The Fire Dragon

‘I don’t know, my lord.’

‘Think to me, don’t speak aloud. I can’t hear you when you actually talk.’

‘Well and good, then. I was looking into the fire, and then I saw you. Can you hear me now?’

‘I can. You must be badly troubled, to reach me this way.’

‘It’s Branoic. I saw it – I mean, I had one of my visions, and I saw him take that wound. How does he fare?’

‘Oh my poor child! I’m afraid he died soon after.’

A flood of tears washed the vision away. Lilli covered her face with her hands and sobbed, rocking back and forth on the edge of her chair.

Although Nevyn tried for some while to reach Lilli again, he failed, picking up only her grief like the sound of distant keening. Finally he broke the link and threw a few more sticks onto his sputtering fire. As the flames leapt, he became aware that someone was standing in the shadows beyond the pool of light and watching him.

‘Who is it?’ Nevyn snapped. ‘How long have you been standing there?’

‘Owaen, my lord, and not long at all.’ The silver dagger captain took a few steps forward. ‘I – er, well – I wanted a bit of a talk with you.’

‘Very well. Come sit down.’

Owaen sat down on the ground about an arm’s length away. For a few moments they stared into the fire together. Owaen’s face was as expressionless as a mask.

‘Ah well,’ Owaen said at last. ‘It’s about Branoic’

‘I see. You’re surprised that you’re sorry he’s dead. You thought you’d be glad, but you’re not.’

‘Just that!’ Owaen looked up sharply. ‘Ye gods, you truly can see into a man’s soul, can’t you?’

‘Only when his feelings are obvious.’

Owaen tried to smile but failed. ‘He got that wound saving my worthless life. I got cut off at the head of our countercharge, and he came up to pull me out of a mob. Ye gods! I thought he hated me. Why would he do it?’

‘You’re a silver dagger and the captain,’ Nevyn said. ‘That’s reason enough.’

Abruptly Owaen raised one arm and buried his face in the crook, but in a brief moment he lowered it again. His voice shook. ‘I was thinking about his woman. She’s left with no one to protect her, if our prince tires of her, I mean. Do you think I should offer to marry her?’

Nevyn’s first impulse, quickly stifled, was to laugh.

‘That’s an honourable thought,’ he said instead. ‘But she has me and her studies. The prince would know better than to try to send her away from court or some such thing.’

‘True spoken.’ Owaen smiled, relieved. ‘I wouldn’t have made her much of a husband, anyway. But I felt I should offer.’

It seemed that the prince was worried about Lilli as well. The next morning, when the army was digging trenches to bury its dead, Maryn summoned Nevyn to his side. They escaped the noise and confusion by walking clear of the encampment. Out in the middle of what had once been a field, they could see a pair of men pulling stones off its boundary wall and carrying them out onto the grass.

The prince shaded his eyes with one hand. ‘That’s Maddyn and Owaen. I wonder what they’re doing.’

‘Building Branoic a cairn, most like,’ Nevyn said. ‘I saw Maddo earlier, and he said that he and a couple of the lads had dug him a proper grave.’

‘Oh.’ Maryn lowered his hand and looked at him with bleak eyes. ‘I thought I’d got used to men dying for my sake. I was wrong.’

‘Well, your highness, this particular death –’ Nevyn let his words trail away.

‘Indeed. Do you want me to find Lilli some other husband?’

‘I don’t. I think me the dweomer will give her all the position in court that she’ll need.’

Maryn nodded, staring at the ground. ‘I’m sending messengers back this morning. I tried to write her a letter, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I don’t know why. I felt as if I’d never known how to read and write.’

Nevyn choked back his own words: it’s because this death gladdens your secret heart. ‘Well, you could send a special messenger,’ he said instead.

‘Good thought. I know! Maddyn. He’s still blasted weak from that spoilt pork. We’re sending the wounded back to Dun Deverry, and he can join the escort.’

For a moment Nevyn felt struck dumb. The dweomer cold seemed to freeze his lips and fill his mouth with ice. Maryn glanced his way and considered him with narrow eyes.

‘What’s so wrong?’

‘My apologies, my liege.’ Nevyn had to force out the first few words; then his voice steadied. ‘That escort? Will it be substantial? I have the oddest feeling that Maddyn and the wounded will be in some sort of danger.’

‘I’ll double it, then.’ Maryn smiled briefly. ‘I know those odd feelings of yours by now.’

Lilli woke and found her chamber filled with cold grey light. For a moment she lay in bed. Her eyes burned, and her head throbbed with pain. Did I sleep? she wondered. Did I sleep at all? I must have. All at once, she remembered.

‘Branno,’ she whispered.

Her hot and swollen eyes refused to deliver more tears. She sat up, pushing the blankets back. She had wept for half the night, or so it seemed as she looked back upon it. In her hearth a pile of ash testified to the fire in which she had seen Nevyn’s face and heard him speaking. It was odd, she realized, but never once, not even in the depths of her grief, had she tried to pretend to herself that the vision had been merely some unreal dream. She knew it beyond doubting. Branoic was dead.

Someone pounded on the door.

‘Who is it?’ Lilli called out.

‘Just me, my lady.’ Clodda’s normally cheerful voice trembled. ‘You’ve barred the door, and I can’t get in.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Lilli got up and went to the door. ‘I didn’t mean to worry you.’

She unbarred the door, opened it wide, and let Clodda come in. The maidservant dropped her a brief curtsy.

‘I was ever so afraid you’d been taken ill,’ Clodda said.

‘Not ill, truly.’ Lilli hesitated. Telling someone about Branoic’s death would make it horribly real – but it’s real anyway, she told herself. ‘Branoic’s dead. Nevyn told me last night. He used dweomer.’

Clodda’s face turned pale. ‘Oh my lady!’ Her voice shook with tears. ‘That wrings my heart.’

‘Mine, too.’

‘No doubt.’ Clodda pulled up a corner of her dirty apron and wiped her eyes. ‘Oh, it’s so sad. My poor lady.’

With a sigh Lilli sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘It must be well into the morning. Why is the light so cold?’