Mistress of Dragons Read Free Page A

approached. They had heard the silver gong
and, although they had not received direct orders from the Mistress, this was
an emergency and they had standing orders to allow the High Priestess to pass.
Melisande was not strong enough to shove open the huge bronze doors; the
warrior women performed that office for her.
    “Good
hunting, High Priestess,” said one, as Melisande entered the Mistress’s
residence.
    Daylight
entered with her, shining down a long narrow corridor of wood and painted
murals. The eyes of the dragons portrayed in murals gleamed with borrowed life
in the sunlight. The light vanished as the bronze doors closed with a dull
boom, stealing away the life briefly granted them. Windowless, the corridor was
lit only by small cresset lights placed at intervals along the wall. Part of
the task of the warrior women was to lower the lights, fill them with the oil
that kept them burning. The darkness was redolent with the scent of incense,
and had a thick, warm, comforting feel.
    Running
was not permitted in the chambers of the Mistress. Nor was shouting or talking.
One was expected to enter with bowed head and sacred thoughts, move with seemly
decorum. Melisande had to force herself to slow her steps. She wished that she
had not forgotten her shoes. The Mistress would think she lacked discipline.
Calming herself with prayer and the thought that the dragon was yet far
distant, she decorously walked the shadowy corridors to the Mistress’s
bedchamber.
    She
was surprised to find the Mistress’s door closed. The opening of the bronze
doors tripped a wire that rang a bell in the chambers of the Mistress, alerting
her to the presence of a visitor. Ordinarily, she would open the door in
preparation of receiving a guest. Finding the door still closed, Melisande
assumed that the elderly Mistress was still sleeping and had not heard the bell’s
clang. Melisande raised her hand to the bronze knocker, which was in the shape
of a dragon, but at that moment, the door swung open.
    The
Mistress stood within. The golden threads embroidered into her ceremonial robes
shone in the light of an oil lamp that stood upon a richly carved wooden table.
Her seventy years had sapped the strength of her body. Her hair was snowy white,
her face wizened and deeply lined, her thin body bent and stooped. Her voice
was strong, however; eagerness flickered in her dark eyes.
    “You
have seen a dragon,” she said.
    “I
have, Mistress,” said Melisande, ashamed to be unable to control a tremor in her
voice.
    In
this sacred place, the enormity of the situation, the danger and the peril for
her people, and her own responsibility fell suddenly upon her and she faltered
beneath the crushing weight. For a brief moment, she wished fervently that she
was once again that eight-year-old girl, being carried to safety in the strong
arms of a warrior.
    “How
many?”
    “Just
one, Mistress.”
    “The
dragon is coming here? Are you certain?”
    “The
beast was still very small within the Eye, Mistress. But he grew larger as I watched.
He is coming closer. And his gaze looked straight at me.”
    The
Mistress smiled. Her smiles were rare and always inward, so that Melisande was
never certain if the Mistress was pleased with something she had done or if her
joy rose from some secret held within.
    “I
knew you would be among the blessed,” said the Mistress. She moved toward the
door, grasped hold of Melisande’s wrist. “I knew when you were small. I could
see the magic dancing in your mind. You must describe the dragon to me.”
    “A
young male by his bright coloring, golden green on his back and shoulders and
mane, tending to blue scales on his belly and his legs and tail. Should I
summon the sisters—”
    “Yes,
summon them.” The Mistress’s hand was skin and sinew and bone. She clasped
Melisande’s wrist tightly. “Send them to the Sanctuary. Alert the warriors—”
    “I
have already done that, Mistress.”
    “Ah,
yes, you would.” The