looked around and saw that I was at the edge of a milky river, on a very small clay beach. A great forest of immense trees stood at my back. They were taller than towers and shaded the day to dusk. I didn’t see anything else at first. Then I noticed a tiny creature, like a lizard, only plumper. It was on the wide leaf of a tree, watching me. Yet once I saw it, it began to grow. Or perhaps I shrank. I’m not sure. The forest grew bigger as well, until when the animal stepped down onto the clay, it was a dragon. Blue and silver, immense and beautiful. And she spoke to me, saying, “So. You’ve seen me. Well, I don’t care. But you will. You’re one of his. Tell me. What do you know of a black dragon?” Then, and this part was very odd, I couldn’t find myself. It was as if I had looked at her too hard and forgotten to remember that I existed. And then I decided I would be behind a tree, and I was.’
‘This doesn’t sound like the Skill,’ Chade interrupted irritably. ‘It sounds like a dream.’
‘Exactly. And so I dismissed it when I awoke. I knew I had Skilled briefly, but I thought that then sleep had crept upon me, and all that followed was a dream. So, in this dream, in the odd way that dreams have, Thick was suddenly with me. I didn’t know if he had seen the dragon, so I reached for him and told him to be quiet and hide from her. So we were hiding, and she became very angry, I think because she knew we were still there but hiding. Then suddenly Thick was gone. And it startled me so much that I opened my eyes.’ The Prince shrugged. ‘I was in my bedroom. I thought it had just been a very vivid dream.’
‘So it could have been, one that you and Thick shared,’ Chade replied. ‘I think we can leave this now and settle to our real business here.’
‘I think not,’ I said. Something in Chade’s easy dismissal warned me that the old man did not want us to speak of this but I was willing to sacrifice part of my secret to discover his. ‘I think the dragon is real. Moreover, I think we have heard of her before. Tintaglia, the Bingtown dragon. The one that masked boy spoke of.’
‘Selden Vestrit.’ Dutiful supplied his name quietly. ‘Can dragons Skill, then? Why would she demand to know what we knew of a black dragon? Does she mean Icefyre?’
‘Almost certainly she does. But that is the only one of your questions that I can answer.’ I turned reluctantly to face Chade’s scowl. ‘She has touched my dreams before. With the same demand, that I tell her what I knew of a black dragon and an island. She knows of our quest, most likely from the Bingtown contingent that came to invite us so cordially to their war with Chalced. But I think that she only knows as much as they did. That there is a dragon trapped in ice, and that Dutiful goes to slay him.’
Chade made a sound almost like a growl. ‘Then she’ll know the name of the island as well. Aslevjal. It is only a matter of time before she discovers where that is. The Bingtown Traders are famous for doing just that: trading. If they want a chart that shows the way to Aslevjal, they’ll obtain one.’
I spread my hands, displaying a calm I didn’t feel. ‘There is nothing we can do about that, Chade. We’ll have to deal with whatever develops.’
He pushed back his chair. ‘Well, I could deal with it better if I knew enough to expect it,’ he said. His voice rose as he did. He stalked to the window and stared out over the sea. Then he turned his head to glare at me over his shoulder. ‘What else have you not told me?’
Had we been alone then, I might have told him about how the dragon had threatened Nettle and how she had dismissed the creature. But I did not wish to speak of my daughter in Dutiful’s presence, so I only shook my head. He turned back to gaze out over the sea.
‘So we may have another enemy to face, besides the cold and ice of Aslevjal. Well. At least tell me how big is this creature? How strong?’
‘I don’t know. I’ve only seen her in dreams, and in my dreams, she shifted her size. I don’t think we can be sure of anything she has shown us in dreams.’
‘Oh, well that’s useful,’ Chade replied, discouraged. He came back to the table and dropped into his chair. ‘Did you sense anything of this dragon last night?’ he suddenly asked me.
‘No. I didn’t.’
‘But you did Skill-walk.’
‘Briefly.’ I’d visited Nettle. I wasn’t going to discuss that here. He didn’t seem to notice my reticence.
‘I did neither. Despite my best efforts.’ His voice was as anguished as an injured child’s. I met his eyes and saw, not just frustration there, but pain. He looked at me as if I had excluded him from some precious secret or wonderful adventure.
‘Chade. It will come in time. Sometimes I think you try too hard.’ I spoke the words, but I wasn’t sure of them. Yet I could not bring myself to say what I secretly suspected: that he had come to these lessons too late, and would never master the magic so long denied him.
‘So you keep saying,’ he said hollowly.
And there seemed nothing to reply to that. For the remainder of our session, we worked through several exercises from one of the scrolls, but with limited success. Chade’s discouragement seemed to have damped all his ability that day. With hands linked, he could receive the images and words I sent him, but when we separated and moved to different parts of the room, I could not reach him, nor could he touch minds with Dutiful or Thick. His growing frustration disrupted all of us. When Dutiful and Thick departed to their day’s tasks, we had not only made no progress, but had failed to equal the previous day’s level of Skill.
‘Another day spent, and we are no closer to having a working coterie,’ Chade observed bitterly to me when we were alone in the room. He walked over to the sideboard and poured brandy for himself. When he gestured questioningly at me, I shook my head.
‘No, thank you. I’ve not even broken my fast yet.’
‘Nor I.’
‘Chade, you look exhausted. I think an hour or two of rest and a solid meal would do you better than brandy.’
‘Find me two empty hours in my day, and I’ll be happy to sleep,’ he offered without rancour. Chade walked to the window with his cup and gazed out over the water. ‘It all closes in on me, Fitz. We must have this alliance with the Out Islands. With Chalced and Bingtown warring, our trade to the south has dwindled to a trickle. If Chalced defeats Bingtown, as it well may, it will next turn its swords against us. We must ally with the Out Islands before Chalced does.
‘Yet it isn’t just the preparations for the journey. It’s all the safeguards I must put in place to be sure Buckkeep runs smoothly while I am gone.’ He sipped from his cup then added, ‘In twelve days we depart for Aslevjal. Twelve days, when six weeks would scarcely be enough time for all I must arrange so that things will run smoothly in my absence.’
I knew he was not speaking of things like Buckkeep’s provisions and taxes and the training of the guard. There were others who routinely administered all such systems and reported directly to the Queen. Chade worried about his network of spies and informants. No one was certain how long our diplomatic mission to the Out Islands would take; let alone how much time would be consumed by the Prince’s quest to Aslevjal. I still harboured a fading hope that his ‘slaying of the dragon’ would be some strange Outislander ritual, but Chade was convinced there was an actual dragon carcass encased in glacial ice and that Dutiful would have to uncover it enough to sever the head and publicly present it to the Narcheska.
‘Surely your
