The Dragon's Tapestry

Chapter Nine

When are you going to ask Politha?” Maug whispered. Marwen was kneading flatpans for their journey, sprinkling puffs of heavy brown flour carelessly onto the dough. She wasn’t very good at this and wished she’d paid more attention to Grondil’s instructions in the kitchen.

“Politha?”

“About reweaving my tapestry. You promised that you’d ask the first Oldwife we came to.” He stood beside her, slope-shoul­dered and sullen.

Marwen looked up furtively. “Shhh!”

“I’ll tell them about you,” Maug said. There was a nervous bitter edge to his voice, but he kept it low enough that no one else could hear.

Marwen gripped his forearm with a dry doughy hand.

“Maug, not here. Not Politha. Can you not wait until we reach the Oldest?”

He said nothing for a time, and Marwen began to knead the dough again without taking her eyes off him. They both listened to the sound of Crob’s hammer against a boot heel. Finally Maug said, “The Oldest then. But remember, I’m not afraid of you.”

Marwen struggled not to glare at him. She put the bread in the bake box over the fire and sat with the others. It had become dark with thunderclouds, and the wind began to batter cold at the windowboards. They would not leave until the storm was over. She looked around the room for Cudgham-ip, but she could not see him.

The fire tossed and popped as it burned rushweed braids, casting demon shadows that danced on sheets of leather curing on frames. The fire shadows danced on the knobs and points and blades of the cobbling tools. The east window remained shut against the worsening storm. Camlach spoke, and Crob, Maug, Marwen, and Politha listened intently.

“You cannot imagine the destruction,” he said. “Entire vil­lages burned to the ground, men and women and little children scorched and blistered and charred black, screaming until their throats are swollen shut, and they die. Those that survive have nothing to eat, for the grain is burnt to stubble. Ashes fall like snow on villages to the south, and the sun is hidden in smoke.”

Camlach swallowed hard and closed his eyes. It had been only a few winds since his rescue, but the spells had brought much healing already. “Your words constrain me to believe,” Crob said, and he shook his huge head in sorrow.

“Has this dragon a name?” Politha asked.

“Perdoneg,” Camlach said.

Politha’s gasp was not heard, for the wind howled at the win­dowsill in that moment and died away to a moan.

“Perdoneg?” Politha said in a half-whisper. “Are you sure?”

“It is the name he gives himself,” Camlach said and then, looking at Politha soberly, he added, “If there is some knowl­edge that you have concerning this thing, please tell it for the sake of all Ve.”

“I will tell what I know, lad,” the blind woman said after a moment, “not for the sake of Ve but for the sake of magic. The story was passed down to me from my grandmother who made me memorize it carefully.”

She rocked a little from side to side, and Marwen felt her invoke a story spell.

“In ancient times there were many dragons, and they roamed the world and had divers powers. But they were small dragons, and grown men with their wits about them could defend them­selves against one. It was the vestige of these that I thought was in your land. In that day many wizards roamed the land, also, bringing peace and prosperity to the people of Ve. An Oldwife in that day could live her entire life without ever burying an unfulfilled tapestry.

“But the people were not happy. ‘Why should we endure these dragons that torment us and even carry off our children?’ they complained, and so the wizards began to destroy the drag­ons one by one. After a few generations, the population of the dragons had been substantially depleted, but the records also say that fewer and fewer men were born with the power. Then one day, in this long ago time, there was only one wizard to be found in all the land, though he was a great and powerful and good wizard.”

Marwen’s legs were folded under her, but at this she sat up straight on her knees. “I know his name: Morda-hon.” Politha nodded, and Marwen snapped her fingers in satis­faction. The old woman continued.

“It was thought by the people that all the dragons had been destroyed, but they were mistaken. One day from across the water came an immense creature that filled the sky when it flew, eating wingwands whole and able to curl around an entire moun­tain to sleep. The creature had given itself a name: Perdoneg.

“Morda-hon was wise and realized that as all the light was now in himself, so all the darkness was embodied in Perdoneg, and to destroy one would be to destroy the other. Morda-hon spoke to Perdoneg of this wisdom, and they conversed for many days. But the nature of the darkness is to want to comprehend and overcome the light, and finally Perdoneg laughed and said he had come to destroy a wizard and his heir, and that he would do so.

“Then ensued a great battle, and in the end Perdoneg was imprisoned by Morda-hon in the land of the lost—that place where come to dwell all those dead whose tapestries are unful­filled. There Perdoneg became lord and master of unfinished souls. It is said that many generations of wizards have lived since then, descending in secrecy, for as belief in dragons disappeared, so did belief in wizards.”

Politha stopped speaking. The fire cast sharp shadows on the faces of the four, and Marwen thought she could see them all burning in dragon’s breath. In the silence of fire and wind, the old woman added, “It has been long since I have found the courage, in this age of disbelief, to say such a thing, to speak of the wizard. Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps the magic truly fades from Ve. The Songs tell of an age when the magic will be done away with, when evil will have its chance to reign in Ve. Perhaps that day is now come.”

“The magic is not fading,” Marwen said starting, as if awak­ening from a dream.

Politha chuckled. “I should have known better than to try and keep this one under a story spell.” Crob grunted and bent over his work again.

“Grondil, my mother, interpreted the tapestry without error and wove both truth and prophecy with her threads,” Marwen said. “Her spells graced the spice gardens, for which Marmawell is known, and brought safely into the world every child in the village. And you, Politha, who learned the art of weaving so well, you who wove a blanket of invisibility, can you say that there is no magic in those hands that see what your eyes do not?”

Politha smiled and nodded.

“The Oldwives of the smaller villages have not entirely lost their art, it is true. But did your mother not teach you, child, of the way it was in ancient times, when the Oldwives’ spells were not restricted to kitchens and gardens and inkle looms, when an Oldwife could be granted the gift of the staff as was Farrell of Old. Ah, Marwen, once there was a time when the Oldwife of the village was not feared but loved and respected. You, Marwen—were the children kind to you, honoring you for your gift?”

For a moment Marwen feared that every taunt and cruel trick she had endured was revealed in some way to the others in the room, and that they, too, seeing her weakness and vulnerability, would despise her. She glanced at Maug. He looked steadily down at the floor. She felt the walls expand, and Camlach seemed far away.

“I thought not,” Politha said gently. “In the cities, here in Kebblewok and in other places, only the devoted use the services of the Oldwives for anything other than the making of the tapestry for their children, and even the tapestry has become less sacred, a thing to speak of lightly, even to ignore. They do not teach their children to believe in the magic. The Oldwives have become midwives. True, the people do still make sacrifice to the One Mother, but it is holiday, not worship. Perhaps, perhaps the dragon will instruct us, will send us running to our tapestries....” Quietly, tunelessly, into the silence, she began to sing, her old voice quavering and haunting:

When she was done, Crob arose from his cobbler’s bench and fed the fire with more rushweed braids, as if he were cold.

Cudgham-ip crawled from some damp corner of the cottage into Politha’s lap. Everyone in the room became still. He lay there double-blinking in slow motion, first one eye, then the other, again and again hypnotically. Hesitantly the old woman touched the creature’s leathery skin.

Crob jumped to grab her hand away, his accent heavy when he spoke. “Is good, is fine, Politha. Is pet, see, Marwen’s pet, but—uh—don’t touch.”

“So there you are,” Marwen said. She picked the lizard up by the tail where he dangled undignified. “I thought I had lost you,” she said. Angered at the relief in her voice, she added in a half-whisper, “No loss.”

“Now there is magic!” Camlach said, amazed.

Marwen shrugged one shoulder and dropped the ip into her apron pocket. She opened her mouth to tell them all about the remarkable spell she had done to transform a man into a lizard, but she closed her mouth again. She had not been able to reverse the spell. She looked about the room for some object with which to display her magic but could see nothing for the gathering smoke. She smiled.

“If the magic were fading, could a mere Oldwife do this?” Marwen said. She stretched her arms out, fingers extended. Slowly the smoke gathered like breeze-blown mist between her outstretched arms, its grayness acquiring a gritty texture, darker, heavier.

Marwen smiled to herself, partly in pride, partly in the pure joy of the magic. It was a mastery like no other, in which she tuned her spirit to see all other things in their spirit form and then commanded them to be as she willed, as a painter wills color, as a weaver wills thread, as a poet wills words. The smoke that had only a short time before spoken the language of grow­ing rushweed gathered at her fingertips and allowed itself to be molded and formed into the shape of a large ip, its tongue leap­ing from its mouth like a lick of fire.

Marwen laughed quietly as she saw through the haze of her little trance the astonished faces of Maug and Crob. But then the laughter died to a hiccough, and her hands dropped to her sides.

Always before, a smoke sculpture had faded as quickly as it was made, leaving the watchers wondering if their eyes had tricked them. But this time it did not fade; it boiled and bubbled and was no longer an ip but a dragon, its tongue a flame. Tiny glowing embers that burst from the fire hovered in the dragon’s head like eyes, and the eyes turned to Marwen and saw.

Marwen cried out, and her breath made the smoke wings lift. The wind outside beat on the house like the sound of great wings. The windowboard burst open, and the wind roared like fire and wailed like children in pain. Crob jumped up and pushed the windows closed.

“What is it?” Politha was saying. “What is the matter?”

Gritting his teeth, Camlach rolled on to his knees, thrust a fist into the smoke dragon. Shards of smoke roiled around the room a moment and then faded.

For a long time, the room was full of silence. The wind shook the loose windowboards, and the rain fell hard as hail into the thatched roof.

“I’m sorry—I don’t know what happened,” Marwen said. “It is a trick I have done since childhood.” Marwen could still hear her heart. The embers had looked at her and had seen her.

“I have never seen anything so—so beautiful,” Crob said. “I believe the rusty lock you removed to free Camlach was ready to break. But this ...”

“It is evil,” Maug said standing up stiffly. “Her tricks have brought nothing but evil.”

“Hush,” Politha said. “A newly named Oldwife must get used to her new powers.”

Camlach stood and faced Maug but said nothing. Maug sneered and sat down. Marwen had not intended to use her magic this way, with tricks and illusion, and in a way it had not even been her spell. There had been some other force at work, some power that had sensed her own and had touched and embellished and magnified it. It was not a force of good.

“I felt almost as if the eyes of the dragon could see me, as if it were seeking me,” she said staring at the fire.

“I know what the dragon seeks,” Camlach said. “He has sent messages by way of many a horrified survivor. He seeks the wiz­ard, but all say he seeks in vain.”

“Because there is no wizard.” Crob said.

Maug said, “Aye.”

Camlach glared at Maug. “So said my people of dragons.”

Maug snorted, and then there was silence.

Crob left off his shoemaking and joined them by the fire, shivering. “If the wizard lives would he let his people die by this dragon? Only one thing to vanquish this great evil, and that is a well-placed arrow.”

The wind buffeted against the house with a force like the beat of great wings and screamed in the doorjambs and the chimney.

Politha groped with her hand for Crob. “This storm ...” she whispered.

Everyone listened. Maug’s head was bent back, staring up at the ceiling. His mouth gaped open, his body tensed as if he were about to run. A brief white light blinked in the chinks of the walls and the heavens cracked and thundered from end to end. The shutters burst open again, and the wind swooped in with a roar.

“One Mother save us,” Politha said. Maug leaped up. His knees were bent and his hands fisted and he looked wildly from the ceiling to Marwen and back again, his face flickering red and black in the firelight.

“It is not a storm but the dragon’s firestorm,” Maug said between gritted teeth. “I’ve heard it before.”

Marwen breathed deeply. There was the smell of wet burning straw bricks and the cry of an infant on the wind.

Crob stood to close the shutters. The rain lashed at the sheets of leather and the wind blew the fire out. Crob stuck his head out the window.

“There is fire—in the town below,” he cried.

“Perdoneg!” said Maug. “She’s brought ’im. The witch brought ’im.”

“Hold your tongue,” Camlach said to Maug.

Marwen felt the ground roll beneath her. She clutched at Politha. The wind whined, then whipped into a wail. Politha’s blind eyes shone white as the room was lit by another seam of lightning, but Marwen couldn’t hear the thunder. Above the thunder came the crashing of a great voice on the wind, a voice like the sound of a mountain crumbling.

“Listen!” Camlach shouted. Marwen listened. All the hair on her arms stood on end. The great voice was almost as indiscernable as the rumble of rain and thunder, but as she listened she thought she heard the words, “Nimroth ... Nimroth ...”

Maug grimaced and put his hands over his ears.

Crob and Camlach raced out of doors. Marwen ran after them. From all the houses men were running, their eyes lifted to the low dark sky, their hands white around sword hilts and bows. In the walled city below, black clouds of smoke billowed in the rain. Marwen could see no fire.

“There!” Camlach shouted above the shriek of the wind. He pointed upward. There was a fierce joy in his voice. “There is a sight that will make all other dreams die: Perdoneg!” His arms dropped, and he stood smiling savagely up at the clouds, his chest heaving.

At first Marwen could see nothing but the clouds rolling and steaming over the gray hills. Then she saw flames streak like sun­light to the west, and a moment later she made out the black shadowed shape of a creature whose great wings sucked and beat at the wind, and caused the clouds to wheel.

“Nimroth ...”

Camlach threw his arm around Marwen. She stopped looking at the clouds to look at him, but his eyes were fixed on the sky. “That is the wizard’s name,” he said. He laughed and gestured rudely to the sky. “I knew it already, Perdoneg. But he is not here!” His arm fell to his side, and the other arm dropped from around Marwen’s shoulders, but still he looked up. “Nimroth is not here,” he said.

Then the rain poured down in dense cold streams, and Mar­wen could scarcely see Camlach. The sky lightened faintly as they ran into the house, and norwind died away to windeven. Marwen did not look up. She knew the dragon was gone.