Mary Herbert: Legacy of Steel

Sara raised her mug to her lips and sampled the watery ale while she surreptitiously glanced around the common room. Asking directions was out of the question. The mixed group of villagers and fishermen would be suspicious about vague queries about caves, and they would not be pleased if she explained that a wounded blue dragon was hiding somewhere near them. Nor did she think she could take a nap, summon her dream, and ask the dragon for directions.

Frustrated, she paid the innkeeper and walked outside into a steady rain. A short distance away, several fishing boats were hurrying back into the small harbor before the teeth of a rising wind. The roof of clouds thickened and darkened with every passing moment.

"Bad storm this afternoon," observed a villager behind her. "Best stay here tonight." He brushed past her to hurry down the path to the houses that clustered securely on a low bluff by the harbor.

Sara shivered under her wet cloak. The man was probably right. It was ridiculous to wander aimlessly around the beaches in this kind of storm. The gods only knew where- She checked herself abruptly. No. The gods would not know. Not anymore. They were gone, with their moons and their magic, leaving behind a world reeling from the loss. There was no one to pray to, no one to guide, no one to listen.

What if I did find that dragon? Sara mused. Could I heal it? Should I? What would I do with a large blue dragon bereft of its health and its purpose and, quite likely, its rider? Whom could I ask? Who would care? Perhaps it would be better just to go home. The beast will probably die before I find it anyway.

Annoyed with her thoughts and unanswered questions, Sara turned around and went back into the inn. She rented a tiny room, purchased some bread and wine, and retreated to the solitude of her thoughts.

For the remainder of the afternoon, she lay on the bed, listening to the wind roar around the eaves and the rain pound on the roof. She thought for a long time about loss and grief and pain and the comfort of companionship.

The gods were gone; there was nothing to do about that. Their help and succor, their guidance through the ages, had passed on, leaving their children behind. The only thing Sara firmly believed anymore was that if those children were going to survive on their own and make anything of their world, they would have to rely on each other, no matter who those children happened to be. She sighed. And if that meant slogging up and down the coast to find and help a desperate dragon, then that's what she should do. The future would fall into place as it would.

Sara fell asleep to the music of the storm and dreamed of the dragon. The images that came this time were stronger and sharper than before, revealing more details of the dragon's surroundings. Through its eyes, she saw the dark stone walls of a large cave and the faint outline of a long, low opening that led out to a beach. Through its ears, she heard the pounding of the surf, the howl of the wind, and the distant cry of seabirds outside. She heard, too, the dragon's harsh breathing.

Who are you? whispered a voice in her mind. You have plagued my dreams for nights.

And you mine! Sara sent a rejoinder, then she added in a gentler tone, Where are you?

Go away. No one can help me now. 1 am dying.

You called for help for days.

That was then. Go away.

Where are you? Sara called, but her plea met only silence. The pain came then, just as before-the grief that sliced her heart and the physical pain that flayed across her back. She writhed under her thin blanket and sobbed until someone pounded on her door and told her to be quiet.

When morning came, she was sore and -exhausted, but somewhere in the throes of her dream, she had detected the direction of the dragon's cave. She would go northeast up the coast toward Daron.

The wind still whipped the surf to a rage and blew fitful showers of rain across the landscape; a heavy veil of cloud still obscured the sky The worst of the storm had passed, though, and Sara found travel was not too difficult. Following a tip from the innkeeper, she sought a footpath that ran parallel to the beach and skirted the low hills through clumps of thick shrubs and tall, wind-cured grass.

After giving the matter some thought, Sara bought an old pack mule from a farmer and loaded her gear on its back. To her own supplies, she added bundles of firewood, a fishing pole, and a large cooking pot. The farmer looked on with curiosity until she told him flatly she was going to hunt for dragons.

Leading the mule, Sara headed up the coast along the narrow path. After several hours of slogging through the mud puddles, being alternately soaked and buffeted, and seeing nothing but low sand hills cloaked in mist, she began to wonder if she was going in the right direction. There was nothing along this stretch of the coast that could hide a gnome, let alone a dragon. Yet her dream had said north to her consciousness, and her heart agreed. So she kept walking and hoping her intuition was right.

At noon, she stopped for a quick meal and to rest the old mule. While she ate, she noticed the daylight seemed to be getting brighter. The rain had slowed, and now it stopped altogether as the clouds lifted. The wind !whisked away the mist and the drizzle, and in just a short while, Sara could see along the coast from horizon to horizon. She sat up abruptly and stared north. There it was, she thought. It had to be. Far ahead, almost lost in the haze of distance, was what looked like a dark line of rugged bluffs at the edge of a high headland.

Excited now, Sara hurried through her meal and urged the mule back on the path. As she hoped, the low-lying hills beside her rose higher into a range of tree-clad slopes that led upward to the towering bluffs. The trail forked near a small creek, one path pointing upward to the hills, the other leading to the beach. Sara took the beach path and came down among the sea grass and dunes. Gray waves rolled noisily onto shore at her left. A sea gull glided silently overhead.

The cliffs loomed up before her, dark with rain. A flock of white seabirds roosted on the sheer walls and made an endless racket of calls and cries. Sara did not see anything that resembled a cave at this end of the headland, so she and the mule made their way to the base of the cliff and worked their way along the narrow strip of sand left by the high tide. The storm had pushed the tide up higher than normal, and in some places waves had washed up against the stone. Fortunately the tide was receding, and Sara was able to search along the entire length of the high, irregular cliffs.

Several haphazard piles of sand finally helped her locate the cave. The piles were scattered about the base of a cliff wall that sat slightly forward from the main bluff and was edged by a narrow, rock-strewn glen. A small creek tumbled down the glen in a series of delicate waterfalls before tumbling into a small pool on the beach and flowing into the sea. just to the left of the waterfalls lay a snag of driftwood and the piles of sand. At first Sara saw little else until she crossed the creek and climbed up the sand.

There it was-a long low opening into the rock worn away by eons of storm tides. It looked like a tight fit for a dragon, even with much of the sand removed from the entrance. The blue must have had to dig its way in.

Sara looked around carefully. She did not see any sign that the dragon had left recently. The sand was washed smooth by the rain and unmarred by tracks. Beside her, the mule tossed its head nervously. Its nostrils flared at the strange scent coming from the cave; its tail flicked its agitation. Sara took it away from the cave mouth to the other side of the creek, gave it a long drink of fresh water, and tied it to a snag of driftwood. Away from the frightening cave, the mule settled down immediately.