They gathered in the room’s far corner while Anfen snored deeply at the other end. ‘He’s out for a good while yet,’ said Loup. ‘But these are his rules we’re about to break, so hush or we’re in it, deep. Here’s the story. We’re taking a quick nap. Anfen, he don’t understand visions, thinks it’s risky.’ Loup looked suddenly angry, twisting his whole face into a curdled bunch of wrinkles and beard. ‘Oh aye, can be, but so’s taking a step outside at night. And you can’t stay inside all your damn life, just cos you might kick your toe out there!’
‘Easy …’ said Sharfy, a hand on his shoulder.
‘Oh aye.’ Loup nodded. His face uncreased, his toothless smile returned. ‘Who’s to say? We might just learn stuff that’s useful. Aye, you sometimes do.’
‘You’ve done this before with black scales, right?’ said Eric.
Loup stared into the distance. ‘Once. Girl who did it wouldn’t say what she saw, but she was … different, after. Glad she went, oh aye. Went on for big things, that one, riches and power. Whether it was what she learned in her vision, or what she’d have done anyway, not for me to say. I miss her.’ He sighed, eyes distant for a moment. ‘Black visions fade too, sometimes. Might just pass out and wake up, see the vision itself sometime down the track. Hope you’re not riding a horse or walking a ledge when you do!’ He turned to Sharfy. ‘You done red ones and green ones, aye? Done gold?’
‘Not gold,’ said Sharfy. ‘Done purple, bronze.’
‘Aye, bronze! That’s wild enough, there’s your out-of-body. Still, let’s see what black puts you in for. Rare treat, a black one!’
‘Let’s start,’ Sharfy said impatiently. ‘Eric, spare a pinch?’
Eric opened the small leather pouch.
‘Some red in mine,’ said the soldier, taking a small battered pouch from his pocket, inside which was a tiny amount of ground red-white powder, fine as table salt.
‘You and your mixing. Pure black for me,’ said Loup, gums glistening. ‘And enough left over, Eric, for more down the track, if you’re wanting. But don’t you do it without me there to help you! Not without risk, oh no. And now listen close, so you know what we’re about to do. We’re about to put in our bodies, in our minds, a little piece of the Dragon itself. Fathom? This little scale, all crushed up, still a little bit alive, is made of the great god-beast’s very stuff. Full of secrets, it is, and knowledge.’
By opening the leather pouches, it felt like whatever they were about to do had already begun, that they’d slipped already into some heavy moment that could not reverse course in time. Loup set down four cups before him, three empty, one filled with water. Sharfy’s ugly scarred face eagerly lit up, reminding Eric suddenly of goblins and inviting a moment’s doubt he resolved to ignore.
Loup poured a dribble of water in the other three cups, pinched a small amount of black powder and added it, stirring each in turn with his gnarled finger. Eric’s cup got the greatest share. He couldn’t tell if this was a courtesy to him, as the finder of the scale, or whether Loup had other reasons.
‘It’s a kind of knowledge minds like ours can’t hold,’ Loup continued. ‘Unless you think your hands can hold a mountain. You get half a thought of It — not even! A flicker of noise across Its sleeping mind — and your mind, why, it’ll bend just trying to hold it. Just a few grains of Its scale, that’s enough. And it’ll send us through the very sky, brain all full of the same magic that made the world.
‘The red, if you must mix,’ Loup said to Sharfy, who added a pinch of red scale to his cup. ‘When I say,’ said the magician, a glint in his eye, ‘drink it up. Simple as that; hard part’s the crushing. Takes the strength of a mountain to crush up even an old piece of Its skin. Drink, then we’re away. See you beyond, and Eric, I’ll give you a push over there, if you need it. Drink now!’
His mouth was full of grit. He managed not to gag, but it was a battle to swallow the mix. He fell back, hands to his throat as his airways seemed to close off. From the corner of his eye, he saw Sharfy doing likewise, then rolled his head the other way, where Loup — Loup just watched him, eyes gleaming.
Then he woke to the folk magician shaking his arm. It was dark. ‘Awake, at last!’ Sweat ran into Loup’s beard and covered his torso. A more relieved face Eric could hardly imagine. He sat up and groaned.
‘He’s back!’ Loup stood and did a little dance, elbows cocked.
Eric’s head felt like it had been put through a washing machine. ‘What happened?’ he slurred. ‘How long’ve I been out?’
‘Hours,’ said Loup, smiling. ‘I thought you’d slipped away for good! That can happen sometimes, you know. Spirit goes out of body, sometimes don’t find its way back. Happens more’n you might think.’
Eric looked at him in disbelief. ‘Thanks for the warning.’
‘Ah, you were safe with me right here. What’d you see? Gave you a push over there, but I lost you after that.’
‘I don’t know what I saw. A lot.’ He thought back, sifting through the pictures like trying to recall an old dream. It fell through his hands the second he reached for it, then was gone. ‘Something to do with Kiown and the others …’
‘Pff, I saw that. Right at the start, that was, before I gave you a push higher up. Don’t you bother with that old news. What else?’
‘Nothing. My head’s completely blank.’
‘Ahhh! She’s faded on you!’ Loup regarded him thoughtfully. ‘You’ll see it. It’ll come, likely some night before sleep, not far from now. Means you was showed something you’re not meant to see just yet. Maybe given some instruction, but your head can’t know what it is, or you might think to do otherwise! Gotta be felt right down in your bones, whatever it is.’ Loup’s gummy smile was so close Eric could smell his sour breath. ‘I followed you in. Out my own vision, into yours. Good at that, I am. Not all mages can do it. Not even the old schools, who thought they knew it all. Lingering around, you was, all confused, so I gave you a boost up high. Meant to follow you, then something grabbed you. Whoo! Did it what? Oh aye, grabbed you hard and yanked you away so’s I couldn’t see. Didn’t want me to see whatever was meant for your eyes! More to you than there seems, don’t you doubt it. And here, you’re just back now!’ Loup laughed and shook Eric’s arm like they’d shared a grand joke.
‘He’s back?’ Sharfy came in and crouched by Eric’s mat. ‘What’d he see?’
‘Nothing yet!’ said Loup, growing more excited. ‘He’ll see it when the Dragon wants him to. Could be a day from now, could be a week or more. Knew it, I did! It was all meant, that whole group of things: him finding the scale, me crushing it up, now the vision. What else? Maybe all of us being here in this very house, and whatever comes next, good or bad. As It wills! Anfen’s being a fool.’
Eric lay back — whatever he’d been through had made him sleepy. ‘So, the boss found out.’
‘Yep,’ said Sharfy. ‘You were out too long. He twigged you weren’t just sleeping. Not happy with us. And if anything goes bad in the next few days, it’ll be our fault. You watch.’
‘What was your vision like?’ Eric asked Sharfy.
‘Not saying,’ Sharfy answered, face grim.
‘Ah, he blames the black scale,’ said Loup, grinning wide. ‘That pinch of red’s what did it. Warned you about mixing, I have. Sometimes gives it a kick, but black scales don’t need a kick. Skewed you to a bad place, eh?’