Bones of the Dragon (46 page)

Skylan fell to his knees, babbling incoherently, begging for mercy. The cold fingers touched him on the shoulder. Skylan shuddered and closed his eyes, waiting to die.

The hand patted him timidly.

“You’re safe,” said Wulfe. “The draugr’s gone.”

Skylan opened his eyes and looked wildly about. The deck was empty except for the boy. Skylan seized hold of him, and was thankful to feel warm flesh.

“You saw her? The draugr?” Skylan gasped, and he shuddered again at the thought.

Wulfe nodded. “She is the woman I saw steering the ship. I didn’t know then she was a draugr. Who is she? Do you know her?”

Skylan sank back onto the deck with a groan. “She is . . . or was . . . my wife.”

S
kylan sat hunched miserably on a sea chest, his head in his hands. He had no idea what was happening to him. He could not see the sun for the thick wall of fog. He could not see the land, though he knew it must be near, for he would sometimes sight a broken branch or leaves floating on the water. The sea was flat, sullen, an oily gray. Fog shrouded the ship, hanging from the mast like a tattered sail, and it dripped like saliva from the dragon’s fangs. The fog transformed the
Venjekar
into a thing he did not know.

Skylan, who had crawled the decks of this ship before he could walk, could not distinguish starboard from port, aft from stern. He stared into the mists, trying to pierce them, but the fog made his eyes swim, and he grew dizzy. The air was smothering, clogging his lungs. And out of the fog had come the apparition of his dead wife. Skylan wondered, with a feeling of dread, if he was trapped in the Nethervold.

The boy was no comfort, for though he was made of flesh and bone and warm to the touch, there was something strange about Wulfe, something not of this world. He could see the dragon in his spirit form, and that was not possible.

“Did you murder your wife?”

The boy had been quiet such a long time that Skylan was startled by the question. “Is that why the draugr came for you?”

“I did not!” Skylan cried, and he grasped hold of the amulet and raised his face to the sky he could not see. “I swear by Torval, I meant no harm to come to Draya!”

“Then why does she haunt you?” Wulfe asked.

Skylan could think of many reasons, but he chose not to. “You are awfully calm about it,” he said, somewhat resentfully. His heartbeat was just starting to return to normal.

“The draugr didn’t come for me,” Wulfe pointed out. “She came for you.”

“Do you . . .” Skylan licked dry lips. “Do you know why?”

“Sometimes draugrs come only to kill, because they hate the living. Sometimes they come back for a reason. There was a draugr in our village who came back to be with his wife. The draugr was a real nuisance, scaring away all the men who wanted to marry her. The elder tried to talk to the draugr, but he wouldn’t listen, and finally his family had to dig up the corpse and burn it. Since the draugr didn’t kill you,” Wulfe concluded, “she must want something from you.”

“You mean she’ll come back?” Skylan asked, horrified.

“Oh yes. They always do.”

Skylan groaned. “I can’t bear this!”

Groping his way through the thick fog, he crossed the deck to the rudder. He had decided to remove the lashing and steer the ship toward where he thought he would find land. He could feel the dragon’s baleful gaze on him, but Skylan didn’t care. If he didn’t escape this ship, he would go mad. Skylan tugged desperately at the knots of the rope that held the rudder in place. The knots had been tied tight. The rope was wet. His fingers slipped and fumbled, and at last, in despair, he gave up.

Probably just as well, Skylan reflected bitterly. He might have steered the ship away from land, not toward it, sailed out into unknown waters and been lost forever.

If he wasn’t lost now.

Wulfe had said the dragonship was taking him home. Skylan hoped the boy was right, although returning home presented him with new problems. He would have to explain what had happened to Draya and what had become of his men.

I cannot tell the truth. Not for my sake, but for Draya’s. I would have to reveal that she was a murderer. She would be forever reviled among our people, and I won’t do that to her. I have caused her grief enough already. And then there are the warriors. If their families discovered they have fallen victim to enchantment, the news would kill them. I cannot do that to them. I will have to lie.

Torval despises lies and liars, but he will forgive this. I lie to spare others pain. Torval understands that.

The story would have to be a good one. Skylan would have to give it considerable thought. He turned from the rudder, walked back across the deck. His eye fell on Wulfe. The boy knew the truth. How could he prevent him from blabbing?

To be truly safe, Skylan should ensure the boy’s silence by killing him and disposing of the body. No one would ever know about the murder. Skylan shook his head at the thought. Whatever wrongs he had done, he would not stoop to murdering children.

The boy probably doesn’t know all that much, Skylan reflected. I’ll find out what he does know and work around it.

“Let’s play a game,” said Skylan, thinking this would be a good way to help the boy relax, start him talking.

“I don’t like games,” Wulfe said.

“You’ll like this one. It’s called dragonbone.”

The game being a favorite of the Vindrasi people, men often brought their boards and gamepieces aboard ship to while away the longhours at sea. Skylan had his own board and pieces he had carved himself.

Skylan set up the game board on an overturned water barrel down in the hold and arranged the pieces, explaining the game as he did so.

“Why is it called dragonbone?” Wulfe asked, regarding the pieces with distrust. “Are those the bones of dragons?”

“No, of course not,” Skylan scoffed. “The dragonbones are sacred to us. Real dragonbones would never be used in a game. The pieces represent dragonbones, that’s all.”

Wulfe found this puzzling. “Why call them bones, then?”

“Because it wouldn’t be a dragonbone game otherwise,” Skylan said. His cup of patience, never very full to begin with, was fast draining. “Now be quiet, and I’ll teach you the rules.”

Skylan set up the game board, which was made of oak, and painted with colored pictures, and began to explain the game, much to Wulfe’s mystification. There were lines that Skylan termed “paths,” though these paths didn’t appear to lead anywhere except straight into each other. The paths were marked with runes, which Wulfe could not read, and outside the paths were portrayals of sun and moon and stars, dragons and dragonships, swords and shields, trees and mountains and seas all entwined. The paintings were very beautiful, and Wulfe wanted to ask about them, but apparently that wasn’t part of the game.

Skylan laid down what he termed the “bones,” which didn’t look like bones at all, at least any bones that Wulfe had ever seen. The bones were of different shapes and different colors, and all of them were marked with runes. Skylan said some of the bones belonged to Wulfe and some to him. Wulfe was supposed to throw a bone on the table, and then he was to march the bones along the path, though to what end Wulfe could not see, since the paths went nowhere. Sometimes a bone could fly over another bone. Sometimes a bone landed on another bone. Sometimes bones “died” and were taken off the board.

Wulfe found the entire concept baffling. The idea of playing a game was foreign to him. He didn’t understand why he should want to move the bones that weren’t bones around in the first place, and then to be told that some bones could move one way and some another depending on where they were in relationship to each other confounded him.

Skylan could see that the boy was floundering, but carried on anyway. The game play distracted him, took his mind off his troubles. In order to teach Wulfe, Skylan played both sides, showing the boy as the game progressed what piece to play and explaining why he was playing it.

Wulfe had no idea what he was doing or why he was doing it. He moved the pieces at random, sometimes picking up Skylan’s piece instead of his own, for the boy truly couldn’t understand the difference. He wasn’t enjoying this at all, but he continued to play because he could see the game brought pleasure to the downcast, brooding, and unhappy young man.

Wulfe was starting to like Skylan. He didn’t think of him as an Ugly One anymore. Skylan was different from the druids who had raised Wulfe. Studied, scholarly, soft-spoken, self-possessed, the druids eschewed all strong emotions. This was partly necessitated by the fact that the fae who inhabited and loved the forest also loved the druids for the care they took of the trees and plants. If anyone sought to harm the druids, the fae would take it upon themselves to remove the threat, never mind that the druids might not want
them to do so. The druids had not turned Skylan’s men into rabbits or ordered the strangler fig to attack. The dryads and hamadryads, sprites and wood nymphs and tree nymphs, undine and sylphids and all the rest of the fae had been roused to anger by the aggressive actions of the warriors, and the results had been disastrous.

The druids were oftentimes shocked and horrified by the actions of the faeries, who could be incredibly thoughtless and cruel. Unable to forgive or forget the terrible war that had brought death to so many and destroyed their world, the fae were always glad for a chance to lash out at the Ugly Ones. The fae lived in the moment, from moment to moment. They did not worry about the consequences of their actions because, for them, actions had no consequences. The druids had learned that the only way to exert a modicum of control over the fae was to maintain control over themselves. Strong emotions such as fear and anger could precipitate a calamity.

Thus, in his eleven years among the druids, Wulfe had never heard a raised voice. People had learned not to quarrel (or to keep their quarrels private), for the fae might take sides. Life proceeded at a calm, placid, and easy pace. Skylan, by contrast, crackled with emotions, all shooting off in different directions like jagged streaks of lightning. Wulfe found this exciting, if a little dangerous, and while it took some getting used to, Wulfe liked it. He was dangerous, too, in his own way.

Still, Wulfe hadn’t counted on quite so much danger.

He was reaching for one of the pieces, about to pick it up, when his hand froze in midair.

“What’s the matter?” Skylan asked, seeing the boy’s face pale and eyes widen.

“The draugr!” Wulfe said in a low voice. “She’s standing right behind you. No! Don’t turn around!”

Skylan stiffened. His hand tightened over the piece he was holding. Sweat broke out on his forehead.

“What is she doing?” Skylan asked, shuddering.

“I . . . I think she wants to play the game with you,” Wulfe said. He stood up and edged away from the stool.

The draugr took the boy’s place, seating herself across the board from Skylan. He stared at the corpse-face, with its dead, sunken eyes and bluish lips, and he had to fight the urge to flee.

The draugr silently moved a piece, then pointed to him, indicating it was his move.

“I’m not going to play with a draugr,” Skylan said, his throat constricting.

“I don’t think you have a choice,” Wulfe told him.

“Where are you going? Don’t leave!”

Wulfe scampered up the ladder, out the open hatchway, and disappeared.

Skylan stood up from the stool. His sword lay on the deck, covered by the blanket.

“I’m not playing,” he said defiantly.

The draugr pointed at the dragonbones. Skylan snatched off the blanket, picked up the sword, and swung it in a slashing arc meant to decapitate the draugr.

The sword glowed red, as hot as if it had come from the forge fire. Skylan dropped it with a cry. The smell of hot steel mingled with the stench of burning flesh.

Skylan wrung his hand and swore. He glared at the draugr and then ran toward the ladder, intending to follow Wulfe. The trapdoor slammed shut. Skylan beat on it and shouted for Wulfe to open it.

The trapdoor did not budge.

Cold and clammy sweat ran down Skylan’s neck. He turned slowly to face the draugr. The hold was dark, but he had no need to light a lantern. The draugr gave off a ghastly light.

She pointed at the board.

Skylan walked slowly back, sat down.

“Why are you doing this to me, Draya?” he asked, his voice ragged. “Why are you tormenting me?”

The draugr pointed at the dragonbone. Slowly, his hand shaking, Skylan picked up the bone in his burned palm. Wincing at the pain, he moved the bone along the path, hardly looking to see where he placed it.

That game did not last long. Skylan was not a very good dragonbone player at the best of times. As Garn was always telling him, Skylan was too rash, too reckless, too eager to win. Now, his mental processes clouded by horror, Skylan made one unfortunate move after another, and the draugr soon swept away all his bones. Skylan prayed to Torval this would be the end of the game, that the draugr would release him from the nightmare. Instead she indicated she wanted to play again.

Skylan gave a groan.

“We will make a wager. If I win this game, we quit,” he bargained. “You will go away and leave me in peace.”

The draugr gazed at him with her lifeless eyes and said nothing. Skylan did not know if they had a bet or not. He could only hope. His terror was starting to wane, and he forced himself to concentrate on the game. He faced the draugr defiantly and rolled the first bone. Marking where it fell, he placed his bone on the path.

The draugr picked up five bones in her withered, bloodstained hand and made ready to toss them.

“What are you doing? That’s cheating,” Skylan said angrily. “You can’t start by putting five bones into play.”

The draugr threw the five bones onto the board. She picked them up, one by one, and moved them into position, then reached her hand across the board toward him.

Skylan shrank back from the horrible touch. The draugr picked up five of his bones and held them out to him. When he hesitated, unwilling to take them, she thrust them at him. Skylan held out his hand, shuddering as the draugr’s icy nails brushed his skin.