I didn’t look at them. What could I do? I sang. I heard them arguing behind me, and behind that, the noise of crew members screaming as they fought the kraken. It was cacophony on a grand scale, and I couldn’t believe the dragon could distinguish the sources of all that noise.
The dragon opened its mouth. At first, I heard nothing, but then the rumbling roar hit me. Ripples spread out over the water, rocks shattered and split from the islands, the very wood of The Misery throbbed in sympathy. Clouds scuttled across the sky as if trying to escape the creature. Wispy vapors fell away from its mouth: yellow, sulfurous, heavier than smoke. The creature stared at The Misery, still speeding toward it, and I couldn’t fight off the ugly certainty that the dragon stared directly at me.
A crescendo of screaming sounded behind me, and someone shouted, “My god! It’s on top of the ship!” You can give credit to the dragon that I didn’t look. The dragon had me. You cannot turn away from such a creature. It will either vanish or it will destroy you.
Teraeth must’ve looked away though, and Juval must’ve thought he had an opening. I really don’t know what the Captain was thinking.
I guess he was acting from blind panic.
I heard a scuffle, a grunting noise, the slick scrape of metal. A second later, I heard the unmistakable, unforgettable sound of blood gurgling from a ripped throat.
“Idiot,” Teraeth muttered.
Then the lady fair walked over
The carnage of bloody fears
Red, yellow, violet, and indigo
She said, None of you I’ll have!
My love you do betray
Red, yellow, violet, and indigo …
The dragon’s keening changed in pitch. I felt the dragon’s song against the surface of my skin, the echo in my eardrums, the vibration in my bones. It was a physical shock, a tangible ecstasy.
He was singing.
The dragon was singing with me.
Then she flew up to the sky
And she’s there to this day
Red, yellow, violet, and indigo …
Behind me, more shouts, more screams. The kraken scattered men on the deck as she tried to rip open the hold. There was a loud cracking sound, like a giant snapping trees for firewood.
And on a clear night you can
Still see her veils wave—
“Thaena!” Teraeth screamed. He tackled me as the mast fell right across where I’d been standing.
And, since I’ve never mastered the trick of singing with the wind knocked out of me, I stopped.
The dragon didn’t like that at all.
He launched himself into the air, screaming with ear-shattering rage, gigantic wings spread wide against the glaring sun. That titanic creature crossed the distance to the ship in less than three seconds. I’d underestimated his size. He might’ve fit in the Great Arena in the Capital City, but only if he tucked himself up and rolled into a ball like a house cat.
The Old Man glided over us, his shadow a silken cloak sweeping over the ship. He smelled of sulfur and ash, the hot stench of the furnace and melting iron. As he passed, he idly reached out with a talon and plucked up the kraken still clinging to the deck. Great chunks of wood went with her. The dragon tossed the Daughter of Laaka into the air like a ball of string and breathed glowing hot ash at her.*
I’m sure you’ve heard stories of dragons breathing fire, but believe me when I say what this one did was worse. That was not fire as you find in a kitchen or forge, not the sort of fire that happens when you rub two sticks together, or even the magic flame sorcerers conjure. This was all the ashes of a furnace, of a thousand furnaces, heated to iron-melting, white-hot strength, and blasted out at typhoon velocity. The heat melted, the ash scoured, and the glowing cloud left no air to breathe.
She never stood a chance.
The dragon gulped down the charred mass of twisted flesh before it could fall back into the sea.
Then he banked and came back around to deal with us.
Teraeth stood up. So did I. The ship started to list, and worse still, Khaemezra and Tyentso came up on deck. I didn’t think the two magi would show themselves unless the situation was truly grim, and dealing with the dragon had become more important than keeping the ship afloat.
“Oh god. Relos Var,” I whispered. “Relos Var will come now.”
“We’re close to the island. If we can reach it, we’ll be safe. It’s consecrated to Thaena; he won’t dare show himself at one of the seats of her power.”
“Will singing again help?”
“Probably not. Let’s just hope you put him in a good mood.”
“What happens if he’s in a good mood?”
“He flies away.”
“And if he’s in a bad mood?”
“He turns us all to cinders for daring to wake him from his nap.”
I looked around. “If he’s going to destroy us, he’d better hurry. The ship’s sinking.” Ripping away the kraken had opened gaps in the hull. The ship was taking on water.
Teraeth dragged his eyes away from the approaching dragon and looked at where The Misery was beginning to go down. “Oh hell.”
“I want him.”
The dragon’s voice was loud and echoing, yet not an animal sound. The dragon didn’t speak with the reptilian hiss I expected, but a grinding elemental noise that mimicked speech.
“Give him to me and I will save your craft.”
“Yeah, but will you promise to feed me every day and give me lots of care and attention?” I muttered.
“He likes you. That’s good,” Teraeth said.
“Yeah, I feel really loved.” I looked toward the back of the ship. “Taja, I hope those people can swim.” I leaned backward to keep my balance.
Juval’s body slid slowly across the planks. Tyentso also began to slip. Teraeth reached across and grabbed her by the arm, pulling her tight against him for balance. She gave him an odd look, but didn’t protest.
“You may not have him. He is important to me,” Khaemezra said. I stared at her, then back at the dragon. Her voice— “I won’t hurt him, Mother.”
“I said no.”
I looked at Teraeth and mouthed, “Mother?”
The assassin’s mouth twitched. “Everyone calls her that,” he said.
I shook my head. It wasn’t just a figure of speech. Not with that voice. I’d never heard a voice like Khaemezra’s—until I’d heard a dragon speak.
“Give him to me or I will—”
But their haggling had taken too long. The Misery had suffered too much in our flight. A second crack, much louder, sounded as the center of the ship splintered and broke in half. The bottom half slid into the ocean. The top half fell backward to smack against the water. I felt a moment’s sensation of weightlessness as the deck dropped from under me.
The water rushed over my head. Sound vanished, then returned as a dull roar. As the ship sank the vast pull of current sucked me down, trapping me in spite of my efforts to swim free. No matter how hard I tried to swim up, the light faded, a dim glow drawing distant.
The water felt warmer than I expected, but perhaps that was just glowing heat from the stone around my neck.