“Thus he entreated Helen for the story of Ilios. ‘Fair and noble guest, tell us your tale from the beginning …’”
A dog nosed Anna awake, sniffing her face and licking the dried juice of meat off her fingers. She could tell by the somber gray of light within the hall that dawn was close at hand. Helen lay fast asleep on a heap of dirty rushes, her breath a liquid snore. Helvidius had fallen asleep still sitting, head draped over the table; he would regret that later, when his muscles stiffened.
She had to pee.
She got up and picked her way over the sleeping servants, tiptoed around the men-at-arms who reeked of ale and piss and sweat. Outside, in the open dirt yard, she crept around to where a line of privies had been dug up against one palisade wall, well away from hall and longhouse. The sky grayed toward twilight and the last stars shone faintly, fading into the growing light of dawn.
The stone keep stood like a stolid, faithful servant, its shadow blunt against the lightening sky. Outbuildings were scattered about; she saw a flash of coals, bright red, from one of the open huts. Smiths and tanners worked outside the palisade wall now, so their stink wouldn’t disturb the sleep of the householder, her kin, the mayor of Gent and his retinue, and their noble guest.
Here, by the privies, the noble guest was clearly disturbing Mistress Gisela’s niece.
“I beg you, Lord Wichman,” said the young woman, twisting away as she tried to hurry back to the safety of the hall, “I have much work to do.”
“What better work than what I can give you, eh?”
“My lord.” She tugged out of his grasp and slipped sideways, trying to escape into the gloom. “Forgive me, but I can’t stay.”
Angry, he grabbed at her cloak, jerking her up short. “I hear it said you thought yourself good enough for my bastard cousin Sanglant. Surely you’re good enough for me!”
At first, Anna thought the slow hiss came from the niece, preface to an angry outburst. Then she saw a pale stream of light trailing above the distant treetops, undulating in languid curves. A great golden beast rose into the sky, and as the sun’s rim pierced the bowl of the horizon, its roar shuddered the air.
The niece screamed and bolted. Young Lord Wichman, still groggy from a night of drinking, gaped at the sky, groping at his belt to draw his sword. He staggered back and Anna shrieked as the dragon, its golden scales more blinding than the sun, flew directly over the holding. Gouts of flame boiled upward into the clouds, the hiss of fire meeting ice. Anna had never seen anything so beautiful or so terrifying.
“Dragons!” shouted guards from the wallwalk.
Lord Wichman sheathed his sword and cursed. His bland face suddenly creased with delight, and he spun and ran toward the stables, shouting. “To arms! To arms!”
The alarm sounded, horn blasts piercing the quiet of dawn.
“Dragons! Dragons!” The cry lifted again as men-at-arms scrambled out of the hall and servants brought horses from the stables.
She had to get back to Master Helvidius and Helen. Ai, Lady, she had to get back to Matthias who, with the other tanners and laborers, slept outside the main palisade in little enclosures sheltered with mere fences, more to keep livestock out than to protect against fearsome beasts. But could anything protect against a dragon?
The huge creature rose sluggishly, each flap of its wings like a sheet of gold thrumming and throbbing in the air. Slowly it banked and turned for a second pass. Before she knew what she meant to do, she ran for a ladder and climbed up to the wallwalk to get a better look. It was madness; ai, Lady, indeed, she was crazy and Matthias would say as much, but even Matthias must be astonished by the sight. This seemed more uncanny, more miraculous, than the daimone chained in the cathedral. She had to get a better look. And perhaps from this angle she could see the tannery.
She had to hop and scramble up, hooking her arms over the top of the palisade and brace herself on the logs, in order to see over. What she saw caught her breath in her throat.
The guards at the gate yelled again: “Dragons!”
But they were not pointing at the sky.
Through the deserted camp, strewn now with the remains of hovels and shelters, littered with garbage and beaten to dirt churned muddy by yesterday’s rain and frozen by the last night’s frost, rode a hundred horsemen. Their helmets gleamed, fitted with polished brass. Their gold tabards shone as brightly as the dragon’s scales, each one marked with a menacing black dragon, miniature hatchlings that rippled and moved as the Dragons approached.
As from far away she heard a man shout in a thin, hysterical voice: “Don’t open the gates! Don’t open the gates!”