Oh, it’s no use. They won’t print a retraction, because I can’t offer any proof that I’m the one who calculated that the ancient Draconean calendar was built around the ecliptic year. Never mind that my mother is an astronomer; never mind that he isn’t enough of a mathematician to calculate an integral, let alone puzzle out this problem; never mind that I even have the notebook where I worked it all out. There aren’t any dates on my notes, and even if there were, I could have added them later, now couldn’t I? Maybe even after Mr. Mornett told me about his theory. After all, with my grandmother and grandfather so illustrious, of course I would feel pressure to establish myself as a scholar in the public eye.
Sneering monster. I knew that editor didn’t like Grandpapa, but I’ve tried everything else. There’s simply no way to prove that Aaron Mr. Mornett that lying beast stole my idea, not the other way around. The people who distrust him believe me; the rest shrug it off. After all, he’s a Fellow of the Philosophers’ Colloquium! And I’m just a child. A female, half-Erigan child, grasping at straws because everybody in my family is famous, and what have I done to distinguish myself? Published a few minor articles in some obscure journals? No wonder I’m trying to take credit for this.
He even tried to talk to me yesterday, if you can believe it. I don’t know what he thought would happen—was I going to somehow not notice what he’d done? Or forgive him? He deserved a lot worse than me slapping him. Only it was so public, and now I’m a disgrace—not the amusing kind; the pitiful kind—and he’ll forever be remembered as the one who so cleverly calculated the length of a Draconean year. While I’ll be the one who threw a tantrum over it.
I am going to ask Grandmama if I can leave Falchester. I don’t care that the Season isn’t over; there’s nothing for me here anymore except shame.
Audrey
PRESENT DAY
FROM THE DIARY OF AUDREY CAMHERST
11 Ventis
I woke up this morning half thinking I’d imagined Mornett’s voice last night. My head feels like it’s twice the size it should be; maybe the swelling pressed on my brain and made me hallucinate it all.
All right, I didn’t really believe that. But part of me wanted to, so I went downstairs to breakfast like nothing had happened—like, if I pretended nothing had happened, it would become true.
I found Kudshayn in the front hall, looking lost. Ordinarily one of the servants would have pointed him toward the breakfast room, but the house was strangely deserted; I think they were all hiding from the scary dragon-man. And Kudshayn has never been to Scirland, so he has no idea how our country houses are laid out.
He looked both relieved and appalled to see me. “Your face,” he said, reaching out with one claw, but not touching. “I am so sorry. That happened because of me.”
“Nonsense,” I said—or tried to. He’d spoken in Draconean, so I instinctively answered him the same way, but Draconean nasal vowels do not work very well when your nose is swollen shut. I changed to Scirling and said, “It happened because of stupid bigots, and no permanent harm done. I’m only sorry you had such a dreadful first experience here. Come to breakfast, and we’ll see if we can’t improve it.”
He and I had breakfast alone, because Lord Gleinleigh turned out to have left very early on a matter of business. I can’t say I mind. And I haven’t seen Kudshayn in . . . oh, heavens, it must be over two years. That symposium in Va Hing, where he had such trouble with his breathing, so it isn’t like we had much opportunity to talk then.
Of course I could only eat porridge, with my face feeling the way it did, but the housekeeper had laid out a full spread. Kudshayn studied his toast with the same expression he gives every unfamiliar thing: detached and patient, observing its every quality before making the decision to eat it. “I can ask for whatever you’d like,” I told him. “The housekeeper was at her wits’ end, saying she didn’t know what to serve to a Draconean. I told her you can eat almost anything a human can, and the exceptions aren’t likely to be on her table regardless, but she didn’t seem to believe me. I think she might be happy to receive a little direction from you.” (As long as it comes via me, I suppose. It will take a while before the staff here adjust to his presence.)
Kudshayn took an experimental bite of the toast, first dry, then with butter, then with jam, then with butter and jam together. “This will do,” he said. “It is best with the butter and fruit.”
I couldn’t help but grin, even though it made my face hurt. I think the sun will fall into the sea before Kudshayn changes. “Yes, it is, and the more the better. But perhaps we can shock Mrs. Hilleck just a little, and tell her you want steak tartare or a block of unsweetened chocolate for breakfast.” I am not so cruel as to tell her that he adores bean curd or anything else she won’t easily be able to obtain at the market in Lower Stoke.
“I will consider it,” Kudshayn said. Which was perfectly true, I am sure—just as I am sure that after he considers it, his answer will be the same. How could I expect him to be interested in shocking the housekeeper, when there are tablets to be translated?
Very well; no sense in fighting the tide. “When we’re done here,” I said, “I’ll show you what I’ve done so far. You can dig me out of the bog I’m caught in.”
His nostrils flared in query. I sighed and twirled my spoon in my porridge. “The second tablet. I know the general sense of it, I think; in some ways it’s a lot like our Scriptures. How the first few Draconeans chose mates and laid clutches and on through the generations, so-and-so begetting such-and-such—but it’s also trying to explain how certain lineages got founded, I think, and it keeps referencing various places as they move around, all of which I’m sure was very meaningful to your Anevrai foremothers. But there are so many proper names—at least, I assume they’re proper names—and I think some of them refer to the same people or places, but it’s difficult to be sure.”
Kudshayn munched his way through another slice of toast, thinking. Then he said, “Can you identify any of the places?”
“None of the names sound familiar. I can’t even draw etymological connections from them to any current names—well, I can, but they’re all made out of spun sugar. There are descriptions, though, and a geographer might be able to match them to candidates.” Popping the bacon into my mouth, I added, “Then again, maybe it’s all made up. It doesn’t sound much like southern Anthiope to me—not even the climate it used to have.” It’s boggling for me to imagine that Grandpapa’s homeland used to have thick cedar forests and so on, but he promises me it’s true.
It is so odd to think that what we are doing here may have political implications come next winter, with the Falchester Congress. An ancient genealogy is the very stuff of tedium . . . unless that genealogy references people living in an environment that sounds more like central Anthiope than southern, when everyone has always believed that southern Anthiope was the ancient homeland of the Anevrai.
What if this text says otherwise?
It shouldn’t matter. This is an ancient story, a myth, not sober historical fact. None of this really happened, not the way it’s described. But there might be grains of truth buried in it, and even if there aren’t, people will read it that way regardless. Will that mean everyone starts arguing over whether Draconeans should be permitted to re-settle in Vystrana and Tashal instead of Akhia and Haggad? (They’d find the climate there closer to congenial.) Or will it just be one more lever to say they should stay in the Sanctuary, and under human control?
Either Kudshayn wasn’t thinking the same things, or he chose not to share it. He only said, “I would like to see what you have so far. It was somewhat frustrating to me that Lord Gleinleigh would not let you send anything ahead of time.”
And this was Kudshayn saying that. His “somewhat frustrating” is anyone else’s “tearing my hair out.” I think all the equanimity I don’t have got allocated to him in the shell, leaving none for me.
I said, “Of course. I’m only waiting on you to be done with breakfast.”
Which I didn’t mean as a prod, but naturally he took it as one, swallowing the rest of his toast in one bite. Then he wiped his hands off, very fastidiously, and followed me to the library.
I really ought to put away the tablets I’ve finished transcribing. I keep fearing the maids will accidentally knock one of them onto the floor, even though it would take a spectacularly clumsy maid to make that happen. Or Hadamists might break in—I hadn’t thought of that before, but after what happened at the airfield, I’m starting to think we should take more precautions. But today I was glad they were all out, because I wanted Kudshayn to see them in all their glory.
He’s politer than I am, though. When we walked in, Cora was there, and instead of ignoring her to drool over the tablets (not literally; neither of us would risk getting saliva on them), Kudshayn bowed. He is very good about using human gestures, even if his bow looked more Yelangese than Scirling, and his wings didn’t even hit anything when he did it. In Scirling he said, “You must be Miss Fitzarthur.”
“You’re Kudshayn,” she said. “Were you the one arguing with Uncle last night?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“No,” she decided. “Your voice is too low, and you have an accent, though it isn’t too strong. I wonder who was here?”
The swelling wasn’t enough to hide my expression when Kudshayn looked to me for clarification. “Audrey?”
“Did you hear what they were arguing about?” I asked Cora.
I was too forceful; she flinched back. “No,” she said. “I only heard the end of it. He told whomever it was that he didn’t want to see him here again—that Uncle didn’t want to see the visitor here again, I mean. I thought it was odd that he would throw an invited guest out the very first night, but now it makes more sense.” Then she paused and thought it over. “Except it doesn’t really, because I still don’t know who was here.”
Kudshayn was still looking at me. “Audrey?”
I pressed one hand to the side of my head, as if that would make the throbbing stop. “I heard them, too, though not what they were saying. The visitor—it was Aaron Mornett.”
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Kudshayn look so angry. He didn’t spread his wings or anything, but the sudden tension through his body made me understand why people can be so frightened of Draconeans. In those moments, it’s easy to remember they are more related to dragons than they are to us . . . and dragons are predators.
Which doesn’t mean that Draconeans are, of course, and Kudshayn is far from being a warrior. But I wouldn’t have blamed Cora if she’d shrieked and run for cover; that’s how most people react, and she’d never met a Draconean before today. Instead she just frowned and said, “Who is Aaron Mornett?”
It is a very good thing she knows only a little of the ancient tongue and none of the modern, because Kudshayn’s reply was foul enough to shock the scales right off her. I said, “He is my nemesis. And I think he was here because your uncle tried to recruit him, or Mornett thought he was going to have a chance to work on the tablets, or—or something. Whatever he was doing, it cannot be good.”
Cora was still confused. “What do you mean, he’s your nemesis? What’s wrong with him?”
“He is not a reputable scholar,” I said. Oh, if only I’d had the sense to listen to Grandmama when I was eighteen. I can’t believe I ever fell for his lies—except I can, because Aaron Mornett could talk the tide into changing direction. Not to mention that I was young and stupid, and believed that I’d found a kindred spirit.
Kudshayn’s crest was still stiff with fury. But he has a lot of practice in staying calm around humans, so when he spoke, his voice was perfectly mild. “What do you want to do?”
How could I answer that? It does no good to say that I want to hurt him the way he hurt me; there’s no way I can ever do that, because he doesn’t care an ounce for me and never did. His reputation isn’t what it once was, and I can at least claim some credit for that, but even if Lord Gleinleigh were at home, I could hardly go stomping into his study to slander the man on the basis of a late-night argument I barely heard.
I said, “I want to know what he was doing here.”
Cora said thoughtfully, “He didn’t stay the night in the house, because I heard Uncle throw him out. So unless he drove here and then drove through the night leaving, he must have stayed in Lower Stoke. In fact, that makes sense; the overnight train from Falchester to Locheala stops there at eleven twenty-one, leaving him just enough time to walk here from the station, have a conversation with Uncle, and be overheard a bit after midnight. But there isn’t any train back toward Falchester until eight fourteen. So he might be gone by now, but he would have needed to stay somewhere for the rest of the night, unless he sat on a bench at the station the whole time. I can ask.”
Her sensible recital of facts brought me back down to earth, especially because it explained the suspiciously late hour. “Would you? It won’t tell me what he was doing, but it would help to know something.”
“Of course,” she said. “But why don’t you just ask Uncle when he comes back?”
I sighed. “Because that would mean admitting I eavesdropped on them last night. I’ll consider it, I just—you understand.”
Cora looked like she didn’t understand at all, but she went out, leaving me alone with Kudshayn.
He came and put his wings around me, and I wrapped my arms around his waist. It is not as good as being able to return a wing-hug, but it was the best I could do. “I have to do something about him,” I said into Kudshayn’s ribs—it’s inconvenient that he’s so much taller than me. “I can’t keep being like this, hiding from him, jumping at shadows. For five years I’ve been going to sea and avoiding places I want to be, because I know I might see him there.”
Kudshayn’s wings closed in a little more, putting me inside a warm, comforting cave. “Be yourself,” he said. “Translate the epic. Win fame that he cannot touch. And then one day you will realize he is unimportant to you, and to everyone else. That will be the best revenge.”
He’s right . . . but it’s abstract enough, not to mention far enough in the future, that it’s hard to reassure myself with such thoughts.
Anyway, Cora came back around lunchtime and said he stayed the night in the railway inn and left by the 8:14 train, which shows a surprising amount of early-bird vigor for him. At least I know he’s gone, which means I can breathe more easily.
But Kudshayn tore two sets of gouges through the library carpet when I told him Mornett had been there, and if I had claws I might have done the same. I don’t trust that man any farther than I can throw him, and I don’t like not knowing what he’s up to. I held a viper to my bosom five years ago; having him somewhere I can’t see him isn’t much better.
Tablet III: “The Dream Tablet”
translated by Audrey Camherst and Kudshayn
Before cities, before iron, before fields, before laws, a dream came to a daughter of the line of Ninlaš, a daughter known as Peli. One night she lay in her cave, two nights she dreamed, three nights she had a vision, which she did not understand.1
She saw a seed. A wind came and blew the seed onto stony soil, but there it took root, and from it grew a tree, four branches from one root. A wind came and tried to blow down the tree as it grew, but the branches bent and did not break. Flowers grew from the tree, each branch bearing a flower of a different colour, and again a great wind blew. This time it tore the flowers from their twigs and blew them to earth, but where each flower landed, something new began to grow. From the black flower came a river, flowing between banks of clay. From the blue flower came a round stone that began to endlessly roll in place. From the green flower came thick grasses bearing seed. From the golden flower came a tall mountain whose top reached the sun, and whose root descended deep into the earth.
Still Peli slept, and still she dreamed. She saw the mountain shake, the grasses tremble, the stone falter in its rolling, the river flow backward in its course
. Light vanished from the world. From deep in the earth came a howling; from deep in the earth came the sound of lamentation. Then light grew once more, but now the tree bore only three branches.
These dreams made Peli sorely afraid, for she did not know their meaning. She therefore went to seek out one who could explain them. Across plains she went, across rivers, across forests, across mountains, until she came to the place where Hastu dwelt.
She came to him and said, “I have seen a thing I do not understand. One night I lay in my cave, two nights I dreamed, three nights I had a vision; I slept and saw a thing I did not understand. Listen and tell me its meaning.”
She told him of her dream: of the wind that blew the seed onto stony soil, of the tree that grew from the seed, of the four branches from one root. She told him of the flowers of different colours, blown to the ground, and what grew from each. She told him of the calamity that came, and afterward the tree had only three branches.
He listened to her, Hastu, wise Hastu, clear-sighted Hastu, Hastu the šiknas.2 He listened as Peli told him her dream.
When she finished he said, “Not easy is this to understand.”
“Wise Hastu can understand it.” And she told him her dream again.
When she finished he said, “Not easy is this to interpret.”
“Clear-sighted Hastu can interpret it.” And she told him her dream again.
When she finished he said, “Not easy is this to explain.”
“My friend3 Hastu can explain it,” she said, and told him her dream again.
When she finished he said, “Your dream is one of calamity. You will bear an egg; you will bear four hatchlings in a single egg. The Ever-Moving, the Source of Wind, will try to strike them down. From them will come many new changes that will threaten the world. The river you saw will drown the sun; the stone you saw will crush the sun; the grasses you saw will ensnare the sun; the mountain you saw will devour the sun. Your hatchlings will cast the world into darkness. At least one of them must die to prevent this evil, but better it would be for all of us if all four were to die, before this calamity comes.”
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