Chapter 3: Chapter 2: The Would-be Diversion

After the wounded were carried to their beds, after the last weary servant had fallen asleep, Nana rocked, the low fire crackling, the embers glowing carrot orange. In the air the smell of the dead dragon, of sulfur and ash, lingered. The barn had burned to the ground, horses stampeding, killing three people. Nineteen more had perished—instantly incinerated as they ogled the beast from the castle walls. Another, a young archer, not yet fourteen, newly arrived at Castle Togair, was expected to die. And Lord Togair's back was charred like a rare steak—the skin crispy, the flesh beneath oozing.

On and on, Nana rocked, bits of the child's magic glistening in her white-haired eyebrows and sparkling on her blotchy nose. As Lady Togair snored softly behind the drawn velvet curtains of her canopy bed, and the babe, swaddled and warm, slept in her bassinet, Nana transfixed by the babe’s magic, her eyes endlessly staring at the fire, rocked. Indeed, she couldn't look away. Not that she wanted to. No, she slipped all too willingly into the enchantment's embrace.

Her body, for the first time in over twenty years, was totally pain free. Her back did not ache. Her thumb joints weren't crying out in agony. She wasn't panting or out of breath. Miraculously unencumbered by afflictions old and new, her mind skipped along paths she was usually too weary to explore. Nana, always in charge, constantly bossing the other servants around, normally kept a running list in her mind of things that must be done today, tomorrow, by the end of spring; and of course who must do them. She was the nexus around which much of the work of the castle flowed. In the kitchen, cook reigned; in the barn, the old groom governed through inactivity. If you opposed him, or impeded him, or he simply did not like you, somehow you never had a mount when you needed one. But in all other ways, it was Nana who held sway. When the child's magic took away her pain and bid her ‘let go’, ‘let me control your thoughts’, she eagerly acquiesced. Free of pain, she also longed to be free of responsibility. Like some gay three-year-old, she followed where'er magic led.

Decayed memories sprang to life of seventy-three years ago when Nana was a child, cuddled and rocked, her head on a bony shoulder. There was a rough edge to Grams' voice. Years of near starvation, of harsh work, of heavy burdens that had, in her childhood, permanently bent Grams' young bones—work, endless work—had taken her soft, sweet as honey voice. As if her throat was both mortar and pestle, she ground out her words, pausing often to spit. “Those were terrible days. Hard to live and hard to remember. Oh, child, isn't time you were abed?”

“Please. Tell me. Why did the dragons eat the seers?” Young Nana asked.

“Magic was their food. But it was more than turnips to them, it was the stuff of poppies.” Her voice was sharp-edged with regret. “We were scared witless of the beasts.” She shook her head, her eyes begging forgiveness from a six-year-old. “I'm ashamed of what I did.”

“Did you hurt someone?”

She nodded, hugging Young Nana close to comfort herself. “I remember the day, cold, wet, every puddle with a sheet of ice on top. A dragon—oh, the smell, enough to put you off a good dinner. The beast had sniffed out a seer, a young lad." With palsied movements her head shook. "He’d not seen twelve summers . . . and skinny, weren't being fed. The head of our village, a kindhearted woman, agreed to hide him.” She closed her eyes. “Child, it was so long ago. Best we not speak of it.”

“Please, Grams. Please.”

The lines in Grams’ face grew deeper.

Young Nana kissed Grams' cheek. “I’ll still love you.”

“But I can’t love myself.” Drawing in a ragged breath, she continued. “But mayhap it is good that you know, so you can do right, where I did not. Regret eats the soul.” Old eyes looked into eyes unlined by shame. “You see, your mother was only a few weeks old. The beast threatened to burn us out if we didn't give up the lad. I couldn’t risk her. She was the only good thing in my life.” Tears flowed down Grams’ face. “I told the dragon where the boy was hiding. Gods forgive me. I betrayed the seer.”

“Did the dragon eat him.”

Grams’ nod was almost imperceptible; a fit of coughing seized her. Young Nana leapt from her lap to fetch cider, dipping Grams' mug in the barrel and warming the sweet liquid with the tip of an iron rod which had been laid in the fire for just such a purpose. 

With a sigh, Grams took the warm mug, wrapped her swollen thumbs around it, and drank the liquid. “Ah, how it soothes my throat.” When the liquid was gone, her eyes softly closed.

Frustrated, Young Nana shook her awake. “What happened to the dragons?”

“They say magic itself died. Magical people stopped being born. The dragons starved, they did. But not before they burned village after village. When nothing was left—crops gone, us sleeping in caves—they ate each other. Good riddance.”

“Why did the magic die?”

“Oh, child.” Grams laid a trembling hand on Young Nana's coal black hair. “Some say the magic died of old age. As I breathe, it was old, older than even the mountains. But I think we killed the magic. It drowned in the tears of the seers we fed to the beasts.”The wood turned to coals, and the coals to ashes, and still Nana rocked as the chilly spring night crept between the stones and into the room. As if Nana was a guitar Magic played upon the strings of her mind, bringing forth a new melody—a new thought.

Surely that was the last dragon. But if even one remains . . .

She rose—expecting her joints to ache, because they always ached—marveling anew when she moved effortlessly. Crossing to the bassinet she bent down, intending to kiss the child's platinum curls. Her own heart's loud, irregular beating stopped her. Fear had her trembling. She drew aside the window curtain to gaze out at the ruin of the courtyard. Bless the new god the castle was stone. A lone man walked the charred rock wall. Turning away from the destruction, she paced and thought, as an hour passed and another, Magic ever helping her, restoring the youthful agility of her mind.

How do I hide the babe if dragons can smell magic?

An idea trembled on the edge of her thoughts. She grasped it, as if it was water and she dying of thirst. Kneeling on the floor beside the bassinet, she spoke to the sleeping child, “I canna keep the beasts from finding you, but by heaven if another comes, perhaps I can buy time to spirit you away. All I need is a diversion.”

Silently, she slipped out the door into the hall. On cat's feet she moved, magic aiding her every step. Her soundless approached surprised the guard outside of his lordship's chambers.

“It is urgent,” Nana whispered.

The guard, putting up a hand, would have denied her entrance. “He's bad off.”

Her age, her status, her words, “I will bear his anger, not you,” gained her admittance.

Inside, the dark room was hot, heated by a roaring fire, with more wood stacked close by. On the bed lay Lord Togair, naked but for a cloth covering his buttocks.

His back, his shoulders, were a horror to behold. Nana swallowed down her revulsion. 

He was awake. “Who's there?”

“Nana, my lord.”

“Water.”

She poured water into his cup. Then held it near his mouth so he could sip from the metal straw.

“I beg you, my lord, send to the port of Tirikan for Seer Murtagh.”

“The charlatan? Why?”

“To calm the people. I fear if you do not, many will leave Castle Togair. They need to believe that we have a magical person to feed the next dragon that may wander by.”

Slowly, Lord Togair eased himself into a sitting position. For modesty's sake, Nana turned away. “That dragon didn't just wander by, “Lord Togair said. “There must be a magical person in Castle Togair.”

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“But there hasn't been a magical person born since my mother was a wee babe.”

“Dragons aren't supposed to exist either. Yet, the skin has been seared off my back. And that done by a beast that was half-dead when it waddled up to the gate. No, there must be a magical person here.” Groaning, he pushed himself off the bed. Seconds later the sound of liquid splashing into the chamber pot was followed by the pungent odor of urine. When he had finished, he leaned weakly against the wall. After a few ragged breaths, he made his way to the bed, easing himself down into a sitting position.

As Nana watched, he swallowed several times, as if to keep from throwing up.

“I could use Murtagh to find this magical person,” he whispered.

What? Find?

“My lord, your mind moves too quickly for me.”

Slowly, trembling with pain, he lay down on his belly. Nana knelt beside the bed, her ear close to his mouth to hear his words. “Bid Cormac retrieve Seer Murtagh from the port dungeon. I'll use him, Nana, to find this retched magical person who has brought this dragon upon us.”

She wrung her hands. “You mean to have Seer Murtagh search for the magical person?”

“Yes. Murtagh should be well motivated. If he doesn't find the true seer before another dragon comes, the people, thinking he is magic, will feed him to the dragon. He will be the first to die.”Before dawn lit the sky, Cormac left for Tirikan. Nana took to her bed, listless.

What have I done? What have I done? Now the child will be hunted.

Her one solace was the stars on the babe's forearm. They had not twinkled since the dragon had breathed its last.

For several days, Nana roused herself only to shout at the wet nurse. “You'll be nursing her whenever she cries, whether that be noon or midnight, or I'll have you whipped.”

It was Lady Togair who coaxed a new idea from Nana's tormented mind. “Is it true?” the fine lady asked. “Has Lord Togair sent for a seer?”

“Aye, my lady.”

“A seer.” Her voice was filled with awe. “They are so learned. I wanted to go to school, but my father forbade it. My mother taught me to read and write, though she said I wrote poorly.” She fiddled with the coverlet. “Called me hopeless, always blotting the ink.”

“You, hopeless? Why you charmed his lordship.”

A weak smile lit up her face. “I did, didn't I?” Then, as a new thought flashed in her mind, her eyes shone all the brighter. “Do you think this Seer Murtagh is really magic?”

“Nah,” Nana shook her head. “But it's fun pretending.”

Lady Togair's laugh rang out like the tingling of a small bell.Nana woke in the night, thoughts swirling about in her brain like starlings. She spoke, talking to herself, unafraid of waking the snoring wet nurse—the woman could have slept in the kitchen at Christmastide.

“Murtagh will yet be a diversion, and who knows how long it will be before another dragon comes—if at all.” She crossed her fingers.  “Please let that be the last dragon.”

She glanced toward the bassinet and the babe, christened Saoirse.

Nana's thoughts darted, how quickly they flitted about. “If we have time—time is different for dragons. They act in decades and centuries, not days and weeks. But Saoirse will be walking on broken glass. She will have to measure every word. Yet . . . ” Nana's next breath came easily. “Yes, if Murtagh knew the child, familiarity alone would keep him from guessing the truth. Those we know best, we suspect least. And he is proud. How easily she will beguile him. After all she is a seer, and if the tales of old are true, she will know him better than he knows himself.”

But as Nana plotted and planned, her soul sorrowed. “Even if I trick Murtagh into teaching Saoirse about magic, coax him with fawning and praise and pretended awe, can magic protect her? Magic never saved the seers of old.”

Her thoughts skipped down a beguiling path. “But the dragons are dying; they are weak.”

She clenched her aching, arthritic hands, groaning. The magic the babe had given her had slowly ebbed away.

“How did it come to this? That Murtagh, that lying, evil man, may be Saoirse's only chance?”

Only chance?

Her eyes drifted to the fireplace. Next to it lay the kindling box.

“Perhaps not her only chance . . . ”

Quickly she rose and heaved the box, trying to rotate it—a sharp pain like a hot knife stabbed into the joint of her right thumb where it met her hand. “Ahhh!” With her left hand, she pulled on her right thumb. Yes, the pain lessened. No doubt it would ache all tomorrow, and she had tatting to do. Togair demanded all his collars be trimmed with lace.

“I don't need to see it,” she whispered. “The liquid that melts metal is still there. I know it. I put it there.”

She went back to bed, carefully laying her aching right hand on the pillow beside her head.

“But it's not enough,” she sighed. “There's not enough to kill a dragon.”

 

I have added a Cast of Characters to the Glossary.

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