Lionheart screamed and fell flat on the bridge as a spurt of fire lanced the air over his head. Then he pushed himself up on his hands and knees, backing away as the dragon that had been Una rose up on its haunches and black wings arched on either side of its awful face. “Una!” he shouted.
“You never fought the Dragon.” The monster’s voice was harsh and full of fire, yet he still heard traces of Una deep inside. Smoke rolled between the long fangs, full of dank poison. “Will you fight me now? Will you kill me?”
He was paralyzed in her shadow as she loomed over him. Perhaps he tried to scream. Perhaps he tried to move. But his muscles constricted and would not do as he bade them. He lay helpless before her.
She lowered her head, the fire in her eyes like two ovens melting his face. “Won’t you try, my prince?”
With a last effort of will, he flung his arms over his head, allowing the cloak to take the brunt of the heat. This small relief gave him the strength he needed to crawl, and he scrambled to escape. But she caught him from behind and pressed him down flat. A gleaming claw grazed his cheek, like a dagger of polished obsidian. The bridge groaned beneath their weight.
“You killed him,” growled the young dragon, embers spilling between her teeth and searing his face. “You killed my Leonard, Prince Lionheart, killed him cruel as murder. But you won’t fight the Dragon. Coward!”
Lionheart relaxed. His death was certain, and he could no longer struggle against her. He lay like a limp doll beneath her claw, waiting for the fire to strike.
But instead, he heard—like water striking the flames and bursting in cool relief across his mind—birdsong. And in that instant between life and death, he heard words in the song:
I am coming for you.
Wait for me.
The song struck them both with the sharpness of a sword. The dragon raised her head and roared, bellowing flames and agony to the frozen sky. Then black wings tore the air, lifting the monster from the bridge and carrying her off into cold, iron clouds.
So he would live another day.
Lionheart lay amid the wreckage of the dragon’s wake.
He would live his death of a life.
“Leo! Leo, no!”
Hands plucked at his sleeves, his shoulders. Through the numbing haze of the smoke, Lionheart thought he saw a wafting veil. “R-Rosie?”
“Leo, I’m so sorry!” Rose Red cried. She wrapped her arm behind his lolling head and neck, grabbing hold of his shoulders. With a grunt of effort, she hauled him into a sitting position. “I’m so sorry!” she repeated. “I came as fast as I could, but I couldn’t find her, and they wouldn’t let me through the gates, and I only just came . . . oh! I thought you were goin’ to get it!”
Lionheart coughed violently. His stomach heaved and contracted at the stench all around him.
“We’ve got to get you out of here.” Rose Red shook her head as though to clear her own mind. Then she braced herself on her stumpy legs, strained a little, and lifted Lionheart to his feet. He vaguely recalled in his stupor how, from the time they were children, she’d always been able to toss him around like a rag doll. Such amazing strength she had! “Put your arm round my neck. That’s right. Now this way.”
They moved awkwardly, and Rose Red shielded him as they went from the licking flames. Lionheart wondered distantly how much she had overheard and was grateful that she asked no questions. She half carried him from the bridge and out of the smoke that was rising in a tall column to the sky, a memorial to the young dragon’s presence.
“Come on, Leo.” Rose Red spoke in a soothing, encouraging voice. “Let’s get you back to—”
She broke off, freezing in place.
The dragon’s smoke had served as a signal. A large crowd of city folk, their terrified faces contrasting horribly with their merry clothing, approached with makeshift weapons in hand. They too paused, hundreds of frightened eyes taking in the sight of their singed prince in the arms of the veiled chambermaid.
Then someone shouted:
“Demon!”
5
The cry was taken up.
“Demon!”
“Friend of dragons!”
“Monster!”
As the shouts rose, the courage of the people rose as well. They swarmed the prince and the girl, dragging them apart. “No!” Rose Red cried, trying to cling to Lionheart. “Help him! He’s hurt—”
Lionheart, his head full of smoke and fire, held tight to Rose Red without thinking and shouted at those who struck her. But his strength had left him, and before he had time to react, she was pulled from him. Others stood around him, supporting him and saying, “Are you hurt, Your Highness? Did she harm you?”
He shook himself, staring after the mob into which Rose Red had disappeared. They were flowing toward the city gates. He struggled to pull himself into full consciousness. “What are they doing?”
“They’ll hang the little beast at last,” someone said. “She’s bewitched our land long enough.”
It took a moment for the words to fit inside his brain. Then he shouted. Energy surged through him and he burst from the arms of those who would help him and raced after the mob. With speed he did not know he possessed, Lionheart caught up with the tail end of them, bellowing for all he was worth. “Unhand that girl! Do you hear me? Unhand her, I say!”
But the crowd was beyond hearing now. They flowed back into the city and round to the city gates, climbing the stairway to the top of the southern wall. In an older, crueler age, Southlands had hanged its criminals from this wall, a gruesome welcome to all those who would enter the Eldest’s City. This practice had been abandoned within the last two generations. But the people had not forgotten.
Lionheart beat at the heads of those in front of him, desperate to force his way through the throng. Some thought to fight back, and he received a punch in the eye and a cut lip before the terrified townsfolk recognized their prince and disappeared as quickly as possible. But he could not break his way through; he could not find Rose Red.
He saw a guardsman standing on the fringes of the mob, surrounded by a cluster of soldiers. They uncertainly held their weapons ready. Lionheart raced to the captain, shouting, “Send your men! Cut down these fools and find the girl!”
“Your Highness,” the captain said, his face pale, “they want a hanging, and a hanging they’ll get. We don’t want more dragons in these parts.”
“Dragons?” The prince lunged forward and wrested the sword from the captain’s hand. Grabbing the man by the cloth around his neck, Lionheart pushed him against the wall and pressed the blade against his throat. “By all the powers of Death and Life-in-Death, if you won’t send your men, I’ll cut out your heart and feed it to the dogs!”
The captain gasped an answer, and Lionheart backed away, releasing his hold. He held on to the sword and plunged into the mob. He heard the captain give a shout, and suddenly Lionheart was flanked by soldiers. They pressed through the crowd, and the people, seeing the weapons, parted and let them by. Lionheart thought he would smother in that mass of hatred and blind fear, but he pressed on up the stairs, his sword blade forward to plow a path. The stairs up the wall were narrow, and he feared he would never make it through in time. Fire still blazed in his mind, battling with the cold voice in his head that whispered, She doesn’t matter. Hold on to your dream! She doesn’t matter, my darling.
“She does!” he roared. “Out of my way, you devils!” He knew it was hopeless. How could he gain the top of the wall before they flung Rose Red over the side?
Just when he thought he must give up, another voice spoke, drowning out the mob’s din, the fire, and the dark whispers of the Lady. It was a voice he recognized.
Make way, it sang.
The crowd before Lionheart parted. With a last burst of energy, he reached the top and found himself face-to-face with a burly man—a butcher, by the stains on his hands—and a bearded merchant, and several other self-appointed leaders of the mob. One of the
m was twisting a thick noose. The butcher held Rose Red by the shoulders, driving his fingers into her collarbone.
Just as Lionheart gained the top of the stairs, they tore the veil from her face.
Lionheart stared once more into those hideous, moon-wide eyes set in a craggy, bald head. The skin was pasty as dead fish but harder than granite, the jaw set with jutting teeth. For a moment, Lionheart faltered. He gazed into the awful eyes of his childhood friend and shuddered.
She bowed her head.
Lionheart raised his sword and pointed it directly at the butcher’s chest. “Let her go,” he said.
“Your Highness,” the butcher said without loosening his grip, “the demon must die. She let a dragon into the city. Everyone knows she’s a dragon herself, or a witch. We can’t have her betraying our land no more!”
The man with the noose stepped forward and started to place it over Rose Red’s head. She screamed, her dreadful eyes rolling. Without a thought, Lionheart swung his sword and cut the rope. It fell, frayed, upon the stone walkway. By now the soldiers had broken through to the top, and they stood behind Lionheart, weapons upraised.
“Let her go,” Lionheart repeated and stepped closer, resting the edge of his blade just below the butcher’s ear. “Am I prince or not?”
“Your Highness!” The butcher’s eyes were defiant, his teeth gnashing. “Your Highness, she’s bewitched you! Everyone knows it. Let us hang her and save you—”
“I’ll kill you,” Lionheart said, fire seething in his lungs. He had yet to slay a man in cold blood but had no doubt that in another few seconds he could and would. “I’ll kill you, man.”
The butcher stared into his eyes, gulped, and released Rose Red. She fell upon her face, gasping, and crawled to Lionheart, wrapping her arms around his feet. He knelt and touched her back protectively but kept his sword upraised and his gaze fixed on the butcher.
“The people won’t stand for it!” the bearded merchant cried, spraying spit in his bluster. “They won’t stand for her to live anymore! You’re not thinking clearly for her spells, but it’s the truth we’re telling you!”
Lionheart did not let his sword shift from the butcher, but his gaze turned to the merchant. “There will be no hanging,” he said. “Not by you.”
“The people won’t stand for her to go on working her evil on the land,” someone in the crowd cried. “We’ve seen one dragon already today. How many more will she bring?”
“You escaped those five years, prince!” someone else shouted. “You don’t know what it’s like.”
“Friend of demons,” someone muttered, and more evil murmurs rippled through the crowd until the sound was thunderous.
The soldiers behind the prince moved into a protective circle around him. The captain said, “You’ll have to give her up, my prince. I don’t think I can protect you if they take it into their heads to swarm.”
“Traitors!” Lionheart snarled.
“That’s what they’re calling you,” someone behind him said.
Lionheart whirled around, his eyes flashing murder. “Who said that?” he cried. “Who voices such treason?”
He saw long faces and shifting eyes, but no one spoke up. The captain said, “You’re on dangerous ground, Your Highness. Walk carefully, now.”
Lionheart bared his teeth and gripped his sword until the veins of his hand stood out. Rose Red, clinging to his feet, sobbed, her shoulders heaving. But suddenly she looked up and said, “Leo, please, do what you must.”
“There will be no hanging today!” Lionheart declared. He stepped away from Rose Red and out of the circle of soldiers, leaping up onto the balustrade along the edge of the wall and balancing there precariously so that the people below could see him. “There will be no hanging!” he bellowed. “We will bring the accused to the mayor’s hall for fair trial and there decide what is to be done with her. In accordance with the law.” He raised his sword above his head. “Your prince has commanded!”
With that, he climbed back down, suddenly pale and dizzy. He knelt and took hold of Rose Red’s elbow, hauling her to her feet and, with the guardsmen surrounding them, marched her back down the stone steps, through the mob and the streets of the Eldest’s City. The crowds were crushing all the way to the mayor’s house, but word had spread. By the time they reached the house, King Hawkeye, Daylily, Baron Middlecrescent, Foxbrush, and all the court who had come to celebrate the prince’s marriage were gathered in the courtyard. Hawkeye sat in a great wooden chair upon a dais, upraised so that he could be seen above the swarms of gathered citizens.
Ungentle in his fear, Lionheart pulled Rose Red up on to the dais and said sharply, “Kneel!”
She flung herself on her knees before the Eldest, bowing her head so that her face was hidden. No expression crossed the Eldest’s face at the sight of her, but he drew his feet back slightly. He turned to his son. “What is this, Lionheart?”
Lionheart breathed heavily, sweat dripping down his face despite the winter air. His clothing stank of dragon smoke. “The people of Southlands bring accusations against this girl, my servant, and wish to see her tried according to our law.”
Hawkeye nodded, the deep lines of his face sagging. “Have the people a spokesman?”
Lionheart whirled on the crowd. “Who among you wishes to bring charges against this girl before your Eldest?”
There was some scuffle, but finally the bearded merchant from the wall stepped forward, wiping his face and removing his hat as he made many bows before the king. “Your Majesty,” he said, “my name is Sparrowclaw—”
“Make your accusations, fat one!” Lionheart spat. Hawkeye reached out and touched his arm, gently drawing him back. “Hush, my son. Let the man speak.”
The merchant wiped his face again with a lace-edged kerchief, but he made his voice loud enough to ring through the courtyard. “Your Majesty, my Eldest, everyone knows this girl—this creature—before you is a demon. For years the people of Southlands have been uneasy knowing that she resided within your House . . . at your great mercy, of course. But how can one look at her and fail to see the goblin she is?”
Rose Red remained bowed in a lump before the Eldest, her forehead pressed into the wooden slats of the dais as the merchant continued to say his piece. “Before the years of our imprisonment, all Southlands was concerned by the favor given this person by the prince. ’Twas said she ensorcelled him, serving in his own private chambers for who knew what ends? Then, as you know, sir, she called the Dragon to our land. Did we not all see the way our Enslaver fawned over the girl? She alone of all our people did not suffer from his poison. She alone could cross the bridges. We may have been captives, Your Majesty, but we were not blind! We may be commoners, but we are not stupid!”
“Ignorant dogs—” Lionheart hissed, but his father spoke more sharply this time. “Silence, boy.”
“Five years, Your Majesty!” the merchant cried. “Five years of slavery, of fear, of nightmares!” The crowd rumbled in response, all those merrymakers clad in their festive best for the wedding celebration, their faces scarred with past fears and present hatred. “Five years,” the merchant continued, made brave by the support he felt about him, “which Prince Lionheart escaped! He does not understand, Your Majesty. This witch has clouded his mind!”
Lionheart brandished his sword, but Hawkeye rose and took hold of his arm. “Lionheart, I am still king,” he said. “Stand down.”
“And today,” the merchant continued, “she has brought another dragon into our midst. Did we not all see the monster that flew over our heads just now? Were there not those among us who saw the dragon disguised as a foreign girl, leading our prince from the city?”
People in the crowd cried their agreement. Lionheart paled and took a step back, his face a mask of fury.
“Then who do we find,” the merchant went on, “carrying our prince back from this encounter? The demon girl!”
He pointed at Rose Red where she crouched, and the crowd too
k up their former cry. “Demon! Friend of dragons! Monster! Witch!”
Lionheart felt defeat surrounding him. He turned to his father and spoke with dismay. “Will you not hear her defense?”
Hawkeye nodded, taking a seat once more. He seemed suddenly so much older than he was, ancient and frail. And Lionheart knew that no matter what Rose Red might say, his father would have to honor the wishes of the people.
Cursing bitterly, Lionheart knelt and put an arm across his servant’s shoulders. “Rosie,” he said. “Dear Rosie, can you stand and give a defense?”
She shook her head.
“Is there no one who can speak for you?” Lionheart ground his teeth. “They will not hear me. They’ve decided I’m bewitched. But is there anyone else you can ask to stand by you?”
Rose Red slowly sat up and raised her eyes to Daylily. Beautiful Daylily, in a golden gown, a crown upon her hair, furs about her shoulders. Daylily who knew better than anyone all that Rose Red had suffered during the Dragon’s reign in Southlands. Daylily, who had seen Death’s realm.
The Lady of Middlecrescent gazed back at Rose Red a long, silent moment. Did she recall the shadows of that Netherworld? Did she recall the skeletal throne by which she had sat when Rose Red had come to fetch her back? Did she see only the death of her dreams or, worse still, their fulfillment?
It did not matter. Daylily’s gaze shifted from Rose Red to Lionheart and back. Then she bowed her head over her clasped hands and refused to look up again.
Rose Red turned to Lionheart. “No one will speak for me,” she whispered.
Lionheart closed his eyes. “What can I do for you then, Rosie? What can I do?” But she had no answer.
The prince stood up and faced his father. “Please, Eldest, you cannot order her death. I tell you she is innocent. She did not bring the Dragon here, nor the creature that we saw today. I know this girl; I’ve known her a long time. She is loyal and truehearted. And she is innocent; I swear upon my hand.”