Page 31 of A Matter of Dragons

I nodded but hesitated. “Hey,” I began, struggling to find the words. “Were we the only ones sent to Cairncliff?”

Eadberh’s face wrinkled. “What’d you mean?”

“On this mission to spread the fame of His Majesty. Was it only us?”

“Uh, yeah,” Eadberh said. He cast a quick glance over his shoulder as though checking to see if he’d somehow forgotten someone. “Why? What’d you see?”

I shrugged. My certitude suddenly seemed silly. Why would Captain Olovan be in Cairncliff? Wasn’t it far more likely that I’d just seen someone who looked like Olovan? I’d watched him through glass, across a street, and from the second floor. It’s not like I’d had a chance to really examine the man in the cloak.

“Nothing,” I said. “Let’s go.”

Eadberh nodded, the very picture of professionalism. “After you, my lady.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Rayne

Well, that was a bust. Ailen the healer seemed perfectly competent and not at all interested in gossip about dragons, although she was quite disappointed when I admitted I didn’t know the date of my birth.

“Then I can’t do a star chart for you,” she’d said in a tone of genuine distress.

I tried to explain that I was an orphan without realizing at first how awkward that made Eadberh’s role as my brother. Eadberh tried to jump in with some straggling half-assed story about how we’d both been very young when our parents had died in the fire that scarred my arm, but the healer woman was quite insistent that one of us would at least know the month of my birth.

Lady, I’d wanted to say, I don’t even know the year of my birth. Everything before King Donovan rescued me from the orphanage is just a guess. Really, I don’t have any clear memories from my childhood until I started living in the army barracks of the king’s castle.

But we were here for information, so I’d lied. Mid-winter, I’d said while Eadberh had nodded in solemn agreement. The healer then spent a very long time hunched over star charts researching what salves would work best on a woman born in the middle of winter while Eadberh and I tried unsuccessfully to make conversation. In the end, we left with an overpriced jar of sweet-smelling yellow goop that probably wouldn’t do a damn thing. Still, I couldn’t quite bring myself to chuck the little vial in the gutter.

But the morning hadn’t been a total waste. Eadberh said he’d gotten some useful information from a farrier that he’d talked up after abandoning me to the healer woman’s very detailed explanation of how the celestial bodies influenced my destiny.

“The farrier said it was a pity the dragon didn’t come closer,” Eadberh said as we walked together through town. It was a beautiful day; the sun was beating down on my layers and layers of red fabric and making me insanely jealous of Eadberh’s simple tunic and breeches.

“Hmmm?” I replied, wiping my hand across the back of my neck.

“Yup. He said any closer and we would have been able to see the dragon’s heart spots.”

I stopped walking; Eadberh now had my full attention.

“What’s a heart spot?” I asked.

Eadberh smiled at me. “It’s a dragon’s weak spot.”

“No!” I cried. “By the King, Eadberh, that’s fantastic!”

Eadberh nodded as though he were giving a benediction to a loving crowd. “I know, I know,” he said.

“So, where are they?”

“He said they’re usually under the arms.” Eadberh touched his own chest lightly, brushing the spot where his arm met his shoulder. “That’s where the scales are softer and lighter colored.”

“By the King!” I grabbed Eadberh’s arm and practically pulled him into a dance. “We could actually do this!”

He was grinning like an idiot. “I know,” he said. “I thought it was impossible when the king announced this mission.”

“Oh, damn,” I gushed. “Me too.”

Our eyes met. We’d never talked about this, the sheer impossibility of the task before us, the incredulity of sending one man and one woman to slay a dragon in a foreign land. There had been times when I’d wondered if this was a suicide mission, if the king had decided for some reason that I’d outlived my usefulness. Or if the rumors about Eadberh’s inappropriate bedtime companions had reached his royal ears.

Now the world suddenly seemed brighter. No, this wasn’t a suicide mission. This was our mission, and our king had every confidence in us. Dragons had a weak spot, by all the stars and heavens. Dragons had a weak spot, and we knew about it.