Hunting of the Last Dragon (3 page)

Greetings, Brother Benedict! Writing already, I see, and my day's narrative not even begun! Ah—I can guess why. Yester-eve the Abbot asked me about the stuff called paper, that the Chinese write upon, and I wondered how he heard of it. Now I remember that I mentioned paper to you yesterday afore you picked up your pen, while you unrolled the new parchment. I'll warrant you told the Abbot of it, and that now he thinks there might be other pearls of wisdom in these pleasantries of mine. I suppose he instructed you henceforth to write down every word. 'Tis a waste of good ink, Brother; I swear I'll not drop any pearls until you hold your pen, ready and inked. What? Still writing anyway? It comes of swearing obedience to your Abbot, I suppose. Well then, without further ado, on with the tale.

My father had told me to listen for news at Rokeby. Though I had forgot his instruction, I did hear news as I was about to leave. I overheard two women speaking, and got the words “burned to the ground” and pricked up my ears.

“Aye,” one of the women was saying, her voice hushed, “everything was destroyed, they said. The whole of Wicklan, the fields and all. 'Tis the beginning of the Day of Judgement, for sure.”

Wicklan? They spoke of Thornhill, surely, that was razed yesterday? I moved nearer, and listened as they continued.

“Only the priest escaped,” went on the first woman. “He hid in the crypt beneath the church, and came out three days later to find that all was ash and blackened stone. He ran all the way to the next town, arrived babbling like an idiot, his hair gone white overnight. He said he saw what did it. Saw it coming, flying down from the sky with fire pouring—”

“Hush!” whispered her friend, glancing at the children gathered about their skirts. She added, in a brighter tone: “Let's go and see the bear, Mary. Mayhap they will bait it with a pack of hounds. That will cheer us up and entertain the little ones.”

They wandered off, leaving me disturbed, my new-won joy gone down a notch or two. As I passed the last
pavilion, the picture on it caught my eye. It was an evil image: a being half human, half animal, with outlandish scarlet robes, devilish slanting eyes, and tiny hooves. Craving distraction from the news I had heard, and not a little curious, I joined the line that was beginning to form outside. A brawny man was taking money as people filed in, and a lad stood beside him shouting: “See Lizzie Little-feet, curiosity from the great Empire of China! Discover heathen rituals! See foreign costumes of priceless silk! Hear the mysterious language of Babble!”

Slowly we shuffled forward, one by one entering the dimness. I was one of the first in, so I got a good place again, right near the stage. Afore long the pavilion was near full, and there was a great deal of jostling and pushing behind me. Children were grizzling to be picked up so they could see, though there was nothing yet to be seen, save an empty stage and a large bolted wooden box painted with hideous faces. The box was guarded by a man, who was shortly joined by Tybalt himself. The swordsman recognised me, and gave me a grin and a wink.

Behind me, a boy asked if the freak was dangerous, and whether it had two heads. “I don't know, son,” the lad's father replied. “But she's a wicked heathen, so she'll have horns, more like, and hoofed feet.”

Other people laughed, though there was little mirth in it. Then the pavilion entrance was closed, putting us all in darkness. Instantly there was silence. Of a sudden I was afraid, thinking on another freak I had seen in another fair, long ago when I was small. That freak had been hideously misshapen, his face disfigured beyond any semblance to a human being, and I had been in terror of him, though he was heavily chained. Could this monster be worse?

A torch was set aflame, lighting the box and the faces of the men bending over it. People pressed forward, and I was crushed so hard against the stage, I had to put my hands on the edge of it to brace myself. The faces on the painted box were so close I could have spat on them.

The box was unbolted, the lid thrown back. Ghostlike in the semidarkness, a figure rose from within. It raised its arms, there was a shimmer of red silk, and the torch was passed quick beneath its face. The face was small, human, yet different. Only for a moment I saw it—saw the alien brown features, goblin-like and freakish, with dusky wild hair and coal-black almond-shaped eyes—then the torch was whipped away. Truth to tell, I was disappointed. Hardly a freak, this, compared with the other I had seen!

The person was lifted out and placed upright on
the stage. Small it was, half lost within folds of scarlet silk, teetering like a child barely able to stand. Then it lifted its shining hem, and the torchlight passed close by its feet. They were small, far too small for human feet, and I thought they must be devil's hooves. Then the freak began to walk. Up and down the platform it walked, not quickly, but with tiny limping steps, as if its feet were chained closely together. Its head was bent, its hands folded at its waist. I watched, appalled and entranced. Was it human, or was it some alien half-thing, unnatural and demonic? Just then the freak stopped hobbling and turned to face us all. In the leaping flame-light from the torch I saw its face again, and realised, with a start, that it was a maid.

“Speak, O Heathen One,” commanded Tybalt, holding the torch flame by her head.

For a moment she hesitated, swaying as if her tiny feet were hardly able to support her, though she was slight enough to be blown away by the wind. Then she opened her mouth and chanted a bizarre little song, her voice high and lilting, making words as strange as spells. When she had finished, she very politely bowed low. People cheered and clapped, though I did not. I don't know what I felt—fear, or fascination, or pity. She was like a changeling, a strange brown elf-child, enchanting and fragile. Some of the people standing
close called her a hobgoblin and spat at her.

Tybalt commanded the freak to do something else, and she sat on a stool and took off her tiny shoes. Being close, I noticed that her fingernails were long and curved, like claws. Her feet were bandaged. At another order from her keeper, and with the torch held close to her, she removed the bindings. Her feet were grotesque, misshapen clumps with the toes and heels curved down and inwards, almost touching underneath. And they were flat, shapeless, as if the bones had all been broke.

“They've been bound up like that since she were a little child,” announced Tybalt. “That's what they do in the barbarian land she's from. It's to keep the women in their place, you see. To stop them a-wandering, and gossiping, and getting up to mischief. A very sensible custom we would do well to take on, here.”

Some of the men chuckled, shouting agreement, and their wives scolded them.

“That fine garment she wears,” Tybalt went on, “it's silk, made from worms.”

People roared with laughter and disbelief.

“True!” he cried, smiling a little. “You've heard of the East, of the Silk Road, of old Cathay, and the Orient, land of silk and fabulous furs. Well, that's where she's from: China. She's an Easterling. Our kings and queens
wear purple finery brought along that famous Silk Road from her far land. And more than silk is brought: fine treasures, idols of silver and gold, and all manner of jewels. A long way she's come, this barbarian maid, to entertain and educate you gentlefolks. Heathen she is, prays to golden idols and devils and all things wicked and forbidden. Her people are uncivilised, backward. They live in ignorance and heinous sin. You'll never see the likes of her anywhere else in our land, so look well.”

Several people made the sign of the cross, doubtless fearing that the very presence of the heathen maid might breathe evil over them. An echo of my grandfather's ravings came to me: something about the Black Death coming from the East, filling the sky with fire and blowing to England on evil winds. Had she seen the fire, this tiny freak? Is that why her eyes were narrowed and slanted—to shut out the light and the heat from the fiery skies?

“How did you come by her?” called out a woman.

“Well, that'd be telling a great secret,” said Tybalt. “But you may be sure, she's rare and precious.”

Other questions were asked, not all answered. During them the maid remained very still, her hands folded in her lap, her small, strange face uplifted. Around me, people began to leave. Tybalt departed,
doubtless to his own tent for another breathtaking performance with his sword, leaving the other man to stand guard. I stayed, I know not why, looking at the freakish girl upon the stool. Slowly she bent and bound the linen strips about her feet again, then pulled on her tiny shoes. When she raised her head, I alone was left.

As her gaze met mine, her lofty look disappeared, and to my surprise she smiled.

“You let Tybalt play his sword about you,” she said. Her soft voice was mildly accented. Her words, and the expression on her face, startled me.

“How do you know?” I asked. It felt odd, exchanging words with her.

“Your hair,” she said.

“Ah.” I touched the top of my head, feeling the bristles. “Well . . .” Tongue-tied again, as always, with a maid—even a freakish one.

“He has done that but few times before,” she said.

“Done what?” I asked.

“Shaved off hair. Most people tremble so, he dares not do it. You must have been right brave.”

“Not brave,” I said, and felt my face grow hot. “Scared stiff, more like.”

Again she smiled, then her guard roughly picked her up and carried her out an exit at the back of the tent. As they went outside I glimpsed a cage with a
dark grey canvas across the top.

I was left alone in the silence. A strange feeling fell on me. I cannot say 'twas fate, or a foreknowing, but it was something akin to it. I knew that we should meet again.

Do you need rest, Brother? You yawn—a yawn brought on by the evening's warmth and the mead, I hope, and not because my tale is dull. I thought that I was getting into the swing of it quite well. Ah—I just noticed—your candles are near burned out. We'll continue after dinner on the morrow, and I'll tell you what I found when I went home.

Hail, Brother. 'Tis straight into the tale today, for this is the hardest part of it for me, and the sooner done, the better.

On the way back to Doran I practised with my new bow: shot at a hare and hit a hill. The wind was stronger than I judged, and sent my arrow amiss. The road seemed longer, too, and it was sunset when I left the woods and began to climb the last rise that lay between my home and me. Most of the time I walked with my head down, watching the road for ruts and holes, but as I left the woods and began to climb the hill I smelled smoke in the air, and raised my eyes. I saw a terrible thing. The brow of the hill still hid my village, but the sky above Doran was black with smoke, spreading high and wide, veiling the low sun.

Disbelief went through me first, and then a fear so
deep that I could scarcely breathe. I ran up the hill, stumbling in my haste, half blind with acrid fumes, fine ash, and tears.

Doran was gone. Burned bare. Trees, wheat, farm carts, ploughs, vegetable plots, sheep, goats, chickens—everything was gone. Only some of the clay block walls of the cottages still stood, and they were black, many cracked and fallen in the heat. Thatched roofs were gone, the little wattle fences between the houses, the wooden sheds where pigs were kept, the ploughs and carts—all gone. I recognised nothing, for everything was black. Even the little lanes had vanished, or I could not make them out with fences and gardens and farm buildings disappeared. There was nothing. Nothing but ash and glowing embers, and smoke. And the stink . . .

I don't remember much of that night. I still have nightmares of running to and fro on the edges of the glowing ash, choking and retching in the smoke, howling for my parents, for little Addy and Lucy and the twins, and Grandfather. In my dreams the air is full of screams and wails, and I suppose they were mine. I could see my home, a blackened husk. I tried to run to it, but the embers and heat and fumes beat me back. The air was full of the smell of roasted meat. And there was another smell, deeper than the smoke, a sulfurous
smell that stung my eyes and nose, and tasted bitter in my mouth. I still can taste it, even now.

The next thing I remember clearly is washing my hands at dawn, in the stream that ran to the ruined mill. My palms were blistered, bleeding, covered in black ash. My clothes were filthy, everything was black, and the soles of my boots were scorched. I remember that I washed my face in the stream, and looked up after, expecting to see the village there as it had always been, and Addy running up to vex me with some new game she wanted me to play. Several times I did that, washed and looked up, craving to see Doran again the way it was.

But it was not, and Addy never came.

There was no wind, and the day was hot, uncannily quiet. No birds sang, no cattle lowed, and no crickets chirped. I found one tree at the edge of what had been the south wheat-field. I climbed up and sat there, high in the branches among the ash-laden leaves. Hiding, perchance. Waiting.

From there I could see the layout of the village, and better make out where the houses had been, though much was hard to recognise. Scattered in the ashes, and across the stubble in the charred fields, were distorted piles of blackness. I realised, after staring at them for some time, what they were, and horror so great
came over me that I screamed and wept, and curled up into a little ball in the tree, and prayed for death, cursing the mischance that had led me out of the village that day, guilty that they all had died and I had not. Then I slept, evil dreams mingling with the stink of smoke and death.

I awoke with a shout and an almighty crash, and found myself flat on my back on the ground, with human legs all around me. I cried and laughed, thinking they were my own Doran folk, and it had all been a dreadful dream; but then a man bent over me, and I saw that it was Tybalt. I could tell from his face, and from the other faces bending close, that it was no dream. Around me, people were arguing about what caused the fire. Some were saying it had been soldiers; others said it was the wrath of God, or the beginning of Judgement Day. Then someone said the Black Death must have come to Doran, and the people had shut themselves in and burned themselves and all they had, to keep the pestilence from spreading. I lost my wits, I think; I seem to remember howling like a madman, and kicking and biting the people who tried to help me. I refused the food and drink they offered me, even refused to touch my bow and arrows, which a boy had found somewhere. I am ashamed to think how rude I was to them, telling
them to sod off and leave me be. Tybalt tried to reason with me, but I swore at him, and in the end he forced me into the long covered wagon he travelled with and slept in, with his family. I fought, and he hit me, I think, for I woke up with a throbbing head and aching jaw, and found myself alone in the wagon, being jolted along the road like a prisoner going to his hanging. My very teeth rattled, my head ached, and my heart was so sore I wept in pity for myself.

And that, Brother Benedict, is how I came to be staying with Tybalt's family, and how I came to meet up again with Lizzie Little-feet.

I have told enough for today, for thinking on these things makes me mortal tired. I'll go for a walk around the monastery gardens, for they are very beautiful, and there is peace in them. Mayhap I'll find Brother Tobit in the vineyard, with his hoe and cheery face and wicked jokes. Did he ever tell you the story about Adam and Eve and how they— By God's bones! Are you writing this down, as well? I'm off!