CHANDELIERS HUNG FROM THE DARKNESS, perhaps attached to a ceiling too high to be seen, perhaps suspended from shadows. They were gold and wrought in curious shapes, and held hundreds of black candles at a time.
The dragons moved below.
They entered the Hoard of their Father and gathered beautiful treasures. Gowns of purest silk from ages long past, crowns of purest gold that had belonged to kings and princes. One great dragon woman, whose fire burned more fiercely than that of all the rest, plunged both hands into a chest full of rubies and strung these through her long black hair.
Thus adorned, they filed back to the center of their Village, where the chandeliers glowed. The candlelight gleamed on their riches and their eyes. Beautiful yet unsmiling, they stood gazing out across the Dark Water. They had never seen this lake before. But this was the world of their Father, and he would shape it as he willed. They stared across the water, expecting something, though they knew not what.
“Dance,” said their Father.
They turned, each taking a partner, and began to dance. There was no music here, but there was rhythm. They were graceful dancers, and though there were hundreds of them, each couple moved as though in a world of their own, like so many stars dancing their silent steps in the sky. Not one of the dragons looked into his or her partner’s face. They were absorbed in themselves and could not bear to look at another.
The floor heated and writhed beneath their feet.
In the flow of the dance, a certain yellow-eyed dragon with a sallow face and lank hair came with his partner to the edge of the Dark Water. His empty eyes gazed out across the darkness and caught sight of something. He snarled and stopped the dance.
“That light!” he said. “The evil light!”
Other dancers stopped as well, the pause rippling across the whole dance floor until they all stood still once more.
Then the yellow-eyed monster snarled again. “Douse the light! Kill it!”
They were all roaring then, rushing down to the edge of the water—though careful not to touch it, for dragons do not like to get wet—stretching out their bejeweled fingers and arms as though they would pluck the silver light, which was like a white sun moving toward them across the surface of the lake, from its place and crush it into nothing. At first it was too distant for them to see what caused the glow so unlike the glow from their own chandeliers; they only knew they hated it.
It represented everything they had lost long ago.
The dragon with rubies in her hair pushed to the forefront, and it was she who first saw the person carrying the light. A tiny chambermaid, ragged and covered in a veil, trembling as she clutched the handle of a silver lantern. The ruby dragon gnashed her teeth, longing to devour the girl in a single bite.
And still Rose Red’s boat drew nearer to that crowded shore. She could not tell faces apart, could not even discern man from woman, so united were they in their hatred. She saw claws and teeth; she saw jewels and crowns. She saw death in every pair of eyes.
Walk before me, child, sang the wood thrush.
She bowed her head over the lantern and held it before her face.
“Stop!”
The Dragon’s voice rolled across the mass of his children. Their roaring ceased. They parted ways, crowding into each other with only little snarls and snaps, creating a path through their midst. Down this the Father of Dragons walked, majestic in black robes, crowned in white fire. He paced to the edge of the Dark Water and waited as the narrow stick boat drew to shore.
“Princess,” he said, “you have come to me.”
His face was that which she had seen a hundred times and more in her mountain dreams. How strangely friendly and welcoming it seemed when compared to the faces of his swarming children. Rose Red peered through her veil at him and took comfort from his very familiarity.
Her lantern dimmed.
“Welcome to the Village of Dragons.” The Dragon extended a hand to her as the prow of her little boat touched the shore. “Allow me to assist you.”
“I’ll assist myself,” she snapped and jumped from the ship to the black rocks of the shoreline. Immediately, a wicked current took hold of the twig boat and dragged it out into the deeps. Rose Red looked over her shoulder and watched as her craft sank and vanished, joining the others at the lake’s bottom. “Silent Lady,” she whispered again and turned back to face the Dragon.
He smiled down at her. “You have not dressed properly for the occasion.”
“And . . . and what occasion is that?” she managed. Her voice was small; the heavy breathing of hundreds of dragons threatened to drown it out.