Alice Borchardt - The Dragon Queen

THE DRAGON QUEEN

Alice Borchardt

PROLOGUE

How odd that I should write a book, and write it now when I have ceased to believe in them. When I

was young, I loved books: the coiled paper rolls in copper casings, the bound parchment kind whose

leaves turned one at a time. They revealed all the world to me.

Or so I thought.

This is what the Christian church has done to us: made us people of the book. Now I think that is

perhaps not such a good thing.

Before Patrick came toIreland we were people of the wind, the storm, the spring flood filling the rivers.

We marked the turning of the seasons and the sun’s journey through the halls of heaven. We struggled

with the famine in the spring and feasted when the autumn poured out its abundance at our feet. By day

we lived in the sun when it shone and the gray rain and wispy mist when it didn’t. We sang to one another

of the paths taken through the heavens by sun, moon, and stars and watched them when they rose and

set above the chamber tombs to carry with them the souls of the dead. And we sought truth,

enlightenment, love, and beauty in each other’s faces, hands, hearts, and bodies—not in the shadowed,

crackling pages made of paper and parchment.

We were a people of music, and we sang and danced, the thunder and whisper of tides on sand and

shingle, the roar of the wind speaking in a forest making love to moor and meadow or the shrill lament of

a cold winter storm. When hungry, we ate—if we had the food. A lot of times we didn’t. When cold, we

huddled about the fire and wove magnificent tales of love, conflict, good, evil, gods and heroes, who

were sometimes more than gods in their steadfast courage and sacrifice.

Oh yes, I admire books. Istill do. They can preserve a truth for twice a thousand years and teach it to

any who has the skill and cares to read it. They can also fix a lie in stone forever. But worse still,

they—the books— can be about nothing at all.

Nothing real.

And men and women can pour out their lives, brooding over shadows that never existed except in some

madman’s mind. Men can wear away their lives searching for the kernel of truth they think can be found

in the disordered ravings of a fool. For you see, the turning spindle twists thread, the shuttle flies between

the warp and weft, and the jewels of mixed colors light cloth, the adze smoothes wood, the knife cuts it,

and the scraper cleans hides. But a mass of words may mean nothing at all.

So we must return to the music, the dance, the songs, to hunger, desire, and love, lest we forget who

and why we are. We must sit around the fire and tell the tales, the stories of gods and men, so we might

know how to behave properly. In work and war, in life and death, we are instructed by the deeds of

others. In wisdom and courage, skill and truth, by music and the dance.

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

I am myself a creature of the dance, the imitation of the movements embraced by the dialogue between

earth and sky. The dance of power, the steps I trod on the edge of a mountain so long ago.

CHAPTER ONE

Cornwall,EnglandTintigal, Year of our Lord 470

The ship pulled up to the quay. Above the fortress, rock frowned down on the two men standing on the

deck. “It has never fallen to assault,” the captain told Maeniel.

“This I can believe,” Maeniel said, studying the formidable stone and wood walls at the top.

“Even Caesar did not care to besiege it,” the captain continued. “Or so it is said.”

Though spring had come to the continent, the wind inBritain still had a bite to it, especially the sea wind.

Maeniel pulled his mantle more tightly around himself. He knew the captain was eaten alive with curiosity

about him and his mission. He had declined to say more than absolutely necessary about it to the man.

The people he served needed as much protection as they could get. Not simply from the imperial tax

gatherers but also from the barbarian warlords who so willingly served the interests of those who

monopolized the remnants of Roman power. The captain probably had friends in every port where the

Veneti called. A man now might be hard put to get a letter toRome within a year, but gossip spread like a

brush fire.

“I was surprised when they gave me permission to bring you here,” the captain continued.

“I have business with Vortigen,” Maeniel said.

The captain laughed. “I love the way you say that, as though you were a man stepping out to a fair to

purchase a horse. A small matter of business, nothing extraordinary. Vortigen is the high king ofBritain ,

and he seems to know your name. Oh no, my lord Maeniel, nothing unusual about this situation at all. Big

doings up there tonight, though. I have been ferrying important people out here all day, one after another.

You will be the last. Enjoy yourself at the feast, my lord.”

Maeniel nodded and smiled.

“High king or not, I hope he knows what he’s doing—all those Saxons,” the captain said, spitting the

word Saxon.

One of the sailors reached out with a hook and pulled the boat up against the quay, while two others

began mooring her fore and aft to iron rings set in the stone.

“No!” the captain shouted. “Don’t. We will sail with the tide. I won’t remain here. Not tonight at any

rate.” He looked up at the fortress through narrowed eyes.

The man holding the boat to the dock gave him a puzzled glance. “I thought you enjoyed the king’s

hospitality.”

“Not tonight, I won’t,” the captain said. “And don’t ask me any questions about why.”

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

Maeniel jumped over the gunwales to the stone quay. “You are returning toGaul , then?” he called back

to the captain.

“Yes.”

“Come,” the man said. “All this trouble for nothing. We could at least stay the night. We might pick up a

cargo.”

“No,” said the captain. “We will be in Vennies by sunrise. I’d prefer it that way.”

A dozen men were at the oars. The mate shrugged and pushed off with the boat hook.

“Put your backs into it!” the captain shouted to the crew. “We will be home by morning. You married

men can chase your wives’ lovers out the window and get some sleep. We were paid in gold for this

day’s work. Everyone will have a share.”

Then they were gone, drawing away on the evening tide.

Maeniel’s eyes closed. The sea wind brought a mixture of odors to his nostrils: salt, roasting meat, and

other savory cooking smells; pitch from the torches being lit on the walls above him; the human odor of

infrequently washed bodies living in close quarters on the rock, perspiration and perfume, the diverse

odors of linen, silk, and wool. This was going to be an aristocratic gathering.

And something else was borne on the wind to him, something he didn’t want to intrude on his

consciousness just now, a warning. Yes, a definite warning. Sometimes humans sense things also. Yes,

he’d paid the captain in gold to bring him to Tintigal in thekingdomofDumnonia , but the man might as

well have remained and tried to pick up a cargo. In fact, the captain had not done too badly once

Maeniel was inBritain , picking up other travelers along the coast and ferrying them out to the rock. But

come nightfall, he began to grow nervous. Maeniel knew the signs very well. The hair on the back of the

captain’s neck began to stir, as had Maeniel’s when he first saw the fortress. And the captain didn’t

know why any more than Maeniel did. Left to himself, Maeniel the wolf would have cleared out. He

wouldn’t have run exactly, but that “not right” feeling, when it wouldn’t leave yet wouldn’t be resolved,

was something the wolf wouldn’t have wanted to play around with. But humans— as he was now—with

their predetermined appointments and planned meetings left little room for a response to the shadowy

awareness that haunted him, that haunted the wolf.

A serving man appeared at his elbow. He bowed. “My lord.” He was responding to Maeniel’s silk

woolen tunic and heavy velvet mantle. “My lord, are you here for the feast?”

Maeniel nodded.

“The stairs are to your left. They will bring you to the citadel; but before you go, if you would be so kind,

I must have your sword.”

Maeniel felt even more uneasy. He was tempted to say no, but in the growing gloom he saw two

indistinct figures behind the serving man and realized they must be part of the king’s guard. “Will I be the

only one who must yield up his weapon?”

The servant bowed again. “No, my lord. No one may bring a weapon to the king’s board, not tonight.

They will be held in the strong rooms under the fortress and will be returned in the morning. They will all

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

be under guard through the night.”

Maeniel unbuckled his sword belt. “I want to see where you take this,” he said.

The servant smiled, a little bit patronizingly, but said, “Certainly, sir.”

Then his eyes widened slightly at the sight of the hilt. It was wrapped in gold wire. A lot of gold wire,

more gold than the servant had ever seen in his life. “It looks old,” he said.

“It is old,” Maeniel answered.

“The hilt—”

“The hilt is nothing. The blade is everything.” So saying, Maeniel drew half its length from the sheath. The

torchlight shining down from the ramparts above woke rainbows in the steel.

The two soldiers behind the servant peered over his shoulder to look into the blade, for indeed, they

could see their reflections there.

“Only the gods could make such a weapon,” one of them said.

Maeniel looked down at it sadly. “Not the gods but men made and wore it before the Romans came

toGaul . But no matter, please take care of it.” He handed belt, sword, and scabbard to the servant. “My

teacher bestowed weapons on me. I cherish them.”

Then he turned and began climbing the stair. The servant walked ahead with the sword, the soldiers

behind.

From the stair, Maeniel could look out over the ocean. The sun was only a salmon glow among the

purplish blue clouds on the horizon, but since a feast was in the offing, torches blazed everywhere. The

serving man paused before they reached the top.

“The fortress was built in the form of rings, each higher level above but inside the lower.”

Here Maeniel encountered magic. He always seemed to do so when he least expected it. This ring had a

broader area of open ground than the others, and it had been turned into a garden. Large square clay

pans held food crops, and giant urns housed small trees and shrubs. A waist high wall surrounded the

garden, and the trees and vines flowed from troughs at the edge, hanging down so far that they almost

reached the next level. There were roses—many roses—white, yellow, and red. Pomegranates, hazel

trees, and berry vines, their long thorny canes draped over the rail. They were not in fruit but in bloom,

white flowers scattered like stars among the vines. The clay pans were filled with herbs—rosemary;

mints, which will grow anywhere if they have water and sun; pennyroyal; spearmint and the hairy apple

mints—onions, leeks, garlic, cabbages, and mustards, their cross shaped yellow flowers open to the night

wind and sea air.

“A garden in the sky,” Maeniel said.

“Yes. Are you then an adept?”

“Adept?” Maeniel said, mystified. “Adept at what?”

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

“Magic, sir,” the serving man answered, then pointed to the soldiers. They were climbing the last flight of

stairs to the inner keep above. “They don’t even know we are not with them, though they will announce

your presence to the king. He will thank them for it. He is always polite and will not warn them that they

are deceived.

“Most can’t see this garden at all, and those who can only think it is a quaint concept of the high king to

keep a few pots of flowers and vegetables near his front door. I will conduct you to the hall of weapons.”

“Yes,” Maeniel said. “Beneath the rose.”

“Behind it,” the serving man corrected, for there were pots of white roses all along the inner wall.

Maeniel saw the wall and the entrance hidden by magic, and he and the serving man—by now Maeniel

was sure he was no ordinary servant— stepped into it.

Was it morning or was it evening? He couldn’t be sure, and the wolf did not inform him. The sun was

just over the horizon, driving long shafts of light into the mists drifting in the vast hall.

Vast, Maeniel thought.Why vast? The drifting mist was so thick he could barely make out the doorway

behind him. Yet he had the sense of enormous empty space, a high roof, and giant windows looking out

over a cloud filled sky, of winds that drove sharp down drafts, cold and moist, and updrafts, hot and

reeking of jungle, forest, and marsh, and a sense of latent lightning hovering just out of being but poised to

rend both earth and sky. The mists around him were not fog or dew but clouds drifting over the summer

country of an earth below.

“You are no natural man,” the servant said.

“No,” Maeniel answered as the clouds, dark, now bright blue, silver, and bloody with the new—or was

it the old?—sun boiled around him. “1 am a wolf who is sometimes a man. Tell me, is it twilight or dawn

here?”

“There is nohere here,” the servant answered, “and it is neither one nor the other, each and both at the

same time. Do you wish my master any harm?”

“No. I came in hopes of his help for—”

The servant raised his hand. “I need know nothing more. There are those here who do wish him ill. He

has been warned, but he balances the need for peace with the danger they pose. 1 can do no more than

advise caution.” He extended the sword before him. There was a chime as though a great bell had rung.

The sword vanished. “It will be returned in two days. Wherever you may be, you will receive it. The

blade is warm with the love its maker put in it. His blood went into the molten steel as an offering, making

it resistant to any magic but your own. No matter what I do, I cannot retain it here for long. It is yours in

more than one sense.”

Seconds later they were both climbing up the steps to Vortigen’s hall.

“Not even the dead can remain long in the halls of the sky,” the servant continued. “Birds alone rule it.

That’s why they are sacred to her—she who gave you face and form. She has always had only one

name, The Lady.”

They reached the top, and Vortigen’s hall stood before them. When Maeniel turned to look, the servant

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

had gone.

The feasting hall occupied the top of the fortress, a dome of fitted, unmortared stone.

Vitrified, Maeniel thought,a house of glass .

He’d heard of the process but had not seen it before. The walls had originally been made of wood, the

dome of sand and other silicates framed within it. A hot controlled burn fused the sand into a mass like

obsidian, and when the wood was burned away a glass bubble remained. This was Vortigen’s hall. The

exterior and interior walls were polished, with openings drilled for a door and smoke hole in the roof.

It was beautiful.

Maeniel stepped through the arched door. The glass dome at the top near the smoke hole was

transparent, but since it was night only the stars shone through. They were reflected in a cataract of

brilliance on the polished stone floor. The hearth was in the center; three steps led down into the fire pit,

where a fire blazed, warming the room. It was a very big room, but still the firelight was reflected by the

black, polished floor and the matte finished walls. In addition, there were candles, many candles, each in

a tall holder behind a table that encircled almost the whole room.

A good many people were already present; and they wandered about, sipping wine from Roman glass

beakers and visiting with friends and acquaintances. Maeniel had lately encountered the new invention,

the fireplace with a chimney, on the continent. He liked the central hearth a bit better, but it used a lot of

fuel. He had no doubt a world warmed only by fireplaces was approaching. Yet, there was something

very democratic about this ancient hearth. People could gather around it and all be comfortable, whereas

with a fireplace those few who were able to get the seats closest to the fire harvested most of the warmth

and light, while the rest were consigned to increasing levels of cold and darkness. It was rather like what

was happening all over the dyingRoman Empire .

Someone offered him a cup of wine, a very attractive serving girl with very blond hair, blue eyes, and fair

eyelashes. The cup was glass blown over a gold frame, but when she drew near to pour the wine, he

found himself immersed in a stink of fear. Then he saw the collar she wore and noticed all the other

women were similarly collared. She offered to conduct him to the king. Maeniel followed.

A man he took to be Vortigen was seated at the table directly opposite the door. When he reached the

king the girl turned and walked away to attend to other guests. Maeniel knelt.

“Get up,” Vortigen said. “All I can see of you is your eyes. Please, come around and take a seat on the

bench beside me.”

Maeniel rose and nodded, seeing that the table—a work of art itself, being made of old oak and carved

along the edge with the dragon motif of the royal house—was not one table but six sections with

openings so that guests could pass between them. The woman who had led him to the king was walking

along with her crystal pitcher, filling the cups of a few seated guests.

“She is beautiful,” the king said. He sounded uneasy. “Want her?”

“No.” Maeniel’s answer was a resounding one, a little too vehement.

The king made a quick keep it down gesture. Maeniel apologized immediately. “I’m sorry,” he said

more softly, and then, trying to sound regretful, he said again, “No.”

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

“If what the letter said about you is true,” Vortigen said, “I can understand why you might find her

disturbing. They are all slaves, you know, purchased for the occasion by my sons and brothers in law

ofAnglia ,Sussex , andEssex . No women were invited to this feast. The women are for the convenience

of the guests. That, and that only, is the reason they are here.”

“Yes,” Maeniel said. He studied the people, who were still crowding into the room. Each man seemed

to have from one to four Saxon warriors in his entourage. Maeniel walked around the table and seated

himself beside the king, saying, “With your permission, my lord.”

Vortigen waved away his apologies and placed a hand on his knee. “And how is my old friend and

correspondent, the bishop of Aries?”

“He’s well,” Maeniel said, “and sends you his greetings.”

“And is he still involved with the Bagaudae?”

“Yes, and it is on their behalf that I have come here. I have been told their activities are even more

prevalent in this country.”

“They are,” the king told him. “It is for this reason that the Saxons have been imported here by my

relatives along the coast and the Saxon shore… to suppress the brotherhood of the Bagaudae.”

Maeniel nodded. “The same way the Gauls used the Franks to collect taxes and suppress rebellion

among their own people.”

The king nodded sadly. “As high king I have warned them that the raids along the shore would cease,

the land grow more profitable, if they remitted taxes rather than trying to crush their own people by

employing the Saxons as mercenaries. But all they learned from the Romans was how to destroy and

how to take. They are loyal only to their own interests. Hence, we are overrun with tribesmen from the

continent, and the people abandon their lands and flee. This has not happened in the north. We stood

fast.”

He sighed. “I am a weary man. All my life I have fought the long defeat.”

And indeed, to Maeniel’s eyes he did look weary. Though Maeniel knew him to be only forty, the king’s

hair was lightened by streaks of gray and his face was deeply lined by a fatigue no sleep could ever

banish.

“All the Romans did was steal,” Maeniel said. “And all they accomplished was to rupture the ties that

bound the chieftains to their own people and destroy any ability of the ordinary man or woman to call

even the least of these rich high lords to account for their actions. The landowners are the tyrants and the

barbarian warriors are the instruments of their pleasure. The smallholder, the craftsman skilled or

unskilled, is nothing to them. The Romans appreciated beauty, but they turned to their slaves to create it;

and indeed in Roman lands the singer, the musician, the dancer, the sculptor, the painter are all slaves, as

are the thinkers, prelates, and any others who do not devote themselves to the arts of war and

oppression. This is and was their legacy, and we are left to struggle along with this curse as best we can.”

“You say it well. I can see where the good bishop finds many of his arguments,” Vortigen said.

“I have had a long time to think,” Maeniel said. “But perhaps we can stop the rot here. Even inGaul the

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

Bagaudae keep the dream, the hope of resistance, alive.”

“I have no help to offer you,” Vortigen said. “If my family ever knew I had entertained an emissary from

the Bagaudae and a follower of Pelagius, I would have a great deal more troubles with my subkings than

I have now. I greatly fear I have neither men nor money to offer your distinguished patron. But we will

speak about this later, and perhaps I can find something to offer you. One thing I cannot give you is a

seat by my side, but I will place you at the end of a table near the door.”

Maeniel nodded. “I am honored to be here at all,” he murmured.

The throng in the hall was growing. A big man wearing a sword and accompanied by three large Saxon

warriors swept into the room. The servant who had placed Maeniel’s sword followed.

“He’s armed,” Maeniel said.

Vortigen studied his guest sadly. “Of course. No one would takehis sword. This is Merlin, or rather the

merlin. Just as I am Vortigen and the vortigen.”

“You confuse me,” Maeniel said.

“It is a riddle, a riddling question,” Vortigen said.

“I have heard of Merlin, though. He is the chief druid ofBritain and the archbishop ofCanterbury .”

“Yes.”

“He is a young man to hold so high an office,” Maeniel said.

And indeed, the man Maeniel looked on did appear young. He was dark, as many north Britons were,

and yet fair at the same time with white skin fine as alabaster and wide set, piercingly blue eyes. His hair

was black and worn to his shoulders. He was dressed magnificently. His rank demanded no less. He

wore dark suede riding pants, cross gartered leggings, a tunic of midnight blue silk embroidered with

stars in gold. His sword belt was heavy with moonstones, opals, and gold. He wore a scarlet velvet

mantle.

“He is the midnight realm of Dis Pater come to earth,” Maeniel whispered.

“Don’t speak so,” Vortigen answered and made a sign against the evil eye.

Merlin left no doubt who and what he was, for he immediately strode not around the fire, as ordinary

mortals do, but through it, down three steps and into the flame. Maeniel and Vortigen rose to watch his

progress as he walked across the bed of seething coals.

Itmay not injure him, Maeniel thought. Sometimes those without unusual powers can walk through fire

and not be harmed if they are quick enough; however, clothing usually did not share the immunity of the

flesh under it. Surelythat silk tunic and mantle will catch. But they didn’t, and as if to laugh any doubts

about his magical prowess to scorn, Merlin paused to kick a heavy flaming oak butt aside.

A fountain of sparks rose into the air surrounding him like fireflies in the summer twilight, but Maeniel

could see that they did him no harm. Nowhere was his skin scorched, or even his clothing, and had he

been merely mortal they would have, must have, but they didn’t. When he reached the other side and

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

climbed the three steps up, he presented himself to Vortigen, now standing in front of his chair at the

table. He did not bend his knee to the king, and Maeniel remembered that there was a law in some Celtic

lands that not even a king could speak before his druid. A murmur of awe filled the room, closely

followed by applause.

Merlin frowned.

“Greetings, Merlin,” Vortigen said. “And are you here to amuse us with your conjurer’s tricks?”

Maeniel could see the man was stung. “Conjurer’s trick, my lord Vortigen?”

Maeniel heard the subtle insolence in themy lord .

“And why are you wearing your sword? I believe you promised to leave it behind when you attended

this gathering. Our agreement was no arms.”

And then the servant was standing behind Merlin. He seemed to have gotten there without anyone quite

knowing how. He bowed low. “My lord?” he asked. “I believe we had a similar conversation on the

stairs.”

Merlin turned and looked at the servant; his back was to Maeniel, but he saw the results of the look as

the man took two steps back. To Maeniel this was a new kind of power.

Merlin turned to Vortigen. “What is this, my lord king, no trust?”

“No,” Vortigen said. “No exceptions. Your weapons.” He pointed to the door. “Or go.”

Merlin unbuckled his sword belt.

“Give it to Vareen.”

The servant bowed and took the belt from Merlin’s hand. As he did, Maeniel saw his face twist in pain,

and Maeniel heard a hiss and smelled a stink of burning. Vareen’s face went white.

“There is no need to punish my servants because you are angry with me,” Vortigen said.

“I think there is,” Merlin said, “a need to discipline any who would try to make themselves greater than

they are by trespassing against those of infinitely higher station.”

Vareen’s face smoothed out. “A small matter,” he said, “a trifle, really.” He smiled into Maeniel’s eyes,

turned, and departed.

Merlin scanned the room, evaluating then dismissing each man he saw until his gaze fell on Maeniel. He

made as if to dismiss him in a perfunctory manner, but his eyes returned to rest on Maeniel almost in spite

of himself.

“I believe I know everyone here… but this one. It seemed when I entered you were in close

conversation with him. Am I interrupting anything?”

“No, he is simply a messenger from an old friend, Cosmos, the bishop of Aries. He brought me news

and a letter from my friend.”

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

“And his name?” Merlin demanded.

A strange tension thrummed in the air. Maeniel opened his mouth to give the answer himself, but

Vortigen forestalled him. “He is called the Gray Watcher.”

Merlin smiled, or rather demonstrated he had teeth. “Watcher? I thought you said he was a messenger.”

“Sometimes that, also,” Vortigen said, “but I think we might be seated. The feast is about to begin. My

lord Merlin, you will have the seat on my left, the seat of honor. The Gray Watcher will have the seat on

my right.”

Maeniel felt mild surprise. Vortigen had said he must sit at the foot of the table. He wondered what

caused the change of plans.

Merlin showed his teeth again. Maeniel felt right at home. Did humans really think those smiles fooled

anyone? Maeniel understood now why he was uneasy. There was enough hatred packed into this

chamber to begin a conflagration to burn allBritain .

He was prescient. He just didn’t know it. And again he wondered at the willingness of humans to use

social lies to cover the fact that they loathed one another. Had he felt the same way about someone, or

even some thing, the way most of these humans did, he would have gone fifty miles out of his way to

avoid that person or thing. But here they were, all together and contemplating how quickly they could find

a way to cut one another’s throats. He felt a rather dismal certainty they wouldn’t do it here, but aside

from that, he knew all bets were off.

One of the mountainous Saxons who arrived with Merlin was seated on the other side of Maeniel. “That

is the woman’s seat,” he said, pointing down to the place on the bench where Maeniel was sitting.

“Indeed,” Maeniel said.

“If the queen were here, she would be seated where you are.”

“Since she is not, I will keep it warm for her.”

“You are not insulted?” the Saxon asked. “Most men would be insulted to be told they are seated in a

woman’s place. They would be afraid someone might think to treat them like a woman.” The Saxon gave

a sly smile.

“I’m not interested in being insulted,” Maeniel said. “I’m interested in being full. I’m hungry. Insult me

after dinner, then I will have time for you.”

“Maybe I will insult you after dinner,” the Saxon said, “and treat you like a woman, too.” He laughed at

his own sally and elbowed his other seat mate, another of Merlin’s big Saxons.

Maeniel, who wanted no fight at a king’s table, looked over at the Saxon, a long, slow, considering sort

of look.

“You have eyes like a wolf,” the Saxon said. The smile dropped from his face. “I have killed wolves.”

“And I,” Maeniel said, “have killed men.”

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

Alice Borchardt - The Dragon Queen

相关推荐

开通VIP享超值会员特权

作者详情

相关内容

热门标签

举报选择: