Dragon Castle (17 page)

But there is nothing wrong with enjoying both at the same time.

As she sews together the long slice down my forearm, I am using my other arm to reach out for another one of her warm, luscious pastries.

Buchty
are lovely steamed dumplings that Baba Anya fills with plum jam made from the trees that Uncle Jozef planted behind their dom. Though I love her cooking, I am showing remarkable selfcontrol as I eat them. I've only had a few. Well, actually eight thus far. I have to admit that
buchty
stand little chance of survival when I'm within arm's reach.

“Dobre,”
I say as I down that doomed dumpling in two bites, hand cupped to catch any jam rolling down my chin. No need for fine dining manners here. That's another reason, apart from the fact that she is an excellent cook, that I love coming to her and Uncle Jozef's humble table.

I have always made certain that I've honored their hospitality with equal gifts of my own. Baba Anya and Uncle Jozef firmly refuse payment in any form other than whatever physical tasks I may undertake to show my appreciation. Though a prince, I am also a young strong man who—thanks to Uncle Jozef and Georgi—is good with his hands and unashamed to use them. I helped craft the table at which we are sitting and all four of the kitchen chairs. I've been Uncle Jozef's main helper when it comes to rethatching their roof or carrying in firewood. I've also hung numerous strings of trout from the hook by their door.

I look over at Baba Anya. I'm almost embarrassed by my gluttony. But not quite. I take a ninth plum
buchta.

Baba Anya beams approvingly at my appreciation for her food. When she smiles like that she seems younger—barely old enough to be a grandmother. However, if one believes the rumors about her longevity, her only seniors are the ancient oaks of Stary Les. Of course she denies that.

“
Nie,
such stories may be confusing me with my great-grandmother Baba Marta, who lived here before me,” Baba Anya said.

One undeniable thing about Baba Anya is that no one ever remembers her as anything other than an old woman. But a kind one, which may explain such a lack of curiosity among the
sedliak,
the common folk, as to the way she and Uncle Jozef always seems to have been here. Peasant wisdom, like not seeking an explanation for the blessings of fair weather and fine harvests, is to never question a benevolent presence.

That's not at all my way. I always want to find the answers to so many things that there's such a swirl of questions in my head it's as if a trio of birds have taken up residence between my ears. Their names are How, Why, and What. They constantly twitter, wings fluttering, as they roost on the overburdened branches of my mind.

I look up from my plate at Baba Anya. She's nodding her head in approval. There's a gentle smile on her face . . . and also a twinkle in her eye as if she knows exactly what I am thinking and is amused by it.

Though Baba Anya is said to be the oldest woman in our little land, there's nothing feeble about her. She may stoop over and move slowly whenever she is out in the public eye, walking down the road to the market. However, I've noted, she stands quite straight and moves with ease and grace when she thinks no one's watching.

Sometimes when I am sitting with old Uncle Jozef and Baba Anya, there is this little signal they exchange. Each of them places their right thumb to the left side of their nose, accompanied by a quick look in my direction and a small knowing nod. They always do that when they think I'm looking the other way. By the head of the dragon! Why is it that I am the only one who ever seems to notice that? Aside from Georgi, that is. Who, now that I think of it, sometimes makes that same gesture to each of them. I wonder . . .

“Yipe!”

Baba Anya has just jabbed the threaded needle into the edge of the worst of my wounds. It takes my thoughts away from wherever path they were about to follow. She holds the edges of the cut together with the fingers of her left hand, deftly stabs and tugs with the needle held in her right. One stitch, two, three, four . . . a strong tug to that final stitch. Then she ties the thread, bends her head to bite it off. Only a little blood is still welling up from the sutured gash, which was deeper than I'd realized.

By the time I reached Baba Anya's house my cuts and the gashes in the flesh of Ucta and Odvaha had looked much worse. Despite the bandages I'd made by tearing my already ripped tunic into strips, blood had soaked through and was dripping from all three of us.

Uncle Jozef was splitting wood by the door. To my surprise he seemed to expect us. He examined our injuries and nodded.

“Lot of blood, nothing too bad,” he said. “Baba Anya will take care of you. She's waiting out back.”

Not only was she waiting, she had set up a wooden tub, a bowl of water, washcloths, and a pile of clean bandages. How had she known?

“Come here, grandson,” she said, holding out her hands.

I shook my head. “Please,” I protested. “Ucta, Odvaha. Could you care for them first?”

Knowing my stubborn nature as well as she did, Baba Anya did just that. She swiftly cleaned, sewed, and bound their wounds, her hands a blur of movement as my two friends sat patiently on their haunches.

Then she turned to me.

“Here.”

She held my arm over the small wooden tub. Taking a ladle, she dipped out the gold-colored liquid and poured it over my wound. It felt cold at first and then just the opposite! It produced so sudden and searing a sensation that it seemed as if thrusting that same arm into a fire would have been a relief. But the burning was brief and my bleeding stopped.

Then she'd led me inside, plumped me down at the table, and produced a bowl of goulash. The scent that rose up to fill my nostrils was intoxicating, made just a bit sharper by the rings of raw onions arrayed on top of that delightful dish. It's hard to believe that her goulash is nothing but a mix of flour and table cream, cubes of pork meat, onion, sauerkraut, salt, and paprika with a bit of sugar added to sweeten the taste. It's a mystery how she makes everything she cooks taste so marvelous.

That big bowl of hot goulash was a mystery in another way. It takes at least two hours to make something this good. Yet I smelled nothing cooking when Ucta, Odvaha, and I arrived. I don't think there had even been a fire in the stove. And she just returned within the hour from the market. Another of Baba Anya's mysteries that she left me no time to ponder.

“Yedz!”
she'd commanded, putting a spoon in my hand and poking me in the ribs. “Good for blood.”

I did as she said quite willingly. I emptied that ample goulash bowl, not even sparing the raw onion rings!

Then she produced that wonderful platter of plum dumplings—as if from midair—and repeated the word that has always been one of her favorites.

“Yedz!”
Eat.

THE TWELFTH AND last of the plum dumplings sits forlornly on the wooden plate. Poor pastry. It misses its comrades.

I look over at Baba Anya again. She nods.

I pick up the last lonely dumpling.

Come, no longer be alone. Join your friends.

As I chew, Baba Anya's grin grows broader. Watching me eat appears to nourish her more than putting food into her own mouth.

Another thought comes to me. Why does her smile appear snaggly and gap-toothed when she is out in public? Yet the wide grin she just favored me shows that she has all of her teeth, not a one of them yellowed with age.

“The eye sees what it wants to see, child,” Baba Anya says.

Of course. Just like Georgi and Uncle Jozef, she's able to read my mind. And just like them, she offers me an explanation that explains nothing. I sigh. It's like everything else happening around me. No answers. Just more uncertainty.

The questions flutter back to their accustomed roosts in my brain. How will I bring back my parents? What can I do to rescue my brother from wedlock with a witch? Why am I the one who has to figure out how to rid us of our malevolent guests? Will I live to see another sunrise? What next?

As if in response to my unspoken questions, Baba Anya nods and looks over my shoulder.

“You are ready for more of the story, child.”

Uncle Jozef's voice comes from behind me. He's entered so quietly I haven't heard even the creak of a floorboard. He leans over and places a third scroll before me.

I unroll it and look down on the mountain.

PAVOL LOOKED AROUND. There was no one to observe what he was about to do save himself and the donkey, unless one counted the eagle overhead. He tossed the pouch from one hand to the other.

He undid the leather that was wrapped seven times about its neck with slow deliberation and opened it. One by one, he reverently removed the items from within and arranged them in a circle on top of a flat granite boulder. When he was done, the empty pouch placed in the middle, the flecks of quartz and feldspar within the big stone seemed to reflect the mountain light with more intensity.

The lanky young man and the scrawny donkey studied the strange assemblage: a rough brown river stone, the canine tooth of a bear, a goose's wing bone, a small eagle's feather, an iron finger ring, a bronze bracelet, a silver necklace. Seven in all.

Pavol took hold of the hilt of the rusted sword that hung in the battered sheath on Jedovaty's back. He carefully selected the rough brown stone, picked it up between thumb and forefinger as if holding an egg, and held it in front of his face. Then, with surprisingly swift competence, he drew the rust-flaked blade from its sad sheath.

“Stone to sharpen steel,” Pavol intoned.

Then, holding the dull sword high by its cracked hilt, the slender youth drew the stone along the timeworn blade, once, twice, three times.

The first draw of the whetstone produced a sound like that of a metal gate being forced open after years of disuse. With that stroke all of the rust fell away. The second draw of the whetstone made the steel cry as shrill as an eagle and a sharpness keener than any razor came to the no longer nicked blade. The third produced a high, long note as sweet as an anthem of victory. The sword now shone more brightly than a mirror. From tip to hilt, it glowed, fine and finished as the best blade fashioned by a master smith. Strangely, though untouched by that transformative stone, the sheath too had been transmuted. No longer patched and shabby, it was now a worthy receptacle for a noble weapon, shining silver subtly inlaid with red and green precious stones. The threadbare rope from which it had hung was now a wide four-buckled belt of tooled leather interwoven with steel threads.

“Ano!”
Pavol shouted in delight, holding high his sword as sunlight glinted from it.

Jedovaty stared but briefly at the transmogrified sword.

“Now me?” the donkey asked. His voice was remarkably like that of a child taken to the market by parents who promised him sweets.

“Not yet,” Pavol said.

He returned the stone to his pouch and picked up the white fluffy feather. It quivered in his grasp as if seeking to take flight. Turning to the battered shield, so pathetically thin and cracked that it seemed an eggshell might offer more protection, he stroked the feather across the dented metal.

“Wind against fire,” he cried.

The shield throbbed like a beating heart in response to each touch of the eagle's plume. The first throb sounded like the dull thud of a hammer against wood. The second was the martial clang of steel against steel. The third was the deep roar of the storm wind that overthrows all before it. And with each note the shield grew in size until it was twice its original circumference. It did not shine like the spear. It was as whole and solid as bedrock and dark as the heart of the night. Upon its surface a single word became visible in raised golden letters.

Skala.
Bigger.

“What next?” Jedovaty asked. He was impressed, but not enough to shed his impatience. “Will that bear tooth turn you into a ten-foot tall warrior?”

Pavol patted the donkey on his shoulder.
“Nie,”
he said with a grin. “Pavol stays Pavol. A man must do the best he can with what he is. However”—he lifted the silver necklace with his thumb and little finger—“it is your turn, my friend.”

Pavol tossed the necklace up and shouted a single word.

“
Dospej!
Grow up.”

The silver strand began to spin in the air, twinkling like a flight of fireflies. As it spun it increased in size before settling about the neck of the little donkey, who stood up straighter at its touch. Then that necklace began to melt and blend into the donkey's dark coat. A wash of color flowed as a river's color alters where a stream carrying clay enters dark water. A sudden cloud of dust rose. When it cleared, the donkey Jedovaty was gone. A white horse eighteen hands tall stood there, looking back along its body appraisingly.