Paul Thompson - Sister of the Sword

“Lady.” The little girl was tugging at Beramun’s kilt. “Lady, there is no Arkuden any more.”

The child’s declaration was like a spear through Beramun’s heart, and she froze.

Karada’s sunbrowned face turned paler than Beramun had ever seen it. The chieftain grasped the poor child by her shoulders and shook her hard.

“What do you mean? Where is the Arkuden?” she cried. The child could only sob.

A blow on her leg broke through Karada’s shock. The smaller boy had struck her with his walking stick. She set the girl down.

“What happened?” she asked, striving to keep her voice calm. “What happened to the Arkuden.”

“They killed him,” said the boy, pulling the girl away from her. “The green-skinned men killed the Arkuden!”

Blusidar’s island was no mere rock in the midst of the ocean. From high above, Duranix could just barely see it in its impressive entirety. Both shape and terrain were surprisingly regular. Though the coast had been etched by centuries of tides and tempests, the island was a nearly perfect circle. The outer edge was bordered by a wide band of sand dunes. A ring of steep mountains sat in the center, and a heavy belt of forest filled the area in between.

The odd regularity was a puzzle to be pondered at a later time. For now, Duranix remained convinced Sthenn was hiding somewhere in the forest. Days had passed without any sign of the green dragon. He must have been badly injured by Duranix’s lightning strike to remain hidden so long. Though a satisfying theory, it was also troubling. Wounded, Sthenn might be more desperate, more dangerous than ever.

Duranix floated on high, riding the steady winds available over the island. The sky was bright and cloud-free. Though he could see the natural life of the island with his usual clarity, he detected no visible trace of Sthenn. His deeper senses did not lie, however. His old enemy was near.

He descended to the mountain where he’d first encountered Blusidar. He hoped to see her again and scrutinized crags and crevices as he swooped in. She was nowhere around. Disappointed, Duranix alighted atop a forked pinnacle, balancing on the narrow peak with his tail spread out behind him.

Stop being a fool, he chided himself. Why waste time looking for the female? She was backward, awkward, and blind to the danger Sthenn represented. It was dangerous to divide his attention between the two. Better to concentrate on his green nemesis and leave Blusidar to fend for herself.

Cast-off scales glittered on the slope below his perch, and he realized Blusidar must have used the notch in the peak for preening. The thought birthed an irresistible itch between his shoulders. His wings, numbed from his long vigil over the island, were regaining feeling, and it felt as though a hundred brazen-toothed vermin were gnawing at him. Leaning to one side, he lowered his shoulder and scraped his back against the sky-blue stone.

Instead of a dull, stony scratching sound, the air was filled with a sonorous droning, like the organized noises the humans in Yala-tene called “music.” Duranix stopped scratching and the sound ceased. Experimentally, he rubbed his shoulder again on the rocky crag. The noise resumed. The spire of heavily crystallized stone vibrated in sympathy when scraped, creating an impressive sound.

He tried striking the spire with his horned head and tapping it with a talon. Each method drew a different note from the rock.

Movement in the air interrupted the performance. Extending his wings, Duranix prepared to pounce or fly.

Blusidar flashed past him, close enough that he felt the wind from her wings. He called to her.

“Why are you still here?” she said, passing close behind him. She was a swift flier, he had to admit. Young dragons often could outfly their elders. Mature dragons were stronger but also much heavier.

“I’ll stay until I find Sthenn,” he replied. “I have pledged to put an end to him, whatever else happens.”

Blusidar extended her rear claws and landed on a lower prominence. “Make not the sound,” she said, shifting from one clawed foot to the other with evident agitation.

He looked from her to the pinnacle. “Rubbing the stone? Why not?”

“It is for ji-ri-ni, not for play!”

In the ancient dragon tongue, ji-ri meant “hatchlings.” The syllable ni indicated “to make.” So ji-ri-ni meant “making hatchlings.”

Taken aback, Duranix tilted his huge, homed head to one side, regarding the spire. Apparently the dragons confined to this island in the past had used the sonorous stone as part of some sort of mating ritual.

“Forgive me,” said Duranix, embarrassed. “I don’t know your customs here.”

“Dragons of your land, they do not do this?”

“I have never seen it.”

His own mother had mated just once and subsequently laid three eggs. Duranix’s father was an ancient bronze known as Venerable Ro. (It had once been customary for each new generation of dragons to gain a syllable in their names—Duranix and Blusidar, having three, were of the same generation. Sthenn and the Venerable Ro were of the eldest generation.)

Blusidar settled down, flaring her nostrils. “You will not go until the green is found? Then follow, and be quiet.”

She leaned sideways and fell silently from her ledge. Spreading her wings, she glided over the jagged lower slopes and soared up a hundred paces. Hovering in an updraft, she waited for Duranix to join her.

Feeling more than a little old and clumsy in her wake, he opened his heavier wings and pushed off his perch. Stones loosed by his talons clattered down the mountain. Blusidar gave him a disdainful glance and flew on.

She traveled some way, paralleling the cliffs. He flew slightly above and behind her. The woods below presented an unbroken canopy of intertwining branches, alive with thousands of birds.

When at last a break appeared in the tree cover, Duranix saw a shallow river meandering through the forest. Blusidar dropped her tail and landed on a stout fallen tree. He settled on the sandbar beside the tree. His claws promptly sank into the damp, loose sand.

He didn’t have to be told why they’d come here. The stink of Sthenn was strong in the air. Across the river lay the remains of a herd of wild pigs, recently slaughtered. Blood from their mangled carcasses mingled with the flowing water.

Duranix waded into the river, holding his wings up out of the mud. He counted six dead pigs and signs of at least that many more devoured by Sthenn. A great heap of brush and logs was scattered in all directions behind the herd. The blood was still fresh; the kill wasn’t very old.

He hadn’t flown away, or Duranix would have seen him. He must have crawled away. In the river—yes! The flowing water would conceal his trail, and the open air above the stream would help disperse his fetid odor.

Duranix pondered which way Sthenn might have gone, until the sound of sloshing broke his concentration. Blusidar waded to the pig carcasses. She hoisted one of the more intact ones by its hind leg and skinned back her lips to take a bite.

Like lightning, Duranix swatted the dead pig from her claws before she could sink her fangs into its flesh. She snarled at him, dropping on all fours and shrinking back to present a smaller target.

He snapped, “Calm yourself! You don’t want to eat that. Sthenn doesn’t leave gifts behind. What he couldn’t finish, he tainted.” Duranix picked up the carcass and sniffed. “Yes, poisoned with one of his vile secretions. Eat this animal, and you’ll wish you could die!”

Blusidar uncoiled herself and sniffed the dead pig cautiously. She blinked rapidly, eyelids clashing like swords. “This smell... is poison?”