Blood of Dragons

The thought steeled her resolve. She would disable their ships and escape. And when she was healed, she would return to destroy not just them but the evil nest that had bred them. She had heard their speech and recognized words from her ancient memories. I know where you spawn, she thought at them. I and my offspring will fall upon your land and leave not one of your nests standing. We will feast on your kine and your children, and foul your drinking places with carrion. You will be the ones eradicated, and no memory of your ways will descend from you.

She was so close now that she could hear their muffled voices and stupid laughter. Laugh well, for a final time, she thought at them. Her path would take her between the two moored vessels, in water deep enough to conceal her and shallow enough that her claws would not lose their grip on the river bottom. She bent her legs slightly, crouching so that only her eyes and nostrils remained above the water, and began her stealthy approach.

Lord Dargen breathed out the fumes of Hest’s own wine as he staggered along beside him. He gripped Hest’s shoulder and leaned on him, cursing him when his stumbling feet jostled him against the railing. ‘Stop. Stop!’ he commanded Hest suddenly. ‘Need to piss. Stay and watch, Bingtown Trader, and see the weapon a Chalcedean bears.’ He was, Hest thought, very drunk indeed.

He kept his grip on Hest’s shoulder as he staggered to the railing and Hest had perforce to move with him. He moved aside in distaste as the man made lewd comments about Hest’s supposed desire for him and Hest’s lack of endowment. The night was not peaceful. Animals called to one another in the nearby forest and ghostly gleams of luminescent hanging moss made mad ghosts in the trees. The yellow lamplight from the windows of the ship fled the vessel in long bars of light on the river’s face. A ripple in the water’s surface caught Hest’s eye. He stared, wondering what disturbed the slack current between the two vessels. A large gleaming eye glared up at him and then was lidded abruptly.

‘The dragon!’ Hest shouted. ‘She is right alongside us! The dragon is in the river!’

‘Idiot!’ The Chalcedean cursed him. ‘What is frightening you? A river pig? A floating log?’ Lord Dargen staggered to Hest’s side and looked down. ‘There is nothing there! Just water and a coward’s imagining.’ He seized Hest’s wrist and with shocking strength dragged him closer. ‘Look down, Bingtown coward! What do you see? Nothing but black water! I should throw you in so you can see for yourself!’ With his free hand, he seized the back of Hest’s neck and shoved him forward so that he leaned far out over the railing. Hest shouted wordlessly and struggled, but even drunk, the Chalcedean had a madman’s strength. Worse, as Hest stared, a gleaming blue eye looked up at him from the depths. The rest of the creature was invisible, cloaked in the black water, but he knew it was the dragon that looked up at him with hatred. And waited.

‘It’s there! Look for yourself, there! See the eye, look!’ His voice rose and cracked into a woman’s squeal.

The Chalcedean laughed, drunk and guttural. ‘Over you go, Bingtowner!’

The boat gave a sudden wild heave sideways. The shrieking of splintered wood competed with the harsh cries of the men in the galley and the terrified screams of the hostages trapped below decks. Hest clutched at the railing and a wordless scream escaped him. The Chalcedean staggered free of him shouting, ‘Arms! The dragon attacks us. Kill her, kill her now!’

As the boat tipped again, the Chalcedean lord was flung against the railing. For a long moment he clung there, and Hest dared to hope to see him tip over the edge. But the next onslaught from the dragon flung the ship in the other direction, and he slammed against the ship’s house. ‘Attack!’ he roared, fury and fear diminishing his drunkenness.

The door of the galley was flung open and men poured out onto the deck, weapons in their hands.

‘I wish the city would light itself here,’ Rapskal complained.

Privately, Thymara agreed with his sentiment even as she recognized the impossibility. Even this magical city had limits. Only certain bands of metal woke to light, and not all of them still worked. How they worked at all was still a great mystery, but she now recognized Elderling magical works when she saw them. And in this part of the city, they seemed to have chosen to use it as little as possible. Almost, she remembered why. She turned away from the memory tug. The statues in the nearby squares were only statues, silent and unmoving. They were of lovingly worked stone, but no shining silver threads of memory gleamed in them.