Dragon's Keep (3 page)

"
look
," I said.

Mother
left her
loom. We watched the swallows fly round
and
round
each
other as if binding a bow.

"A sign of love to
come," said Mother happily.

"Will love come to me?" Most of the
maids about Wilde Island were married by my age.

"It will, Rosie. And as soon as you are
healed, we'll take you to Empress
Matildas
son, Prince
Henry." She smiled at the thought.

"But if I cannot be cured—"

"You will be," said Mother, and I
saw how tightly she clenched her faith, like a falcon grips its rail. She'd set
her hopes on Henry. No matter that his mother, Empress Matilda, was deposed
and King Stephen was in power. No matter that we Pendragons were exiles. No
matter that I bore a devil's mark.

Mother led me
to
her wardrobe,
opened the door, and stood behind me, facing us toward the long mirror, my gown
pale violet, hers of gold.

"Queen Rosalind
Pendragon," she said. "Know who you are."

I said naught. Firelight caught in the glass,
burning around her gown and mine. She shut the door. We settled by the hearth
to await the healer, the silence growing cold and colder between us as Mother
worked her loom. She was weaving a large panel, which she hoped to finish by my
fifteenth birthday. The tapestry was a portrait of me dressed in a rose-colored
gown, seated on a golden throne with Queen Evaine's scepter in my hand. Angels
blessed me in the starry sky above, and below my
feet, the words

of
Merlins prophecy. I blushed, looking at the cloth so
rich in color and dream.

"Where will you hang it?" I asked,
hoping the answer would be her solar or mine.

"I've not decided yet."

Veritas Dei,
God's truth, I didn't want the
tapestry on display
in the Great Hall for
every island clodpole to drool over.

Three things the
stars say of this queen.
She shall redeem the name Pendragon.
End war with the wave of her
hand.
And
restore the glory of Wilde Island.

When I was younger my mother's faith could
buoy me. All seemed right in her eyes: My healing sure.
My
future strong.
My
life charmed by Merlin's prediction. When had
I lost the surety of her eyes?

Another hour passed. Still the healer did not
come. I begged Mother for a story. She quit her tapestry and told about the
time she'd rescued her friend Aliss from the frozen marsh when she was a
schoolgirl at Saint Brigid's Abbey. They'd run away from the hated school,
trying for Pendragon Castle in the midst of winter, but the snowstorm had won
out. I knew the tale and liked it well.

"She would have
drowned if you hadn't pulled her out," I said.

"No doubt," said Mother with a half
smile.

"If I had a friend my age
..."
I sighed.
"One
like Aliss."

"You have friends
enough."

"Who?
Bram the pigboy?
1 have no
friends at all now that

Magda --"

"
Don't,
kosie."

I turned my eyes to the
vanity where Mother's jeweled combs
and
perfumes were prettily displayed. We'd had this argument before. Mother would
not allow me a friend my own age. "Because you are the princess,"
she said, but I knew the real reason. Good friends kept confidences and shared
secrets. I had one that could never be shared.

At last a bedraggled
messenger arrived with news from Sheriff
William.

"Your Highness, the healer you sent for
was attacked on the road."

"By the dragon?"
I said, coming to a stand.

"No, Princess, only thieving
footpads," said the man, fingering his filthy hat. "They stole her
horse and cloak and slit her throat besides. Only her servant boy lived to tell
of it."

I fell back in my chair, sickness rising up
my throat.

"Her—her name," I stuttered.
"What was it?"

"Princess,"
said Mother (she always called me that in front of
others), "the name is not important."

"Was she young or old?"

"I said you don't need to know."

I gritted my teeth.
"Young
or old?"

"Young!"
Mother turned her back on me to dismiss the
messenger.

The man cleared his throat. "The sheriff
told me to give you

her
healing pouch, which the thieves had no use
for." He handed Mother a mud-encrusted bag.

She waved him from the room.

Locking her chamber door, Mother turned.
"Why ask her name and age when the woman's dead?"

"She had a name and a life until she set
out on the road to heal me," I said guiltily.

"You're the princess. It was her
duty."

"To
die?"

Mother ignored my question and searched the
healer's pouch. Frowning, she pulled out powdered wormwood, a wad of cinquefoil
leaves, and a vial. "Your nursemaid could have gath
ered these selfsame herbs in the nearby
woods." She removed the
cork from the vial and the smell of honeyed
poppy filled the air. This being a favorite of hers, she corked it again and
slipped it into her velvet bag.

"This healer would have failed us just
like all the rest." She hurled the filthy pouch and paltry herbs into the
fire.

Dragonslayers

After morningsong
the castle made ready to bless the knights before they
sailed to Dragon's Keep. One and twenty slayers were setting out to kill the
dragon. During the ceremony Mother expected me to sit silently on the dais and
inspire the knights with my beauty, but I had other plans.

Marn slid her cold hand along my neck as she
braided my hair. "You'll charm the knights," she said with pride.
"See if you don't." Marn tugged my scalp harder and I winced.
"Keep still," she warned. I steadied myself before the vanity.

"How your mother would have liked to
have her hair this length when she was crowned. She cried that morning when I
brushed it out, poor poppet, all shorn from her years of schooling at the
abbey, but I was used to her tears by then."

I frowned. "Mother does not cry."
I'd seen her weep once in my life and that was on the night I'd tried to cut
off my claw.

"Aye, well, she's a queen now. But she
cried her share as a
babe and she was all
over tears the day her mother and father sent
her away to school."

I watched my nursemaid's reflection stooping
in the mirror to choose the blue ribbon from my store. "Why did they send
her away?"

Marn twisted the ribbon about my plait.
"Who can say? But her twin brother, Bion, was the one thought to become
king and they doted on him. So little Gwen was in the way, you might say."

"In
the way?"

"She was stubborn,
like you, and not an easy girl to manage."

"I'm not stubborn."

Marn laughed. It was nearly time to gather in
the foreyard to send off Lord Broderick and his dragonslayers.

"Have you called for the turnkey?"

"Aye, though why you'd want to see
him,
I don't know. There's no time to—"

"It won't take long."

"Ah, my little
poppet."
Marn sighed.
"You're all grown now and don't need your old nursemaid at all."

I reached up to touch Marn's wrinkled cheek.
She'd mothered me my whole life, and I thought to say I'd always love her. But
she blushed at my touch.

"Hold still now, Rosie," she said.
"I've got a flea."

Marn plucked my scalp
and crushed the flea with her gnarled
fingers.
"A plump one," she said. Straightening my ribbon, she stepped back.
"Ah, my pretty girl.
You're ready for the knight's blessing.
I'll just go tell the queen."

"First the turnkey," I reminded.
She gave me an unsettled look before she shut the door.

Lord Broderick was the
best of Father's knights, and I had a
mind
to save him from the dragon. A plan had come to me by way of Mouser.

The lackwit could never
catch all the castle mice, though he
made
great noisy scenes, rushing up and down the halls with his soiled pouch
shouting, "There's one!" and "Stand away!" as he
rammed into our astonished guests. Sick of this
display, Sir Mag
nus had mixed poison for Mouser to use against the
vermin. The mice ate it well enough. But so did my cat. Tilly had a fit and
died.

I didn't blame Mouser for Tilly's death.
Everyone knew the boy had curds for brains. Sir Magnus never should have given
him the poison.

Remembering poor Tilly, I'd devised a plan.
Seeing how our good knights arrows, those that struck the beast at all, had
clattered against his scales like pebbles on a stone wall, I thought to poison
the dragon. A plump murderer in the dungeon would do nicely. We'd feed him
greasy bacon, stitch poison into the pockets of his cloak, then free the
murderer in an open place and let the dragon sup.

Our isle was teeming with footpads, having
once been an English prison colony and a place where folk still came on occasion
to serve out their time as bond slaves. Even Marn's husband had come here years
ago to pay out his debt.

Many outlaws escaped custody once they
reached Wilde Island, which enraged my father and mother and kept our sheriffs
busy. I was sure to find a murderer in our dungeon.

Marn entered with the turnkey and I waved her
from the room.

"List who we house in the dungeon just
now," I said. "And Cell me of their crimes."

The turnkey pursed his lips and gazed at the
ceiling as if the an
swer hung there.
"Well, there's Rob Thornby. He's in for steal
ing Madreck's
sheep."

This was not crime enough for my plan.
"Go on," I said.

"Then there's Madreck.
Held for brawling at the tavern and knocking out young Gifford for
stealing his sheep."

"I thought Rob Thornby stole the
sheep."

"Well, Madreck didn't know that!"

"Ah," I said, confused. "Well,
who else is there?"

The turnkey crossed his arms and rocked back
on his heels. "There's old Plimpton. He's been imprisoned years and
years."

"For what crime?"
I asked, hoping it was murder.

"Well, that I don't know,
Princess."

"How is it you don't know?"

His eyes widened. He
licked his thick lips. "Plimpton's been
there since I was a boy, before I ever was turnkey, Princess."

I dropped the inquiry. No doubt the man was
thin and frail and would not tempt the dragon. I needed someone plump.

"Who
else?"
I said.

The man screwed up his brows.
"Pardon?"

"Who
else
is in the
dungeon?"

"That's all, Princess."

"All?"

"There'll be more after today's
blessing," he assured hastily.
" Whenever
the
villagers carouse with the king's good ale, Sheriff
William brings the
brawlers in."

I came to a stand. "What about the
thieves who haunt the roads at night? What about the murderers who slit my
healer's throat?"

He shrugged. "Well, they're hard to
catch, aren't they?" he mused.

Was there no one wicked enough to clothe in
poison? I dismissed the man then took the stairs by
twos.
I was
breathing hard when I reached the crow's nest.

Sir Magnus was hunched over a book of
incantations. His hands rested on the table, where herbs were separated into
piles.

"Princess," he said coolly and
without looking up.

"I have a job for you."

"Not now. I prepare for the knights'
blessing."

"It's for that I've come. You do not
have to go through with the blessing if you take my advice."

"And what is that?" He gazed up at
last, the tufts sprouting from his brows like black wings.

"Remember how you poisoned my cat?"

"Princess, are you
feeling well?"

"You can do the same to the
dragon." I told him my cunning plan.

When I was done, he said, "The beast
would smell the poison."

"Not if we disguise it in bacon
fat."