Crown of Renewal (Legend of Paksenarrion) (56 page)

And he woke to darkness solid as stone. Warm. Comfortable. Where was he? He put out his hands, and one glowed red as a firecoal, and he could see nothing more in the light of that hand. He wasn’t afraid, and that brought him the first flicker of real thought: Why wasn’t he afraid? He felt himself, rediscovered his arms, his hands, his head, his neck, his chest and belly, and … What was that? Something tangled over him, something flexible … but soft. He pulled it up, sniffed it, rubbed his face in it, then put it aside. He had no more name for it than he had for himself. For a moment that woke fear, fear that threatened to pull him down to nothing again.

Had he always been in the dark alone? He tried to answer that question, and a vague sense of light came to him … of space illuminated. Of … rooms? Of knowing what was over there, or over here, knowing what he could touch from where he lay and what was out of reach.

As he lay wondering about this, a sound moved in the darkness, a sound for which—like everything else—he had no name. A long streak of red, edged with flickering blue, appeared. He shrank back, frightened by what he could not understand. The red shortened, disappeared.

“You’re awake,” a voice said.

The words, he knew, referred to himself. He should know them.

“I will touch your head,” the voice said.

He was still puzzling out the meaning from the sounds when something warm brushed his face and settled—not uncomfortably—around the left side of his face. The something grew warmer; a smell came with it, a smell that brought with it a memory of red, yellow, heat, and loud noise. Darkness swept across the remembered fire, then his memory jerked aside and he saw a figure hitting … hammering … the word came to him … on something … the noise hurt.

“Better,” the nearby voice said. “Drink.”

He had not thought of his face, but when a rim touched his lips, he opened them and drank whatever it was that flowed down his throat. He felt different after. Thoughts moved in his head, separate as beads on a string. He could imagine beads and string-wire-thong-rope.

“I will take you,” the voice said.

Before he could realize what would happen, he was wrapped down his length in that warm touch and moving—he could feel it under him, a quiver. The noise returned—a noise like the sound of hammering but much fainter and less regular. A distant clang and clatter. He slept.

At next waking, darkness had been replaced by light. He could see no source for it, could not name it, but he could see across a space to a solid wall of rock and see the surface of rock between himself
and that wall. That way—the light dimmed. That other way—the light seemed stronger. He looked down at himself: a body he recognized as … human. He lifted his hands, stared at them a long time in puzzled wonder. Slowly words came: “finger,” “thumb,” the numbers to count fingers with, the name “hand” for the whole. He had time alone to consider the rest, to recover the names: wrist, arm, elbow, shoulder, head and neck and chest … to remember that what he saw with were eyes, what he smelled with—still a smell he could not name—was a nose, and his mouth—his lips—his teeth …

He made a sound himself and remembered that he heard himself with ears. The sounds he made … were not words, though he did not have a word for words; he only knew the sounds meant nothing to him. Abruptly, his body made demands; he sat up and looked around. Without naming it, without knowing what he would do, he stood and, stumbling, one hand against the rock wall nearest, made his way toward dimness and found there a pot that smelled … right. Fluid emerged; he knew it should go into the pot and aimed it. Most did.

He turned, steadier now on his feet, and moved toward more light. He had lain … there on something soft. He did not want to lie down. He wanted to move; he wanted to see. An angle of wall blocked him; he moved along it and found between that and the other wall an opening half the width of the chamber he’d been in.

Beyond a turn of the wall, brightness stabbed his eyes; he squinted, blinked away the instant tears, and ventured closer, very slowly. A gust of air brought him more smells, smells he now thought he should know. He went on carefully, one step at a time, one hand always on the rock, until the rock fell away before him and he was looking out over shapes and colors, smelling too many things to count, seeing distance after distance melting away into haze. Colors … his mind dredged up only a few names, and none that quite fit but for “blue” of the sky … another word he remembered … and “green” for a small plant growing in another pot, just inside the opening.

He sat down, his legs failing him suddenly, and stared out at the vastness, his eyes watering, the water running down his face, and
tasting … salty, he remembered as he licked his lips. Salty. The light shifted as time passed; he did not think about that but merely noticed more light, a paler sky. The wind continued to blow across his face, bringing more strange scents.

“It is good to see you in the light,” said the same voice he had heard before.

He turned and saw a … human? Dark skin, unlike his, and fire-gold eyes. The human—if it was a human—wore dark clothes that rippled in the wind like … like … flames, only flames … were not … dark. The man held a pot, a pot he recognized, and carried it to the opening, closer than he himself had gone, and threw its contents outward, even as a long red tongue emerged from the man’s mouth and in a gout of flame incinerated those same contents and then—aimed at the pot’s interior, scoured the pot, and set it down.

“You are not human.” His own voice startled him. It spoke words, and he knew the meaning of the words, and more words rose in his mind, a chattering swarm of them. “Too many words,” he said then, and shut his eyes.

“You see truly,” the other said, and this time he knew the meaning of those words as well. “I am Dragon, and we share a name, you and I. Do you know it?”

He shook his head, unable to speak for the clamor of all the words. Something warm touched the heart-hand side of his face, and the words settled as blown leaves settle to the ground when the wind passes. He opened his eyes. “Dragon,” he said.

“Your name is Camwyn,” the dragon said. “Camwyn … dragon-friend.”

The words lay still in his mind, ready for his use, and now he knew the use. “I … am not at home,” he said.

“Where is your home?” the dragon asked.

He looked out into the blues and grays and tans for which he now had names and at colors for which he had no names because he had never seen them before. Now he knew the wind felt dry and hotter than it had. Now he knew the land below had no forests, nor farmers’ fields, nor pastures for beasts, for there was nothing green there and no water that he could see.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It was …” He felt around for direction and found none. “There were trees outside the city,” he said.

“Yes,” the dragon said. “There were trees and fields. Do you miss them?”

He thought about that. Between the vague memory of another place and time and this place now lay a thick curtain of nothing.

The dragon cocked his head. “Well. This has been a safe place for you, in this time, but you are correct: it is not your home. If you do not know where your home is, perhaps a new home will do.”

“Is there any water?”

“I brought water for you,” the dragon said. “A moment.” The dragon walked back down the passage, into the dark, carrying the pot, and returned shortly with a different-shaped pot and a mug.

Water. Cool, fresh, cleaning the last taint of salt from his … tears. “My name is Camwyn,” he said. “Has it always been Camwyn?”

“Yes,” the dragon said. “And you were a prince, and you will be a king.”

“I don’t remember,” he said. “I am Camwyn. Camwyn is my name … and my … myself.” He looked down at his legs, bare to the wind. Scars marked them. “I am not a child.”

“No,” said the dragon. “You are a young man. Do you want the tale of your coming here?”

Tale … the word meant story, a kind of story sometimes not real but also a story that could be real.

“Yes,” he said.

“You were beset by evil enemies,” the dragon said. “You fought them; they were many, and you were but one. You were wounded—those scars you can see, and also inside your head, where you cannot see. So you have no memory of that, but … you are alive, and now awake, and you have words.”

“Evil enemies” had a familiar sound, a sound that belonged in tales. “If I have words,” he said, “then … I can think.”

The dragon made a strange noise, almost like a kettle hissing. He remembered hearing a kettle hissing. “Words alone do not make thought,” the dragon said. “Good thought makes good words.” Again that cock of the head and a flicker of red tongue. “Tell me, Prince … are you wise?”

Almost, the question made no sense. Wise … slowly his mind retrieved the concept. He stared at the scars on his bare legs. “Was it wise to fight one against many?” he asked.

“It depends,” the dragon said, “for what reason you fought.”

“I do not remember.”

“You were trying to save a treasure from being stolen when everyone else was enchanted and could not respond. And you were afraid your brother might be hurt.”

“My brother—” He scowled, struggling to remember. “I have a brother? Where is he?”

The dragon sighed. “He is far from here; the people there had no way to save your life. So he let me take you away, since I have skills in healing they do not.”

“I should go—?”

“No. Not as you are. Let us see what wisdom comes to you, Camwyn. Consider a king—your brother—who loves you well and has seen you sinking near to death. He is offered a chance to save your life—and possibly but not certainly your mind—at the cost of sending you away with a stranger and very likely never seeing you again. Was that wise?”

Camwyn looked a long moment at that dark face and then down at his own hands. “If I loved a brother … if it was his death … but it would be hard.”

“It was hard. But was it wise?”

“It was love,” Camwyn said. His eyes watered; he did not try to brush the tears away. “I don’t know about wise.”

“A good answer. Now, imagine that king again: his brother is away, he hopes finding healing. His kingdom is in peril, and to save his people he must not sit worrying about his absent brother but act—act quickly—to save them.”

“Yes …” Camwyn looked at the dragon again. “Is that what is happening?”

“I am here, not there,” the dragon said. “But he expected trouble to come. Let me go on. That king, say, in that time—when perhaps trouble has come or perhaps is only nearing—what will it mean to him if his brother comes back, still weak, still with no memory? What will it mean to the kingdom?”

“He will be happy,” Camwyn said. “But … he will want to be with his brother and think only of his brother.” He scowled, thinking hard. “And … a king … he should think of his kingdom.” In his mind, a vague shape appeared … a crown, he finally realized. “My brother … you said he is a king. And loves me. But … I cannot see his face. I cannot … I do not know … his name.”

“No,” the dragon said. The dragon’s voice was soft.

“He would worry about that,” Camwyn said. “About me. And if there is danger … he might not be fast enough. He might … he might die. And the people.” He scuffed his feet—bare, pale—and looked down his thin scarred legs at them. “It would be … wise … not to go. Until I remember.” He looked back at the dragon. “Will I remember?”

“I do not know, Prince Camwyn Dragonfriend,” the dragon said. “But I know you just said a wise thing. And you still have a good heart. And you will be a fine king.”

“I don’t want my brother to die!” Camwyn said. “I can’t be king until—and I don’t want him to die!”

“That throne is not the only one in the world,” the dragon said. “I know a throne that needs a wise prince—yes, even a prince who cannot remember all his former life. No one need die for you to sit on it.”

Camwyn scowled. “Wasn’t there a king before?”

“Yes. An unlucky and not well-loved king and a Chancellor who broke faith with his oath.” The dragon tilted its head. “You are young, but you are not a liar nor a fool.”

“I hope not,” Camwyn said. He touched the heart-side of his head. Under his hair, he felt a ridge.

“You have a scar there,” the dragon said. “From a wound you took and the treatment that healed it. It is why your memory is gone, and it is why your healing took so long.”

“How long?”

“A full season,” the dragon said. “But now, it is time for you to strengthen your body more than you could do walking the bounds of this cave. We must go elsewhere.”

He wanted to ask where, but astonishment took him instead as the dragon stepped out into the air and changed before his eyes, then
uncoiled a long red tongue back into the cave. “Stand on it,” said the voice in his mind. “You have ridden this way before.”

Camwyn did so, and the tongue drew him in.

“Sit down and face the outer world,” the voice said.

He had a vague memory of some previous ride, when he stood up with … with someone else beside him … but he sat down on the warm dry tongue, solid as a plank, and gazed out. The cave entrance shrank—was distant—he could see the entire mountain and the small dark mouth of the cave, and then the dragon turned, and he was looking along the side of a mountain range larger than he had ever imagined.

“Is this the Dwarfmounts?” he asked.

“No. They are sunrising of here. We go north.”

North. He was unsure of that word and its meaning, but as the dragon flew along the line of mountains, he breathed in the crisp air that came into the dragon’s mouth. To his heart-hand, the land fell away into the pale tones he had first seen from the cave—another, smaller, line of mountains rose from beside a salt-white plain, and in the distance yet another. Rows of mountains, with nothing green between them. A streak of white fire moved across his vision.

“What was that?”

“A young dragon,” the dragon said. “They are all fire and no wisdom.”

Another streak, another—and this one came nearer.

“Will it hurt you?”

The tongue beneath him trembled; the dragon sounded amused as he said, “No. I am elder.”