Published in hardcover, June 1993, by Tor Books
Published in paperback, September 1994, by Tor Books
Paperback ISBN: 0-812-53323-2
Copyright © 1993 by Jeffrey A. Carver
All rights reserved; duplication except for personal use prohibited.
Dragon Rigger is a sequel to Dragons in the Stars,
also published by Tor Books (ISBN 0-812-53303-8)
"Dream Mountain! That is Windrush's obsession--not mine!" hissed the black dragon SearSky. His back was turned as Windrush landed in the main encampment. "We should be going after the Enemy to destroy him! Forget the underrealm! Forget the Mountain! Win back the lumenis, that's what I say!" The powerful dragon snorted fire.
At least a dozen pairs of glowing, faceted dragon eyes turned to follow Windrush as he strode to the center of the gathering, where the complaining dragon held forth. "SearSky! You wish to command us to victory--is that it?" Windrush asked. His mood was dark; he was still stinging from his encounter with the rigger-spirit.
SearSky turned, flared his nostrils, and fixed Windrush with a red- eyed stare. "At least I would command us into battle, Windrush--not into some endless search for something that is gone, probably forever! Why don't we take the fight where it belongs? To the Enemy!"
For a moment, Windrush said nothing, but he let the flame in the back of his throat produce a small flurry of sparks with each outgoing breath. "That is your wisdom, then?" he said at last.
He was answered, not by SearSky, but by mutters from many of the others gathered around. There was a good deal of sympathy for SearSky's opinion here. And these were many of Windrush's best leaders.
"I expect you heard about the defeat in the Valley Between last night?" SearSky said acidly.
Windrush swung his head in alarm, looking for his younger brother, WingTouch. WingTouch had been the leader of that patrol. He found the grey-green dragon standing among the others. "Is this true?" he asked.
WingTouch's eyes flickered the color of a sun-drenched sea, then darkened with sorrow. He flexed his wings restlessly. "We lost a lumenis grove and six dragons. I am sorry, Windrush. The Enemy's sorcery was stronger than ever."
Windrush exhaled a cold breath. Another grove lost. How many more could they lose? The Enemy was destroying the grounds that fed the dragons' bodies, even as it destroyed their spirit by hiding the Dream Mountain, the very source of life and beauty in the realm. "I see," Windrush said.
"Do you?" asked SearSky. "We are wasting time on this foolish search of yours, on your efforts to regain the past. Let us move on and win the future!"
Windrush was weary beyond words, but as their leader he could not let this pass. "You believe," he said, "that we are clinging to a forgotten past? Have you forgotten what the Enemy has taken?" He shifted his gaze from one dragon to another, letting the fire in his eyes speak his anger.
"Have you forgotten that without the Dream Mountain, this realm would not exist? That our gardens would be lifeless valleys? That lumenis would not grow? Have you forgotten that without the draconae, there will be no more dragons? Are you so blind that you have forgotten?"
He was answered by a muttering near silence. He heard raspy breathing, and the movement of claws on stone. Then a sullen voice--Stonebinder's?--protested, "What of the dracona in the Grotto Garden? There is an egg there!"
"One dracona, huddling in our protection!" Windrush roared. "An egg that will probably never hatch, away from the Mountain! Do you think that is our future?"
SearSky, eyes glowing red, turned his craggy head. "That has ever been your argument, Windrush. But we have been following your way, and we are losing. The Enemy seems to create life well enough without the Dream Mountain. Perhaps it is not so vital as you think. Perhaps you should think about another way. Unless--you have come to tell us of some new victory in your travels, eh?"
Windrush thought of the humiliation he had suffered in the cavern earlier tonight. "No," he said softly. "No victory." He vented sparks, trying to dredge some encouragement from his thoughts. "No victory, but perhaps a hope. Perhaps one who knows something of value to us."
He described to the others what he had found in the cavern, but he could see that most of them were only puzzled by it. What was wrong with them? he thought. Could they not see the potential value of the knowledge they might gain from the captive spirit? As he told how the episode had ended, he was answered with rumbles of disbelief. He hissed sparks of frustration.
"Windrush! We thought you were the master of underrealm skills!" This was Stronghold, the tan dragon to his left. "If you can't see through the Enemy's deceptions, how do you propose for us to defeat them?"
Windrush blinked slowly. He hoped that this was not turning into a challenge to his leadership; if it was, it could not come at a worse time. While they argued among themselves, the Enemy tightened his grip around their territory; and more importantly, around their hope and belief in themselves. This encampment stank of anger and hopelessness, and he had to answer it.
But he was having trouble focusing his gaze upon Stronghold, and he let out a breath of steam as he gathered his thoughts. "I have some skills in the underrealm," he said, his voice rising in volume. "But never have I claimed mastery of the arts of deception. That is the work of the Enemy. Those who admire such skills should give credit where it belongs--to their Master, the one who destroys! SearSky, you spoke of the Enemy creating life. Well, he might twist life to his purposes, but I do not believe that he can create it. You almost sound as if you believe his lies!"
His words sent a murmur of displeasure through the assembly. SearSky growled, "I have never believed the lies of the Enemy!"
Windrush glared back at him, and finally grunted in acknowledgment. It was true, SearSky had never been a servant of Tar-skel. But many of those gathered here, including his own brothers, had once been under the Enemy's sway--until Jael's victory at the Black Peak had freed them. They knew Tar-skel's dark mastery firsthand, but it was not something of which any of them boasted. Nevertheless, Windrush could not deny their right to question him. He had been foolishly unwary, and his encounter with Hodakai had been a minor display of the Enemy's powers.
Fire burned uselessly in his throat as he regarded the unhappy dragons. He was their leader, and somehow he had to find not just wisdom, but skill and cunning. At this moment, though, his thoughts were like a slow landslide of stones in his head.
He heard the low sigh of Farsight, the younger of his two living brothers. Farsight swung his head from side to side as he spoke, his silvery-clear eyes twinkling. "My brother, your scales and your eyes are as dull as a moon behind a storm cloud. When did you last take of lumenis?"
Windrush exhaled smoke. "Well, I--"
He felt a gentle shove on his right flank. WingTouch was staring at him with eyes that glowed like lanterns in the sea. Even in the face of defeat, WingTouch never seemed to tire or grow discouraged. "Fly, brother--fly and feed, before you fade away. We need you. Do you hear?"
A rumble of agreement rose among the others. Windrush realized suddenly how right his brothers were. He had not fed in many days, and he needed the restorative power of lumenis to think clearly. "Very well," he murmured. He raised his voice. "All who need lumenis, rise with me and fly!"
"Fly now!" called Treetooth, a dark green dragon.
"Fly and feed!" "Fly and feed!" The cry rose quickly, even among those who had questioned him. Most of the dragons present took to the air with a thunder of beating wings.
The Valley of Fallen Light lay eastward, just over the ridge from the main encampment. It was the largest lumenis reserve in the realm, and so far it had been kept safe from the Enemy. As the dragons passed over the ridge, they encountered the guardian spell, one that would pass only dragons whose inner twists of true being, garkkon-rakh, matched its pattern. The weary Windrush was a beat slow in preparing for it, and it struck him like an invisible sheet of flame. Foe! Foe! it cried, as it wrapped its underweb sinews around him. Stunned by the spell's hot flash, he reached out with dragon thought to trace the grooves and twists of the spell. It required, not great skill, but an aware and true dragon presence. He touched the fire with his thought, and the heat vanished and he passed unharmed.
Followed by his two brothers and the rest, Windrush flew past the watchful guard dragons who maintained the spell-barriers, and descended into the Valley of Fallen Light. Even in darkness, the place glowed as though alive with fire. It boasted not just lumenis, but plants of all kinds, nourished by the fire of the lumenis. Even from the air, especially at night, the lumenis stems could be seen reaching skyward like silent branches of glittering, fiery ice.
Windrush dropped a wing and plummeted, murmuring under his breath the ancient words of beckoning: "Living fire, give breath to my wings! To my heart! To my eyes!"
A heartbeat later, he glimpsed one branch of lumenis that seemed to rise up beckoning to him alone. He felt its touch in the underweb, its energy flowing up to meet him. He reached down with his talons, caught the branch, and swooped back upward, lifting it from the ground. The plant sputtered with light as it broke free. All around him he saw sparkles in the night as other dragons caught up branches. Beating his wings, he climbed back into the sky before lifting the lumenis to his powerful jaws.
"Strength from fire!" trumpeted a dragon. The vale echoed with the sounds of dragons bellowing.
Windrush was too famished to celebrate. With a silent thought of gratitude, he crushed the lumenis like glass. The plant erupted between his teeth, melting into pure sunlight. It streamed in all directions; it coursed through his body like an elixir, filling him until he began to feel himself glow from the inside out. All around him, starbursts were exploding, and dragons were pulsing with inner light.
Fragments of lumenis flew across the sky like exploding embers, droplets of light raining down over the grove. Where they fell onto soaring dragons, the particles vanished with a sparkle into the dragons' scales. But fragments that fell to the ground exploded softly, each explosion the beginning of a new lumenis plant.
Windrush gladly let droplets of light spill from his mouth, seeding the grove. Energy flowed into his body and his mind together, driving out fatigue and burning the fog from his thoughts. Lumenis flame danced in his brain like an elemental; it had no thought, but it was the energy that fed life, fed all dragon thought and dragon being, all garkkon- rakh. He felt strength flowing into his wings, his eyes, and his claws. He might be unrested, but he no longer felt weary. Anyone who dared to attack him now would be destroyed by claw and flame. He bellowed his fury into the night air, and heard his cry echoed.
He was not just feeding; he was growing intoxicated with the power of the lumenis. He ground the remaining fragments between his teeth, squeezing the light from them. His spirits soared with every splash of light; he felt as though he could fly the breadth of the realm in the time it would take to shape the thought. He felt an overpowering urge to fly higher than a dragon could fly--to soar to the uppermost limits of the realm, to challenge the emptiness, the winds and the darkness beyond. His wings labored to carry him higher.
The cries of the others receded below him, an echo in his ears, a fading din. The threads of the underweb began to glow in his thoughts, and he felt an impulse rising in his mind: Why not challenge Tar-skel directly? Why not just reach out through all that was dragon and real and garkkondoh, and challenge the Enemy's magic, and defeat it once and forever? It was a dizzying thought. Enough wisdom remained in him to let it spin harmless into the night air--but the intoxication was still growing. And something else was happening, something about the realm itself was changing.
A voice, somewhere, was calling out to him. It was a silent voice, and yet it reminded him of a dracona singing to him as of old, singing out a story, a vision of the realm as it was, or as it might be. Someone calling to him...but who?
Even in the euphoric glow, he recognized that something extraordinary was happening. This was not the usual lumenis intoxication. A power was coursing in his veins that he did not understand. Through the dizziness and strangeness, he felt a connection opening in the underrealm, and it was not under his control.
The realm was changing.
The darkness of the night grew deeper, and the points of light in the sky gleamed with a strangely cold intensity. They looked very far away. And yet, as he watched them, it seemed that they were being transformed into something different--not warm, distant lights, but rather tiny points of ice. And they were not isolated from each other, but were joined together by a pale, gossamer web that somehow stretched out of the underrealm into the outer world, and encircled the sky.
Windrush was so astonished that he stilled his wings and glided in the thin, high air, staring at the web. He could still see the dark outline of the mountain range, but the strands of the web were growing brighter, and the mountains were receding. What was this? He felt that he was seeing illusion, and yet not illusion. He smelled the power of an enchantment, but could not discern its nature, whether good or evil, nor could he tell its source. Perhaps if he flew higher....
He was far above the other dragons already, but still he beat the air, climbing toward the roof of the sky. The valley, with its popping lumenis, dwindled below. He was in danger of climbing out of the spells of protection; but still he climbed, hoping to make the vision come clear.
The web grew stark against the night sky. It seemed a peculiarly geometric thing--like the underrealm with its strands and connections, and yet a hard, cool thing; and he thought suddenly that it was a vision of the realm bound together in power, and he felt an electric excitement. Was this a vision of dragon power--of the dragons' final victory, of the realm restored to unity?
No...
He smelled a tang of steel--and the web suddenly began to shrink, its points of light growing inward like daggers of sharpened ice. He felt his breath hissing, his link with the underrealm being choked off. This was no weaving of beauty, he realized; it was a thing of malice, of imprisonment.
And yet, he sensed movement beyond the web. He heard the sound of chimes, the sounds of draconae, the sounds of the dreaming ones. For an instant, he thought he glimpsed the Dream Mountain itself, rosy and translucent, and hope sprang into his heart. But it was locked far out of reach, beyond the web of ice.
Closer, in the web, he saw dragons caught, struggling; and nd the harder they struggled, the harder the ice became. Some fought with each other, and that made the ice grow thicker. It filled half the sky, closing around him. And now, beyond the web the sky began to shiver and crack...and beyond that he glimpsed a different sky, the sky of another world. The ice crystals stretched, like clawed fingers, out of this realm to take hold in the next.
He shuddered, circling helplessly in the center of the vision. He glimpsed a new figure, not a dragon, yet glowing as though with dragon magic, climbing its way up the web. And he heard words drifting through the air:
From beyond hope
will come one...
Innocent of our ways
will come one...
The sound of the words faded, but not his memory of them. They were the Words of the ancient prophecy, passed on through his father from his mother, the dracona Skytouch.
As Windrush pondered the Words, the new figure became clearer. He could see its form now: neither dragon nor beast, it was human. Rigger. His breath rushed out in a silent exclamation. Where the rigger touched it, the ice was melting. The glow of the Dream Mountain began to shine through more strongly.
The human turned her head. It was Jael.
But in that moment of recognition, she became transparent and disappeared. The Dream Mountain faded, and the icicle prison walled him in on all sides. It stretched out forever, through the fractured sky to the skies beyond.
Windrush could do nothing except circle angrily. Finally he roared and flew straight toward the wall of ice, his hot breath boiling the air before him. Better to die than to let this terrible work go unchallenged! But when his fiery breath touched the wall, it vanished. The shattered sky vanished, and the web; everything vanished except the night air whispering over his wings. He cried in protest, but his voice faded on the wind.
He looked down at the other dragons, a swarm of fiery insects in the valley below. He heard his name floating up on the air. Without answering, he searched the night air one more time, looking for the source of that vision. Finally he gave up and spiraled downward....
In the spaceport bar, the spectacle of a drunken ex-rigger proclaiming his duel with dragons was watched by a young woman seated as far from the shouting and jeering as one could be in the confines of the tavern. Jael LeBrae rose from her seat--astonished, delighted, dismayed--unable to speak, and scarcely able to breathe. Could she have just heard what she thought she'd heard?
"--hope his dragons hold their ale better than he does--"
"--think one of your dragons just peed on me--"
She craned her neck to get a better look, but there were too many people standing near the bar, between herself and the speakers. At her table, the young man she'd been talking to was waving, trying to recapture her attention. She squeezed out from her seat, past two other crowded tables. Damn, she thought. She hated these crowded bars; she didn't know why she even came to them. Don't let that man get away!
"--you okay?" she heard the young rigger shout after her.
She glanced back. "Excuse me--I have to go!" she called. At that moment a space opened up and she pushed her way through the crowd, determined to reach that drunken man who had just been spouting nonsense to the whole room, nonsense about a world of dragons, a world that he claimed was as real as this one.
The bar crowd seemed to have swallowed him up. By the time she reached the spot where he'd been, he was gone, and the people were laughing and jeering about something else altogether. Only a puddle of beer where the man had fallen remained as evidence of the commotion he had created, and already a janitor was clicking and whirring its way through the crowd, coming to clean up the spill. Jael rose up on her tiptoes and looked around to try to see where he had gone. An elbow caught her in the side and she smacked it away in annoyance. "Scuse me," someone grunted irritably.
Jael started to snap a reply, then shook off the impulse and instead asked a blue-tinted fellow whom she thought she'd seen near the storyteller, "Do you know where that guy went?"
The blue rigger peered at her over the top of his glass. "Who?"
"The guy who was telling the story. Just now."
Blue took a swallow before lowering his glass. "Rangoon? They tossed him out the back door. Why?" He looked her up and down appraisingly.
Jael stretched up on her tiptoes again, trying to see over the crowd. "Where's the back way?" she demanded, ignoring his expression. Blue hooked a thumb over his shoulder, past the end of the bar.
Jael squeezed urgently through the crowd. She passed a doorway to a smoky hallucinogen room, then found the rear exit behind a knotted group of bar patrons. Shoving past them, she stepped outside into the warm night air.
The back door opened onto an alley, which was lit with a shadowy twilight glow. Jael peered left down the alley, then right. She heard someone grumbling, and thought she heard the words, "From that one comes a beginning..."
Her heart raced. Where was the voice coming from?
The voice continued, more forcefully, "From that one comes an ending. And you can bet your ass the realm will tremble!" Then the voice broke into what sounded like tears.
At last she caught sight of a tall figure picking himself up out of the shadows close to the building. He staggered down the alley away from her. She ran after him, out onto the main street. "Wait! Hey, excuse me--!"
The man turned, peering back at her through half-lidded eyes. "Huh? D'I know you?" His brow was furrowed, and his long hair fell across his eyes. He drew himself upright in an attempt to display some dignity, but the effort failed as he staggered sideways.
"My name is Jael," she said breathlessly. "I heard you back there. Your story--"
He pressed his lips together angrily. "Now, what story would that be?"
"About the dragons."
His laugh was harsh and bitter as he rubbed his scraped elbows. "I don' know nothin' about no dragons! Now, leave me alone." He hiccuped and started to turn away.
"Rangoon--wait!" Jael cried.
The man drew himself up with a great effort. "My name," he said, with great deliberation, "is Kan-Kon."
She blushed. "I'm sorry--someone told me--" She cut herself off with a gesture of agitation. "Never mind that. I have to talk to you about the dragons!"
"I told you." Kan-Kon shook his head vigorously. "Don' know nothin' about no dragons."
"That's not what you said, back there."
"Ahhhhhh..." He snorted, shifting his gaze away. His face was illuminated by the strange twilight from the sky. It was spillover light from an orbiting farmsat, an array of mirrors reflecting sunlight onto some round-the-clock farmlands not far outside the city. He looked back. "That was just storytellin'. You can't go believin' what some old lush says in a bar, girl!"
Jael stared at him. "You said it. And you meant it."
His voice was harsh. "Now, how would you--"
"Because of this," she snapped. She mimicked his voice: "`From beyond hope will come one. Speaking her name will come one. And the realm shall...tremble.'" Her voice started to quaver as memories of another time, another world, rushed back to her. She forced herself to continue the familiar words of dragon prophecy. "`From this one comes a beginning. From this one comes an ending. And surely--'"
"And surely the realm shall tremble!" Kan-Kon hissed. He squeezed his eyes shut and mouthed the words again, silently. He opened his eyes slowly and stared at her with an anguished gaze. "How do you know those words?" he whispered. "How do you know them?" He stared at Jael as if he were standing in the presence of a ghost.
How do I know those words? Jael's heart ached at the memory of those words, ached until she thought it would burst. It was two years since she had heard that prophecy spoken--and not a day had passed that she hadn't thought of the realm, of the dragon Highwing, of his sons. Of the struggle that she had left behind. And just lately, hardly a night had passed without new and disturbing dreams...
"Miss?" the man whispered. "Talk to me!"
She came back to the present with a start. She had accosted a drunkard. A drunkard who knew dragons. A drunkard who knew the prophecy. Never had she met another human who actually had set eyes upon the dragons, or would believe her if she said that she had. "The words?" she murmured, in a voice so low that the man leaned forward, his beery breath in her face as he cupped his ears to hear. "How do I know the words?" she repeated. She shook her head, full of cobwebs--then suddenly blurted, "What are you doing? Hey! Stop that! What are you doing?"
Kan-Kon had dropped to his knees, his head bowed. He was shaking, clutching her leg. As she struggled to pull away, she realized that he was weeping, sobs racking his body. "Oh, miss--miss!"
"What? What's wrong?" Her hand went out hesitantly, but she drew it back without touching him. She tried to tug her leg from his grasp.
"Don't be doing this to me!" Kan-Kon moaned. "Don't be lying to me!"
"I'm not lying to you! Stand up, will you? Will you let go of me? I'm not lying to you!"
With painful slowness, Kan-Kon released her and sat back on his haunches, gazing up at her like a lost dog. Embarrassed for him, she gestured to him to stand up. With great clumsiness, he rose to his feet. His cheeks were streaked with tears, and his lips were trembling. "Have you...been there?" he whispered. "Have you? Is that where you...heard those words?"
Jael hesitated, then nodded dizzily. She'd told no one of her experience, had talked of it with no one except her Clendornan friend and shipmate Ar. And even Ar, though he'd gone through much of it with her, had put it behind him in a way that she'd found impossible. And now here was someone literally crying to hear her story. Someone who knew....