The Dragoneer: Book 1: The Bonding

by Vickie Knestaut

  Galelin. He’d know. She’d have to pay him a visit soon. But not tonight. As soon as Jalite and Assina let her go, she was heading to bed.

  The thought of another female dragoneer spun about in her head as if on a dragon of its own, the idea nothing more than a dole of doves to be herded into a fluttering ball of feathers.

  Finally, Jalite and Assina allowed her to dress again after they had taken all of her measurements. Trysten brushed them off as they tried to wipe away Assina’s smudges of charcoal. She claimed she was tired after such a long day and merely wanted to go home. Jalite and Assina reluctantly agreed, as if allowing her out of their cottage with the smudges on her shoulders and her chest and the small of her back was a mark against their professionalism.

  Once outside, Trysten took another deep breath of the chilled air and felt surprise at how much more heat the air had lost since she entered the cottage. Though she couldn’t say for sure, she also had the sense that the stars had grown larger and more vibrant since she had entered Assina’s cottage. She took in another deep breath and the air scrubbed the sleep from her, shook it off her bones as chills wracked her. She gritted her teeth and wrapped her arms around the armor and sweater. If there had been a female dragoneer, where was her armor? Who kept it? She had likely been buried in it, but frequently, there were two sets of armor, in case one set was damaged in battle.

  And where was she buried? Was there a woman out there buried with her alpha, with her family at her side, in a place of honor? There was a book that held where each person, each dragon was buried. She could ask her father—No, she no longer had to. She was the Dragoneer. Those books were hers. The den was hers, now. She could walk right up and sit in the chair behind the table, light a lantern, and pull the books down and read them until morning if it struck her.

  She went straight to the weyr, but rather than climb the flight of steps to her father’s, to her den, she instead slipped inside on an impulse.

  Night time had always been her favorite time to visit the dragons. The weyr was quiet, sparse, and empty of many of the adults who would try and speak to her, or who would ask what she was up to. This night was a slight exception. Most of the tables had been cleared from the center aisle, but a few remained. A couple of the weyrmen swept up or otherwise covered over spots of spilled food or drink on the dirt floor. A pair of men carried a bench between them. A man and a woman negotiated who owned a particular table.

  As she waited for one of the weyrmen to notice her and ask her if her father knew where she was, Trysten noticed the breathing of the dragons. Many of them were still awake, and instead of singing their song of swooping, polyphonic breaths that rose and fell in waves and tempos, their breathing fell into a synchronous, uniform beat.

  One of the weyrmen looked up from a dark pool of some liquid he was covering with dirt. His eyes widened briefly, and Trysten expected to hear the question. But instead he asked if he could help her with anything.

  Trysten blinked at the man. Her eyes burned again. Exhaustion numbed her limbs. A sense of loss settled into her, stretched her out, as if she were an overburdened water skin suddenly relieved of its load. She briefly wished for something near with which to prop herself up, such as a staff.

  “No,” she said, then shook her head. “No, thank you.”

  The weyrman stared at her a few seconds longer, then went back to sweeping up the mess he’d claimed as his task.

  Trysten took a deep breath, then glanced down the aisle, towards Elevera. She stood in her stall and watched with her quiet eyes. Curiosity flooded Trysten’s senses. It collided with her own human sense of loneliness, and swirled with bewilderment. She had what she wanted more than anything else in life. She was the Dragoneer. She bonded with Elevera. She had succeeded her father and kept the tradition alive in her own family. She had everything she could possibly want.

  And so why did the sense of loss pile upon her so heavily, so oppressively?

  She turned to the stairway that led to her den. The thought of climbing the steps and lighting a lantern and sitting down with the books to look for something she probably would not find was too daunting. Whatever was in those books would still be there tomorrow. She left the weyr and walked home.

  Chapter 30

  The next morning, after a bite of breakfast, she returned to the weyr and found it empty except for the weyrmen who bustled about in their care of the dragons. A few of them spared her a glance and then returned their attention to the tasks at hand, but most of them ignored her. The weyrmen spent their lives caring for the dragons and their equipment. Certainly they knew about the song, about the synchronous breathing. Without looking up, they knew that the Dragoneer had entered the weyr.

  The stairs to her den beckoned. The books that might tell her of other incredible, brave women who once bore her title waited for her there. How did they deal with the same issues, if they had to deal with them at all? If there were female dragoneers before her, then surely there had to be female hordesmen, if being a hordesman was how one got to learn the traditions.

  She swallowed hard, then peered at the hordesmen’s hall at the end of the weyr. Research would have to wait. Her father had always been ready to work with the hordesmen at the crack of dawn. Even though a good bit of the village had slept in after the late night, she was still late to the weyr by comparison.

  As she passed the midpoint of the weyr, she looked up at Elevera and smiled. The smile dropped away, however, when Trysten caught sight of her father out of the corner of her eye off to her right. Out in the yard, her father leaned against his staff as he stared off into the cloud-swaddled wall of mountains. She stepped out to join him.

  “Why are you late?” her father asked.

  Trysten stopped. She peered at the ground at their feet, trodden with the footprints of people and dragons among mud and stones.

  “Everyone had a late night.”

  “Including the hordesmen of the Western Kingdom?”

  Trysten looked up to the mountains.

  “Being the Dragoneer means that you are responsible for the safety of this village. It also means that you are responsible for this stronghold against the Western Kingdom. The entire kingdom depends upon you now. The least you can do to honor that responsibility is make the most of your time. You should have had the men ready to go by first light.”

  Trysten let out a long breath and crossed her arms over her chest. “And exactly how am I supposed to know that? I know that Paege would know all of this because he got to be a hordesman, but you wouldn’t even allow me into the consideration, let alone allow me to fly with the hordesmen.”

  Mardoc did not respond right away. He swayed a slight bit, as if he were challenged by a wind that only he could feel.

  “Part of being the Dragoneer is being clever. Being reasonable. If you don’t practice during the daylight, when will you practice?”

  “Is this why there are no female dragoneers? Because we’re not clever or reasonable enough?”

  This grabbed his attention. He turned his gaze to her. Dark sacks hung beneath his eyes. Her breath caught in her throat as she saw her father’s appearance had aged ten years since the previous night.

  “You know why there are no female dragoneers. Or why there haven’t been until now.”

  “Never? There has never been a female dragoneer before me?”

  Mardoc turned his attention back out to the mountains. He regarded them a second longer. “Never.”

  “Why?”

  Her father did not respond.

  “Do you really believe that no other woman has ever wanted to be a dragoneer before me?”

  “I believe you are one of a kind.”

  Trysten crossed her arms over her chest. She regarded the mountains as well. A hate for them welled up in her, rose up like an answering wall of mountains. So much of their lives was dictated by those brutes. By the wilds, if she could she would knock them down, fly into them with Elevera and thrash them with her fist and
dragon tail, send the rocks flying, scattering like the silk-weed pods that lined the pastures in fall. How different would their lives be if there were no mountains?

  The mountains stood in utter defiance of her wish. They did not flinch. They did not stir. Clouds boiled off them like steam then dissipated in the winds aloft, leaving a pale blue that appeared to have arisen out of the ice atop the mountains.

  She heaved a sigh. “Excuse me.”

  Without waiting for a response from her father, she re-entered the weyr and continued to make her way back to the bunk house.

  Much like the dragons in the weyr, the chatter and motion of the hordesmen in the dining hall came to a halt as Trysten stepped inside. All of the hordesmen looked at her as the remains of their breakfast lay before them.

  “Are we riding today?” Trysten asked. She crossed her arms over her chest and lifted an eyebrow.

  The hordesmen continued to stare at her. A few looked to their compatriots across the table, and a few suddenly found the crumbs on their plates, or their half-finished mugs of tea to be of interest.

  One of the hordesmen, Rast, cleared his throat and straightened his back. “You never told us when you’d like us to assemble.”

  Trysten tapped her foot once. “I see that. I should hope that the Western Kingdom is a little more thoughtful than myself and gives you proper notice of their next attack, so that you may plan accordingly.”

  A few of the men stirred. Rast’s face reddened. His back grew rigid.

  “Let’s go,” Trysten said with a nod back at the weyr.

  The men rose from their seats and followed Trysten. Her teeth tightened as she stepped into the weyr and saw her father standing in the side entrance. He did not lean on his staff, but held it upright in his hand, as if it was the staff that needed his support.

  At the middle of the weyr, she stopped before Elevera’s stall and turned to the hordesmen. They all stood still and regarded her. She folded her hands behind her back as she had seen her father do before giving the men a lecture.

  “I need your help.”

  The hordesmen traded glances. A few shuffled their weight.

  “I’ve not had the benefit of proving myself to the horde like each of you has. I’ve only proven myself to Elevera, and as alpha, she has chosen me as Dragoneer. As honored as I am by her faith and decision, I still have a lot to learn about being a hordesman. You will teach me.”

  A number of the hordesmen looked to her father, who must still be standing in the side door, as she had not heard the shuffle of his lame foot walk away.

  “Yahi the cloud reader has said that the fighting season will start early this year. We have no time to waste. We have to be ready to defend ourselves, defend our village, and be the bulwark that stops the enemy from reaching the heart of the kingdom. That is our duty. That is our right. We will be ready, and from this moment forward, we will be ready by sunrise. That means we will be out here, our mounts saddled, our dragons ready to take to the air. Is that understood?”

  Again, several of the men looked to her father.

  Trysten took a deep breath. Her hands fell to her side. She drew her shoulders back. She knew if she looked at her father, she would find him doing nothing more than staring at her with a solid, blank face, his attitude perfectly appropriate for a hordesmen listening to the orders of his dragoneer. That infuriated her. It was almost as if he was mocking her. Why was he even standing there at all? His days as the Dragoneer were over. Why wasn’t he at home, relaxing, healing, helping her mother? Why did he have to be here, as if watching her do an imitation of him?

  She reminded herself not to sigh in frustration, to stay steady. Rast leaned forward and whispered something into another man’s ear. The other hordesman stifled a grin, then glanced up to the ceiling, and then to the ground.

  She had to get them in the air. Her father couldn’t follow them up there. Once they were in the air, she could act—she could command them as was her right and duty.

  “Grab your saddles and mounts. I expect to find you all waiting for me in the yard when I get out there.”

  While most of the men looked to her father again, Paege left and went for Leya, the dragon who had become beta when Elevera became alpha. A few men stood a second, and then followed Paege’s example. The rest continued to look at Mardoc as if waiting for his daughter’s orders to be confirmed.

  “Now!” Trysten said and then smacked her hands together.

  The men jumped to get their dragons.

  Despite herself, Trysten looked back at her father. As expected, he simply stared at her, his face as expressionless as the mountains behind him.

  By the wilds did she envy his ability to do that, to make stone look expressive. She couldn’t even try to hope to match him, and so she didn’t as her face tightened in aggravation. She turned away and started for Elevera, who shifted in her stall. Her wings flicked up a bit, and her tail lashed with a sense of expectation that buoyed Trysten up, that lifted her over her irritation with her father.

  Chapter 31

  When she led the saddled Elevera into the yard, all of the hordesmen were ready to fly. A bit of relief trickled through her, softened her muscles a tad. She glanced at Paege, who gave her a subtle and knowing nod. She climbed onto Elevera’s back, and the hordesmen followed suit.

  “We’re going to go through the calls,” Trysten announced. She nearly asked if the men were ready, but then recalled that her father never did. He expected them to be ready. It was their duty.

  “Release the dole,” she called to the weyrman standing outside the door.

  The weyrman gave a nod, then hurried inside to retrieve the cage of doves. Trysten returned her attention to the hordesmen, then lifted both palms into the air before raking her heels up along Elevera’s side. As the dragon’s wings unfurled with a snap, she dropped her arms to grab the edge of the saddle before the dragon rose on her hind legs, pitching Trysten back. Her grip on the saddle tightened and her knuckles blanched white before Elevera gave a small, stubby shove with her hind legs as she beat down hard and fast with her wings. The world lurched as if yanked out from under Elevera’s feet. Dust and bits of straw fled the raw power, and the dragon rose into the air as she continued to beat her wings.

  The other hordesmen followed Trysten into the sky before she ordered Elevera to level off and start a wide circle around the village. The hordesmen fell into formation behind her, the lesser dragons forming a V that streamed out behind Elevera as each dragon took advantage of the turbulence created by the wing beats of the dragon before it. Off her right flank, Paege and Leya kept pace.

  Below, several weyrmen opened the doors of the cages. Doves streamed out and fled towards the sky. Trysten thrust her left arm into the air and made a series of swooping motions to indicate what she expected the horde to do. As she made the motions, she pictured each one in her mind, and knew that Elevera would execute her orders.

  Off to her right, Paege repeated the orders for those who missed them.

  Trysten pushed down on the left edge of her saddle and inward with her right heel. Elevera dipped her left wing. The muscles in her back shifted as she lifted the leading edge of her right wing slightly. She dipped off to her left and began to spiral over and down towards the doves, who upon sight of the horde, elected to stay low and flee across the open country of the pasture heading east.

  Behind her, the V shape had broken into two columns, one on either side of her. It was a sight to behold, the massive, sleek dragons sailing through the sky. A grin spread over her face and stretched into the wind as she returned her attention to the fleeing dole. She lifted her left arm again and gave a series of orders for the left column, tracing each one in the air exactly as she’d seen her father do countless times from the ground, or teaching new hordesmen inside the weyr.

  They descended upon the dole. With a quick, curving gesture from Trysten, as well as a brief jab from her right heel, Elevera broke to the left and thrust her wings down
and back to power past the doves. Upon sight of Elevera, the doves scattered to the right, only to be reined in by Leya as Paege pulled up even with her. Several of the doves broke off, either dropping down and veering off, or arcing up and peeling away. Most of them remained crowded in the dole, however. As they tried to climb up and away, two of the hordesmen pulled up overhead and kept the dole pinned close to the ground. Finally, with a sweeping motion followed by a grabbing hand and a jutting elbow, Trysten spurred Elevera on and broke right as Paege pulled Leya back. The doves swept up and out, through the hole that Paege and Trysten had created. Another hordesman swept in low over the ground, his dragon’s claws nearly brushing the tops of the stone heather as she flew. Upon sight of her, the doves arced up.

  Soon, Trysten conducted the horde through a series of maneuvers that had the dole of doves wound up in a tight ball, flying round and round as the dragons hemmed them in. Trysten grinned at the sight, at the doves flying in such a perfect, tight sphere of taupe feathers and pink beaks. Furthermore, it was a delight to see the dragons circling the dole in such a perfect formation, each one equidistant from the other and forming a moving cage that kept the doves from escaping. With a pat on Elevera’s neck, she signaled with her other hand for the riders to keep up the formation. For half of an hour they held the formation and never lost a single dove.

  Finally, Trysten signaled for the horde to return to the weyr. They broke formation. The doves scattered and raced away in several directions. The horde flew back to the weyr and landed in the yard. As Elevera touched down, Trysten absorbed the sudden stop with her body and rocked forward and back in the saddle. She looked up and saw her father standing in the doorway again. He gave a single nod, then turned into the shadows and disappeared.

  After a break, Trysten ordered the hordesmen to prepare for a round of mock battle. They armed themselves with bows and a quiver of blunted arrows, then leaped back up into the air on their dragons.