The Two Princesses of Bamarre Read Online Free PDF Page B

as bile.
    The cloud engulfed
    Drualt’s army.
    Within the cloud,
    Defiance stumbled,
    Choking.
    Hooves beat the smoke.
    Drualt, the laugher,
    Heard Yune’s laugh.
    He raised Blood-biter, and,
    Glowing white, the sword carved
    A tunnel, a sun shaft
    To pure air
    And, unseen,
    To Yune.”
     
    Next to me, Bella mouthed the words as Meryl spoke them. I glanced up at Rhys. He leaned forward, intent, nodding as Meryl spoke.
    She kept reciting. Drualt used the cloud as cover to get under Yune’s wing. He stabbed at her underbelly, wounding her. They battled for hours, and each was wounded several times. Then the tide turned against Drualt. He was unhorsed, and Blood-biter was knocked out of his hand. Before he could reclaim the sword, Yune’s flame melted it.
    Meryl looked pale, and I thought I saw a tremor run through her. This is exhausting her, I thought, and wondered why. But her voice was steady, deeper and richer than usual.
    Drualt knew that cunning alone would save him. He raced to Yune’s hoard, fire licking his heels, and dove into it. Yune swallowed her flame, not wanting to harm her treasure. She pawed the pile of bones and jewels, searching for Drualt.
     
    “Within the moldering,
    Noxious hoard,
    Drualt’s living hand
    Found the sword
    Of long-dead hero
    Arkule. Yune’s claws
    Raked her festering pile
    And almost plucked out Drualt’s
    Keen right eye.
    A claw found instead
    Drualt’s scorched shoulder.
    The dragon shrieked her triumph:
    ‘You’re mine now. Mine!
    Mine to burn, mine to crisp,
    Mine to kill.’
    She lifted Drualt.
    And on that upward journey
    To his doom,
    Drualt thrust Gore-gouger
    Into Yune’s soft flesh
    And plunged—”
     
    Meryl broke off, panting and holding her side. Bella and I jumped up. Rhys took a step toward her.
    She held up her hand. “I’m fine.
     
    “. . . plunged Arkule’s long
    And ancient sword
    Into Yune’s stony heart.”
     
    The recitation was over. Meryl began to curtsy, lost her balance, and almost fell. Then she caught herself and completed the obeisance. She stood and smiled.
    The smile was forced, I thought, too brilliant to be real.
    Rhys applauded wildly, flamboyantly. I stood and clapped. Bella clapped too, but she was frowning. She and I knew that Meryl usually went on reciting to the end of the dragon stanzas, through Yune’s collapse, Drualt’s narrow escape from suffocation, and the reunion with his horse, Defiance. She always insisted that the battle wasn’t properly over until every uncertainty had been resolved.
    “Wonderful! Marvelous!” Rhys was still clapping. “I’ve never heard it done so well.”
    “Thank you.” Meryl sank onto the bench.
    Rhy’s expression changed from delight to worry.
    She must have caught a cold, I thought, sitting next to her.
    “You should rest in your room,” Bella said. “Such a warm day . . . the exertion . . .”
    “I’m not tired. Reciting always gives me energy. You know that.”
    But she continued to sit. Ordinarily, after declaiming, she could almost leap tall trees.
    “Now it’s my turn to entertain.” Rhys still looked worried. “Apprentices aren’t supposed to, but . . .” He smiled ruefully. “I can’t resist.”
    He took Meryl’s place at the fountain. “I can use those clouds.” He took out his golden baton and pointed it upward. . . .
    And we were in a fog so thick that when I looked down, my arms faded into it above the elbow.
    I heard Rhys say, “No. No.”
    The fog vanished, and a compact little cloud floated above the fountain. A roll of thunder came from the cloud—lighter and sweeter than ordinary thunder. It was little-cloud thunder, without lightning but with rhythm, ta-dum dum , ta-dum dum . The cloud pulsed in time to itself, a dancing cloud.
    I smiled. Meryl was smiling too, leaning against my shoulder. I looked up at Bella, whose face was impassive. She wasn’t to be won over so easily.
    Rhys raised his baton again. A wisp of cloud came to hang in the air next to