Dragon's Keep (4 page)

"Do you know how much poison it would
take to kill a dragon?"

"I... I couldn't say."

"Too much."
He stepped into the adjoining alcove. I spun the
astrolabe as I waited—his favored instrument for reading the stars,
not
that he read them well. At last Magnus returned, muttering to himself and
gripping stems of flowering vervain. "Are you still here?"

"So you refuse
me?"

"I have a ceremony
to
perform.
Tell the queen to send me a sound boy to help with the herbs, and not the
lackwit Mouser."

I swept my hand across
his precious piles. Brown leaves and
green
drifted to the floor as I quit the crow's nest.

In the castle foreyard I sat atop the
platform with Mother and Father and surveyed the roving crowd. The dragon's
attack must have brought them to the knights' blessing. I'd not seen so many
townsfolk gathered there since the night
of
the witch burning.

Lord Broderick was down upon one knee.

"Why must he be sent?" I said
to
Mother. We were on the dais, so none could hear my quiet plea. "He's our
best knight."

"He is,"
whispered Mother.
"Strong enough and wise enough
to lead the others."

I viewed twenty men behind Lord Broderick.
They knelt in
two lines spanning outward in
a V like geese in flight. Some slay
ers were pimple faced and slender,
no more than boys in battle garb.

Sir
Magnus .stepped up to Lord
Broderick.
A
castle page stood
at his side holding the
silver tray. Waving an herb above Lord Broderick's head, Magnus announced to
all, "Wormwood!" then circled his hand about three times like a
wheeling vulture.
"With power to protect against the
serpents bite."
He placed the wormwood in a leather bag. Leaning
forward I could just make out the letter
B
embroidered on the pouch.

Sir Magnus reached for the herb tray again.
"Vervain!" he said, holding up the flowering spears. "Wear this
and you will find the place where the Pendragon scepter is hid. None, not even
a dragon, can keep a stolen thing away from this truth-telling herb!"

He cupped the flowers tenderly and pressed
them in Lord Broderick's pouch.

More herbs were given and prayers were said.
Father Hugh anointed each slayer with holy oil.

"Now," announced Sir Magnus,
lifting his broad hand, "you
are ready
to kill the beast. Go with God, Lord Broderick, slay the
dragon, and
with these men return to us with Queen Evaine's scepter!"

The people cheered. The dragonslayers crossed
themselves. Lady Broderick swooned and was caught by her son, Niles. We stood
and sang a holy hymn, then marched in chorus across the drawbridge. Lord
Broderick and the slayers rode from the castle gates, their red and blue
banners fluttering in the breeze.

"All hail Lord Broderick!" shouted
the village folk. "All hail
the dragonslayers!"
I felt a chill as villagers tossed lavender and
wild roses before Lord
Broderick's horse.

Slowly he passed before us, his armor
glistening like a well-rubbed goblet. With his visor up, he gazed at Lady
Broderick standing just beside me. What passed between the lady and her man was
such a rush of feeling that I trembled from it. Here was the deep of love, and
seeing this one glance, I knew the shallow waters I'd drunk from all my life.

Trumpets blared. The people cheered, tossing
their hats into the air with the merry glee of the Midsummer Fair. The simple
folk had such faith in the slayers' strength.

It's true they were the best of men, but my
heart did not rise
up. Wormwood, vervain,
bows, spears, and sharpened swords: In years past I'd believed in such herb
spells and weapons. But now I'd seen the beast with my own eyes. He was as a
dark god to us, a
nd our knights had little chance against him.

Pilgrimage

The slayers did not
return
from Dragon's Keep that autumn.
Eating little and saying less, I grew thin as a shadow wraith. Cook tried to
tempt me with puddings that I could not down. Sir Magnus blamed my morbidity on
the stars.

Father strove to train even stronger slayers.
Shouts and loud clatterings came daily from the foreyard where Father trained
new dragonslayers on the giant straw dragon Sir Magnus had
fashioned. The great beast's wooden rib cage,
built like a ship's
frame, was filled with straw, covered in green
sailcloth, and bound in many ropes under Magnus's supervision. Soundly built
for persecution, the beast was hung from a high
windlass, his sail
cloth wings outstretched as if in flight.

Leaning against the
mews, I watched the dragonslayers battle
the
straw beast till they were hoarse from shouting and their hair was wet with
sweat. At last Magnus would call, "Halt!" The injured dragon was
lowered to the ground while weary slayers joined Father to guzzle beer and
stuff themselves with sausages.

I waited in the shadows savoring this moment,
for Sir Mag-

nus
would fairly weep as he
inspected his dear dragon. Then he'd
begin
shouting at the builders, "Fix him and be quick about it!"

The real dragon haunted my head and heart.
More than once in those dark days I flew into a rage.
One
week I broke Mother's vase, the next Cook's platter (this after she'd sent me
stuffed eel to cure my morbid liver).

Marn came to bind the spirits. In my solar
she waved her wrinkled hands round and round, wrapping me in invisible cords
and whispering, "Three times winding, four times binding. I bind all evil
spirits now and cast them from this room."

Giving me the kiss of peace, she said,
"Ah, aren't you better now, poppet?"

I wasn't.

Picking up the broken
platter and eel innards, she left. At last
even
Marn stopped trying to cure my tempers and spent her time
w
ith
Sir Allweyn in the mews.

Wandering the castle
halls at night with a candle, my shadow
roved black across the walls. By day I rode Rollo or
walked the
grassy hills. One afternoon I
fell into a fitful sleep in the graveyard, leaning against Magda's headstone.

I dreamed.

I was a bird, or some kind of flying beast.
Blue winged and golden breasted. I soared over Wilde Island to a shining lake.
Wheeling down, all my talons went chill as I skimmed along the deep blue
surface of the water. In the midst of the lake I saw a girl rising up and
shining, as a flame rises from a candle.

Magda.
The child fell back into the water, and I dived in
after her.
Down and down, then pulled her to the surface
again.

I stepped from the lake, thinking 1 still
held her, but she was gone Turning, I called, "Come out of the
water!" and she to me, laughing, called, "I can't come out. I'm
dead." I shivered and saw I was no longer a bird but myself again.

Naked on the shore, I lifted my arms to the
wind, for though I was
cold,
I wanted the breeze
across my skin. I spread my fin
gers wide.
And oh! My hands were bare as well and my left hand as beautiful and whole as
my right. I screamed with joy and woke
myself.

That night I called Father Hugh to my solar.
I told the man my dream, though I did not speak of Magda, nor that my claw was
healed, only that I'd felt some healing from the water.

"Healing
waters," he said with a nod. "It's said Saint Columba
once dwelled in a cave near a lake on the far side of Morgesh Mountain before he returned to Scotland. In those days pilgrims came to the
hermits
lake for healing. Columba's Tear, the lake was
called. And many found remedy there when the water was a-stir."

I leaned forward. I'd read of Columba's Tear
in Queen
Evaine's Annals. She'd taken her
child there, or was it her grand
child? "And do the sick still
venture to the lake?"

"I've heard of no healing there since
the days of Saint Columba . . . Five hundred years ago? Or is it six?" He
scratched his balding head.

I would not be turned away by a thing so
small as time. "Once a place is sacred," I said, "is it not
always so? Would God remove his grace once given?"

"Oh, Princess," he said, his brows
tilting. "Not likely." He

frowned
then, thinking. "But if there were once roads to
that rough place across the mountain, there are none now.
And
no holy hermit there to greet a traveler once he comes.
It would be a
two-week journey at least, and that on a healthy horse and in the milder months
of summer."

Later when Mother came I told her of the
lake.
"A pilgrimage?"
She crossed her arms.

"This lake, Columbas Tear, is just over
the mountain. It's a place of holy healing. My dream told me so."

"Would we follow a dream?"
mused
Mother.

I grew hot. "Your
healers never cured me, I've chewed my fill
of
horehound and pressed one too many dead men's teeth against my skull! So if a
dream showed me—"

"A journey up
mountain."
Mother nodded and
gave a sad smile. "It is time."

My heart leaped, but Mother seemed troubled.
She touched her saint's pouch. "We should present you to Prince Henry before
high summer. And I have it\j>n my heart that you will go ungloved."

"Ungloved," I
whispered. "I'll cross the sea and feel the wind
blow through my fingers."

Mother smiled at that.

Mother told the king we were going to Saint
Brigid's Abbey for a time of prayer and fasting. The nuns there were cloistered
from the world. And so no one, not even Father, knew where we were going.
Another lie to protect my claw, but I counted it a
small sin. Thus, late in the afternoon on Saint Bertilla's feast day,

I slipped Father Hugh's
map into Rollo's saddlebag and Mother
mounted
Aster. To begin our pilgrimage a-right, I scattered lavender as we rode across
the drawbridge.

We chose the woodland path through the valley
that lay below Morgesh Mountain like a great green skirt. That Mother had
changed her mind, and so quickly, puzzled me. She was not one for mountain
rides. And never rode without full escort. Was it the strength of my dream that
swayed her?
Another thing.
What had she meant by "It is time"? Her voice, usually clear,
was
husky when she said that. And I heard old tears unwept behind her
words.

These darker thoughts soon vanished. I let
the wind sing in
my ears and heard a chorus
of toads croaking in a nearby stream.
Mother turned onto a path that
chased up Morgesh Mountain.
As night came
on, die pine boughs stirred as if to sweep stars from
the sky.

At last we came upon a dim-lit cave and tied
our mounts to the saplings. Rollo hoofed the ground then chewed the stubbled
grass contentedly. "Good boy," I whispered in his ear.

The cave was welcome
enough, for I was tired and cold. There
was
no door, only a boulder betwixt cave and path, and I could see the crackling
fire painting the entry walls pale gold. Mother slipped inside. I marveled at
her daring then entered myself.

I should have known by the sudden smell of
rotting meat, there were no kind folk here. An old woman wrapped in a muddy
shawl was crouched over a table, her back to the door. She turned as I came in
and placed her hand near the pile of leaves and scattered bones.

"Come closer," she said, pointing
to the fire.

I gripped my cloak. "Why stop
here?" I asked Mother.

"Hush," she said. "Meet
Demetra."

I stayed in my place near the entrance.

"So this is
she," said Demetra, standing up and peering at me
with her moonstruck eye. The milky whiteness of it
sent a chill to the back of my neck.

"She's a tidy beauty," said
Demetra.
"If a little frail."

I felt as if she were eyeing me for the cook
pot. "I'm fourteen," I said.
"And
strong."

"I know your
years." Demetra gave a gap-toothed smile. "For
don't I know her starting spark to the day?"

"What does she mean by that,
Mother?"

The queen adjusted her skirts as if seeking
an answer in the
folds.
"Rosalind," she said hoarsely. "I would not have come here
if
there were any other way—"

"Aye."
Demetra clucked. "You've taken your time about
it."

"Let's go," I
said, tugging Mother's arm. She seemed fixed to
the floor as if her feet were hexed. "We should ride farther
tonight," I pleaded.
Still no movement from Mother.
"We have a long way to go."

"I'd say you've
arrived all right." Demetra laughed and waved
her hand at two birch stools near the fire.

Mother sat obediently.

"You've hexed her,
you witch!"

"Rosalind," commanded Mother.
"She's done nothing to me. I came here on my own power. Sit down now,
daughter."

"I don't understand."