Redheart (Leland Dragon Series) Page 5

  He opened his eyes and narrowed them on her face. “Nobody is interested in looking in on a skinny beggar girl.”

  Her cheeks filled with stinging redness. The bruises on her face ached with the sudden rush of blood, and she touched her fingertips to them. Then she turned away. She couldn’t decide whether his comment did more to offend her, or hurt her feelings. “I’m not taking a bath in a place with no door,” she finally said.

  His voice was softer when he replied. “Very well. You start the fire, and when I return, I’ll post myself as guard outside the curtain. All right?”

  She nodded without looking at him. When she heard his heavy boot steps move away, she turned to light the beeswax candle in the flame of a wall torch. Then she carried it carefully to the fire pit in the floor, and patiently waited for the wood to accept the flame.

  Who was this man, anyway? The woman last night called him Mr. Armitage. Jastin Armitage. Why was he waiting for her outside the barn this morning, and why was he helping her? He obviously had nothing but contempt for her. Whether it was because he thought she was a beggar, or simply because she was a woman, she didn’t know. And she disliked him right back. So why was she accepting his help? Frankly, she could think of no other choice.

  She blew an encouraging breath across the flame that was beginning to overtake the firewood. The nagging hunger in her belly fed the nagging doubts in her mind over her decision to leave her father. So far in her journey she had been attacked, nearly eaten by a dragon, and now she was starving and forced to rely on a stranger for help. She’d underestimated how hard it was going to be, and the amount of resolve she was going to need. Maybe it was time to admit she’d been wrong. Not about hating the way her father treated her, but wrong about leaving. Perhaps her father had been right all along. She needed him, she needed their home. And she needed the comfortable, predictable life they’d led, despite how utterly miserable it made her.

  She reached for heavy iron tongs beside the fire pit, and used them to retrieve the heated rocks. She carried them, one by one, to the bath water and listened to them sizzle as they sank to the bottom of the barrel.

  Not just miserable, she reminded herself! She’d despised that village. Not the people, but the mindset. No one in that entire place gave a thought about what lay beyond the village gate. No one wondered if there were others who might act, and think, and live differently. They settled for the drudgery of rising from the same straw bed they had woken from their entire lives.

  Were they content? Some of them, she supposed. It was evident in their happy smiles and cheerful whistling as they went about their daily chores. Her friend, Lilly, was like that. Lilly had married and already had a baby before Riza left, and Lilly’s face shone like a buffed silver tray each time she spoke of her husband. Riza envied her friend sometimes for the bliss she knew from her simple life.

  But Riza wanted more than simple. She wasn’t certain what it was she wanted, but she was sure what she didn’t want. If she had to take risks to learn, then that was what she would do. If she needed more resolve, she’d just dig down deep within herself and find some, somewhere. She wasn’t going back. Ever.

  It was a long time before she finally heard Jastin’s voice though the curtain. “I have returned.” A wooden chair scraped across the floor and stopped outside the closet.

  “All right,” Riza called out. She stood, and pinched the curtain close to the wall, making sure not a speck of space was left. “Don’t come in. I’m going to get in the water.”

  There was no reply as she worked stiff fingers around her bodice, and then the loops of her tattered blouse. As she freed the collar, the entire thing pulled away in dirtied strips of cloth. She stared at it, amazed, finally realizing just how awful she must look. Next came her skirt, which had more dirt than material. The strings of her boots were broken in so many places she could just slip them from her feet.

  She stepped over the edge of the barrel, and lowered herself into the steaming water. She shifted her weight to settle within the circle of rocks at the bottom, and let out a long sigh of relief.

  “Enjoying the bath?” Jastin asked through the curtain.

  She closed her eyes, and leaned back. “I don’t have a single place on my whole body that doesn’t ache.” The heat of the water seeped into her flesh, her muscles, and finally into her bones.

  “How long has it been since you’ve eaten?”

  “I don’t remember.” Her stomach twisted. She pressed a hand to it to quiet it. “But I’m not a beggar.”

  “No? Then tell me how you came to look like one.” His chair groaned, and she could see his boots shift in the space beneath the curtain.

  “By accident,” she replied. Then she held her breath and submerged.

  Chapter Nine

  Jastin shifted in his chair, growing more impatient as he waited. What was the girl doing in there? Finally, she called, “All right, I’m coming out.” When she emerged, she was wearing the new green dress he’d purchased. He could have afforded a more expensive dress, but hadn’t he already done more than enough?

  Her hair had turned dark cinnamon from the water, and was pulled back into a fat braid that dripped water down her back. Her eyes were the green of a placid lake within her pale, but freshly glowing, face. He hadn’t noticed her eyes before. Her bruises stood out in splotches of purple from her temple to her ear. With no dust to mask them, they were as obvious as black clouds against an ivory sky.

  “I’ve bathed my horse in half the time it took you to clean yourself,” Jastin said.

  Riza rolled her green eyes. Someday he might be inclined to teach her some manners. “It was your idea,” she said. “But, thank you. I’ll pay you back as soon as I’ve earned enough.”

  She took a step closer to him, and smoothed the rounded collar of her dress. It was a little roomy just below the waist where her hips would be if she’d had any. Likewise, the bodice gathered up across her chest, where she failed to fill that, too. But the sleeves and hem were the right length.

  “Go speak with Rusic.” He nodded toward the man in the apron.

  As she took a step away from him, she looked over her shoulder. “How did you know my size?”

  “I didn’t. I told the clothier I needed a dress for a skinny little girl.”

  She frowned. Her round mouth opened as though she might speak, but she appeared to change her mind. Instead, she turned away and strode to the man who would be her boss. Perhaps she was learning manners already.

  “Well, is this the same heathen of a beggar girl what asked me for a job this morn?” Rusic bleated, and a great smile broke out across his flushed face. “Wouldn’t have known ye if I hadn’t seen ye go into the little room with my own eyes!”

  “I feel better,” the girl said, smiling.

  “I’ll bet ye do! Now, if yer ready to get to work, I’ll show ye the kitchen.” He beckoned her around the bar with a wide hand.

  When Riza disappeared into the kitchen, Jastin pushed off from the wall, and strode to a near table. It was dimly lit, the torch on the wall beside it purposely extinguished. A young man sat at this table. His hair was long and stringy, and the color of dung.

  Jastin kept his eyes on the kitchen door as he pressed his palms to the tabletop. “Well?” he asked the young man.

  “That’s her,” was the reply.

  “You’re certain? She’s the one you saw in the woods a few days past?” He turned his gaze to the scrawny, grinning idiot.

  “Sure enough.” He stood, and his chair scratched against the floor. He extended his palm. Then his grin curled into an oily sneer, exposing stained teeth. “I recognize ‘em finger marks on her face.”

  Jastin’s teeth ground hard against each other, but he dropped a sack of coins onto the informant’s palm.

  “Pleasure doin’ business,” said the young man.

  “Get out of my sight.”

  The young man did.

  Chapter Ten

  A coo whisper
ed near Kallon’s ear. He peeped open one eye. An orange shaft of morning light punctured through the mouth of his cave and illuminated a gray pigeon. Round, black eyes stared up into his face, and it cooed again.

  Kallon snorted, and a puff of cave dust enveloped the little messenger. “Tell Orman I’m not coming today. Not coming ever.”

  Pigeon wings fluttered. The dust settled like a heavy cloud onto its feathers. The bird leaped into the air and soared to Kallon’s head, where it landed. Peckpeckpeck. It tapped with its dull beak.

  Kallon snapped open both eyes, and tossed his head to send the annoying visitor flying. Feathers ruffled as the pigeon flailed and careened toward the cave wall. Just in time, it managed to brake, and it dropped onto knobby feet. It cocked its head as it strode back toward Kallon, bobbling proudly.

  It came closer and closer. Kallon lowered his snout. A few more steps. Then Kallon snapped his maw like a lightning flash, and caught the thing against his tongue.

  Orman’s voice vibrated within Kallon’s mouth. “If you eat another one of my birds, I’m going to turn you into a human!”

  Kallon almost swallowed anyway. He rolled the tasty bird around in his mouth, contemplating, before he finally lowered his chin to spit the thing—Ptoo!—onto the ground. Wasn’t worth it. Orman would never let him hear the end of it.

  The slobber-covered pigeon rolled across the dust and became coated with sticky mud. Stiff feathers stuck out like porcupine quills. It gave a pitiful squeak, and sat dazed.

  Then its little gray beak opened, and Orman’s voice came from the pigeon’s throat. “You’re late! Were late last month and the month before.”

  “Not coming.” Kallon gave the pigeon an irritable frown.

  “Yes, you are.”

  “No.”

  “Yes!”

  “Go away!”

  There was a short silence as the bird’s beak snapped closed. Its black eyes stared. Then came Orman’s voice again. “I have the stone.”

  Kallon jerked up his head. He stared back at the bird, and felt his scales rise like hackles between his shoulders. His mother’s stone? It couldn’t be. Orman himself told him it was destroyed. “You’re lying. You said it was gone.”

  “Thought it was. It isn’t.”

  Kallon heaved himself to his feet. Orman wouldn’t dare trick him in such a way. If the wizard thought it was the linking stone, it must be something near enough to fool the old man.

  As Kallon moved, the muddy pigeon darted into the air, scattering clumps of dirt, and then ducked between dragon and stone to free itself into the waiting sky. It veered upward, toward the top of the mountain. Kallon quickly followed.

  He could have flown the path with his eyes closed, and sometimes did. He knew the way by sight, by smell, by instinct. Glancing below, he saw his shadow brush the limbs of a tall oak that had been just a sapling on his first visit to Mount Krag, and to the home of Orman Thistleby.

  He’d been excited then to learn humanspeak. He’d wanted to follow his father’s example as a dragon knight, a respected vassal, honoring the Redheart name and the land earned by the mighty Reds through honorable service. His fledgling wings had beaten proudly beside his father’s as they’d traveled, and he’d recognized the anticipation in his father’s expression. It had been a day of great hope and promise.

  Kallon’s eyes grew hazy. Several feet short of Orman’s dwelling he dropped, landed, and clenched his claws against the stone path. Memories brought feelings, and feelings brought pain. Gripping the mountain, he willed himself to forget.

  “Changing your mind?” Orman’s voice called out from where he stood several feet up the slope. His wrinkled hand wrapped the end of his stick as he peered down to Kallon.

  “Maybe.”

  Orman nodded, and his watery eyes softened. “I miss them, too.” He shuffled to turn. “Come on. Haven’t got all day.”

  “You think you have the real stone?” Kallon asked as he followed the wizard up the path. Mountainside rubble shook and loosened beneath his heavy steps. Pebbles bounced and careened downward, slapping into leafless trees and cracked boulders.

  “I know I do.” Orman paused at the summit and opened his arms to the thick, humid air. “Felt it vibrate in my hand, heard your mother’s whisper.”

  Kallon stopped again, just short of the plateau. “Heard her voice?” His heartbeat quickened. The wizard continued to embrace the air, his eyes closed as if in ecstasy. Wind tousled his wiry hair. Kallon waited. Then he inched forward to bump Orman’s shoulder with his snout. “Heard her voice? What did she say?”

  Several seconds passed before Orman finally lowered his arms, and shot Kallon a scowl. “I will tell you all about it in time. You know I must clear my mind first.” He shuffled away.

  Kallon crested Mount Krag. Atop the plateau he circled slowly, admiring Leland’s marbled mountaintops. But the nearest peaks were tattered and shabby, wearing their fissures as a threadbare cloak on a failing king. In the distance, mountains slanted like ancient gravestones. Had these peaks always been so feeble? Had he only just truly noticed?

  Then his eyes found Mount Gore, Leland’s tallest. This was the heart of the land, and the very center of the mountain chain. No fissures marred this bold crest. Blue-green firs blanketed its slopes, and wisps of cottony fog meandered lazily about its shoulders. It seemed the last bastion against the creeping death slowly overtaking Leland Province.

  Mount Gore was also the chosen place for the meetings of the Dragon Council. At least, it once was. Kallon couldn’t help but wonder if it were still true. Perhaps the leaders of each tribe were meeting there even now. Maybe they gathered, circled in the stone arena, discussing matters of dragons. Things with which Kallon no longer concerned himself.

  “You should be leader, not Blackclaw,” said Orman, near Kallon’s shoulder. Kallon’s eyes darted to the wizard’s face. Orman made no movement; he only stared out past the gaunt mountains toward Gore.

  “Stop doing that,” Kallon said.

  “What? Speaking?” Orman arched a single, bristled brow.

  “Reading my thoughts.”

  “Stop thinking so loudly, then.”

  Show-off wizard. Kallon turned toward Orman’s dilapidated hut. Thick slices of oak trunks were stacked vertically for its walls, and were held together with what smelled like red clay and willow sap. It seemed hardly big enough for the man to turn around in, and the thatch roof listed sideways, as though awaiting the help of a brisk wind to slide it to the ground. Orman’s home had looked exactly the same for as long as Kallon could remember.

  Outside, glass jars and clay pots and silver chalices lined a granite table, each filled with colorful shards of crystals. Below the table, in its shadow, other knobby crystals of red and brown were partially buried. Kallon searched for a new scent, but didn’t find one, so he moved to the blue and green cylinders bathing in a fragile current of water behind Orman’s hut. “Where is your stream?”

  “Nearly gone. Just as the rest of the water of Leland.”

  Kallon stabbed his tongue into the cool water. It still tasted sweet.

  “Bah!” Orman batted at Kallon’s tongue. “Dragon spit on my crystals! Now I’ll have to clear them again.” He mumbled fitfully as he spun the cylinders in the streambed to point them north. “Stop mucking about!”

  “Where is my stone? I want to hear this voice you say is my mother’s.”

  “Your stone?”

  “If it was my mother’s, it is mine. She would want it so.”

  “Yes. Well, I’m sure you’re right about that. Wait here. And don’t touch anything.”

  Kallon rested back on his haunches to wait. As he did, the back of his head collided into a dangling string of clear crystals hanging from the eaves of Orman’s roof. They crashed and squawked like a flock of Maybirds. He glanced to Orman.

  Orman stopped in his tracks, and his shoulders tightened. But he didn’t look back. He simply sighed, and continued into his tiny home.

>   “How did you find the stone after all this time?” Kallon called.

  “Had a dream,” Orman said, emerging from the hut with a deep purple crystal that dangled from a cord in his weathered hand. Kallon’s breath caught. It was his mother’s stone. It had to be. He remembered it.

  “A dream?” Kallon asked. “After all these years you just had a dream?”

  “Not any dream. I called for it.” Orman sandwiched the crystal between his palms. He closed his eyes. “The wind has been rushing east to west, scaling down the mountainside with a message I cannot hear. My human ears try, but they cannot hear.”

  “But the stone—“

  “The message is for you, Kallon Redheart. Made for your ears.” Orman’s eyes opened. “I called for a dream to help me understand, and I dreamed of your mother’s linking stone. This stone.”

  Kallon poked a claw at the top of the crystal where it jutted up from Orman’s hands. “Where did you find it?”

  “In the boughs of a Dandria.”

  Kallon blinked. “A wishing tree? There have been no wishing trees in our woods since before I was born. Not since the Great Fire.”

  “There is one now.” Orman narrowed one eye, and craned his wobbly neck toward Kallon’s snout. “How long since you visited your parent’s graves?”

  His words were a fist to Kallon’s gut. Kallon winced.

  “If you had been recently, you would have found the tree for yourself. It grows wild and strong from your mother’s grave.”

  The emotions he’d fought to control threatened once more. How could he visit when the very thought of doing so shuddered his scales and wrenched itself like a spear through his ribs? He stared at the ground, unable to face Orman’s heavy gaze.

  “How it came to be in the boughs, I don’t know,” Orman continued. “Except to guess that it lay near the ground so long without being discovered that your mother took it upon herself to try to reclaim it. Only Dandrias grow so quickly, and so tall. The cord was wrapped around a fist of a branch, as though pushing it toward the sky for your mother to reach.”