Dragonbound: Blue Dragon (2 page)

Devaj always made climbing the narrow stone staircase look easy. Kanvar gasped for breath as he hauled his body up each flight. Nothing physical came easy for Kanvar, but he didn't let his crippled leg and arm stop him from doing everything anyone else in his jati could do. Sometimes it just took him longer.

Kanvar pushed through the bright blue cloth with gold stitching that covered the doorway into his home. Inside he found a Unani doctor hovering over his brother. This doctor had gray hair and looked old enough to be the head of the Unani jati.

Kanvar's mother stood close by, her face puckered with worry, her hands clasped tightly in front of her. She acknowledged Kanvar's entrance with a questioning look. Had he gotten the herbs? Kanvar nodded and pressed his hand against the pouch he wore around his neck.

Sweat drenched Devaj, soaking through the sheet that covered him, and plastering his golden hair to the sides of his face. He tossed and moaned and muttered about dying of emptiness and flying away.

The Unani lifted the sheets, revealing an angry red rash on Devaj's chest, marked with scaly white skin that peeled and sloughed off. The Unani's eyes flashed angry and hard. "Three weeks of this fever you say?"

"Yes. Kanvar has brought herbs from Stonefountain. I think they will help."

"I think not," the Unani said, letting the sheet drop back over Devaj.

"The rash is new," Mother said. "Surely there is some kind of treatment for it?"

"Yes, I have a treatment."

Kanvar didn't like the coldness in the Unani's voice. The Unani opened his outer robe to reach into one of the pouches he had secured around his waist. "Bring me some hot water, Mani," he ordered Kanvar's mother.

Mani retreated to the other side of the screen that separated the cooking area from the rest of the house.

While he waited for her to return with the water, the Unani elder paced to the wide open window that looked out across the city to the bay and the ocean beyond. The blazing gold sun looked down on the baked bricks. The Unani stared out into the empty blue sky as if looking for something until Mani returned with the water.

While the Unani mixed his medicines, he questioned Mani. "Can you recite your ancestral line?"

"Of course I can," Mani said. "It is the most renowned dragon hunter line in all of Varna." She started listing names until the Unani waved her to silence.

"Can you recite your husband's ancestral line?"

There was silence for a moment. Mani's face flushed. Kanvar realized with horror his father had never made him memorize the required ancestral line. All the other boys he knew could cite their ancestors back at least twenty generations.

"Amar isn't from Varna," Mani spluttered. "My father met him on a hunt in Kundiland. Amar has killed dozens of dragons. He's been in Kundiland hunting dragons this past two months. He's well-known for his hunting abilities and an accepted member of our jati."

The Unani took the cup of medicine to Devaj's side. "Ah, but has he ever killed a Great dragon?"

Mani marched over nose to nose with the Unani. "Very few men have ever killed a Great dragon."

The Unani held out the cup to Mani. "Give this to your son."

Mani took it, sat down on the bed, and ran her fingertips across Devaj's sweat-soaked forehead. She started to lift his head up to drink, but she sniffed the medicine cup, and her eyes widened. "This smells like snakelily. That's poisonous. It could kill a grown man in minutes."

"Yes," the Unani said, rubbing his hands on his robes. "A quick and painless death. Your son is doomed one way or another. This is the most merciful way."

"No," Kanvar shouted. He would not sit by and let this merciless Unani elder kill his brother. He hobbled forward and threw himself across the bed, blocking his mother from administering the poison.

"I don't understand," Mani said. She held the cup away from her in horror.

"Do you not?" the Unani said. "Then I will be very clear. Your husband is a Naga. The boy has dragon sickness. He must bond with a Great dragon or he will die a slow painful death. His very existence is a curse to humanity. By our laws he must be killed before he gets a chance to bond with one of those monsters. If you do not give your son that drink, I'll take his case to the All Council. They will send men to hunt and kill him as well as your husband."

"It can't be." Mani's hands shook so the poisoned drink sloshed over the sides of the cup. "My husband is a dragon hunter, not one of the dragonbound, not a Naga."

"Suit yourself," the Unani said. He straightened his robes and headed for the door. "I'll be back with the Naga hunters to finish the job. If you have a singing stone, I suggest you get it ready to use against your husband when he returns. He is a Naga. He has controlled your mind and forced you to love him so he can breed more of his evil kind."

The Unani pushed his way past the door cover.

Kanvar eased himself off of his brother. Devaj moaned and blinked up at Kanvar. "So empty," he cried. "So alone."

"No," Kanvar said, gripping Devaj's hand. "You aren't alone. Mother and I are here with you."

Kanvar looked up at his mother. "What are we to do? The Unani must be wrong."

Mani set the cup down on the dragonhide-covered table beside the bed and went to a locked chest she kept in the corner. It was grandfather's chest. Kanvar had been allowed to look inside once or twice. It held grandfather Raza's dragon armor, his spear, sword and crossbow. And grandfather's singing stone. All his tools for hunting dragons.

"Your father's ship is back from Kundiland. It came into port a few minutes before you arrived. He could be home at any time." Mani lifted Grandfather's heavy crossbow out of the chest. Raza was a big man and had designed and built the double-firing crossbow himself.

Straining, Mani cranked the handle to cock the bow. One string first, and then the other. She fitted two of the steel bolts into the grooves. The crossbow bolts were sharp and strong and could pierce dragon scales.

Kanvar had spent many a pleasant afternoon practicing with the smaller crossbow his father had bought for him. But that was only a toy compared to Grandfather Raza's bow. Now Kanvar tensed as he watched his mother ready the crossbow. He couldn't understand why she would need it. If father had returned, he could recite his family lines and prove that he was not a Naga. The All Council's men would leave Devaj alone.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs, and a deep voice called out. "Mani, I'm back. You won't believe the hunt we had."

Mani winced and moved the crossbow behind her back while she reached into the chest and grabbed the little iron box that housed Grandfather's singing stone.

Kanvar's father pushed his way past the curtain into the room.

"Father." Kanvar limped over and wrapped his arms around his father.

"Greetings, little one," Father said, returning the embrace and then peeling himself free of Kanvar. He caught a look at Kanvar's frightened face. "Are you crying, boy?"

Kanvar wiped the moisture from his eyes and backed away.

Mani remained across the room where she stood stiff-backed in front of Raza's chest. "Amar, thank goodness you're home. Devaj has a fever. The Unani thinks he's going to die."

"A fever?" Amar's face lit with a bright smile. "Devaj? Are you sure?" He strode across the room to the bed where Devaj lay pale and sweat soaked.

"Why are you smiling?" Mani's voice shook. "I just told you our son is dying."

"No. Not dying." He stroked the hair back from Devaj's face.

Without a sound Mani moved the crossbow out from behind her back.

Amar whirled to face her.

"You read my mind," Mani said, flipping open the little iron box with her left hand. "Deceiver. You are a Naga." She aimed the crossbow at Father's chest.

Kanvar cried out in alarm. It seemed insanity had dug its sharp talons into his world.

"Now, Mani, put the bow away," Father said. "You don't need it. I'm your husband. I love you, and you love me."

"Don't try to use your mind control on me." Mani grabbed the singing stone from the box and let the box clatter to the floor. She held up the glowing blue stone.

A painful rush of singing voices filled Kanvar's mind.

Amar reeled against the bed, and Devaj cried out in pain.

Mani took aim and fired a crossbow bolt at Amar's chest. The weight of the bow and her shaking hands let the bolt go astray, and it sliced across Amar's right shoulder and buried itself in the wall behind the bed. Amar turned with the momentum of the shot and grabbed up Devaj from the bed. He raced for the open window.

Kanvar, run!
Kanvar thought he heard his father's voice in his mind, like a faint echo behind the painful cut of the singing stone voices.

Mani's second bolt hit Amar in the back just as he reached the window. The bolt slammed him out the window. Carrying Devaj, he fell. A blinding flash of gold light brightened the sky beyond the window, and Kanvar heard the beat of heavy wings on the wind.

"Unbelievable, a Great Gold." Mani swore.

Kanvar stood frozen, staring in disbelief at the sky outside the window. His blood throbbed in his veins while his mind tried to process what he'd just seen, or hadn't seen. Grandfather Raza had told him the Great Gold dragons were nearly invisible in direct sunlight. Their golden scales wrapped the sunlight around their bodies, hiding them unless they moved. A trained dragon hunter would recognize the shimmering flash of gold from the dragon in flight, where other folk wouldn't. Kanvar had seen the flash, and surge of wonder went through him. The sheer amazement at seeing the dragon vanished quickly to the thought that his father had fallen out the window, shot twice with bolts that could kill a lesser dragon with one shot.

Shot by his own wife.

Why?

Because he was a Naga. A human bound by blood to a dragon—the Great Gold, most likely. The Nagas were human traitors who joined the dragons and used their power to fight against other humans. They had the power to talk to the dragons telepathically. The power to read human minds. The power to control human thought and actions and manipulate human emotions.

Kanvar had grown up hating the Nagas above all else.

Yet, how powerful his father must be to trick Kumar Raza into thinking a Naga was a human dragon hunter and to take Raza's daughter as his bride. A good bet Raza's disappearance had something to do with Kanvar's father. Kanvar was old enough to realize his grandfather wouldn't have gone after the Great White without all his gear. He'd questioned his mother about that before, but she hadn't been able to give Kanvar a reason. Until now.

His mother stood at the window, the empty crossbow in one hand and the singing stone in the other. She turned away from the empty air, and her eyes fell on Kanvar.

"Kanvar?" She held up the stone and crossed the room toward him.

With each of her swift steps, the rush of song in Kanvar's head intensified. He cried out and pressed his hands to his ears, but it did nothing to stop the music.

"You too?" his mother said. "I should have known. Deformed as you are. Dragon blood runs in your veins."

She set the stone down on the table and lifted the cup of poison, holding it out to Kanvar. "Drink this now. Hurry, before the All Council's hunters get here."

Kanvar sucked in a pained breath. The mind-piercing song from the singing stone left no room in his brain for him to think clearly. Still, the truth settled over him and interwove with the music. His mother wanted him dead.

"Kanvar, now. Drink it!"

How could she? His own mother who had loved and cared for him all his life. Who had been so proud of Devaj's fighting skills. Who had hung on his father's arm and looked at Amar with adoration. In only a few moments she'd turned against them all.

I don't want to die
, Kanvar thought. But he knew he should die. By all laws and all sense of right, he knew he must die. Better that than become a Naga. Better that than betray his own people. With a shaking hand he reached out and took the cup from his mother. It felt warm against his palm from the heated water the Unani had used to dissolve the poison. The sour scent of snakelily wafted from the drink.

Kanvar lifted it to his lips. But could not force himself to drink it. The cup slipped through his fingers and clattered to the floor. The poisoned drink splattered his robes and soaked into the clay bricks.

Mani rushed back to the chest and grabbed more crossbow bolts.

The faint message his father had put into his mind before vanishing with Devaj, finally melted its way past the singing stone's music into Kanvar's consciousness.

Kanvar run!

He turned and fled. Speed had never come easy for him. He counted the seconds it would take his mother to ready the crossbow while he hurtled down the stairs, not striving for any balance, just throwing himself downward and hoping, between his good arm on the wall and his good leg on the steps, to get to the bottom without breaking his neck.

When he reached the final flight of stairs he heard his mother start down after him.

He redoubled his efforts. Gasping for breath. Imagining the fire off the crossbow bolt as it took him in the back like it had his father. His father had gone. Left with Devaj and the dragon. Abandoned Kanvar to his mother's fury. The taste of betrayal mixed with fear on Kanvar's tongue as he brushed aside the door covering, limped into the dusty street, and turned toward the harbor.

But it wasn't his father's fault, was it? Mother had shot him. Shot him! He might not have gotten far with a crossbow bolt in his back. He could have died in flight with the gold dragon. Then the dragon would have died too. And Devaj would have fallen. Dead. They were likely all three dead. His father had pulled Mani's attention away from Kanvar and told him to run. Run while he had the chance. Kanvar cursed himself for waiting so long to act. If Mani caught him, it would not be his father's fault, but his own.

"Kanvar, you'll never get away," his mother called from behind.

Kanvar rushed headlong down the street, not caring that his lame foot dragged against the stones, scraping his skin along the side where his sandal couldn't protect it.