Elizabeth Haydon - Destiny - Child of the Sky

“Hold a little while longer, Grandfather,” he said softly to Shrike, using the Cymrian term of respect accorded to elders in Serendair long ago. “You shall be back with your fellows and your commander ere dawn.” tangy scent of burning hickory cinders filled Ashe’s nose as the last vestige of light left the sky. To any other nose it would have been impossible to discern, miles away, but the senses of the dragon were keen enough to detect even infinitesimal changes on the wind or in the earth, and so he closed his eyes and followed the odor to its genesis.

Through the earth he could feel the source of warmth that had spawned the crisp scent, small but intense flames burning unsteadily in the winter wind. Torches , he mused. There must be a small hamlet or town deep within these woods. He would undoubtedly find Anborn there.

As if reading his mind, the unconscious Cymrian stirred. Shrike’s body shuddered as he came awake. Ashe patted his shoulder reassuringly as the man’s eyes opened, shot with blood from his injuries, the irises black and gleaming in the fire’s light.

“Rest easy, Grandfather,” he said in the Old Cymrian tongue. Shrike’s bloody eyes opened wider.

“Who are you?” he rasped.

“Your protector, for the moment,” Ashe replied, glancing behind him into the dark sheets of snow undulating on the stinging wind. “Your escort shortly. You asked me to bring you to Anborn. We are not far from him, I believe.”

Shrike blinked rapidly, as if fending off the falling snow with his eyelids. “Who are you?” he repeated weakly.

“Does it matter?”

The ancient Cymrian struggled to sit up beneath his blankets and managed to raise himself, unaided, against the rotten trunk of a fallen tree. “Yes, it does,” he muttered testily. “Not to me, but it will to Anborn. And to you, if you wish recompense from me.”

Ashe chuckled. “I’ve asked none such.”

Shrike closed his eyes. “Then you’re a fool, and deserve none such.” A flash of pain wrinkled his face. “I must have offended the All-God more than I had imagined, that he would curse me to spend my last hours in the company of a coward who hides both his face and his name.” He lapsed back into weary silence.

-

The wintry air grew dry as the dragon bristled at the insult. Ashe took a deep breath and expelled it slowly, willing himself to be calm as his face flushed hot beneath the hood of his reviled mist cloak.

The Cymrian’s words had struck deep. He knew that those who had suffered at the hands of F’dor would resent anyone who seemed to hide his identity, since that was the demon’s stock-in-trade. More, to be named a coward by one who had witnessed the Cataclysm, had survived the War and all that had followed it, rang truer than he could bear. He was whole now. Even if Shrike was the demon’s host himself, there was no longer any reason to hide. He reached up and took down his hood.

The light of the metallic curls of his hair, shining copper-gold in the fire’s glow, reflected off the ancient man’s face. Shrike felt the light and opened his tattered eyes again. The astonishment in them, tinged with horror, reflected back at Ashe.

“Impossible,” Shrike murmured. His face grew even paler.

Ashe smiled, and reached into the pocket of his cloak. He drew forth a small pouch, loosened the drawstring, and shook something small out into his hand. It caught the light of the fire in the same manner his hair had. He held it up before Shrike’s eyes. It was a thirteen-sided coin, struck in copper, oddly shaped.

“Do you remember this?” he asked. “You gave it to me years ago, when I was just a lad, to jolly me out of my boredom on a Day of Convening.”

The ancient man craned his neck with great effort, then collapsed back against the tree trunk again. “I remember.” He pulled the rough blanket up over his shoulder with fingers that trembled. “I can recall each time I have beheld you, Lord Gwydion, because it gave me endless joy to do so. Each time—I—looked at you I saw your grandfather, Gwylliam, at his—noblest, your grandmother, Anwyn, at her most wise. You were our hope, Gwydion, the promise—of—a brighter future for a war-torn people. Our solace. Your death was the end of hope for me—and for all the Cymrians.” The strain of speech overwhelmed him, and Shrike coughed, then went silent.

“Forgive me, Grandfather,” Ashe said softly. “I have carried the knowledge of the injury my deception has caused my family and friends. I regret any pain it has caused you as well.”

Shrike coughed again, this time more violently. “Why, then?”

“It was not of my doing, at first. Then it was out of necessity. I cannot explain it past that. But you are right; to continue to hide now is cowardly. I will do it no more.”

Shrike smiled wanly. “You intend to remove the shield from your face, then?”

Ashe smiled in turn, and rested his forearms on his knees. “When it suits me.”

“Does it suit you now?”

Ashe laughed. “Can you see me?”

The ancient man snorted with annoyance and pain. “Bugger you for toying with me in my last moments. Are you willing to stand in the sight of Time, and let your name be on the wind, or not?”

Ashe’s face grew solemn, and his dragonesque pupils contracted. “Yes,” he said.

Shrike inched up a little higher against the tree and smiled. “Then I have recompense to offer you after all, Lord Gwydion.”

The night seemed to grow darker around the small fire. Shrike’s eyes gleamed more brightly; it was as if he had drawn the light out of the air into himself, and now sat, staring into the flames, lost in thought.

Ashe waited silently, observing him closely. Though the ancient man’s damaged eyes had taken on new life, his skin was growing grayer. The dragon in his blood could feel Shrike’s body waning, his life ebbing away slowly, even as his soul grew stronger in the fire’s light.

Finally, when the wind had died down and the night had become silent enough that the snow itself could be heard falling in soft whispers on the frozen ground, Shrike spoke.

“My sword,” he said quietly. “Is it still here?”

Ashe rose and went to the gelding, standing twenty paces away in a copse of trees, blanketed against the snow. He unbound the curved scabbard from the saddlebag and brought it back to Shrike, putting it carefully into his hands. The old man’s heart beat stronger as he touched it.

“Thank the gods,” he murmured. With great effort he eased the weapon from its sheath and held it up before his eyes. It was an ancient blade of modest manufacture and without ornamentation, old and battered as its bearer. Ashe recognized the curve of it; it was a sailor’s cutlass, shortened in the same manner as the swords from the Cymrian ships that lay in the dusty display cases of Stephen’s museum.

Shrike watched the fire’s reflection in the dark steel a moment longer, then turned back to Ashe.

“Listen closely, son of Llauron, and I will repay your kindness.

“I met your grandsire, King Gwylliam, on the—day—the last ship of the Third Fleet set sail. I was a hand on the Serelinda , the vessel which—carried the king away from the Island for the last time.” Shrike leaned against the rotten trunk and closed his eyes, exerted by the effort of the speech.

“Rest, Grandfather,” said Ashe gently. “I’m certain there will be at least a moment to talk once we reach lodging and patch you up a bit. Surely Anborn won’t throw me out right away; you can tell me your story when you are feeling better.”

Shrike’s eyes snapped open, blazing with intense fire. “You’re a bigger fool than I thought, Gwydion ap Llauron,” he muttered. “What know you of moments?” He struggled to sit up taller and glared at Ashe. “I am the Lord of the Last Moment, the Guardian of That Which None Shall See Again, so—named—by your own grandsire. Are you saying that there is none such in your own past? Nothing you would—give your very soul to see again, just once?”