Maybe the Dragonslayer would know. He’d be able to tell Leaf how to slay the right dragons the right way.
“Well, here we are,” Ivy said. “Where the famous Dragonslayer lives.” Violet and Daffodil were waiting by a door in the tunnel; Ivy unlocked it, and they all went inside.
Leaf was startled by how enormous the Dragonslayer’s caves were. They were almost as big as a room in the dragon palace, and furnished with beautiful things. Of course, Leaf remembered. He’s probably the richest man in the world. That was something else he’d never thought about — the treasure the Dragonslayer had stolen from the queen.
But he wasn’t like Rowan and Thyme and Cranberry, Leaf told himself. He was fighting to save his people.
Wasn’t he?
Or … is that just how Rowan told me the story, so I’d want to be like him?
He felt uneasy for the first time since entering Valor.
“Dad!” Ivy called. “There’s someone here to see you!”
Leaf blinked at her. “Dad?”
“Oh, yeah,” Daffodil said. “The Dragonslayer is Ivy’s father.” She threw herself down on one of the large green-and-gold pillows along the walls of the living room. Leaf saw something in a glass box on a pedestal in the center of the room, but it was misshapen and ugly, out of place among the rest of the beautiful décor. He wanted to take a closer look, but he didn’t want the Dragonslayer to find him poking around in his things. He decided to stay where he was, standing with his hands behind him, ready for inspection.
“Is it my new hat?” a voice called from the next cave. “Tell him to leave it on the table!”
“No, Dad, it’s not a new hat!” Ivy called back.
There was a pause, and then some grumbling and shuffling noises. After a moment, a man appeared in the doorway and squinted across the room at Leaf.
That’s him. The Dragonslayer! The only living man to ever kill a dragon! The mighty hero of the stories!
Bit shorter than I expected, imaginary Wren commented.
The Dragonslayer was barefoot and looked as though he’d been asleep. He had a tangled black beard and sleepy eyes and a gold earring shaped like a sword dangling from each ear. He looked like he ate more than Master Trout and moved as rarely as possible; he wasn’t big, but all his limbs looked like bread dough.
“Who’s this?” the Dragonslayer asked, scratching one of his feet.
“Dad, this is Leaf,” Ivy said. “We found him in the woods. He’s come a really long way to see you.”
“It’s a great honor to meet you, sir,” Leaf said.
The Dragonslayer cleared his throat and shot a look at Ivy’s friends. “Official Dragonslayer audiences are held in the main hall once a month,” he said. “You just missed one, I’m afraid. Ivy, you know better than to bring him here.”
Violet and Daffodil exchanged significant glances.
“Sorry, Dad,” Ivy said carefully. “He has a kind of unusual request, so I thought it might be all right.”
“Well, it isn’t,” he said. “Find a place to put him, and I’ll hear him at the next audience.”
“Wait, sir!” Leaf said, grasping at one straw that might catch his attention. “I have a message for you from the Indestructible City!”
He sensed immediately that this was the wrong thing to say. Ivy blanched, and the Dragonslayer’s eyebrows drew together like a lowering storm front.
“You’re from the Indestructible City?” the Dragonslayer growled. “Another one? Is your lord deaf?”
“N-no,” Leaf stammered. “I’ve never been there. I just met someone who said — they said to tell you the Invincible Lord is expecting you before the next crescent moons.”
The Dragonslayer crossed the room in three large steps, seized Leaf by his shirt, and lifted him into the air. “Are you threatening me now?” he snarled.
“I’m not! I’m not!” Leaf instinctively did one of Rowan’s twist moves to slip free and jumped away from the Dragonslayer. “That’s what they told me! I don’t know what it means — I thought it was just a friendly greeting between lords!”
The Dragonslayer glared at his hands, then at Leaf, as if considering whether to grab him again, but not wanting to look foolish if Leaf escaped once more. “The presumptuous, pompous, self-styled ‘invincible’ Lord Jackanapes is not my friend. You can get out of my city now.”
“But that’s not why he’s here!” Ivy said. “I swear, Dad, he just wants to learn from you —”
The Dragonslayer had turned to eye Daffodil and Violet with suspicion. “You brought him into the city?” he demanded.
“We found him,” Ivy said, trying to draw his attention to her. “Dad, really, he’s just another guy looking for a hero. He’s not working for the lord. I promise.”
“We’ll see,” the Dragonslayer muttered, tugging on his beard. “Everyone get out.” He stalked off into the other cave as Daffodil and Violet leaped to their feet.
“I’m so sorry, Leaf,” Ivy said. She pushed up her sleeves and rubbed her face. “I did that all wrong.”
He couldn’t see anything that she’d done wrong; it was the Dragonslayer who’d acted strange and unfriendly (and a little bit like a dragonmancer, Wren whispered ominously). And it was Leaf’s own fault, for being such an idiot. “I’m the one who’s sorry,” he said. “I had no idea the Invincible Lord was his enemy. I should — I should go apologize —”
“No, don’t,” she said, jumping in his way. “That’s not a good idea. Not right now.”
“But he’s a man of honor and courage,” Leaf said. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Violet making a face at Daffodil, but he wasn’t sure what it meant — maybe she was mocking his sincerity, but he didn’t care. “He’ll understand if I —”
“Trust me,” Ivy said, putting her hands on his arms and walking him backward to the front door. “We need to get out now and wait for a better time.” She looked truly sorry, as though she’d failed him. And so worried. He didn’t want to make anyone feel as unhappy as she looked.
He put his own hands over hers and stopped her momentum. “I do trust you,” he said. “Don’t be sad. I’m sure everything will be all right after I talk to him. In a month, I mean,” he clarified quickly. “At the next audience.”
She gave him a relieved smile. “I think I know somewhere you can stay.”
He wanted to say, Can’t I stay with you? but it was pretty clear he wasn’t welcome in the Dragonslayer’s cave. So he followed her without arguing to the cave of a man she called “Uncle Stone,” who looked like a taller, sadder, slightly less hairy version of the Dragonslayer.
“Yes, fine,” Stone said glumly. “I have room, if he’s not too loud.”
“I imagine he sings in his sleep,” Ivy said, “but apart from that, the strong, silent type.”
“Thank you, sir,” Leaf said.
“I have to go give Foxglove my notes on the dragons and what happened out there,” Ivy said. “But I’ll come check on you after that.” Her smile almost made up for her leaving, except then Leaf was alone with her morose uncle. Stone looked him up and down, pointed at an extra straw pallet, and went into a corner of the cave to mash some vegetables.
Leaf set down his pack and unbuckled his sword, wondering what he’d gotten himself into.
“Nice sword,” Stone commented.
“Useless sword,” Leaf said. “Against dragons anyway.”
Stone gave him a wry smile. “Yeah, I wouldn’t recommend trying that.”
“I already did,” Leaf admitted. “It really didn’t work. That’s why I’m here — I’m hoping the Dragonslayer will tell me how he did it.”
Stone let out a snort. “Heath? Got lucky, that’s what he did. Unlike some of us.”
“Have you tried to kill a dragon?” Leaf asked. He was slightly unnerved by the way Stone talked about the Dragonslayer.
“I was there when it happened. Don’t they tell that part of the story in faraway villages?” Stone asked.
Leaf suddenly
, for the first time in years, remembered what his father had said when Rowan first told the Dragonslayer story. Something about a partner who’d been left behind. But that couldn’t be Stone — he was right here.
“You were?” he said. “What was it like? What did he do? I want to know everything!”
Stone’s face hardened. “Well, if you want worshipful stories of the great Dragonslayer, you’ve come to the right place,” he said. “This place is full of zealots who’d love to tell you the great saga. But I’m not one of them.” He dropped his masher, smacked his hands together, and moved toward the exit.
“Wait, no. That’s not why I’m here,” Leaf said. “I promise, I want to know the truth. What really happened.”
Stone paused with his hand on the door and looked at Leaf for a long moment.
“No, you don’t,” he said, and disappeared into the tunnels.
Wren and her ride arrived at the palace after dark, which was Murderbasket’s idea. He might be a bit of an idiot about human intelligence, but he was clearly an expert at skulking around. He approached on a quiet glide down from the clouds, avoided all the guards, and landed in a deserted courtyard.
“All right,” Wren said, sliding off his neck. “I’m impressed.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, looking pleased.
“With myself,” she said, “for picking exactly the right dragon for this job.”
He looked down his nose at her. “Hmmm. You’re still welcome.”
“You are also welcome,” she said. “For my excellent advice and for the part where I did not stab you with my dangerous weapon.”
“You DID stab me with your dangerous weapon,” he objected.
“Oh, barely,” she said. “Imagine if I’d been doing it on purpose.”
He shuddered. “I’d rather not.” A distant roar cut through the silent night, and he turned his head toward it, then looked back down at her. “Are you sure you want to be here?”
“I definitely do not,” she said, “but I have to find Sky. And probably stab all the dragons who took him. In the EYEBALLS! They’ll be sorry they stole my friend and made me walk all over the desert! Mostly the first thing.” She pulled out her sword and brandished it at the shadows. “Watch out, evil dragon eyeballs!”
“Three moons,” he said. “I think you’re the most violent dream I’ve ever had, and considering what I do for work, that’s saying something.”
“Your eyeballs are totally safe with me,” she said, patting his claws reassuringly. The sword overbalanced in her hand and jabbed his talon membrane again, in a different spot this time.
He jumped away from her with a hiss, shaking a new drop of blood off.
“OK, I’ll admit that was terrible,” Wren said. She put the sword away. “This time I’m really sorry.”
He let out a small disbelieving laugh. “No one has managed to draw my blood in years,” he said. “And now a tiny scavenger has done it twice. I have this great idea: Let’s both never, ever tell anyone about this.”
That is a good idea, Wren realized. She didn’t exactly want gossip spreading about the sweet fireless dragon she was going to steal back from the desert queen.
“Agreed,” she said. “Don’t you ever tell anyone about me.”
“No one would believe me anyway,” he observed. “I hope you find your friend, that you both survive this place, and that you never corner me in a dark alley again.”
“Thank you,” she said. “I hope you decide not to kill whoever it is you’re supposed to go kill.”
“How did you — no, never mind, I don’t want to know,” he said. He spread his wings to go and she stepped toward him, suddenly wishing he could stay, although she would never say so out loud. He was her new second-favorite person, easily outpacing stupid Undauntable.
“I mean it,” she said awkwardly. “Thank you, Murderbasket.”
“Murderbasket,” he muttered, shaking his head. He gave her an exasperated smile and then lifted off into the clouds, as silently as they’d come.
Now I just have to find Sky, Wren thought. In a gigantic dragon palace. How hard could that be?
She started as she did in every new place, by getting a sense of the geography. For one thing, there was a giant wall around the outside of the palace, specially designed to be impossible for humans to climb, as far as she could tell. Which meant probably the only way she was getting out of here was on Sky. Also, she discovered in the morning, it had several dragon heads on spikes at the top of it.
That was a little unsettling. Despite everything she’d read about dragons, she still believed they weren’t as awful as humans, and she didn’t like seeing evidence that they might be. She forced herself to check each of them for pale orange scales, but none of them were Sky.
Most of the palace was a labyrinth of winding hallways, lined with tapestries, which opened onto courtyards and enormous ballrooms and feasting halls. Here, again, it was very easy to find food and survive on the dragons’ crumbs and leftovers. The hardest part was actually moving faster than the mice and oversized ants who wanted to get to them first.
Twice she found herself caught in an unfamiliar room with not enough hiding places when a dragon walked in. Strangely, though, each time the dragon barely glanced at her, muttered something about overwatered plants (Wren thought), grabbed whatever it was looking for, and left, even though she was sure it had seen her.
Am I just a giant mouse to them? Not even worth eating or squashing?
As she crept through the palace, she could hear a particular dragon roaring with fury, and she finally followed the sound to a tall tower that radiated creepiness. Someone was trapped in there, and they weren’t afraid to let everyone know how displeased they were. Sometimes the prisoner roared words — “I’LL MURDER YOU ALL! YOU’LL BE SORRY! I’M GOING TO START WITH YOUR TONGUE AND EAT YOU ALIVE!” — and sometimes she just roared pure fury.
Wren had initially been inclined to feel sorry for whoever it was, but the more violent her threats became, the more Wren felt like perhaps the world was better off with this dragon inside that tower. But it did make her wonder — was this where they kept prisoners? Could Sky be in there, too? Trapped with the angry dragon? Probably with his talons clasped over his ears and his wings over his head, wishing he were a snail and had somewhere to hide.
There were no windows, so there was no way for Wren to get inside. But she found a safe spot to spy on the tower for a couple of days and she studied the food that went in and out. It was almost all meat, and it was mostly all picked clean when the plates were removed. It didn’t seem like enough for more than one dragon either — there would be only one bowl, for example, or a single tray of charred grasshoppers, or something like that.
So if he wasn’t in there, where else could he be?
She scouted the palace until she found where most of the soldiers slept: in the low buildings nestled against the inner walls of the main entrance courtyard. Armored sand dragons went in and out of their barracks all day long, doing drills in the hot sun.
Wren needed a spot where she could watch the soldiers, and she found it in a closet full of dusty linens that had a small hole in the back wall looking directly out over the courtyard. There was a strange monument out there, a tall black obelisk with carved words painted in gold on it. A large circle of sand surrounded the obelisk, but the rest of the courtyard was lined with white stones that reflected the glare of the sun.
The closet was a good place to sleep and hide during the busiest parts of the day, while Wren waited for some sign of what the soldiers had done with Sky.
Two days later, the loud giant appeared, whooshing in the front gate like a sudden thunderstorm in the mountains. Wren thought of him as the general, although she didn’t know whether dragon armies had titles like that. He shook a vast quantity of sand off his wings and bellowed a name. Soldiers clattered in behind him and he waved them off to the barracks, then shouted the name again. The name was something like what fire
s do when they’re burning low — Smolder? Wren thought. I’ll go with Smolder.
Finally a dragon came out of the central palace and slowly paced across the courtyard. He had black diamond patterns along his spine, like a snake, and a lot of keys and pouches on a ring around his neck. Wren noticed that he skirted around the circle of sand to reach the dragon who’d stolen Sky.
“Prince Smolder,” the general said, inclining his head in a way that was somehow perfectly respectful but also conveyed an ocean of contempt at the same time.
“Sandstorm,” said the new dragon in a similar tone, eyeing the mess the soldiers had made coming in the gate. “Anything to report?”
“Nope,” said the general. He puffed up his chest and lashed his tail. “Any word from Queen Burn?”
“No,” Smolder said with a sigh. “But don’t worry, I’m sure she’ll be back soon and you can give her your gift the moment she arrives.”
“YESSSS,” Sandstorm said with a smug grin. “Still alive, is he? I think she’d like him better that way. For now. HA HA!”
Smolder winced. “Yes, he’s fine. Why don’t you have your dragons clean this up, and I’ll go make sure food is ready for them.”
“I want that cinnamon drink!” Sandstorm bellowed after him. “The new one from the kitchens, like last week! Tell them to make me another!”
Wren wasn’t sure who was the boss of who here — she would have thought the prince would be in charge, but the general seemed very comfortable ordering him about. Prince Smolder turned back to the palace with an expression that suggested he had several thoughts about that question, too. Unconcerned, or perhaps unaware, Sandstorm strutted over to the barracks to shout orders at some soldiers.
Wren was sure they’d been talking about Sky, although she didn’t know why he’d be considered a “gift” for the queen. But that meant he was alive, and he was here. And he belonged to Sandstorm, it sounded like, until this Burn character returned. So surely Sandstorm would want to check on him as soon as he could …
She thought for a moment, then slipped out of the closet and hurried down to the courtyard. By the time she got there, the general was done ordering the soldiers about and was striding toward a low door that led to some of the kitchens.
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