Wyvern Read online

  “Tell me more of these beasts you hunt in your homeland, the ones who wander in herds and have noses that swing and curl and can pick up tree trunks.” She tuned the strings on her fret board and gave Alaric a doubtful look. “Though I think you tease me with such tales, Master Alaric.”

  Alaric lay on his belly, tail wrapped tightly around him so that his head rested on the coils. A treasure hoard, beyond Elsbeth’s most avaricious imaginings, surrounded them. Gold coins shimmered in heaping mounds and spilled across the cave floor in glittering streams. Rubies, sapphires, and emeralds—jewels of every type—reflected colored fire that danced across the walls. Wyverns weren’t dragons, he’d told her, but they shared an obsession for treasure and keeping it close.

  “I, a wyvern, tell tales of fantastical beasts?” He watched her tune the fiddle. Smoke from his nose hovered above his head in a cloudy haze.

  “Good point. Why one such as you might make up stories about fabled creatures makes little sense.” She smiled. “You could just as easily talk about yourself.”

  After two weeks in her host’s company, she’d learned to read a few of his expressions. In some ways they were almost human. The bony ridge above his eyes rose, much as a person’s eyebrows, when he was doubtful or surprised. When he smiled, his eyes squinted at the corners, and his scaled cheeks tightened. Elsbeth liked it best when he laughed. It came from deep in his chest, a low vibration like a giant cat’s purr. Never loud or grating, his laughter thrummed the ground beneath her, and she often found herself laughing with him. Only the flash of razor teeth sometimes made her uneasy.

  He was intelligent, humorous and appreciative of her music. Elsbeth never grew tired of stories involving his travels. Nomadic by nature, Alaric had traveled the world and seen things she had only dreamed about. Listening to him tell of far, exotic lands with their great temples and ancient rituals made her sigh with longing. What would it be like, she wondered, to see the whole world and experience its riches? Were it not for Angus’s failing health and her fear she might not return to him before he died, Elsbeth would greatly enjoy her time with the wyvern.

  “Were I a dragon, I’d fill your ears with every vanity imaginable. From my esteemed bloodlines, to the mates I’ve taken, the offspring I’ve sired, the knights I’ve killed and the treasure I’ve hoarded.” Alaric shrugged, causing his wings to lift. “Wyverns boast enough, but for dragons, it is high art.”

  One of his statements pricked her curiosity. “When I first met you, I assumed you were a dragon. We all did. What makes a wyvern different besides the shanks?”

  “Many things.” He flexed his wings. “For one, we are much larger and faster flyers.” His tail uncoiled. “Our tails are longer, more useful.” He sniffed in disdain. “And we are far more intelligent.”

  He scraped the floor with one curved claw. “That armor you wore came off an adolescent dragon. Most that die in confrontations with men are ones old enough to get in trouble and too young to know better. Older dragons, and wyverns for that matter, know how to hide, use their magic for defense or are formidable fighters. A feeble human male is no match for a full grown adult.”

  That startled her. Elsbeth had never viewed Angus’s dragon armor as anything more than proof of bragging rights. She was proud of her grandfather. He was brave to face down an adversary superior to him in size and strength, but she didn’t always understand the motivation to seek something out and kill it for trophy. Alaric’s remark certainly humbled Angus’s accomplishment.

  “Those scales were from a young dragon?” The idea made her little sick.

  “Aye. Probably no more than seventy-five or so in human years. No older than a hundred years, I’d wager.”

  Her eyes widened. “Young at seventy-five? How old are you?”

  Alaric chuckled. “In human years? Six hundred and four.”

  Over six hundred years old! Elsbeth could hardly grasp such an age for any living being. She hesitated in asking her next question, not wanting to offend. “Is that old?”

  The chuckle turned to an outright, booming laugh. “No. I’m considered in my prime, with full mating rights and offspring to carry my bloodline.”

  She ignored the small voice inside that warned her not to pry further, that it was rude. But Elsbeth was far too fascinated by the details of wyvern culture to pay heed to the rules of courtesy. She cleared her throat. “Do you have a mate now? A wife?”

  He snorted. “Mating is seasonal. Wyverns are like dragons in that we don’t bond with our kind. Females choose their males amongst the fastest flyers, the best fighters. It ensures strong offspring. Beyond that, we are solitary, barely tolerant of each other.”

  Irena had said as much. How sad, she thought. To come together only for the purpose of creating young, never for companionship. It seemed a lonely existence. “Do wyverns not love?”

  Alaric’s silver gaze darkened. Elsbeth paled, afraid she’d asked a question considered taboo amongst wyverns. He answered in a low, growling voice. “We love, just not our own. Like dragons, we are most vulnerable to humans because we form bonds with them. We take human form and walk amongst you. You are a passionate, creative and sometimes colossally stupid race. You burn brief, but you burn bright. It’s what draws us.”

  Elsbeth blinked, stunned by his revelations. “You live among us as people?” The idea gave her pause. How could one tell if a man was not truly a man, but a beast ensorcelled? Would he have a ravening appetite? An urge to set fire to things? Would one find him gnawing on a whole sheep? Raw?

  Rumbling laughter interrupted her musings. Alaric gently blew a stream of smoke at her. “Humans are so expressive. Your faces give away your thoughts. Let me guess. You were wondering which farmers and merchants of Byderside might be hiding draconus heritage right under your very noses.”

  She blushed and smiled ruefully. “It crossed my mind.”

  “I can assure you, none are there. We would have clashed over territory by now if that were so.” Alaric’s humor faded. Elsbeth was sorry to see his eyes darken once more, a sure sign something troubled him. “Wyverns are nomadic. We assume the guise of wanderers, never staying in one place more than a month or two. We can only hide our true nature for so long. The magic used to change us is both powerful and draining.”

  “Have you ever…” Elsbeth paused, remembering something he said when they first met on the cliffs.

  “I knew a woman once who played such an instrument as if the gods danced along the bow hairs.”

  At the time, she’d registered very little beyond his menacing size and her own churning terror at coming face to face with a notorious creature of legend. Now, safely entrusted to his care and comfortable in his presence, she recalled his voice.

  Melancholic and filled with yearning, he’d spoken of the human woman who played a fiddle as if he lost the most precious thing to him. “Forgive me,” she said. “I don’t mean to pry.”

  Alaric’s wings rose in a shrug. Elsbeth gazed back at her reflection in the obsidian pools—red hair tangled about a thin face flushed with the heat of her embarrassment.

  “You aren’t,” he said. “I took on human form years ago and met a village woman who played her fiddle. She enchanted me with her music and all else about her.”

  “You loved her,” Elsbeth whispered. A small ache blossomed in her chest.

  “I love her still.” Alaric’s dark gaze never wavered.

  The strangest sense of anticipation settled within her, a gladness she neither recognized nor could explain. Elsbeth reached out to skate her fingertips across smooth scales. “I’m so sorry, Alaric.” She sighed. “For what little it’s worth, I understand your sadness.”

  His eyes remained black, obscuring the elliptical pupils, and the telltale shiver rippled his scales. He suddenly rose, towering over her. She scooted back, clutching her fiddle to her chest.

  “Come,” he said. “And bring your fiddle. There is a place within the heart of Maldoza open to the sky. You can play ther
e and remind me of better days.”

  They traveled swiftly through the labyrinth of tunnels that cut deep into the cliffs. Elsbeth carried a small torch by which to see as she followed Alaric into the blackness. For one so massive, he moved incredibly fast, and she had to maintain a steady jog just to keep up. Passageways that seemed too small for him to fit offered no obstacle. The warping feel of magic passed over her each time they moved through one as Alaric either altered the corridor or himself to get through the narrowest spaces.

  The ability to wield such spells left all of Maldoza’s interior open to him. Elsbeth understood more than ever why no knight had yet been successful in confronting and killing the wyvern. Five turns and a double-back later, and she was completely lost.

  Alaric looked at her over one wing. “It’s not much farther, Elsbeth. Do you wish to ride?”

  “No,” she panted. She was no delicate flower or some aristo woman used to being carried everywhere. And for reasons she couldn’t quite explain, Elsbeth didn’t want Alaric to think her weak.

  The tunnel in which they passed grew lighter, and she heard the sounds of bird calls and rushing water. Elsbeth no longer needed the torch as they drew near an archway. She drew next to Alaric and gasped.

  The corridor opened onto a massive, roofless cave. Sunlight streamed down in wavering stripes of gold and pale yellow, illuminating thousands of birds nests crowded in the layered rock. A spring bubbled up from the floor, spilling water in meandering rivers. Unlike the lair she shared with Alaric, this one was cooler, misty with the flow of water and a gentle breeze that swirled inside and ruffled her hair.

  “This is part of Maldoza?” She stared around her in wonder. “No one would guess from the outside this place exists.”

  “It is well-hidden and only visible from above. I chose Maldoza as my temporary home specifically for this cave. It is safe from intruders and easily guarded.”

  Alaric’s rumbling voice sent nesting birds into flight. They flew skyward in a protesting din of screeches and chirps. Only their echoes remained along with the underground spring’s quiet music.

  “Follow me,” Alaric said, and led her down an easy path to the cave floor.

  Elsbeth leapt nimbly from rock to rock, holding her fiddle case tightly in one hand and the torch in the other. They halted at the opposite side of the cave’s perimeter, and the wyvern indicated a flat rock for her to perch.

  “Here is a good spot.” He didn’t settle next to her but rested on his haunches and watched as she doused her torch and opened her fiddle case.

  Elsbeth quickly finished tuning the fiddle and ran the bow across the strings in a few experimental passes. The cries of the strings filled the cavern, but they were muted, softer. She frowned at Alaric. “This is a beautiful place, but my music won’t sound as good. Are you sure you want me to play here?”

  At his nod, she stood and began to play—a lively wedding reel that had always been Angus’s favorite. Muffled by the cave’s mist, the tune filled the chamber with a softer cadence, as if she played it in a dream.

  Alaric had not moved during the song, neither to stretch out beside her nor tap a claw in rhythm to the music. Elsbeth was dismayed to see his eyes were still black, and he watched her, unblinking.

  She cleared her throat. “Forgive me,” she said. “Does my playing displease you now?” A slow dread rose within her when his scales bristled. What if he no longer enjoyed her fiddle? She still had a week remaining. Would he abandon their bargain and start terrorizing the countryside once more? “Is there another tune you’d like to hear?”

  “Do you have a husband?”

  Elsbeth almost dropped the fiddle. “What?”

  “When I found you at Maldoza, you played your fiddle as if you mourned a friend and serenaded a lover. You’ve not played that way since.” The scarlet scales expanded more, stretching from behind Alaric’s head to the tip of his tail. “What lover inspired you to weave your soul into your music? That’s what I want to hear, not some melody you’ve performed at every harvest dance.”

  She stared at the wyvern, shocked by his words. What was she supposed to say? His admonishment had nothing to do with her skill and everything to do with the heart of her playing. Those spiking scales were a sure sign he was displeased with her.

  Elsbeth gave everything to her performances, no matter how mundane the celebration or how removed she was from the people celebrating. She played for strangers with the same enthusiasm she played for friends. “I don’t understand what you’re asking,” she said.

  “Play as if your lover stands before you and waits to hear the songs you created for him.”

  His command was making her uncomfortable, as was the intensity of his gaze. “I have no husband, and only the memory of a lover.”

  Alaric’s scales subsided slightly. “Alaric the man, beloved and not forgotten?”

  Elsbeth gave a tentative laugh at his reminder of their earlier conversation. “Yes.”

  His scales smoothed back into place. Alaric lowered his head until he was almost nose to nose with Elsbeth. “You played for him that first night on the cliffs. I could hear it on the wind, feel it in my blood. All the passion you carried for a man now lost to you.” His long tail curled around her feet. “That is what I want to hear again, Mistress Weaver—your soul in the bow.”

  The knot in her throat threatened to choke her. Elsbeth breathed on a shudder and blinked away tears. It took two swallows before she could speak. “You ask more of me than you know.”

  His faint huff of laughter was devoid of humor. “Oh, believe me, I know of what I ask.”

  Elsbeth suffered a brief moment of anger—anger at being forced to bare an unrelenting pain to the wyvern. He was no longer a stranger to her, but even Angus only guessed at how badly Alaric the Bard’s departure had hurt her. She’d indulged in a moment’s maudlin nostalgia on the cliffs when she played with him in mind. She’d been lonely and frightened. She never imagined the reviled creature haunting Maldoza and terrorizing Byderside might be so sensitive to her music.

  Wyvern and woman faced off in silence. Elsbeth almost refused, then remembered Alaric’s own confession, one given willingly and without hesitation. Like her, he’d loved and lost. “One song, Master Wyvern, and then something else.” Her voice turned pleading. “I beg you.”

  “One song, Mistress Weaver. And then you may play your harvest tunes.”

  She nodded, placed the fiddle under her chin and closed her eyes. An image of her Alaric rose in her mind. His dark hair, silvered by moonlight, was soft against her fingers. He twirled her around the solstice fire, gray eyes hot and promising all manner of seduction once he whisked her into the shadows. Elsbeth held that image and put bow to fiddle.

  Her surroundings faded, buried by the power of her music and the emotion fueling its fire. She played as she had on the cliffs, pouring nearly a decade of love and memory into her song.

  She’d composed it shortly after Alaric left, a tribute not to the sorrow of his leaving, but to the joy he’d given her in the time he’d lived among them and made her his lover. The strings thrummed beneath her fingers, alive with a magic even wyverns could not create. When she played the last note and opened her eyes, she was stunned to see the cave once more and the wyvern watching her.

  “Beth,” he said, voice reverent and deep, “had you played that at Ney-by-the-Water, I would have never given you the choice to stay.”

  Elsbeth gaped, unable to believe what she just heard. The blood rushed to her head. “Who are you?”

  Pinpoints of light glimmered along Alaric’s scales, coalescing until they covered his body in a ruby nimbus. The light pulsed like a heartbeat, flashing off the cavern walls and the flow of water beneath his feet. Elsbeth turned away, raising her hand to shield her eyes from the brightness.

  A voice, still deep but quieter than the wyvern’s, spoke. “Look at me, Beth. You know who I am.”

  She didn’t want to turn, didn’t want to look upon
the reality of a man who, for eight bleak years, had been no more substantial than her most treasured dreams.

  “Beth.”

  Where Alaric the wyvern once stood, Alaric the man now faced her. Her stomach flipped; her heart thundered in her chest. Dressed in nothing more than the sun-burnished skin that made her palms ache to touch him, he stood within a haze of sunlight. Except for shorter hair and a beard, he was unchanged since she’d last seen him walk the roads leading away from her village.

  His next words were not those of a poet romancing his love, nor those of a bard coaxing a reluctant maid to his arms. They were the words of a warrior, a conqueror returning to reclaim what was his and no one else’s.

  “’Tis a good thing you have no husband, Beth, or I’d have to kill him.”

  Elsbeth, who’d faced down an angry mob and bargained with a wyvern at the haunted cliffs of Maldoza with a stiff spine and absolute resolve, fainted.

  She awakened to a subtle warmth seeping through her clothing along her right side and the familiar scent of spruce and snow. The cavern’s spring no longer bubbled in the background, and she lay on the pallet she’d brought with her. She was again in the wyvern’s lair.

  Afraid to open her eyes, she remained still, basking in the heady recollection of meeting Alaric again. She didn’t want her dream to fade, didn’t want to find herself alone and heartbroken with only a puzzled wyvern wondering why she’d fallen asleep on him.

  “You have to open your eyes sometime, Beth.” That voice, so loved, so familiar and never forgotten, breathed gently in her ear.

  Elsbeth kept her eyes tightly closed. “No, I don’t,” she said. “This is a good dream. I don’t want it to end.”

  The warmth along her side shifted until it pressed down on her from shoulder to ankle, and she snuggled against a solid chest and long thighs that slid between hers. Fingers flittered across her cheekbones and drifted into her hair.