The Dragon Master

“There weren't always dragons in the Valley.”

Though it wasn’t spoken loudly – quite softly, in fact, despite its firmness – movement around the fire stopped and voices hushed, even those that had been boisterous with drink but a moment before. All eyes turned to look at the old Welshman, except for those of his grandson, sitting two seats over on the bench. The boy’s eyes rolled with a sigh. “There aren’t any dragons in the valley now, Papa.”

All of the voices that had just fallen silent rose now in a collective gasp. Certainly, Iowerth ap Iowerth had told a few tales that bordered on the outlandish, but he was still known far and wide as the hero of ’87, a date so long ago that no one else in the village remembered it, and so no one could say for sure that those things hadn’t happened. And absolutely no one would have dared say it to Iowerth’s face.

Now here was his Anglicized grandson, David Edwards, fifty years too young to remember the battle that his grandfather had won almost single-handedly and that had restored Good King Richard to the throne, openly doubting him. David’s father, named for his godfather, the King himself, started to rise until the elderly Iowerth waved him down. “No, Richard,” he said. “The boy won’t learn anything if he doesn’t ask questions. Although,” he added with a wink, “he might also learn to be a bit more respectful about it.”

Everyone settled back down with a small chuckle at that. David, suitably chastened but understanding that his grandfather wasn’t really angry, cast his eyes to the fire and then back to the old man. “But I’m eight and a half years old and in all that time I’ve never seen a dragon, even though I’ve always lived here. I’ve never met anyone who has. And if they were there…” his voice trailed off, not sure if he was still doubting but not yet sure that he was ready to believe.

Iowerth pulled him closer, sat the boy on his knee. “Well, I’ve seen many of them. Ridden more than a few of them, even. Most of the adults in the village have seen at least one or two in their lifetimes, though there aren’t as many riders as there used to be. You have to know where to look though, and we don’t talk about them around the younger children. Can’t have them running about chasing dragons with a sling like they do rabbits, eh?” The adults all laughed again. Looking around, David realized that he was in fact the youngest one there. It was late at night, the summer sky pitch black but for a sliver of moon and the twinkling stars. All the younger children had been put to bed hours ago, and most of the elders had gone as well, except for Iowerth.

“Do you mean – do you mean Dickon knows about the dragons already?” His twelve-year-old brother was, like his father, named for the old king that his grandfather had served, and even went by King Richard’s childhood nickname to distinguish him from the elder Richard Edwards. David was named after the great saint of his grandfather’s homeland and it still irked him that although a saint should take precedence over even a king, Dickon got to do everything first because he was older.

But at this, though David expected him to crow loudly over his inclusion in the secret, his brother only brushed his dark hair out of his eyes and smiled shyly. “I know about them, but I can’t see them. I don’t have the Gift.”

Iowerth cleared his throat. “We told Dickon when he was ten, which is the usual age. But when we brought him down to the Valley, the dragons remained hidden from him. He could neither see nor call them. Which is no different from most people,” he smiled kindly at his older grandson, “but less common here. You see, this village was founded as a training base for the King’s Dragon Army, so the original families mostly all had the Gift. However as generations have married outside the village, not every child is born with it. Your father has it, but now that I am old, he is needed to manage the lands that King Richard gave me as reward for helping him reclaim his throne, and which support our people and our way of life. Your brother does not have the Gift, so he will learn husbandry of the earth and follow your father. You will be the next Dragon Master. We are telling you now so that I may have time to train you. I have already been given many more years than I expected and am still of sound bearing, but that may not still be so if we had waited two more years to introduce you.”

David sucked in his breath and heard it whistle through his teeth. His head was spinning. In a matter of minutes he had gone from believing that dragons were but a fairy tale to learning that he must train to be a Dragon Master – but what if he, like his brother, did not have the Gift?

A big hand clapped down on his shoulder and he realized that he was shaking. He looked up into his grandfather’s eyes. “Don’t worry, child. You have to have it. But your first lesson is to learn how we came to need the dragons at all.”