The Dragon's Child

By J. Kathleen Cheney

Kseniya Ilyevna originally came to the mountain of the Dragon Wizard to protect her younger sister, but when she learns of the wizard's true plans for his daughter, she vows to spirit the child away.

In seizing freedom for the little girl—her sister's child, Jia-li—Kseniya finds herself tied to the Zheng family and all the strange events that befall them. In six short stories, we follow Kseniya and her extended family as Jia-li grows into a budding wizard herself.

[Previously published separately, this brings together the stories found in the ebooks: The Dragon's Child, The Dragon's Pearl, and The Eretik]

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dream Palace Press
• Release date: Feb 27, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386736493

J. Kathleen Cheney

J. Kathleen Cheney is a former teacher and has taught mathematics ranging from 7th grade to Calculus, with a brief stint as a Gifted and Talented Specialist. She is a member of SFWA, RWA, and Broad Universe. Her works have been published in Jim Baen's Universe, Writers of the Future, and Fantasy Magazine, among others. Her novels, The Golden City, The Seat of Magic, and The Shores of Spain, are published in by Ace/Roc books. Her website can be found at www.jkathleencheney.com

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The Dragon's ChildTitle Page

Copyright © 2017 by J. Kathleen Cheney

1st Digital Edition, 2017,

cover design by J. Kathleen Cheney.

All rights reserved.

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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or person, living or dead is coincidental. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks, is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

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For more books by J. Kathleen Cheney, please visit:

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The Dragon's Child

J. Kathleen Cheney

Dream Palace Press

Contents

Foreword

The Dragon's Child

The Legacy of Dragons

Early Winter, Near Jenli Village

The Dragon's Pearl

The Eretik

The Waiting Bride

A Time for Every Purpose

Afterword

Cast of Characters

Also by J. Kathleen Cheney

About the Author

Published By

Foreword

This set of stories came from an odd desire to see two things:

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1) Stories that revolve around a family, and

2) Stories that combine eastern and western concepts of what dragons might be like.

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In this set of stories, the Golden Horde is gone, destroyed by dragons that breathed fire, imported from the West. This left a wide-open geographical space into which the Han, the Manchu, and a Russian diaspora moved, creating borderlands that never actually existed.

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Some of these stories have been printed prior to this collection. The Dragon’s Child first appeared in Beneath Ceaseless skies in 2008. Early Winter, Near Jenli Village first came out in July of 2009 in Fantasy Magazine, and was later placed on the Locus Recommended Reading List.

The Dragon's Child

The ground trembled and the mountains shook, bringing all motion in the great courtyard of the wizard's complex to a halt—guards and servants alike stilled in fright. Jia-li clung to Kseniya's arm until the tremor passed, her dark eyes wide.

Breath steaming in the frigid air, Kseniya glanced down at the girl and squeezed her hand. It's over now.

Jia-li's brows drew together. I can feel the dragons under the mountain, and they are angry, she whispered.

The dragons' fury had become more evident the last few months, the quakes growing more frequent, making Kseniya wonder if the wizard's control over them had grown lax.

Jia-li shivered. They don't want to be there. I told my father so. I told him he should let them go, but he just says I don't understand.

A thing he often told her. The wizard kept Jia-li at lessons most of the day, a hard thing for any child to endure. That the child was also his daughter made no difference to him. He showed no love for the girl, nor any interest in her beyond her general health and what talents she demonstrated. And with her mother dead, only Kseniya remained to care for her.

Kseniya knelt in the snow and straightened the collar of the girl's quilted jacket. Even after eight years, she still found it disconcerting that Jia-li had her father's eyes, dark brown with a distinctive hooded shape. Only the lighter hue of the girl's hair gave hint of her foreign mother's blood. Come, you don't want to be late. He would be angry.

Jia-li nodded dutifully. Two guards stood at the outer gate, so Kseniya stopped there while Jia-li walked up the wide red-painted stairs of the wizard's grand house without looking back.

It would have to be soon, Kseniya decided as she watched Jia-li disappear within those walls. Now that the girl was old enough to make the trek through the mountains, Kseniya had to find a way to steal her away before the wizard broke the girl's spirit and corrupted her soul.

In the pale afternoon light that slipped through the high windows of the storeroom, the fine silk of a red veil slid through Kseniya's fingers, and she wondered when a bride had ever come to this bleak mountaintop. Underneath folded lengths of more mundane fabrics, she'd found an old wooden chest, and secreted inside lay a fortune in embroidered silks—tunics and jackets and trousers—the answer to her prayers.

She had always known that if she were to steal away with her niece, it must be in winter when the dragons preferred to sleep. These long-forgotten silks would provide warmth during their passage, and when they escaped the mountains she could sell them for food.

She shut the lid and quickly rearranged the fabrics over the chest, only regretful she'd not found any weapon within. She took a deep breath and forced down her excitement. She could not risk giving away her intentions.

Calmed, she gathered up the length of plain ramie Bao-yu had sent her to fetch and hurried back to the inner hall of the women's house. The old woman took the cloth in her wrinkled fingers, then smiled and patted Kseniya's hand in thanks.

Unable to speak, Bao-yu was still the closest thing Kseniya had to an ally atop this mountain, the only one of the servant women willing to associate with the outlander held among them. Bao-yu didn't seem to mind her foreign style of dress or strange accent. Nor did she look away from Kseniya's scar-lined face, as most of the women did.

The mountain froze in the winter and no rain fell in the summer, making it inhospitable, so servants never stayed long, neither the men who guarded the wizard's complex nor the women who did the cooking and washing. Only Bao-yu had lived there longer than Kseniya, and she supposed the old woman simply had no place else to go.

Bao-yu resumed her work, embroidering a hidden luck-token on the inside of the collar of one of Jia-li's tunics. It was one of the dragons native to this country, Kseniya realized, not the fiery creatures the wizard held captive. The servants told tales of the dragon the wizard had driven away with his horde ages before—one who brought the spring and rain—but Kseniya thought that creature a myth. Even so, Bao-yu's furtive rebellion against their master warmed her.

When a knock sounded on the outer door, Kseniya went to open it, expecting her niece returned from the wizard's house. Indeed she found Jia-li there, the wizard's bodyguard with one hand on the girl's shoulder.

Her eyes properly downcast, Kseniya didn't catch his movement in time to retreat. He laid a hand upon her arm.

Startled, she slammed his hand into the doorframe and trapped it there, her fingers clamped about his wrist. A knife lay concealed under his jacket's sleeve, stiff against her palm. His fingers stayed relaxed, though, not resisting her hold.

Aghast at her actions, Kseniya grasped Jia-li's jacket with her free hand and dragged the girl into the warmth of the hall. Then she stepped back and let go of the man's wrist. She kept her eyes on the ground, desperately wishing she could look at his face to gauge his reaction.

To her surprise, he didn't strike her in return. I need to speak with you, was all he said, the words delivered in a whisper. Then his dark-booted feet moved out of her range of vision.

Kseniya raised her face and stared after him, her heart pounding, but he was long gone. What had she done?

There would be trouble later due to her rashness, threatening all her planning. Letting loose a shaky sigh, Kseniya closed the door.

Jia-li stood in the foyer, her pale face worried. What happened?

He startled me, dearest. That's all. Kseniya didn't think she'd heard the man's voice once since his arrival on the wizard's mountain late in the fall. She didn't know what it meant that he'd spoken to her. In all her time on the mountain, none of the guards had ever come near her, repulsed by the scars that mapped her skin. She bit her lip. Does he ever talk to you?

Jia-li shook her head. He just watches.

Easy to believe, for the man had alarmingly sharp eyes. Kseniya had tried to avoid him, reckoning him more of a threat than the old bodyguard he'd replaced. It would have to be tonight, she decided then, even though the moon was not full. She would have preferred more light.

Sighing, she leaned down and turned Jia-li's hands upward so that she could see the girl's palms. The skin showed red and blistered. Let's go back to your room so I can take care of these.

In the winter the house felt chilly, but Jia-li's ornate bedroom in the rear of the building retained its warmth. The girl settled cross-legged on her silk-draped bed, her light-brown hair streaming over one shoulder. With her back to the lamp, the flame outlined her small form with a flickering glow.

It is worse every day, Jia-li said, her eyes glistening. He keeps asking me things I can't do.

Kseniya knelt and took the girl's hands in her own. The blisters lay under Jia-li's skin, not atop it, as if the skin burned from the inside, the fire inherent in the girl burning its way out of her body.

Kseniya concentrated her will into her hands, and where they touched Jia-li's, she set the damaged flesh to rights, thieving away the pain. She felt grateful for the winter's cold —it eased the fire that prickled along her skin. She let it flow throughout her body, spreading the dull ache thinly so that it did little harm beyond discomfort. She breathed slowly, her eyes shut, not wanting to worry the girl.

Jia-li's small hand touched her cheek, tracing along one of the old scars. I wish you would teach me to heal.

When you are older, dearest. You're not ready yet. Kseniya opened her eyes and smiled at her.

I wish he weren't my father, Jia-li said.

I know, Kseniya whispered. The women's house had ears, and ill-spoken words might find their way back to the wizard. Whether by magic or some mundane method, it mattered not. Better to give the man nothing to use against them.

For a second, she suspected Jia-li would cry, but the girl squared her small shoulders, determination on her face. Will you tell me about my mother again?

Kseniya refused to let her sister's memory die. As one of their father's bastards, Kseniya had been raised by Anushka's side—to guard her more royal sibling. But Anushka's will to live had faded after giving birth to Jia-li, and she slipped away to a different freedom.

Kseniya tucked an errant strand of Jia-li's hair behind her ear and resettled herself on the floor. "Your mother was a princess of the Cholodio Mountains, and her people were known far and wide for their healers. When the Emperor heard of them, he decided he must have them. He took all his soldiers there but couldn't conquer the mountains. So he set his wizard at the task, and he unleashed his dragons upon their lands, destroying their villages and farms."

It sounded only like a child's story now, even to her own ears—and she had lived through it. The princess escaped and hid among her people, but the wizard sent men to hunt her. Long before, a seer had prophesied that the wizard would only be defeated by a child of his own blood. So, to save her people, Anushka gave herself up. When you were born, she hoped you would be the one to free them.

And then we can leave? Jia-li asked in a wistful voice.

She had chosen not to burden the girl with hopes of escape, and even now thought it best to hold them secret. Yes, dearest. Then we will go home.

It was no small matter, waking the girl in the dead of the night, but the moon would rise soon, and Kseniya wanted them off the mountaintop before the light gave away their escape. She stole into the storeroom and retrieved the satchel hidden there, filled now with hoarded food and the finest of the bridal silks.

Jia-li dressed without argument, drawing on layer after layer for warmth. Once satisfied, Kseniya carried the girl through the women's house and out to the courtyard. They slipped through the side door onto the platform where the washer women rinsed their laundry in a spring that emerged from under the foundations of the house.

A gate led out on the back of the mountain, the path the guards watched least in the winter as it led only down a steep, icy trail. We must stay in the shadows, she whispered.

Jia-li nodded fervently, and Kseniya set the girl on her feet. But when they stepped toward the distant gate, it swung inward.

One of the guards, Kseniya realized, sneaking into the women's house. Heart pounding, she shoved Jia-li behind her. The guard couldn't help but see her there, but she hoped he might not notice the child cringing behind her.

He stopped twenty paces from them. The rising moon's pale light crossed his face—the wizard's bodyguard.

Kseniya didn't know how he'd guessed they would flee this night, but it was over, her attempt to steal Jia-li away ruined before they even escaped the house. Biting back tears of frustration, Kseniya cursed herself silently. Her aggressive reaction to his touch must have warned the man that she'd been trained to arms, and made him suspicious of her.

The man came no closer, though, holding his hands wide. It seemed an odd gesture, one perhaps meant to lull her suspicions.

Go, she whispered to Jia-li and pushed the girl toward the courtyard. She heard the girl's footsteps patter away, too soft for the man to notice. And once a moment had passed, Kseniya fled the platform as well, her heart like lead.

Kseniya sat in the inner hall of the women's house, where the morning light from the courtyard served best for mending. Bao-yu sat nearby, completing the embroidery she'd begun the day before.

In the quiet before dawn, Kseniya had returned the silks to the chest and thrown the food out past the gate where the birds could squabble over it. She hoped the wizard might believe she'd merely stood on that platform in the night to look at the stars. The bodyguard might not even have seen the girl behind her. And Jia-li had not known her plan, which should protect the girl should her father question her.

When the groan of the outer gate alerted Kseniya, she went to greet her niece, but it wasn't Jia-li in the courtyard. Two of the wizard's guards stood there.

Come, one ordered.

Kseniya hadn't been inside the wizard's house for years. Large braziers burned on the edges of the room, keeping it over-warm. It reeked of incense, a heavy cloying musk meant to mask the burning smell of the wizard himself. That remembered scent triggered a wave of nausea, and Kseniya paused. Then she lifted her head and walked to the carpet before the dais where the wizard held his court.

He sat on a heavily-carved chair of dark rosewood—a copy of the emperor's throne, one of the other servants had once told her. The wizard's dark hair showed far grayer than when Kseniya had last seen him. His handsome face sagged about his hooded eyes, age and power wearing at his flesh.

His robes of blue silk were richly embroidered, dragons flying across them stitched in bronze and red and gold. Not the slender twisting dragons Kseniya had seen on the robes of envoys from the Emperor's court, but the wizard's own dreadful creatures, fire and smoke billowing from their jaws. They were carved into the beams of the sanctuary, painted on the red walls.

They looked out of the wizard's eyes at her.

The bodyguard stood some distance behind the dais, his somber tunic and trousers letting him blend into the shadows. Even so, Kseniya could feel his eyes on her. Her two encounters with him had surely led to this pass.

One of the guards pressed a hand on her shoulder, and Kseniya sank to her knees.

Why did you bring her? Jia-li asked from somewhere beyond her line of vision. The girl must be several feet behind her, and to the left. The bodyguard's dark eyes flicked in Jia-li's direction, confirming that.

Quiet, girl, the wizard said. He raised a hand, his long, pointed nails painted with blue lacquer. With one finger, he drew a slashing arc through the air.

Pain seared like fire along Kseniya's cheek, a line cutting across one of the old scars. She clenched her jaw to keep from crying out. She remembered that pain all too well.

Jia-li screamed. She turned to her father and cried, Stop it! Stop it!

The first flare of pain passed, leaving a low burning in Kseniya's skin like poison. She could sense blood, hot and sticky, flowing down her cheek, but didn't dare heal herself. Should the wizard witness it, she feared he might learn the way of healing from her.

And there would be more to come; she knew that from experience. A drop of blood fell to her chest, bright against the drab ramie of her over-robe.

Now, you will heal her, the wizard said to his daughter.

I can't! Jia-li protested. I don't know how.

The wizard stroked the air again, and the dragon's fire cut through Kseniya's skin, a trail of red blossoming across her left sleeve. Kseniya bit down on her tongue.

Heal her, he said. You heal your hands at night, so I know you have the power in you.

The girl cast a horrified glance at Kseniya.

The bodyguard hadn't precipitated this after all, she realized. No, she mouthed at the girl.

That defiance earned another stripe, this time running from shoulder to shoulder.

Heal her, the wizard ordered, his voice louder.

It had been the same with Anushka—the constant demands that she demonstrate her ability to heal. The wizard had only kept Kseniya alive to provide a victim for his game. I should have warned the girl before, she thought. I knew this day would come.

Jia-li drew herself up to her full height, crossed her arms over her chest, and lifted her chin. She's only a servant, she said in a disdainful tone.

It was a valiant attempt, but the wizard ignored her ploy. He raised his hand, and fire traced across Kseniya's forehead. Blood seeped into the corner of her eye, and she shook her head, trying to dash it out. One of the guards put his hand atop her head to keep her still.

It went on until Jia-li lay sobbing at her father's feet.

Heal her, the wizard insisted.

Kseniya had no recollection of how she got back to the women's house. She lay on the cold tiles of her tiny room, the smell of her own blood going stale about her. It must be night, she decided, for only a dim sliver of light showed under her door.

The wizard would do it again, she knew, once she had recovered enough. His talent let him cut flesh, even from a distance, but nothing else. He couldn't cut her clothes or put out her eyes. His guards, however, could easily do that for him. Little else held much horror for her any longer, but Kseniya feared the day she would lose