by Sandra Unerman
The alley was a dead end. Tibbie halted to catch her breath, while she stared at the building ahead. She had lost track of where she was in the city. A muddle of grimy stone and broken windows spread across her view. She could see no side turnings to take her onwards but such a place must have a back way she could escape through. All the buildings nearby were derelict and deserted, to judge from the stillness and the weeds in the empty doorways.
She dared not turn back or hesitate for long. She ran hard down the alley, scrambled over lumps of stone in the entrance to a courtyard and headed for the main building. But someone caught her arm and knocked her off balance. She fell onto her hands and knees.
‘You can’t go in there.’
She did not recognise the voice. She looked up, as the speaker blocked her way. An old man, not much taller than Tibbie, he was scrawny and ragged, his white hair and beard twisted into dozens of knots. Her fall had jolted her but her muscles still worked. She sprang upright and dodged. But the man was more agile and stronger than she expected. He caught her by her shoulder and she could not wrench free.
‘Let me go,’ she said. ‘They’ll be after me any minute.’
‘There’s worse to worry about than them, whoever they are.’ He did not sound angry but dull and tired. ‘What do you want in here?’
‘To get away.’ Tibbie went limp but his grip did not slacken. ‘Please, sir! Once they see me, I’m done for.’
‘Better face them than the secrets of The Sun in Shadow.’
‘The old inn?’ Tibbie looked at the huge board, faded and warped, which stood across the yard, propped against the post from which it ought to hang. She could just about make out the emblem of a rayed sun, peeping between dark clouds. She had heard more than one tale of the deserted inn and the treasure supposed to be buried in its cellars. And the death or ruin it brought on those who searched for it. ‘Couldn’t I hide in here?’
‘Better not,’ the old man said. ‘Who are they and why are they after you?’
‘The prentice lads from the cloth market. They say I made trouble for them with the Watch.’ She had led them into a trap, to pay them back for the insults they shouted at her. But the old man did not need to know that. ‘Who are you?’
‘Linstone, Master above ground and servant below.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘You’ll find out, if you won’t leave.’ He let go of Tibbie and looked her up and down. ‘You don’t sound like a brat from the streets.’
‘I’m bound to a milliner, taught to be polite to the customers.’ And meek to her mistress and the older girls in the shop, which was harder. She would never have challenged the old man with her questions if she had not been desperate.
‘How old are you?’
‘Fourteen.’ She would be sixteen on her next birthday but younger might seem more harmless. He had made her frightened of him and of the inn but she had delayed too long to resume her flight for now.
‘Young enough to work and skinny enough to survive, if we’re careful.’ Now he sounded worried. Before she could ask what he meant, a shout came from the street.
‘Hey, is that you, Tibbie?’ Sharpie stood there, the meanest of the printers’ devils, with a couple of others. ‘Come out to us.’
She had no voice left to answer him but she shook her head.
‘You can’t stay in there.’ The boys did not approach any closer. ‘Come on out. We won’t hurt you.’
She did not trust them. They had picked on her from her first week in the city, as soon as she had been sent out on errands. Because she would not smile or speak to them, they called her Sourlips and worse names.
‘Send her out, Mister.’ That was Walker, bigger than Sharpie and slower in speech. ‘She’ll be wanted soon, back at the shop.’
‘She’s crossed the Sun’s threshold,’ Master Linstone said. ‘If you won’t come in to fetch her, who am I to drive her away?’
The boys looked at one another and fidgeted. ‘We’re not that kind of stupid,’ Sharpie said. ‘Come on, Tibbie. That place isn’t safe.’
‘He’s right,’ Master Linstone said. ‘If you stay, I’ll find work for you, to ease the burden on my old bones. But remember, I urged you to go.’
He turned and walked into the building. Tibbie thought of the daily punishments she had to endure in the shop for clumsiness and stupidity. She had tried to run away once before but her family had sent her back to serve out her time. They could not afford to keep her at home and she had never been her mother’s favourite. She followed Master Linstone inside.
Eggs were provided by three hens, who pecked about in the scruffy garden at the back of the inn. Milk, bread, and random treats came from offerings left by neighbours at the back gate. Master Linstone explained as much, in between his orders to Tibbie to fetch water from the garden well and to scrub out the old kitchen. He cooked the eggs in a pan for their supper, although he did not eat much himself. With fresh bread and a plum afterwards, the meal was a better one than Tibbie was used to. By then, she was too tired to mind that they sat on the floor, surrounded by piles of splintered wood and cupboards with missing doors. They ate from cracked plates, which had once been splendid, painted with dancing lions in red and black.
‘What happened in here?’ she asked.
‘Too many fights.’
‘Was it the neighbours?’ Could they be afraid of the old man or ashamed of what they had done, that they made no attempt to take over the inn? ‘Is that why they give you such good food?’
‘No more questions.’ Master Linstone glared at Tibbie, until she dropped her glance. ‘No more questions. If you’re to stay here, you must swear to obey me and never betray me.’
Tibbie clenched her teeth. She resented yet another demand for obedience. But she could not go back to the shop now and he was asking no more than she had promised to the milliner. She gave him her oath.
‘Stay here,’ he said. ‘I’ll make up a bed for you later.’
He shut the door behind him as he went into the rest of the inn, giving Tibbie no more than a glimpse of many passages and stairs, deep in dust and shadow. She heated water in the kettle that hung over the open hearth, cleaned the egg pan, the spoons and crockery as best she could, and sat down again on the floor. She could see Master Linstone’s bed in a corner, made of sacks and rugs over straw. She had slept on worse, so long as he did not expect her to share. She leaned against the wall and dozed.
She woke to a grey dawn, curled up on sacks in the opposite corner to Master Linstone’s. He must have carried her there, without waking her. Now he was on his feet, with a bucket in his hand. Tibbie watched him leave the room and crept after him. He had not forbidden her to follow this time, after all, and she needed to know more about the life she was committed to in this strange place.
She kept well back along a narrow passage, which smelled ashy and warm. Little light reached her but she could hear Master Linstone’s tread and feel her way with a hand along the wall. When she reached a stairwell, she could see his head as he trudged downwards. She eased herself down, step by step, until a reddish light flared out from a door at the bottom. Master Linstone went through and the door swung to behind him but did not quite shut. Tibbie stopped and listened.
She could not make sense of the noises from inside: scrapes and clatters, mixed with a singing hiss that vibrated against the wall. Then Master Linstone’s voice, ‘Here,’ he said, his voice pinched and tight. ‘Here, drink this lot and I’ll fetch more.’
The hiss speeded up.
‘I know,’ Master Linstone said. ‘I know what you want. Someone’s bound to turn up soon. Slake your thirst meanwhile.’
Gurgles and slurps answered him. Tibbie was taken by surprise when the door opened and Master Linstone blinked at her.
‘Get away!’ he took her by the neck and pushed her up the stairs. ‘Up, quick.’ He did not speak again until they were at the top and he bent over to catch his breath. ‘Never go down there, until I bid you. If she catches your scent while she’s fasting, she won’t care how meagre you are.’
‘What is she?’ Tibbie rubbed her neck, jolted out of her manners once again. ‘What kind of pet do you keep down there? A giant sow? A lioness?’
‘You have that the wrong way round.’ Master Linstone pushed past her. ‘If you want to stay alive, bottle your curiosity until it’s safe. You won’t have long to wait.’
The men came at noon, three days later, to bang on the open front door of the inn. Tibbie followed Master Linstone out to meet them.
‘We’re here to win the treasure.’ The burly speaker was dressed in boiled leather, with an iron cap and gloves. He held an axe and his belt sagged from the weight of two long daggers. ‘You must fight us for it, old man, or tell us where it is.’
‘You won’t need directions to find it.’ Master Linstone’s voice was patient, neither angry nor frightened. ‘But you should listen to my warning.’
‘Forget that.’ Iron Cap hefted the axe and his four companions set hands to their swords. They were less well armoured but all looked eager and strong. Tibbie kept well back in the hallway. ‘Is the treasure here?’
‘There’s nothing here worth the price you’ll have to pay for it.’
‘Is there a heap of gold, wrought and unwrought?’ Iron Cap’s voice turned incantatory. ‘Are there rubies and sapphires, ropes of pearl and emerald buttons?’
‘There’s gold, certainly. I can’t say as to the rest.’
‘The gold will do,’ said a taller man, and the others nodded.
‘The gold will do for you all, most like, if you touch one coin or ring,’ said Master Linstone.
‘We’re ready to fight,’ Iron Cap said. ‘How long do you mean to stand in our way, old dotard?’
‘Long enough to beg you to turn back.’ Master Linstone dragged at his words. ‘If any of you have families who need you or friends to care for you, come no further.’
‘Here’s my family. Here’s my best friend.’ Iron cap patted his axe. ‘If you don’t want us to hurt you, or that sneak behind you, tell us where to go.’
‘Down to the cellars.’ Master Linstone stood aside. ‘The stairs are plain to see.’
The men marched inside, fast but wary. Master Linstone followed them. ‘Come,’ he muttered as he passed Tibbie. ‘Now you’ll be safe if you ever will be.’
Tibbie was on the stairs when the door at the bottom opened to ablaze of light. The men moved into the cellar, which cleared her view of the interior. She saw gold piled up like coal, into a mound, twice the height of the invaders now spread along its rim. They stared, as immobile as Tibbie, at the buckles and bracelets, necklaces, dinner plates and saucers, as smooth and bright as buttercups in sunshine. Scattered sparks of vermilion and azure hinted at gemstones buried below the outer layers. At first, Tibbie thought that the gold itself was the source of the light, which flickered and grew as she watched. But sweat beaded her skin and the scent of ash overpowered the reek from the men’s bodies. A fire must be hidden somewhere, to bring such warmth so deep underground.
‘Too much to carry,’ Iron Cap whispered. He reached forward to pick up a cup. At his touch, the mound wobbled and shook into new dents and ridges. A lump surged out, a head like that of a giant horse, redder than the gold, on a long sinuous neck. Its huge teeth were pointed and fire spurted from its nostrils.
‘Dragon!’ The yell came even before the great claws emerged from the mound and the tail lashed out, its scales amber and yellow. By then, Iron Cap’s head was bitten off and his blood soaked the gold as his body toppled forwards. The other men turned to run but none of them reached the door. The dragon seized two in its forearms and knocked down the others with its tail. Their screams hurt Tibbie’s ears, before they stopped, their echoes brief as lightning. The dragon pushed two of the corpses into the mound, while gold artefacts tumbled around them. It turned back to fetch the others and paused. Its head reared up and one dark eye looked directly at Tibbie.
‘All mine,’ it said, in the singing hiss from the other night. ‘You’re not worth the bother. He can keep you if he likes.’
Tibbie’s stomach heaved. ‘If you must vomit, go upstairs,’ Master Linstone said. And she went.
Tibbie sat huddled in the kitchen all that afternoon. She did not look up until Master Linstone set a bowl of porridge beside her in the twilight. She pushed the bowl away.
‘You’ll have to eat, eventually,’ Master Linstone said.
‘Why didn’t you tell them?’ Tibbie tightened her grip on her knees. If she loosened up, she thought she would shake to pieces. ‘Why didn’t you say what the danger was?’
‘They wouldn’t have listened.’
‘You could have tried. You could have told me.’
‘I did my best. I said all I could to drive you away before you set foot in the building.’
‘You never said dragon.’ Tibbie lifted her head to glare at him.
‘I swore an oath, in exchange for my life.’ Master Linstone sat in his usual place by the fire. His face was haggard but his voice steady and unapologetic. ‘When she caught me, she was sated, from the others she’d eaten here. She offered to let me live if I swore to keep her secret and to serve her, to fetch her water, and to polish her scales.
‘And to tempt in more victims.’ Tibbie sat upright.
‘I never do that. I didn’t expect to last this long. A little respite was all I wanted. I’d warn everyone away and sooner or later, the dragon would be hungry enough to eat me. And I made the warnings as strong as I could. I used to kneel and weep in front of the treasure hunters. I told them how many people had died here. Nobody ever listened.’
‘I made her no promise,’ Tibbie said. ‘I could go out and tell people.’
‘You swore an oath to obey me.’
‘But – but -.’
‘If she is roused out of her lair, she’ll destroy half the city, before anyone can stop her. This way, she kills only the greedy ones, the ones who prize gold above their lives. And she was here first.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘She was asleep amidst her treasure for centuries, deep underground. The innkeeper’s men broke into her lair when they dug down to extend the cellars. That was what roused her.’
‘The city ought to know.’
‘Who will believe you, if you say you’ve seen a dragon?’
Tibbie thought of the stories she had heard about the inn and its treasure. The place must be cursed, people said. The prentices had known not to come inside; the neighbours out the back must know or guess enough to keep Master Linstone alive. If nobody said dragon, maybe it was because they would rather not face the truth.
‘Stay here with me, Tibbie. Stay and live as long as you can.’
Tibbie opened the door to the cellar and hauled a bucket of water inside, without setting foot over the threshold. She gazed at the mound of gold, which gleamed as bright and clean as if it had never been stained by blood. She could not make out the dragon’s position, until she inched forward, the bucket pushed in front of her. The mound heaved and an eye opened, too near for Tibbie’s comfort.
‘Where’s the old man?’ The hiss was drowsy and slow.
‘Upstairs.’ Master Linstone was asleep. If she survived to tell him, he would be angry when he learned that Tibbie had ventured down here on her own. ‘I’ve brought you some water.’
‘I need no water today. I’ve blood aplenty to drink.’ The eye blinked and the gold rattled, as the dragon burrowed further down. ‘Touch one shred of my hoard and I’ll drink your blood too.’
‘I won’t.’ Tibbie’s arms shook and her hands were so sweaty that she had to wipe them down her thighs. ‘I only came to see you.’
‘What for?’
‘Because I want to be more like you.’ The thought amazed Tibbie, as she blurted it out. ‘Strong and brave and beautiful.’
‘You’ve seen no more of me than my head.’ The eye closed but the hiss did not sound angry.
‘I wish I could see the rest of you.’
‘You’ll be sorry if you rouse me up. Go away.’
Tibbie dared not stay longer. But she would come again.
©November 2022, Sandra Unerman
Sandra Unerman is the author of two fantasy novels, Spellhaven and Ghosts and Exiles. Her short fiction has appeared in Mirror Dance and The Casket of Fictional Delights, as well as previously in Swords & Sorcery. She lives in London, UK, and is a member of Clockhouse London Writers.