While opening the door to his home with his dirty clothes in a sack in one hand, Waver started to speak to Valor in the dragons’ tongue as usual, which was apparently a mistake.
“O-oh... it’s you.”
As he told the baize named Beatrice earlier, Waver Cove didn’t make a habit of revealing his ability to talk to dragons. That did not strictly mean his abilities were a secret. Most of those who knew, including his human family, believed it to be a delusion he’d eventually outgrow -- and if he didn’t, it would drag him down forever. However, there was at least one human who believed he could genuinely speak to dragons, no matter how much he tried to dissuade her.
A petite noblewoman with deep black skin and beautifully braided curly black hair, wearing an understated but still inappropriate blue dress, stood in the middle of his old smelly barn. She was only a few years younger than Waver, and she’d also known him since they were children.
She had been looking at Valor, who was pretending to sleep and twitching in embarrassment, when Waver walked in. At the sound of his dragon words, she spun around, causing her dress to fan out in a picturesque way, and flashed a bright, mischievous smile.
“Please, don’t let me get in your way,” Ori, the girl, said. “What were you going to tell them? They’ll understand if you say it in our tongue, too, won’t they...?”
Waver sighed.
“Fine. ‘Did I wash off most of the stink?’ Honestly, Ori, you shouldn’t come in while I’m not at home. You’re going to trouble poor Valor, and I don’t have the furniture to welcome nobility.” As if that would ever stop her from imposing.
“Oh, don’t be like that. If no one knows I was here, no one will blame your lack of manners.” Ori giggled, but a shadow passed across her face. “I figured you must have just bathed. Your skin is so clean that you’re basically glowing like the moon in this light. But you don’t usually bathe this early in the day. Which means... you were doing farm work again?”
“I wish you didn’t know my daily schedule so well.”
“Don’t try to change the subject. Don’t you think your talents are better spent elsewhere?”
“What talents?” Waver gestured dismissively, walking over to join Valor in solidarity. “You can’t pay for meat or rice or rent with delusions.” The noble winced at the term.
This was an argument that had repeated itself dozens of times. Ori thought that Waver’s way of life was somehow beneath him. Waver thought that was rather easy for the apple of the duchy’s eye to say.
“You know, if you applied yourself to it, you could probably at least get a patron,” Ori pouted. “You live this way because you’re too accepting. If you’d just stand up for yourself once in a while-”
“I live this way because I’m a commoner without a trade trying to support two.”
“I don’t know what they said, but I probably agree,” Ori said, seriously. She must have inferred from the dirty look Waver gave them that Valor had taken her side. Realizing the conversation wasn’t going the way she wanted, though, she quickly changed her tone. “Look, I do have a small parcel of self-awareness. I know I’m ultimately just in your way. But I have more than arguments for you, this time.”
Waver sat down on a bale of hay, and looked up at her expectantly. She pulled a letter out of a dragon leather satchel at her side, and handed it to him. He looked at the seal, and back at her critically.
“Your client this time is desperate and a bit of an idiot, so he’s been offering jobs even to drake talkers. Set your price just slightly lower than they do, and both you and Valor will be sleeping on feather mattresses in barely any time at all. So? What do you say? Better than farm work?”
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“You’ll need to change into silks, of course,” Ori had said. “And you’ll look more credible this time if you ride Valor on the way. That won’t be an issue, will it?”
Not often, but Valor and Waver had ridden together before. Valor’s matte black claws thudded dully against the center of the road, which was paved in dirt so not to damage dragons’ feet. The dragons’ thoroughfare was thronged on either side with cobblestones, and in the late afternoon, all kinds of humans swarmed over them. The center of the road, too, was populated with all sorts of dragons, but each was either accompanied by a human or strictly trained and evaluated for independent transport.
Domesticated flying dragons naturally existed, but the turbulent movement of flapping wings wasn’t appropriate either for cargo or for inexperienced riders. Small parcels could be strapped to a dragon’s head for stability, and experienced riders could stomach the constant up-and-down, but for the most part, goods and people traveled over land.
A maroon waistcoat and a white shirt with billowing black silk pants. When Waver needed to dress up, he only had one option. It took quite a while to save up for a new set of formal clothing after he outgrew the clothes he was left with upon disownment, so this outfit was only about two months old. Occasionally, Valor looked up to admire it, too.
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“Well, clothes look better when you work hard for them... I guess? More importantly, you helped pick them out,” he replied, stroking the side of Valor’s head affectionately from their back. In public, Waver was careful to speak only in human tongues, and only so much that no one would suspect a genuinely two-sided conversation is taking place.
Generally speaking, dragons who lived with and worked for humans could understand human language just fine. Dragons did tend to have difficulty with humans’ tone, though. This much was known, even to most humans.
What most humans wouldn’t understand was just how limiting human words were. If words were beasts that carried meaning on their backs, a human word could only hold about as much as a human could carry on its back. Dragon words, however, were wide as a dragon’s wings, expansive, and sturdy. A dragon’s word carried weight, and the density of meaning that dragons spoke with was more than humans could process. That was why even the most dedicated scholars had given up. It was accepted knowledge that dragons were beasts who communicated primitively with mere growls, grunts, and hisses; it was much easier to accept for the humans who prided themselves in their wisdom.
Waver himself didn’t understand how he could understand the language of dragons, let alone why. If one were to ask him, he would say that he conjured a dragon in his mind’s eye to listen and speak in his stead. When he listened, he would read the imaginary dragon’s heart, and when he spoke, he would resonate the imaginary dragon’s throat. As a result, to most dragons, Waver’s voice sounded slightly hollow and insubstantial, but as Valor sometimes quipped, that might just have been a reflection of Waver’s innate qualities as a human being.
By the time the two arrived at the mansion of the Dame Michel Linnaeus, the sun was only an hour from setting. Dyed in the red light of the sunset, Waver alone met their client.
The man was tall and wiry, with brown skin and blonde hair. He dressed in a tasteful grey, but the unmistakable gleam of ambition shone in his eyes.
“Dame Linnaeus,” Waver said politely, keeping a straight face. “My name is Waver Cove. I’ve come at the recommendation of the Dux’s daughter, who informed me that you had need of dragon specialists.”
“Indeed,” The man said, with some suspicion. “Cove? As in the knight of the duchy?”
“No relation, I’m sorry to say,” Waver replied.
“I see. Well, I haven’t heard your name, then, but that makes it easier. Less chance of competition if you share my discovery, if you’re a commoner. No offense meant, you understand.”
“None taken, Dame,” Waver said.
“Thank you.” Michel turned away from Waver and faced the window, making a strong silhouette in the evening light. “In that case, let’s move to the main topic. Are you familiar with the wild species, the skylight?”
“Only from temple records, Dame,” Waver said. “They’re a strange sort of dragon that swims through the sky as if it were water, through unknown means, aren’t they?”
“They are. What else do you know about them?”
“I know that... their scales are light on the bottom and dark on the top? That they always seem to be wet? That all attempts to tame them have failed?” Waver tried to gauge the Dame’s reaction as he rattled off facts.
“That! That right there!” The man cried, startling Waver as he turned to point at him, advancing a few steps. “Untamed! Don’t you think that’s a shame? That such ethereal beauty and utility might be kept out of humanity’s reach like a fruit with no branch?”
This is for mattresses. Mine and Valor’s. Our mattresses are on the line, Waver thought. “A shame,” Waver repeated aloud.
“As I’m sure you know, goods and supplies can’t be carried in bulk by flying dragons, lest they arrive damaged or even totaled. But ground travel takes so long, and you always risk natural disasters, and attacks by bandits. If transport could swim smoothly above the clouds... that could cause a revolution in logistics! Warfare, commerce, everything would change if airborne cargo transport were only possible. Do you see?”
The minor noble’s enthusiasm had a tinge of madness to it.
“I’m afraid that much is too advanced for me,” Waver said. Privately, he thought that bandits would simply take to the skies, and other natural disasters would strike that would be no issue on land, but he said no such thing. I don’t like the idea of helping a new group of dragons to become property, but... well, I’ll keep listening. I doubt I’d be able to convince a wild dragon to enter bondage even if I wanted to.
“Hmm. Yes, as expected, matters of wider progress should be left to those with vision. A specialist need not worry that far ahead. So? Do you have an idea of what I want -- no, what I need?”
“I suppose this isn’t necessarily a commission to tame the Skylight species,” Waver said, thoughtfully. There was no way the category of hucksters called “drake talkers” could be trusted with anything that ambitious. “What you’re actually looking for is the conditions necessary to take that on, maybe?”
“I knew you looked bright!” Michel beamed. “Yes, this is reconnaissance. I will pay this much for useful information on the skylight species, and this much for the complete means to tame a skylight.” Michel showed Waver two figures. The first, as Ori promised, would pay for Waver to buy a place of his own, with enough left over for new sleeping arrangements within. The second figure... no, best not think of what he could buy with ten times enough cash for a stable and two mattresses. It would only break his heart.
“I understand the evaluation and payment terms, Dame Linnaeus,” Waver said. “Shall I rent a libel, or do you have one to lend? Unfortunately, the only dragon I live with is the drake I came in with, and-”
“Live with...?” The Dame narrowed his eyes suspiciously. Waver quickly course-corrected.
“A-anyway, drakes can’t fly well enough to keep up with a Skylight.” It would break their heart, but Valor would have to sit this one out, too, Waver thought. “A libel would be the best option, right?”
“Hmmm...” The noble scratched his clean-shaven chin. “I think I’d spring for an amphiptere or a wentis myself, but I suppose a libel would probably be more cost effective. You should rent, but if it’s just a libel, I’m happy to cover your fee. Just show them my signet - I’ll approve the invoice since I know it’s you.”
This rich bastard, Waver thought bitterly, as they politely accepted the Dame’s ring.