City of Dragons

You are right, little queen. I will do better. Sometimes it was just easier to agree with Relpda than to argue with her. The little copper dragon was demanding, imperious, and as thoughtless as a child of anyone else’s needs.

She also worshipped him and depended on him as no creature ever had before. And he had fallen in love with the jealous, selfish, and spiteful little creature. “Little,” he said aloud as he buttoned his shirt and laughed at himself. Little only in comparison to the other dragons. Feeding her was becoming next to impossible. He was fortunate that Carson’s fish trap continued to supply a steady stream of fish. Without a daily morning ration of that, he knew that Relpda would have made his life miserable. As it was, he was feeling not just his own hunger pangs but hers, too.

He looked at the hearth. Hanging in the chimney, above the flames and in the smoke, were several sides of bright-red fish. The smoke both cooked and preserved the meat. It also added its own aromatic note to the various smells in the cottage. He was so tired of smelling things. He took his worn cloak from the hook by the door and gave it a shake before swinging it around his shoulders. Time to get the day started. Things to do. Haul water for washing and cooking. Feed his dragon, feed himself. But first he’d find out what it was that Carson was attempting to do. The tapping had become an uneven pounding.

He walked around the corner of the house to find Carson wrestling with a rough wooden frame. He had stretched a piece of leather over it, hooking it over pegs tapped into the sides. This “window” was what he was trying to force into the opening. As Sedric approached, the brittle leather split. “Damn the luck!” Carson cursed, and he threw frame and leather to one side.

Sedric stared at his partner as he directed a kick at the unsatisfactory construction. “Carson?” he asked hesitantly.

The word jerked the hunter’s attention to Sedric. A sudden flush suffused his face. “Not now, Sedric! Not now.” He turned and stalked off, leaving Sedric staring after him in astonishment. He’d never seen Carson so out of temper, let alone expressing it in such a childish way. It summoned unwanted memories of Hest. Except that Hest would have turned his anger on me, not stalked off to brood, he thought. Hest would have made it all my fault, for speaking to him.

He walked over to Carson’s abandoned project, picked up the frame, which was not much damaged by the kick, and regarded the stretched leather thoughtfully. He felt a pang of guilt as he recognized what it was. Leather scraped so thin that it still allowed light in but kept out wind and rain. Leather scraped of all hair and dried hard, so it would not smell as strongly. This was Carson’s response to Sedric’s complaint about the window coverings. Sedric scratched his stubbled chin, considering. He’d complained, with no thought that Carson would take the complaint as a criticism, or put so much thought and effort into trying to remedy things.

He was still holding the frame when he heard footsteps behind him. Carson took the window out of Sedric’s hands, saying gruffly, “It was supposed to just slide into place, so you’d wake up to light. But the opening is too far out of square. I wanted it to be a surprise for you, but it’s not going to work. I know how to do it, but I don’t have the right tools. I’m sorry.”

“No. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to complain so much.”

“You’re used to better. A lot better than this.”

There was no arguing with that statement. “But that’s not your fault, Carson. And when I complain, well, I’m just complaining. I don’t mean that it’s up to you to make things better. It’s just. .”

“You’re not comfortable here. I know that. You’re used to better, Sedric. You deserve better, but I don’t know what I can do about that.”

Sedric choked back a laugh. “Carson, it’s not as if anyone else has an easier life than we do. When the boat comes in, things will be better.”

“Only a little bit. Sedric, I watch you. I see how tired you are of all this. And it worries me.”

“Why?”

Carson gave him an odd look. “Perhaps because I was there when you made a very sincere effort to take your own life. Perhaps because I worry that the next time you try it, I might not be there. And you might succeed.”

Sedric was shocked. “I’m a different person now! I’m stronger than that,” he objected. Carson’s words had stung him, yet he could not have said why. An instant later, he knew. “You think I’m weak,” he accused the hunter before he had known he would say the words.

Carson lowered his eyes and shook his shaggy head. His response was reluctant. “Not weak, Sedric. Just. . not tough. Not in the way that deals with hardship that just goes on and on and on. It doesn’t make you a bad person, just-”

“Weak.” Sedric chose the word for him. He hated that Carson’s comments hurt so badly, hated worse the sting of tears in his eyes. No. He wasn’t going to weep over this. That would only prove him right. He cleared his throat. “I have to go to the fish trap and get something for Relpda. She’s hungry.”

“I know. So is Spit.” Carson shook his head as if tormented by gnats. “I think that’s part of why I’m out of temper today. It’s not you, Sedric. You know that.” He spoke the words almost pleadingly. He shook his head again. “That damn Spit. He knows he can make me feel his hunger. He pushes it at me. It puts me on edge all the time. It makes it hard to think and harder to be patient, even with a simple task.” Carson jerked his head up and met Sedric’s stare. There was determination in his eyes. “But I’m not going to take him food. Not yet. I’ve got to let him be hungry, hungry enough to try to do something about it. He’s a lazy little bastard. He should be trying harder to learn how to fly. But as long as I’m around to feed him every time he gets a hunger pang, he isn’t going to put any real effort into it. I’ve got to let him suffer a bit or he’ll never learn to take care of himself.”

Sedric pondered his words. “Do you think I should do the same with Relpda? Let her be hungry?” Even as he spoke the words aloud, he felt his dragon become aware of the thought.

No! I don’t like to be hungry. Don’t be mean to me!

“I know it seems harsh,” Carson said, almost as if he, too, had shared Relpda’s thought. “But we have to do something, Sedric. It can’t go on this way. Even if I hunted morning until night every day and was successful in every hunt, it wouldn’t be enough to feed them all. All of them are hungry, all the time, some more than others. But there’s a limit to what we keepers can do. The dragons need to make the effort to fly and to feed themselves. And they need to do it now, before it’s too late.”

“Too late?”

Carson looked grim. “Look at them, Sedric. They should be creatures of the air, but they are living like ground animals. They aren’t growing properly. Their wings are weak, and on some they’re simply too small. Rapskal had the right of it. From the time he first took charge of Heeby, he made her try to fly, every day. Look at her some time and compare the lines of her body to those of the other dragons. Look where the muscle is developed and where it’s not.” He shook his head. “Trying to get Spit to exercise his wings is difficult. He’s willful, and he knows full well that he’s bigger and stronger than I am. My only handle on him is food. He knows my rule. He tries to fly. And then I feed him. He has to try every day. And that’s what the other dragons have to do. But I don’t think they will until they’re forced to it.”

Not liking Carson.

But we know it’s true, Relpda. You’re too big for me to keep you fed. I know how hungry you get. I bring you food, but it’s never enough. It’s never going to be enough until you can fly and make your own kills. We both know that.

Falling hurts.

Being hungry hurts, too. All the time. Being hurt from falling will stop once you learn to fly. But if you don’t learn to fly, the hurt of being hungry will go on always. You have to try. Carson is right. You have to try harder, and you have to try every day.

Not liking YOU, now.

Sedric tried to mask how much that hurt his feelings. I’m not trying to hurt you, Relpda. I’m trying to get you to do what you have to do in order to, well, to be a full dragon.

I AM a dragon! The force of her incensed thought nearly drove him to his knees. I am a dragon, and you are my keeper. Bring me food!

In a while. He hoped she could not sense that he was deliberately making her wait. His own stomach rumbled in protest.

Carson gave him a sideways glance. “You should eat something.”

“I’d feel guilty to eat while she goes hungry.”