Vedientir

  "That's precisely how you eat it," Teikos said gleefully, reclining in his chair. "That'll squeeze out the mustache on your face."

  "That'll squeeze something else out, I'm afraid," Dion coughed out his answer and then stuffed his mouth with the sweet corn bread, trying to soothe the pain he felt on the inside of his cheeks. He wiped the sweat that reached his eyebrows and took another piece of meat. It was beyond tasty, and he found out that the second piece was easier to swallow. The brandy, however, he abandoned completely.

  "I see that your birds have found their supper on their own, but what about your great friend?" asked Lanika when she returned to the porch. "I wouldn't like it if he ate my geese."

  "He could probably be hungry again, but I don't know. He had a good meal not so long ago. He ate almost an entire egg," said Dion. Lanika and Teikos looked at him askew, then looked at the dragon, and finally at one another.

  "I have an egg," Lanika said. "The hens produced a lot of eggs today. I'll give him more than one. How is it that he eats so little?"

  Dion smiled when he realized how they understood his words.

  "I'm sure he can eat all the eggs you have, but let me see first if he's hungry."

  He turned in his chair slightly.

  "Zmai. Esi galadan? Jajo malih kokah?"

  After asking the dragon if he was hungry, Dion explained to him that eggs of small hens were now on offer. The dragon raised his head to nod at once agreeably, and then lifted himself into a sitting position. As he did so he swung his tail and that startled the geese that ran to the other side of the yard.

  Dion noticed Lanika looking at him differently when he turned back towards the table. Teikos had become serious as well.

  "What is wrong? What happened?"

  "Nothing. We just haven't heard that language being spoken aloud in quite some time. The last one we heard use it was your grandfather, and that was a long time ago in Syevnor," answered Teikos. His brows went up and he pursed his lips.

  "Too bad he didn't come with you. We haven't seen each other in a long while."

  "So, should I give your friend something to eat?" asked Lanika, still waiting for Dion's answer regarding the eggs. He nodded in response.

  "Raw or fried?"

  "Fried."

  "Tell me news of your grandfather," requested Teikos and then the two of them turned to stories about Daedar and food while Lanika prepared dinner for the dragon.

  A large wooden bowl soon appeared in front of the dragon, filled with steaming hot scrambled eggs fried in sweet smelling butter. Two large round flatbreads, the size of wheels on a smaller cart, white and thick with fire-burnt black patches accompanied the eggs, along with a bucket of milk that was almost too heavy for Lanika to carry by herself. It amounted to only a few mouthfuls in the end, but the dragon looked more than satisfied with the amount of food he received. He lifted the bucket of milk with his two clawed arms as a man would lift a bowl and he emptied it to the last drop. He hummed almost inaudibly for a few moments after he laid the bucket aside.

  "Lyud," said the dragon when he stopped humming. Dion turned around to see what he wanted, but the dragon was not looking at him. He was looking towards the entrance to the yard and Dion could hear heavy footsteps coming nearer, and he was sure he knew who was coming, judging by the dragon's relaxed posture.

  "Son!" Lanika was overjoyed when Kerkio appeared in front of them. He was covered from head to toe in armor of the King's legion. She took the shield from his hand and struggled to lean it on the wall. It was a large shield, wide and long, with a gold rectangle in the middle. It represented Tialoch. Four short and straight golden arrows pointed up, down, left and right from the sides of the rectangle. They represented all the roads that led to Tialoch.

  "Not that," he said in a gentle voice when Lanika tried to take the bundle he carried in his other hand. He carried the chain mail that he had borrowed in Echa and the blue cloak of the South legion.

  "This is yours," he said to Dion and placed the chain mail and the cloak on an empty chair next to Dion.

  "I wasn't expecting you so soon," said Dion. "I thought you would stay in Tialoch longer."

  "I wasn't expecting to come this soon either, but I was allocated differently than expected."

  "Where is your bird?" asked Dion as he moved to another chair to make room for Kerkio who made it clear he wanted a place at the table.

  "I left it with Ellodoris in Tialoch," answered Kerkio, but there was no sadness in his voice. "There is room for it in the legion's stables. Ellodoris will take care of it there. He actually insisted on it," Kerkio finished with a brief laugh.

  "What news do you bring?" Teikos asked his son. Twilight was thickening into night, and Lanika brought lit candles to the table.

  "Almost all bad," answered Kerkio while he ate. "The legion managed to recapture two streets today - that's the only good news I have. What did the king say to you?"

  "To return the dragon to his home," Dion answered. Kerkio seemed surprised at first but then nodded a few times in agreement with the saneness of the king's decision.

  "And what of Echa?" asked Kerkio again and Dion just sighed in response. He had no will to talk about it.

  "I hoped for a different answer, but I am sorry to say that I understand him. If a stronger wind were to blow on the city walls now, Tialoch would likely struggle to survive. Echa will have to wait, and the two of us can't do much to change that."

  "Wait for what? What is happening with Echa?" asked Teikos.

  "You told them nothing?"

  "We spoke of other things," said Dion and then Kerkio began to talk.

  ✽✽✽

  "Only the west fails to produce bad news," concluded Teikos after Kerkio finished explaining what Dion and he had been through the last few days.

  "The candle has burnt halfway," he added and yawned unexpectedly. "Think it's time for bed. Morning will see us rested and smarter. Do you agree?"

  "Bed!" shouted Lanika. "All this talk and I forgot to put the geese away for the night," she added, angry at herself.

  "I'll do it, mother. You sit," said Kerkio and got up from the table in her stead. He went past the dragon that had succumbed to his dinner and was now sprawled over the porch. The ravens were hiding in the warmth beneath one of his wings, but they were still awake.

  "What? How?" they heard Kerkio yell outside. There was great surprise in his voice and everyone in the house jumped to their feet.

  "What?" yelled Teikos in return over the rumble of chairs scraping on the wooden floor of the kitchen as all three of them went for the door. The geese were lying all over the yard, still and lifeless. They looked like debris left over after a flood.

  "Alcohol," said Kerkio. He held one of the geese by its neck and could clearly smell it on its beak. "Where did they get alcohol?"

  "Ah!" shouted Teikos painfully and looked at the night sky. "They ate the cherries from the tonic. We threw them onto the compost today. Is it breathing?"

  Kerkio shook his head, but went to check another goose just to be sure. He shook his head again.

  "Dead."

  "It's my fault. If I hadn't come..." started Dion, but Teikos stopped him at once.

  Lanika took a candle with her and went to the compost to see if Teikos was right. She couldn't find a single cherry.

  "What now?" Lanika asked miserably. "All that meat and feathers have gone to waste."

  "Not feathers," said Teikos but then grabbed his head with both hands. "But, we won't be done until morning."

  There was nothing else to do but get to work. They quickly built a fire in the middle of the yard - they needed both light and warmth from it. Teikos brought a few logs for sitting and placed them around the fire, and Lanika brought and gave each one a large sack. She sat down first with a sack between her legs, placed one of the geese over her knees and started plucking its feathers.

  "This way," said Lanika to Dion and got up to show him how to do it properly. He was not spared t
he work even though he was a guest.

  "Take it by the neck with one hand, pluck with the other. Take one feather at a time and pull it out."

  They piled the plucked geese not far from the fire and worked through the night. The stars and the Night Light had almost finished their journey when they were finished with the last goose.

  "We'll tidy up later in the morning. Let's get into bed while it's still dark." Teikos was more tired than he had been in years and his wobbly legs carried him slowly towards the house. They left the sacks filled with the plucked feathers next to the geese and the dying fire that provided little light and warmth now. Dion followed Teikos toward the house, barely able to see where he was going, playing with his fingers that were stiff from repetitive work and covered in a layer of oily dust.

  The dragon and the ravens slept through the whole ordeal and continued their sleep undisturbed even after Teikos, Lanika, Kerkio and Dion walked loudly past their heads into the house.

  ✽✽✽

  There was a complete absence of sounds in the house when he awoke. He was the first one to get up and quickly found his way to the porch through the unknown house.

  "Jutar," the dragon wished him a good morning. His warm breath steamed in the cold morning not yet warmed by the newborn daylight.

  "Good morning," answered Dion in the same manner. It took a while until his eyes cleared enough for him to notice that something about the dragon was different. He started examining him from the nose all the way down to the tip of his tail.

  "Stani," the dragon commanded him to stop.

  "So, this is what he sounds like when he's upset."

  "Hranit Zmai - Zmai rast. Nai tesko," argued the dragon seeing that Dion did not stop staring at him.

  "You feed the dragon - the dragon grows. Not so hard to understand, you say," said Dion and laughed merrily as he again tried to measure the dragon with his eyes. As far as he could tell, the dragon's tail seemed a few inches longer, and a tad thicker. The dragon stretched and winced when the wound on the wing tingled.

  "Vedi," the dragon called Dion and pointed with his head towards the yard. He had a curious expression on his face.

  The dragon was showing him the geese. They were alive and wandered around the yard in silent confusion. Their skin was purple-blue from having spent the night in the cold without a single feather on their backs to keep them warm.

  Dion burst into a laugh so loud that he woke up Kerkio and his parents, and most likely a neighbor or two.

  "How can that be?" he heard Lanika ask when she came out the house and clapped her hands in surprise. Her clap startled the bewildered geese and they watched her with eyes that now seemed larger than their heads.

  Kerkio and Teikos started laughing along with Dion.

  "Dead," said Teikos through tears of laughter. "Dead drunk!"

  "To be so drunk to not feel us plucking their feathers?" asked Lanika still refusing to believe Teikos.

  "Not so loud," said Kerkio. "Maybe they have a headache."

  He had one more joke he wanted to tell Dion but spoke no words when he saw that there was no more laughter or joy on Dion's face.

  Dion grabbed one of the small chairs, sat down next to the dragon and peered into the grass next to the porch.

  "What is it?" asked Kerkio and knelt next to Dion.

  "I cannot force myself to fulfill what father had asked of me," Dion said with anguish. "I cannot stay here while Echa burns. Besides, I had ample time to think last night and I figured out that it's just a matter of time before those hellish boars pick up the scent of my acorns again - if they haven't already. I would not want to draw them to your house."

  "I agree with you," answered Kerkio honestly. "But why don't you simply rid yourself of those acorns?"

  "I can't. I see how much they mean to Daedar, and it hasn't escaped me that even Arnos holds them dear. It seems that they have really been a part of my family for a long time and I won't just throw them away somewhere or destroy them. I'm going to go search for the South legion. I'll go to Phares and board a ship to Syevnor. The boars won't be able to follow me or smell me all the way across the Inner Sea."

  Surprise made Kerkio stand up.

  "Syevnor," he thought, and a barely noticeable smile appeared on his face.

  "It was only yesterday that the king found out that the South legion had not returned home. If Valan sent someone to Syevnor to find it, they have most likely departed this morning, probably only moments ago. One more pair of eyes cannot hinder the search," Dion continued, explaining what had to be done more to himself than to Kerkio.

  "Well, what if the legion is no longer in Syevnor?" asked Kerkio.

  "That would mean that they had found a way home," said Dion loudly, joyful for a moment as if what Kerkio said was true.

  "I hope I don't find their dry bones in some wasteland," he finished.

  "I hope we won't," said Kerkio.

  "We? What do you mean?"

  "I will go with you. I have to go - Telurion's order," answered Kerkio. "Arnos might be the Protector of a small city, but he is important enough to this kingdom to have at least one man guard his son. Especially when that same son is the carrier of the battle standard in a time of war."

  Dion sighed, hurt and angry at the same time.

  "Like I'm a child. Once again someone begs you to take watch over me."

  "Companion," said Kerkio and laughed at himself when Dion's words from the beginning of their journey emerged in his memories. "I'm not watching over you. We are companions now."

  Chapter 12 - Westward

  "What do we do with him?" asked Kerkio and glanced at the dragon who was at that moment more interested in Lanika and the geese.

  "We should find a way to return him home. The king is right about that, but the dragon does not remember where he is from and I cannot guess from what little he has told me. Judging by the number of refuge seekers, it is too late now if he is from the lands around the Thin Island, unless we plan on dying along the way, but I doubt he is from there since those lands are well known. That leaves Syevnor as our best bet, and we are going there anyway. The lands of the Alliance there are large but the unknown Syevnor is greater still. I know it is not limitless but no map that I ever held in my hand had a clear edge of it drawn."

  Suddenly he looked away from Kerkio, shook his head and grinned widely.

  "I just remembered something. Long ago I saw a map in Echa's library. I was quite young then, but I remember it remarkably well. In the northwest corner of known Syevnor, where ink faded into nothing, stood: Here be dragons. I also know that's how unknown parts of the world are marked on maps, but what if this time this is not the case? What if the dragons really are there?"

  Kerkio laughed heartily, but soon realized that Dion was serious and nodded agreeably.

  "Then that's one more good reason for us to go to Syevnor," he said. "We'll go there to see what happened to the legion, and if we do stumble upon the dragon's homeland, even better. I should go and prepare us for our journey. Will you speak with the dragon? I will see to it that my parents keep him safe if he for some reason does not wish to go to Syevnor with us."

  "You have really never been?" Dion asked him in return. It was impossible to overlook the gleam in Kerkio's eyes each time Syevnor was mentioned.

  "No, but I also haven't given it much thought until recently. A year or two ago the wish appeared, but I had so many duties by then that it was impossible to allot time or exploit an opportunity to travel there. Besides, there isn't much I am interested in, except in Lanika and Teikos's village. I would like to see where they lived before I was born."

  "I hope we will fulfill your wish soon enough," Dion replied and Kerkio nodded back to him before he rose to his feet.

  "Mother!" he called Lanika. "I'm going to Syevnor!"

  Lanika looked at him and at once forgot about her geese. Teikos peeked out of the shed where he was busy trying to get one of the geese to warm itself in the hay.


  "When was that decided?" he asked.

  ✽✽✽

  "Zmai?" called Dion.

  "Ada?" responded the dragon and moved closer to the porch where Dion was sitting.

  "Ti rechao ada ti nai naiden," began Dion with what the dragon had said to the king and the only thing that he knew about the dragon - that he was lost.

  "Ada."

  "Tei dam nai tu uv Aelan," continued Dion, telling the dragon he knows the dragon is not from Aelan, and the dragon's eyes focused on Dion's.

  "Grak!" said both of the ravens when they landed onto the table next to Dion. The words of the old language made the ravens invite themselves.

  "Kerkio et ya hodat an Syevnor," he said to all of them. "Zmaiev dam morty tam."

  Dion explaining to the dragon and the ravens that Syevnor might be the dragon's home and that they are going there was the last thing Kerkio listened in to, although he could not understand a word, except for his name and the name of the land of Syevnor.

  "It's a strange family," said Lanika. She too was surprised by Dion and the animals he spoke to on their porch.

  "Yes they are. Strange, but kind," Kerkio answered. "And while on the subject of kindness - if the dragon decides not to follow Dion and me to Syevnor, will you take care of him until our return, or take him with you to Phares if Tialoch falls?"

  "I very well won't leave him starving and thirsting but you need to be careful in that land."

  "I always try to be careful, mother."

  "I know you do, but the memory is still here."

  "I know, mother. But those days are in the past." He tried consoling her even though he was sure he would not find success.

  "Are they? Judging by what is happening in Tialoch, I would say those days have come back."

  "When do you leave?" asked Teikos from behind their back. He left the geese to warm themselves on their own.