Dragonoak: The Complete History of Kastelir (8 page)

I nodded. It wasn't a question, but I nodded regardless. Sir Ightham spoke as though irritated at herself for not piecing it together sooner, and then went back to searching through her bag. I kept glancing at her out of the corner of my eye, and eventually, she relented.

“King Garland and Queen Aren,” Sir Ightham said. I brightened, full of my enthusiasm for Praxis again, and she read the inscription out loud. “
Commissioned in 1477 by Liege Halka, to acknowledged the roles Their Highnesses played in ensuring the Territories' war never encroached on Felheim, never marred our way of life.
”

Everyone in Felheim knew what they'd done, knew the way they'd promised to lend their aid to one territory, should another try crossing our borders, and none had been willing to take that risk. If we could slay dragons, we could crush them.

Being in front of the statue gave me a better feel for history than Michael ever had, and I leant closer to Sir Ightham, dropping my voice to a rough whisper. Not that anyone would've been able to overhear us with such a buzz of conversation blending into the air.

“What are they like?” I asked.

Sir Ightham found what she'd been looking for – more parchment, surprise – and said, “What are who like?” barely bothering to follow the tenuous line of conversation.

I pointed up at the statues, saying, “You're a—
you know
, so you must know them.”

“I suppose I must,” was all she said, turning from the statues.

I hurried after her, pleading my case.

“Come on! Sure, I've heard plenty about them, but you can't learn everything from books, can you?” I tried, grinning up at her, even though she was staring dead ahead again.

We turned out of the square, down a narrow road that was far from empty, surrounded by houses and apartments on all sides. There were rows of washing strung out on lines far above our heads, windows pushed open, flowers bursting and blooming on balconies. As though she wouldn't know any peace until she answered me, Sir Ightham sighed, slowed her pace, and said, “They are neither as tall nor as stern as their statues make them out to be.”

It was all the information she'd part with on the matter, but to me, it was invaluable. It was something I'd be able to hold over Michael's head. A thousand other questions came to mind – did she know the Princes, how big was the castle, and could Thule really be larger than Praxis? – but I knew better than to push my luck with her.

Instead, I said, “I'm glad we got rid of those bags. They were making a crook of my spine.”

“Don't get too used to your new-found freedom. We'll need to stop for supplies at the next market—additional food, some manner of pan, bitterwillow. Can you remember all of that?”

Without it being written down
, she meant.

“Food, plants, pan—got it,” I said, sealing the information with a nod. “Anything you like in particular? How about Calais?”

“We eat most things,” came her eventual reply, and I didn't question her further. She was a Knight, likely trained to withstand all sorts of torture; I wasn't going to be able to force a preference between chicken and pork out of her.

“I'll get more carrots,” I decided. “He seemed to like them.”

Sir Ightham didn't answer me, as was her wont, and we strolled into what would've been the bad part of Praxis, if Praxis could be said to have a bad part. The houses around us had been replaced by taverns, doors and windows spread open to soak up the first hint of spring. A musician played a piano in one and a patron drunk enough to mistake himself for a musician played in another, sounds entangling in the centre of the street until you couldn't tell who was playing badly.

Instead of looking around, I found my eyes fixed on Sir Ightham. Her expression was as neutral as ever, and I wondered what it would take to pry a reaction out of her; wondered how many questions I'd have to ask before she snapped and told me to shut up, rather than just fall silent. Realising I'd been staring for a second too long, I followed her gaze, and saw what everyone was already aware of.

Outside of a tavern, perched on a stool with plenty of empty seats around them, was a pane.

Even seated, the pane was taller than me.

I couldn't say how the seat beneath it – her – hadn't been reduced to splinters, but it was far from the most pressing thing on my mind. I wanted to run, but my feet were stone and I couldn't part them from the street.

I expected pane to merely look like overgrown humans with horns and fangs, but up close, I saw how wrong I'd been. Thick tusks protruded from the pane's prominent lower jaw, each of them two inches long. Her skin was no darker than mine, but it looked more like soft, brown leather than flesh, and a ring of gold stood against the coal her eyes were made from.

Sir Ightham inclined her head towards the pane in a respectful manner, and the pane's long, pointed ears perked up at the recognition.

The pane rose to her feet, strange as they were – hoofed like a goat's, but shaped like a wolf's – rising up and up. I'd considered Sir Ightham tall, but she barely reached halfway up the pane's chest. The pane bowed her head as a formality. There was no real respect exchanged, and the pane returned to her full height easily, infinitely more relaxed than Sir Ightham had ever been.

“Dragon-slayer,” the pane said.

Her voice was unlike anything I'd heard before. Not quite human, but not quite a growl, either. It was like gravel sifting through fingers; gravel that had been left out in the sun to trap heat.

It took me a moment to take in the weight of her words themselves. She knew what Sir Ightham was, even without her dragon-bone armour. Being called a
dragon-slayer
might've been a compliment from a human, but to hear it from a pane, I didn't see how it could be taken as anything less than a death sentence.

Sir Ightham, entirely unperturbed by the pane knowing who – or what – she was, said, “And a good day to you, dragon-born.”

The pane grinned. Her tusks were arrow heads, ready to be lodged into Sir Ightham's throat. I lost faith in the fact that I was a necromancer, for there was no way I could do anything to negate the damage caused by a pane. But the pane didn't strike. That was all in my head. Instead, she slipped a hand between the tough leathers and sash of bright orange cloth she wore, plucked out a letter with her great, clawed hand, and held it out to Sir Ightham.

“Been hearing some troubling rumours, lately,” the pane said as Sir Ightham took the letter. “But as they say, a burden shared...”

Sir Ightham scanned the letter, and I tried to imagine the pane writing, tried to imagine her holding anything as small as a quill between her fingers. When she reached the end of the note, Sir Ightham's brow creased, and she read over it for a second time; certain she'd understood it, she folded it in two and tore it down the middle, over and over.

“Peculiar,” Sir Ightham said.

The pane nodded gravely, fishing something else from beneath her clothes. She clasped a chain in a fist, and the gold-silver pendant swayed in such a way that I couldn't make out the design. I didn't edge closer and it was gone in a flash, but Sir Ightham understood what she'd seen. She brought a gloved hand to her mouth, fingers running across dry lips, and the pane's ears twitched at the reaction she'd managed to draw out of her.

“What say you?”

Sir Ightham considered the question as though she had no choice in the matter. Whatever she'd read, whatever the pendant had meant, affected her more than five bandits and their swords had. She set her jaw and tilted her head towards me.

“Give her your things,” she said, pushing all of the pane's attention onto me.

I'd hardly been inconspicuous up until that point. I was right
there
, hovering around Sir Ightham, unable to back away, but now the pane was looking right at me. The corner of her mouth tugged upwards, revealing rows of fangs more subtle than her tusks, and I was so intent on not blinking, on not showing fear, that I missed her swing her bag off her back. It hit me square in the chest and my arms instinctively wrapped around it.

I tried not to wince, not to breathe too loudly.

“This your servant?” the pane asked, eyes fixed on me.

“This is my
squire
,” Sir Ightham said. She was met by a moment of silence, before the pane let out a deep, hearty chuckle. Even Sir Ightham seemed amused by her own words, and I dug my fingers into the pane's bag, hoisting it further into my arms.

“What's our first step to be?” the pane asked.

A few secrets scrawled onto a letter had earnt her a place within our group. But then again, if Sir Ightham was to travel with a necromancer, why not add a pane into the mix?

“I'll take rooms for us at the
Rambler's Rest
,” Sir Ightham said and the pane nodded. Turning to me, Sir Ightham said, “I trust you remember what we need from market.”

I slung the pane's bag onto my back, meaning to use my arms to strengthen my protest, and Sir Ightham took the opportunity to slip a handful of silver coins into my hand. I clasped them tightly, but before I could get a word out of my mouth, Sir Ightham was gone. She pushed a hole through the crowd and it closed behind her, leaving me alone with the pane and my thundering heart.

If Sir Ightham wanted to be rid of me, she could've just sent me home.

I kept my head down as I considered my options. For the first time in months, being ignored actually seemed appealing. I couldn't run—the pane would reach out and grab the scruff of my collar, and the crowd would never let me back in. They'd made a well around the pane, not daring to walk too close to her, quickening their pace as they passed.

So much for hoping the pane had business of her own to attend to. She crouched in front of me, which still didn't put us at eye-level, tilting and bowing her head in an effort to catch my gaze. I was being rude, I knew that, certain I'd have an easier time with it all if I just acknowledged the pane, but I couldn't force myself to move. All I could think of was the pane who'd come to my village, Queen Kouris in the woods, and all the people who'd been ripped to shreds by hands like the one being waved in front of my face.

“Now, now. Was only teasing you, yrval,” the pane said, returning to her full height. She reached out not to attack, but to pluck the bags from my back. The weight was lifted and my gaze flickered up, though my body remained tense. She slung the bags onto her back with such ease that I believed them to be empty, despite holding them a split-second ago. “Name's Rán.”

“I'm R—” I began, stunned. My tongue was too large for my mouth, too heavy, and I was in such a daze that I might as well have been struck across the back of the head. “Rowan, I'm...”

Talking was getting me nowhere. I'd forgotten how to wield my tongue and I'd had to dig to remember my own name. Poor as it was, Rán didn't hold my introduction against me. She smiled in a way that thankfully didn't show off as many of her teeth, immediately turning to leave.

Relief claimed me and immediately loosened its grasp: Rán was gone, but she'd left with the bag containing Sir Ightham's dragon-bone armour. I didn't dare to think what would await me if I returned to Sir Ightham empty-handed. Horns or no horns, I probably wouldn't have come out of it in one piece.

I did the most foolish thing I could think of.

I ran after the pane.

I soon learnt that there was one major advantage to walking with a pane: people got out of the way, and they did so quickly. Rán walked at a comfortable pace, but I had to half-jog to match her stride.

“What's that dragon-slayer having you fetch?” she asked, looking down at me.

The words came automatically, loudly.

“Food, pans, bitterwillow.”

I gripped the coins tightly, fifty valts in five and ten pieces, afraid that one would slip between my fingers and roll along the street, lost under someone's boot or a stray cart. Worse still, I was afraid they'd lose their value simply by being in my possession. On the verge of causing the coins to sweat, I focused on making sure I hadn't dropped any; it gave me an excuse not to look up, and up, at Rán.

“What kind of food are we looking for?” Rán asked, rubbing her chin. My shoulders rose to my ears with every word she spoke, especially when I realised I'd given reason for her attention to shift towards the pane diet. “Doubt that dragon-slayer has much in the way of taste—what about yourself, yrval?”

“I—”

It was no good. I couldn't get my brain and mouth to match up.

“Food, yrval. What are you in the mood for?” Rán went on cheerfully. “Could be pointing you in the direction of a pretty good fruit stall—when they say they're getting their goods from Canth, you can almost believe 'em. Ripe as anything. Got any favourites?”

“What?”

Rán bowed her head towards me and I caught the toe of my boot on a raised paving slab.

“Fruit—you humans are still eating that, aye? Apples, melons, pears. That sort of thing.”

“Oranges,” I blurted out. It didn't sound like a real word.

I couldn't even tell if it was the right answer.

“Not a bad choice,” Rán mused. I was too confused by the thought of pane eating something other than raw meat to offer up anything remotely intelligible. On Rán went, supporting the conversation without my help. A bizarrely welcome change from the past few days. “We'll stop by for some fruit first—they sell some hefty joints of meat more or less opposite that stall. Should be enough to keep you and the dragon-slayer full for a few days. Haven't had any time to look into cheese or bread yet, so that'll be an adventure. Now, just to get this out there, I'm not in the habit of biting off heads, so the worst thing that's likely to happen if you relax is you feeling an awful lot better.”

“I know!” I squeaked. Actually
squeaked
. But I didn't know, I was convinced my life was forfeit, but Rán made no effort to hold it against me.

“Ah, can't go forgetting about those horses of yours. Best be stocking up on this and that for them, too.”

A fear of squeaking for a second time prevented me from asking how she knew about our horses, and rightly so. The market came into sight and I realised I'd been leeching paranoia from everyone we'd passed. Of
course
we had horses. How else could we have got around?