‘Yes,’ said Hiza with a grim smile. ‘It seems the world really has it in for this particular limb. Perhaps I should just lop it off and be done with it.’
M’Meska was less injured overall than the rest of them, but where she was the wounds were worse, for leaves had worked in between her scales. She was still clawing out little pieces of glass, giving small hisses as they came loose.
‘I don’t like this,’ said Jaya, her eyes on the skies above.
‘What part?’ said Bel.
‘There’s only one path through Crystalweb,’ she said. ‘Easy enough to spy from above, I’ll warrant.’
No one wanted to return to the wood’s interior, from which they would need to flee if the dragon found them. With the storm over, the leaves were falling less frequently, but spiders still ticked and tacked along their webs.
Damn paths , thought Bel. Be nice if one of them ever turned out to be useful.
While his own personal path had consistently failed to show him a way to kill Olakanzar, it had at least proven that it could lead him to escape. If they were attacked again, maybe he could draw the dragon off, away from the others, keeping them safe as he fled.
‘Maybe big lizard not like Crystalweb,’ said M’Meska. ‘Maybe got glass in scales like do I, not want to come back into here?’
‘Let us hope so,’ said Hiza, though his tone was not exactly sanguine.
Despite his anxiety, Bel did not push them to move any more quickly. Sleepless nights, constant fear and the latest round of damage made for a bone-tired and bedraggled party. Caught between the wood and the sky above, there did not seem to be anywhere that was really safe. He did not know what to hope for once they made it through, for they had not really improved their situation beyond taking a small hop in the right direction.
Crystalweb wasn’t large, and even at their slow pace they were soon within sight of the way out. The afternoon sun shone merrily on exposed fields, bereft of cover for another league or so. As they drew closer, they felt a sinking in their stomachs as they saw a large green body move across the exit and eyes swing to stare in. It seemed the dragon did indeed baulk at the idea of re-entering Crystalweb. But apparently that did not stop him from knowing the way out of it.
‘Ho, ho!’ called Olakanzar. ‘Look what approaches, slow and steady like winter creeping. Little sparrows don’t dare to leave the path? Don’t dare trickle away through the trees, off into the slicey air – already had too much to bear? Only one sun in the sky, only one fat itchy eye, only one path through Crystalweb, why, why? Because that’s what is, and what is, is what? No escape! And if they leave another way, I’ll fly so high that the wood seems but a coin beneath, see all the ways out, see all the ways in, no way to snatch this coin from me !’ He roared, and a jet of liquid fire issued towards them, blackening the white trees.
‘He certainly does like the sound of his own madness,’ said Jaya glumly.
‘Arkus, what must we do to rid ourselves of this peril?’ asked Hiza.
Bel almost ignored his rising blood – what would the message be? To run away again? He was tired of it.
‘Cuts have I,’ continued Olakanzar, almost sounding good-humoured. ‘Plenty from so short a time, so just imagine what’s been done to soft little sparrows lost? Hold your chin up to the wind and shave, just a trim, or a whole head gone? Barber you to death, that wind, if you turn and flee, and Olakanzar can fly free, avenged, revenged …mended by the departure of those who have him so offended.’ He gave a great and unexpected racking sob, like an inversion of his high-pitched giggles. ‘Sleep I need! Why must you run, make me hunt you, taunt you, hate you! Just come here and hear your consequence! Surely you must know it just, you must, that your bones combust!’
Another jet of flame, though they were standing almost fifty paces from where it fizzled out.
Something in the dragon’s misery filtered through Bel’s mind.
‘He hasn’t slept,’ he muttered. ‘He doesn’t dare, for then we might evade him.’
How long could a dragon stay awake? He had no idea, but surely it wasn’t indefinitely. A strange excitement rose, and he caught a glimmer of potential steps along the path …not away this time, but towards the dragon. He tried to relax into the flow, but it wasn’t strong, and his hand did not instinctively reach for his sword. It was something else this time, something milder. His lips tingled.
Words.
‘We cannot fight him,’ murmured Bel, his eyes distant. ‘But perhaps there is another way.’
‘What are you talking about?’ said Jaya.
‘Stay here,’ said Bel, moving forward. He felt a pressure building in his throat, opened his mouth.
‘Olakanzar!’ he called, and the dragon’s roving eyes snapped to his. ‘You must stop this foolishness!’
‘Foolish?’ said the dragon. ‘Foolish you call me? Foolish you say, foolish?’
‘Aye!’ said Bel. ‘Foolish! Foolish as the moth who flies close to the candle, as the cook who burns himself on a handle!’
‘I don’t know that it’s wise,’ said Hiza quietly, ‘to make him any angrier.’
Bel ignored him.
‘Is it foolish ,’ said the dragon, ‘to kill those who killed my only mother?’
‘Listen to me, you great lumbering lout!’ shouted Bel. ‘We did not kill your mother . And while you have chased us little sparrows, the real murderers have long since fled!’
‘I smelled you,’ said Olakanzar. ‘In the cave, and in the wood. I smell your trail, leads to your grave.’
‘Because we were in the cave,’ said Bel. ‘We came for this!’
He reached into his pocket and held up the Stone. The dragon’s malformed eye bulged at the sight of it.
‘But we did not strike out your mother’s life,’ continued Bel. ‘That was done before we arrived. Those who killed her were Mireforms, creatures of mud and earth who leave no smell or trail, save for a trail of laughter as they think on what a fool they made you! They have retreated, out of your reach, back to their master, who laughs at you also, and laughs at us for having such a fool as you in pursuit.’
The dragon’s eyes went from Bel to the Stone.
‘That’s mine,’ he said, strangely moderate. ‘The burned man gave it to me. I gave it to my mother, and now she’s gone, so it’s mine again.’
Bel had come almost to where the trees were blackened by the dragon’s fire.
‘The burned man,’ he said, ‘is who brought us to your cave. This,’ he waved the Stone, ‘was mine first, given to me by my father when I was naught but a babe, then taken by Fazel. Not stolen now from you, but returned to me.’ He put it slowly back into his pocket, out of view. ‘Do you remember being a baby, Olakanzar?’
The dragon’s head tilted, staring at something that wasn’t there.
‘Chasing the sparrows in the trees,’ prompted Bel.
‘Yes …flitting between the trees, oh so spry and nimble, before the blurry and the pain, before the world turned glitchy …before the …before the …’
‘Before the itchy,’ said Bel.
Olakanzar gave a clumsy nod, his head wobbling on his long neck.
‘And do you know how you got the itchy?’
‘Mother said we were tricked,’ said Olakanzar. His huge red eye blinked, and shed a single hot tear. Where it hit the ground, it steamed.
‘Aye,’ said Bel. ‘Tricked by the burned man himself, back when he was not yet burned. He was accompanied by another called Tyrellan, First Slave to the Shadowdreamer. They came to your cave, and lured your mother away so they could give you the itchy.’
Patterns flickered subtly in front of him, less exact than usual. He had the direction, but not the details. In a way, he was pleased by that. Some feats he could achieve himself, without aid from ethereal forces.