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A DRAGON’S WILL

T HE WET DRIFTWOOD would not kindle. While Reyn struggled with tinder that the wind kept claiming, Malta took off her cloak and stuffed it into the tangle of wood.

He looked up to the sudden crash as she smashed their lantern onto the pile.

A moment later, flames licked up the edges of her cloak.

He feared the fire would die there, but after a few moments, he heard the welcome crackling of wood igniting.

By then, Malta had come to the shelter of his cloak.

When her brother gave them an odd look, she lifted her chin and stared him down defiantly.

She pressed her wet and shivering body firmly against Reyn’s.

In the sheltering darkness, he held her, smelling the fragrance of her hair.

Boldly he kissed the top of her head. The fine scaling of her crest rasped his cheek, and Malta gave an involuntary shiver.

He felt her body flush suddenly with warmth.

She looked up at him, surprise intensifying the pale gleam of her Rain Wild eyes.

‘Reyn,’ she gasped, caught between delight and scandal. ‘You should not do that,’ she chided primly.

‘Are you sure?’ he asked by her ear.

‘Not when my brother is watching,’ she amended breathlessly.

The bonfire was burning well now. Reyn lifted anxious eyes to the sky.

He had not heard Tintaglia pass overhead for some time, but her anxiety hung strong and infected him.

She was still up there, somewhere. He glanced around at the people who had come to the beach with them.

Stink Island lived up to its name. All were in muck to the knee, and Red, much to his disgust, had fallen in the stuff and was probably regretting his desire to see a dragon up close.

A second bonfire was kindled from the first. Out on the water, the ships suddenly cried out and the dragon replied from a distance. Reyn sounded the warning: ‘Get out of her way!’

Tintaglia came down in a heavy battering of wings, fighting both the rain and the gusting wind.

Unencumbered by a human burden, she would land gracefully, Reyn expected.

But as Sorcor had predicted, the muck was slippery.

The dragon’s braced feet slid and mud flew up from her wildly lashing tail and flapping wings.

She skittered to a halt nearly in the bonfire.

Tintaglia’s eyes flashed angrily over her compromised dignity.

She quivered her dripping wings, spattering more mud on the humans.

‘What idiot chose this beach?’ she demanded furiously. In the next breath, she demanded, ‘Is there no food ready?’

She complained her way through two hogsheads of salt pork. ‘Nasty, sticky stuff, too small to bite properly,’ she proclaimed at the end of her meal, and stalked off to a nearby spring.

‘She’s immense,’ Sorcor exclaimed in wonder.

Reyn realized he had become accustomed to her magnificence. Malta had her memories from the dream-box, but this was the first opportunity for the others to see a dragon other than on the wing.

‘She is full of beauty, in form and movement,’ Amber whispered. ‘I see now what Paragon meant. Only a true-born dragon is a real dragon. All others are but clumsy imitations.’

Jek gave Amber a disdainful glance. ‘Six Duchies dragons suited me just fine. Would have been fine by you, too, if you’d lived with the fear of being Forged. But,’ she admitted grudgingly, ‘She is astounding.’ Reyn turned aside from their incomprehensible conversation.

‘I wonder what Vivacia would have looked like,’ Althea said quietly. Firelight danced in her eyes as she stared at the dragon’s shadowy shape.

‘Or Paragon’s dragons,’ Brashen inserted loyally.

Reyn felt a grating of guilt at their words. His family had transformed dragons into ships. Would there some day be an accounting for that? He pushed the thought away.

When Tintaglia came stalking back from the spring, she had cleaned much of the muck from her wings and belly.

She gave Reyn a baleful look from her spinning silver eyes.

‘I said “sand”,’ she rebuked him. She swung her great head to regard the gathered humans.

‘Good,’ she acknowledged them. Smoothly she shifted from complaining to demanding.

‘You will have to build another fire, farther from the waves, where the muck turns to rock. Stone does not make the best of beds, but it is preferable to mud, and I must rest tonight.’ Then she caught sight of Malta.

Her eyes spun more swiftly, gleaming like full moons.

‘Step out into the light, little sister. Let me see you.’

Reyn feared Malta would offend the dragon by hesitating, but she came boldly to stand before her.

Tintaglia’s eyes travelled over her from crest to feet.

In a warm voice, she announced, ‘I see you have been well rewarded for your part in freeing me, young queen. A scarlet crest. You will take much pleasure from that.’ At Malta’s puzzled blush, the dragon chuckled warmly.

‘What, not even discovered it yet? You will. And you will enjoy a long life in which to relish it.’

She swung her gaze to Reyn. ‘You chose well. She is fit to be an Elderling queen, and a speaker for dragons. Selden will be delighted that she has changed as well. He has been a bit worried, you know, that she would disparage his changes.’

Reyn smiled awkwardly. He had not yet apprised the Vestrits of Selden’s changes. Tintaglia distracted them from their exchange of puzzled glances.

‘I will sleep the night, and require more food before I fly in the morning. The tangle rests well north of here. For the night, at least, they are safe.’ She blinked her great eyes and the silver whirled coldly.

‘I have done away with those who dared to threaten them. But my serpents are wearied. Serpents, even in prime condition, cannot keep pace with a dragon a-wing. In the days of old, there would have been several of us to shepherd them along, and several serpents with the memory to guide them. They have only me, and one serpent guide.’

She lifted her head. There was determination to the motion, but Reyn sensed desperation beneath her boldness. Despite her arrogance, his heart went out to her.

‘I have spoken to the liveships. Paragon will accompany my serpents north. That ship’s crew will aid me in protecting the serpents, and will anchor beside them each night when I must come ashore to feed and rest.’

Wintrow spoke up boldly. ‘Both liveships will go north. We have already made decisions –’

‘That interests me not in the least!’ The dragon cut in harshly.

‘Or do you think you still “own” the liveships? Vivacia will go south, to your big city. My Elderlings will go with her, to speak for me, to arrange the shipments of grain and foodstuffs for the workers, to hire engineers as Reyn sees fit, to inform the people in that city of what dragons will henceforth require of it, to arrange –’

‘Require?’ Wintrow cut in coldly. Outrage had stiffened him.

The dragon rounded on Reyn in exasperation. ‘Have you told them nothing? You’ve had the whole day!’

‘Perhaps you don’t recall that you dropped me in the middle of a sea battle?’ Reyn asked irritably. ‘We have spent most of our day trying to be alive at the end of it.’

‘I recall well enough that my serpents had been endangered for purely human ends. Humans are always squabbling and killing one another.’ She glared at them all.

‘It will no longer be tolerated. You will put such things aside until my ends have been served, or risk my wrath.’ She threw her head high and half-lifted her wings.

‘That, too, my Elderlings will establish. No ship is allowed to interfere with a serpent! No petty warfare will be tolerated if it interferes with supplies to the Rain Wilds. You will not –’

Wintrow was incensed. ‘What manner of creature are you, to seek to order our lives by force? Do our dreams, our plans, our ambitions count for nothing in your greater scheme of things?’

The dragon paused and turned her head, as if considering his questions gravely.

Then she leaned her great head close to him, so close that his clothing moved in the rush of her breath.

‘I am a dragon, human. In the greater scheme of things, your dreams, plans and ambitions count for next to nothing. You simply do not live long enough to matter.’ She paused.

When she spoke again, Reyn could tell she was trying to make her voice kinder.

‘Save as you assist dragons, of course. When you have completed this task, my kind will remember your service for generations. Could humans hope for a higher honour?’

‘Perhaps we hope to live out our insignificant little lives as we see fit,’ Wintrow retorted. He did not move back from the dragon he defied. Reyn recognized the set of his shoulders and the way he held his mouth. Her brother shared Malta’s stubborn streak. The dragon’s chest had started to swell.

Malta hastened to stand between her brother and the dragon. She looked fearlessly from one to the other. ‘We are all weary, too weary to bargain well tonight.’

‘Bargain!’ the dragon snorted contemptuously. ‘Oh, not again! Humans and their bargaining.’

‘Far simpler to kill anyone who disagrees with you?’ Wintrow suggested tartly.

Malta set a restraining hand to her brother’s arm. ‘All of us must sleep,’ she suggested firmly. ‘Even, you, Tintaglia, are in need of rest. By morning, we will be rested, and each can state what he needs. It is the only way this can be resolved.’