“The Lady Artifex must have used code because she only wanted it to be read by other Riders.” Master Johannes cleared his throat, and started leafing through the pages as he read out different passages aloud to us.
“Lady Artifex writes, ‘The High Queen grows more difficult with every passing day – every passing watch it seems sometimes!’” Master Johannes read aloud, and I felt my cheeks blush in shame as I remembered the angry and frustrated impulses that I myself have been having. “‘Again today, the High Queen goes to her Keep, and seems to disappear for hours at a time. I wouldn’t mind or even have known, were it not my job to protect and guard her at all times – how can I do my job when she seems to run off!’”
Okay – so at least that part of the Old High Queen Delia’s behavior I couldn’t claim (I hoped!).
“And, much later…” Master Johannes said, holding several pages open as he flicked forward through the text. “‘Today was the day when it happened, and I think I will remember it until my very deathbed. The day that she summoned the dragons. She went up to the old shrine on Mount Hammal, with its collection of ragged mystics, and there, she… I don’t know what it was that she did, to be honest, but two of the largest dragons that I have ever seen flew upon us!’
‘I am not ashamed of saying that I was terrified, because I was. One was as gold as the morning sun in summer, and vast in size – while the other shone with many hues. I was sure that they had come to destroy us!’”
“Mount Hammal is this very mountain,” Abioye whispered to me, as he too listened alongside me.
“‘These two great dragons – who must truly have been ancient in age to have grown so large – landed, and the High Queen approached them alone. I was told to look after her three sons, where I stood with her complement of knights….’
‘We watched as the High Queen talked, gestured, waved her hands and implored, and one of the dragons flew off – the multicolored one – but the other, the larger gold, stayed. Something had been agreed between them, and after a while, Delia asked for her sons, the princes, to be brought forward to meet this great beast.’
‘What was I to say or do with this order! I half-expected them to be given up as sacrifices to the beast as I stepped forward – but no, the gold just looked at them with one red-gold eye before breathing over all of us, and it was done. A contract or a deal or a promise had been made, and after that, the High Queen traveled up the sacred mountain every night, just before dusk, to confer with the ancient gold.’”
“She must surely be writing about Zaxx the Gold…” Montfre murmured, and I flinched internally as a wave of Ymmen’s repulsion rolled over me. But if that was this great dragon-tyrant that my noble dragon had warned me about – and Fargal the sleeping dragon was his sister – did that mean that the multicolored dragon who hadn’t stayed was Fargal?
“‘The gold dragon tunnels ceaselessly through the nights, and the earth grumbles and shakes, and strange smokes and fires can be seen over the mountain…’” Master Johannes continued to read.
“‘During the day, the gold appears to sleep, as all is still – save for the entire flocks and herds of cattle and geese that us knights are forced to send up the mountain for him.’”
“They were feeding him,” Abioye murmured. “Keeping Zaxx the Gold happy to do whatever it was the Old High Queen wanted him to do…”
“And here!” Master Johannes had once again flicked forward a few pages to the next relevant passage. “‘The High Queen wears a new crown now, one made of stone with small pointed edges, although I do not remember any stonemasons, jewelers, or artists being called to the palace…’”
“Ach!” There was a small needle of pain from the Stone Crown, almost as if it knew that it had been recognized…
“‘…the High Queen’s powers grow stranger and more terrible with every passing of the moon. She had always had a touch of magic running through her blood – it was strong enough to feel if she looked you in the eye – but now it is different. I swear that I can feel her even before she enters the room, such is her presence…’”
No one, as yet, had claimed that of my ‘presence’ I thought – a little relieved, actually.
“‘She can stop rain and hurl storms back to those foolish few lords who still try to oppose her’” Master Johannes read. ‘She has powers I cannot even begin to fathom. She can call lightning. She can make the earth tremble and shake under our enemies feet – but even that isn’t the strangest thing…’” Master Johannes cleared his throat a little nervously. “‘…every day, the dragons come. Dragons of every size, shape, and hue, and they come to fill the crater with their raucous screeching and calling.’
‘There are Stocky Greens and Sinuous Blues, Crimson Reds and Giant Whites, as well as the smaller ones – the Vicious Oranges, the Mountain Blacks—’”
“Ymmen?” I murmured out loud, under my breath at this litany of dragon species and shapes.
‘I am NOT a Mountain Black! I am Ymmen, and Ymmen means me!’ I received the reply, with a hot and indignant blast of frankincense-laden air in the back of my mind. Okaaaay, I thought, not really understanding what the difference was – but obviously it was important to him!
‘—and the dragons are whirling around the mountain at all times of the day now, before settling to roost inside the crater. The queen is calling it a Dragon Sanctuary, and that the crater itself is off-limits to humans – until she or the gold deems it otherwise.’”
Master Johannes sighed, frowning deeply as he flicked forward towards the end of the book, but he muttered as he did so. “It is common knowledge that it was on this sacred mountain where the bond between human and dragon was finalized,” he explained. “There have always been dragon-friends amongst the humans, but it was here where humanity were finally able to call on their dragon allies, and to learn how to ride them – eventually becoming the Dragon Knights – or Riders that we know today. It just feels a little strange to read it thus,” the Master Johannes added uncertainly, and I could already guess what he was about to say before he confirmed it out loud for me.
“We were told that the dragons were already here, and that they willingly gave their friendship to us – but now it reads as though there was some kind of deal struck, dragons and magical power in return for what – easy food?”
The idea seemed to upset the old master greatly, but that didn’t stop him from continuing his search through the Lady Artifex’s coded journal.
“‘I have decided. It has to be done,’” Master Johannes read out loud, in one of the final passages of the entire slim volume.
“‘The High Queen has asked me to go on expedition to the Empty Plains, beyond the World’s Edge Mountains—’” the passage began, and I found my teeth champing together involuntarily at this very Three Kingdomer description of my birthplace that was neither empty nor the edge of the world.
“‘I have overheard her discussions with her band of vipers – her councilors, the Dragon Monks of Mount Hammal – they need more resources, more land, more everything for her kingdom to grow. It already stretches from the northern ice wastes right down to the southern deserts – how much further does she really want to go?... But I am being sent anyway, and the information that I provide, I know will be used for her to dominate and subjugate whatever peoples I find there, just as I have seen her torch entire villages with dragon fire for daring to hold back their taxes…’