Suzerain of the Beast (Vision Dream Series Book 3), page 56
“What is it?” she whispered.
“I…I have not a clue,” replied the young lord.
Suddenly a small figure came out from behind a boulder and ran up to stand before the shadow knight.
“You found it, Momma. Found it,” cried Selkeeda, gleefully.
“Come away from it, Sweetie, Come here, Momma will protect you.”
“No, Momma come,” said the little girl, defiantly.
Go to her. Go with her, Angelterra heard a voice in her mind tell her.
Concera!
Angelterra rushed to Selkeeda’s side, knelt down beside her, and scooped the child up in her arms. The princess looked up at the huge shadow knight who seemed to be waiting for something.
Touch the bracelet to the rock.
Angelterra stood and, while holding Selkeeda to the side of her leg, stretched out her hand and touched the brightly glowing bracelet to the cold, smooth rock. When she did, the knight took his sword and saluted her. And as she withdrew her hand, his shadowed body began to spread out and out and out until the shadow looked like a great arched cave opening. Angelterra touched the rock wall again. But it was….gone!
“The place!” cried Selkeeda.
“I think I should go get my father and the king at once,” said Lord Georveld, who had come up close behind the princess.
“I think you probably should,” agreed Angelterra, as she stared with awe at the towering cave opening.
“No!” shrieked Selkeeda. And the girl broke free of Angelterra’s grasp and dashed head long into the cave, disappearing in its blackness.
“Selkeeda! No!” screamed Angelterra. “We have to get her!”
Both she and Lord Georveld bolted into the cave after the girl. The young lord’s torch flickered off the smooth jet-black walls of what looked like a monstrous hallway. They had only gone a few steps into the cave when Selkeeda popped out from the shadows on the right side of the wall.
“Here, Momma! Here!” said the little girl, cheerfully.
Angelterra stooped and hugged Selkeeda so hard that she was sure she would break the little girl in two.
Suddenly behind them they heard voices and saw lots of torchlight. The three of them all stopped and looked back at the wide entrance.
“It was here just a minute ago,” she heard Lord Mathlindor say. “I swear it was.”
“I saw it too,” said the king.
Angelterra watched as the older lord walked up to the entrance of the cave and put his hand up as if testing the area. His hand did not penetrate. Angelterra realized that there was something different about the entrance. It was as if she were looking through a black sheer veil.
“It is solid,” said Lord Mathlindor. “Just a wall of rock and nothing more.”
“Father! Father, we are right here! Right in front of you!” exclaimed Lord Georveld. The lord trotted up to the entrance to stand before his father. He reached out to touch his father, but he could not. “It looks like smoke, yet it is as solid as the rock that it replaced.”
“And it seems they cannot hear us either,” said Angelterra.
“We appear to be trapped within the mountain,” said Lord Georveld. “Maybe there is another way out.”
“Go now,” said Selkeeda. “We see him now.”
Angelterra looked at Lord Georveld who shrugged.
“See who now, My Sweetie?”
“Beast.”
❖ CHAPTER 56 ❖
JEELA TURNED AROUND to see what was making all the commotion, as she clung to her saddle, while the Perlewyg dragon was still careening out of control.
Lord Dersveldenar!
He had unstrapped himself from his saddle and had then wrapped the leather-strapping belt around his left arm. Dersveldenar was half way out of his saddle and starting to climb downward.
He was going to pull out the arrow!
Jeela relayed the message up to the princess, who turned around to see Lord Dersveldenar climbing down the side of the dragon.
“No!” screamed the princess, but Dersveldenar could not hear her.
Lord Dersveldenar worked his way down to where the arrow shaft was protruding. As Jeela watched him reach for it, Quellaina suddenly changed direction in her spin, hurling the Swevladilionian lord almost straight out in midair. His face grimaced as the leather bit into his arm. Then the dragon flipped the other way slamming Dersveldenar hard against its scales. The lord tried again, and this time he managed to grab hold of the arrow shaft. Jeela looked over and saw Nermindar hand a salve-covered cloth to the princess, who in turned handed it to Jeela.
“Tell him to rub this on the wound,” hollered the princess.
Jeela took the rag and reached down towards Dersveldenar with it. Lord Dersveldenar glanced up and took the rag from her. Jeela made a gesture of pulling out the arrow and rubbing the cloth on the wound. She hoped he understood. Three times Lord Dersveldenar tried to wrench the arrow from the softer flesh between the scales, but each time the dragon jerked violently. He looked up at her.
“Knife!” she barely heard him scream.
She started to reach for the small dagger in her boot. She realized that if she did she would be giving away its location and thus losing the element of surprise if she needed it to keep Dersveldenar from harming Princess Angelterra. But if they crashed to the ground and died, she would not be able to save the princess from whatever fate the Hwevlandarians might have for her after she found them their legendary beast. Jeela pulled the dagger from her boot and handed it down to him. After a couple of strategic slices that caused the dragon to roar in pain, Lord Dersveldenar freed the shaft from Quellaina’s body. He then rubbed the salve from the rag over the area and wedged the rag into the wounded area between the scales. Suddenly the dragon corrected its flight and started to soar once again high above the clearing, leaving the Hwevlandarians far below. Jeela watched the enemy knights who had been shadowing them on the ground halt their mounts after realizing their prey had escaped them. She noticed Lord Dersveldenar was having a hard time climbing back up. Jeela signaled Nermindar to find a place to land.
Soon Quellaina touched down in a small snow-covered field, her beating wings kicking up dust devils of powdered snow. The landing was not soft since the dragon’s wound sight was still tender and the force of the landing threw the lord, who was still dangling from his saddle strap, hard to the ground. Dersveldenar lay there in the snow, face up, with his eyes closed. Princess Swevladilia jumped down and rushed over to the lord’s side.
“Lord Dersveldenar? Lord Dersveldenar? Are you all right?” asked the princess.
“Nance?” said the lord, as he blinked his eyes and tried to look around him.
Dersveldenar started to sit up but fell back down.
“Do not move right away,” said Swevladilia. “Just lie back and take your time.”
“All right, Nance,” said the lord, and he lay back down.
“I am not Nance, My Lord,” said the princess. “I am her daughter.”
“Daughter?” asked Lord Dersveldenar sitting straight up. He looked at her again. “Oh. Yes. I remember.”
“Are you feeling better now?” asked Swevladilia.
He rubbed the back of his head. “I think…I think so.”
“Good,” snapped the princess, and she slapped him in the face. “You could have killed Quellaina!”
“Oh, just like your mother,” said Dersveldenar, now rubbing his face while Swevladilia walked away from him. “What about the fact I saved us all?”
“He did save us, Your…Lady Swevladilia,” said Nermindar, who was now working on the dragon’s wound. “And Quellaina too.”
The princess turned around to face Dersveldenar, her arms folded, her face scowling. “You do not care for Quellaina or us or Angelterra. And not even your king. Your volunteering to come with us was done so you can have a chance to murder Angelterra yourself. Just to get back at my mother.”
“You are…half right,” admitted Lord Dersveldenar. “I have harbored ill will towards you because of your mother. My hurt has blinded me from seeing that you are not her. And I am sorry for that. But you…all of you must believe me when I say I never planned to slay your lady friend.”
“That thought crossed my mind as well,” said Jeela.
“My king would not have done your lady harm unless the situation was grave, no matter his words,” said Lord Dersveldenar. “Even though you are Nance…Nancyadril’s daughter, you are part Swevladilionian. The king has forgiven you of her crimes, and so have I.”
Jeela was not sure if she trusted this man. He seemed sincere, but the words of his king still gave Jeela pause.
“I can see in all your faces that you still do not trust me,” said Lord Dersveldenar.
No one said a word.
❖ ❖ ❖
After a time they flew back towards the Swevladilionian army to warn them about the trap. Jeela had worried about Allie, for she had seen Allie in her tiny lizard form thrown from the dragon. Nermindar had assured the lady knight that Allie was safe in her box. He told her that the First Magic works by its own rules. Though Jeela pretended she understood, she really didn’t…not fully. Magic and the strange persons or creatures of magic both amazed and frightened her. It was all so unpredictable. Yet, these beings of this First Magic all seemed to be willing to offer their special abilities to aid them in the fight against Shutharja. Princess Angelterra was able to enlist such a being against the powerful sorceress, Jol-Setherath. When Jeela discovered that the sorceress was her own twin sister, Syveela, the lady knight found it hard to believe since she had no magic herself. But Syveela’s magic was different, and there was something sinister about it. And it flowed not from the cooperation of a being of First Magic, but from Shutharja, a sorcerer and a human. It all didn’t make a whole lot of sense. She supposed it was best to leave these things for wizards to ponder. Though now she had her own article that seemed like magic. The crystal shield was forged by some type of heavenly power by Vinnida.
Could it have some kind of magical property too?
Jeela rejected the idea. The gift from Vinnida was just a normal tool of a knight…wood or iron or even crystal, a shield is just a shield.
As they approached the river, Jeela saw that the Swevladilionians were just finishing their crossing.
“Tell the wizard to land right now!” Lord Dersveldenar yelled to Jeela.
She quickly relayed the message up to Nermindar, wondering if Dersveldenar had seen something wrong with the dragon. Quellaina began to make wide circles as it searched for a suitable site among the trees and clearings to set down. They were still a good mile or two from the Swevladilionian army. When they finally landed, Lord Dersveldenar jumped down while the others stayed in their saddles and watched him with curiosity. Dersveldenar began to fiddle with the strapping of his saddle. Jeela thought that perhaps he needed to tighten it.
“Do you require help securing your saddle,” offered Nermindar.
“He is not securing it,” said Princess Swevladilia. “He is removing it.”
“Tis true. I am fond of this saddle and would miss it,” agreed the lord.
“What are you going to do out here,” asked Jeela. It did not seem like a good move, and the lady knight began to wonder what this man had in mind.
“Since none of you trust me, I am letting the three of you go on with your quest without me,” said Dersveldenar. “I am going to wait here for the first part of the army to arrive.”
“Will your king not be angry,” wondered Nermindar.
“I will of course tell them that the dragon was wounded and is now of no use as a scout,” said Lord Dersveldenar. “And I had to come back to warn them of the ambush awaiting them in that village. After the news about the village, they will forget all about you as they plan their route. So I wish you all good luck in your search.”
“You are a good man at heart, My Lord,” said Swevladilia. “My mother has good taste.”
Lord Dersveldenar smiled and bowed to the princess. He pulled his saddle down from the dragon’s back and carried it to a boulder sticking up out of the snow which would keep it dry. Quellaina twisted her large head toward the lord and allowed him to pat her upon the nose in thanks for his deed. He smiled in wonder at being able to touch a dragon in friendship and then waved to the three of them as Quellaina leapt into the air.
❖ ❖ ❖
The ground below them was mostly wild, and anytime they started to see settlements or plumes of smoke from nearby chimneys, Nermindar steered Quellaina away from that area. Now the dragon gently banked to the right. Jeela had not seen any sign of a town or a village or even a farm.
“Nermindar says that Quellaina has picked up Angelterra’s essence,” Swevladilia called back to her. “And she is heading towards her.”
The knight nodded that she understood the message, but in truth she was unsure exactly what an essence was. Perhaps it was her Spirit. It is said that during a chant service, one’s Spirit can intersect with another’s and the two of you become connected. Or one could catch glimpses of memories or thoughts of the others while chanting deeply. Jeela had on several occasions saw bits of images during chant services that seemed to belong to someone else. And she knew that it was thought to be good etiquette to keep such images private even if you know to whom they belong.
They had flown in the frigid air for turns and turns of the hourglass and now the sun was starting to set quickly as it does in these short days of December. Ahead of them the horizon was jagged, made so by the peeks of the great mountain range that was now ahead of them. Jeela knew that they would have to land very soon. Night travel was dangerous, especially as they neared the mountains. And as if reading her thoughts, the Perlewyg dragon banked in a wide slow circle in preparation to land somewhere. Jeela saw an open field below them. And it was not long before the dragon set down gently. It seemed that her arrow wound, with the help of both Lord Dersveldenar and Wizard Nermindar, no longer bothered Quellaina or restricted her flight. Remembering how this same dragon was healed by Angelterra of a similar wound in what now seemed long ago, Jeela came to the conclusion that dragons heal fast with the help of magic.
“We need to find some shelter, perhaps under those trees,” said Nermindar, as he jumped off the dragon in a single motion.
Jeela glanced over at the grove of large evergreen trees and nodded to the wizard that it would be satisfactory.
“I am so hungry,” said the princess, as she climbed down into Nermindar’s waiting arms. “We need to start a fire right away.”
“No fire,” said Jeela. “We are in enemy territory.”
“But these people are not our enemy,” countered the princess.
Jeela pointed to Swevladilia’s long white hair, “We may not be theirs, but you certainly are, whether you like it or not.”
The princess nodded without further argument. So the three of them, with the Perlewyg dragon coming up the rear, walked over to the grove to have a cold meal and an even colder rest. The grove was made up of several towering pine trees with few lower branches surrounded by a dozen or more smaller full spruce trees, making a protective cave of trees.
Under one of the tallest of the pine trees, they sat, resting themselves upon piles of long pine needles and snow. The dragon was the first to enter the grove and settled down. The trees seemed to capture the creature’s warmth, giving the grove an almost cozy feel. Without a word, Swevladilia handed out to each of them a piece of hard bread and some dried venison meat that was packed for them by the king’s cook. She took the wine skin and poured each of them some wine in small wooden cups. They consumed the meal in silence as it started to get dark. Jeela was chewing on her last piece of dried meat when she noticed two dark objects moving towards them. She jumped up and drew her sword. The knight waved Swevladilia and Nermindar to move deeper into the grove and stay out of sight. As the objects neared, she realized it was two people, one big and one very short…a child. The man was holding a long hayfork with two long pointed tines. The boy grasped a small axe and held it out as if it would protect him by its own power.
“What…What…who are you?” stuttered the man, pointing his fork at her.
“Just a traveler,” said Jeela.
“There be more of you. I saw you all come down upon the back of that creature,” said the man.
“Two more in the trees, Grand,” said the boy, pointing his ax where the princess and the wizard were hiding. “And the monster! I see the monster in there too!”
Princess Swevladilia walked slowly out from her hiding place followed by Nermindar. The princess pulled back the hood of her cloak, revealing her hair. Jeela almost closed her eyes as she prepared herself for this farmer and his boy to rush off sounding the alarm that the enemy has arrived upon dragons to destroy them all.
“Nancyadril? Can that really be thee after all these years?” asked the old man, as he lowered his hayfork in amazement.
“Who is she, Grand? Who is she?”
“How do you know my mother, Sir?” asked the princess.
“Your mother? It is like seeing her step out of the long ago past,” said the man. “Without aging a day. And what of Raunloss?”
“My father,” said the princess.
“I knew it! I knew those two were destine for one another,” laughed the man, now putting his fork down and leaning against it.
“But, if I might ask. Who are—” started the princess.
“Yes, yes, sorry,” said the man. “I am—”
“Grand, you are not going to invite these strangers home are you?” asked the boy, sounding worried that that was his Grand’s plan.
