Sea Dragon Heir Read online

  Table of Contents

  Introduction - DEATH

  1 - LIFE

  1 - DREAM

  2 - TRUTH

  3 - LOVE

  4 - RITES

  5 - BRIDES

  6 - MAGIC

  7 - PRINCE

  8 - FATE

  9

  10

  2 - REBIRTH

  1 - THE BRIDE

  2 - THE DOMAIN

  3 - MEETING THE SEA

  4 - OTHER WOMEN

  5 - DRAGON PRIESTESS

  6 - SISTERS

  7 - WOMAN OF THE LAND

  8 - PRINCE

  9 - DRAGON QUEEN

  3 - REVENANT

  1 - HOMECOMING

  2 - OLD CARADORE

  3 - SEDUCTIONS

  4 - GHOSTS

  5 - SORCERESS

  6 - PERSUASION

  7 - HOME

  Epilogue

  This book is dedicated to Deborah Jayne Howlett, my incomparable friend, whose humor and love have brightened my life for many years.

  Introduction

  DEATH

  THE LADY OF THE castle huddled with her children in the shattered tower. The sky reached down in grey mist and bitter smoke, between the broken stones. Below the lowering clouds, the shadows of circling birds danced like demons, screeching with parched throats for carrion. All around the castle, the sound of battle still crashed; the hoarse cries of desperate men, the ring of steel, the immaculate hiss of arrows. The lady’s cheek was dry, as were her eyes. Her arms were about her children, and she muttered in the ancient tongue an invocation. “Come rise, come unto me, deepest dream, come from the foam, from the lost and lone. Come rise, come unto me, leaping heart, here to my sight, to my soul.” The children were silent among her dust-scored, ragged skirts. Their eyes were old and their faces grave and resigned. Grubby fingers clung to her, perhaps without hope. The lady knew that below her, amid the blood and the noise, history was being made. Her line, and her husband’s line, would not end here, but change. When the men with the black and purple banners pierced the heart of Caradore, came loping like wolves down the seared passages and, finally, beat down the last door of her sanctuary, they would no longer be fired with the lust of killing. Her invocation had made sure of that, even if she lacked the power for greater effect. Her body might suffer, as would the bodies of her older daughters, but they would survive. It was necessary. Had not her guides taught her the wisdom of patience? History was a tapestry long in the making, and through time the threads would change. She must protect the heir to this house, whatever it took. ?Come rise, come unto me ? .? Her voice cracked. “Mama.” A single word. “Hush, little one. Hush.” She rocked her body back and forth, waiting for the heart’s pierce which would tell her that her husband was dead. There was a moment’s stillness, and fragments of dust, ash and straw sifted down from the ruined ceiling. Then came the baying roar from the enemy, the irrepressible caw of triumph. She felt it in her heart, felt the light go out. It doesn’t matter, she told herself, it doesn’t matter.

  THE CONQUEROR, THE KING of fire, was Cassilin, son of the great Magravandian house of Malagash. Now, he held court in the place where once the banners of the Palindrakes had swung. The hall of old Caradore had been unsealed; its ceilings were embers. Rain came down now, turning the pungent ashes to a gruel of bone and earth. The grey blocks of the walls were blackened, bannered with bright blood; the smooth flagstones of the floor slick and dark, their crimson carpets soaked like moss, releasing an odor of must and meat fat. The Palindrakes, and their rough army, had fought with passion to defend their ancient domain, and the king of fire respected this. An entrenched code of honor nestled uncomfortably beside his ambition and lust for power. He had coveted this high, feral land, and now it was his. Caradore, and its guardian family, the Palindrakes, had once belonged to the sea. Their flags were adorned with the ocean’s brutal, yet fragile, monsters: sea dragons; proud, attenuated and coral-frail. If the mournful cries of their shattered ghosts echoed from the ocean now, no one heard them. The flags had fallen and were burned. The elements had clashed and fire reigned triumphant. The king of fire was omnipotent, drunk on his conquest. Wherever he moved in the world, crowns fell before him, and towers and banners. He was the spearhead of the new empire, filled with the energy of the god, Madragore, and his smoking eyes. This wind-sculpted corner of land was not far from the heart of his empire, but had proved resistant. The ancient families here knew the old wisdom and used it. They understood the language of the waves and their cold denizens. Ultimately, it had been no match for the hot, youthful zeal of Madragore. When his men had finished with the women, the king, who would be emperor, had them brought unto him; the wife of his slain enemy, her cowering daughters veiled in blood. Boy children hung wide-eyed from their skirts. They could not swear fealty to Madragore, the god, because in their terror and despair they could not speak. He would be merciful. Someone called out, “All hail to Cassilin Malagash, divine king, emperor of Magravandias, the spiritual son of Madragore! All hail!” The king of fire accepted this annunciation. It belonged to him. He had coveted this land for a long time; it was beautiful and wild, as were its people. He also needed its special power for his campaigns. Now, he rose from the blackened throne and addressed the lady of the castle, whose husband was dead, his head impaled upon a rail somewhere in the outer courts. “Madam, I grant you the clemency of Madragore. Give to me your eldest son.” The lady did not cringe or falter. She remained silent, her body bent with pain and despair, yet somehow regal. The king of fire stepped down to the floor of the court, his mailed feet firm upon the scum of drenched ash and blood. He inspected the brats pawing their mother’s skirts, seeking a hiding place, finding nothing but rents and tears. One by one, he prized them away, held them up by their arms to inspect their faces. They dangled in his grip like puppies, wriggling feebly. Which was the one? She would try to hide the dragon heir. She had no doubt put a glamor on him. It was essential he was recognized, the mark of Madragore put upon him. The king found an idiot boy, who drooled, whose eyes rolled. He did not look like a son of the House of Palindrake. It must be the one; ensorcelled. The king knew he had made the right choice when the lady uttered a low, sad sound. He hauled the boy across the floor and called for his mages. They came to him from the shadows; some drooping with age or dissipation, hidden by cowls, others fierce and upright with narrow eyes and lipless smiles. They bowed to the king of fire, their tall crowns of black and indigo inclined precariously. “Do what has to be done,” said the king, dropping the boy at their feet. The mages walked around the crawling child, their hands curled above their hearts. Their robes hissed along the damp floor, but otherwise they made no sound. Presently, they began to hum, each chest expelling a different tone. It seemed the notes writhed together in the air somewhere above their heads and become another thing; dense and definite, yet invisible. The boy was caged by their voices, and the glamor that protected him decomposed. He crouched with terrified eyes, trying to appear staunch and resigned. The king of fire and his black sorcerers were not deceived. At a signal from the mages, soldiers stepped forward and lifted the boy between them. He was carried out into courtyard, where bodies lay like slaughterhouse rags and tatters of banners flapped soddenly in the sea wind. The rain had seethed away, but the wind itself was damp, tasting of salt. A fire now raged in a blackened brazier in the center of the yard; its flames a gout of color in the rinsed world. The boy knelt with bowed head, his hands between his knees, his black hair like a veil about his face. Only a short distance away, his father’s head grimaced from its pike. The body lay somewhere among the others, discarded and unrecognizable, its center of power hacked away. The mages stripped the boy of his clothes and then bound his body
with a net of indigo cords. They shaved off his thick black hair. All the while, they chanted in guttural, snarling voices. Their words seemed to leave smoke hanging in the air that the wind could not disperse. Once they had bound him, he was flung between them, spinning round, presented to each of the elemental corners, while his clothes burned on the spitting fire that leaned away from the wind. The king of fire watched the ritual without expression. In his heart, the small thing that gave him grace empathised with the Palindrake heir. The boy looked so vulnerable, shaved and naked, stumbling as the mages pushed him cruelly around the courtyard. The cold must be biting into his young skin, seizing his bones. But it is necessary, thought the king. The dragon heir must bow to Madragore. Now the mages held the boy firm beside the fire. A brand had been heating there, bearing the mark of the god. The boy did not struggle, perhaps had become mindless with fear, for he was so young. He began to shudder uncontrollably once the brand had been pressed onto the back of his neck, but he did not cry out. The mark was livid against his pale skin, and an ephemeral reek of burned meat filled the hurrying wind. They took him then down to the shore, where the waves pounced upon the rocks, destroying themselves in clouds of foam. Here, another fire was built, splashed with liquors to encourage the flames. The widow of Caradore and her remaining children were conducted there also, to watch the final ceremony. The sea was grey, implacable, and the sky full of tears that did not fall. Never had Caradore seemed so unwelcoming and stark. The archmage, a tall, inhumanly pale and reptilian man, stood behind the boy and faced him out to sea. The dragon heir had been dressed in a robe of dark indigo, so that he looked like a neophyte priest, with his naked head and thin neck. The brand was crimson above the collar of his robe and glistened with pain-killing unguent. He must be in possession of his senses for this ultimate rite and pain robbed any man of such acuity. The archmage’s voice was soft, yet it rang out clearly above the crash of the waves, the complaint of the wind. “Hear me, oh lords of the spiritual west, the realm of water. We take unto ourselves the rightful heir to the provinces of the sea, who is Valraven, son of Mestipen, son of Rualdon. We take unto ourselves the power of the dragon heir, so that he must pay fealty to the lord of fire, Madragore, father of the great mountain, of the flame of the soul. As the heir bears the mark of Madragore, we say unto you, should he not serve God’s avatar in life, should he forsake the banner of Magravandias, the fire now within him will consume his body and all in his domain.” The mage’s voice became quieter, confidential. “Do you understand this, boy?” The boy paused, then nodded his head once. He understood. His mother’s words came back to him dimly, from a hundred years ago—yesterday—as the ground had shaken at the approach of the Magravandian horde. The sun had shone then, and the flags on the seven towers had cracked in the clean wind. Clouds had raced high across the sky as if in panic. “Remember,” his mother had whispered, “your life is safe. If your father lacks the power to protect himself, and the power passes on, the enemy will not kill you. You are only a boy and they will think you tractable, easier to control than your father. You must do as they direct and be patient. The line must not die with you, Valraven, but sleep. All things come to an end. Find the faith inside you, wrap it up carefully and lay it to rest. Never speak of what you know to your sons. The heritage must be forgotten. That will be its salvation. Others will come later and find it. It will be a secret gift to your own heirs.? Now, he bowed his head and felt the seared skin on the back of his neck stretch and burn. He knew what they would tell him to do next, and perhaps a more fearless person might refuse. His father would not have approved of his mother’s advice. He would have told Valraven he should die rather than betray the power they served. Their line might die, yes, but the power would not go away. It would only wait for someone else. Valraven could not be that brave: he wanted to live. “Repeat after me,” said the archmage, his fingers like clamps on the boy’s shoulders. “I, Valraven, heir of Caradore, swear fealty to Madragore and all his denizens.” Haltingly, the boy spoke, his voice thin, hardly heard. The mage nodded approvingly and continued. “I give unto my god all the power of my tribe, and of the sea, and of its creatures. Should I forsake my oath, may the fires of Madragore consume me and my domain.” Further up the beach, cold tears ran down the face of the Lady of Caradore. Imperceptibly, she shook her head. Yet it was right that this should happen. Valraven must not die. There had been enough waste. Old Caradore was lost. She already knew that she and her family would be moved to the summer castle further south and there the new seat of the Palindrakes would be established. The Palindrakes as Madragore’s servants. No one could fight Magravandias, not yet. It would take many lifetimes. Her eldest daughter slipped her hand through her elbow. Together, they watched the waves pulse up the shore, reaching for the fire that burned there. Presently, Valraven was led away by the mages, and everyone began to climb back to the scene of battle. The lady paused at the cliffs foot. She saw the tide’s return and the fire hiss to blackened ashes. The water dragged the embers into itself, until there was only a faint mark upon the sand. It was a message from time.

  1

  LIFE

  1

  DREAM

  Two hundred years later:

  WHEN PHARINET WAS ONLY seven years old, she dreamed of the dragons. They danced in the sky for her, like moving pictures from a book, their wings of shell and bone fanned out against the piercing stars. She stood on the beach below them, jumping up and down, clapping her hands. They danced for her alone. When she awoke, it was still dark, and she could hear the restless sea fretting at the shore below the castle. The dream had filled her up with strange sensations that felt like excitement, the sort of feeling she had when she was about to go out visiting her friends with her brother, Valraven. She still wanted to jump up and down. Although she never mentioned the dream to anyone, she thought about it often, until it eventually became buried beneath layers of other dreams and experiences. In later years, she would realise that the dragon dream had marked the moment when she’d discovered there was more to life than what the senses beheld, and what others told her. Life was a secret, or a labyrinth of secrets. She had entered the outer chamber. Her father had still been alive then. Pharinet’s mother had died as she’d struggled to expel her daughter into the world. The girl child had followed the arrival of her twin brother, Valraven V, by scant minutes; setting the precedent for the haste in which she strove to keep up with him in later life. Pharinet knew her mother only from portraits, which her grieving father had hung about the castle. In every room, dead Lerinie still held sway; gazing down her patrician nose, smiling privately upon her children. In some ways, the pictures were rather sinister. Pharinet wondered what her mother had really been like. She was astute enough to recognise the gloss of her father?s feelings over the portraits, since every one of them had been commissioned after her mother?s death. When she asked Valraven what he thought, he seemed uncomfortable and would only mutter a stupid answer. Everna, her older sister, told her that was what boys were like. They couldn’t talk about personal things, so Pharinet shouldn’t be surprised or affronted. Everna was only too ready to relate stories of their mother. She had been nine when Lerinie had died, and despite the fact she had adored her mother, seemed not to resent the twins for their part in her demise. She had become their surrogate darn, and enjoyed the role. Memories were perhaps sweeter than reality. As far as Pharinet could gather, Lerinie seemed to have had little time for her elder daughter. She had been a busy woman, forever gadding about Caradore visiting the estates of other noble families. Everna suggested that Lerinie had had a purpose for her, which she’d been keeping on hold until an appropriate time, such as the onset of womanhood. Unfortunately, her unexpected death had prevented her from revealing what this purpose might have been. No one had thought mere child-birth could have killed Lerinie. She’d been so strong. Resigned and loyal, Everna had picked up the bloodied mantle of motherhood and wrapped it around her own small frame. Perhaps it had been that wh
ich had made her grow. By ten, she was tall enough to peer over the heads of several of the castle guards.

  VALRAVEN SENIOR WAS sometimes away from home for months at a stretch, because he was held in high esteem by the emperor and was therefore required to spend time at court in Magrast, the capital city, or else direct campaigns for conquest and containment further afield. Everna told the twins that since their mother’s death, the emperor, Leonid II, had allowed their father to spend more time at home. The emperor himself had visited Caradore on several occasions, each time claiming over dinner that the sea air did him good. He looked upon his visits as holidays, even though he brought with him a milling entourage of clerks, generals and attendants, and spent most of the time closeted in Valraven Senior?s private office discussing politics and war. Pharinet and her twin thought the emperor rather a ridiculous figure. He was neither tall nor fat, but seemed altogether too large to fit comfortably into any environment. His voice was not coarse or even particularly loud, but it carried far. His laughter was free and spontaneous, but somehow inappropriate. He was eager and bouncy, like an overfriendly lion cub; tawny and golden and laced with hidden claws. They supposed he’d look more at home in the great city Magrast, where everything was grand and organized. Caradore was sprawling and relaxed, and the emperor seemed like an irritant within its shell, getting bigger and bigger as his visit progressed, perhaps in the same way that a pearl forms in an oyster from a grain of sand. He singled the younger Palindrake children out for attention and, as they wriggled uncomfortably beneath his compelling gaze, told them about his own sons. The scions of the empire were paragons of male virtue, accomplished in every desired skill. The emperor never brought any of them with him to Caradore, however, and if there was a Madam Emperor, she might as well have not existed. Sometimes, in her bed at night, Pharinet would think about how the greatest man in all the world sat drinking and chatting with her father somewhere below. The Palindrakes were the most privileged of families. She knew that her great-great-grandfather’s sister had been married to an ancestor of the emperor’s—his great-great-grandfather—and that the two families were therefore related. The emperor did not feel like a relative, though, despite his attempts at avuncular charm. If his sons were her distant cousins, why hadn’t she met them? “The man we see is not the man that is,” Everna said, during one of his visits. “He is like a god in Magrast, yet here, he can be a boy, perhaps the child he never was. We should not be deceived by appearances. In the capital, he would probably barely acknowledge us.” Everyone in the castle knew that the emperor came to Caradore to escape the city. Perhaps, if he’d not had this refuge, he’d have gone mad. It must be difficult for one man to keep taut all the reins that controlled the empire. Everna said that after their mother had died, the emperor had come straight away to Caradore, perhaps abandoning important business in Magrast. He cared for their father, and despite his elevated status, took charge of the household in the wake of grief, organizing an unusually grand funeral for Lerinie and making sure that the business of the estate ran smoothly. After Lerinie died, Valraven Senior should have taken another wife. Everna told Pharinet that he must have more male heirs in case anything should happen to Valraven Junior. There had been two other boy children between the birth of Everna and the twins, but both had died. Pharinet was appalled by the idea her brother was not immortal, and did not want to think what life might be like without him. Still, whether their father had the intention to remarry or not, he did not outlive his crushing grief. When the twins were ten, he was involved in a riding accident and died from his injuries. Afterwards, Pharinet had seen the grey stallion responsible; rolling his eyes and stamping in his stall. Later, the men of the castle had built a fire on the beach, and everyone had gone down there in the evening. One of the women from the kitchen had slit the throat of the horse and the blood had run down the sand to the sea. No one questioned that Everna was now mistress of Caradore; Valraven’s guardian and spiritual guide. She was only nineteen, but dressed and behaved like a much older woman. Pharinet could not feel sorry for her father. She sensed his life had not been happy; grief had bowed his shoulders and greyed his hair. Dead wife, dead sons. It had pained her young heart to see him moving slowly around the castle alone, lost in his private thoughts. When he’d looked upon his surviving children, his eyes had been full of sadness. They’d never heard him laugh, yet he’d been kindly, if remote. He must have loved their mother so much. Now, his spirit was free. As the people of Caradore danced a slow, wistful pavanne upon the wide shore, Pharinet had felt a lightness inside her. It must be hope or freedom. After their father’s death, the emperor did not visit Caradore again, although he would send gifts to the children to mark various religious festivals. Sometimes, Pharinet wondered how he was coping without his sanctuary. Had they all made him feel so unwelcome that he no longer felt he could visit? She could not say she liked the man particularly, but deep in her heart felt sorry for him, realizing at the same time, this solicitude might be misplaced. She discussed it with her sister, and Everna sent a letter to the emperor’s steward, tactfully worded, but implying they hoped His Mightiness would still look upon their home as his. They received a formal reply, thanking them for their invitation, but making no mention of a visit, although there was a paragraph concerning Valraven Junior?s future training in the army. The letter was altogether disappointing, if not slightly threatening.