CHAPTER THIRTEEN
IN THE GLASSHOUSE, THE CLICKS and calls coming from the loquisonus machine threaten to put me to sleep. I stifle a yawn, and when Dr Seymour asks if I slept poorly I blame it on my arm, which is sort of true. As it turns out, healing broken bones with fireblod is excruciating. I keep last night’s events to myself. Revealing that echolocation’s true name is the Koinamens would be admitting to discussing it with Muirgen and Rhydderch – and risking immediate demotion.
Dr Seymour has added an hourly lesson to our shifts, which she teaches with the loquisonus machines on high volume in case of live activity. We look at the theory of sonar waves and at dragon biology, and she bombards us with rhetorical questions – are dragon horns necessary for the transmission of echolocation? Why is the tongue of the Bolgorith double-forked? Are particular dragon species better suited to particular languages?
We study semantic shifts in relation to dragon-migration patterns, and I learn that there are twenty Arctic Indigenous dragon languages that have almost three hundred different words for cold , made up of synonyms, metaphors and metonymy. Could the same be said of echolocation, she asks us? Only after this drilling session does she allow us to take our stations at the loquisonus machines.
Today I pore over the logbook until my eyes hurt, determined to catch up on everything I missed when I was in the sanatorium. There are two days’ worth of recordings containing several calls that sound different, but have the same meaning. The recordings in which the words ‘unidentified noise’ are communicated by a Skrill-type54 are always of conversations between Muirgen and Rhydderch. But they’re also said using a Skrill-type64, in a communication between the two Sand Dragons, Soresten and Addax.
So what if Muirgen and Rhydderch speak one version of echolocation and Soresten and Addax another? Both versions could be similar with subtle variations. That might explain what we observed in the fields: how Soresten used a particular echolocation call to give an order to Muirgen, but a slightly different one when talking to Addax. My heart races as I scribble my thoughts across the pages of the logbook.
I make three lists: calls unique to Muirgen and Rhydderch, calls unique to Soresten and Addax and calls shared between them all. There are more calls in the first two lists than the third. And the calls used by the four dragons communicating all together have more simple meanings: come , go , wait , stop …
I rub my eyes and force myself to think. I can feel an idea forming on the very edge of my mind, glittering in the corner of my vision. It grows like a bubble filling with air, then bursts.
Echolocation isn’t simply a language.
It’s a language with even more languages inside it.
Mama has been pushing the theory of the existence of dialects within spoken dragon tongues for years and nobody ever believed her. What if she was right, and echolocation is a language with dialects, too, just inaudible to the human ear? My hand shakes as I press hard on the pen, unable to keep up with my own thoughts. Across the table, Gideon is deep in concentration, unsuspecting.
What if the universal echolocation language – the Koinamens – used by the entire dragon species is simple? Limited in its vocabulary and less developed than the dialects that exist within it. That’s why Muirgen and Rhydderch couldn’t speak in great detail with Borislav and ended up fighting him. Had they spoken the same dialect, Borislav could have alerted them to the fact that he was not an intruder but a messenger.
But how did these dialects develop in the first place? Why don’t all dragons just speak one form of echolocation that communicates both simple and complex meanings? I should have listened more to what Mama was telling Dr Hollingsworth about dragon dialects, instead of obsessing over my portfolio and potential apprenticeship.
Dr Featherswallow, if dragons spoke in regional dialects, surely we would have heard them.
That’s what Hollingsworth said. Well, she was wrong and Mama was right. I stare at my scribbles.
My heart seems to stop and start. Are the echolocation dialects regional, too? Rhydderch said last night that Muirgen is his sister, meaning they were hatched and likely to have been reared in the same place. So maybe echolocation dialects vary depending on the location in which a dragonling learns to echolocate. And if Soresten and Addax are both Sand Dragons, perhaps they come from the same region—
‘Vivien!’
Dr Seymour is staring at me, a bemused smile on her face.
‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ she says. ‘I’ve said your name three times.’
‘Sorry,’ I say, closing my logbook abruptly. ‘I was … concentrating.’
‘Have you made any progress?’ Dr Seymour says, adjusting her glasses.
I shake my head. Last time I made progress, Gideon managed to take the credit for it. This time, if this theory can be proved, I want Wyvernmire to know it’s mine.
‘Come on,’ Dr Seymour says. ‘We’re going on another trip.’
We drag the buggy full of loquisonus machines past Yndrir – on the morning guard shift – and deep into the forest. I remember how Atlas appeared from it last night, like a light in the dark, and feel a sudden feverish curiosity about the reply I hope is waiting for me in the library.
‘I reckon the dragons have several types of code to stop humans from deciphering echolocation,’ Gideon says as we walk.
‘Why would they go to all that trouble?’ I say. ‘The war is between the government and the rebels, not humans and dragons.’
‘Well, they probably created the code before the Peace Agreement, didn’t they?’ he replies with a withering look. ‘And anyway not all dragons want peace.’
They didn’t create the code, idiot , is what I want to tell him.
‘Even the rebel dragons are collaborating with humans,’ I say instead. ‘I don’t think dragons everywhere woke up one day and said, Let’s create a code with the mind-reading skills we coincidentally have, just in case things get bad with the humans .’
I laugh, pleased with myself, and Gideon glares at me.
‘Maybe they were preparing for the day they wouldn’t be able to speak without humans like you understanding their every word.’
‘Says you, Bletchley’s other polyglot,’ I reply shrilly.
‘I limit myself to the languages of my own species, in case you haven’t noticed,’ Gideon mutters. He looks at Dr Seymour. ‘My bet is that these rebel dragons will use the rebel humans while they need them, then turn on us all once they’ve won the war, just like the Bulgarian dragons—’
‘ Shhh! ’ Katherine whispers. ‘Look.’
She’s staring through the trees up ahead. I follow her gaze. There’s a movement in the giant oak straight in front of us. A dracovol flies from branch to branch, perching and then hovering again, a dead mouse between its jaws.
‘A dragon messenger,’ Gideon whispers.
I glance at Dr Seymour. Her face has turned pale.
‘Those aren’t allowed at Bletchley,’ Gideon says, running towards the tree. ‘It might be carrying a rebel message.’
‘Gideon, wait!’ I call as I follow him through the forest.
We stop at the bottom of the tree and stare up at the creature. It surveys us with black, unblinking eyes. It has a short, rounded snout, and two of its lower teeth are poking up through its nose. Long, scaled tendrils rise up from its head, like whiskers. It’s the size of a cat. While dracovols don’t have the level of dragon or human intelligence, they’re said to be as clever as dolphins. The dracovol gulps down the mouse, then crawls along the tree trunk and into a large crevice.
‘Leave it, Gideon,’ Dr Seymour says sharply as Gideon peers inside. ‘Dracovols are known to live in the wild, too, so there’s nothing to suggest this one is carrying a message—’
‘She has eggs,’ Gideon says.
‘Let me see,’ I say, pushing him out of the way.
The crevice is at eye level and has been lined with small rocks and stones. Heat rises from them, warming my face, and when the dracovol breathes a flame across their surface they turn red, then white. Nestled in between the hot stones are three small black eggs. The dracovol curls her tail round them and lets out a small warning hiss. Behind me, Gideon has taken one of the loquisonus machines from the buggy and is setting it up on the ground.
‘Maybe she’s not carrying a written message, but an echolocation one,’ he says excitedly as he puts on the headphones.
‘She’s not carrying a message, Gideon,’ Sophie says, rolling her eyes. ‘She’s parenting.’
But Gideon is twisting the dials on the loquisonus machine, searching for the right frequency. Dr Seymour stares helplessly at him and an awful thought shatters my good mood. Is this Dr Seymour’s dracovol? I feel a prick of terror as she sits down on the forest floor with her head in her hands.
This isn’t a wild dracovol at all.
‘I’m right,’ Gideon says with a grin. ‘She’s echolocating.’
Can dracovols echolocate like dragons? Dr Seymour never mentioned that.
She never mentioned her secret messenger, either.
‘Who is she talking to?’ I ask as my stomach fills with dread.
Could there be several dracovols in the area? And, if so, who owns the other ones? Does someone at Bletchley know Dr Seymour sent this one to look for Ursa?
I stare into the crevice again. The dracovol is pressing her snout to one of the eggs, her eyes still on me.
‘It doesn’t sound anything like dragon echolocation,’ Gideon says, concentrating on the live transmission.
I hold my hand out. ‘Can I listen?’
He hesitates, then gives me the headphones. I press them to my ears. I hear two simultaneous sounds: a low humming sound and a twitching, scratching sort of noise. This echolocation call is continuous. There’s no pause, no opportunity for a response. I hand the headphones to Dr Seymour, who takes them reluctantly, and look back inside the tree crevice. The dracovol’s eyes are closed now, her head still on top of the eggs. Suddenly one of them shivers.
‘Oh my God,’ I say quietly. ‘I think … she’s talking to them .’
‘To who?’ Sophie says, peering in beside me.
‘To the eggs.’
‘Impossible,’ Gideon says.
I turn round to face Dr Seymour.
‘ Is it impossible?’ I say. ‘Or could she be communicating with the dracovolets inside the eggs?’
Dr Seymour snaps into life again, standing up and looking inside the tree. When the dracovol sees Dr Seymour, she gives a high, throaty chirp.
‘It might not be female,’ Dr Seymour says. ‘Sometimes the female dracovol abandons the eggs and the male hatches them instead.’
Gideon, I notice, is writing all this down in a notebook he has produced from his pocket.
‘But is it possible?’ I say.
She sighs. ‘Yes, I suppose it is.’
‘Then dragons probably do the same, right?’
Dr Seymour nods.
‘Well then, this is proof,’ I say, raising an eyebrow at Gideon. ‘If dragons and dracovols echolocate with their young inside the eggs, then echolocation was never intended as a weapon.’
‘Viv’s right,’ Katherine says. ‘Echolocation must come naturally to them, like an in—What’s the word?’
‘Instinct,’ Sophie finishes.
‘Doesn’t mean they can’t use it as a weapon,’ Gideon argues.
‘Stay focused, all of you,’ Dr Seymour says. ‘Weapon or not, our job is simply to decipher it.’
‘Maybe dragon eggs depend on echolocation to be able to hatch!’ I say. ‘Maybe, without it, the dragonlings can’t grow. That would explain why dragon echolocation is so much more complex than whale or bat echolocation. Because the species depends on it to survive.’
‘It’s a possible theory, Vivien,’ Dr Seymour says. ‘We’ll explore it further, of course, but remember that for now it’s just that. A theory.’
I stare at her. This makes so much sense. This is progress . Why isn’t she celebrating?
‘Time to pack up, Gideon, please.’
Gideon loads the loquisonus machine back into the buggy. I peer into the crevice again.
‘Leave it, Vivien,’ Dr Seymour says sharply, and I recoil.
She’s never spoken to me like this before. She’s restless, moving from one foot to another, biting her nails. What’s wrong with her? Is she worried Ravensloe will find out she let me use the dracovol?
On the way back to the glasshouse, she strides ahead of us. I hurry to catch up and check that the others are still a few feet behind before I lower my voice.
‘Is it the message I sent?’ I ask. ‘Is that what’s bothering you?’
‘I told you never to mention it,’ she says.
Back in the glasshouse, I return to my logbook. I know what I saw. The dracovol was echolocating to its eggs. I understand now why the Koinamens is sacred. It has meaning and purpose beyond winning any war.
I drop my pen. What would Wyvernmire do with a secret like this? With an insight into a species beyond anything any scientist or zoologist has ever had? She’ll win the war, that’s certain. But will she use her knowledge of echolocation for other things? I think of the wyvern heads that supposedly used to be mounted on her wall. What if she used echolocation as a weapon against the dragons?
The thought makes my skin crawl. Suddenly I see why Muirgen was so angry with me for asking about echolocation. If dragons use it to hatch their eggs and heal each other, what else can it do?
That’s not your concern , I tell myself. Your concern is saving your family, saving Ursa. And now you have the tools to do just that.
Now that I know that echolocation is a language that very possibly contains dialects, the key to winning the war is to learn to speak them. I’ve learned nine languages already – what are a few more?
*
Dr Seymour doesn’t speak to me for the rest of the shift and Gideon simply glowers every time I look up from my logbook.
‘You realise we’re supposed to be working together, don’t you?’ he says. ‘I could check your findings if you want—’
‘No, thanks.’ I smile so hard my cheeks hurt. ‘After all, the art of languages is traditionally a woman’s domain.’
As soon as the siren sounds, I go to the library. It only takes me a few moments to find Searching for Swallows in the fiction section and I feel a swoop of nerves as I lift the front cover and spot a lose scrap of paper.
Atlas has replied.
I don’t let myself read it straight away. Instead, I take it downstairs to the dormitory, where I kick off my boots and sit on my bed with my legs folded beneath me. With a glance at the closed door, I retrieve the note.
Featherswallow, I wish I could express to you in a few short words the joys of carpentry, but the task is an impossible one. Instead, I’ll say this: there is an exhilarating feeling in creating something that has never existed before.
I smile as a warmth creeps into my cheeks. Why do I feel so energised? Is it simply the novelty of this secret conversation, of the clandestine passing of notes? Or is it the fact that I’m speaking with a boy who actually has something clever to say, whose choice of words is more poetic than Hugo Montecue could ever hope to be? I reach for a pencil, intending to think carefully before writing my reply, but it comes on its own.
Atlas, languages are like that. You can say the same thing a hundred different ways, and occasionally one of those ways is so unique to the translator that it is impossible to reproduce. No other translator will use the same words, the same rhythm, the same turn of phrase ever again. Translating is creating, too.
I slip my note beneath the book’s cover and hide it under the others piled high on my bedside table. I’ll return it to the library before dinner.
I run my hand along the spines of my current reads, the pages dog-eared from my late-night research. Every section of the library is stocked with an array of dragon-related books, so I’m now reading about a ridiculous amount of topics, from dragon dens to the hatching process. And, although I know none of them will mention dialects, some might give me some information about dragon languages in relation to different regions or locations.
I lie on my front and flick through Whispering with Wyrms: The Dragon Tongues of the Modern World in the vague hope of making sense of everything I learned today. I scan the list of dragon species at the back, from the Frilled Baikia to the Silver Drake, then turn to page 189.
The British Sand Dragon (Draco arenicolus) is brown, green or beige in colour. The underbellies of fertile females turn yellow during the mating season. Nests contain one to two eggs and are made of hot sand. The first tongue learned by the dragonlings is usually Wyrmerian.
The British Sand Dragon is native to the sandy heathlands of Dorset and Kent in the South of England.
So Soresten and Addax, both Sand Dragons, are very possibly from the same region of England. Which further backs up my theory that echolocation dialects could be regional. My chest flutters. It’s all coming together and—
I drop the book. There’s a box on the floor at the end of my bed, with an envelope stuck to the top. How did I not notice it before? I pick up the envelope and turn it over. The paper is thick and expensive and sealed with red wax. My name is written on the front in purple ink. There’s a box by every bed, I realise. I tear the envelope open.
Your presence is requested at Prime Minister Wyvernmire’s Christmas Ball this Friday evening at seven o’clock.Formal dress only.
Please be advised that leaving the building after blackout is strictly forbidden.
PS Attendance for recruits is mandatory.
I untie the string round the box and lift the top. My fingers brush against tissue paper, which I pull away, and then something like satin. I lift out a rose-coloured dress made of silk marocain. The material shimmers as it slips between my fingers. It’s sleeveless and dripping with beads, the most beautiful item of clothing I’ve ever seen. The door to the dormitory bangs open.
‘Have you seen this?’ Marquis says incredulously.
He’s holding a green suit and a pair of leather shoes. Atlas appears behind him, a red smoking jacket and a black tie in his hands.
‘Nice to see you keeping daylight hours, Featherswallow,’ he says with a wink. ‘Any idea what’s going on?’
I stare from my dress to the silver heels neatly packaged at the bottom of my box. Then I look back at the boys, all thoughts of Sand Dragons gone.
‘It seems,’ I say, ‘that we’re going to a ball.’
From the private papers of Dr Dolores Seymour
Excursion to Rùm– June 1919
6 June – Day 1
I am here at last. The necessary permissions weren’t granted until late last night, so I arrived on Rùm in the early hours of this morning. The Isle of Rùm, one of the Small Isles of the Inner Hebrides, is a rocky, mountainous landscape with scarcely an acre of level land. The smallest Scottish island to possess a summit above 2,500 feet, Rùm is an ideal hatching ground for British dragons. From its coast, one can see the Isles of Eigg and Canna, both property of the government. While trespassing on Eigg would result in a prison sentence of up to ten years, permission has been granted to the dragons to hunt on Canna, which, by the sounds of the screams, may be inhabited by wild pigs. Travelling to Rùm by any form of advanced transport that may disrupt the nesting space is illegal, as stipulated by the Peace Agreement. Therefore I accessed the island by way of the most primitive of rowing boats from the mainland. My camp for the next few days is composed of a tent and a cave, which – my colleagues have assured me – remains uninhabited.
7 June – Day 2
The spring mating season has given way to a time of nest-building and egg-laying. The dragons do not inhabit Rùm all year round, nor do they use it to mate. Extraordinarily, Rùm is used solely as a hatching ground and, even more incredibly, by all species of dragons. None are discriminated against. Since my arrival yesterday, I have spotted several species, including the Western Drake (Draco occidentalis), the Green-spotted Wyvern (Draco bipes viridi) and the Wyrm (Hydrus volatilis), one of the rarer, non-fire-breathing breeds that lays its eggs in the shallows.
8 June – Day 3
Oh, the exhilaration my work induces! Today I had the opportunity to observe, from a safe distance, a female Western Drake with her egg. The latter was purple in colour, and the shell was covered in calcium peaks that formed jagged edges not unlike the spikes along the ridge of the mother’s snout. She has chosen a precarious location for her nest, on the very edge of a cliff – so precarious, in fact, that I did much of my observing from a tree. Although more and more dragons land on Rùm each day in search of a nesting spot, the island is far from overcrowded. This female’s decision therefore remains a mystery to me.
9 June – Day 4
The Western Drake left her nest long enough for me to see it up close. It is lined with stones, which she keeps smouldering hot, and dry ferns that occasionally catch alight. She has only one egg, which, I believe, is not unusual for a young first-time mother. The reason for her absence was to converse with another Western Drake, in the process of building her nest on a neighbouring cliff. While I couldn’t hear much of their conversation, I was able to establish they were speaking Wyrmerian – the one and only dragon tongue whose basic grammar I can grasp. I wish I could attempt communication with them, but I don’t dare. My presence here, I have no doubt, will only be tolerated for so long.
10 June – Day 5
The crash of waves against rocks, the screeches of the gulls and the cacophony of hundreds of dragon voices – these are the sounds I fall asleep to. I fear the noisiness of the hatching season – almost a social event – may suggest that the Royal Observatory’s speculation about dragons’ ability to communicate via ultrasonic sound waves is incorrect. If the dragons could do so, why would they deign to use their voices at all? There are both males and females present on Rùm– some share the egg-nurturing duties while other single parents are merely visited by their flightier mates. I have been watching two British Sand Dragons tending to their nest on one of the beaches near my camp. Both are female. I have seen them both turn the eggs over with their talons before burying them once more. There is no sign of a male partner in the vicinity.
11 June – Day 6
The Western Drake’s egg is moving. If one watches very closely, one can see it tremble for just a second before standing still. This phenomenon only occurs when the mother approaches the nest. It’s almost as though the tiny creature inside can sense her presence. And yet she rarely touches it, except to turn it over or bathe it in flame.
12 June – Day 7
Today I observed some peculiar behaviour. The Western Drake brought her head down to the top of her egg, as if smelling it. And again I saw the egg move, more visibly this time. It shook almost violently, then toppled over on to its side. The mother raised her head, satisfied, and left to hunt. It is almost as if she had instructed the creature inside the egg to move. I have had a tentative, outrageous thought. What if dragons do possess a means of communication that is not the spoken word? It is a theory we considered during the war, then further explored last year through the observation of a small, isolated dragon clan on Guernsey, a highly unusual group because they spoke only one singular tongue. Might it be possible that these dragons had decided they had no use for multiple tongues, seeing as they could read each other’s minds?
13 June – Day 8
Something truly horrific has happened. The Western Drake is dead! Last night she returned to the nest foaming at the mouth and, despite my attempts to help her, she succumbed. Following this catastrophe, I did something reckless. I took her egg, as well as the contents of the nest, and brought it into my cave. I have built a small fire beneath the nest in an attempt to keep it hot.
14 June – Day 9
I rise every two hours during the night to stoke the fire. My cave is full of smoke. I know little about how hot the egg should be, or if the heat it receives should be constant or sporadic. The dragons who came to eat the body of the dead mother have left it untouched. I fear this means she was poisoned. I depart for the mainland in two days.
15 June – Day 10
No movement from the egg. Its surface has begun to crack. Today I walked three miles to observe the nest of the other Western Drake. The stones beneath her two eggs seem to be constantly smouldering. I therefore dare to hope that I am doing things right. I found the courage to approach her and ask her – in English – if she might adopt the egg. ‘No,’ she replied, nodding towards her own two eggs. ‘I do not have enough flame for three.’
16 June – Day 11
The egg is dead. The shell has begun to disintegrate and smell. I leave for the mainland in the morning. What does a dragon egg need to survive and hatch, apart from heat? What was it about the mother’s presence that made her egg tremble in response? I am determined to make this the topic of my next research project.