White Wind Rising Page 3

  Burp shuffled further onto Keeper’s lap and rumbled. Keeper scratched him under his chin.

  ‘I don’t know what I was thinking but one day I came here to the tower to ask the Alchemist if he’d show me his dragon. I just wanted to see it, just for a moment but instead he locked me up in here.’ Keeper shook his head. ‘Stupid, stupid. And that was ages ago.’

  ‘How long?’ Archer said.

  ‘I don’t know how long I’ve been here, seems like for ever.’

  ‘And why are you called Keeper? That seems strange. Seeing how that is what the Alchemist makes you do. Keep his dragon, I mean,’ Archer said.

  ‘That’s not my real name. That is just what the Alchemist always calls me,’ Keeper said. ‘When his big voice comes booming in saying do this, do that. He just says, Keeper, you will now feed the dragon ten cabbages every day. Keeper, you will feed the dragon twelve cabbages a day. Keeper you will collect the creature’s droppings. So, that’s why I am called Keeper.’

  ‘I see,’ Archer said. The Alchemist had called Archer his baker. But Archer was not having any of that. ‘So what is your real name?’

  Keeper scratched his head. He looked at Burp. Burp looked up at him then looked at Archer, tilting his head.

  Keeper stared at Archer, his red eyes glistening. ‘I don’t remember.’

  Stolen Name

  Archer did not understand. ‘How can you not remember your name?’

  ‘I don’t know, do I,’ said Keeper, shrugging. ‘I just don’t.’

  ‘What do your mother and father call you?’ Archer said. ‘Think back to before. Before here. You know. When they call you in from playing outside, what name do they call?’

  ‘My mother and father died in that plague when I was very little,’ Keeper said, quietly. ‘Grandma and grandpa raised me after that. I never spend much time outside playing, to be perfectly honest with you. I’m usually in the forge where it’s nice and warm, helping. Usually I am making nails by the bucket load. Always need more nails, that’s what grandpa always says. Nails make the Vale and we make the nails.

  ‘So you remember all that stuff,’ Archer said. ‘But not your own name? Not even if you try really hard?’ It was very strange. It probably had something to do with magic.

  ‘I can’t really remember everything very well.’ Keeper frowned and scratched his head again. ‘And I definitely don’t remember my name. I always thought it must be the Alchemist has made my memory bad. Taken it away from me, somehow.’

  Archer thought that was probably right.

  ‘Maybe I can help you remember,’ Archer said.

  ‘Really?’ Keeper said, sitting upright. ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘Is it Osbert?’ Archer asked.

  ‘No,’ Keeper said. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Alfred? Albert? Ethelbert?’ Archer tried to think of common names. ‘Edward? Edbert? Wilfred? Cedric? Egbert?

  ‘Nothing sounds familiar,’ Keeper said, slumping.

  ‘Your name is the first thing you are given when you are born,’ Archer said, for he had many younger brothers and sisters and cousins. ‘Other than a cuddle with your mother. What a thing to take away. The Alchemist really is as bad as everyone says, isn’t he.’

  Keeper shrugged and looked away but Archer thought he saw tears forming in the boy’s strange red eyes. ‘Doesn’t bother me,’ Keeper said. ‘I’ve got Burp.’ Burp looked up at him and hissed softly.

  ‘Where did you say you lived?’ said Archer, thinking back. ‘Did you say you lived near the head of the Vale? On the Sweetwater?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Keeper. ‘I think so, anyway. I remember we live at the Cobnut Forge which isn’t far from the village called Bures.’

  ‘But that’s near where I live,’ said Archer. ‘Not even half a day’s walk away. But I don’t remember you at all. I know most of the children round our way. And I don’t remember the old blacksmiths having any children our age. I can’t remember their names. How long have you been here, exactly?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Keeper, gesturing to the blackness around them beyond the reach of the torchlight. ‘I don’t have any way to measure the days, do I? There are no windows to see whether it is day or night. I can’t see the seasons change. There are no festival days. There are no celebrations. But it feels like it has been a very long time. Years, perhaps.’

  ‘Years? That’s terrible,’ said Archer. What a thought. Years and years, growing up a prisoner, getting older and older. ‘Wait. It can’t have been years, can it? No, no, you cannot have been here for years.’ Archer smiled.

  ‘Why do you say that?’ Keeper asked, suspiciously.

  ‘Because you are still a boy, aren’t you,’ Archer said, pleased with himself. ‘If you had been here for years you would be all grown up and you’re not, so it cannot have been years.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Keeper, smiling once more. ‘That’s a relief. Just months, then, I suppose. You know, I don’t remember you either. But then there’s lot’s that I don’t remember. So what are you doing here? How long have you been here, down the chimney? Months, too?’

  ‘I only just came today,’ said Archer, shaking his head. ‘He locked me up, too, down in the kitchen. He told me, through the walls or ceiling with his big booming voice, that I have to bake five loaves of bread a day and fill five jugs of water. He called me baker. But I’m not doing that. I decided. I’m getting out of here.’

  ‘Five loaves? I only get one loaf a day in here,’ said Keeper, his mouth hanging open and a far-away look in his red eyes. ‘Do you suppose that means there are more people in here? One loaf of bread a day for each of us. And one jug of water. That would mean there could be five people in the Tower.’

  Archer thought for a moment, quite impressed by Keeper’s thinking. ‘That would make sense,’ he said. ‘Unless the Alchemist is just very greedy and thirsty.’

  ‘I wonder if the others all have dragons too,’ Keeper said, scratching Burp’s head. ‘Imagine that, Burp. All those new friends.’

  ‘Perhaps we’ll find out,’ Archer said, looking at the chimney.

  ‘So what’s your real name, again?’ Keeper said, suddenly. ‘Did you say it was Baker?’

  ‘My name’s Archer,’ said Archer.

  ‘Ah, I see,’ said Keeper, nodding. ‘So you do archer things, do you? That must be why you have that bow and those arrows there. That’s better than being a baker, isn’t it. Lots better. How did you get that bow, anyway? Did you make it yourself? What do you shoot with it? Did you ever shoot a flaming arrow through the air into a pile of wood or some hot oil or something like that, making it burst into flames all over the place? Probably not, you wouldn’t be allowed to do something like that. I wish I had a bow and arrow, can I hold your one? I won’t break it, you have my word, honest, upon my oath.’

  Archer laughed. ‘My father made me the bow and he showed me how to make arrows. I’m supposed to protect our family’s sheep so I spend most days up in the hills watching over the flock. But to tell you the truth, I almost never see any wolves at all. They keep to the Moon Forest unless it’s lambing season and even then they stay away from me. I don’t think I could ever hurt a wolf anyway.

  ‘And I’m supposed to mend fences and help the sheep when they get stuck. But usually I spend all day practicing shooting arrows at my targets. I am going to win the archery competition at the Vale Fair when I grow up.’ Archer took his bow off his back and handed it to Keeper but watched the boy closely to make sure he did not do anything to damage it.

  ‘That sounds like a really good life,’ said Keeper, ‘if you like that kind of thing.’ He took the bow as if it was a new-born baby. ‘This is wonderful, I never held a proper bow before. I wish I could go outside and shoot arrows at things like you do. So did your father call you Archer because he wanted you to be one?’

  Archer coughed. ‘When I was born they gave me a different name but ever since I was old enough to hold a bow I was never without one. My mo
ther and father always called me their “little archer”. Everyone just called started calling me Archer all the time. And then whatever people call you, that just is your name, isn’t it.’

  ‘I wonder what my name is,’ said Keeper, handing the bow back. ‘And I wonder what I want to be when I grow up.’

  ‘You don’t remember what you want to be when you grow up?’ Archer said, feeling sorry for him. He inspected his precious bow carefully and noticing just how much soot he had managed to get all over it.

  ‘I probably wanted to be a blacksmith. Like grandpa and grandma.’ He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘What do your parents do? Look after sheep, is it?’

  ‘My mother and father are farmers. Me and my little brothers and my little sisters help around the farm. There’s endless work. They all want to be farmers, too. Not me, though,’ Archer said. ‘Not me.’

  ‘Why not be a farmer?’ Keeper asked.

  ‘I just always wanted to be an archer instead. Pulling back on the bowstring is the only thing that feels right.’ Archer felt the wood of his bow, worn smooth from use. ‘When I win the archery competition at the Vale Fair I will win the prizes that they have there. Like those golden cups and silver plates from the Morningtree Guildhall. If I won riches with my archery I could give them to my mother and father so that my family would not be poor any more, no matter how much the Alchemist takes from us every harvest.’

  ‘Yes, very nice.’ Keeper did not seem to be listening very closely. ‘Must be lovely being out in the fresh air every day. Smelling the rain. Touching the earth. Feeling the wind on your face. The hot sun on your back.’

  ‘It is,’ Archer agreed, thinking about it. ‘But it’s hard work, especially when we have to give so much of what we grow to the Alchemist. And that’s not fair, is it, Keeper?’ Archer said.

  Keeper shook his head. ‘Not fair at all. But no one ever does anything.’

  ‘The Alchemist is too powerful. I don’t blame my parents for not having enough food. It’s all the Alchemist’s fault,’ Archer said. ‘Taking everything for himself. Taking everything rom the whole Vale. That’s why I got angry and decided to do something about it and came up here to the Tower to tell him what for.’ Archer felt his cheeks redden.

  ‘Only he didn’t listen to you about anything because he’s nasty and cruel and now you are trapped in here like me and Burp,’ said Keeper, shaking his head. ‘Why did you come up here? It’s like me, I should never have come near this place. Were you so hungry you lost your wits?’

  ‘I get angry a lot anyway,’ Archer said, lowering his head. ‘Just this morning I left home like normal at dawn and went up to the hills. You know, the month before harvest can be the hungriest time. Almost all the flour has gone but the wheat has not matured enough to harvest and make into new flour. I unwrapped my lunch parcel and there was a chunk of stale bread and a few tiny unripe apples. You know when they’re all hard and don’t taste of anything?’

  ‘I remember apples,’ Keeper said. ‘Used to love a nice apple, me.’

  ‘Stupid but it made me angry that we work so hard but we don’t keep. They say the Alchemist never comes out of his tower. I thought maybe he does not know that he is making us hungry.’ Archer shook his head at his folly.

  ‘Did you tell your parents that you were going?’ Keeper asked.

  ‘Ever since I was born, mother and father have warned me about going near the Tower. I am not supposed to go within a thousand paces of it, not for any reason. Everyone tells the stories of children from the Vale disappearing over the years and everyone knows that the Alchemist had taken them.’

  ‘Your parents will be worried,’ Keeper said. ‘I bet my grandma and grandpa are worried about me, too.’ He scratched Burp’s head. The dragon hissed and stretched out.

  ‘My parents are stupid,’ Archer said, feeling a thrill at saying something so unfair. ‘They just give in and do what they are supposed to do instead of fighting, instead of challenging the Alchemist. But I suppose they were right all along. And that’s how I ended up here,’ he said to Keeper. ‘What a fool I was.’

  ‘But now you’re escaping,’ Keeper said, grinning.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Archer, nodding. ‘I don’t know when the Alchemist will notice. He will probably be expecting his bread and fresh water any time now. When he doesn’t get it I bet he comes looking for me. We need to be escaped by then or who knows what he will do.’

  ‘Put you back in the kitchen?’ Keeper said, hopefully.

  ‘Worse, probably,’ said Archer. ‘So you might not want to risk making him angry. But if you want to come with me, you can.’ Archer looked at Burp. ‘You and your dragon. It might be dangerous. You could fall and kill yourself. The Alchemist might turn you into a newt or a turnip. You might be better off staying here in the dark where it is safe.’

  Keeper jumped to his feet, startling Burp. ‘Let’s go.’

  Dragon Fire

  ‘So what’s the plan, then, Archer?’ Keeper said.

  ‘Nothing clever,’ Archer said, looking at the fireplace. ‘I’m going to try the same thing again.’

  ‘Why did I never think of going up the chimney?’ Keeper said. ‘I suppose we just never go over to it, do we, Burp?’

  ‘I’m lucky you didn’t have a fire,’ Archer looked at the stones around the fireplace. They were clean. No black on them at all. ‘Actually, it looks like you never have had a fire. What do you do to keep warm in winter? And how do you cook your food?’

  ‘Burp keeps me warm,’ said Keeper, grinning and patting Burp between the horns. ‘I curl up to him at night where we sleep on the sand. I barely ever need my blankets.’ Burp hissed.

  ‘You curl up with a dragon,’ Archer said.

  ‘And I don’t cook any food. I just eat my daily bread and cabbages. I’m happy enough, although I do miss soup sometimes. Grandma makes this carrot and turnip soup with the chopped turnip greens stirred in at the end. It’s the most delicious thing you ever ate, so grandpa says and I have to agree with grandpa on that one. I really miss that soup. But who needs hot food when you have good company?’ He scratched Burp under the spiky chin.

  Archer’s stomach rumbled at the thought of a nice soup.

  ‘What do you mean you sleep on sand?’ Archer asked, thinking he had misheard.

  ‘Over here,’ said Keeper, grinning as he climbed to his feet. He grabbed the torch and led Archer to another part of the room.

  There stood a structure like an enormous, wooden, square water tank. Instead of water, there was very fine, very clean, perfectly dry sand. It was piled up around the edges with a deep bowl-like depression in the middle.

  There were a couple of empty sacks in there too. Keeper’s blankets.

  ‘This is actual sand,’ said Archer, running his fingers through it. ‘This is where you both sleep? Not in a bed?’

  ‘Why would a dragon sleep in a bed?’ Keeper asked, laughing and shaking his head.

  ‘I suppose you’re right,’ Archer said. ‘But why do you not sleep in a bed?’

  Keeper sighed. ‘It would be good to sleep in a bed again. Come on, let’s get out of here before the Alchemist realises you’ve gone.’

  ‘I’ll have to get the rope first,’ Archer said.

  ‘Don’t think I am strong enough to pull myself up a rope,’ said Keeper, patting his belly.

  ‘If you want to get out of here then you will have to,’ said Archer. ‘There’s no two ways about it, you’ll have to just get up there. You climb up, one hand over the other, gripping hard with your legs. You were a blacksmith, I bet you have strong arms.’

  ‘Then I will,’ said Keeper. He frowned. ‘What about Burp?’

  They both looked down at the small dragon who was sitting at their feet looking up at them.

  Chains wrapped around his wings. Burp would have trouble even climbing some stairs. He was incapable of climbing a rope.

  ‘We’ll tie it round him and pull him right up,’ Archer said. �
�Like pulling a bucket of water out of a well.’

  Burp hissed. Keeper stroked his head. ‘He didn’t mean anything by it, Burp.’

  They went back to the empty fireplace and opened the trapdoor to the lower chimney. Archer pulled up his rope, then worked and worried out his arrow.

  ‘Is there anything else we need to bring with us?’ Archer asked, inspecting the arrow. He was amazed to find that it was undamaged.

  ‘Oh, yes let’s go but we need to bring Burp’s cabbages with him,’ said Keeper. ‘I will get a sack of cabbages together for him and we will have to bring those with us. He goes through quite a few cabbages every day.’

  ‘This is going to be a lot of work climbing up the rope again,’ said Archer. ‘My arms are already tired.’ Archer’s stomach rumbled. ‘Have you got anything to eat?’ he asked Keeper.

  ‘There’s still half a loaf of bread from yesterday on the table but it is quite stale now. Today’s bread was due soon. I wonder what happened to the last Baker.’

  ‘Probably the same thing that will happen to us if we do not hurry,’ Archer said.

  ‘I’m going to miss that bread,’ Keeper said. ‘It has all different types of things in it on different days. Still, never mind, at least we have half a loaf from yesterday, anyway. And we can always eat Burp’s cabbages.’

  ‘What, raw cabbage?’ Archer said. His parents always boiled their cabbages until they were soggy.

  ‘It’s juicy and like a hot flavour,’ said Keeper. ‘Just talking about it is making me hungry. I am going to have some now. I had better feed Burp before we go.’

  Keeper pulled three large cabbages from the pile and brought them over to Burp. He tore off the outer, dark green leaves and gave them to the dragon.

  Burp lay down awkwardly and munched through the leaves, holding them clumsily with his chained-up wing claws.

  Keeper kept pulling leaves off until he was into the lighter green, almost-white inner leaves of the cabbage and he tore a few of these off and stuffed them into his own mouth, crunching them up.