by G. A. Aiken
But to his great disappointment, Olgeir the Wastrel no longer earned his son’s devotion. The old dragon had broken the truce they had with the Southlanders and had betrayed one of the warlord dragons he had an alliance with. The Northland Code was all, to dragons like Vigholf. A clear set of rules and guidelines with loyalty being the most important. Yet his father was loyal to no one but himself, so how could he expect others to be loyal to him in return?
Vigholf heard the pounding hooves of his brother’s war horse and turned to watch him ride up. It still amazed Vigholf how his brother did that. Most hoofed animals wisely stayed away from their kind because they knew how easy it was to become dinner. But his brother never had that problem. Animals were drawn to him, birds perching on his shoulders, wolves and deer resting at his feet, and horses taking him anywhere he needed to go though he could easily fly.
They’d never been very close growing up, Ragnar the Cunning a confusing mix of brilliant fighting skills with talk of philosophers and Magick. But Vigholf had learned to appreciate the skills his brother held and his true Northland spirit.
“Ho, brother!”
“Vigholf. You have news for me?”
“I do.”
His brother dismounted and got his horse to wait simply by sliding the palm of his hand down his forehead.
“Well?”
“I found out why our kinsmen have been heading back to the Horde lair. Da’s got himself a prize.”
Ragnar’s face twisted as if he expected to get punched. “Tell me it’s not that bloody Gold again.” Then he looked panicked. “Tell me Father doesn’t have Dagmar.”
His loyalty to that human female had always managed to stun Vigholf. She seemed quite plain and uninteresting to him, but for twenty years Ragnar kept his eye on her. Protecting her when he could, comforting her when he couldn’t.
“Calm yourself, brother. It’s neither. In fact, our father has gotten himself something much more valuable than one of the Dragon Queen’s sons.”
“Which is?”
“The Dragon Queen’s daughter.”
Ragnar stepped close, his excitement evident. “The Dragonwitch? Morfyd?”
“No. The other one.”
His brother’s face fell. “The slag?”
Vigholf shoved his brother’s shoulder. “Don’t be a bastard, Ragnar! Not all of us follow the dictates of monks.”
“It doesn’t make me a monk because I’m a bit choosy about my bed partners. How did he get his claws on her anyway?”
“She was on the wrong side of the Outerplains, it seems.”
“Foolish dragoness, and again he’s breaking the truce by snatching one of their females.” Ragnar began to pace. What he always did when he was trying to work something out. “So they’re all going back for The Honour.”
“Of course. A fresh dragoness to fight for until the last dragon is standing? Who among our kinsmen would miss out on that?”
“When is it?”
“I don’t know. Da hasn’t given a date yet, which is strange for him. He usually likes to get them mated off and out of his hair as fast as possible. I’m not sure what he’s waiting for.”
“I know. He wants her to call on her kin. Get them to fly in here to help her, and then he can get his war.”
“And every warlord will side with him if they think the queen made the first move. But I don’t think the little Red called on anyone. The Gold, her brother—if he knew about his sister, he didn’t show it.”
“He didn’t know. Neither did Dagmar, or she would have told me.”
“Even after she found out you’d been lying to her all these years?”
“She has more to gain by giving me information than withholding it. And what I did is not something I’m proud of, brother, so do not speak of it again.”
Vigholf had no idea why his brother would let it bother him so, but Ragnar was not an easy dragon to understand.
Ragnar stopped pacing. “The Southland dragons haven’t arrived because she hasn’t called to them. She’s going to try and get out on her own.”
“Why the hell would she try that?”
Ragnar faced him, his smile bright. “The beauty, my dear brother, of a mother-daughter relationship.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means she’ll move heaven, earth, and any number of hells to get out of there without her mother finding out.”
Vigholf shook his head. “You’re going to use this, aren’t you?”
Ragnar threw his arm around his younger brother, giving him a rough hug. “What kind of scheming, plotting bastard would I be if I didn’t?”
Gwenvael slept on and off for the rest of the day and well into the night. The scent of more food woke him up, and another meal and a delicious concoction of wine mixed with healing herbs had him up and wandering around his aunt’s house. It seemed a large step down for a princess who’d hoped to inherit her mother’s throne upon her death—and the death of any other siblings in her way—but Esyld seemed to be quite content.
They chatted for a while, Gwenvael busy bringing her up to date on his kin while leaving out any political talk completely. He left her tying dried herbs together and still laughing when he went out to find where Dagmar had wandered off to.
He found her behind Esyld’s house, sitting on an overturned trunk and staring out over a small stream. With bottle of wine and fresh fruit in hand, he walked up to her.
“See?” he teased. “I noticed you were gone.”
She jumped at the sound of his voice and kept her head down. “I didn’t hear you coming.”
“Most don’t.” He stepped in front of her and examined her closely. Her spectacles were on top of her head, and she was digging in the pocket of her gown for something. She was nervous and sniffling.
Knowing he wouldn’t get a straight answer out of her, Gwenvael gripped her chin and tilted it up until she looked him in the eye.
Tears. Real ones.
She jerked away from him. “I’m fine. You can stop looking at me like that.”
“Tell me.”
“No.”
He sat down next to her on the trunk. “I have wine.”
She wiped her eyes and ignored him until he opened the bottle and held it out for her.
“It’s good wine.”
She took the bottle from him and swigged several gulps down. She handed it back to him and muttered, “It’s a bit weak.”
Gwenvael took a healthy gulp and almost choked it back up. “Weak,” he squeaked out. “Definitely.”
Locking the top on the bottle, Gwenvael placed it down in front of them. “Now I want you to tell me everything. Tell me the price you had to pay to free me from the Horde.”
She began to sob and when Gwenvael tried to put his arms around her shoulders, she shrugged him off. He felt cold fear grip him. “Gods, Dagmar, what did they do to you?”
Still sobbing, she reached into a hidden pocket of her skirt and pulled out a piece of parchment. She shoved it at him.
He glanced at the seal but didn’t recognize it. Quickly tearing it open, he read it. It was written in the ancient language of all dragons; although a few of the letters were penned slightly different, a few of the words possessing different meanings, it was still readable to his eye, if not to a human’s like Dagmar.
“It’s to my mother. From a Ragnar of the Olgeirsson Horde.”
He blinked, raised a brow. “Ragnar? That wouldn’t be sweet, caring Brother Ragnar you told me about, would it?”
She nodded, continuing to sob.
Gwenvael winced. “I understand how that could upset you, Dagmar, but I can assure you it’s a very common practice. My grandmother attended colleges all over the Southlands as human and no one ever knew.”
She pointed at the letter and continued to sob.
“Dagmar, all it says is that he’s responsible for me being alive and safe and wants to talk to my mother about an alliance to help him overthrow his father.”
/> When she continued to cry, he went on, “This is standard political crap. I don’t understand why you’re so upset.”
Swallowing back her tears, “We both know this”—she pointed at the parchment in his hand—“is, excuse my father’s term, elk shit. We both know he doesn’t simply want me to convince you to take me to the Southlands just to get this ridiculous letter into the Dragon Queen’s hands.”
“So?”
“Which means he really wants me there for another reason. Once I’m there, he’ll want me to do something to benefit him.”
“Probably true…so?”
“And normally, I would jump at the chance. To travel into the Southlands. To meet Queen Annwyl and bargain for a much better deal than I got with you.”
“That was an excellent deal.”
“Normally, I’d lie and connive and do whatever necessary to make you take me into the south.”
“But…”
More tears began to flow. “But that thing…”
“Thing? What thing?”
“That thing…in one’s head…that tells you when something would be wrong to do. It won’t let me do it.”
Feeling a sudden high level of annoyance, Gwenvael carefully asked, “Do you mean your…conscience?”
Her tears turned into hysterical sobs, and she went down on her side, her head dropping into his lap.
“Dagmar! Everyone has a conscience.”
“I don’t!”
“Of course you do.”
“I’m a politician, Gwenvael! Of course, I don’t have a conscience. At least I didn’t. Now I’m cursed with one. And it’s your fault!”
Somehow he knew that last bit would happen.
Why didn’t he understand? Why couldn’t he see? A conscience made her weak and vulnerable. Another poor female to be taken advantage of. Next thing she knew, she’d be planning parties, begging her father to arrange for suitors, and thinking about having children.
This was a nightmare!
“Stop it,” he ordered, grabbing her shoulders and forcing her to sit up. “Stop it right now.”
“Just say it. Say that I’m pathetic. That I allowed that bastard to trick me for twenty years and I never realized it and now I have a bloody conscience. Just say that I’m worthless and get it over with.”
“I will do no such thing. You have a conscience. You’ve always had a conscience. You might as well face it.”
She scowled at him through her tears. “Liar! I’ve never had a conscience before now.”
“Dagmar, you attacked a dragon that breathes fire because he was going to eat your puppy.”
“I had to protect him.” And when he smirked, she quickly added, “He has a use.”
“Looks a little small to be one of your battle dogs. So what use does he have?”
“Who else would eat up all the scraps off the floor?”
“Dagmar.”
“All right, all right. Fine. I have a conscience. There. Happy?”
“Ecstatic.” He crouched in front of her and wiped her face with the sleeve of his linen shirt. “Annwyl’s going to like you. She doesn’t like to think she has a conscience either.”
“I’m not going with you, but I will give you the information you need and I have maps that should help.”
“Good. You’ll bring them with you when we leave for the Southlands in the morning.”
He had to know this was dangerous. Ragnar wanted her in the south for a reason, but neither of them knew why. “Don’t be foolish, Gwenvael.”
“I’m not.” He grabbed the wine and settled on the ground, his back against the trunk. He took her hand and tugged her to his side. The thought of sitting on the ground did nothing for her, but it seemed an evening for such things.
Taking a sip, he handed her the bottle. “Before we do anything, though, I need answers to important questions. Honest, direct answers.”
“All right.”
“What’s coming for Annwyl?”
“Minotaurs.”
He sighed. “I asked for honest, direct answers.”
“And that’s what you got.”
“Minotaurs? Standing cows are coming for Annwyl? You want me to believe that?”
“Standing cows that are trained from birth to kill in the name of whatever gods their elders worship.”
“Did Ragnar tell you about the Minotaurs?”
“He did. But I heard it from others. I believe it’s true.”
“Fine. Then I’ll believe it’s true as well.” Gwenvael took another drink of wine. “I have to say the day is getting stranger.”
“And your second question?”
“How did you get the name Beast?”
Dagmar rubbed her forehead, the pain of her past returning violently. “And that’s important to know why?”
“Tell me.”
Dagmar held her hand out. “More wine.”
“When I was thirteen,” she began, suddenly looking much younger than her thirty winters, “one of my father’s nephews came to visit. He was much older than I, but we’d never gotten along. Apparently I was a ‘know-it-all bitch who should be tossed into a convent’ while he ‘should have been strangled at birth and thrown off a mountainside as our ancestors used to do.’ Needless to say, when he came to visit this time, we kept our distance. Yet he was never a smart boy and rumors quickly spread that he’d been making fun of me to his men. Telling them I was ‘growing into a right beast.’ I ignored it, even though my father and brothers had also heard the same rumors. But I didn’t say a word or complain. Just didn’t see the point.
“One night, a day or so before he was supposed to return to his father’s lands, I left the kennels and was about to enter the fortress. I heard one of the servant girls and went around the corner to make sure everything was all right. I didn’t like what I saw and she seemed to be even unhappier, so I grabbed my cousin and pulled him away. Angry and drunk, he grabbed my throat and punched me in the face, breaking my spectacles.”
“Bastard.”
She chuckled, but kept with her story. “As usual, however, I was not alone. I had Canute’s great-grandfather with me. As he’d been trained to do, he took my cousin to the ground by the throat and held him there, waiting for my next command.” She stopped, took another gulp of wine. “My cousin was begging me to call him off, and by this point my father and three eldest brothers were standing behind me after they’d been fetched by the servants. I looked at my father and said, ‘I shouldn’t.’ He replied, ‘But as a Northlander, we all know you will.’ I knew what was expected, so I did it.” She swallowed. “I gave the command and my dog…finished him. The next day my father sent the remains back to my uncle with a note that read, ‘A little gift from The Beast.’”
“And that uncle was Jökull?”
She nodded. “And that was Jökull’s favorite son. Not long after was the siege that killed my brother’s wife.”
“You blame yourself.”
“Sometimes. I can’t help but wonder where we’d be if I’d only given a different command.”
“Too late for those thoughts. They don’t help. Besides, I don’t worry about what I should have done. I only worry about what I’m going to do now.”
“Yes. That sounds about right for you.”
He got to his feet. “Come on. We need to get ready.”
“You still plan to bring me to the Southlands?” She held out her hand and he grabbed it, easily hauling her to her feet. “Seems foolish to me.”
“Maybe. We’ll see.” But he didn’t think so. Nothing had ever felt more right before in Gwenvael’s life than taking Dagmar Reinholdt to Dark Plains with him.
“I’ll need to send my father another letter before we go.” She wiped the dirt from the back of her skirt with both hands and gave that wicked little grin he’d learned to enjoy. “And I think I could use your help with wording.”
Sigmar shoveled food into his mouth and completely ignored his daughter-in-law. Ever since Dagmar h
ad gone off with the dragon, his oldest boy’s wife had been more and more impossible.
It wasn’t news that she hated his daughter, but she needed to face the fact that she didn’t stand a chance against The Beast. Few did.
“All I’m suggesting is that a marriage between her and Lord Tryggvi would do you very well.”
“Is that right?” Sigmar asked, putting down his spoon. “What do you know about him?”
“He’s the ruler of Spikenhammer and is an excellent warrior.”
“True enough. What else?”
“What else? Well, I know his mother is—”
“His mother? What do I care about his mother? I mean what about him? Which gods does he worship?”
“I don’t know. Who cares?”
“You should. What if he worships them gods that demand sacrifices? Human sacrifices,” he said before she could mention oxen or deer. “How does he handle crime in his city?
What kind of executions does he run? Does he believe in torture? If so, what kind?”
Her mouth opened and closed several times, but she had no answers.
“That’s the difference between you two.” He looked at his sons, each of them eating heartily before they headed off for training. “Isn’t that right?”
They grunted agreements around their food.
“You don’t know those answers, girl, but she would. She sure as fuck wouldn’t come to me with some half-thought-out idea. She’d have already asked the questions and found the answers.” He slammed his finger into his temple several times. “’Cause she thinks that one does. Which is more than I can say about you.”
She looked at Sigmar’s oldest. “You going to let him talk to me that way?”
“Only if he’s right. And he’s right.”
“My lord.” One of the servants rushed in. He was the one Dagmar worked closest with, and he now handled many of her duties now that she was gone. He was smarter than most but feared Sigmar enough not to push anything. “Another missive from Lady Dagmar. It seems to be nearly three days old.”
“Read it,” Sigmar ordered him.
Opening the sealed parchment quickly he began, “‘Dearest Father. I hope this letter finds you well. I know I promised to be at Gestur’s by now, but there’s been another change of plan.’”