Paul Cook: Brother of the Dragon

“Spirits? Ha! Who are these spirits?”

Why had she spoken? Beramun wondered miserably, terror welling up inside her. Yet the stormbird expected an answer, so she stuttered, “They are th-the makers of all things — the s-sun, the moons, the plants, and the beasts of plain and forest.”

“And I?” said the hideous creature, its face coming even closer to hers. “Was I made by your Great Spirits?”

“Yes,” she said faintly, her legs wavering like grass in a strong wind.

The black, slit-pupiled eyes widened. The monster threw back its head and roared. It took Beramun a heart-wrenching moment to realize the beast was laughing. Curiously, this display of mirth made the raiders draw together, anxiety evident on all their faces.

“Pretentious vermin!” the stormbird bellowed. “No one made the dragons! We were born from Chaos, forged of fire and fury! The world is ours, and you worthless insects are merely pests to be tolerated or exterminated as we see fit.”

The monster stretched up to its full height. “I am your master now. I am Sthenn, the Wakeful One, the Shadow Who Does Not Sleep, called Greengall, Deathbringer, and the Terror of Night. You live by my whim alone, and my whim is that you serve me. Is that clear, vermin?”

Zannian rode up, his skull-topped hood propped under one arm. “Patience, Master,” he said, an edge in his voice. “They all struggle at first. They wouldn’t be plainsmen if they didn’t try to escape, but they’ll give no more trouble, I promise you.”

Sthenn gazed down at the mounted man for a long moment, and his angry posture relaxed.

“More and more,” he said, “I understand Duranix’s interest in humans. Such amusing, infuriating creatures. It will be delightful to discover whose are best — mine or his.”

Beramun understood none of this, but seeing the stormbird’s anger fade helped her own fear subside, and her heart slowly resumed a normal beat. When Sthenn had reared up, she thought her life was over. Fortunately, the great beast was easily distracted, as Zannian’s intervention proved.

She looked again at the youthful chief as he got his band moving again. Thief and killer he was, but he was brave, facing the dragon’s rage like that. In some savage way, he might even be honorable.

Drawing the borrowed blanket close around her shoulders, Beramun hobbled along with the rest of the captives. She did not notice Roki frowning at her, nor did she remember the older woman’s warning about being wary of kindness from her human captor.

The sun shone several days, then the clouds that had been lurking on the mountaintops like a pack of gray wolves swept down into the Valley of the Falls. A damp mist clung to every surface in Yala-tene, and when the feeble sun set, the dew turned to ice.

Repairs on the foundry came to stop. Stone blocks grew too slick to handle safely, and visibility fell to just a few paces. Amero and his workmen tried to carry on, but the cold made their fingers stiff and clumsy, so Amero called a halt, dismissing the men with a sigh. He soon stood alone in his ruined workshop.

Lately life was so full of delays. None of his recent projects had come to fruition. The town wall, though well advanced, should have been finished a year ago, and his bronze experiments could not resume until the foundry was repaired.

When he was younger, it seemed he had all the time in the world to solve the questions that surrounded him. Now there was little time for anything but daily work.

Shaking off his gloom, Amero resolved to visit Unar, the man whose eye had been injured when the furnace blew apart. He left the shattered building and stepped out into the frosty night.

Finding a house in the warren of streets wasn’t easy, even on a bright, sunny day. To identify themselves, most householders painted their family’s totem symbol on their doors. Amero came at last to the door with the hook-billed turtle and knocked on the worn cedar panel.

The door opened. Highlighted by fire was a face he knew well. It was Unar’s widowed sister, Lyopi. She held a flaming brand.

“Amero,” she said. She was one of the few people in the village who called him by his given name.

“I’ve come to see Unar.”

“He’s sleeping, but you’re welcome.” Lyopi stood aside, and Amero entered the warm interior of the house.

The ground floor was a single large room, as in most houses in Yala-tene. A dull red fire crackled on the hearth. As Lyopi dropped the burning stick onto the fire, Amero saw Unar was propped on a heap of furs, a soft willow poultice on his injured eye.

“How is he?” Amero whispered.

“The eye is lost,” Lyopi replied. “Old Memmet the healer removed the stone chip, but could do nothing for his eye.”

He took her hand and squeezed it gently. “I’m sorry. Better it should be my eye.”

“Don’t say foolish things.”

She pulled free of his grasp and moved to the dark periphery of the room. Without a word, Amero followed.

Lyopi seated herself on a stool by the wall. Not seeing another chair, he sat on the floor at her feet.

For almost a year, Amero and Lyopi had been together, as intimate as mates but still undeclared to the rest of the village. Some gossips believed he was taking advantage of a lonely widow, but in fact, it was Lyopi’s choice that they remain apart. By custom, to be Amero’s mate, she would have to live in his house and give back her first mate’s property to his kinsmen. Because Lyopi did not want to relinquish her home, she and Amero remained friends and occasional lovers — a situation that suited her fine and Amero found tolerable.

She pulled the thick, loose braid of her chestnut hair over her shoulder and leaned back against the stone wall. Her brown eyes, usually so warm and full of life, were dull as they regarded her injured brother.

The silence stretched for several long seconds, until Amero asked, “Why so sad, Lyopi? Unar’s strong. He’ll live.”

Her gaze shifted. “Yes, but what will he do? A one-eyed man is a poor hunter.”

“There are other things a man can do besides hunt.”

She uttered a short, bitter laugh. “We’re still plainsmen, Amero. Hunters. Living inside a pile of rocks hasn’t changed that.”

“Unar will always have a place in my workshop, if he wants it.”

She made a quick gesture, wiping tears from her cheeks. “Even in summer?” she asked, knowing he usually employed helpers in his shop only during the idle months of winter.

“Even in summer. Unar’s not the only one who doesn’t hunt, you know.”

Lyopi offered a fond smile, which soon faded. Leaning her head against the cool stones behind her, she closed her eyes.

Thinking she looked very tired, Amero rose to leave. She reached out and caught his hand. “No. Stay.”

Suddenly embarrassed, he replied, “I didn’t come here for that.”

Sometimes she seemed to read his mind almost as well as Duranix. “I know,” she told him, putting a hand to his bearded cheek. “Stay anyway.”

So he did.

Across the fog-shrouded village, another light burned far into the night. Tiphan lived with his father in a modest one-story house close to the Offertory. Like everything else in his life, Tiphan’s home was as tidy as he could make it. Sensarku acolytes cleaned it for him daily, just as they cleaned the Offertory grounds.

Tiphan sat at the one table in the house, peering closely at the document before him. For five nights he’d yearned to study the arcane manuscript he’d bought from Bek the bookseller, but every night his father had stayed awake, talking, prowling around the house, and generally making himself a nuisance. Finally tiring of the delay, Tiphan had sprinkled yellow tane pollen on Konza’s dinner. Soon the old man was snoring away on his pallet.