The Book of Earth (30 page)

“Maybe the cat never actually broke skin. Maybe she was just wet from all that mud and ice.”

But Erde shook her head vehemently. She had seen the dark blood glimmer the night before and felt it, slick and hot, turning cold on her hands.

“Well, it was the cat’s blood, then,” Hal protested. “No wound heals that fast! Unless she’s magic.” This thought made him laugh for some reason, and he put the mystery aside for the time, sending the goat on her way with a bemused slap on her rump. “The Mule’s gone on ahead–our ‘magic’ goat can lead us down this time.”

E
rde shed her thick woolen cloak after the first few switchbacks of the long descent. Though it was still damp from the rain, she stuffed it unceremoniously into her shoulder pack and wished the mule was there to carry it for her. Next she found herself loosening the collar tie of her linen shirt. For the first time since leaving Tor Alte, there were too many layers, her clothes felt too heavy. She was actually hot.

She’d forgotten what it was like to be free of rain and mud and sleet, free of the confining weight of wool and padding. She inhaled the perfumed air and felt as light as a feather floating on it. She flapped her arms experimentally, like a dark-headed stork considering flight. Earth picked up this image from her as he lowered himself step by ponderous step behind her. He sent back panicked entreaties of caution. Erde giggled voicelessly, giddy with heat and her newfound sense of freedom. Then a stone rolled beneath her heel and nearly sent her cascading over the edge into oblivion.

Hal heard the clatter of pebbles and glanced around sharply. “Do not, I repeat, do NOT hurry. The way is treacherous.”

The dragon echoed this sentiment.

Yes, it’s treacherous
, thought Erde,
but so was every place we’ve come from, and at least this has a path
. She was eager to get down it. It was narrow, slippery and steep, but appeared to be a used thoroughfare. Mostly by animals, perhaps, being too precipitous to be satisfactory to any but the truly surefooted. Still, it gave her hope that they might actually be going somewhere, not just wandering about in
the wilderness, as she’d sometimes begun to think. If they were getting somewhere, she reassured the dragon, they might actually find their Mage City. To please him, she conjured the familiar cluster of tall towers gleaming at the end of a long white road. She breathed in the sweet warm scent of the rising air and watched the elegant dance of the hawks wheeling in the sun. She could feel the sun and sudden warmth working on the dragon as well. He, too, watched the birds, with wonder and longing. She tried picturing him with wings, vast gossamer webs like Glasswind’s, all the colors of the rainbow. It wasn’t right, somehow. It didn’t fit. But she could imagine him in flight, the two of them together, not soaring like the hawks, but . . . 
traveling
.

“Milady, pay attention!” Hal warned again as she stumbled into him with her eyes fixed on the sky.

*   *   *

They came down off the cliff through an old fall of boulders that spilled out across the bottomland like a stone archipelago in a sea of waving green, a green so rich it seemed to vibrate before Erde’s eyes. The soft air was pungent with odors. It went to her head, as if she’d inhaled a sweet young wine. Ahead, the trail vanished beneath waist-tall grass. The she-goat stopped immediately to graze. Hal stripped to his jerkin, tossed his cloak over his shoulder, and struck out confidently across the plain toward a grove of trees in the near distance. The swish of the grass against their boots was like the breathing of large animals. Erde followed dreamily, dazed with sun and heat and sweetness, and the suddenness of the change.

The grove was a large circle of oak trees, thick-trunked and ancient. Their broad outer limbs arched high, then swooped nearly to the ground, enclosing a leafy cavern within their shade, paved with moss and rounded stones like river rock. A peaceful stillness hovered there, a sense of refuge and contentment. Erde was reminded of the great-hall of Tor Alte, with its treelike columns and branching rafters. This grove had the same grace but lacked its chill solemnity. Small creatures busied themselves everywhere, among the leaf piles and in the burrows between the spreading roots. In the center of this shadowed whispering space, where the branches thinned, a shaft of sunlight filtered in onto a small still pond. On the grassy shore, a
cairn of rocks stood guard over a herd of drinking deer. Nearby lingered one or two very thick and shaggy brown creatures that Erde decided must be cattle of some wild variety. As they approached the cairn, she saw the flat top stone was piled with wildflowers as fresh and bright as if they’d just been picked. The deer lifted their heads, muzzles dripping sparkling beads of water. They seemed merely curious, breathing in man-scent and dragon-scent as if both were simply information, then moving away slowly to graze or lie down in the deeper shade.

Erde sensed Earth’s quickening interest and his hunger, and felt both consciously set aside. He raised his own great head, deerlike, testing the air, and promptly vanished.

Hal knelt for a drink at the pond. “He’s getting very good at that, but why . . . ?”

A voice hailed them, a cheery greeting from the far side of the copse. Out of the shadows trotted the mule. In place of his pack and harness, he bore a smiling woman, sitting astride his bare back, at ease and waving gaily. Erde pulled her prentice cap down over her ears and tried to think herself back into her disguise. As the mule shambled to a halt in front of them, the woman slid off gracefully, planted her sandaled feet, and spread her arms wide.

She was small, a head shorter than Erde, with delicate ankles visible below the shin-length hem of her loose-fitting garment. The soft white fabric was dye-printed in shades of blue, birds in flight. Erde could see that the full skirt was split, like baggy leggings. She was instantly envious. This was exactly the sort of garment she had always wanted. She was equally envious of the woman’s brilliant infectious smile and the dark cloud of hair that danced around her shoulders as if it was alive. Erde thought she had never seen anyone so beautiful.

“Hello, Raven,” said Hal. Erde watched openmouthed as the knight snatched the woman up in a hearty embrace.

When he’d set her down again, Raven held him at arm’s length for serious study. “A sight for sore eyes! You’re looking well, Heinrich.”

He offered a courtly bow. “And you, my heart’s desire, as always. How are you all keeping?”

Raven’s fine mouth tightened, a brief shrug in her gaiety. “Oh. Well enough, all things considered.” She gripped both
his hands, then released him gently. “More of that later. What have you brought us this time?” She turned to smile at Erde. “Forgive us. His visits here are so rare and so welcome.”

“Of course. Permit me.” Hal looked too happy to be embarrassed. He snatched Erde’s cap off her head and fluffed up her cropped hair playfully. “Raven of Deep Moor, may I present the Lady Erde von Alte.”

Raven laughed and clapped her hands as if at a feat of magic. “Traveling incognito! How exciting!”

Erde was unsure of Raven’s social standing or what ceremony might be appropriate. She certainly did not dress like a lady, or as Erde had been taught a lady should dress, or behave like one either, riding about bareback and flinging herself into men’s arms. But Erde wished neither to presume nor condescend with one who called the Baron Weisstrasse by his given name and was so familiar with his person. She bobbed shyly, and looked to Hal for a further hint. Her hesitation was not lost on him.

“Raven,” he offered slyly, “is Queen of All She Surveys.”

“Oh, my lord, you are too kind!” Raven dropped into a ground-sweeping curtsy, then rose out of it with a giggle and hooked Erde’s arm within her own. “Welcome, my dear. Erde, is it? Are you hungry? Thirsty? Has he exhausted you with his mad trekking about? Well, no mind, we’ll feed you here and rest you and pamper you like you must be used to!”

A flush of pride made Erde wish she could point out to this woman that if she’d been your usual petted high-born, she’d never have made it this far. She also thought it peculiar that Raven spoke in collective pronouns and went about touching or holding everyone she talked to, even a perfect stranger.

“We could all use a little pampering,” remarked Hal.

Raven threw him a dark smiling glance. “Oh, you’ll get it. When do you ever not?”

He laughed, and stretched luxuriously. “It is very nice to be here. Do you have any idea what it’s like out there?”

Raven sobered. “We hear, and none of the news is good. Tell me, which way did you come? Did you meet Lily and Margit on the road?”

“No, but we weren’t ever on the road. Are they coming or going?”

“Coming, we hope. From Erfurt. They’ve been out quite a while. Too long, actually, and we’re worried, since Doritt said they shouldn’t go at all. But Rose has heard nothing, so . . .” She shrugged as if all this made sense, then cocked her head. “But wait . . . the Mule said three?”

Erde wondered if she actually meant
said
.

“Three, indeed,” replied Hal as if he’d heard nothing unusual. “Four, with the goat. He never counts himself, you know.”

The she-goat had wandered into the shadows to graze, but Erde could feel the dragon waiting nearby.

Raven gave her musical laugh. “Then someone is hiding . . .”

Hal dipped his head gravely. “My lady Erde, will you make the introductions?”

Erde tried to smooth the doubt from her forehead. Her own identity was revealed, and now she had to trust Hal’s judgment that the dragon would be safe. She asked Earth to make himself visible.

He appeared gradually, like a memory returning. A shaft of sunlight rippled across him in waves as the branches shifted in the breeze. Was it a trick of the light, Erde asked herself, that made his color so newly rich? She thought of him as, well, rather dull and dirt-colored—but now he was vibrant with sienna, ocher, and olive. Had his crest always been the dark blue-green of winter spruce? Suddenly, he almost seemed the hero’s vision of a dragon, his great amber eyes shining like beacons out of the mossy shade.

“Oh!” Raven’s hands flew to her cheeks. Bright tears started in her eyes. “Oh, Heinrich! Oh, wonderful! You finally found one!”

“My lady Erde found him,” Hal corrected, looking Earth over with approving surprise. “I found her.”

Raven’s awe did not include a moment’s fear. Nor did she complain that this was small for a dragon, and wingless. She went straight to him and laid her hands on him, petting and murmuring as if to a lover, telling him how beautiful he was and how welcome. She flirted with him, just as she seemed to with everyone she met, and Earth blossomed in the bright warmth of her praise. He stood up straighter and
arched his massive neck, then tried to curl his stubby tail. Erde was caught between jealousy and laughter. She’d never seen him preen before, and she could sense a spark of self-confidence waking in him. But then, she hadn’t told him he was beautiful all that often. She hadn’t thought he was, until now.

“A living dragon,” Raven cooed adoringly. “And just this morning, Rose said she thought something remarkable was about to happen.”

“He is called Earth,” said Hal. “And he needs your help.”

Finally, Erde understood. Raven was not just any woman, she was one of
the
women, of whom Gerrasch had spoken.

“Then he shall have it,” she replied. “Of course he shall.”

*   *   *

Raven led them out of the oak grove and along a faint track that undulated across the rolling grassland toward a darker line of forest crowning a distant rise. While Hal told their story, Raven strolled next to him, her opposite arm slung over the mule’s withers, her loose linen sleeve pushed up past her elbow. The arm was slim and brown, as smoothly muscled as a young boy’s. Erde felt herself weak and pallid by comparison. She dropped back a few paces, then several dragon lengths, unsurprised when Hal and Raven didn’t notice her absence, too absorbed in news and gossip and each other.

Under the full gaze of the sun, Earth was reduced to more mortal dragonkind, though still no longer “dirt-colored.” It was as if one filmy obscuring layer had fallen away but others remained, still cloaking the full beauty waiting underneath. Erde sent him an image of a snake shedding its skin, then a butterfly climbing out of its cocoon.

—
I think you’re changing. But it’s all right, you know. It’s like growing up
.

Earth took the notion away with him into his mind to think about.

That same bold valley sun told Erde that Raven, though beautiful, was no longer a girl. Beyond that, her age was mysterious. She behaved so much like a girl, or perhaps,
so unlike a grown woman, at least the grown women that Erde had known. She thought Raven was one of the lucky few who can act however they please
because
they are beautiful. People think anything they do must be beautiful also. If someone ugly puts their hands all over you without asking, you’re insulted. If a person is as beautiful as Raven, it’s no longer an affront. It becomes flattery.