Isle of Dragons

by J H G Foss

  Eventually the dragon’s then left the chamber and the servants came in to eat the leftovers. Then the servants leftovers were left for the rock lizards. It was rare to let the servants and lizards do this, but Roztov had seen it done in a few households. Usually it was thrown straight out, but the “kinder” dragons did this, which Roztov took as a good sign.

  He followed Lorkuvan into what was apparently her private chamber. It was well appointed with furniture to the scale of a dragon. As in the Spire, some dragons favoured large couches to rest on and she reclined herself into the one at the far side of the room. She began to sort through a large collection of treasure on a table nearby, a pass time that all the Stovologard dragons indulged in when they were relaxing.

  Roztov scampered across the floor and under the couch.

  ‘The food is in the main hall,’ she said to the room. It was a while before Roztov realised she had just addressed him.

  He slowly stepped out from under the couch and looked up at her. ‘Remember me?’

  The dragon fixed him with its yellow eyes and gave him a stern look. She was in better condition than when he had last seen her. He blackish green scales glistened in the light from the windows, her long, almost elegant, body rose up from the couch and she spread her wings.

  Roztov nervously took two steps back and licked both his eyeballs.

  ‘I’m the guy that saved your life, remember?’

  He stood side on so she could see his piebald markings, but then realised how ridiculous that was.

  ‘Outlander,’ she hissed. ‘And now here in Stovologard, causing trouble.’

  ‘Trouble? Not me lady.’

  ‘Don’t lie to me, you dung-eater.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘There was talk of shape-shifters in the city. Everyone assumed it was dragons from the Spire, but now I realise it must have been you.’

  ‘Listen...’

  ‘You may have saved my life,’ said the dragon, ‘but you have killed four dragons that I know of, two by rats, one that fell and one of the rune-keepers. Why should I help a murderer?’

  ‘Well, for a start you’ve got no proof that was me.’

  Lorkuvan reared up again and showed her teeth. Roztov scuttled back a few more paces.

  ‘Don’t eat me!’

  ‘Why would I eat you? I’m sure you’d taste disgusting. Just tell me the truth before I lose my temper.’

  ‘Very well then. It was me and my friends. One of whom died in the battle,’ replied Roztov. ‘Stovologard is the reason I’m here though. We were heading somewhere else, but your agent Dreggen brought us here. Then a dragon fired out ship and killed most of our crew. We’ve just been trying to survive since then.’

  ‘Murder is murder all the same in Stovologard. It is unheard of for men to kill dragons, it’s hard to guess what dreadful punishment they would create for you.’

  ‘Right, well, let’s just stick a pin in that for the moment eh, old girl?’ said Roztov hastily. ‘I’m just here to give you a warning. Whatever crazy plan you dragons have to link up with Garumuda will be a disaster for you. Preventing the opening of some kind of magical portal between you and him will save hundreds of dragon lives. And thousands of humans probably.’

  ‘Well that’s kind of you, I must say,’ laughed Lorkuvan. ‘That’s all you're here for is it?’

  ‘We just want to leave. If you have a ship you can give us we can get out of your scales.’

  ‘I’m not sure about that.’

  ‘We don’t want any more fighting or deaths.’

  Lorkuvan snorted. ‘There is no need to start making threats. All I mean is that ships are not my purview. I know nothing about them.’

  ‘There is nothing you can do?’

  ‘I never said that,’ said the dragon. ‘Honestly, if you were a dragon I’d say it was good to see you. After what happened at the Chasm, I’ve given a lot of thought to why a powerful outlander was on Tanud. Now you have solved that mystery. I share your concerns regarding Garumuda. Tell me what you know.’

  ‘All right,’ said Roztov. ‘The man called Dreggen that led out ship here, he was part of a flight of dragons on a mission to meet Garumuda. They were taking a message back to your King, but were all killed by griffon cavalry. Only Dreggen survived. How he got as far west as he did before he met us, I’m not sure, but our ship’s captain foolishly hired him as a navigator. He is now on the island, in the custody of the Spire dragons. Wherever he is, he’s a danger to everyone. He may not know it, but he will have been tainted by Garumuda in some way.’

  ‘What do mean tainted?’

  ‘Old Bones will have hexed him somehow, I doubt even the Spire dragons will know how. That’s what Garumuda does though, he hollows out men and fills them with poison.’

  ‘You are familiar with his methods?’

  ‘All too familiar I’m afraid. His armies of undead are right on the borders of the kingdoms of men.’

  Lorkuvan sighed. ‘How strange that sounds to my ears. You may as well say “the kingdoms of mice”. Your counsel is useful, I concede. I remember it now. Three years ago. It was an ill-conceived notion. When they never came back it was forgotten about. Do you know where this Dreggen is now?'

  ‘The Spire dragons still have him as far as I know,’ answered Roztov. ‘Whatever message he has, they’ll know it too. I should have probably killed him when I had the chance back in Vine Street.’

  ‘Why didn’t you?’

  ‘Recent evidence to the contrary, I am a peaceful man.’

  ‘You speak of the death of my kin lightly. I should really hand you over to the rune-keepers.’

  ‘I’d be out that window and away in the blink of an eye, lady.’

  ‘Boastful little rock lizard.’

  Lorkuvan relaxed a little into her couch to think. After a while, she seemed to make up her mind about something and spoke again. ‘There is to be a ceasefire. Then after that there is to be a Diet. Apparently Bloated King Blavius has something on his mind he wants to discuss with King Primus, but the Spire dragons will be there too. I’ll bring you along as an advisor if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Right,’ said Roztov, wondering what he was agreeing to.

  ‘As to Garumuda, I am in agreement with you. Forming an alliance with the undead is madness, even if they are dragons. King Primus may see things differently though, as he does most things. Garumuda is his kin, they are of the same bloodline.’

  ‘Stone me!’ exclaimed Roztov.

  ‘Nothing happens quickly with dragons. Come back in a week. We will discuss things further then.’

  ‘We just wait where we are then?’ asked Roztov.

  ‘Well, I’m not taking you in like a herd of lost vegetains,’ laughed the dragon. ‘If your friends are safe where they are, then leave them there. I can see what I can do to help you leave once this Diet is over, one way or the other.’

  ‘Right you are, my lady,’ said Roztov feeling he was being dismissed. ‘Well, it’s been lovely to see you again.’

  ‘Don’t let me detain you any further.’

  Roztov scampered out of her room and into the corridor. He could smell the leftovers in the main hall, but he had no desire to eat scraps with the lizards and went to meet Ghene for lunch instead. He had a fair bit of news to pass on.

  Chapter 20

  The Mines

  In the following days, they did their best to stay out of sight, keeping to their rooms. It didn’t last long though, all of them were too curious about the city, its people, its food and its buildings to stay indoors for long. The war too, continued in the south of the city, and the druids went down to heal the injured behind the lines, using all their magic and only returning when they were spent, tired but satisfied they had at least saved some lives.

  While the war went on the dragon’s hold on the people of the city loosened a little and the slaves and servants began to rebel against the gendarmes. The streets were growing chaotic, the dole carts were constantly being
raided, which seemed odd to them as the food and drink was given away free anyway, and gangs of runways lurked in the side streets, looking for trouble.

  ‘The word on the street is that there was a rebellion in a southern quarter, the Stovologard dragons killed a hundred of their own people,’ said Meggelaine when she returned from some afternoon food and shoe shopping.

  ‘We should go down their again,’ said Roztov looking up from his journal. He did not relish the thought though, there was always more suffering than the three of them could handle.

  ‘Let’s eat first,’ said Meggelaine. ‘We’ll need our strength. Stop looking at my feet Roztov.’

  ‘Of all the shoes you could have picked, you had to choose those?’ he said, pointing at them with his pen.

  ‘My old ones were ragged. We marched from one end of this rotten island to the other you know. My feet are all blisters and these were the most comfortable.’

  Meggelaine looked down and turned in her left foot so she could admire her new footwear. They had been made for the spoilt offspring of some pampered dragonthrall. A little girl of six or seven would have taken great delight in them, due to the bright red colour and the pink silk ribbons that tied them, and if she was honest with herself, the little fressle liked them for the same reason.

  Ghene was at the window, catching glimpses of dragon fire through the smoke and fog. ‘There is more fighting in the south. We should go and help the people after we have eaten.’

  Roztov went to the food table and began to make himself a sandwich to take with him.

  Later that evening, tired and dirty, the druids returned from their day of healing the injured from the fighting on the southern outskirts of the city. Once they had eaten, they joined the others by the fire.

  ‘Is there anything we can do to help?’ asked Arrin. ‘I’ve been feeling a bit useless these last couple of days.’ Tankle nodded her agreement.

  ‘I might have a job for you two later,’ said Meggelaine, who always liked to have a secret.

  ‘Oh well, good then. It’s just that it’s so unjust. Broddor would have sorted them out,’ said Arrin with an angry tremor in his voice. ‘He’d soon sort out those dragons killing those people.’

  They all knew Broddor had been Arrin’s hero, so no one cast any doubt on his statement.

  ‘He was fearless, right enough,’ agreed Roztov.

  ‘And that armour, and his sword...’ continued Arrin with the enthusiasm of a teenager. ‘I only saw him fight Mordran that one time, but what a battle. I wish I had been there to see him fight that rune-keeper dragon. What a battle that must have been. And that time, when me and Salveri were fighting those manhunters with him in the forest, he was holding off all their spears, none of them could land a blow on him. Salveri... Well, they are both dead now...’

  Roztov could see tears in Arrin’s eyes, glistening in the gloomy light from the cracked windows.

  ‘There will be some great tales told about Broddor, when we get back. That’s what he would have wanted. I’ll never forget how all this started, that dragon attacking the ship out of the mist, and Broddor thundering past me, across the deck and right along the bowsprit. He must have leapt ten feet in the air off that thing. Probably gave that dragon the scare of its life.’

  Arrin laughed and wiped his nose. Roztov knew he was changing the tale, in truth Broddor had got no more than three steps along the bowsprit before falling, but what did that matter? He had still been attacking a dragon and in a dwarfish tale about the honoured dead it was the essence of the story, not the details, which mattered.

  Roztov noticed that Meggelaine was weeping now too. ‘Broddor and Ophess, and Sal and all the others. Oh Roz... I’m going to boil the kettle.’

  As Meggelaine went over to the fireplace Tankle tried to distract her little friend a little.

  ‘What was that language he spoke? He often said things like “Conusmig”,’ she asked. ‘It was like no dwarfish I ever heard.’

  ‘Oh it was dwarfish,’ laughed Meggelaine even as tears wetted her cheeks. ‘But heavily accented. His family emigrated from the north, the Lead Hills I think, generations ago and that was the dialect the spoke in Kardane. If he ever said anything in dwarfish, believe me, it isn’t repeatable.’

  Meggelaine boiled the kettle and made tea for everyone, calming her emotions with this simple ritual.

  When they had time, Roztov and Ghene would turn into rock lizards and skulk around in the building to eavesdrop on the residents. It appeared they were in no current danger of discovery, the conversations of the locals was primarily about the war, the street gangs and the availability of food. The people in their street all worked at the harbour. They were sailors, stevedores, fishermen and the like, thin, but hardy, used to a tough life. Most of them were Sunda, but there were some Bullays and dark skinned Yats, and quite a few mixed-race people. It seemed that they were safe enough, certainly while the gendarmes were struggling to keep control of the population.

  ‘They don’t seem to understand the concept of men living anywhere other than Tanud,’ remarked Roztov after one of their visits.

  ‘They are simple folk, by and large these city people,’ said Ghene. ‘Maybe out in the towns and villages the people are a bit less ignorant. Honni realised we were outlanders after all.’

  ‘Aye, he must have got it from somewhere,’ agreed Roztov. ‘In the city though, some people can rise higher than a mere servant certainly. Lady Fiewa for one, admittedly she’s a Spire spy, but she had my card marked straight away.’

  ‘True, she’s not the only one too, I’ll wager,’ mused Ghene.

  ‘I’ll have a wee sniff about for them, next time I’m there,’ said Roztov. ‘Delivering messages is a great way to get into people’s houses.’

  ‘I'm amazed you are still getting away with it,’ Meggelaine remarked from her place by the fire. ‘Right under their noses. What about those Rune-Keepers? Presumably if one gets close to you, they'll see a rock lizard transform into a man or elf?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ Roztov assured her. ‘We know what we’re doing.’

  In truth though they had already had some very close calls.

  Roztov and Ghene went to the tower the next day and left to her own devices Meggelaine took Arrin and Tankle down to the harbour to look at the ships. It was not the first time.

  ‘So, what have we got today?’ she asked the sailors.

  ‘Little fishing boats as always,’ replied Arrin as they walked along the harbour wall in the fog. ‘There are colliers over there, but they are little better than lighters. I can see some sloops moored over there.’

  ‘Are they any use to us?’

  ‘No, it’s the same as last time, there is nothing ocean-going here.’

  ‘Drat it,’ said Meggelaine, snapping her fingers in irritation. ‘Look though.’

  They were at the harbour mouth now, as far out as the wall went and lost in the fog. Sea spray occasionally lashed up from below and splattered their cloaks and faces. They could no longer see the city, they couldn’t even see the other side of the harbour mouth, but they could see an empty collier going out into the sea, a dark silhouette moving slowly through the fog.

  ‘It’s going somewhere, right enough,’ admitted Arrin.

  ‘And they come back laden with coal and hematite. I’m not a miner, but I know you don’t catch iron ore in fishing nets,’ said Tankle.

  ‘There must be another island,’ speculated Meggelaine. ‘Beyond the fog barrier. We should come back with Tup later and go out on one.’

  As they walked back Arrin was deep in thought. ‘I saw something that looked a bit like a scow the other day. We should go out on one of them.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘They will be going out further than the lighters. I mean, probably.’

  It did not take Floran long, with a gold coin pressed into the captain’s hand, to arrange them passage on a large scow out beyond the harbour wall. There were only three sailors crewing the boat, bu
t a further ten people, men and women, onboard who were presumably miners.

  After an hour of sailing they left the fog barrier behind and all four of them felt a huge weight lift off their shoulders.

  ‘My word,’ exclaimed Floran. ‘When was the last time I saw the sky free of fog and smoke?’

  Meggelaine closed her eyes and held her face up to the sun. ‘It’s glorious.’

  ‘Look yonder!’ cried Arrin pointing out over the clear blue sea.

  Ahead of them were dozens of tall towers, sticking straight out of the sea, each bigger than a tenement block.

  ‘What are they?’ gasped Tankle.

  Floran asked the captain, and then translated the reply. ‘They are the mines. They are offshore mines, apparently.’

  As they got closer, they began to appreciate the scale of the things. They were broad and tall, with flat tops and wooden ladders that led up to doorways usually one or two stories up. There were cranes too, further up that were used to load the colliers. The captains sailed the scow past the first of the towers, evidently going to one further out. They watched the towers go past, seeing them close up they could see they were made from dark red bricks, patched and repairs with yellow mortar.

  When the scow arrived at its destination, they all climbed up a ladder and into what appeared to be an administration room.

  ‘This man is wondering why we are here,’ said Floran, gesturing to a confused looking old man. ‘I think he is the foreman of this tower.’

  ‘Just give him a gold coin,’ said Meggelaine as she looked up. There was a central well, where coal was being drawn up in baskets. She could hear a capstan being turned somewhere and could smell oxen or something, but couldn’t see any.

  ‘Ask him how they turn the capstan, Tup,’ she said. ‘They can’t be using vegetains, they are too lazy.’

  Floran asked the question, and the recently bribed foreman, smiled, bowed and led them up a series of ladders to a room full of gears and pulleys with a large capstan in the middle of it.