The Dragon Keeper

  Sintara found that, against her will, she was listening raptly to his words. They were frightening and challenging at the same time. When his voice stopped, the quieter sounds of the evening flowed in. She listened to the river lapping at the muddy shore, to the distant noises of humans and birds settling in the trees for the night, and to the sounds of dragons breathing. “What should we do then?” she heard herself ask.

  All heads turned toward her. She did not look at anyone except Mercor. The night had stolen the colors from his scales, but she could make out his gleaming black eyes. “We should leave,” he said quietly. “We should leave here and try to find our way to Kelsingra. Or to anywhere that is better than this. ”

  “How?” Sestican abruptly demanded. “Shall we knock down the trees that hem us in? Humans can slip between their trunks and find pathways through the swamp. But if you have not noticed, we are slightly larger than humans. Gresok went blundering off, going not where he willed but only where the trees would permit him passage. There is no escape that way, only swamp and dimness and starvation. And poorly fed as we are, at least the humans bring us something to eat each day. If we left here, we’d starve. ”

  “There’s no need for us to starve at all. We should eat the humans,” someone on the edge of the herd suggested.

  “Be quiet if you cannot make sense,” Sestican retorted. “If we eat the humans, once they are gone, we are still trapped here, with no food. ”

  “They want us to leave. ” Kalo spoke suddenly, startling everyone.

  “Who does?” Mercor demanded.

  “The humans. Their Rain Wild Council sent a man to speak. One of the feeders asked me to talk with him. He told the Council man that I am the biggest of the dragons and therefore the leader. So he spoke to me. He wanted to know if I knew when or even if Tintaglia would return. I told him I did not. Then he said that they were very upset that someone had eaten a corpse out of the river, and that someone else had chased a worker down into the tunnels that go to the buried city. And he said they were running out of ways to feed us. He said that his hunters have hunted out all the large meat for miles around, and that the fish runs are nearly over for the year. He said the Council wishes us to call Tintaglia, to let her know that the Council demands that she return to help them solve this difficulty. ”

  In the darkness, several of the dragons snorted with contempt for such foolishness.

  Mercor spoke with disdain. “Call Tintaglia. As if she would respond to us. Kalo, why did you not speak of this before?”

  “They told me nothing that we do not all know already. Why bother repeating it? They are the ones who refuse to accept what they already know. Tintaglia’s not coming back,” Kalo confirmed bitterly. “She has no reason to. She has found a mate. Together they are free to fly and hunt wherever they will. In a decade or two, when her time is ripe, she will lay her eggs and when they hatch, there will be a new generation of serpents growing. She has no need of us any longer. She only helped us stay alive because we were her last resort. And now we are not. If Tintaglia had had a mate at the time we emerged from our cases, she would have despised us. She knows as well as we all do that we are not fit to live. ”

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  “But live we do!” Mercor broke in angrily on Kalo’s rant. “And dragons we are. Not slaves, not pets. Nor are we cattle, for humans to slaughter and butcher and sell off to the highest bidder. ”

  Sestican flared the diminutive spikes on his neck. “Who even dares think of such a thing!”

  “Oh, let us not be fools as well as cripples,” Mercor returned sarcastically. “There are plenty of humans who are unable to comprehend us when we speak to them. And some of them judge us little more than beasts, and unhealthy ones at that. I’ve overheard their words; there are those who would buy our flesh, our scales, our teeth, any parts of our bodies for their elixirs and potions. What do you think happened to that poor fool Gresok? Kalo and Ranculos know, even if Kalo chooses to pretend ignorance. Humans killed him, thinking to butcher him for trophies. They did not know we would be able to sense him dying. How many of them were there, Kalo? Enough humans to make you a good meal even after you’d devoured Gresok?”

  “There were three. ” Ranculos was the one who spoke. “Three we caught, and one who fled. ”

  “Were they Rain Wilders?” Mercor demanded.

  Ranculos blew out a snort of disdain. “I did not ask them. They were guilty of slaying a dragon, and I saw that they paid for it. ”

  “A pity we do not know. We might have a better idea of how much we can trust the Rain Wilders if we knew. Because we are going to need their help, much as it distresses me to say so. ”

  “Their help? Their help is next to worthless. They bring us food that is half rotted or merely the scraps of their kill. And there is never enough of it. What can humans help us with?”

  Mercor’s reply was deceptively placid. “They can help us go to Kelsingra. ”

  A chorus of dragons replied all at once.

  “Kelsingra may not even exist anymore. ”

  “We don’t know where it is. Our memories are of small use in finding our way there. We could not have found our way here to the cocooning grounds unassisted. Everything is changed. ”

  “Why would humans help us go to Kelsingra?”

  “Kelsingra! Kelsingra! Kelsingra!” prattled the depraved dragon at the edge of the huddle.

  “Make that fool be silent!” Kalo roared, and there was a sudden yelp of pain as someone did just that. “Why would humans help us go to Kelsingra?” he repeated.

  “Because we would make them think it was their own idea. Because we would make them want to take us there. ”

  “How? Why?”

  It was full dark now. Even Sintara’s keen eyes could not see Mercor’s face, but his amusement filled his voice. “We would make them greedy. You have seen how willingly they dig and delve here in the hopes of unearthing Elderling treasure. We would tell them that Kelsingra was three times the size of Cassarick and that the Elderling treasury was there. ”

  “Elderling treasury?” Kalo asked.

  “We would lie to them,” Mercor explained patiently. “To make them want to take us there. We know they want to be rid of us. If we leave it to them, they will let us slowly starve to death or leave us living in our own filth until disease claims us. This way, we offer them the chance to be rid of us, and to profit at the same time. They will be willing to help us, because they will think we are guiding them to riches. ”

  “But we don’t know the way,” Kalo bellowed in frustration. “And if they knew of an Elderling city to plunder, they would have done so by now. So they don’t know where Kelsingra is either. ” He lowered his voice and added dismally, “Everything is changed, Mercor. Kelsingra may be buried under mud and trees just as Trehaug and Cassarick are now. Even if we could find our way back to it, what good would it do us?”

  “Kelsingra was at a much higher elevation than either Trehaug or Cassarick. Do not you recall the view from the mountain cliffs behind the city? Perhaps the mud that flowed and buried these cities did not cover Kelsingra. Or perhaps it was upstream of the mudflow. Anything is possible. It is even conceivable that Elderlings survived there. Not dragons, no, for if any of the dragons had lived, we would have heard them by now. But the city may still be there, and the fertile croplands, and the plain beyond teeming with antelope and other herd beasts. It may all be there, just waiting for us to return. ”

  “Or nothing might be there,” Kalo replied sourly.

  “Well, nothing is what we have here, so what do we have to lose?” Mercor demanded stolidly.

  “Why do we need the humans’ help at all?” Sintara asked into the quiet. “If we wish to go to Kelsingra, why don’t we just go?”

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  “As humiliating as it is to admit it, we will require their help. Some of us are barely able to limp abo
ut this mudflat. None of us can hunt enough to sustain ourselves. We are dragons, and we are meant to be free to the land and the sky. Without healthy bodies and the use of our wings, we cannot hunt. Some fish we can catch for ourselves, when the runs are thick. But we need humans to hunt for us, and to help those of us who are feeble of body or mind. ”

  “Why not just leave the weaklings behind?” Kalo asked.

  Mercor snorted his disgust for such an idea. “And let the humans butcher them and sell off their parts? Let them discover that, yes, dragon liver does have amazing healing powers when dried and fed to a human? Let them discover the elixir in our blood? Let them discover what wondrous sharp tools they can make from our claws? Let them find that, yes, those myths have a sound basis in reality? And then, in no time at all, they would come after us. No, Kalo. No dragon, no matter how feeble, is prey for a human. And we are too few to discard so casually any of our race. Nor can we afford to abandon them as meat or as a source of memories for the rest of us. On that we must be united. So when we go, we must take every dragon with us. And we must demand that humans accompany us, to help provide meat for us until we reach a place where we can provide for ourselves. ”

  “And where might that be?” Sestican demanded sourly.

  “Kelsingra. At best. A place more congenial to dragons, with better hunting, at worst. ”

  “We don’t know the way. ”

  “We know it isn’t here,” Mercor replied tranquilly. “We know Kelsingra was along the river and upstream of Cassarick. So, we begin by going up the river. ”

  “The river has shifted and changed. Where once it flowed narrow and swift between plains rich with game, now it is wide and meanders through a bogland of trees and brush. Humans, light as they are, still cannot move easily through this region. And who knows what has become of the lands between here and the mountains. A score of rivers and streams once fed into this river. Do they still exist? Have they, too, shifted in their courses? It is hopeless. In all the time that these humans have lived here, they haven’t explored the upper reaches of the river. They want to find dry, open land as badly as we do. If humans could travel in that direction, they would have trekked up the river long ago, and if Kelsingra still existed for them to find, they would have discovered it by now. You want us to leave what little safety and food we have, journey through a bogland in the hopes of eventually finding solid land and Kelsingra. It’s a foolish dream, Mercor. We’ll all just die on the way to a mirage. ”

  “So, Kalo, you would prefer to just die here?”

  “Why not?” the big dragon challenged him sarcastically.

  “Because I, for one, would prefer to die as a free creature rather than as cattle. I’d like a chance to hunt again, to feel hot sand against my scales again. I’d like to drink deeply of the silvery wells of Kelsingra. If I must die, I’d like to die as a dragon rather than whatever pathetic thing it is that we’ve become. ”

  “And I’d like to sleep!” Kalo snapped.

  “Sleep, then,” Mercor replied quietly. “It’s good practice for death. ”

  His final words seemed to end all conversation. The dragons shifted and settled and shifted again, each looking, Sintara thought, for a comfortable spot that no longer existed. It was not just that the cold, damp earth was uncomfortable; it was that Mercor’s words had destroyed the small amount of acceptance that the dragons had built for their situation. The anger and her stubborn endurance now seemed more like cowardice and resignation.

  Since Sintara had emerged from her case, she had known that everything in her life was wrong. Mercor’s proposal filled her thoughts with possibilities. Cautiously, unwilling to wake the others, she extended her puny wings and stretched her neck to allow herself to groom them. Had they grown at all? Nightly she waited for dark and performed this senseless ritual. Night after night, she pretended to herself that they had grown and would continue to grow. They were laughable things, scarcely a third of the size they should have been. Flapping them scarcely stirred a breeze, let alone lifted her bulk off the ground. Carefully, quietly, she folded them back to her body.

  Wings made a dragon, she thought. Without wings, she could not hunt successfully, and she could never hope to mate. Indignation roiled suddenly through her. Only a few weeks ago, stretched out to sleep in a small band of sunlight, she had been rudely awakened when Dortean had tried to mount her. She had wakened with a roar of outrage. He was an orange, with stumpy legs and a thin tail. That he had even attempted to mate with her was humiliation enough. He was stupid and pathetic. To awaken to his muddy legs straddling her back as he hunched hopefully at her was a disgusting contrast to all her stored memories of dragons mating in flight.

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  Usually males fought for a female once she had indicated she was willing. And when the strongest male defeated his rivals and rose to join her in flight, he usually had to face the final challenge of dominating the female. Dragon queens did not mate with weaklings. Nor would a drake accept as a mate a docile female. Why mingle one’s bloodline with that of a bovine female, whose offspring might lack the true fire of a dragon? So to be straddled and humped by a dim-witted and deformed creature was an insult beyond bearing. She had rounded on him, snapping and slapping at him ineffectually with her dwarfed wings. At first, it had more inflamed than deterred him. He had continued to come at her, muddy necked and with his small eyes blazing with febrile lust. He had tried to clutch her to him, but a desperate swipe of her tail had knocked him off his feet and into the ever-present mud. Misshapen as he was, he could not easily right himself, and she had stormed away from him, down to the river, to wash his muddy paw prints from her back and haunches. She wished the acid waters of the river could have washed the humiliation from her as well.

  She settled herself for sleep, but it did not come to her. Instead, memories flickered in her mind, filling her with sadness—memories of flight, of mating, of the distant beaches where her ancestors had laid their eggs and then basked on the hot sand. Terrible longings replaced her sadness. “Kelsingra,” she said softly to herself, and to her surprise, memories of the place flooded her. To describe it as a city by the river could not begin to do it justice. It had been a place constructed as much with the mind and heart as with stone and beam. The entire city had been laid out to reflect that both Elderling and dragon lived amicably there. The streets had been wide, the doors to the public buildings ample, and the art on those walls and around the fountains had celebrated the companionship enjoyed by both dragons and Elderlings.

  And there was something else, she recalled slowly. There was a well there, a well deeper than the river that bordered the city. A bucket dropped into its depths sank past ordinary water to a deeper river of a most extraordinary substance. Even a tiny amount of it was dangerously intoxicating for an Elderling and possibly fatal for a human. But dragons could drink from it. She closed her eyes and let the old memories of other dragons rise to the forefront of her mind. An Elderling woman, gowned in green and gold, turned the crank on the windlass of a well and brought up a bucket full of gleaming silver drink. It was emptied into a polished trough, and another brought up, and another, until the vessel of polished stone brimmed with silver. In her dreams Sintara drank of it, the silver running through her veins, filling her heart with song and her mind with poetry. She allowed herself to float on the exhilarating memories, leaving the reality of her present life behind.

  In this other remembered life, she was a queen dragon who preened herself, her silver-dripping muzzle spreading the fine sheen over her feathery scales. The green-and-gold robed woman rejoiced in letting her drink her fill of the silvery stuff. Together they left the well and strolled through the bright sunlit streets of the city. They passed lavish squares where fountains leaped and played, and brightly robed denizens of the city greeted her with bows and curtsies. The market was in full voice, filled with the songs of minstrels and the dickering of merchants and custom
ers. Scents of cooking meat and sacks of spices, rare perfumes, and pungent herbs filled her nostrils. When she and her companion reached the river’s edge, they bid each other the fond farewells that old friends share. And then the queen dragon spread and limbered her gleaming scarlet wings. She crouched low on her powerful hindquarters and then sprang effortlessly into the air. Three, four, five beats of her wings and the wind off the river captured her and flung her aloft. She caught the current of warm summer air and soared on it.

  The crimson queen blinked transparent lids over her whirling gold eyes. The wind slapped her, but the blow changed to a caress as she banked into it and rode it ever higher. Warm summer sunlight kissed her back, and the wide world spread out below her. It was a golden land, a wide river valley that gave, on both sides, to rolling hills dotted with oak groves and then to steeper cliffs and finally craggy mountains. On the flat lands along the river, cultivated fields of grain alternated with pastures where kine and sheep grazed. A fine road of smooth black stone bordered one side of the river, with tributary paths and byways wandering out to the more rural districts. Beyond the settlements of humanity, in the foothills and the narrow valleys that threaded back into the mountains, game was plentiful.

  On the updrafts over the hills, other dragons soared, their glistening hides winking like jewels in the summer sunlight. One, a pale-green dragon with gold mottling on his haunches and shoulders, trumpeted to her. A thrill ran through her as she recognized her most recent mate. She answered his greeting and saw him bank to meet her. As soon as he had committed to his turn, she mocked him with a shrill call and beat her own wings powerfully to gain altitude. He gave a deep cry of challenge to her in response and came after her.

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  Rain. Cold sleeting rain suddenly spattered on her back with the force of a shower of pebbles. Sintara’s eyes flew open, the dream and the respite it had brought her shattered. In the next moment, the cold water was coursing down her flanks and sides. All around her in the darkness, dragons shifted and reluctantly huddled closer to one another. Sorrow vied with fury in her. “Kelsingra,” she promised herself aloud. “Kelsingra. ”