Dragonfruit, page 2
It had not taken long to unmask the person responsible. For months, the princess had been courted by a prince from Wakeo, an island in the far southern reaches of the Nominomi. The prince had desired the widowed Oliana, but mostly, he desired the spices that grew with startling abundance across the Tamarindi archipelago. Nutmeg, cinnamon, clove, and mace, symbols of the island’s wealth. When Oliana rejected his offer of marriage, the prince had reacted badly, with poison. Not long after, he would be found dead in his own kingdom, along with his entire family. Tamarind’s Lord Isko had seen to that.
The poison had not killed Oliana. And it had not harmed her nine-year-old son, Samahtitamahenele, Sam, who had spent the day with friends by the shore. But for the future queen, and for the little girl who served as her page and who had shared her supper, life had become even more fragile. It had placed them into the deepest of sleeps, and no one knew how to wake them. Not the royal healers, or the wisewomen and wisemen who lived in the villages. Not the doctors and physicians from the oversea kingdoms, paid exorbitant sums to sail to a faraway island and offer counsel. Queen Maga’lahi and her people despaired.
And then startling news had come from the royal menagerie. A seadragon had produced dragonfruit, three rose-colored eggs that could, if the stories were true, heal the princess and her page. A terrible wrong could be undone. Only no one knew how they worked.
Much had been written on the other uses of a seadragon. Its scales were made into coveted suits of armor, their hardness easily deflecting spears and swords, axes and clubs. Recipes for stewed dragon eyes were plentiful if one wished to preserve one’s youth or beauty. Straightening a stooped back, for instance, or removing the yellow tint from elderly eyes and teeth. And dragon oil, carefully strained, was the preferred fuel for lamps. Its light burned brightest.
Unlike scales and eyes and oil, dragonfruit was rare, for the simple reason that seadragons did not easily give up their eggs. What the old tales did not share was how to properly administer it. Did one eat the entire egg? Yolk, baby dragon, and all the bits in between? Revolting if so, as well as physically taxing. The eggs were large, three feet tall and two feet wide. Perhaps only a few bites or sips would do? And if so, when would be the best time to consume the egg? When it was freshly laid? Or freshly hatched? In the morning? Or at night? Or some time in between? No one knew.
It was decided that the eggs would be served to the princess in different ways, at different times, until she woke. The dragonfruit was taken from the menagerie, to be guarded within the royal pavilion. The mother seadragon’s keening could be heard throughout the city.
What followed was the worst sort of luck. Earthquakes were common in the Nominomi. Mild ones, stronger ones. Usually, the islanders simply picked up what had fallen, or rebuilt what had broken, and carried on. But one such earthquake occurred as the dragonfruit were being transported from the menagerie to the queen’s pavilion, tremors violent enough to overturn the carriage. Two eggs shattered, yolk seeping into red mud, the small dragons crushed beneath the wheels, their blood mingling with that of the injured driver. The queen would not risk feeding any of it to the princess. And so it was that all hope rested on the last remaining dragonfruit.
But late that very night, the egg disappeared from the royal pavilion. The guards responsible for its safety were discovered unconscious with painful lumps on the backs of their heads where they had been struck. A note had been placed where the egg once rested. Two words scrawled across parchment: Forgive me.
One other person was in desperate need of a wish. She was someone’s daughter too.
The little page who had also consumed the poisoned soup—her name was Hanalei. Eight years old, the beloved only child of Lord Arihi, whose wife had gone to the gods years before. Seeing his hopes dwindle with each shattered dragon egg, he stole the last one, took his sleeping daughter from their ancestral home, and vanished.
Where they went, no one knew.
“It pains me to say it, Hanalei. But I’m not pleased to see you.”
Hanalei glared at the man looming before her. Don’t show him you’re frightened. That had never worked before. “Are you ever?”
“No.” Bragadin was captain of the Anemone. A man the same age her father would have been, had her father lived. He was an Esperanzan, though his skin, sun-browned from years spent at sea, led many to believe he was descended from islanders. His hair was black, as were his eyes, and Hanalei knew that if his chest were ever to be cut open and his heart exposed, it would be black too.
She had been tossed onto the deck of the dragoner. Not gently. Bruises had begun to form along her arm. A collection of islanders and overseaers gathered around. Rough-looking men and women, part of the captain’s crew. One wore her banana-leaf hat. Another had wrestled away her satchel. A man with a red beard pawed through the contents with filthy hands as Hanalei looked on, her right eye twitching. Those were her things. Her drawings and notes, her coins.
“Give it here.” Captain Bragadin snapped his fingers, then held out a hand for the satchel. Reluctantly, the red-bearded sailor did as he was told, his expression sour.
The captain did not look inside the satchel, only dropped it beside his boots, the strap dangling from his hand. Every part of him brimmed with annoyance. “I’ve been following these dragons for months,” he told her. “Six months, Hanalei. I know you have too. And yet here you are, always one irritating step ahead. Why is that?”
“Luck, Captain.”
Captain Bragadin’s eyes narrowed. “Try again,” he suggested softly.
Because she could sense them. Sometimes, not always. A feeling that told her to sail north not south. Or to turn around and retrace the path she had taken. It had always been so, ever since her father had stolen a seadragon egg and fed its contents to her, his dying child. Bits of dragon flesh. Drops of yolk. But these were things she would never tell anyone, let alone this man here.
Hanalei kept her tone respectful. Not her words, though. “You’re getting older. Just like Captain Salvega.” She looked over his crew, lingering over the youngest dragoners. Two boys, fourteen or fifteen years old, their expressions hard already. “I won’t be as quick when I’m your age either.”
Someone whistled low, that Hanalei would dare to say such things out loud. Bragadin had spent his early boyhood on the streets of Raka, plucking dragonscale in the notorious orphan workhouses before finding work on a ship, then owned by the infamous dragoner Salvega. When Bragadin had turned fifteen and had grown strong enough—he had always been mean enough—he had murdered his captain, feeding him to the day’s catch and taking the Anemone for his own. Hanalei knew she should take better care with her words. Outrage had made her reckless. The cries from the water had stopped. Three dead seadragons. She wanted to kick something.
Bragadin’s lips had curved in reluctant amusement. “Still a disrespectful brat.” He lifted her satchel off the ground, testing its weight. “And still peddling your dragon science, I see.” He eyed her clothing and shook his head. “Doesn’t look like your fancy school pays well. Honest labor rarely does.”
“It pays enough.”
“So you say.” Captain Bragadin’s expression turned thoughtful; he slung the satchel over his shoulder. “What am I to do with you? Hm? I have a crew to feed. All these fine people here. And you have cost me two seadragons.”
“More than that.” A male voice spoke from the back of the crowd. Hanalei started, for this was a voice she knew. She stared in astonishment as her guide Moa came forward, still shirtless, a white band around his forehead. Nothing of his earlier friendliness showed on his face. He barely spared her a glance before turning to the captain, who explained to Hanalei, “Moa was visiting his old village when you turned up. He sent word. I suppose you could say that I, too, have been lucky.” Captain Bragadin’s eyes gleamed at whatever it was he saw on her face. Dismay, surely, and a hurt that surprised her. Nothing for you, sister. Be careful.
Captain Bragadin said to Moa, “What do you mean ‘more than that’?”
“One of the dragons, it turned the color of the heart flower before it swam off. Its hair,” Moa added, waving his hands around his head for emphasis. “I saw.”
Shock rippled through the dragoners. Not all looked surprised. These would have been the ones watching from atop the grotto, the ones who had flung down the giant net. They had seen what Moa had seen, and knew what Hanalei’s warning whistle had cost them.
Captain Bragadin’s eyes were fixed on Moa. “You’re certain? Its frill turned the color of the heart flower?”
“Yeah.”
Beside Moa, the dragoner with the red beard muttered, “What color is the color of the heart flower?”
“Pink, you idiot,” Captain Bragadin said. “Who else saw this?”
The ship dipped suddenly and violently, forcing Hanalei and everyone else to plant their feet wide and spread their arms to steady themselves. Even so, a few dragoners went stumbling into barrels and crates. Some grabbed on to the railing. From below came shouted orders, followed by the horrible, unmistakable sound of scales scraping against wood. The seadragons were being loaded into the hull through a side hatch.
“Who else?” Captain Bragadin demanded again when the ship had righted itself. There were a few nods and yeahs, and when he turned to face Hanalei, his expression was thunderous. He stepped toward her. “Dragonfruit. That seadragon was carrying eggs, and you scared it off?”
Hanalei could not help it; she stepped back. “You did that. You would have killed her and realized your mistake later. Don’t blame me.”
“You should want to see them dead just as much as I.” With deliberation, Captain Bragadin looked down at her hands covered in scars, then down at his. The same sort of damaged flesh between them—thin, shallow cuts; dragonscale was sharp—though his were much more faded. “Why don’t you?”
Hanalei fought the urge to hide her hands behind her back. “I don’t blame the dragons for these.”
“No. You blame me. Thankless as usual.” Captain Bragadin turned to a woman who stood by the wheel. An islander about his age, whom Hanalei recognized as his longtime navigator, Vaea. She was taller even than Hanalei, with sculpted arms, and dressed in black. Stylized sunrays tattooed her forehead and nose. “We leave now,” the captain told Vaea. “They can’t have gone far. Take us . . .” His eyes flickered involuntarily to Hanalei, who offered, “South.”
Captain Bragadin glared. “West. They’ve gone west all along. So we follow.”
Moa’s hands dropped to his sides. “What about the girl?” Moa asked. “You want me to toss her?”
Moa thought he was being mean, but hope bloomed within Hanalei. Yes. Toss me.
“She can swim.” Vaea dashed Hanalei’s hopes as quickly as they had risen. She met Hanalei’s look with a faint smile.
“Quite well, unfortunately,” Captain Bragadin said. “She’ll cause more grief later if we let her go. Easier to be rid of her for good.”
Moa paused. “So . . . ?” He drew a finger across his throat, eyebrows raised in question. His meaning clear.
Hanalei opened her mouth. No sound emerged. She had spent an entire day in his company. His family had taken her in when she had arrived on the island. His mother had offered her food to eat and a mat to sleep on and her eldest son as guide.
“I’ll do it,” one of the younger dragoners offered, the fourteen-year-old with the hard eyes. He appeared neither a full-blooded islander nor a full-blooded Esperanzan, but a mix of both. Straight black hair flopped into his eyes. He was shorter than Hanalei by several inches, but broader, with a face full of spots picked at and ruptured.
Stone-faced, Moa glanced over his shoulder at the boy, whose fierce expression wavered. He ducked out of sight behind two very large dragoners. Moa turned back to the captain.
“Not yet.” Captain Bragadin answered Moa’s question, but only after a very long pause. “Take her below. She cares so much about those blasted dragons. She can keep their corpses warm.” He looked past Hanalei, his expression clearing. “Ha. Look who’s here.”
Another dragoner had sailed into the grotto. Black ship, bloated hull, also flying under the Esperanzan flag. The RES Lagoon. A royal Esperanzan ship. A figure with golden hair stood at the helm, his disappointment apparent as he realized there were no more seadragons to be had.
Captain Bragadin cupped both hands to his mouth and hollered, “Late again, Augustus! Too bad!”
Hanalei recognized the name, and the hair. Prince Augustus was the Esperanzan king’s youngest son. He had three older brothers, all in excellent health. The spare of the spare. Which meant he was allowed to partake in dangerous pastimes, like dragon hunting.
At Captain Bragadin’s taunting, Prince Augustus raised a hand in a rude gesture. Captain Bragadin and his crew laughed. Behind the RES Lagoon came two other ships. The Nautilus and the HMS Whalebone. The sight of them cheered Captain Bragadin immensely. He was an ungracious winner, and an even worse loser.
Moa grabbed Hanalei’s arm. “Let’s go.” He led her off, down through the hatch and along a passageway that smelled of unwashed bodies and frying fish. They stopped at the far end. At their feet was another hatch in the floor. He checked to see that no one was around. “Hey. Why do you talk to him like that? You want to be dead?”
Hanalei yanked her arm free. “What do you care? You were going to slit my throat.”
“He wouldn’t say yes,” Moa snapped. “The captain doesn’t hurt girls.”
“Really? Do you believe in sea fairies too?” Hanalei shoved up her sleeve, showing him the three circular scars on the back of her arm, just above the elbow. “Cigar burns,” she explained, seeing his eyes widen and taking no satisfaction in his surprise. “When we didn’t work fast enough.” She pulled her sleeve down. “Does your family know you hunt other things besides dragons?”
Moa’s face hardened. He leaned down and threw open the hatch door. “Get in.”
Two dragoners came around the corner, stopping to watch them. Hanalei looked into the opening and was met with darkness, but what she could not see she could smell. Bilgewater mixed with dragon blood. Utter foulness.
Hanalei breathed through her mouth. “Will you give me a torch at least?”
The other dragoners heard her and laughed. Moa said, “So you can burn us down? No.”
“I wouldn’t—”
“Get in.”
Why had she bothered to ask? Hanalei lowered herself into the hole, feeling around for a rung in the ladder. Only when she was five rungs down did she stop and look up. Moa watched from above. She put as much scorn into her words as she could. “I hope he pays well. Brother.”
The hatch slammed shut, leaving her in the dark and quiet. She waited until the footsteps faded away before descending farther. Her sandals slapped along the rungs, setting off angry echoes. At the bottom, her foot sunk into something cold and clinging, like the thickest coconut soup. Only it did not smell like coconuts here. She yanked her foot upward, grimacing, and turned carefully on the ladder so her back rested against the rungs. Unless she wished to sit in bilgewater and dragon blood, she would have to stand here until Captain Bragadin decided what to do with her. Which could be soon, or it could be never.
She would not cry, not for herself or for the seadragons, in case Moa came back and saw. She did not know how long she clung to the ladder feeling sorry for herself before she realized she could see them. Her eyes had adjusted to the shadows, enough that their outlines were visible, three hulking shapes spread about the hull, ensuring their weight did not tip the dragoner into the sea.
However badly her day had turned out, she still lived. She lowered one foot into the muck, then the other, and waded toward the closest seadragon. The water came to her knees. It felt less repugnant to think of it as water and nothing else. When she reached the dragon, she felt along the scales, careful not to cut herself, until she found its head. Its chin rested against the floor, partially underwater. Its horns were too far up for her to touch. Gently, she stroked its snout, rough like coral, and pressed her cheek to its feelers, feathery soft. The feelers would have turned black upon its passing but its scales remained unchanged, the color of pearls. It glistened faintly in the dark. Not so far into the future, they would be used to make armor, scales overlapping, impenetrable. A symbol of a soldier’s wealth and power, paid for with gold.
Hanalei did not know any prayers for seadragons, so she took a human one and did what she could. Olifat was the father of all sea gods, but Taga was his son. The seadragons belonged to him. Placing her hand on dragonscale, she said quietly into its ear,
May Taga find your spirit and guide you home
to the sea beyond.
In clear water
where danger will never catch you.
Among the coral and caves
where the bounty is full.
Alongside your ancestors
and their ancestors
that loneliness never hold you.
His kingdom your own
beloved child of the gods.
And because a prayer stood a better chance of being heard with an offering, she ran her palm along the sharp edge of dragonscale and pressed her blood into its skin.
She did the same with the second seadragon, wading across the hold, murmuring a prayer and farewell, offering blood. It was not until she placed a hand on the third seadragon that she realized it was still alive, though barely. The scales were warm, not cool to the touch, like the others. Air escaped through its nostrils, shallow and soundless, rustling its feelers so that it brushed against Hanalei’s arms, neck, face. Unthreatening. A moment later the feelers drifted away.
To die like this. In darkness and filth. Hanalei brushed away her tears, and said, “May Taga find your spirit and guide you home, to the sea beyond . . .”
Much later, when the dragon was no longer warm and Hanalei had pulled herself up onto shelter, in a crook between its neck and arm, her thoughts drifted back to her last night on Tamarind. Ten years ago, when she had been ill, lingering between this life and the next. Everyone had spoken quietly around her. They thought her asleep, dying. It was a conversation she was not meant to hear between her father and Lady Rona, who served as the queen’s companion.
