Mending the Sword

Contest: The Sword’s Edge

Prompt: young dragon + broken sword + clumsy wizard



Word Count: 2911

Mending the Sword:

Mica looked down at her cupped hands.  “They’re so tiny,” she whispered in wonder.  The lizard uncurled and gave a mew.  It stretched its neck and flicked its tail against Mica’s thumb.

Bann grinned.  “Here, take another one,” he offered.  With a deft movement, the lad scooped a russet-coloured lizard from the nest crate and dropped it beside its hatch-mate and into Mica’s hands.  “We try to keep them as socialised as possible at this age.”  He explained, picking a third lizard up.  “In the wild, the brood will only stay together for a few months and many will die of exposure.  The dams move nest frequently, and only the strongest can keep up.  By the time the lizards are big enough to fend off predators on their own, there’s normally only one or two left.”  He shrugged, “Cam thinks that’s why grown dragons are so aggressive.  They grow up solitary.  He thinks keeping them together will help bond them.  Make a herd or something.”

“A flight.”  Cam’s irate voice floated over the chirping and hissing clicks of the hatching lizards.  “A flight of dragons, a herd of cows, a nuisance of apprentices.”  The older man made no move to greet Mica.  Instead, he glared at Bann and turned back to his stack of books and parchments.

“Ignore him,” Bann murmured stroking the lizard.  “These eggs were particularly hard to find and he is worried how few will hatch.”

Bann dropped the lizard he was holding back into the nest and motioned Mica to do the same.  With a small sigh, she held her hands over the crate and tried to release the dragonet.

“Ow,” she cried, “there is a thorn on that twig.”

“Limbane branches,” Bann dropped the remaining lizards into the crate.  “Nasty thorns, but the hatchlings chew the leaves.  Put some witches-hazel on it; it will heal quick enough.”  He flipped the grating lid over the crate and padlocked it shut. 

“I thought dragons ate flesh, like dogs.”  She smiled wanly; the bards back at the keep claimed it was human flesh and sang songs about it.  Some of them quite graphically.  And how dare he be so causal, the thorn had drawn blood! 

“The males do, and your little russet one,” he nodded towards the crate.  The tiny lizard Mica had been holding was licking the blood droplets from the limbane thorn.  “Cam’s research suggests there may be a link between what they hunt and how they behave.”



“Well?”  Bann demanded as Cam twiddled the microscope into focus.

“Well what?”  The old wizard snapped back.  “You bring another would-be-but-never-will-be young royal into my house.  You show her my research and let her pet and play with the dragonets.  And, like all the ones before, she goes away disappointed.”  He slotted a slide into the 'scope and looked up.  “When are you going to learn, Bannon, dragons are... are monsters to most people.  Mindless monsters that hoard gold and menace the peasantry and eat noble young ladies.  Like your new friend.”  He sniffed and jerked his head towards the open door.  “Ladies like your mistress Mica want mystery and intrigue.  They want dragons to be exciting and dangerous.  But not too dangerous,” he conceded in distain. 

“Look lad,” Bann grimaced as Cam patted him on the shoulder and steeled himself for the on-coming lecture.  “Girls, they want adventure.  Brave, bold knights who slay mighty beasts.  You have a keen mind and a good heart, boy; but, well, when it comes to young ladies, you are just as clumsy as any lad your age.”  Cam was still patting him on the shoulder, unaware of Bann’s growing sense of indignation.  “I am not saying that lasses don’t appreciate good animal husbandry.  But, well, noble ladies tend to think of wizardary as being spells and sleeping draughts and love potions.  Lightning bolts.  Bloody ridiculous quests and foreign lands full of magical knicknacks.”  Cam was warming to his theme; there would be no escaping now.

“And what do you do, boy?  Aside from letting a royal catch herself on a bloody limbane thorn that is!” 

He snorted, “you give her lizards the size of her thumb.  They eat grass and herbs at that age!  Oh very frightening!  No wonder she left, boy.  You bored her!  You took one of the most feared and revered monsters of legend, and showed her a broken sword!  Something once great, now shattered beyond repair.  A dream dissolved.”   

Cam shook his head.  “A broken sword, boy.  That’s all she saw.”



Bann lay awake, staring at the beams running above his cot, Cam’s sad words bouncing through his head. Monsters.  Adventures.  Quests.

Why should we conform to these ideas? The thoughts tasted bitter in his mind.  Why are dragons mindless monsters and wizards potion-masters only?  Cam is right, I still do not know how to talk to people. He refused to dwell on Cam’s specific comments about young ladies.  He knew he was awkward at conversations.  That was why he had been apprenticed to Cam in the first place.  A merchant’s son, his speech should be free-flowing, easy and eager; but his father called him bookish and inept.  As blacksmith or a wizard, father eventually decreed, Ban would excel at either and both would cover his persistent shyness.  As a blacksmith, it would be taken for surliness and as a wizard, well everyone knew aloofness was part of a wizard’s magic.

Sleep, when it finally came to Bann, was no refuge.



The following morning, Bann busied himself with chores; tidying Cam’s workbench, cleaning the distilleries, cutting new bedding for the hatchlings.  He was stalling, he acknowledged to himself.  Seeking manual work to avoid thinking, but when Cam caught him drawing water to scrub the flagstones in the cooking area, he yelled at the lad; snarling at him to get back to his studies and leave the cleaning to the damn village girls.

Reluctantly Bann settled at the bench by the stone fireside.  The sheaves of paper stacked beside him contained Cam’s notes on herb-lore and dragon-raising.  He would not admit it, but Bann suspected Cam was compiling a book on the combined subjects. 

He felt his jaw tighten.  Book writing. Adventure and mystery indeed.  Perhaps Cam will slay demons with his pen, he thought bitterly.  Disgusted with himself, Bann opened the heavy leaves of Arcanum Draconus, Pytoi’s most recent work.

Normally he fell into words, hungry for answers.  Yet today, with the anger of yesterday and the restless dreams of the night raging on, Pytoi’s book brought no comfort.  Neither did Draconii Nyxn nor Cam’s botanicals and herb-lores.  He tried others, even the thin volumes Cam had written in runes and the single old reed-parchment in Nhme hieroglyphs.

But each one brought him back to the starting question; why are dragons always depicted as monsters?

And, evermore persistently, how can I change this?



Mica snapped back to reality with a start; Master Pytoi was asking a question.  She gave a quick shake of her head, trying to clear it.  Her cousins, Lucie and Dulah, were diligently copying notes.  Lucie once again doing everything she could to integrate herself with the court wizard.

Dulah nudged her, “even drier than normal, eh?  ‘Toyie could make Kvo poetry dull.”  The princess snickered, “still that won’t stop Lucie from trying to make him sweet.”  Master Pytoi moved to the front of the small schoolroom and began writing on the aging blackboard.  “So, how were the dragons?  Were they as fearsome as ‘Toyie’s always says?"

"Master Pytoi wrote in his last book that they eat their young and drink the blood of princesses."  Lucie offered not looking up from her work-scroll. 

"Well maybe that is why the old herb master's apprentice invited you down."  Dulah rolled her eyes.

Lucie's face was serious, “surely not!  I hardly think Master Cam would take on such a foolish apprentice.” 

“Well I hear he is as boorish as they come.  Do they start like that, do you think?  Or do they dry out like fruit in the sun?”  Dulah tittered and flicked her long hair.  “Stealing Mica’s blood would be far more exciting.  Although frankly, Luce, I still think Pytoi put that in to make his book less dreary.  Old ‘Toyie is so insipid in real life!.  Was your apprentice-boy insipid, Mica?”

No, thought Mica. Rambly and out of his depth, maybe.  But he understands his subject and spoke to me with real passion and delight.  She paused mid-thought, and when did anyone last speak to me like that?

She would have to find an excuse to visit the dragon-keepers again.  And soon.



The vision of a broken sword kept coming back to Bann.  Was that really what Mica had seen?  His lips thinned as he pictured his excited words breaking her dream-world image of dragons.  Of course with Pytoi himself as the royal tutor (to say nothing of the prince’s bards, he reminded himself drily) Mica would have been raised on a heady diet of fairy-tale monsters.

And yet, she had seemed so captivated by the tiny dragonets, gasping in delight as one hatched right in front of her.  As the thin shell peeled away and the slimy little lizard lay recovering, he told her to breathe on it, “just like a dragon would.”  She had given him a funny look, but complied; helping the baby dry out.

Mentally, Bann found himself naming the minute lizard Lady in her honour.  Privately he had named several of Cam’s dragonets over the past three years.  Once he had even admitted this to another apprentice, one who had been sent to Cam for a stint to learn herb-lore.  Cam took several apprentices from other wizards each year, keeping them for a few months.  They never stayed long, even Cam’s reputation as a herbalist paled when faced with tedium of cleaning out his dragonets.

The transient apprentice pulled a face and asked Bann if he named the chickens in the courtyard too, or perhaps the crickets in the field beyond?  The apprentice had gone on to serve in one of the royal keeps, indentured to a court wizard. 

Bann remained with Cam and his growing collection of domestic dragons.



In the end, Mica simply donned her cloak and headed down to Cam’s.  Finding herself unable to give a reason to go, she slipped out unseen. Being only a minor royal has a few advantages after all, she smiled.  Lucie and Dulah would never be able to leave the keep unescorted.

She found Cam’s workshop empty, Bann’s study notes scattered on the large fireside bench and a half-eaten bread roll to one side.  She hesitated, calling out in case either were in the courtyard or the house beyond.  When no-one answered, she tip-toed forward and peered into the nest-crate.

The tiny lizards had grown, but were still smaller than her hand.  As she looked on, one scampered forward and, climbing a small branch, reached up through the grating-lid to her.  Thrilled, Mica tentatively stroked the minuscule finger-like claws, an enormous smile beaming across her face.

It was the dark russet-coloured one she had watched hatch and had breathed over.  The same one that had licked her blood from the limbane thorn. 

A loud crash made her jump and spin round.  With a shrill chirp, the dragonet raced back down the branch and disappeared into its bedding leaves.

Bann stood, scarlet-faced in the doorway.  Several of Cam’s books littering the floor by his feet.  Mumbling, the apprentice bent to pick them up and embarrassed, Mica crossed the room to help.



The royal’s presence had shocked Bann. Convinced he would never see Mica again, he had walked straight into edge of Cam’s workbench as his mind raced and his stomach lurched.

Scooping up the scattered books, he could feel the heat burning his face and, alarmed she would see the beads of sweat prickling his forehead, he swung round facing away from her, mumbling all the while. 

Her company clearly unwanted, Mica handed the apprentice the remaining books and left.



There was a sickening churning in Bann’s stomach all that evening.  Why had Mica returned and why had he been so stupid as to walk into the bench and drive her away?  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Unable to concentrate, Bann shoved his notes roughly aside, slopping coffee over a parchment and the staling remains of his lunch.  Frustrated he broke the roll into pieces and dropped it into the lizards’ nest.

Like lightening, the dragonets raced out from the foliage grabbing at the bread crumbs.  They ranged in colour from dull oranges through earthy greens to the deep russet  of Mica’s hatchling, Lady.

Thinking of, Bann bent over the crate and looked closer.  This clutch had twelve dragonets, a poor hatch-rate, but Cam was working on it.  As Bann looked on, eleven of the dragonets appeared and disappeared in and out of the bedding, crumbs of bread in their claws.  Only Mica’s lizard seemed disinterested.

Puzzled, Bann flipped the grating and reached in to pick the hatchling up.

Immediately the lizard reared and snarling, lunged for Bann’s hand. 

Cursing, Bann pulled his hand back as Lady’s teeth just missed their mark.  In the crate, the dragonet was flinging itself at the grating, hissing and spitting.  All around it, the other hatchlings cowered.  Anxious that Lady may unsettle the other lizards, Bann reached back into the crate and pulled Lady out

Lady squirmed in his grasp, thrashing it’s tail and arching it’s long neck.  Cupping it gently to avoid crushing it’s thin wings, Bann searched around for another crate to house it in.



The quilt was heavy on Mica.  Restless, she sat up in bed.  The room was quiet save for her maid’s soft breathing in the antechamber.  Distant sounds carried through the shuttered window from the keep’s courtyard below.

Padding over to the window, Mica opened a shutter and breathed in the night air.  She felt smothered, suffocated. Like someone has their hand over my entire body, she thought irritated.  Bann’s abrupt dismissal of her earlier still rankled and she remained piqued all evening.  Still, the tiny dragons pulled at her and she itched to see the russet baby again.

And I do not need a reason to go down, nor shall I be chased away by some rustic apprentice, she bristled silently.  I am a royal of Keep Vance.  And I will damn well do as I please!

Waking her maid with a start, Mica slammed the shutter closed.



Lady was still refusing food.

Bann tried again.  “Here, flamegrass.  C’mon, Lady all dragons like flamegrass.  No?  Limbane?”  He sighed and ran a hand through his hair.  It was getting long again and Cam would probably hack at it with the scissors.

He tried another herb, “shail-night?  No, I don’t like it either.”  He fidgeted, “please Lady?  I am running out of ideas.”

The lizard cocked it’s head and chirped.  “No, there’s no point arguing with me, Lady, you have to eat something.” 

“Do you talk to all your dragon-babies, Boy?”  Bann bolted upright.  Mica stood in the doorway removing her cloak hood.  “Do they answer back I wonder?”  If her voice tanged with irony Bann failed to notice.  Blood rushed to his cheeks.

Mica stalked passed him to the nest-crates.  “Why is this one isolated?”  She demanded.  Lady sat back on it’s haunches and trilled at her.  “Hello little one,” she cooed.

“Whose talking to the lizards now?”  Bann muttered.  Mica shifted slightly, pointedly ignoring him.  She picked up a flamegrass blade and fed it through the bars of the crate.

Chittering excitedly, Lady snatched the leaf from Mica and gobbled it down.  Pleased, Mica offered it another leaf and giggled as Lady took that one too.

Biting back a retort, Bann picked up a blade and poked it through the grating.  Lady backed away in distain and gave him a baleful glare.

Royal and apprentice glanced at each other and Mica unbent enough to share a bemused half-smile as Lady willingly took another flamegrass blade from her.  With a tilt of her head, she lifted the grate and put her hand in the crate.

Bann gave a choking cough and reached for her arm, but Lady had already run up Mica’s hand and gazed quizzically from the royal’s shoulder.  Lady trilled happily and shot across Mica’s neck to the other side.  Running back and forth along Mica’s shoulders, the dragonet squealed in delight and began burrowing through Mica’s thick hair.  It scooped up a lock in its claws and sat there gnawing.

Mica gurgled with laughter, “a dragon is chewing my hair!  Wait ‘til Dulah hears of one of 'Toyie's blood-thirsty dragons doing that.” 



Excited at the rapid bonding that was flaring up between royal and dragonet, Bann begged her to stay longer so he could observe the infatuated lizard. In the end Mica had stayed, and for several hours, so it was late when Bann finally finished his studies for the day. 

Cam barked at him on three separate occasions, demanding to know why was he so damn well bloody happy.  Frankly, Bann was not entirely sure himself, but Mica’s assertion that Cam’s tiny dragonets were definitely more interesting (well, she had said ‘adorable,’ but then, Bann conceded, she was a girl and what did she know?) than Pytoi’s mindless monsters was a good place to start.  And so was this potential new line of study.

Broken swords can be mended, Cam, dreams repaired and you may need to add my name to your research paper.  Mine and royal Mica’s.