Winterlands 3 - Knight Of The Demon Queen by Hambly Barbara

Author:Hambly, Barbara
Language: eng
Format: epub

CHAPTER TWELVE

“Mother.”

She heard their voices, far-off and clear. The dragon dreams in which she slept were like sleeping in a world wrought all of brown topaz that refracted every separate sound and scent and vibration to crystal distinctness. She could hear snow falling in the Gray Mountains, moles whispering as they turned in their sleep.

But the voices caught at her mind. She didn’t know why.

“You’re stupid,” the younger boy said. “Of course she’ll know who we are. Dragons know everything.”

Indeed we do, she thought. Indeed we do.

She knew they were two boys moving on foot northeast through the thick woods five miles to the south of her. She knew that though the younger bore a little sword they were no threat. They had lost their mother, by the sound of it, though the elder—she turned her mind upon them, seeing within as dragons can—was old enough to take care of both himself and the younger.

The older boy was a wizard, as humans reckoned wizardry. The nimbus of power shone dim around his head and shoulders. Adolescent humans were seldom strong in their powers until the flesh from which they sourced their magic ceased its changes from child to adult. She didn’t know why she knew this, or why the children looked familiar to her.

Heretofore her dreams had been dragon dreams: sailing on the wind above ice fields and rocks; absorbing the magics of sun and air as if she’d long been starved; dreaming of the other star-drakes, wherever they were, in the mountains or the ocean’s heart, or among the Skerries of Light.

Why did she dream of lost children?

“Dragons may know everything,” the older boy, the wizard-boy, said, “but she may not remember who she is. She may not remember she’s our mother. She may not be able to turn back.”

“That’s stupid,” the younger declared. He was stocky and red haired. “You’re stupid.”

The young of any species generally smite those younger still who treat them with disrespect—it is a way of making oneself safe—but this older boy only sighed and said, “Yes. Yes, I am.” The white dragon considered the boys for a time in her sleep.

She had laired in the crypt of an old temple that had been built to some human god and was now overgrown with dead briars under an eiderdown of last night’s snow. There was some gold there, though robbers had been at the place, long ago. Still, there was gold enough for her to sing to, gold into which to pour the music of her mind and heart and have it reflect back a thousand-fold the heart-shaking beauties of the everlasting world.

She felt the goodheartedness of the old temple’s priests, who’d stayed to keep their god’s honor fresh in the minds of the local people; felt the grief and terror and tragedy of their death at the hands of bandits; the peace and wonder of each slow-passing season, each nesting bird, each fox kit raised and taught to hunt and to go forth to meet the winter moon.

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