Tortall (23 page)

She snaked her long neck around Afra to peer at Uday.
A little uncertain, Afra half-turned so the dragon might get a better look at her son.
And I am quite charmed by
you,
small human
. Uday crowed in glee, as if he understood.

The dragon straightened so she could eye all of us again.
It was
this
young dragon who caused my waking. When first she entered my barriers, I began to rouse myself from sleep, bringing down my old wards and cracking the shell that time had formed over me. It has been more than two thousand circles around the sun since her kind and mine have spoken. Moreover, she is so young. I feared that you two-legged creatures might have captured her. You have been known to do that
.

Her gaze was so stern that the villagers, who had begun to rise, knelt again. The soldiers behind Numair and Daine quailed.

I am no captive!
I told her.
Daine and Numair
—my mind added their images and voices to their names so the opal dragon would know them better
—are my parents. They adopted me. My kin allow it. Daine tried to save my dragon mother’s life, and my mother left me with her. I have been managing very well among humans, thank you!

Now the beautiful creature looked down her long muzzle at me.
In my day, infant dragons were not so forward
, she said, her mind-voice crackling.

I am not like the infant dragons you knew
, I replied.
You said yourself it’s been more than two thousand years since you spoke with any dragons
.

For a moment I thought I heard her sigh. She picked up a slab of orange stone that was three feet thick.
My nap lasted far longer than I had intended. I was very bored, and tired
.

You could come with us
, I said.
It wouldn’t be boring if you did
.

“Kitten—Skysong—means that it wouldn’t be boring for
her,
” Numair said. “But surely, after such a nap, it
is
time you moved around a bit?”

“Numair!” Daine said, tugging on his sleeve. “The people in the city—well, people anywhere! If we have a dragon with us—a
big
one—if folk see her out and about …”

I slumped. I liked this dragon, for all that she was so much older and a snob. She was beautiful and funny. Daine was right, though. People screamed at the sight of me. What would they do if they saw her?

My children ceased to need me long before my nap. The time I showed you, young dragon, the time when these lands were green and the creatures were larger, was the last time I was happy
. Somehow I could feel the dragon spoke to me alone.
I cannot—would not—take you from these strange friends, or your two-legged “parents.” But I would be happy to come with you, if you would like
.

I squeaked and ran at her and wound between her forelegs. The glassy stone of her body was cool and pliable. She looked at Daine and Numair.
The skill of the dragon depends on the stone of our flesh
, she said so that everyone could hear.
We opal dragons are the mages of ideas, illusion, seeming, and invisibility. That is why my magical protections held for so long
.

Suddenly I could feel her, but I could not see her. No one could. Then I could not even feel her. I cheeped, sending my magic out, searching for her. Just as suddenly as she had vanished, she appeared again, beside Afra and Spots. Afra
jumped; Uday began to wail. Spots’ ears went back. The villagers decided it was time to run away.

“Now that’s fair wonderful,” Daine said with a smile. “You can hide in plain sight.” She looked at Afra. “I didn’t catch your name.”

“I’m—Afra. This is Uday,” Afra said, keeping an eye on the dragon. “Your little creature, there—she’s been looking after us.” She pointed to me, then Spots. “And the horse—he, too, has cared for us.”

“Kitten is the dragon,” Daine said, coming over to Afra. “Her ma named her Skysong, but she’s got to grow into it. Spots is the horse. He’s Numair’s. I see Kitten found some of my things for you to use. She’s a rare thief.” She hugged Afra’s shoulders, then looked at the dragon. “And your name, Great One?”

The opal dragon looked from Daine to me.
Why does this child not speak to you mind-to-mind, as she does to me?

“She is too young. That’s what her family told us,” Daine replied. “It drives her half-mad. I think it’s the only thing she dislikes about living among humans. She needs to talk with us, and she can’t.”

The dragon—my ancestress? my kinswoman?—went to the rocky hollow that had once been her bed and began to sift through the stones, tossing most of them aside.
I am Kawit, in the language of my people. Ah. Skysong, eat this
.

She turned about and offered me one of her discarded scales. It sparkled in the sun.

But it’s too pretty to eat
, I protested.

Eat it
, Kawit ordered me.

I obeyed. Daine asked Kawit, “Will you teach me how you did that?”

The scale fizzed and tingled in my mouth, crunching among my teeth. Then it was gone.

I compliment you upon your raising of Skysong thus far, Veralidaine
, Kawit said.
She is a valiant young one who will do whatever she must to care for her friends
. She nodded to Afra.

“How did you know my full name?” asked Daine, startled.

Because it is in all of me
, I said.
My mother put Daine’s name in all of me, so every dragon, god, and immortal would know who my new mother is. Kawit, would you tell her?

“Oh, my,” Daine said. She sat on a rock.

You have already told her
, Kawit replied.

You hear me!
I cried, and I ran to my mother. I jumped into her lap.
You hear me! Now we can talk and I won’t have to make funny signs or noises!
Daine hugged me close. Once we stopped saying private things to each other, I looked at Spots.
Can you hear me, too?

As well as if you were one of the beast-People
, he replied, nibbling on some weeds.
I’m glad you are happy, but we managed perfectly well before
.

But now I will understand your jokes. I only used to guess at them
, I explained. I looked up at Numair.
Papa, Afra has magic in two colors, and Uday in three. Afra needs someplace to be safe and well fed and not enslaved
.

“Why are you telling my secrets?” Afra cried, looking around. She hadn’t noticed the villagers’ departure before
this. Even the soldiers who had come with Numair and Daine had fled.

“She tells only us,” Numair said kindly. “And we are safe, because Daine and I are both mages. I wish Kitten had brought you to us sooner—”

“I suspect she wanted to look after Afra herself,” Daine told him. “Seeing as how we’d given her nothing to do.”

I felt myself turn pale yellow out of embarrassment. It was dreadful that my parents knew my mind so well.

She has something to do now
, Kawit said.
I know nothing of this new world. She may be my guide, and my friend. I hope she will be my friend
.

I struggled to concentrate, so that only Kawit would hear my reply.
I would
love
to be your friend
, I said.
If you don’t mind that I am very young
.

I like it
, Kawit told me.
You make
me
feel younger
.

Daine sat me down and went to Afra. “May I see your baby?” she asked. Slowly Afra turned so Daine could lift Uday from his carry basket. “I have two of my own, but they are with their grandparents,” Daine told Afra. “Please come with us. We’ll send the soldiers back for the rest of your things.” Holding Uday, she took Afra by one wrist and drew her toward the trail.

“But the dragon—Skysong—” Afra said, hesitating. “She drew a crown. The emperor is with you?”

“He’s a nice young man,” Numair said, coming to stand beside her. “Kitten said you have two-colored magic? How do you manage to keep one aspect from overpowering the other? My own, which is two colored, has always been integrated,
as you see—” He showed her a ball of his black fire so she could look at the white sparkles in it.

Oh, no, I thought. If Numair starts to ask questions now, I will never get my own answered.
Papa, when are we going home?
I demanded, tugging on the leg of his breeches. He was already walking off with Daine and Afra. Spots trotted ahead of us.
Kawit, come! Papa, did you fix the river? Mama, are the chickens going to be all right? Are you going to scold those mages for trying to kill us? Will you tell the soldiers to leave Spots with Kawit and me instead of tying him up all of the time?

That was just a start. I had a great many more things to say.

When Adria reached her father’s deserted storeroom after school, she sat in a dark corner, hid her face against her knees, and cried. The new mathematics instructor had marked her work a failure. Worse, he had sent a note to her father after showing its contents to Adria.

Instructor Hillbrand told me that Adria is brilliant at mathematics, but in my view her past excellence has led her to laziness
, Instructor Park had written.
I instructed the students to do all of the steps which lead to the solution. She will not give the intermediate steps, only the answer. She will not do all of the work that is required
.

Adria blew her nose on her handkerchief. She wasn’t
trying
to be bad. The stupid in-between steps just wouldn’t stay in her mind, not when the answer was so plain. She had explained that to Instructor Park, but he had only shaken his head. Then he had written the note.

What her parents would say—what her father would say! Her lips trembled and her eyes flooded. Please, gods, don’t let Father be angry, she begged silently. She didn’t know which was worse, waiting for one of her father’s rages or having one break over her head. She hated being a coward.

She wiped her eyes and got to her feet. Regardless of her problem with the new teacher, she knew she would
definitely
be punished if she didn’t get to her shop chores. She could see an open crate of brass lamps that had to be cleaned for sale. There was the sweeping to do as always, inkwells to be filled in the clerks’ room, brushes to be rinsed off. She would do the lamps first, the inkwells and brushes when the clerks went to supper.

As she set up a table for her polish and rags, she worried the mathematics issue like a bad tooth. Instructor Hillbrand had never cared how she reached her answers. From the time she was very small, she had known the answer to any mathematics problem, long before the other children. She had been the wonder of the district and Father’s darling. Instructor Hillbrand had even spoken of university training when she was older, though Father always said it would cost too much.

Then came Instructor Park, educated at the great university in Carthak. His mathematics for older students involved letters as well as numbers. There were steps toward the solution, and each student must do the steps as well as answer the problem. He would not accept the answer alone.

Adria polished an already shining lamp, crying again. She loved the new mathematics. The idea that letters could take the place of numbers opened a world of possibilities whose limits she could not see. Even after her scolding, she had asked the instructor about the mathematics that lay beyond their current studies. That conversation had not gone well.

“It is clever of you to deduce some of the future
applications, Adria,” he had said with a kind smile. “But you overreach. First you must work your way through this course, and learn the discipline of the mathematics I will cover in these three months. Since you are already having difficulties, you should concentrate on the work at hand.” As she had turned away, red with shame, he had added, “Besides, higher mathematics is taught at the universities. Surely your family prefers that you remain here, to work in their interest, on accounts.”

After the possibilities she had glimpsed, that answer was as bad in its way as any whipping Father might give her. It was as if she had seen a star-covered sky, only to have Instructor Park tie a blindfold over her eyes.

She picked up another lamp and wiped her face on her sleeve again. That was when she heard a voice say, “Don’t cry.”

She gasped and looked around, frantic. “Who’s there?”

“Me,” the voice replied. It was a very small voice, and childlike.

Adria searched the big storeroom, forgetting the lamp in her hand. Unless the child, or any of the clerks who wanted to make fun of her, had packed himself in a crate or turned himself into a fancy jar or box, she was alone. Trembling, she went back to her rags and polish.

Doomed to be switched and mad as a rat in a trap, she thought as she scrubbed at a tarnished spot on the lamp.

“Why sad?” asked the voice.

She dropped the lamp. The lid rolled off into the shadows.

“Ow,” the voice said.

Adria stared as smoke oozed out of the lamp. No, she thought, too fascinated to run or shriek. It wasn’t smoke. It was more like liquid, but it was liquid that kept to a roundish shape, without sending random trickles outward.