LeRoy Clary
Dragon Clan #1: Camilla’s Story
CHAPTER ONE
Camilla watched the old woman from concealment behind the corner of a ramshackle outbuilding on the edge of the forest. Finally, after careful consideration, she stepped into the open. The woman looked up from her wash-barrel, surprise evident on her lined face. Her eyes quickly turned away from Camilla and roamed the clearing in front of her cabin, as if ensuring they were alone, before focusing on the visitor, again.
After a pause, she said, “Come here, boy. Let me get a better look at you.”
Camilla didn’t correct the washerwoman on mistaking her for a boy. Everyone else in the village also believed her to be a boy. The woman’s hands never paused in their work, wringing and rinsing the filthy clothing. The pots and tubs she used for boiling and washing clothing sat on sturdy tables made of split timber and were located in a row along the bank of the stream. Fires burned in stone rings under a few pots. Camilla had watched the woman from hidden shadows of the surrounding forest many times like she’d watched everyone in the village of Nettleton.
Young girls living alone faced too many other problems so she kept to herself. But at the compassionate words Camilla limped closer. The old woman probably wouldn’t kick or hit her. It’s always best to be wary around strangers.
“Did someone hurt you, child? Are those bruises?”
The sharp tone the woman used, backed Camilla off a step, in defense. Before she could move further away, the washerwoman reached out and snatched a fistful of her shirt with a bony hand. Pulling Camilla closer, the woman looked at her.
Camilla looked into her rheumy eyes, seeing nothing to fear. Without asking, the woman touched and probed her injuries. Camilla twitched in pain when a wrinkled finger found her split lip, although she tried to remain stoic during the rest of the inspection.
The washerwoman spat a stream of brown tobacco juice. “Somebody hurt you bad. Shuck your filthy clothes so I can see what else he did to you. I might as well wash them, too. Dirt makes you sick, some say.”
“I don’t have others to wear.”
“We’ll find you something.” Her voice had abruptly changed again, to one more gentle, but still, there was the undertone of temper, and the bark of command as if she wanted to always sound stern. Her gentle actions belied the gruff manner.
Camilla had come to the woman for help, and in doing so, she must reveal a pair of her secrets in order to receive it. She stepped out of her britches and hesitantly pulled the coarse, torn and filthy shirt over her head. Despite the warm day, she covered herself with one hand as she turned to face the woman. She waited.
“You’re a girl!”
Standing nude in front of the woman there was no hiding the first secret. She squared her shoulders and winced in pain at the action while waiting for the woman’s reaction to her birthmark.
The washerwoman’s eyes found and locked onto the image of the muzzle and red eyes of a dragon peering over her shoulder. “Twisted gods, what’s that awful thing? Turn around so I can see it.”
The second secret was to never allow anyone to see the design on her back, but she needed help for the first time in years. Her whole family had been slaughtered because of similar birthmarks, she believed. Yet she somehow trusted this angry, spiteful woman who tried to hide her compassion with a sharp tongue.
The washerwoman made the three-fingered sign to the gods to ward off evil. “Mother, protect us this day,” she mouthed in ritual, as she moved closer. She examined the birthmark in the shape of a writhing red dragon that stretched from left hip to right shoulder, the ugly red head forever looking over the girl’s right shoulder. The lines were fine, the image as detailed as one drawn by the most talented artist. “Who else has seen this?”
“Nobody.”
“You’re sure?”
When the woman motioned with a wag of her hand for her to continue speaking she went on, “I always make sure it’s hidden.”
“Even when you bathe or sleep? Nobody has laid eyes on it?”
“Only you. I think you’re a nice person. I’ve watched you, and you talk like you’re angry, but you help people when they need it.”
“Don’t spread nonsense like that around. Pull your shirt back over your head before a customer stumbles in here to have laundry done and dies of fright.” Her expression softened to one of sympathy as she looked beyond the birthmark to the torn and battered body. She lifted the shirttail long enough to examine a few of the worst scrapes and bruises. “Got a name?”
“Camilla.”
“What kind of name’s that?” The woman suddenly barked a laugh without humor.
Camilla shrugged instead of answering. Silence is sometimes the best response to strangers when you don’t know something. Her mother had called her Camilla. Other than that, she had no idea of what kind of name it was.
The washerwoman threw her head back and cackled again. “You can call me Robin, like the bird with the red breast. Most just call me the crazy washerwoman, but my friends call me Robin. Take your pick.”
The probing fingers touched a fresh welt. Camilla tried to ignore them until they found a place under her arm where she’d been kicked, and the skin was raw. She pulled back. “That hurts.”
“Yes, he hurt you bad, girl.” Robin knelt and gently pulled the back of the shirt up again as she touched the red swelling on the left side of her back where Camilla had been punched several times. Then she moved on to the ribs where the bruises had already turned black, tinged with green. Robin moved her fingers back to the raw mass of scrapes where Camilla had been dragged over rocks and gravel. She never once touched the image of the dragon. The washerwoman raised her eyes to meet Camilla’s.
Camilla said, “Do you know how to make the hurt go away?”
“I can help, but you’re going to be in pain for at least a few days. This time, you’ll live, maybe.” A wet rag in the rough hands of Robin dabbed the scrapes gently. “What about the next?”
Camilla shrugged.
“You still sleep in that little cave over on Copper Mountain?”
Camilla pulled away. She shouldn’t know that. What the woman called a cave was an overhang of rock wide enough to wriggle under, and twice as long as she was tall but deep enough to provide dry shelter when it rained. Against the rear, Camilla stored supplies she found or stole, mostly dried fruit and three old blankets. She’d used the cave for two years, now. Even in the worst weather, it remained dry and warm. Camilla nodded to answer her question, determined to keep her face impassive and give nothing else about her private life away. Robin already knew far too much.
At another touch, Camilla involuntarily flinched.
“That hurt?” The woman demanded.
Camilla shook her head, no. She waited, gritting her teeth. Glancing at the clearing in the pine forest, she took notice of the small stream flowing beside outbuildings before joining the river a few hundred steps away. Small barns, tool sheds, outhouse, and a cabin that seemed to lean to one side filled the clearing in the dense forest. A dozen or more clotheslines supported by dozens of split poles crisscrossed each other. Most held clothing drying in the breeze. Cleanliness is not high on a list of priorities when scrounging for each mouthful. But green, black, red, orange, yellow, and blue clothing looked almost like cheerful flags decorating the clearing.
“Take a deep breath, girl.”
She inhaled and doubled over, clutching her chest.