certain that it was true.

  King Tedric also seemed somewhat better. His cough was gone and his color stronger. However, the weight he had lost over the winter had not returned. The skin around his neck and under his eyes hung loose. Derian had a rather better look at the king than he had anticipated, for Tedric had forgone the formality of wearing a wig. His close-cut white hair showed his scalp at points, vaguely embarrassing Derian. It seemed like he was seeing the king naked rather than merely unwigged.

  Prince Shad, rising to greet Derian when he entered, was as informal as the king. He was young enough that he didn't bother with a wig, but he was in shirtsleeves and his trousers were loosely tailored. He looked more like the sailor he'd been a year ago than a prince.

  "Thank you for coming, Counselor," said Shad, "when you must be longing to rest from the road. The kitchen has sent up a variety of cool drinks. What would you like?"

  Derian accepted both a glass of tea heavily infused with mint and Shad's insistence that he put aside both jacket and vest. So eased, he seated himself and answered questions about the journey over the mountains and back againùmoderating himself more than he had with his family last night. It wouldn't do to criticize Firekeeper for the pace she'd set, not when her need was so real and urgent.

  He wondered what the king's need was. The letter that had been sent to Derian's family had been dated before Firekeeper arrived back in Eagle's Nestùindeed, from a few days after their departure from Bardenville. King Tedric couldn't have known what they'd find and how Firekeeper would react.

  Could he?

  Derian recalled the king's cryptic speech before their departure and wondered. However, he schooled himself to patience. One thing he'd learned about dealing with royalty was that they got around to business in their own timeùand sometimes that was a lot faster than the common man was ready to deal with.

  "Lady Archer," the king said, something in th
e shift of his tone or posture signaling that the time for visiting was over, "asked us to give you her greetings. She arrived in Eagle's Nest some days after your departure, in response to a summons we sent regarding the Melina question."

  Derian knew some of how the Melina question had developed since their departure. For one thing, knowledge of her remarriage was now general gossip. Opinions varied along much the range he had anticipated, though the level of fear and resentment was rather higher than he had imagined. Even his own familyùas sane and loyal supporters of the Crown as could be desiredùhad expressed some fear that Melina's influence would reach the castle. Derian had done his best to dissuade them, but he hadn't been happy about the need to do so. He also hadn't liked the rumors he'd heard about what Melina was doing with slaves and human sacrifice.

  "Lady Archer is in Eagle's Nest then?" he asked, feeling on more comfortable ground there.

  "No," the king replied. "She has gone to the Norwood Grant to prepare an expedition into New Kelvin."

  Derian straightened in his seat, sensing why that letter had been sent to his parents' house half a moonspan before. King Tedric seemed once again like a ruler with his own and his country's interests at heart rather than a seer.

  "We need a chosen few to go into New Kelvin," King Tedric continued. "There are two reasons. One, we need inside information as to how much truth there is behind the rumors. Two, it may be our only hope for saving Citrine's sanity."

  He went into detail then on the first matter. When he had finished, Sapphire spoke about Citrine's situation, the tears pooling in her blue eyes eloquent of the sorrow and fear she would not let into her words.

  Derian listened to both speeches without asking a single question, already knowing that he would do as King Tedric desired. Even if the politics of New Kelvin didn't interest himùand they did, especially now that Melina was involvedùhe would have risked himself for Citrine alone. It wasn't that he valued her life more than he did his ownùand he had no illusions that he'd be risking his life if he returned to New Kelvin, especially with Melina in a position of influenceùit was that he didn't think he could face himself if he let Citrine suffer, knowing there was something he might have done to heal her.

  Firekeeper was less altruisticùor perhaps merely differently so. Her first words when Sapphire ended her recitation were:

  "And my people and your people? What do this going to New Kelvin do for them?"

  If Derian had not sat through some of the king's counsel meetings, he would have thought the wolf-woman impossibly rude. Now he recognized the note in her voice as akin to that he'd heard in the voices of the heads of Great Houses. She might see that she could be of use to the king, but her own interests must be dealt with first.

  King Tedric didn't look surprised at Firekeeper's question. Indeed, he may have been watching her fidget as Sapphire spoke.

  "Indirectly, your going to New Kelvin may do a great deal for your people, Firekeeper."

  He held up a hand when the wolf-woman looked as if she might interrupt.

  "I have considered the matter you brought to me and have discussed it with my heirs. They agree with me that what you have told us is indeed serious. They also agree that it is a matter to be dealt with in secrecy and with great care."

  Firekeeper frowned, but King Tedric had kept his words fairly simple and it was clear to Derian that she had mostly understood.

  "The reality is," the king continued, "that the conceptùthe ideaùof the Royal Beasts is a difficult one for us humans to grasp. Even those of us who have met Blind Seer and Elation, who have heard reports of messages relayed by crows and seagulls, must make a great effort to accept that these are other intelligent people."

  Firekeeper made a noise like a kettle coming onto a boil, but said nothing. Shad, who had been quietly holding Sapphire's hand, now spoke:

  "Firekeeper, try to imagine what it would be like if you had grown up with wolvesùonly wolvesùas the only people to whom you could talk. Now suddenly someone is telling you, offering proof even, that the rabbits and the deer and the elk and the bear are all just as smart as the wolves, different, but just as smart."

  Firekeeper nodded, her head tilted to one side in a fashion that made Derian think that she had possibly entertained just such thoughts at one time or another.

  "Now, to make that matter more difficult," Shad went on, "you're being told that it's not every rabbit or deer or elk or bear who is as smart as your wolves, just some, and those all live far away, across the mountains. That's how it is for us. We can see Blind Seer and Elation, but it's hard to imagine a whole pack of Blind Seers, a whole flock of Elations. Do you understand?"

  Firekeeper said "Yes," but from her tone the word hurt her. Shad went on.

  "Now, we here believe you, but getting the rest of our people to believe is going to be very hard to do. Some will refuse to believe in any case. They will say that you have trained a handful of animals and are running a scam…"

  Firekeeper tilted her head interrogatively.

  "A trick," Shad clarified. "That you're trying to fool us for some gain of your own."

  "Why I do this?" Firekeeper asked.

  "Maybe to get control of all the lands west of the Iron Mountains," Shad offered. "People will remember that Earl Kestrel was the one who found you and they will remember that he holds much land bordering the mountains. They might decide that the earl was lying after all, that he was playing a far deeper game… more complicated," Shad clarified, "trickier… than he ever let on."

  Firekeeper snorted.

  "That stupid! Not even Norvin Norwood could manage that!"

  King Tedric spoke, "People believe what they want to believe and many would find it easier to believe that Norvin would go to that much trouble to create an interesting heir to the throne and then, when that gambitùtrickùfailed, come up with something else."

  Firekeeper chewed her lower lip for a moment.

  "Humans have," she said thoughtfully, "so many words for 'trick' that they must use many, many of them. Wolves," she continued proudly, "do not lie."

  Blind Seer raised his head and stared at her.

  "Not often," she added, clearly in self-correction.

  Derian swallowed a smile. Shad and Sapphire traded a glance that held a lingering trace of disbelief. Then Sapphire took over.

  "There will be those people who will believe," she said. "Some of these will be more open-minded than most. Others will be dreamers. Others will be those who have seen you and Blind Seer at workùsoldiers during King Allister's War, members of the Kestrel household, people here at the castle. However, most of these are not going to be decision makers. Moreover, just because they believe won't mean they'll like what they're learning."

  "Because humans believe," Firekeeper said scornfully, "that they are the Ones and the rest are tail-dragging followers."

  "That will be true for some," Sapphire admitted with more patienceùor perhaps more personal insight than Derian would have given her credit for. "However, others will simply be afraid."

  "So they should be," Firekeeper said smugly. "That is what I warn you."

  Smugness melted from Firekeeper's features to be replaced by fear.

  "And that is what I am warning Beasts, too. Humans afraid are very dangerous. Even without old magics humans have once I think many Beasts would die and many, many Cousins. There would be sickness from dead and dying. In the end, I think Beasts would win, but they would not like what is left when they are finished."

  Derian thought he understood what she was imagining. He'd seen the battlefields following both the Battle on the Banks and King Allister's War. He'd smelled the sickly sweet smell of rotting corpses, the odor of gangrene in the field hospitals, the vomit and diarrhea from those who fell ill with fever and infection when there were too few hands to clean up the mess. And those had been small wars.

  What Firekeeper had sketched out for him along the trail home had been a long campaign, one side fighting from cover.
No farmer would be safe in his fields, no hunter would dare go out alone. Domestic animals would be stolen from their barns and coops. Fields would be stripped. Orchards would be covered with flocks of birds set not on gorging but on ruining.

  With a sudden shock, Derian realized what Ewen Brooks and his colonists would be up against, even if they weren't killed outright. What could they do in return?

  They could burn huge swaths of forest land so that the Beasts would lack cover to approach them. They could poison their fields or bury traps or dig pitfalls. Sickness would come, for they would try to kill any animal who came closeùwithout bothering to learn if it was enemy Royal or uninvolved Cousin. Thus the scavengers would be unable to perform their role in the natural order.

  Mind, none of this would save Ewen's colony, but he and his people might get revenge for the ruin of their dreams. If they were among those who accepted that the Royal Beasts were as clever as humans, then they might figure that their opponents would be clever enough to assess loss and make a truce. Given this thought, Ewen and his people might destroy all the more, hoping to force that unwilling accord.

  And would the Beasts make a truce? Looking at Firekeeper, sitting there on the floor, her arms wrapped around her knees, her dark eyes as unreadable as a cloudless night sky, Derian wasn't certain they would. They might just prefer to fight until their enemy was destroyed and trust the land to heal after the battle was ended. And if the war of Beasts and humans crossed the Iron Mountains, then the same scenario would be repeated over and over againùeven to the walls of this city and these quiet castle gardens.

  After a pause, clearly offered to provide a chance for the king or his heirs to reply, Firekeeper went on:

  "But even if they not like what would come, I think there will be those who will start the fight unless they are given reason not to fight. My people will be dying, my pack nearest to the front. Why would I wish to go to New Kelvin?"