King's Dragon (Crown of Stars 1)

FIRES burn, thick smoke rancid with the scent of human fear. He stops, licks the air. In the tangled smell of charred wood, dead men, burning thatch, and dust kicked high by the trampling of many feet, he finds the familiar dry musky scent of his own kind—though it is not marked with the peculiar piquancy of his own litter, his own tribe, his home shore.

Beyond, the sea surges below a distant headland, soughing up more softly along the strand where the clean wooden boats lie beached. They smell of seawater and barnacles and the good strong scent of oak flavored with ash and willow.

Shouting and crashing come from the wood beyond. He darts back into a thicket. Some of the soft ones, the humans, are running; their terror and pain are sweet on his tongue, tasted from the air. But he lets them pass. Two are children, carried by a strong mother whose tears smell like the salt of the sea. He senses a new weakness in himself, brought on by his contact with Halane, Son of Henri. He thinks of OldMother, who is already beginning the slow trek up the fjall where she will take her place with the WiseMothers. She speaks of the soft mothers with scorn because they cannot bear litters with the strength and numbers of the RockChildren. But Halane had a mother such as this. He lets them run by untouched before he crawls out from the thicket and starts his descent toward his cousins.

Will these cousins greet him with peace in their hearts? Or will they set their dogs on him?

He shrugs off these doubts. OldMother’s scent is strong on him. She promised him much before her joints began to stiffen and she passed the knife of decision to the new YoungMother. Even if these warriors are not true cousins, they will not harm one who bears this sign of favor. Nor will any dogs, of any pack, eat one who has been marked by the scent of an OldMother.

Still, though, he carries his new weakness with him as he descends through the forest. The weakness rests within him, but he also conceives of the wooden circle which hangs at his chest as the physical sign of that weakness, a tangible reminder. Other humans flee past, but he avoids them. This new weakness has taught him a lesson: The soft ones are not true people, of course, but they are a kind of people. People can talk. It is the lesson the WiseMothers teach. It is what they whispered to him when he was a half-grown pup and dared venture up the mountainside to the sacred place tended by the SwiftDaughters to see whether the WiseMothers would speak to him or else kill him for his presumption.

“The knife and the tongue are equally strong weapons.”

The WiseMothers had spoken twice, and he had always remembered.

“Face your weakness and it can become your strength.”

He steps out of the wood and into a landscape torn by wind and sea spray. The soft ones’ houses are all burning now. The scent of fire mingles with the pungent smell of sea and sand and shore. The dogs bark, smelling him. Alerted, a Watcher sees him and whistles to question him. He whistles back, sees the sign given for free passage. With new confidence, he strides down to the sea.

Alain woke, cold and shivering, on the ground. He did not stir. The horrible images of his dream swelled in his mind. He still smelled the sea, and the fire burning. He still heard the screams of children and the grunts of men falling beneath the spears and axes of Eika savages. He still saw the monstrous dogs, their hollow bellies and tireless rage, their yellow eyes shooting off sparks. Always they panted, tongues hanging out, saliva—or worse things—dribbling down their fangs.

t is never safe.

She sank down onto her knees, head bowed and resting in her hands. She must not be tempted.

The king’s son. Sworn to the Dragons, and forbidden. Caught in the intrigues of the court. It was too dangerous to even think of such a man—as if such a man could ever think of her with an honest heart. She must put all such thoughts away.

She must stay hidden in every way she could. She must be careful, because she had no one she could trust, no one but Hanna, who was gone from her now, perhaps not even alive—surely not that—and who had no power in the world in any case.

“Ai, Lady, protect me, your daughter,” she whispered. Yet, as bitter as her shame was, she could not stop thinking about the prince. Desire is like a flame, a torch burning in the night. A traveler in darkness cannot help but be drawn toward it.

Liath shut her eyes. She saw torches along the walls in her mind’s eye, saw fires burning all along the shore as if they were the temptation that ate away at her heart. Hugh would see them and, seeing, use them to find her.

In her mind’s eye she put them out. In the wild lands beyond the city she had built in her mind the sun ceased shining. It was, like a cool spring evening, soothing on her frozen heart. She was still safe; she could make herself safe by not feeling.

On the eastern shore, though she could not see it, fires vanished, snuffed out although there was no onset of rain. Along the walls of Gent a third of the torches blew out, though there was no wind.

X

THE SIN OF PRIDE

1

FIRES burn, thick smoke rancid with the scent of human fear. He stops, licks the air. In the tangled smell of charred wood, dead men, burning thatch, and dust kicked high by the trampling of many feet, he finds the familiar dry musky scent of his own kind—though it is not marked with the peculiar piquancy of his own litter, his own tribe, his home shore.

Beyond, the sea surges below a distant headland, soughing up more softly along the strand where the clean wooden boats lie beached. They smell of seawater and barnacles and the good strong scent of oak flavored with ash and willow.

Shouting and crashing come from the wood beyond. He darts back into a thicket. Some of the soft ones, the humans, are running; their terror and pain are sweet on his tongue, tasted from the air. But he lets them pass. Two are children, carried by a strong mother whose tears smell like the salt of the sea. He senses a new weakness in himself, brought on by his contact with Halane, Son of Henri. He thinks of OldMother, who is already beginning the slow trek up the fjall where she will take her place with the WiseMothers. She speaks of the soft mothers with scorn because they cannot bear litters with the strength and numbers of the RockChildren. But Halane had a mother such as this. He lets them run by untouched before he crawls out from the thicket and starts his descent toward his cousins.

Will these cousins greet him with peace in their hearts? Or will they set their dogs on him?

He shrugs off these doubts. OldMother’s scent is strong on him. She promised him much before her joints began to stiffen and she passed the knife of decision to the new YoungMother. Even if these warriors are not true cousins, they will not harm one who bears this sign of favor. Nor will any dogs, of any pack, eat one who has been marked by the scent of an OldMother.

Still, though, he carries his new weakness with him as he descends through the forest. The weakness rests within him, but he also conceives of the wooden circle which hangs at his chest as the physical sign of that weakness, a tangible reminder. Other humans flee past, but he avoids them. This new weakness has taught him a lesson: The soft ones are not true people, of course, but they are a kind of people. People can talk. It is the lesson the WiseMothers teach. It is what they whispered to him when he was a half-grown pup and dared venture up the mountainside to the sacred place tended by the SwiftDaughters to see whether the WiseMothers would speak to him or else kill him for his presumption.

“The knife and the tongue are equally strong weapons.”

The WiseMothers had spoken twice, and he had always remembered.