The Camelot Spell - Laura Anne Gilman [62]
The ring came away in his hand without any difficulty, and Newt stepped away from the dragon’s head with undignified haste.
“You have what you came for,” the dragon said, keeping its head low and watching them. “Go now. Bother me no more.”
“Once more, Wise One,” Gerard said, inclining his head to the dragon, as close as he could manage to the way knights saluted each other on the jousting field. “Once more.”
“Indeed. I shall look forward to it, human. I shall be here when you return.”
And with that, the dragon curled its head back onto the treasure-heap, closed its eyes, and began to snore once again.
The three humans, the talisman safely captured on Newt’s finger, turned and fled the cavern.
More time had passed than they had been aware of while they spoke to the dragon. Night had fallen and the sky was spread out before them, black silk scattered with brilliant stars. The air was cool and crisp, smelling faintly of what they could now identify as dragon-breath—or perhaps the smell came with them, clinging to their clothes and hair.
From their vantage point high up on the hill, the world seemed as distant as the sky.
“You have the talisman?” Gerard asked Newt. The stable boy nodded, unclenching his fingers and displaying the thick golden band on one finger.
“It seemed smaller, somehow, in the dragon’s ear,” Newt said.
“Do you realize how that sounds?” Ailis asked. “Speaking of a dragon so casually.”
“No stranger than speaking of a troll. Or an enchanter in a mystical house of ice. I begin to wonder if my horse will start to speak next. Or the very walls of Camelot.”
“They had best not,” Gerard said, clearly not happy with the idea that walls might begin to speak.
“At this moment,” Newt said, still staring down at the ring, “I begin to think anything at all is possible.” He let out a whoop, startling himself as much as his companions and the horses tethered nearby. “Dragons! I took a ring off a dragon!”
“It seems more…appropriate a talisman, than the other two,” Ailis said. “But do you really think you should be wearing it? It’s magical, after all.”
Newt blanched, and slid the ring off his finger quickly. He handed it to Ailis without hesitation when she extended her own hand for it, grinning at how quickly he moved once reminded of its origins.
She rested the ring in her palm, tilting her hand first left then right, looking for something out of the ordinary. But the blue magic had faded the moment they identified it, same as with the other two talismans, and it did nothing but glint like ordinary gold in the starlight.
“What do you think they do?” Gerard wondered.
“Do talismans all have to do something?” Newt asked. “Isn’t it enough that they just…I don’t know…are?”
The two young men both turned and looked at Ailis. She looked up at them and gave a startled little shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe…wait.” She closed her fingers around the ring. “Gerard, get the other two talismans.”
He started to question, then thought better of it and went to fetch them from the saddlebags.
“It’s stupid of us to have left them out here where anyone might have stolen them,” Newt said.
“There wasn’t anyone here to steal anything,” Ailis pointed out. “The nearest town is hours away. And who would come near a dragon’s lair if they need not?”
“Perhaps someone who didn’t know a dragon was here? How often do you think he leaves that cavern, anyway?”
Gerard came back with the two glass talismans before she could answer. “Here. What do you think—”
“A moment,” she demanded, sitting comfortably on the ground and placing the ring on the dirt in front of her. She reached up for the two other talismans. “Something about that riddle Merlin gave us…”
“The talismans had to be reclaimed by ‘three who are one,’” Newt said. He looked at the other two doubtfully. “Is that us?”
“I suppose.” Gerard sounded only a little reluctant to admit such a thing. “But who’s the one who is