Chapter 30 Fang, Scale, and Claw
FANG, SCALE, AND CLAW
LIZZY
“Welcome back, Mrs. Darcy.” Mrs. Reynolds curtsied, her head bowed and her back pole-straight, her black gown brushing the granite steps of the main entrance to Pemberley House.
She had not batted an eyelash when I arrived alone and on foot. She simply summoned the staff, now arrayed in two angled wings. Their curtsies and bows followed hers in rank order.
Pemberley was without a butler, so Mrs. Reynolds led the household.
When Darcy and I married, there were sixteen servants.
That was skeletal for a house this size, but Darcy had blocked hiring for three years while he interviewed butlers and found fault with every applicant.
That amused me when I heard—we never had a butler at Longbourn, a vastly smaller house, so the idea was a novelty—and it was irrelevant while we spent time in London.
Now, though, I regretted it. A royal visit was a tremendous burden for Mrs. Reynolds alone.
Mrs. Reynolds permitted herself a glance down the empty road. “Will the master be joining you?”
“Shortly,” I said. “He is enmeshed in a fuss with the coaches a mile back. The delay is deliberate so I may address the staff.” I smiled at Lucy, now officially my lady’s maid, so she stood at Mrs. Reynolds’s right.
Lucy gave me a fleeting grin, but the rest of the staff were stiff and uneasy, their gazes fixed on the horizon.
Except for one footman studying the clouds.
I watched Mrs. Reynolds eye him, her lips compressing. He would hear about that.
“What have they been told?” I said.
“To prepare for a large party of guests, madam. Only that. As you directed.”
Was that the cause of their mood? We did not entertain heavily, but guests were hardly unusual. Anonymous guests, though, were strange. Or was it the war? Every newspaper screamed of the invasion of south England.
Or was their discomfort nearer?
I addressed the group. “Good afternoon. I am certain you all long since discovered that Mr. Darcy and I are bound to a dragon. His name, if that information has not yet spread to every ear, is Yuánchi. Mr. Darcy has appreciated your polite silence and discretion on your master’s behalf. However, I must now speak openly.”
Tense expressions relaxed. Eyes dared curious glances, both at me and the sky. That confirmed my theory for the source of their tension.
Mrs. Reynolds said firmly, “The staff’s discretion is on your behalf, madam. Pemberley’s wyves are her jewels.”
There were many nods. Most of this staff had served Lady Anne. Now that I had seen Emma’s struggle, they must have kept many secrets. Not to mention concealing Georgiana’s abilities.
“Then I thank you, myself,” I said. “I know you have also heard of terrible destruction caused by a dragon. That was not Yuánchi. Another dragon is loose in the world, and she fights for England’s enemies.
The war, distant for so many years, has invaded our shores.
” The gazes converged on me. I chose my next words carefully.
“Pemberley has a service to perform. We will shelter His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, His Majesty the King, members of the royal family, and members of the royal court.” I expected exclamations, but there was disciplined silence.
“Whatever secrecy you practiced before must be doubled. The enemy seeks to strike the monarchy. If any rumor escapes, the enemy will come here.” I paused, then words I had not intended came to my lips.
“We are not soldiers. I do not seek war. But if war comes to Pemberley, I will defend it.”
I nodded to Mrs. Reynolds, and she dismissed the staff. Lucy waited with her while the rest hurried to work, resolute.
When we were alone, I said, “When did you two arrive?”
“Four days ago,” Mrs. Reynolds said, then added dryly, “It seems your troop was slow.” We had departed London at the same time.
“You cannot imagine the inanity of the courtiers,” I said feelingly. “I would despair for England if not for a few bright minds in the mix. But most of our delay was due to Lord Wellington’s stealth. We could hardly stop at town inns. Are the kitchens open? Larder stocked?”
“All as ready as can be. Pemberley will not fail you.”
“The Prince has brought a head of household, and an annoying man who obsesses over protocol, and a head of court who noses into everything. You shall have your hands full. Let me know when it becomes impossible, and I will attempt to intervene.”
“Certainly, Mrs. Darcy.” Mrs. Reynolds’s eye had a steely glint. I suspected she would need little help. “Rooms and meals are well enough, but I am concerned for entertainment.”
“Entertainment?” I echoed, rather densely.
“Guests of rank expect to be entertained.” Primly, she added, “From what I have read, the Prince is easily bored. Bored guests make trouble. Or do foolish things. Ride off and be seen.”
“You are very wise. I did not consider it. See what you can invent.” She nodded. A shiver climbed my spine. “But nothing frivolous, please. London ended horribly. I could not stand an endless ball.”
Lucy had listened. Now she said, “You look tired. Shall I call for tea?”
“Thank you, but no. I must see Yuánchi.”
I tried to steady my voice. “Can you fly?”
Yuánchi stretched his wings, filling the clearing where Lucy and I stood.
There were uneven ridges where tears in his wing membranes had healed.
On his breast, a two-foot-long scar was mending to a line of misaligned scales.
Ugly as they appeared, the injuries were vastly less frightening than his condition when he fled London.
I flew last night. Launching from flat earth hurt, but in the air, I was only stiff. I will jump from a ridge next time.
“Please be discreet. Lord Wellington has spread false rumors that the scarlet dragon lives in a watery cave in Wales. He even added some story about their flag. But Mr. Tinsdale is a traitor, and he knows you and I are bound. Neither your presence at Pemberley nor mine can be known.”
In the past, Yuánchi responded to such cautions with an overconfident snort. Now, he shifted warily, muscles rippling.
“We’ve been feeding him well,” Lucy piped up, so intrigued that her carefully practiced lady’s grammar faltered. “Three sheep a day. The gardener brings them up.”
“Thank you.”
Peevishly, Yuánchi thought, I do not like sheep in winter. His recovery had eased my concerns enough that I laughed.
“What is it?” Lucy asked.
“He does not like the fleece in his teeth.”
“Oh.” She looked up at those black teeth, eight feet above her head. “A cow, then? Snap once for yes.”
Yuánchi showily bit the air.
My eyebrows rose, and I thought bemusedly, Snap once for yes?
You were not here. This one is helpful. His gaze turned to where the house lay, hidden by forest and a rise of hill. They come.
“You can see through that?”
I sense great wyves.
Wyves, plural. Emma. She had insisted on continuing Nessy’s care, and returning to her home south of London seemed dangerous, so she had joined us. Certainly, Pemberley had room.
Three great wyves together. It seemed a portent.
To Lucy, I said, “Would you go to the house and tell Mr. Darcy where I am, please?”
She planted her fists on her skinny hips. “I must stay to keep you safe!” I cocked my head toward Yuánchi, and she relaxed sheepishly, then trotted off.
Yuánchi settled to the earth, his motions lithe and powerful. Any stiffness was too subtle for my human eyes. He ended with his belly and chest buried in the scraggly winter grass, but he did not sprawl sideways to relax. One massive foot landed firmly at each side, his posture alert.
Ask your questions.
Each day since the battle over London, I had pressed him for information. Each day, I was rebuffed. Now, facing his bulk and surrounded by towering, ancient trees, I felt suddenly small.
“Is there some rule I break by asking these things? Some law or custom of draca?” He waited. “Very well. Humans call the black dragon Fènnù. It means Fury. Why is she called that?”
That is her human name. A dragon name is a song.
“Then who named her? The word is Chinese. So is your name. Do you know what China is? What a country is?”
A country is a house like your war castles, but the walls are imagined. He huffed dismissively. Countries change like clouds, and they vanish when I sleep.
I sighed. “I asked a poor question. I will try to be specific, but you must explain things in human terms. Otherwise, we shall not get anywhere. I wish to understand the black dragon.”
Why? Yuánchi’s tone was simply curious, even though he had fought the black dragon twelve days ago.
“Lord Wellington would answer that she is a weapon, ravaging England for our enemies, so she must be destroyed. But he is a military man. To me, she is a mystery. When she rose from the Thames, her mind overcame mine until you protected me. The next day, when you battled above London, I felt her reach for me again.” I licked dry lips.
“It is not only she. I am attracted to her, as well. The visions I had of past wyves show her, never you. Are they her memories?”
They are wyves’ memories. Wyves she has bound. Draca bind to learn what we do not know. Love. Passion. She keeps memories of her bound wyves after they are bone and dust. There was stillness, then, We all keep memories. The memories of a lost wyfe are treasures.
That was comprehensible, at least. “In the visions, I saw moments of vengeance and violence. I know I am the wyfe of war. You need not prevaricate about that. Fènnù called me that, and so did you when we bound. But I have been interpreting that label through human concepts. What does a dragon mean by wyfe of war?”
The passions of wyves burn bright. An ordinary wyfe is a candle. A strong wyfe, a torch. A great wyfe is a sun. All wyves have… colors. Your passion is the color of a wyfe of war.
“Are there human words for the color of a wyfe of war? Is it anger?”
It is steel and courage and sacrifice.
“Not… madness?” My throat was thick. I swallowed, tasting salt. “Or cruelty? I killed a woman, and I felt no regret. Not until after. When I did it, there was…” I could not voice those words. Pleasure. Triumph.
The one you call Fènnù is broken. The fragments of her mind overcome the wyves she binds. Even when she was whole, she chose wyves seeking strength to right wrongs. When she lost her song, only battle remained. Now, the songs of all dragons are unfinished.
“I need a poet to interpret these unsingable songs,” I muttered. I rubbed at a growing ache in my temples. “Well, what is the dagger, then?”
Nothing. Daggers are human things.
“This dagger is a dragon’s tooth. Fènnù’s tooth, unless there is another dragon larger than you.”
Scales rattled as Yuánchi stiffened his wings. You did not say it was a tooth.
“I was not sure at first. Did I never tell you?”
In answer, Yuánchi’s thoughts filled my mind, but they lilted like a woman’s voice: Fang, scale, and claw. Then death, they saw.
Well, that was different. I heard Yuánchi’s thoughts as words, but that was a comfortable illusion. If I concentrated, his words, like those of wyverns, had no sound. No syllables. They were comprehension without hearing. But this had been true mimicry of a spoken voice.
“That is poetry,” I said. “Do draca write poetry?”
Those are human words. I woke to a call and crossed seas to the wyfe who called me. She spoke those words. Even then, she told a lost story. Three great wyves had gathered three great items—fang, scale, and claw—to heal the broken song. But they failed and died.
“You crossed seas to reach England?” Yuánchi cocked his head uncertainly, and I blew out a frustrated breath. “England is the large island on which we sit. It is not built of imaginary lines. Neither does it vanish while you sleep. Did you cross seas to come to this island? To find that wyfe?”
Yes, he thought, sounding mildly chagrined.
“You must have come from the East, as you had a Chinese name.” Yuánchi snorted reprovingly, as if logic were distasteful, but I forged on, “The great wyves gathered the dagger and two other items to heal Fènnù. Or they tried. They failed. Then you came here.”
I did not say all that. Those wyves are gone. I do not hold their memories.
“What exactly are fang, scale, and claw?”
Yuánchi’s head swung, examining me from several angles. Finally, in a fussy tone, he thought, Exactly, they are three human words. You called them poetry.
“So I did,” I sighed. This was giving me a profound headache.
“The dagger summoned Fènnù from the ice. But I do not believe the dagger is a weapon. It was in none of my visions, so it came after Fènnù’s mind was broken.
I think it was made as a cure.” Yuánchi was eyeing me as dubiously as faceted jewel eyes could manage.
“But weapon or cure, we must recover it. If our enemies have it, England will lose this war.”