She fished around in her purse, brushing aside the baubles and bits of jewellery that always seemed to get in the way on top. Finding a silver coin, she placed it on the gold saucer and stepped back.
The dragon stepped over the line of stones, and it seemed that a shiver went through him, from his sharp snout, down his spines and glimmering black-green-purple scales, all the way to the arrow-like tip of his tail, which flicked once, like a cat’s. He lowered his head to the ground and focused greedily on the small gold object. He sniffed at it, and all around where it sat on the stone, inspecting it from different angles, then dashing out a surprisingly pink and delicate tongue to taste it. Finally, he seemed to scrutinise the emeralds, perhaps checking that they had not been prised out and replaced with chips of glass. At last, he appeared to decide he was satisfied, while clearly not being entirely pleased. His voice rumbled, like an avalanche in song: “The piece of my stolen pride and joy is unblemished and undamaged.” In a more hissing snarl he added, whilst switching his eyes first to Caewen, then to Fafmuir, “more’s the pity. Revenge would have been honeyed, but it is not for me.” Then, in one sinuous movement, that dancing, pointed tongue snaked out from between sharp teeth. It caught and delicately lifted the saucer and the silver coin, tucking both within his left cheek, gently, carefully.
Caewen wondered how gold and silver carried that way would not be melted to slag, but decided that it wasn’t the right time to ask about it.
“Good bye, old fellow,” said Aslaug to Fafmuir. “I bid you farewell with the respect that is afforded a magician of the Broadtable, but not with affection. You have misused me, and you are suffering that which is only your deserts.” With that, his wings spread wide and cast gloom-filled shadows as big as the crowns of oak trees over the damp grass. Aslaug rose slowly, heavily, with several ponderous sweeps of his wings. Each rotation of the vast sail-like wings raised up a gust that was nearly strong enough to knock Caewen over backwards. She had to lean in, to remain standing. Soon though, he was high up in the air, and with barely a minute’s passing, Aslaug was diminishing the way he had come: a vague winged shape in the dark evening sky, now vanishing into the deepening black of night.
“Well,” muttered Fafmuir, his voice anything but cheery and rosy. “I suppose that is that then. And what has all this come to? My untimely demise.” He looked at Caewen. “And a busy-body who has got herself stuck far deeper into sticky matters than she realises.” He looked around, found a round rock and eased himself down. “You might as well sit. We might as well talk out my last few living moments.”
“And why should I do any such thing? For all I know, you’ll just spin more lies and try to put some enchantment or curse on me.”
But he shook a weary head and waved one of his gloved hands as if he were swatting at a drowsy fly. “There’s no point in any of that for me now. But, there is some point in a last conversation. After all, you are the only one who knows the whole of the truth here, I wager. You are the only one who truly understands the depth of the precipice we stand at.” He cast a long, assessing look over her. “You have seen his armies, have you not? You know that he comes, and in his train comes ice-cold beasts, and a hundred-thousand swords and cold death.”
Caewen decided that there must be something very much wrong with her. She knew that she ought to just walk away. Ought to just leave Fafmuir–bitter, crazed old man that he was–to die, alone. But she didn’t.
She sat on another small round stone, and she let her shoulders droop and sag. “I am so tired. I feel as if I could just crawl into a hole and die.”
“That’s how you feel?” He laughed. “Imagine how I feel.” He paused. “My flesh is being eaten alive by the curse of Herself of the Tor. I haven’t quite let go yet. I haven’t quite given up. But soon… soon. Before I let her have her way with what remains of my flesh, though, we will talk, and I will say some things to you. I will tell you three truths.”
She nodded. “As payment for what you’ve done?”
He chuckled, and it was a strangely pleasant sound. Like an old man enjoying an old joke by a fire. “After a fashion. First, here is something I wager you do not know: the Winter King is searching for something that belongs to him. Something he has lost. A piece of himself. He must have it back to be whole. The Winter King is timeless, in his way, and immortal after a fashion. But like all preternatural things that take mortal form, he does age.” A fraction of a shrug. “Albeit, slowly. Every aeon, or so, he must slough off his mortal flesh and die to be reborn. Or else he would grow older and older and more decrepit, and eventually he would be no more than a living skeleton with flesh stretched over it.”
She thought of the statue, with the old man and the babe. They were both the Winter King. Was it a depiction of him being born anew? Was the old man becoming the babe in his arms? “I take it he needs to do this? Rebirth himself. But the thing he has lost… does he need it to become young again?”
“No. He has been reborn recently. A hundred years ago, or thereabouts. But to properly renew himself, he must first spend some time properly dead. And to do that he must give up all his powers. And to do that, he must leave his potency elsewhere, for safekeeping.”
“In objects?” said Caewen. There were the small objects arrayed around the feet of the statuette. “Like in gems or daggers or things?”
“Yes. One of those vessels of his stashed-away power has gone missing. He has found all the others, but he needs that last one back to be fully potent. To be fully immortal again.”
She considered this. “Can he be undone then? Might he be killed, as he is?”
“As long as the last piece of his power is missing, yes.”
“I see.” She frowned. “Surely, it would still be–“
He waved a hand. “A nigh impossible task. Yes. Of course. Even with this small fraction of his power lost, The Winter King is still powerful beyond your comprehension. What could ever kill him? Well, an elder dragon of yore, for one. That would have done the job, good and proper. Still, there it is. The first truth. The Winter King is vulnerable.” A scowl. “And you see, my plan would have worked… but for your meddling. Now, the second truth, the reason for the sudden interest in rekindling war. It is not the missing object of power. No. He starting amassing for war long before he realised that one of his baubles was gone. So, what brought about this sudden desire to risk the end of the world?
“I’m listening.”
“A rather substantial fragment of one of the Old Great Spells has been found.”
“Oh? That. I know that already. The goddess of the tor told me.”
“Did she? And did she explain what it is? Why it is important? Did she explain why a nigh godlike child of Old Night and Chaos would ransack the world looking for the other part of the fragment?”
“No.”
“Of course not. Bah. Gods and goddesses. They are a sparrow-headed lot, them godly ones. Half the time they are lying to you, and other half, they are lying to themselves. Allow me to enlighten you.”