Dragonfriend (22 page)

The dragonet gasped,
You just did magic, Lia.

Don’t think you can excuse–what?
His comment caught her so off-guard, Lia stumbled over the leg of Master Ga’athar’s chair and landed squarely in Ja’al’s lap.

Once a flurry of apologies had been made, Lia found her seat again. With the help of a swig of ice-cold lemon water, she calmed her flustered nerves, and tried to think through the crumbs the Nameless Man had tossed to her. What did it mean to be a child of Fra’anior, she wondered? And where exactly would she start looking for one rare Dragoness? Oh. There was one Dragon who might make a captive audience, if he was still alive.

She could start by finding the Tourmaline Dragon. Did Dragons return favours? Most likely he’d chew her up for trespassing on the holy Isle …

Just then, Master Jo’el formed his finger-tent and inquired, “What language was that, Hualiama? And when did you learn magic?”

She stalled, “Magic? Are you certain, Master?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her as though it were one of his batons aimed at her skull.

“Petal,” said Yualiana, aiming a visual cudgel of her own at her brother, “Why don’t you tell us your story? Perhaps together, we might breathe the Great Dragon’s truth into these matters.”

Unfolding her tale calmed Hualiama’s frayed nerves. Flicker entertained everyone by recounting an embellished version of his feat of rescuing her–not forgetting to explain her nicknames of ‘straw-head’ and ‘flat-face’. He lapped up the laughter like a feline which found itself hip-deep in cream, preened outrageously at their compliments and of course, begged for more.

But all too soon, the conversation returned to Lia.

“Your answer?” said Master Jo’el.

Hualiama sighed.

“You’re too hard on her, Jo’el,” his sister admonished. Now officially invited to her son’s oath-taking, Yualiana appeared to have mined a vein of sympathy for Lia’s plight.

“No,” said Hualiama. “I’ve no need to tell you that this is a grave secret …”

He said, “You speak the forbidden tongue.”

“Aye, Master.”

“Hmm.” That was all Master Jo’el volunteered on the subject. Having expected a grilling, she felt like a trout hooked out of a terrace lake.

Flicker chirped brightly, “Of course, the Lesser Dragons would slay Hualiama in a wing-flip if they learned she could speak Dragonish, so keep those fangless traps of yours shut, by my wings. Anyways, I’m sure any Human can learn to speak Dragonish, even the stupid ones. I taught Lia, after all.”

“Thanks!” She smacked his scaly rump.

“Look, Ja’al, you do some magic, right? Listen.” Flicker said telepathically,
You egg-headed excuse for a male, how dare you refuse my Lia? You must have scrambled windroc eggs for brains.

Ja’al peered inquiringly him.

“Are you Humans all born deaf?” Aloud, the dragonet chirped,
Egg-head.

Leg-bread,
the young monk chirped back.

Lia chuckled, “You said, ‘Leg-bread.’ Like this,
egg-head
.”

Egg-head,
Ja’al repeated faithfully.

Flicker and Hualiama burst out laughing. Everyone else looked on in bemusement.

“So, uncle,” said Inniora, “now that your monastery takes women, when can I start?”

With great dignity, Master Jo’el ignored his niece’s question. But Lia did observe that his jaw tightened, and his gaunt cheeks seemed rather more pinched than a moment before.

Inniora turned to Hualiama with an overzealous smile. “Doesn’t every Princess need some kind of handmaiden? Er, companion to the royal personage? Someone to stitch their dresses? Perhaps a royal dragonet-carer, who feeds and pampers the royal pet?”

“Desperate,” said Ja’al.

Flicker purred softly, “Actually, I find her attitude most stimulating.”

“You’re mine,” growled Hualiama.

* * * *

Flicker’s eyes whirled with curiosity and pride. Twice now, straw-head had surprised him with positively draconic responses. Obviously, his skilled tutelage was not wasted! He had thought Lia incapable of properly civilised behaviour such as jealousy, and the fire in her tone revealed a hitherto veiled strength of character and purpose. And just take her thunderous rage, earlier! Oh, by the First Egg of all Dragons, he’d have her breathing fire, soon!

Ha. Only he could have been smart enough to spy her potential–instantly. Why else leap off the cliff? Now, he knew his role. He must guide the Human girl with a firm paw and protect her from the fungus-faced one, until she attained her destiny. His chest swelled. That the Ancient One should have chosen him for such a task! It struck him that she was a perfect Dragoness, a creature of guileful fires and complex passions. The glint of her scales concealed much from these fellow-Humans, but unsurprisingly, the superior intellect of a dragonet had penetrated her subterfuge. He’d have to watch her more closely from now on. Magic? Fury filling those smoky green eyes with flame? Oh, his beautiful Lia, she was a hatchling trying out her wings for the first time.

But his student must not suspect he was wise to her cunning feminine ways.

“A true Princess treats her dragonet with respect,” Flicker said loftily. “Now, this is how you issue orders, Hualiama. Inniora, fetch your harp this instant. You will accompany the fabulous firebird of Fra’anior as she sings
O Erigar, My Island
for us. You will all attend closely to the words.”

Slow-as-sheep Humans. They perched on their ridiculous wooden platforms and made noises of undignified confusion as Inniora fetched and prepared her instrument. Hualiama stood, moved a little to the kitchen area, clasped her hands beneath her sternum, and filled the room with song.

Look at how they appreciated her performance! Yualiana closed her eyes with a soundless sigh of pleasure. Master Ga’athar balanced on the edge of his seat, his eyes alight and his blunt hands clasped in his lap. Hallon and Rallon sat bolt upright, as though a sly dragonet had stuck them each with a claw. And Ja’al? His eyes were alight, fixed upon Hualiama as though he wished to devour her.

In the fifth stanza, Master Jo’el’s head finally snapped up. He gaped at Flicker, who cocked his head aside.
Did the twin suns dawn within your mind, Human?

Hualiama’s song faltered as she took in the Master’s response.

“Repeat that!” snapped Jo’el.

She sang:

The whirl of swords in ancient dance,

Did the terrible Fraga entrance,

‘Nuyallith!’ roared he, ‘what dread power is this …’

“Master,” Lia gasped, “I always thought ‘
Nuyallith’
a proper name. But if Fraga the Red is fighting Johoria Dragonshield at this point in the tale, it doesn’t make sense. The word sounds … Dragonish, really. Isn’t that right, Master?”

Jo’el shook his head. “Perhaps it’s a dialect of Dragonish, Lia–the histories hint at a secret draconic tongue which expresses words of extraordinary magical power, words which raised the Islands from the Cloudlands, for example, and separated the good air from the poisons below. I do know that there’s an ancient martial art called Nuyallith, which used to be practised by the predecessors to the monks who follow the Path of the Dragon Warrior.”

“Nuyallith?” Master Ga’athar echoed. “Isn’t that just a legend?”

“What are the old names for our arts?” Jo’el challenged.

Blank looks around the table preceded Inniora saying quietly, “
Ullith
, the open hand.
Fuyallith
, the way of staves,
Xarallith
, for thrown weapons …”

“A
TOUCH on
the starboard ailerons,” Hualiama instructed. “The
other
starboard–Islands’ sakes, and your other left foot!”

Her trainee pilot overcorrected. The Dragonship groaned and shuddered as the crosswind caught the balloon side-on. Lia said, “Like this, you rustic oaf.” She tapped rapidly on the foot pedals while simultaneously supplying thrust to the port turbines, returning them to an even keel.

“Sorry,” said Inniora. “We peasants of the realm don’t exactly grow up piloting Dragonships.”

“Get your grubby paws off my nice clean Dragonship controls, peasant,” said Lia.

“Is that a royal order, your infinitesimal tininess?”

Lia scowled unconvincingly up at her new, head-taller friend. “Are you as clumsy as you are deaf? Don’t make me come up there to shout in your ear.”

Flicker twitched his wings in befuddlement. Humans. Worse, Human girls. Trying to fathom them was like trying to grasp the Mystic Moon as it sailed by. This banter had continued for over an hour while the Dragonships plotted their course to the monastery. The day was bleak and squally, with low clouds shrouding the Island-massif ahead, and dull grey Cloudlands roiling below under the impetus of capricious winds–not the sort of day to be piloting fat, lumbering balloons between the Islands. He perched on a mound of supplies–sacks of vegetables, spiced dried meat and coils of rope–stacked neatly either side of the navigation cabin. Each Dragonship had to bear their share of the load, Lia had explained, given their limited lifting power.

The entire notion of Human air-travel between the Islands struck him as a hazardous affair.

The dragonet’s nostrils smoked with jealousy as he watched Lia explaining which controls worked the ailerons one more time, showing Inniora the precise level to make her settings, before clipping the lines in place. “Once they’re set, there’s no need to fiddle with them,” she instructed. “It’s like playing a harp. You manage that much with your work-roughened fingers, farm girl.”

“Shall I till your ribs with my hoe?” suggested Inniora, indicating the towering two-handed sword scabbarded on her back.

“By the time you reach that weapon, I could have carved my initials on your churlish intestines ten times over.” Lia smiled at Flicker. “You’re rather quiet over there, o jewel of the skies. Those turric-root sacks can’t be very comfortable. Come here.”

Flicker exhaled a curl of fire, crisping a stowaway giant pincher beetle. He snapped up the paw-sized insect and crunched indelicately, burgundy legs waving from his mouth, as he destroyed his snack.

Such a male,
Lia teased.

That’s what all the females say,
he agreed readily.
You know, if you chose to display more of your hide, you’d have that handsome monk sharing fresh kill with you.

Er …
His mental picture evidently puzzled her.

Why reject him?

It’s the honourable thing to do, Flicker.
But her eyes seemed smokier than usual, almost shadowed.

“When you leak over Human graves, Lia, what does that mean?” the dragonet inquired. “Do you lose your courage? Are your tears supposed to water those flame bushes you placed over each grave? Why don’t you sing the flame songs?”

She chuckled, “The word you’re looking for is ‘crying’, Flicker. We grieve that a soul has passed on, just as you dragonets believe the flame-soul returns to the invisible fires of eternity. But you’re wrong about my courage–if anything, I’m more determined than ever to see Ra’aba brought low.”

“Grief exposes weakness.”

“Grief strengthens,” Hualiama shot back, earning herself a hiss of disapproval. “It tempers and refines, focussing a person on things that truly matter. Surely, there is no pleasure without pain? Joy becomes meaningless in a world without suffering.”

“Therefore I should wish you’d suffer more?” snapped Flicker, before shutting his jaw with a snap louder than that which had just entered his voice. “I’m sorry, Lia. Shards take it, what a stupid thing to say!”

Lia simply extended her hands. A flip of a wing later, he nestled in her arms, and extended his serpentine neck to rub his muzzle against her cheek. She scratched Flicker just behind his skull spikes, the spot where he loved it most.

“Jealous old lizard, aren’t you?” she whispered into his ear canals.

How did she know his moods so well? Testily, he said, “You Humans always think jealousy is a negative emotion.”

Though his fire curled past her nose, Hualiama did not flinch. Instead, she performed her powerful, indefinable magic. In a tone that squeezed his third heart and made his fires surge, she said, “I
am
jealous of our friendship, Flicker. So few people would understand, but you … how can I describe it? You make my Island shiver with happiness.”

“While this conversation confuses us yokels beyond redemption?” But Inniora tempered her response by tickling Flicker beneath the chin.

He purred, “What’s a yokel? You really must teach me more Human insults, Lia.”

Hualiama peered ahead to the monastery’s Island, frowning. “The truth is, I didn’t know much about friendship before you pulled me out of the sky, Flicker.”

Human courage was inexplicable, Flicker decided. A creature like his Hualiama, often riddled with self-doubt and thoughts unshaped by a protective warren, so wounded by life and maimed by her enemies, still chose to spread her wings and soar. The idea practically turned his hide inside-out. Dragons valued physical size and prowess. Little Lia possessed neither size nor raw physical strength, but her heart was a hidden jewel, blazing with star-fire. She had the audacity to laugh at her fate, to struggle on and to overcome.

These events drove her toward a cliff-edge, Flicker sensed. The true plunge would come soon.

The dragonet asked,
What’s bothering you, Lia?

She said,
Am I imagining it, or do I sense something out there?
Her face suddenly turned as grey as storm clouds.
Ra’aba … he’s near.

A frisson of flame ignited the dragonet’s body. Flicker leaped into the air.
I will scout.
And he darted out of the open doorway of the navigation cabin, leaving the two girls staring at him from behind the crysglass.

* * * *

“What was that?” asked Inniora.

“Aye, what was that?” inquired Master Jo’el, right behind them.

“Master!” Hualiama gasped. “Don’t sneak … sorry, Master. I had a sense–”

“A premonition?” His lean face seemed graven in stone. “We call this the Great Dragon’s voice. Learn to listen with your entire being, Hualiama. Open yourself to the currents of the Island-World, from the groan of Islands shifting upon their roots to the song of the stars above. Be not too busy to listen. Even the lowliest beetle has a voice. Know him, and you will know what is abroad in the world.”