Daughter of Dragons

Chapter 12-2

The sorceress laughed. “Are you sure? There are plenty of people who would argue that point with you.”

“I want to read your books.”

“Forget it,” Liselle said, as she set the lunch tray on Lathwi’s lap. “Those books are too dangerous for a beginner like you. You could accidentally put a curse on somebody just by sounding out a difficult patch of words.”

“But—”

“No buts. Until you learn to read without moving your lips, you’re going to have to content yourself with whatever harmless material I can dig up for you. Is that clear?”

“Clear,” Lathwi grumbled. Although she was unhappy with the order, she could not argue against it. For every now and again, she did move her lips when she read.

“Good,” Liselle said. “Now hush up and eat your lunch. Feed yourself with your broken hand, it’ll be good practice. “Go on,” she urged, when Lathwi made no move to pick up the spoon. “A little nourishment will do wonders for your mood.”

“You want make mood better,” Lathwi rumbled, “you take broth away and bring me meat.”

“Oh, no!” Liselle exclaimed. “I’m not going around this mulberry bush again. You can either eat the damn broth or go hungry until supper—I’ll give you to the count of three to decide.”

She scowled at the bowl’s watery contents, then loosed a churlish grunt. “Leave it. Maybe I eat later.”

“Not a chance. I found one of your lunches rotting on the bottom of your thunder-mug already. I have no desire to repeat the experience.

“So what’s it going to be—feast or famine?”

In reply, Lathwi grabbed the spoon and took an overly loud slurp of broth just for the spiteful pleasure of seeing Liselle stiffen. The sorceress was even more obsessive than Pieter had been about matters pertaining to food, eating and incidental body noises.

“Do try harder to rise above your barbaric upbringing,” she said, a distinct edge to her banter now. “It’s not that much to ask in exchange for a roof over your head, is it?”

“Not slurp meat,” Lathwi said, employing the same sort of persistence that had stretched Taziem’s patience to its limits at times. “Meat is civilized food. Broth…is not.”

“If you so much as mention meat again, I’ll stitch your mouth shut while you’re sleeping,” Liselle threatened, fully prepared to back her words with action. “And if that doesn’t work, then I’ll—”

A loud rap cut her off in mid-threat. It was followed by a familiar “Hello?”, and then the sound of leather-soled feet tramping down the hall. “Is anybody home?”

Lathwi rolled her eyes. Jamus knew full well that they were both here. So why did he bother to ask?

A moment later, he strode into the room. His normally immaculate face was streaked with sweat and dirt. His hands, Lathwi noted, were hidden behind his back.

“Greetings, ladies,” he said. “May I join you?”

“It would appear that you have already done so,” Liselle retorted, trying hard to keep the corners of her mouth on an even keel. “What brings you here so early in the day?”

“I was at the stables exercising Lathwi’s stallion,” he replied, “and since I was in the neighbourhood, I thought I’d drop by and see how our favourite patient’s doing.” He turned to Lathwi and grinned. “You’re looking well today. It won’t be long before you’re exercising that foul-tempered beast for yourself. And personally, I’m starting to live for that day. He bucked me off twice this morning just to prove he could do it.”

“He behave better if you bite his ear,” Lathwi advised, and then switched to a more interesting topic. “What you got behind your back?”

He laughed. Now that he was aware of his own mercenary tendencies, he was far more tolerant of them in others.

“You know very well what I’ve got,” he chided, and then tossed the kerchief full of candies at her. As she snatched it out of the air, he added, “Enjoy.”

Lathwi was happy to comply, for while she despised most other kinds of human-food, she’d taken a strong and immediate liking to chocolate. It smelled wonderful, sweetly pungent. And its taste was as luxurious as a nap on a sun-warmed rock. She gobbled one morsel after another in quick succession.

“If she gets sick from all that candy,” Liselle said to Jamus, “you’re the one who’s going to have to nurse her back to health.”

He snorted. “She’s not going to get sick. Look at her, she’s as healthy as that damn horse of hers. But if you want me to oversee her care for a while, just say so. She’s more than welcome to stay at my house.”

“Wouldn’t that be convenient,” she scoffed in return. “You’d finally have a woman who couldn’t run away from you.”

“For your information,” he huffed then, “most women come running TO me, not away.” That took them both by surprise. He flushed, immediately sorry that he’d said it; she berated herself for having poked him in the privates. As she fumbled for words with which to fill the gulf that had suddenly yawned open between them, she happened to look at Lathwi. Chocolate ringed her mouth. The tip of her nose was smudged, too. The sight was so comical, she just had to laugh. “Lathwi!” she exclaimed afterward. “You’re going to need a bath to get clean.”

“Two baths in one year?” Jamus teased, happy for the diversion. “How terribly civilized of you, my dear.”

Lathwi peered at him through half-hooded eyes. If she had had a tail, the tip of it would have been twitching now. “I take many baths since bones broken,” she told him. “Most times, Liselle be there to help.”

“Good for you,” he began, but she was not done with him yet and so cut him off. “Liselle say it not ne-ces-sary for both people to take clothes off. Or for me to taste—”

“Your vocabulary is coming along splendidly,” Liselle interjected then. But she was grinning like a cat who had a fresh mouthful of feathers.

Jamus coughed up a clot of embarrassment, then grumbled. “My father was right—education gives women wicked thoughts. She would’ve never said something like that a few weeks ago.”

“I be knocked senseless then,” Lathwi reminded him.

“I think I liked you better that way,” he retorted, and then turned to Liselle again. “By the way, my men found one of the sorcerers you were asking about last night.”

“Which one?” she asked, and then bit her lip.

“The old man.”

“And?”

“He’s dead. Has been for a while. His house looks like it’s been ransacked, but nobody seems to know if anything was taken.”

So, Liselle thought, her enemy was still out there. She knew she had no right to be surprised or even disappointed by the news, but she was just the same. These last few weeks of inactivity had fostered an insane half-hope that he had given up and gone away.

“What about the addict?” she asked. “Has she been found yet?”

“Not yet,” he admitted, with just a hint of exasperation in his tone. “Curra-chewers are as quick as gutter rats, and this one’s jumpier than most. Every time my men get close to her, she runs; and none of them can seem to get a firm fix on her bolt-hole.”

“She’s probably got it hidden behind an illusion,” she mused aloud. “Good. That means the curra hasn’t completely scrambled her wits.” She gnawed on her lip for a thoughtful moment, then added, “Let me do some experimenting. Maybe I can find a magical way of pinpointing her location. In the meantime, though, tell your men to keep on trying. I have a feeling she has good reason to be jumpy.”

He arched a half-playful, half-reproving eyebrow at her. Only then did she realize that she was telling him how to do his own job.

“That’s a very pretty colour on you,” he remarked, as her cheeks went suddenly rosy. To his surprise and delight, that flustered her even more. At times like this, he could almost believe that she really did like him! He decided to make his retreat before he did something to change her mind.

“Well, dear ladies,” he exclaimed, “it’s been fun, but duty calls. I hope you’ll allow me to visit again some day.”

“Come tomorrow,” Lathwi said. “Bring more chocolate.”

“Good idea,” Liselle chimed in. “I’d like some, too.”

He gaped at them for a moment, then shook his head and grinned. They were, he admitted, too much for him.

And that was kind of nice, too.

G

The next morning, Liselle came breezing into Lathwi’s room with a breakfast tray in her hands and a fat book tucked beneath one armpit. Lathwi was up and eager to begin another day’s lessons, but the sorceress briskly disappointed her.

“I have a lot of work to do today,” she said, as she set the tray on Lathwi’s lap, “so you’ll have to amuse yourself.” Then she handed her the book. “Here. This ought to help.”

Lathwi ogled the book with an almost comical mixture of surprise, glee and greed. It was a big book, with a cracked leather cover and thick, yellowed pages that smelled of dust and mould. The title page read: The Origins of Magic.

“You letting me read magic?” she gurgled.

“Of course not,” Liselle replied. “I already told you you’re not ready for such a text. What you have there is a collection of legends and myths. It’s quite entertaining,” she added, as the big woman’s grin started to collapse. “I read every single one of those tales at least ten times as a child. If you don’t like it, though, you can always go back to that book of doggerels.”

The sorceress breezed back out of the room then, leaving Lathwi alone with the book, a bowl of cooling oatmeal and her disappointment. She wanted to read magic, not doggerels or a collection of legends and myths—whatever that was. She ran a speculative finger down the book’s spine—it called to her in spite of her pique. Who knew what thoughts lurked inside? Who ever knew unless they looked?

And as for the oatmeal—well, although it wasn’t common knowledge, a dragon could eat just about anything when it was hungry enough.

And she was finally hungry enough.

So she shovelled the foul-looking paste into her mouth, bite by tasteless bite. When she was done, she set the bowl on the floor, then thumbed the book open and started to read from the beginning.

G

Back in the days of EverLight, two suns shared the sky, and the world was a marvellous place. Beasts talked, flowers sang, rivers flowed back and forth in their beds according to whim. Men were ignorant, but knew it not, and lived in peace with all creatures as The Dreamer slept on in Her bed beneath the earth’s rocky crust. When She stirred, and the mountains trembled, those whom She had created sang lullabies until She fell into a more tranquil sleep. And when Her snores rumbled throughout the sky, they stamped their feet and shouted until She rolled over again. For years beyond counting, Her dreams were serene, and life was good.

Then, for reasons unknown to mortal men, Her dreamings turned suddenly tumultuous. Rivers raged up and over their banks, drowning all that lie in their paths; the once gentle wind became a fury which uprooted stands of trees like twigs. Men tried to serenade Her back into a sweet sleep, but things got increasingly worse. Vast chasms opened in the earth like anguished jaws, salted rain fell from the skies. Then, with a cataclysmic roar, a mountain to the east burst its top and began to bleed liquid fire. In the midst of this lurid flow, a full-blown nightmare appeared.

She was as dark as the bowels of an unopened grave, all but Her eyes which glowed like the fires from which She had sprung. Her body was vast yet grotesquely formed, and while she could take different shapes, none of these were pleasing to behold. This was Shadow, The Dreamer’s darkling Daughter; and as soon as She saw Her mother’s other creations, She was overcome by the blackest jealousies, for they were hale when She was not. Shadow tried to destroy the world then, but She was new to the ways of power and Her spell went awry. Beasts lost the ability to speak. Men acquired a taste for violence and meat.

Years passed. Shadow grew in might and malice until one day, She lay Herself down on the fertile plains of Veroan and went into a dreaming trance. Soon thereafter, a blight began to gnaw at the grasses which surrounded her great bulk. This blight spread outward in all directions, leaving naught but a ring of desolation behind. The plainsmen rode against Shadow wielding new-forged spears and swords, but The Dreamer’s fell Daughter was impervious to their might, and She dreamed a new terror into being. These were darkling creatures who changed their shapes and devoured human flesh. Yet while many of the nonborn embraced their Maker’s campaign of fear and death, an equal number went into hiding instead. So Shadow gave up Her one attempt at creation and went questing for a more reliable stock of soldiers. And when She returned, She had an army of demons with Her.