Later, Avery strolled past the table, caught my eye and raised his eyebrows, asking if he could join us. I shook my head, and he quietly disappeared. If he had important news, nothing would have deterred him.
People called her Flame, she said. I can’t remember her real name because the other fit so perfectly. She talked, I listened. Then the other way around. When I finally looked up, the common room of the inn was empty, the coals in the fireplace were dead, and I dreaded the coming sunrise. My romance had lasted a full evening, yet it was all I could think about, even after she left me sitting in the same chair. I threw back the remainder of my wine.
Being quiet while trying to slip into our little sleeping room didn’t work. After forcibly taking a single edge of one of the three covers away from my sister to use for myself, sleep wouldn’t come. Finally, I dozed just as the first pots banged in the kitchen, and early risers arrived for their morning meals.
Kendra stirred, shook me and said, “We should grab some food to take with us and eat. We have a lot to do and need an early start.”
The cook kindly filled a cloth bag with enough food for four people. I intended to eat for three. Food might help the hangover and prevent the crossing of my eyes. The stable boy was asleep on his cot in the corner, but we woke him, and he had our horses saddled by the time we were ready. We rode out of the stable into the foggy darkness and the chill of dawn on the coast, the coldest and quietest part of the day.
Flame was still on my mind. So was sleep or lack of it. We rode through the few empty streets of the Port of Mercia. It seemed most activities of the city took place at night. During the day everyone was busy loading or unloading the ships. We took the old river road where the city had stood between the waterfalls a few days earlier, then we picked a path through the rubble as the sun warmed the early morning air. At the base of the stone stairs, we stretched a rope from side to side and tied the horses to it, so they could move around and graze on what little there was to eat.
We’d learned of the stairs from a mage who had been reluctant to join with the others in keeping the dragon penned inside a cave near the top. Otherwise, his story wasn’t important. But, there were too many things we didn’t know about dragons, magic, spirits, and the elusive substance referred to as essence—the source of all magic. In those areas, we were complete dolts, but the cooperative mage had been killed by those of his ilk, and we were left clueless to find what we could.
One thing we knew was that the dragon Kendra had freed always remained close to her, if only to protect her, or thank her. Or to make friends. We didn’t know which. Maybe it didn’t have another place to go or other friends. Since the dragon couldn’t speak, who would know? Not us, for sure. We had to figure things out, most of them well beyond what we were trained to do.
Kendra paused at the bottom of the daunting rise of stone steps cut into the granite with hammer and chisel. “Are you ready for this?”
My eyes followed the direction of hers. The stairs followed the natural side of the mountain and turned back on themselves a few times. A quick count came to three-hundred steps to the first landing. At home, in the palace, twenty steps winded me, especially if taken quickly.
“They could have picked a smaller mountain,” I complained.
“Unless there is something special about this one.”
“And we won’t know that until we reach the cave,” I reluctantly agreed with her.
We climbed slowly. After stumbling twice at the beginning, the reason quickly revealed itself. The stairs had been individually cut right into the solid stone, but not all were the same height. The slight variations had us stumbling from not taking a high enough step, or one too short. The obvious solution was to take each step as if it was the greater height and allow our feet to drop until reaching the step, however, when the next step was shorter than normal, we also stumbled. Going very slow was the only option.
Kendra pointed down. “Hollows in the steps.”
Small puddles held water near the center on most of them. I said, “A lot of feet walked here to do that.”
She nodded as she carefully took a few more steps without falling or stumbling. “Over four hundred years, they say. For this dragon—and there were others before.”
We paused twice on the way to the first landing, sitting on the steps and drawing in huge gasps of air. My thighs and calves burned. My back hurt. I was sleepy and hungover. A certain girl wouldn’t leave my mind. The things I should have said to her, those I would say in the future, and some I wished to take back.
Kendra stood, “Go slower. We will try and make it to the landing before stopping again.”
Her goal seemed impossible, but we did it. A good-hearted soul had placed a sturdy bench there, and we fell on it as I eyed the next section, which was steeper, and with the same uneven cut of stone.
“Enjoy yourself last night?” she asked slyly, without looking my way.
It was her first mention of the wild-haired girl. For some reason, I hesitated to even reveal her name. It might remove some of the magic of the night. Now that I was over twenty years old, women of all colors and sizes attracted me, and often the other way around. Kendra and I were different, as we’d always known. Most people in Dire were smaller, had wide flat noses, and lighter skins. We had darker skin, thin features, and dark stiff hair.
“I did enjoy myself,” was my simple answer as I hoped she would go on to other subjects.
But my mind remained on the girl from last night and how different she appeared from me. Then it reluctantly shifted to other things. The outlaws, or highwaymen, or spirit-directed beings who had attacked us in the mountains had all looked like Kendra and me. For the first time, we’d met people who have skin and features like us. We’d killed them all, but something else had happened. We found they came from a land called Kondor and there were more of them from Kondor working on the ships at the port. More people like us. At the same port, we’d been in last night. From a distance, while walking our horses down the main street, I’d see a few, noticed their startled expressions when they identified us, but we spoke to none.
There had also been four mages who had kept the dragon bound and captive, and they had escaped on ships—gone to Kondor, some said. Even Avery had mentioned he would meet up with us in Kondor as if he knew that was our ultimate destination, yet neither Kendra nor I had ever suggested such a trip. For whatever reasons, he assumed we would follow him there.
Kendra stood and looked expectantly at me, ready to climb more endless stairs. Perhaps this was a good time to talk to her about it. Certainly, we wouldn’t be interrupted by anyone nearby.
“After this, where are we going?” I asked.
She set another slow pace, one step, one step. Pause. “Back to the inn, I suppose. I paid for three nights so you can spend time more with Flame before Princess Elizabeth gets here with the army and news from Crestfallen.”
So, Kendra somehow knew the name of the girl at the inn and how to needle me with it as if mentioning her name was by accident. But she was right about waiting for Elizabeth’s arrival. I said, “No need for her to bring an army, now. Especially, if the king is well.”
We talked in shorter sentences than normal, the words strung out with breaks to draw gasps of air. Kendra paused and bent to rest her palms on her knees. “We don’t know that for sure. Not yet. Maybe we’ll get some answers up here.”
“I know.” Then caught my breath again. “But that wasn’t what I meant by where we will go.”