by Mary Brown
There was somebody, something, up there with us—
Snoring.
The Binding: Dragon
The Dragon Awakes
Raised in natural steps some four or five feet above the ledge on which we stood, was the dark, triangular shape of a cave mouth, and it was from this direction that the sound came. Instantly we all retreated to the very edge of the ledge, clutching at one another in panic like children caught stealing apples. All, that is, except Snowy, who stood his ground, snuffing the air.
"He's asleep," he said. "Or in a coma."
"Is it . . . ?"
"Of course. We were bound to reach him sooner or later. Come, my children, you're not afraid?"
"No! . . . Certainly not . . . Afraid, us?"
But we were, of course we were. It was all right for Snowy, I reasoned, being of faery stock to begin with, but the rest of us were all mortal. Too late I began to recall all I had heard about dragons; immense scaly beings, with leathery wings and huge claws and mouths full of teeth and fire. They ate people, whole sometimes depending on size, and were capable of incinerating entire towns and villages with their flame. They guarded vast hordes of treasure with jealous attention and demanded a sacrifice of seven maidens every year. They hatched from golden eggs and took only a day to reach full size and after that a thousand years to die. They flew in swarms a hundred strong and mated once every nine years, laying nine eggs which took another nine years to hatch—
"Grumphhhh!!"
I jumped back as if I had been punched and fell over the edge of our precarious perch, luckily landing on soft snow only some five feet below, to be hauled back by an anxious Conn. Puddy and Moglet, in jerkin and pocket respectively, had of course accompanied my fall but as I had landed on my back they escaped with bumps but not bruises.
When we were all assembled back on the ledge I looked at Conn. "I'm not sure . . ."
"Neither am I, neither am I, dear girl, but this is what we all came for . . ."
"Bravo, Sir Knight!" said Snowy. "Now, shall we—?"
"I'm frightened!" said Moglet.
"So am I," I said. "But, dear one, Conn is right. This is what we came for. And we're together, so nothing can really hurt us—remember what The Ancient said?"
And so it was that, with Snowy ever so slightly in front, we climbed up the last steps of rock and found ourselves in the mouth of the dragon's cave.
The winter sun was at its highest, illuminating all but the farthest depths of the south-facing cave. Fearfully we peeped: a bare stone floor, stained with droppings; shelves running erratically across the back and sides, and on these humps and piles of metal: shields, helms, coins, a cup or two. In the middle of the cave a few discarded bones—bullock or sheep, perhaps—and a bluish leathery cloak or bag, flung aside from some foray probably, tattered and patched and torn.
But no dragon . . .
Perhaps there was an inner cave. Perhaps—my heart lifted, coward as I was—perhaps he had gone. Perhaps he had never been here. But there were the piles of metal, the bones . . .
"There's nothing here," I whispered. "Except rusty metal, old bones and rubbish."
"Rubbish is rubbish is rubbish," said Snowy cryptically, who alone of us did not seem disturbed, anxious or disappointed, the sun shining on the hairs on his chin and making his lips pink.
"Well there isn't," I said. "If—he—was here, then he's gone, long since. Look! These old bones were chewed years ago."
"And the noise we heard?"
"Oh—wind in the rocks, I expect . . ." I became bolder and advanced into the cave, while Conn stepped forward and examined the shelves.
"Darling girl, there's gold up here!" His voice was excited. "Lots of these shields and things are bronze or iron, but there's silver and gold coin and buckles and rings and brooches set with coloured stones . . ."
I put Moglet and Puddy down so they could explore. "So what? What good is gold on a mountain-top? We need broth and bread. And, besides, we came here to get rid of our burdens, not set up a second-hand armour stall in the market." I was disappointed now, angry with anticlimax. "The place is disgusting, that's what it is, and this heap of rubbish smells!" and I kicked the heap of leathery discard in the middle of the cave.
Upon which the bundle of rubbish stirred.
And opened one baleful eye.
Upon which we beat a fast retreat. I had heard of the phrase "one's hair standing up on one's head" and now I experienced it. It was horrid! I felt as though a hand had scooped its icy fingers up the back of my neck and yanked my hair by the roots.
Once again only Snowy seemed at ease.
"One doesn't kick dragons," he said mildly. "At least, not until one has struck up a friendly acquaintance."
Helplessly I stared at that yellow eye and, unbidden, a child's rhyme I had learnt—when? where?—popped suddenly into my mind.
"Let sleeping dragons lie;
Tread soft, child, pass him by.
Better not know the power and glory,
Learn it best by myth and story . . ."
Too late! I had awoken chaos, and ineptly too.
The bundle of rubbish stirred again, rearranged itself, snorted, sneezed, and opened the other eye, which was, if anything, more baleful and bleary than the first, and for a long—a very long—moment, we all stared at it, and it at us.
Then the bundle spoke, coughing out an ashy, cinderous breath. "Who disturbs my rest?"
Nobody moved, nobody even breathed, then suddenly an absolutely unstoppable sensation rose somewhere behind my eyes, gathered strength behind my cheekbones, ordered itself behind my tongue, pressing its advantage so firmly I had finally to snatch for breath and—
"A—tish—ooo!!" The best of it was that I hadn't sneezed for months.
"Bless you!" said the dragon, and suddenly everything was much better, so much so that almost without thinking I wiped my nose on my sleeve and advanced two paces.
"Good-day," I said, and bowed. "I regret that we disturbed your slumbers, O—O Magnificence, but I'm afraid it was necessary. Well, not afraid exactly: that's perhaps the wrong word." (It was the right word.) "But it was necessary . . ."
"Why?" Uncompromising. "And who are you, anyway? From the village, perhaps? Well, if you are, your climb was for nothing. I do not intend to play puppet for your silly games any longer." He yawned, and a furry yellow tongue curled up like a cat's around stained, yellow fangs. "Now, go away!"
"But—"
"At once!" He raised himself for a moment and his wings rustled as he half-opened them. A few dry, diamond-shaped scales fell to the floor in dusty disarray, and he sank back on his haunches.
I retreated one step but no further, for Snowy's nose nudged me forward again, none too gently.
"Please Sir, please Lord-of-the-Sky . . ."
The eyes, which had gone slitty, opened wide again. "What, still here?"
"Yes, if it please Your Eminence. I . . . I—We're not from the village; no, we're from much farther away. Much farther," I repeated firmly, for now I realized it was no good blurting everything out in one go. It would have to be told in stages, perhaps like a story, for I would have to wake this creature gradually to the reason we were here, lest he lose his temper and blow us over the edge. So, a tale for the fireside . . . "It all started this way: once upon a time . . ."
When I had got into my story and the dragon was clearly listening, his claws folded in front of him, I sat down cross-legged on the cave floor and made myself comfortable, giving him a condensed version of all that had happened, introducing us all by name at the appropriate moment, so he knew where we fitted in the story. When I spoke of the witch the dragon allowed a wisp of smoke to emerge from his right nostril, but otherwise there was little show of emotion. He glanced at Snowy once or twice and nodded when I spoke of The Ancient, as though they were acquainted, but otherwise he was a quiet and attentive audience. By the time I had finished, the sun's rays cast a fading light on the left wall of the cave.
I coughed heartily for my throat was now dry and parched, but Conn handed me Pisky's bowl and he sank warily to the bottom as I sipped.
"Is that it?" said the dragon, but it was not really a question. "So . . ."
Slowly he seemed to reassemble himself, taking deep breaths, scales rustling like a long-forgotten pile of dry leaves. Now I could see the shape of his ribs, the heave of his flanks and he seemed to swell to twice his original size before our eyes. Suddenly we all became less cold, as though we had stepped into a room where the ashes were still warm. Indeed little curls and wisps of smoke issued from the dragon's nostrils and when he opened his mouth I stepped back involuntarily, for a small flame licked momentarily between his teeth and then died back again.
"Fear not," he said. "I mean you no harm, but when a dragon wakes from as long a sleep as mine the fires take some time to get restarted. Come forward, nearer to me, you and your companions. Show me where the sorceress hid my treasure . . ."
Slowly the others joined me; I pointed to Puddy's head, lifted Corby's wing and Moglet's paw, held up Pisky's bowl and hefted my jerkin to expose my navel.
"It was true, then . . ." Somehow he was changing colour. At first he had been a dull, metallic grey-blue, but now the colour was deepening, brightening, and round the middle of his body assuming a purplish hue. I jumped back again as with a hissing, swishing sound his tail, which had so far been hidden, twitched and curled and unfolded itself, the tip, like a huge arrow-head, curling up against his left flank.
Now he addressed Snowy and Conn. "Come hither, let me look at you . . . Ah, I see. You both want restored that which you would not use . . ." They both looked puzzled, but he did not explain. "And what would you give, to restore a horn, to mend a sword?"
"What you would need of healing to set you free," said Snowy, stepping forward and nodding at the discarded scales.
"And I," said Conn, "will trim and sharpen your claws that you may take flight and return home without pain." And he indicated what I had not noted before, the bent and twisted claws on the right front paw.
The dragon nodded. "A fair bargain, from you both. Stand aside, Sir Knight, stand aside all save the unicorn!"
No need for second telling. We all pressed back against the cave wall as the dragon took several deep breaths and then shot a jet of flame that flared with a gassy roar, like those lumps of blackened wood that one sometimes finds in peat. A thick, acrid smoke curled in our nostrils and I put my hand over Pisky's bowl to save him from the smuts that floated down.
"Sorry," said the dragon. "Out of practice. Must concentrate." And now the flame quietened, burned steady, changed colour from yellow to orange to red to a sort of silvery pink and now we were all very warm indeed. The flame seemed to transmute into a shimmering glow.
Into that glow stepped Snowy, for all that I extended a last-minute hand to stop him and cried out: "No, no! You will be burnt . . ." and shut my eyes and put my hands over my ears. From her perch on my shoulder Moglet's cold nose nudged my cheek.
"Look! It's all right, really it is . . ."
The shabby little white horse, uncombed and uncared for, stood calmly in the silver fire. As the light streamed over his dumpy body and lifted his mane and tail with the breath of its passing, a curious change took place. The lumps and bumps and tangles were smoothed out and curried and combed and he stood taller, slimmer and shining with the light itself. And suddenly there were golden sparks and a ting! as of a golden bell and there, between his ears, on the sore little stump he had borne so long, there sprouted a beautiful, spiralling golden horn. The silver fire died down and he stepped forth, shining like the moon at Lugnosa, the harvest month; not gold, not silver, but a glorious mixture of both. For a moment he stood, a creature of pure faery, untouched and untouchable, the snow with the sun upon it, and I sank to my knees in awe as he reared and neighed his triumph. Then hooves found the floor of the cave again and he looked over at us.
"It's all right, you know," he said, and suddenly he was our beloved Snowy again. Going over to the dragon he bent on one knee, his horn touching the floor. "Thank you, O Master of the Clouds!" and, standing now, he circled the dragon on delicate hooves, bending to touch certain portions of the scaly hide with his golden horn. To my astonishment I saw the parts touched burn with a blue light which gradually faded to leave new scales growing in place of the old.
"Magic," I whispered. "Real magic . . ."
"Good magic," said Snowy, and came over to bend his head and nuzzle my hair, his rippling mane curtaining us both. "I am whole again . . ."
And now it was Conn's turn. He was told to place the broken halves of the sword upon the ground in front of the dragon. The latter carefully rearranged the pieces, muttering under his breath as Conn retreated to join us.
"Runes," murmured Snowy, "and a perfect alignment, north/south."
The dragon's tail lay straight behind him this time and the fire he breathed was red and hot, so hot that I began to perspire, and the sword itself glowed with a fire of its own. It seemed to me, through the shimmer of heat, that letters of fire appeared on the blade, but if so they were in symbols and words that I could not read. I could not have pinpointed the moment when the two pieces became one; suffice it to say that when the metal glowed as one piece the dragon suddenly roared for: "Snow! and plenty of it!" Conn and I ran outside, scooped up handfuls and placed them in heaps on the glowing metal. The snow hissed and melted as we watched, and then the blade of the sword gleamed blue and whole on the floor of the cave. Conn, in wonderment, bent to pick it up, but a claw fastened on his arm.
"Not yet, not yet: the metal still burns!"
"But the magic . . ." faltered Conn.
"No magic. Expert welding, that's all. Dragon-fire and snow."
It was many minutes before the hilt had cooled enough, even with more snow, but eventually Conn wrapped a piece of cloth around his right hand and raised the sword. Blue light still seemed to flow along the blade and it sang in the air as Conn swung, thrust, parried.
"Begorra, 'tis better than ever it was! A power in the hand with a mind of its own! Many thanks, Great Sky-Lizard, for giving me back my right arm!" and he bowed deeply to the beast, sword-point down, both hands folded over the hilt.
"Let's try the edge, then," said the dragon. "These pesky claws . . ."
The sun was much lower in the sky by the time his claws were trimmed to his satisfaction. I knew that it was now our turn and my heart seemed to bounce between my mouth and my boots as he beckoned us forwards. I had to carry Moglet, who by now was so terrified that I felt a warm trickle on my arm as I lifted her; Puddy and Corby shuffled forward slowly of their own volition, and the only one who seemed eager was Pisky, who was frisking about happily in his bowl.
"Going to see a dragon face to face, a thing even my revered great-grandparents never did; their parents, on the great-grandmother's side, had one drink from their pool, but they hid and were afraid. I'm not! This is a thing I am going to tell my great-great-grandchildren! Wish I could have something special to remember it by . . ."
So did I: instant oblivion.
"Now," said the dragon, as we arranged ourselves in a semicircle before him. "Now, did The Ancient, as you call him, tell you of the possible consequences of relinquishing these jewels?"
I nodded.
"You realize that you must give freely?"
"Yes."
"I cannot force you to give these jewels up—"
"We understand. But surely—"
"I could take them? No. You yourselves have bound them into a magic of your own, something never envisaged by the sorceress. She merely thought to hide them from me, knowing I should find them difficult to locate if she hid them within living flesh in five different locations. She did not reckon with the bond you forged between you, a bond so strong that, had she tried, she could not have taken them back."
"She—you—could kill us and rip them away . . ."
"No again. I could kill,
she could have too, if you were separate, but even then the jewels would be worthless, dull and insignificant. You were given them to guard, whether you realized it or not, and a gift like that can only be returned freely, never forcibly taken."
"We—we have travelled many miles, not only to rid ourselves of our burdens, but to return that which is not ours to keep. We are not thieves: the jewels are yours, and we bring them to you through storm and fire, flood and cold, distance and dangers for precisely that reason. It was a joint decision," and I looked round at the others for confirmation.
"Agreed," said Puddy.
"Likewise," said Corby. "Mind you, I don't think I realized all that was entailed. Still . . ."
"I'm ready, ready, ready!" sang Pisky, happily. "Great privilege, meeting a dragon!"
"Don't want to," whispered Moglet. "Changed my mind . . . Frightened . . ."
"No, you're not!" I whispered back. "You want a nice painless paw, now don't you? So you can play and hunt properly? Surely my brave Moglet, who wasn't afraid of the wicked spider, won't balk at the last moment when all her friends are willing?"
"Are you?"
"Of course," I lied, more frightened than I could remember. "Of course!"
"That's all right then," said Moglet. "But you must hold me tight!"
The dragon had missed none of the exchange, I am sure, but he chose to ignore it. "You do realize, also, that you will regain your memories?" And he looked at me. "Not all at once, perhaps, but eventually you will remember where you were taken from, your past life, your home . . . And this may be more painful than anything else."
"We understand. But sometimes the torture of not knowing is worse. You should know that . . ." It was daring to speak thus to a dragon, but apart from a hiss and a wisp of smoke he did not respond.
I spoke again. "We are ready. How will you remove these stones?"
"Inspiration." I thought he meant one thing, but as it transpired he was being literal and physical rather then mental.
"Who will be first?"
We glanced at one another, then Puddy gamely dragged himself forward.