“Actually, it’s a bit of a crazy story,” Lynette said. “Which I’m happy to tell, but maybe you should sit down first.”
Samuel raised an eyebrow, but obediently sat down again. Henrietta took a seat beside him, torn between enthusiasm for a good tale and concern about the oddness of the situation. Lynette perched herself on a stood that sat beside the bookcase, desperately hoping that this went well. So many things were riding on it, in so many different ways.
“It starts… probably a couple of months ago, actually,” she said, launching into the story that she and the salases had come up with during their planning session. “Crazy night, wild storm, lightning everywhere. The village made it through relatively unscathed, thankfully, but the next morning, we all got up and found the most bizarre, outlandish, completely out of the blue thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” She paused for effect, then continued, “There was a dragon in the field east of the village.”
Henrietta’s eyes opened wide. “A dragon! Oh, by the gods, you’ve got to be joking.”
“No joke,” Lynette said, playing up her own shock at the supposed incident. Though it wasn’t terribly difficult, given how shocked she’d been to see the salases when they’d arrived. “I don’t know where it came from. Well, through the Gate of Chalandros, obviously, but how did it end up in Varismont? It made no sense at all. So we all got together to try and figure out how to scare it away. Some people wanted to try and kill it, but seriously? We’re not warriors. I wasn’t game to try something that stupid.” Henrietta was nodding sagely, no doubt in agreement about that part.
“So we go out there with pitchforks and cloths to wave at it, but it just sits there staring at us. And then, after a while, I notice that its wing is drooping. Just like a bird does when it’s hurt. So… days go by, long story short,” she said, cutting out as many details as possible from the fabricated tale. “And this thing is still there. By now we’ve realised it can’t fly, and it hasn’t tried to hurt us at all, but it’s not going anywhere. And then one of the young lads comes up with the idea of trying to tame it.”
Henrietta’s eyes opened wide, and even Samuel looked startled. “Tame it?” Henrietta asked. “Was he insane? It’s a freakingdragon, for the gods’ sake!”
“Well, that’s what I said. But the next thing you know, a couple of the men are out in the paddock, trying to feed it cabbages.”
“I thought they ate meat,” Samuel said.
“So did we. But the goats were all over the paddock, and it never tried to harm any of them. And we tried to feed it meat first, but it just wasn’t interested. Cabbages, though? Yes, please. It was all over them.”
“Hold on… this is leading back to your mysterious patient off in the forest, correct?” Samuel asked, and Lynette nodded.
“Absolutely. And believe me, the story gets weirder from here on.”
“Fair enough. Carry on.”
“So they’re feeding the dragon cabbages, and they manage to get a rope around its neck. And then it just follows them into the barn, as placid as can be. So we figure that this is not a wild dragon. Maybe the demons in Chalandros captured it and tamed it first, and then it ran off through the gate for some reason. I don’t know, we had to make a lot of assumptions about where and why and how it ended up with us. A lot of it is just speculation.
“But anyway, a couple of weeks go by and where this all ends up is that this dragon wasn’t just tame. It turns out it was trained to carry a rider. And after its wing healed, it can now fly. And then we found out there wasn’t just one dragon, there werefive. The other four showed up a little bit later, looking for their friend. I know I’m dumping a lot on you here, but telling you the whole story would take an entire week,” Lynette said, subtly pushing them to not ask too many questions. “So… where we get to next is that there was an accident in the mine, and one of the miners got injured. He’s got a broken leg, like I said. And the break is too severe for me to be able to fix. So Paul came up with this wild plan to strap a stretcher to the back of one of the dragons and fly Markon here to get treated at the hospital. Which is what we did,” Lynette concluded, watching both Henrietta and Samuel closely to gauge their reactions. After a few moments, they both looked perplexed, but not too alarmed about the idea.
“We had to land in the forest. We couldn’t just fly dragons straight into Minia. First of all, they’d terrify everyone half to death, and secondly, if the warriors get wind of this, they’d probably try and kill them. So I’m going to need your help with the second part, convincing the warriors that the dragons are tame and harmless and that they’re really far too useful to be killed.”
“I’m going to reserve judgement on that one just for the moment,” Samuel said. “Until I know more about these dragons.”
“Fair enough,” Lynette said, knowing it was important not to push too hard too quickly. By the time they got out into the forest, the doctor would have had more time to come to grips with the whole idea. “One of the men from the village who started training the dragons is waiting with them and Markon while I came to try and rustle up a horse and cart to bring Markon the rest of the way. His name’s Koradan, and it’s truly a wonder what he’s managed to do with the dragons. But anyone who comes with me to collect Markon needs to realise that we’re going to be walking up to a living, breathing dragon – two of them, actually – but that they’re completely tame, and there’s absolutely no risk that either of them is going to hurt you.”
A heavy silence followed. “You’re telling me that you have two dragons out in the forest, and you want us to go and collect a patient that flew here on the dragon’s back?” Over the years, Doctor Samuel must have seen all manner of weird and wonderful cases, both the strange and the gruesome, but even so, he was stumped by this request.
“That’s it, in a nutshell, yes. And believe me, I do realise how insane that sounds.”
“So long as you realise it,” Henrietta muttered, wringing her hands in her lap.
“You’re sure that they’re safe?” Samuel asked.
“I flew here on one of them myself,” Lynette said. “I have literally trusted him with my life. I wouldn’t be asking you do to this if I wasn’t one hundred per cent sure he won’t harm you.”
Samuel sat back, turning the idea over in his head. “And this patient of yours… He agreed to fly here?”
“Absolutely. Everyone in the village has slowly come around to accept the dragons. It took some people longer than others, but we’ve all seen how useful they can be. In the last few days in particular. A good section of the mine collapsed in the earthquake a few days ago. Did you feel that one here?”
“A mild tremor,” Samuel said. “People blamed the demons for it, of course, but in reality, earthquakes are just a fact of life, gate or no gate.”
Lynette nodded. “I totally agree. It hit us pretty hard though, so we’ve been using the dragons to drag a number of boulders out of the way to get to the men who were trapped inside the mine. Markon was the worst of the injuries. I treated the rest back at home.”
That finally earned a smile from the doctor. “I’m so glad you’ve kept up with your nursing skills. You had such great potential when you were working here. Well, then…” He sighed and stood up. “If we’re going to transport a man with a badly broken leg, we’re going to need Gosta. You remember Gosta?” he asked Lynette.
“I certainly do,” she said, forcing a smile. “She’s still working here, then?” Gosta had been one of the more senior nurses ten years ago, and even back then, she’d been a stern and cranky woman who didn’t seem to know how to smile.
Samuel chuckled. “I think we’re going to have to pry her out of this place with a crowbar when it’s finally time for her to retire. She’s got no intention of ever leaving. But she’s good at what she does. Henrietta, could you go and wake her, please. Oh, and young Nerik as well. He’s in the bunk house. We had a badly injured warrior brought in last night and he was kind enough to run a message out to the gate. Poor lad more or less collapsed when he got back, so we let him sleep in the nurses’ room.”
