The Power of Gold Chapter 9
The next two weeks passed uneventfully… relatively speaking. For the three young women who had been chosen to ride Night Furies, those two weeks weren't even in the same latitude as "uneventful."
Camicazi tried to be patient with Night-fury-six-shooter's irrational refusal to embrace the burglar ethic of her new home. The dragon was willing to wear a saddle (although she grumbled a bit about being unable to adjust it herself), and she was always willing to go flying with her primary passenger. Those flights were thrilling, and they learned to communicate with each other in the air. But Cami couldn't help making suggestions about burgling expeditions at every opportunity, and those suggestions didn't go over well.
Things came to a head during a late-afternoon flight. They were skimming the sea at high speed; Six was loving the wind and the spray in her face, and Cami was learning to appreciate them. "You really like going fast, don't you?" she asked. Six nodded happily.
"How long would it take you to get us to Meathead Island and back if we flew this fast?" Cami wondered out loud. Six shook her head, almost slapping the girl with her ear flaps, and let out a growl that meant, "Don't go there," but Cami refused to take the hint.
"I figure, if we left home around sundown, we could get to the Meatheads well before midnight. I could grab their goodies and –" She got no further before Six did a quick half-roll. Camicazi found herself hanging upside-down in the saddle. A moment later, a wave splashed into her face, soaking her hair and slapping her head back. She had barely recovered from that when another wave hit her. Six slammed her rider's head into five waves in quick succession before she rolled right-side-up again. Cami was soaked, cold, coughing and choking from the water that had been forced into her mouth and nose, and very much surprised.
When she finally recovered her breath, her first words were, "Should I take that as a 'no?' " Six gave her the same happy nod that she'd given when asked about going fast. Then she flipped her tail and soared up to the clouds. Camicazi backed away from her endless burglary requests after that. She didn't completely stop, but her suggestions grew much less frequent, and never again at low altitude.
Aside from that, they flew well together. Cami was fearless, so she didn't try to hold the dragon back from wild maneuvers. Six felt sure that she could do anything she wanted in the air without losing her rider or making her afraid, so she had nothing to prove. Sometimes she would take Cami for a wild ride, and sometimes they would just glide above the clouds for half an hour. They weren't really bonded together, but they were comfortable together.
With Naginatta and Faithful-brother, it wasn't quite that simple. Bertha's youngest daughter began to get enthusiastic about flying after a few test flights together. Speed didn't bother her; crazy maneuvers didn't bother her. But heights did. As soon as they got more than a hundred feet off the ground, Nagi would go silent and close her eyes tightly, and would cling to the dragon for dear life. Nothing that the Night Fury could say or do would help her relax, except to fly low. So their flights together became a series of low-altitude, high-speed passes over the town and the island, rather than the power dives and zoom climbs that most Night Furies loved. At least they could talk in flight; Nagi was by far the most fluent of the three in Forge.
Alfrún was by far the least confident of the three, and that did not change with extra practice flights. Part of that was Thing Two's fault. She insisted on giving her rider "the whole package" when they went flying together, rather than starting off slow and then working up to the wild spins and the suicide dives. "That's the way I fly," she said when Six questioned her about it. "If she's going to ride on me, then she needs to ride me the way I am, not the way she wishes I was." It didn't help that Alfrún's tribe had never had any friendly interactions with dragons, so she had to overcome her fear of the great creatures even as she wrestled with her fear of flying.
There was one aspect of Alfrún's training that set her apart from the others in a good way. She was the only one of the three who showed any interest in target practice. Her dragon didn't need practice, of course; her instinctive aim was as perfect as a Night Fury could wish. But Alfrún was unique among the dragonriders of Bog-Burglar Island in that she worked with her dragon on choosing targets. It wasn't enough to just shoot a ship; she wanted Thing Two to learn to hit specific parts of the ship, like the yardarm or the rudder. When they took aim at the ranks and files of scarecrows that the tribe had set up for training purposes, Alfrún taught her dragon to aim for the one with the fanciest clothing, on the assumption that the enemy who dressed the best would probably be their chief. Bertha asked her about that one day.
"I hate war," she answered firmly. "If I can make a ship full of raiders retreat by hitting it in a weak spot, that's better than sinking the ship and drowning the crew. If I can make fifty Vikings retreat by hitting their leader once, that's better than shooting the fifty Vikings, even if my dragon could shoot that many. I don't ever want to lose a battle, because I never want to be captured and become a thrall again, but running up the body count isn't my idea of a good day's work."
"That's a terrible attitude for a Viking!" Bertha exclaimed. "You're supposed to go for the glory! Strike down your enemies left and right! Send them all to Valhalla and let Odin sort them out!"
"You fight your way, and I'll fight my way," Alfrún said with a shrug. Bertha decided to let it go, because she could easily imagine situations where that kind of precision shooting could be very valuable. The dragon certainly didn't object. Six noticed that and thought it was good.
"If you ever get tired of being called Thing Two," she told her sister, "then I'll name you Night-fury-sniper. You deserve it."
"Thanks, but as long as my sister goes by Thing One, then I'll remain Thing Two," the younger dragon said. Six suspected that Thing One would say something similar, so both their names were probably fixed for the rest of their lives.
Six noticed something else: of the three pairs of Night Furies and riders, only Thing Two and Alfrún were actually bonding as a pair. They spent time together on the ground, as well as in the air; Alfrún personalized her dragon saddle with marks that merged perfectly with the markings on Thing Two's back; and Thing Two would often bring a fish to her rider after her own morning meal was done. Six could see, in them, echoes of the way she and Agmundr used to relate to each other, before she had accidentally turned Agmundr into Night-fury-faithful-brother. She didn't comment on it, but she made sure to encourage them whenever she could.
o
The first hint of trouble came a few nights later... and it was a lot more than just a hint. One of the Nadders who was flying the night patrol came flapping back to the Bog-Burglar island at full speed, screaming, "They're coming! They're coming!"
The Night Furies had been circling a school of fish, deciding whether or not they were still hungry after feeding on a different school. They rose and flew next to the Nadder. "Who's coming?" asked Faithful-brother.
"Ships," the Nadder puffed, out of breath. "Seven or eight big longships full of Viking warriors with weapons. They're headed straight for this island."
"How far away are they?" Six asked her.
"About two hours, maybe more," the Nadder said. "I would have seen them sooner if they'd had their sails raised. Those big white sails are easy to see at night. But they're rowing without sails, so they got closer than I'd like before I spotted them."
"Two hours is plenty of warning," Six decided. "You did well, Nadder-blue-with-three-stripes. Land and get some rest. We'll take it from here."
The Nadder nodded and dove for her sleeping place. Thing Two asked, "What do we do next?"
"First, we'll fly out there and see who's coming," Six said. "Bertha will want to know that. Then we'll fly back to the island, wake up Chief Bertha, and tell her what's about to happen. The decision about how to defend the island is hers, but if she's smart, she'll let the dragons soften up the bad guys long before they get to land. Maybe she'll let us do all the fighting, or maybe she'll save some guts and glory for her own warriors; I don't know. But first, let's get the facts."
It took them a few minutes to fly out that far, but it took no time at all to find the ships, even without sails. "If we'd been flying that patrol route, we would have seen those ships at least half an hour earlier than that Nadder did," Daughter-of-Six commented.
"We're Night Furies. We have better night vision than almost any other dragon," Six answered, "but that doesn't make us better than other dragons. That Nadder did just fine, and even her night vision is better than the humans' vision. They'll never see us unless we make a loud noise to draw their attention. Now, spread out and check out those ships. Meet back here in five minutes."
"Can I shoot them?" Six's-girl asked eagerly. She had never seen an enemy before, and she was excited by the possibilities.
"Not without orders from the chief," Six said firmly.
"But why, Mom? You're the Alpha! You can tell us dragons what to do, right?"
"The terms of the agreement are that we work with the Bog-Burglars to defend their island," Six reminded her. "If I start making my own decisions, that's not working with them. Chief Bertha may tell us to come back here and wipe the intruders out, and if she does, then we will. But it will cause much less stress if we let her make her own decisions about her island and her tribe. If things go badly wrong, we can just fly away. The Vikings can't do that. We'll let them decide how to handle this raid, and we'll handle our part of that... dragon style!" They all grinned wickedly, but didn't spark their fires, as they reconnoitered the oncoming fleet.
When they met a few minutes later, they were all agreed that this was a raid in strength, not a social visit or a trading expedition. Their course was carrying them straight to Bog-Burglar Island; there was no other place they could possibly be going. As to their intentions, every man on board was armed, with extra weapons scattered all over the ships. As to their identity, that wasn't so clear. Their side-shields were undecorated, except for a few with simple designs that didn't look like any tribal insignia Six had ever seen before. Whoever they were, they were concealing where they came from. The Night Furies turned and flew for home.
When they arrived, their first priority was to wake up the chief. A few good roars would have accomplished that, but they didn't want to wake the entire tribe, not until Bertha was firmly in control of the situation. So Six borrowed a trick she'd learned from Uncle Toothless many years ago: she jumped up and down on the roof of the chief's house. After half a minute of this, the door opened, and Cami came out, wrapped in a bearskin sleeping fur. She shouted, "Knock it off up there! We're trying to sleep!"
Faithful-brother flew down and wrote in front of her,
RAIDERS!
But it was too dark to read his runes. Cami turned in disgust and went back inside. Six resumed jumping on the roof, and Faithful-brother added a few roars; if the whole town woke up at this point, so be it. Camicazi returned, angry, but her eyes went wide when Faithful-brother used his blowtorch-breath to shed enough light to make his runes readable. Cami spun and ran back inside without shutting the door.
"Mother! Wake up! The dragons say raiders are coming!" Bertha was out the door in half a minute with a lit lantern; Six joined her there.
"What's going on, Six?"
EIGHT SHIPS FULL OF RAIDERS,
COMING IN FROM THE NORTHEAST,
ABOUT TWO HOURS AWAY.
"Are you sure?"
WE ARE POSITIVE. BUT WE
CAN'T IDENTIFY THEM.
"Fair enough. Here's where you earn your fish." She yelled back inside, "Cami! Nagi! Get up, arm yourselves, and tell the night guards to spread the alarm! We've got raiders coming!" She turned back to the Night Furies. "You said there were eight ships, right? Can you sink seven of them?"
WE CAN SINK ALL EIGHT.
"I don't want you to sink them all. I want one of them to get through, so our warriors can get some glory and so we can keep their ship. Oh, and I want you to take your riders with you. You won't actually need them because you won't have to coordinate with us on the ground. You'll fight your battle, then we'll fight ours. But this will be good practice."
WE'LL DO THAT.
Bertha nodded quickly, then ran back inside to get her armor and weapons. The guards were already spreading the alarm, running from house to house and hammering on doors as they shouted, "Alarm! Raiders coming!" "To arms! Raiders are coming!" It was a familiar scenario – Six had heard such alarms raised on Berk in the past – but it was odd, almost disturbing, to hear the alarm and the responses coming only from female voices.
"What's the plan, Mother?" Six's oldest daughter asked her.
"For you and your sister, the plan is to stay together, stay out of sight in the dark, and take safe shots from long range," Six replied. "You've never been in battle before, you don't know what the Vikings can do to dragons, and I don't want to lose you on your first fire-support mission. I'll assign one of the Nadders to keep an eye on you, and if she tells me that you were showing off or taking any risks at all, you'll be grounded during our next battle! I mean it. Got that?"
"Yes, Mother."
"Okay, Mom."
"For the rest of us," she went on in a businesslike manner, "we have two priorities. One is to protect our island. The other is to keep the bloodshed down."
"Did I hear that right?" Thing Two burst out. "Is this the same Night-fury-six-shooter who took out four Viking longships with one firing pass?"
"Yes," Six said firmly, "and that was because no one was on board any of those ships at the time. I'm a daughter of Chief-night-fury and Night-fury-mother-of-twins, and I learned to fight from both of them. Unlike most dragons, Dad will never, never go for the kill. Pain? Yes, if our enemies don't quit when they should. Material damage? Absolutely; the more, the better. But killing? Only if there's no other way. That has worked well for him, and it works for me, too."
"I'm pretty sure that Chief Bertha won't agree with you on that one," Faithful-brother said.
"Bertha specifically said, 'You fight your battle, and then we'll fight ours,' " Six countered. "Our battle is going to be fought our way, and our way will be to focus on the ships, not the humans. If we can damage those ships and make the raiders go home, then that will achieve both of our goals."
"What if we damage the ships, and the raiders decide to race toward our island before they sink, because our island is a lot closer than their home?" Thing Two asked.
Six had to think about that for a moment. "You're right, that's probably what they'll do. Okay, we'll have to try something different. We'll sink the ships, but we'll spread out the sinkings so the swimmers won't reach our island all at once. They'll make it to shore in small groups, twenty here, a dozen there. They'll have to drop all their war gear to stay afloat, so when they reach land, they'll be unarmed and helpless. Bertha and her Vikings won't have any problems capturing them."
"The only problem with that," Faithful-brother said, "is that Bertha and her Vikings want a fight. They want the blood and the pain and the glory, as long as they can be the winners. If all you give them is prisoners, they may not like it."
Again, Six had to consider that. She reached her decision. "Either we let the raiders live, or we kill them; there's no middle ground. I'm a fighter, not a killer. If Bertha wanted a bunch of mindless murderers to protect her island, then she shouldn't have chosen us dragons to do it. We will fight our way, and if the Bog-Burglars don't like it, then they can pay the Outcasts to guard their island next time!"
Faithful-brother had to chuckle. "There's something very ironic about the Vikings getting mad at the dragons because we aren't violent enough."
"I can live with that," Six decided.
"I know I can live with it," her mate nodded.
"If those are the orders, then I'll obey them," Thing Two said.
From Six's back, Camicazi exclaimed, "I wish somebody would tell us what's going on! All this grunting and growling is making me nervous."
"We make battle plan," Faithful-Brother said in Forge, and Naginatta translated for the other riders.
"Okay," Cami nodded. "I hope it's a good plan."
"All righty, then," Six said confidently. "Let's get our dragons organized, and tell them the situation and the plan." That didn't take long; most of the dragons were veterans of at least one war against the Berserkers, and many of them could remember the wars against humanity in general. None of them was thrilled at the thought of attacking people, but they understood that, if the humans gave the dragons a choice between warfare and extinction, then the humans would get their war. That's what they always seemed to want anyway.
As for Six, this was familiar territory, and yet it felt utterly strange. She had sat in on countless battle-planning sessions during the Berserker Wars, and watched and listened as her father, with advice from the other Night Furies, repeatedly came up with plans that caught his enemies out of position and unable to retaliate. Now it was her turn to come up with the plan, and then execute it. Now all the dragons were looking to her for guidance and inspiration. Now, victory and defeat were sitting on her shoulders. It was a much heavier burden than she'd ever realized before. It would have been so comforting if Dad was here... but no. This was her nest, and she was in charge. That was how she'd wanted it, and she wasn't going to change her mind now, even if she could. This battle was hers to win or lose.
As it turned out, this battle wasn't even close. The dragons headed out to sea and relocated their unsuspecting prey. "Okay, the Night Furies will start this," she announced, and pointed out who should attack which ship.
Faithful-brother's attack went in first, because he attacked from sea level, in deference to his rider's fear of heights. His shot blasted the rudder out of existence and ripped a gaping hole in the ship's side. It was above the waterline, but low enough that water slopped in with each wave. Without a rudder, the ship was quickly turned broadside-on to the waves, which filled it and sank it in less than five minutes.
Six went next. She had done this many times; it was just a question of how she wanted to go about it. She decided to blow her target's bow off. That ship sank even faster than Faithful-brother's victim.
Next, two smaller firebolts from Daughter-of-Six and Six's-Girl struck either side of the third ship. Weakened, it split in half as soon as it rode over the next wave. At almost the same time, Thing Two ripped the stern off her ship. Four down! The others slowed to pick up the survivors, then sped up and ran toward Bog-Burglar Island, as Thing Two had suspected.
"Now what do we do?" Thing Two asked her. "I thought the survivors were supposed to swim, not get rescued."
"We carry on with the plan," Six answered. "We sink all their ships, one by one, and let the swimmers land, so Chief Bertha and her warriors can have their fun."
Faithful-Brother slid over to join the discussion. "That may be more fun than they can handle," he noted. "If we reduce them to one ship, that ship will have over a hundred people crammed on board. I don't think Bertha and her warriors are ready for all of those survivors at once."
"The alternative," Thing Two realized, "is to drown all those hundreds of Vikings. My rider is against that, and I don't see the need for it."
Six wanted to cry out, "Dad! What should I do?" But this was her battle. She thought desperately, trying to come up with some kind of solution that would minimize the loss of life among the hostile humans without endangering her own humans.
"Let them come," she finally decided. "We'll sink them all when they're a few hundred yards from shore. The Vikings can make it to land safely if they can hold onto some floating debris, so they won't drown. They'll all land at once; we can't stop that. But they'll be raiders with no weapons or armor, and I'm pretty sure the Bog-Burglars can handle that kind of a challenge." They quickly notified the other dragons that the remaining ships should be allowed to continue until the Night Furies gave the word.
"Hey!" Camicazi shouted. "How come you're not shooting them?"
Naginatta's understanding of Forge was still rudimentary, so Thing Two couldn't just explain the altered tactics. She finally said, "Plan change, we still win."
"How did the plan change?" Nagi demanded.
"Sink there, not here."
"I don't understand," the girl said.
"What are they saying?" Cami asked. Nagi repeated what she'd heard from Thing Two.
"You're right – I don't understand it, either," the older girl said, shaking her head. "I thought you dragons were supposed to be unstoppable killers! What's going on? Why are you showing them mercy?"
They still lacked a common vocabulary to understand each other. Six settled for violently shaking her head "no" as the small flock of dragons followed the longships toward the shore. Camicazi tried to hector and threaten Six into more direct action, but some of the Vikings on the ships heard her voice and hurled some spears in her general direction. Six dodged them easily, and Cami soon learned the aerial version of the lesson she knew so well on land: the best way to stay out of trouble at night is to hide in the dark and be quiet.
When the lead ship was about a quarter of a mile from shore, Six roared, and the dragons went into action with a vengeance. All four of the remaining ships were quickly set on fire, and their occupants found more safety in the cold ocean than on the hot decks. The Night Furies and the Gronckles paid extra attention to the blazing wrecks once they were abandonded, smashing them into many small pieces so those pieces could keep some Vikings afloat. Dozens of raiders were soon bobbing in the water, clinging to boards or pieces of mast or yardarm, kicking toward the dubious safety of the island, where a solid, silent row of Bog-Burglar warriors waited in full battle gear.
There was no battle on the shore. The freezing, waterlogged, unarmed men had no choices except surrender or die, and today was not a good day to die. The Bog-Burglars had been hoping for some glory, a captured ship, and a few hostages they could hold for ransom. Instead, they got no glory, no ship, and over a hundred hostages who would have to be sheltered, fed, and guarded until their own tribe could come up with a proper ransom.
Six was beginning to suspect that Chief Bertha would not be happy about this.