‘Ask my son to attend me,’ Etta directed him.
‘Oh, he will not wish to leave Heeby,’ Rapskal informed her familiarly and fondly. ‘I saw the look on his face and sensed her approval of him. He will stay by her while she is feeding, and possibly while she sleeps as well.’
Wintrow was nodding. ‘Likely it will be as he says. They are enamoured of one another. She had much the same effect on my brother Selden. She will be unlikely to harm him. And the citizens are taking great pleasure in watching their prince befriend a dragon.’ The queen’s expression did not change. ‘Nonetheless, I will invite him.’ Wintrow assured her and left us. Rapskal hooked his arm firmly through mine, a gesture I thoroughly disliked. We followed Queen Etta. I did not like how her guard closed in around us but I held my tongue. As it was with dragons, so it is with queens. A careless word or deed could have severe consequences.
Inside the royal mansion, it was cooler and dimmer. Everywhere I looked, a history of pirate looting prevailed in tapestries and statuary, exotic draperies and foreign treasures. There was a remarkable lack of formality as the queen herself guided us to a sitting room. ‘Find food and drink,’ she commanded one of her servants.
‘Oh, I would be so grateful for that,’ Rapskal responded. He turned his attention back to me. ‘Heeby could not keep pace with Tintaglia, try as she might. We knew Tintaglia would not wait for us. Our errand is urgent, with little time to spare, even to give this message.’
The queen had taken her seat at the head of a very long table. There were more than enough chairs for all of us. I manoeuvred Rapskal so that he sat at Etta’s left hand and took a chair next to him, leaving a place for Amber beside me. Lant took the next place and after some uncertainty, Spark and Per took chairs. They exchanged a look; seated at a pirate queen’s table!
Queen Etta let her gaze rove over all of us. ‘Welcome to my home,’ she said.
The sarcasm in her greeting was wasted on the Elderling.
‘You are so gracious,’ Rapskal replied artlessly. ‘And far more beautiful than I expected! Oh, and here is the refreshment you sent for. I am so parched and so hungry.’ As soon as the serving woman had filled his glass, he lifted it and drank deeply.
For a moment, she stared at him. I waited for her to rebuke him for his ill manners. Instead she suddenly leaned back on one arm of her chair. I saw the pirate who had become a queen as she said, ‘And you are much more forthright and simple than I expected an envoy to be.’
‘Yes, I am that,’ he agreed happily as he held out his glass to be refilled. ‘But scarcely an envoy. General I might be, and master of Kelsingra’s forces when I am there, but on this errand I serve my dragon, and indeed all dragonkind! I shall be sure that all dragons of Kelsingra hear of your hospitality!’
‘How kind of you! Should I be glad of that? Or terrified?’ She sent her gaze around the table, and then laughed aloud, apparently finding Rapskal more amusing than offensive. Wintrow entered and took a place at the queen’s right hand. ‘And my son?’ she asked of him.
‘He is passing the time with the red dragon and has sent for three more cows.’ Wintrow looked at me and added, ‘Your crow has joined them.’
‘She enjoys the company of the red dragon,’ I offered. Questions and concerns boiled inside me, but this was the queen’s table.
‘So. My son sails with you, to rescue your daughter. And somehow this exposes him to the company of dragons?’ Queen Etta stared at me but it was Rapskal who responded. He had cleared his plate of food and was watching alertly the servant approach with a platter of sliced meat.
‘Let me make all clear for everyone. We have come to tell FitzChivalry and Lady Amber that the dragons approve and allow their mission of vengeance. Indeed, once our errand is done, we shall follow them to Clerres to finish whatever destruction they have begun. We intend to level the city and raze the surrounding countryside.’ He took a long draught of his wine, apparently unaware of Queen Etta’s wide-eyed expression.
He set his glass down with a heavy sigh. ‘FitzChivalry is not the only one who has been wronged by these Servants. Far more grievous is our injury from them! In league with the Abominations, they have ransacked the nesting beach, stealing dragon eggs, and killing or imprisoning the hatchling serpents! Tomorrow we fly swiftly on to Others’ Island to protect the eggs buried there until the summer hatching season. Tintaglia shall stand guard over the nests and shepherd the hatchling serpents as they make their way to the sea while Heeby and I hunt down and kill the Abominations who infest that place.’
‘Abominations?’ Amber asked softly. She had kept silent and watchful until that moment.
‘So we name them. They occur when a dragon who has been too long among humans lays her eggs, and they do not hatch into serpents, but something neither serpent nor human nor Elderling. Grotesque and evil creatures. We will slaughter them. IceFyre alone knew how they had wronged us! How they dug the eggs from the nest mounds or preyed upon the young serpents as they tried to make their way to the sea! Some they killed, to devour or to sell their bodies to the Servants of the Whites! Or worse, imprisoned them for decades, harvesting the secretions of their bodies for potions and medicines!’ His scaled lips curled in disgust. ‘The Abominations consume those secretions; they claim it aids them to foretell the future and remember distant pasts!’
Wintrow set down his glass with a sharp sound on the table. ‘Etta,’ he said in a low voice. ‘We’ve been there. On the Treasure Beach. Those creatures. The serpent I freed …’
‘I recall that,’ she said faintly.
Wintrow spoke to Rapskal. ‘Kennit took me there to see what the Others might predict for me. He had been there before, I believe. With Igrot. There was a tradition, that if you found something washed up on the Treasure Beach and surrendered it to the creatures that lived there, they would foretell your future. But I found no treasure. Only an immense serpent, held captive in a caged pool. The higher tides would replenish the water around it, but the creature was stunted and twisted from living in such a small space. It spoke to me … I managed to free it. Though its passing touch took the skin from my flesh, and I nearly drowned for my efforts.’
‘I recall that,’ Etta said. ‘Sorcor, too, spoke of a previous visit Kennit made there.’ A faint smile touched her lips. ‘He destroyed what he found rather than surrender it to the creature there.’
‘That was Kennit,’ Wintrow agreed, and I could not tell if there was fondness or dismay in his voice.
For a moment, a strange silence held.