waddaya think?

The white stone road was not meant for the living. Of this, Yren was perfectly aware. It led away from the centre of the village square in a westward direction, its sombre passage marked by pale menhirs. The origin of these stones and the manner of their arrival in this peculiar location were mysteries that rarely interested Yren’s pragmatic clansfolk. That this was the last route their forebears had travelled was knowledge enough. The road ended some half-day’s walk away leading inevitably up the slopes to the summit of Pyre Hill, not a particularly imposing hill when compared to the mountains that towered over the horizon beyond it, nor a particularly beautiful one next to the flower filled meadows that surrounded it. While the villager’s livestock roamed all about its feet, some brave ones even venturing part way up the hill itself, the superstitious clan visited only to fare well the recently departed.

On this day, Yren had no real business being up here, a fact that Grys and his brother had shouted for all to hear. As the village healer and truthteller, Yren well knew the dangers of coming unbidden to this place. It had been only three moons since the last fare well and the remains of that pyre still charred the centre of the broad granite slab that crowned the hill like an old man’s glistening pate.

He placed the puppy slowly down onto the edge of the pyre stone. He peeled her eyelids back and nodded to himself. Her pupils were dilated and a light froth edged her pale lips. She whined slightly as he laid a warm hand against her ribs. “Hush now, Keema.”

He took from his bag a skin of ale. He uncorked it and sprinkled a liberal amount of the amber liquid around the pyre stone, muttering a quiet prayer to Kwynnhyr. Surely the pyre god would forgive him for seeking refuge here on the heights.

Satisfied that the puppy was sufficiently protected from the spirits of the ancestors, Yren dragged a handful of the heavy logs from the low dolmen on the far side of the hill. He pulled the flint axe from his belt and chopped the wood down to a useful size. Once he had a tidy pile prepared he turned the flint head against the edge of the pyre stone until a spark dropped onto the kindling and eager flames leapt to life.

He carefully placed the kindling into the stacked wood and watched as the wind breathed life into the small fire. Confident that the blaze would last he nodded and looked out over the faintly sparkling lights of the hearth fires in the village below. He could see Grys’ hut. It was the one closest to the bright torches that burned above the wide gate on the far side of the village. Inside, no doubt, Lemet Grysson would be nursing his wounds and cursing the healer and his hound.

Yren turned back to Keema and examined her wounds. In the flickering light of the fire he could see that they were only superficial. He poured a drop of ale into his hand and held it under Keema’s nose.

He smiled as her tongue darted out to snatch up the ale. So, Lemet had done nothing to her. Keema opened her eyes and pressed her nose against the ale skin. Yren poured out another few drops and cursed the thoughtless cruelty of children. The puppy would be sore for a few days from the beating Lemet had given her. The boy deserved the bite she had given back.
Yren tossed another small branch onto the fire. As crackling flame devoured wood there came a low, spine-chilling rumble. He looked up and glared out at the flickering shadows. It came again, a quietly menacing sound that reminded Yren of a cornered bear deciding when to attack. It was followed by a rustle of movement.

Swiftly, Yren lifted Keema and tucked her inside his tunic. She strained weakly in protest against his chest and a whine came from her little throat. He cradled his arm around the bulk of her warm body and backed slowly away from the flames. His shoes slapped softly on the cold stone as he retreated. He had gone no more than a handful of paces when he noticed the axe was still next to the fire. His soft curse was carried off into the night air by the strengthening wind.

Whatever creature it was that prowled out there, and his heart quailed as it’s deep voice rumbled again, he would have to face it unarmed. He continued to back cautiously across the pyre stone, glancing over his shoulder now and again to check his distance from the edge.

Now that he was further from the firelight the softly muted glow of the stars aided him in picking out the shape of the grassy border that ran around the wide stone. Beyond it the hill sloped down and away across a long meadow that stretched all the way to the foot of the closest mountain of the distant Fey range.

He was nearly at the top of the sward when a shadow passed between him and the fire. Its movement caused a draft to brush across his face. In the dim starlight it seemed inconceivably huge. It was silhouetted very briefly by the orange glare of the flames and Yren saw the outline of a beast with a row of spines across its back that were as jagged as the mountains westward.

As he slid his feet quietly over the last few steps, Yren held his breath. He hopped off the edge of the stone onto the cool grass and ducked down over the edge of the hill. With a long slow exhalation he peeked his head back up over the lip of the hill. There was definitely something out there. Something big.

Suddenly there was the sound of someone else breathing behind him. Before he had a chance to react, a hard object was pressed against his throat and he was pulled close into his assailant’s body.

Very quietly, so that it was more another sighing breath than a fully spoken word, the wielder of the blade whispered in his ear. “Your silence may save your life. Softly now, turn this way.”

The blade was lifted away from his neck and Yren did as he had been instructed. As he turned around he was surprised to discover that his captor was a woman. She held her finger to her lips, urging him to remain quiet. “Come,” she breathed. “This way.”

She led him down the slope, picking a winding route around clusters of boulders and the bristling shapes of black- and haw-thorns. Keema was wriggling again, her sharp claws scraping against his soft belly. He stopped for a moment to adjust her position so that her paws would rest on his arms. From above came a snorting sound. Yren looked back up at the hilltop.

It took a while for his eyes to make sense of the hulking shape that towered over the edge of the pyre stone. The beast’s hide had an oily sheen that glimmered subtly under the starlight. Its body was bigger than the village plough ox. Bigger even than the clan chief’s opulent hut. It had a long, wiry tail that coiled in the air behind it like that of a hunting cat. The spines he had seen against the fire were clearly visible, accenting the curve of the creature’s neck. Its head was easily as high as a full-grown man and the eyes that peered down at him were visible only for the gleam of the stars they reflected. The head wove slightly from side to side and Yren could hear more snorting sounds. It was sniffing the air like one of the hunter’s hounds.

A hand touched his and he jumped slightly. The strange woman had returned for him. “Come,” she urged, her whisper quieter than ever. “It is not looking for us.”

The beast let out a loud shriek that froze the blood in his veins. Yren had never heard a sound so frightening, nor so loud. His ears rang with a lingering whistle. “Quickly, now,” the woman hissed. She pulled at his hand. “Now.”

The creature shrieked again and Keema, cowering against his body, jumped at the sound. The scratch of her claws galvanised him into action. As silently as he knew how, he followed the strange woman to the foot of the hill.

There was a pebble strewn gully here, an open tear in the land between hill and meadow, and the stranger hopped down into it as lightly as if it were a single step’s depth. Yren lowered himself more gingerly over the edge, concerned for his charge as much as to ward against a twisted ankle.

The stars burned brightly in the black sky above and the wan crescent of the quarter moon began to slide over the horizon, lending its pale light to the scene. The gully, Yren could now see, was no more than a couple of hundred paces from end to end. The wind was continuing to strengthen and all about was the susurration of the grasses dancing beneath its swift hand.

Back up on the crest of Pyre Hill, the creature continued to shriek.

“What is that?” he asked at length, staring up at the beast as it scrabbled back and forth, its oddly jointed limbs giving it an unnatural gait. When she didn’t answer, Yren repeated his question. She blinked at him, disbelief on her face.

“I beg your pardon?”

“That,” Yren said, pointing incredulously up at the hill. “What in Kwynnhyr’s name is it?”

“It is a dragon, young fool, now get down here.” She pulled roughly at his belt and he allowed himself to be drawn back down. “Do you want to get yourself killed?”

He shook his head. “What sort of beast is a dragon and what is it doing here?”

She shrugged. “An ancient race. That you do not know of them is strange.” Her voice was warm and friendly, her accent difficult to place. He had met traders from both Myrfing and Camelson but their speech had been thick with regional burrs. “As to its purpose, I can only guess. The dragons are strange creatures and keep their own council. It would be dangerous to ask it for reasons. Especially this one, so far from its home range. Do you see the shape of the horns behind its ears? This one is Cal Tor.”

Yren peered more closely at this woman who spoke so reverently of such a terrifying beast.

“Who are you?” he said. Crows feet stretched back from her eyes and the echoes of laughter lined her mouth. In the slanting moonlight he could see the silvery streaks that ran through her long dark hair. This woman was old, at least forty summers, he would have guessed. His own father had only reached forty-nine and he had been crooked with the weight of time by the end of his days. Yet this strange woman had rescued him from death’s jaws and spirited him away down a hill almost too steep for Yren himself.

There was a sudden rustle of movement from within his tunic and a high keening whine sounded as Keema roused herself again. In a heartbeat, the woman had backed away, her long bone knife pointing cautiously at his chest. Keema struggled again, scratching his skin as she poked her head up through the neck of his tunic.

“What in the name of the Lady?” she whispered, her eyes narrowing curiously. “Have you been harbouring a stowaway all this time?” Keema gave a puppy-growl, licked her lips and ducked her head back below the material.

“This is Keema,” he said, apologetically. “It was for her that I climbed Pyre Hill tonight.”

The woman cocked her head, intrigued, and lowered her knife. “You are a strange one, young man. You may call me Cughal. I have come from Eserett.”

“Eserett?” He frowned. “What is that?”

The dragon shrieked again and began to scrape and dig at the bare rock of the pyre stone. Cughal’s voice became suddenly more urgent. “Do you have family here?”

He nodded. “My clan live on the other side of Pyre Hill. This hill. You are welcome to take your rest with us if you wish.”

“Thank you, but it is not rest I was thinking about.” Nervously, he followed her gaze back up to the hill. The dragon was throwing up clouds of granite pebbles that even from here they could hear clattering over the boulders that covered the sides of the hill. “We must warn them of this beast. Lead us there swiftly. And quietly, yes?”

As if agreeing with her request, the wind eased momentarily.

They picked their way along the gully until it was shallow enough to climb easily out. The moon was rising swiftly up into the sky and so it was light enough for them to dash from the cover of one prickly bush to another. They were resting behind one such lonely outcropping when the dragon gave up its digging and resumed its barks and shrieks. Cughal watched it for a moment as they caught their breath. From this angle, her finely boned face seemed quite beautiful, despite the creases of old age, and her sprightliness was testing his own endurance.

“I’m Yren,” he whispered. She looked at him, a strange expression on her face. “My name,” he added, guiltily.

“Very well then, Yren,” she said. “Let us move quickly to your clansfolk before Cal Tor lulls them to sleep with its song.”

He frowned, not sure if he should have laughed. He looked back up at Pyre Hill as the dragon gave another deafening call and was just in time to see it launching itself off the granite crown.

“It flies?” Yren stared in dismay as the beast unfurled its long, slender wings. Like a snake entering water, the dragon manoeuvred with surprising grace through the air. With a few short waves of its wings, it swooped down to the softly glowing bulk of Yren’s village.

“Too late,” Cughal muttered. She began to run, Yren following a pace behind.


*


Too late. Her words reverberated in his thoughts as the blood pounded beneath his brow. They had reached the village, winded by futility.

From their vantage point, crouched behind a wide oak just beyond the boundary wall, they watched the dragon stomp through the ruins of the homes Yren had known all his life. It barked and whistled as it nosed through the splintered wood and reed, scavenging what lay beneath. One of Skurl’s branded sheep, once a prized member of the clan’s most select stock, trotted skittishly across the village square. As it drew next to the white menhir at the very centre of the village, the dragon leapt as if playing a cruel game and snapped savagely at the terrified animal. There was a spray of blood and the beast shrieked again.

Yren held a hand to his mouth, horrified.

“Where is everyone?” he wondered aloud.

Cughal silenced him with a cold finger over his lip. Her eyes were wide and glassy with sadness.

The dragon, Cal Tor she had named it, seemed to be entering a newly frenzied mood. It had coiled itself about the menhir and was biting and gnashing its blood stained teeth on the top of the white stone. After a few seconds it leapt over to the second menhir on the white stone road, tumbling a once proud elm as it went, and repeated this behaviour.

It flitted between them and began digging fervently in the soil between the two markers.

“What is it doing?” Yren whispered.

Cughal shook her head. “I do no know. This is very unusual. I have never seen a dragon behave like this before.”

Cal Tor seemed to have found something in its wild excavation and began to pull at it with fearsome thrashings of its powerful body. With a horrifyingly wet sound, an enormous leathery tube erupted from the ground, the white menhirs fixed to its length. The dragon wrapped itself about the thing and began biting it more furiously still.

“This is bad,” Cughal muttered.

“What?”

“Quickly,” she screamed. “Run!”

There was a deafening sound of tearing earth, a grinding of long-sleeping bones of stone. The leathery thing that Cal Tor had unearthed began to thrash from side to side, the white menhirs crashing through everything in their path. The dragon launched itself up into the air out of harm’s way, as the ground churned and sprouted great plumes of rock-filled gases.

The two cowering humans, no longer bothering to flee, stared up at Pyre Hill as it rumbled and heaved. With a crack, the long dormant creature broke free. If it had taken some time for his eyes to make sense of the dragon as it had paced the top of Pyre Hill, now Yren’s brain fought to comprehend the enormity of this new beast whose body he had long believed to be no more than a hill. A sacred one, but a hill none the less.

Its spine was the road; the spikes that adorned it were the white stones themselves. And in the far distance, lifting up out of the newly torn meadow was the creature’s giant head.

From the air above them the words of Cal Tor became discernible through its bellowing shrieks for those that knew the tongue.

“MOTHER,” it called. “I HAVE COME FOR YOUR HELP.”

Her reply, if reply it was, shook even the mountains to their roots.


*


Yren, hands clasped to his head, tried desperately to protect his ears from the call of the dragons. Cughal had already resumed running, her own hands thrown up to her ears. Although his legs were shaking in terror, he followed her away from the ruins of his village.

His lungs were burning and his heart was crashing in his chest by the time they reached the line of trees that marked the edge of the forest. Yren collapsed to the ground, his sweat soaked back pressing against the soft grass as Cughal fell to her knees. Tears streaked the dust on his face and his breath came in ragged gasps. Behind them followed the roaring barks of the two dragons.

Cughal crawled over to Yren and with soft fingers checked him for wounds. The puppy was struggling to escape his tunic, her small whimpers of frustration bringing a smile to Cughal’s lips. She brushed his hair out of his eyes.

“Are you okay?”

He nodded and sat up, pulling Keema out into the air at last. As she began licking his face in excitement her whole body shook with the wagging of her tail.

“Such a thing has not been seen for many a moon,” Cughal said, wonderingly. She was looking back out of the forest at the beasts. Yren pushed the puppy down to his lap so that he too could watch. The creature he had known only as Pyre Hill appeared to be dancing back and forward beside the mountains as the smaller beast writhed through the air above her. “That, my young friend, is one of the greater dragons. She has not flown for close to three hundred summers. And to think, you knew nothing of dragons at all! You who have lived in the shadows of one all your days.”

Keema hopped off his lap and began scurrying through the leaf litter, unimpressed by the view. Yren, however, was mesmerised by it. “What are they doing?”

Cughal shook her head. “I was but a novice when this one was last seen, and I have never seen Cal Tor parted from his brother.”

Yren frowned at her.

“I thought you said it had been three hundred summers.”

“Nearly three, yes,” she nodded. “But I was still a novice at the time. It is hard to believe that this one has lain here all this time, unnoticed.” She smiled at Yren’s bemused stare. “We are long-lived, we druids.”

Yren shook his head. “How is that possible?”

“For a price, young man.”

“A price? What do you mean? I’ve not yet seen anyone pass fifty summers.”

“Well, now you have. Have you never had dealings with druids before? Your village is not that isolated, surely?”

“I have heard of your kind, yes,” he said. What little the traders from Camelson had told him had not been kind. Meddling politicians, he had been led to believe, much like village busybodies that thrived inexplicably at the gathering of the clans. “But I have never heard of unnaturally long lives.”

“Unnatural? Is it natural then to accept all the obstacles in your way and to sit, unmoving, unthinking? That is the path of stupidity.”

She got to her feet and walked back out from under the forest’s shelter. She paused at the last tree and turned back to him. “Come on, young man. Let us see what the dragons say.”

He called Keema to heel and followed her. When she tilted her head slightly and began talking again in hushed tones, the anger that had filled her words had gone.

“Do you see?” she said. “Cal Tor repeats the same movements again and again.” Cughal put a hand to her head. Yren stared in amazement as she began to glow with a softly luminous blue light. This woman seemed nothing like the druids of the tales he had heard.

“Gah,” she cried in frustration. She spat to one side and lowered her hand. The glow faded. “We are too far.” Cughal looked up at Yren again and narrowed her eyes.

Keema yipped at his ankle and he picked her up, cradling her against his chest. She seemed to be recovering well. “What?” he asked. The druid was still staring at him.

“We must draw closer.” She gestured over her shoulder at the writhing reptilian forms beyond. “I cannot hear what they say.”

Yren shook his head. “Out there?”

“Yes. Come.”

She held her hand out to him and he found himself unable to say no.


*


Cal Tor circled in the air, his thick body roping and twisting as his wings stretched out through the whipping wind. They were, despite their slender appearance, made of a tough hide stretched between his long bony fingers. Beneath the hide, strong muscles pulled at the thick sinews and waved his broad limbs through the air with amazing agility.

His eyes were half closed with the sheer joy of dancing with her once more.

“MOTHER,” he called.

“SON. IT IS GOOD TO SEE YOU.”

She curled her neck up as she roared her reply, her incredibly strong jaws snapping playfully at the air.

He swooped nearer, looping around her head, laughing as she nipped at his wake. He did not care that to the humans cowering in the trees yonder this was a spectacle that would be the stuff of superstition and nightmares for years to come, scurrying ants that they were. Yet in them might be the key to warding off the doom that approached. Subdued by the memory of his purpose, Cal Tor circled away again.

“WE HAVE RECEIVED WORD OF A WARNING, MOTHER.”

“A WARNING? OF WHAT NEED WE BE AFRAID?”

She stamped her indignation, crashing her tail into a tumble of rocks over which a small river flowed. When her horny tail lifted again, a deep depression was left. Quickly it began to fill with water and the pulse of the river returned, changed yet unchangeable.

“THE LADY SPOKE, MOTHER. WE HAD NOT HEARD FROM HER SINCE BEFORE YOU SLEPT.”

“I AM OLD, SON. I ONLY NEED REST FOR A LITTLE WHILE LONGER.”

“I KNOW. MY BROTHER ASKED THAT I COME. HE FELT THAT THE LADY’S WORDS HAD SOME IMPORT.”

“OF WHAT DID SHE SPEAK?”

Cal Tor shuddered. His mother was not going to like this news. At the edge of his awareness he noticed a soft young presence. With a curious twitch he examined the creature there. She was weak, but not as weak as most of the little ones that scurried about the land. He would speak with her in a moment. For now, she could listen to the warning too.

“SHE SAID, _‘A RED RAIN IS COMING THAT WILL ROUSE THE BRANCHES OF THE YELLOW KING. THE STONES SHALL BE MADE TO WAR AND IN THEIR DEFEAT SHALL BE CRACKED. BEWARE THE MOTHER’S COMING. AS ONE DEAD SHE WILL ENTER. WITH DEATH SHE WILL RETURN. THE GREATEST AMONG YOU WILL BRING YOUR DOOM. HOPE LIES ONLY IN THE STONE’S DARK ART.’_ ONE OF THE LITTLE ONES HAD HEARD IT, MOTHER. IT CAME TO OUR VALLEY TO WARN US.”

To one side, his keen yellow eyes focussed on the other human, he opened his thoughts and drew the little creature in. IT WAS JAYTH, was his unspoken thought. It rolled around the human’s mind. Recognition stirred there. So, she knew of the bard. Although it shamed him, his brother had requested that he seek out their allies. Perhaps this scurrying ant could be useful. HELP US, his thoughts hissed, enveloping the mortal in reptilian sibilants.

“HUMANS,” his mother roared. “YOU BRING ME THEIR WORDS. THEIR WORRIES. THEIR WORLD. THE LADY DID NOT SPEAK TO US. SHE ABANDONED US LONG AGO.”

She swatted at her son, no longer playful.

“YOU CANNOT SLEEP THROUGH THIS, MOTHER. ALTHOUGH THE LADY SPOKE TO THE MORTALS, THE WARNING WAS FOR US TOO. SHE HAS NOT ABANDONED US. IT IS WE THAT LEFT HER.”

“LIAR,” she shouted. With two swift earth-shaking strides she leapt into the air, her enormous wings unfurling. They covered the whole stretch of land from the mountains to the forest, and the downdraft as she flapped skyward was like a gale ripping joyfully over all.

Within a heartbeat, the gargantuan dragon had swept away northward, her bulky form vanishing over the barren heaths of Myrfing.

Cal Tor cast one last look at the human before releasing her completely. “HELP US,” he barked.


*


As Yren watched the smaller dragon circle overhead, its final shriek echoing in the sudden quiet, Cughal collapsed to the rocky ground. Keema leapt out of his arm and ran straight to her, licking her hands as they lay limp at her sides.

The dragon seemed to pick up speed, heading away westward over the mountains, and Yren breathed a sigh of relief. He stooped over Cughal, touching a hand to her forehead and feeling for the pulse of life at her neck.

Her eyes opened slowly and seemed to stare through Yren for a moment before she truly awoke. With a start, she grasped his arm. “Are they gone?”

He nodded and helped her to sit up. “Are you okay? What happened?”

She shook her head and pulled Keema up onto her lap. The puppy yipped and thrashed her tail. “They are gone.” Her flat tone sounded disappointed.

“What happened?”

“We must go.” She pushed Keema to one side and climbed to her feet. The puppy was not impressed at this and began pulling at the hem of her robe. Cughal reached down and absently lifted the little animal into her arms. “I must take this news to Eserett.”

“Where?” She had already begun to stride back through the trees. He hurried to catch up. “Where are we going?”

“Eserett. To the druid council.”

“What is the hurry?”

“War is coming. I must warn Rethwyn and Davyl. The dragons are preparing for war.”