Hunting of the Last Dragon Read online

  “So listen well, Jude of Doran, for now you will learn its weaknesses, and by these you will gain the mastery. The dragon has no great brain, and is not cunning, as wolves and wildcats are. Neither does it see well. Its eyes are on either side of its head, and it sees nothing straight in front of it, but has to turn its head to see about itself, and then it sees things distorted, from the side, as it were. It cannot judge distances aright, and uses far-flung fire to catch its prey, as a spider spreads a web. Its hearing is not good, but it knows a man’s approach by the tremor of his footsteps in the ground. Its best sense is its smell, and by that it hunts. That is why it flies at day’s end, when cooking-fires send up their smoke, signalling where the villages are. This dragon that we saw needs easy prey, such as humans, for it has never learned from a parent how to hunt the wild mountain beasts or the creatures of the sea. It is but young, small yet, and unsure how to kill except by fire. It’s not vindictive or evil, else it would have killed us tonight, afore it flew away. ’Tis only after food. And, in spite of all the tales, dragons are not bold. They will fly off sooner than fight, though they are fierce enough when threatened—as are we all. They are sorely misunderstood, and should never have been hunted out of existence. Ambrose himself said that, with deep regret.”

  “Mayhap this one, too, is only misunderstood, and should not be hunted,” I said, hoping to stir some doubt in the old crone. “Mayhap Ambrose would wish us to leave it well alone, for it may grow to hunt a different prey, and leave off killing folk.”

  Lan cackled. “You don’t wriggle out of it that easily, boy,” she said. “Your dragon has tasted human flesh and found an easy prey. There’ll be no changing of its ways. It has to be destroyed. And the power to do that lies in Jing-wei’s knowledge, and in your hands.”

  “Then you’d better show me,” I said. “What is this weapon we have, that cannot fail?”

  Lan got up and hobbled over to a corner, the farthest from the fire. Taking the curved bone she used for digging in her garden, she began digging up the earthen floor. Not far beneath the beaten surface was a wooden board, and this she pulled up, with some difficulty. I supposed it had not been moved for many a year. From a hole beneath she pulled a bag, well wrapped in rags. Then she came back to the firelight, but sat a safe distance from the flames. Lizzie leaned forward upon her stool, her face eager and intent. I tried not to look too eager, though I was all atremble. What mystery was here, what powerful witchery?

  Carefully Lan untied the twine about the sack’s opening, and took out a round bundle wrapped well with thick skins. Several layers there were, some of the skins still with fur, and of animals unknown to me. Last of all was a bundle wrapped in black cloth, strong and close-woven. This she also opened, and before us there lay a pile of dust. Or sand. Or ash, or anything, save weaponry.

  “What’s this?” I cried. “A jest, to wind me up? By God’s belly and blood, you push me too far!”

  Lizzie laid her hand upon my arm. “Peace, Jude,” she said. “It looks harmless enough, but this dust has more death in it than twenty swords.”

  I looked at Lan; she was smiling a little, amused. Witch! You’re enjoying this, I thought. Leaning over, I took a pinch of the powder, and sniffed it. It smelled like nothing I knew.

  “Is it poison?” I asked, brushing the stuff from my fingers, lest I die of a sudden.

  “Nay,” said Lan. “’Tis something yet unknown in this land. But for hundreds of years it has been known in my land, and Jing-wei knows of it, and full well she knows its strength. There is destruction in every particle. It burns, this powder, Jude. And when it burns, it burns with unspeakable violence, with the sudden strength of a mighty wind. And if there are, placed within this powder, bits of sharp steel or flint, then these are flung out with such force that they tear to pieces everything in their path. Even armour is pierced, and shields, and wood. I have seen enemy soldiers so mangled that there was nothing left but tattered, bloody flesh. And not one man only is destroyed in such a blast, but many. ’Tis like letting loose a thousand hellish blades all at once, in the blinking of an eye. Nothing survives such a blast—not even a dragon.”

  I moved away from the dust, and Lan chuckled as she wrapped it away again within its cloths and skins. “’Tis safe enough for now,” she said. “It needs fire to set it off. That’s why it’s wrapped so well. One spark is all it needs. But you are right to move away. This dust belongs to Jing-wei, and will not be touched again by you.”

  “What happens if it doesn’t have the flints and steel in it?” I asked. “Is it all fire and wind?”

  “Something like that,” said Lizzie. “By itself, with coloured powders mixed in it, and shot high into a night sky, it makes beautiful fire-flowers. They are brighter than the moon, and can be seen for miles around. My father used to make them on the nights of great festivals, and for celebrations. But mixed with sharpened steel, and set alight close to enemies, ’tis deadly. I know how to set it off, Jude. I used to watch my father make the fire-flowers, when I was a child. He took great care, though, for sometimes there were accidents and people were badly burned. Handled with skill, the dust is a weapon that will conquer any foe.”

  “And what if it kills us, too?” I said. “What protection do we have against it?”

  “Distance,” said Lan. “I’m hoping that even you won’t be fool enough to stand right next to it with a flaming torch, boy. You place the bundle of steel and powder in the entrance to the dragon’s lair, and the dragon itself will set it alight with its fiery breath. And then all will be over, in less time than you can blink.”

  “What if the beast won’t go near to it?” I asked. “What if it won’t breathe on it?”

  “Then Jing-wei knows of another way. Mayhap you will have to wait until the dragon sleeps, and place the bundle next to it. I’ll show Jing-wei how to make a long trail with dry rags, leading to the bundle of powder. The trail of rags can be as long as needed. Then you hide in a place of protection, and set the rags alight. The fire will creep along them to the bundle of powder and steel, and afore the dragon knows what is happening, it will be pierced to its fiery heart as if by a hundred fatal swords. ’Tis all a matter of timing.”

  “I don’t think I want to touch the stuff,” I muttered. “It’s from the pits of hell.”

  “It may seem like magic to you now, Jude,” said Lan, “but not a hundred years hence, this powder will be on every battleground in England.”

  She put the bag of death away in its hole, covered it up, then brought back something else from one of her shelves. It was a pot of flints and shards of steel. I had noticed it before, when I was poking about when she was out, and thought she used the flints and shards to torture frogs, or to stick into effigies of enemies, to put doom-spells on them.

  “Ambrose collected these,” Lan said. “There are more than two hundred shards in here—enough to deal a fatal injury to your dragon, I’ll warrant.”

  “Ambrose collected them?” I asked. “Was he going to use your fire-dust?”

  “Aye, he thought of it,” she said. “When he was here, there were still a few dragons about, and one—an old wounded beast—made trouble hereabouts. It were more than sixty winters past, now. But he . . . he died afore he had the chance. I kept all these things, in case this need should arise.”

  “This is all to do with Ambrose, isn’t it?” I said, suddenly angry. “’Tis nothing to do with helping me avenge my family, or saving folk from the dragon. This is to try out Ambrose’s crackbrained plot! This is all for his sake!”

  “’Tis not crackbrained!” she spat, standing up over me with the pot of shards still in her hands. I thought she was going to break it over my head. “One day, Jude,” she said, “you’ll be thankful for all that the fates have done for you.”

  To my great relief she put away the pot with its deadly contents, but came back with a small jar that smelled of healing oils. This she gave to me, and told Lizzie to sit down. “I’ll teach you to massage J
ing-wei’s feet, to keep them supple and ease the pain in them,” she said to me. “You must do it twice a day, then bandage her feet firm again, to keep them mending straight. Sit in front of her. That’s right. Now, remove her shoes and bandages.”

  It was an odd lesson, massaging a maid’s feet. Lan showed me which way the muscles lay, and how to work with them and not against them. She told me the places to avoid, where bones had been reset, and showed me how to flex the toes to help ease them in their new positions. Where skin had been broken I learned to oil the scars well, to prevent them from contracting and causing the feet to curl under again. I was right earnest about the task, wanting to do well, but Lizzie laughed at times, mayhap because my unfamiliar hands tickled. I was glad to give her some pleasure, after all she had been through.

  After, when the fire burned low and we were sipping bowls of ale and thinking of sleep, Lan said, “Tomorrow we’ll talk of your journey, and how you can find out where the dragon dwells.”

  “I already know where it lives,” I said. “I heard a minstrel describe the place. ’Tis on the western coast, in St. Alfric’s Cove. Men on a passing ship gave report of it.”

  “Do you know where this cove is?” asked Lan.

  “I’ve forgot,” I replied, allowing myself a brief, wild hope that that might end the matter.

  “It is past the city of Twells,” said Lizzie. Seeing my surprise, she smiled a little and added, “I was listening to the minstrel, too, that night. There’s a little village on the edge of the cliff, overlooking the cove. It keeps a fire burning every night, to warn ships away, since so many were wrecked there in times past.”

  “It should not be too difficult to find, once you have directions to Twells,” said Lan. “It seems, then, that you have all the knowledge you need.”

  I was sorely tempted to point out that it was courage I needed, not knowledge, but I closed my mouth. Looking at me sharp, Lan said, “We all have dragons to conquer, one way or another, Jude. Have no fear; you will be well prepared. All this was written in your stars.”

  And talking of what is written, Brother Benedict, I think you’ve done enough for this day.

  I’ll bring Jing-wei after supper, and she can tell you more about her country, if you wish, and about their ways of making books. Mayhap the Abbot would like to hear her, too; he’s zealous about his dream that everyone will read, and determined to increase by a hundredfold the books in your library here. The scriptorium is crowded, as he’s training twenty more brothers to copy manuscripts. There’s parchment aplenty, he says, and ink, but the quills are running short. The geese in your monastery farmyard are overplucked, and are becoming devilish difficult to catch, and he’s asking all the guests who come to spread the word that he will take a goose in payment for hospitality here, instead of money. He’s so full of zeal, I didn’t like to point out that the farmyard may soon be overburdened with too many geese. I suppose he’ll discover that himself, when they start cluttering up the cloisters and honking through the hallelujahs.

  I’d wipe that smile off your face if I were you, Brother—you’ve got sixty books to copy out when this one of ours is done!

  fourteen

  I understand why you’re late, Brother; please don’t apologise. Jing-wei told me that Father Matthew died last night. I’m sorry; I know you loved him well. I heard that his funeral is tomorrow. Do you think the Abbot would mind if Jing-wei and I joined in the ceremonies, seeing as she looked after him in the infirmary? We seem to share so much of your lives here, we would regret missing this important occasion.

  And now, on with my own important occasion, since you’re willing to continue writing today—though even a dragon hunt seems insignificant compared with a soul entering heaven.

  The next day Lizzie and I prepared to leave Old Lan’s. Though I had prayed all night for storms and earthquakes and floods and even an onslaught from the Scots, the day was like every other day this summer past—windless and still, and blazing hot.

  Lan took great care packing our provisions, for we were to take food for the journey, as well as the bag of fire-dust and the shards of steel and flint, wrapped now in heavy cloth, and the jar of oil for massaging Lizzie’s feet. I say we were to take them, though in truth it was I who was to carry everything, including Lizzie. I managed to hold my peace, until I saw Lizzie roll her red silken dress into a bundle, with her tiny shoes she no longer needed, and poke them into the bag with the cloaks and blankets.

  “I’m not taking those as well,” I said. “You don’t need your silk dress, and you’ll never wear those little shoes again.”

  “I’m not leaving them behind,” she said. “They are all I have of my family.”

  “But we can come back here after, if we survive. You can get them then.”

  “We’re travelling south,” she said, “to the village Lan has told me of. ’Tis pointless coming back again all this way.”

  “The maid speaks true,” said Lan, coming over with her wooden sewing box. Opening it, she selected several balls of fine cord, some large needles, and her evil-looking scissors. These she wrapped in several strips of cloth, and poked into the bag with the silk dress.

  “Embroidery gear?” I cried, outraged. “You must be daft if you think I’m taking that!” I reached into the bag and grabbed them out.

  Lan gripped my wrist, so hard her nails cut my skin. “You will carry whatever we say you will carry,” she hissed, breathing garlic and leek. “Those embroidery threads may be vital. You swore obedience, remember.”

  She released me, and I rubbed my wrist and said nothing, though in my heart I ranted and raved enough. I managed to hold my peace yet again when Lan packed another jar of oil and a container of ointment, explaining that they were to put on burns, should we receive them. When all was packed there were two bags, each as heavy as a large side of pickled pork. I thought on the journey here from Tybalt’s fair, and how weary and footsore I had got carrying Lizzie all that way, though she was light.

  “I’ll be worn out afore I get there,” I said gloomily, “carrying these and Lizzie besides.”

  “It doesn’t matter if you are worn out,” said Lan. “Once there, your usefulness is past. Jing-wei can do everything.”

  “Oh, that thrills me to the veins, that does!” I cried. “So I’m to be her donkey, nothing more!”

  “You can be more, if you’ve the nerve for it,” said Lan, tying twine tight about the necks of the two bags. “But you’re hampered by a mighty contrary disposition, Jude of Doran.”

  “I think my disposition is warranted,” I said, “since Lizzie and I are off to make dragon fodder of ourselves.”

  Lizzie laughed, covering her mirth with her hand. Despair broke over me, and I stormed outside. While there, doing battle with my doubts, I spied a donkey coming along the road towards Lan’s house. The beast was sorely burdened with a woman almost larger than itself. Two men walked with them, one on either side, supporting the woman. As they left the road and turned towards Lan’s house, I saw that the woman looked near death, she was so white, and her leg, sticking out from beneath her blood-stained skirt, was wrapped in rags soaked scarlet.

  Seeing me, the older man called, “Get Lan for me, lad! ’Tis my wife, cut awful bad with a scythe. Make haste!”

  I ran back to the house, but Lan had heard and was already taking boxes of rags and jars of potions from her shelves. Seeing me, she said, “Don’t stand there gawking, boy! Help the men bring her in!”

  I went outside and helped the men lift the woman from the donkey’s back. It was no easy task, for she was near fainting, and was a cumbersome soul to move. She fell off, in the end, and it took the three of us to drag her across Lan’s threshold and over near the fire. The older man unwound the bindings from her shin, and I saw a cut deep, and gone bad with blackness and pus. A foul smell wafted up from it.

  “Throw the bindings in the fire,” said Lan. The man did as he was bid, then stepped back. Unwilling-like, he tarried in the doorway
with the other man, a younger version of himself.

  “When did this happen?” asked Lan, kneeling beside the woman.

  The husband hung his head. “About two days past,” he muttered.

  “Fool!” cried Lan. “Why did you not bring her straightaway?”

  “Well, to be true . . . It were the morning after the dragon came. We saw it land hereabouts, and thought . . . Well, Good Mother, I was afeared that—that—”

  “You were afeared I’d called the thing down here to slobber in my bucket, so I could make spells with dragon spit!” raged Lan. “Is that it, man?”

  He stood red-faced and sheepish, looking at the ground. But his son, a bright-looking lad, said eagerly, “Aye, that was it, Mother! We were sure it were your familiar! We only brought Mama ’cos she’s sickened worse, and like to die, and no one else can help.”

  “We’ll pay you well,” said the older man. “We have swine, and chickens, and—”

  “The donkey,” I said, in a moment of inspired cunning. “Lan will take your donkey.”

  “Not the donkey,” said the man. “Please, not the donkey.”

  Lan looked at me, winked, then said to the man, “’Tis the donkey, or I’ll not help your wife. And if I don’t help her, she’ll die.”

  “Anything but my donkey,” the man said. “I’ve had him five summers, and he’s as a son to me. I couldn’t—”

  “You can’t keep both,” said Lan. “Your donkey or your wife? Which do you want?”

  The man groaned, wringing his huge hands in despair, and was a long time undecided.

  Then of a sudden his wife sat up. I don’t know where she got the strength, for she was like a corpse; but she looked daggers at him and said, with awful ire, “One more moment’s doubt, and I’ll flay you alive, Jonah Smollet.” Then she fell back, fainted clean away, and the ground shook at her falling.