The Dragon's Prophecy Read online

  “I apologize for putting you in this position, everyone else will see you staying while the rest of us ride out. They will think that you are staying behind where it’s safe while we put our lives at risk, but I will know the truth and it is my firm belief that you will be risking your life just as much as we will be risking ours.”

  Brendan nodded his head, “I understand.” He really didn’t but for some reason Sir Gerard was worried enough about what lay ahead that he wanted some sort of assurance from Brendan that his decision made sense. Brendan couldn’t imagine making a decision because of something that he “felt in his spirit”, but he respected Sir Gerard more than anyone else he had ever known, and he respected his faith, so Brendan was going to do whatever the knight asked of him. God would sort it all out.

  “I must leave now to prepare for our expedition, I want you to get your things out of the barracks and move into the ground floor of the keep. There are several bunks in one of the guardrooms by the front door. I will let Claudia know that you’re staying there.” He paused and then pulled what looked like a blue piece of cloth out of a pouch on his belt. “I have been trying to find the best time to give this to you, but none seemed right. I carry something similar into battle and it encourages me greatly. Please carry this with you, it is my hope that it encourages you as well. Watch over my family for me and pray that the Lord will help me watch over all of the people in Carinthia.”

  With that Sir Gerard was gone, and Brendan was left scratching his head, looking at the blue cloth, and wondering what had just happened.

  Chapter 27

  God’s help rarely takes the form that we expect, which is a good thing. God delights in solving problems with the touch of a butterfly’s wing that we would solve with a pounding hammer.”

  The Centurion Guide to Practical Advice – Chapter 9: Proverb 7

  Her father strode off with such an air of finality that Portia wondered if she would ever see him again. Centurions kept emergency travel supplies loaded and ready to go for just such a situation as this. The Hungarians moved like lightning and if the Centurions couldn’t respond just as quickly, they would never be able to stop them. Portia knew they would be gone within the hour.

  "What’s happening momma?"

  "Akros and thousands of his Hungarians have crossed the border, they have already destroyed Barstow Castle and they’re heading this way. Your father is going to take our troops and try to join up with Sir Mieder, and Sir Casten. They hope to catch Akros as he and his men are crossing the river west of Barstow. If they can rendezvous and get to the river before the Hungarians, then they have a chance of turning the tide and driving them back. If they don't succeed then all of Carinthia may fall."

  Portia found her heart being crushed by fear; it was happening just like her dreams. If she didn’t change something her father and the other knights would be overwhelmed and slaughtered, and the castle would be overrun and destroyed. Every village and farm for a five hundred miles would be burned to the ground. She forced herself to speak calmly.

  "Wouldn't it be better for father to stay here with the troops and defend the keep? Wouldn't he stand a better chance of defeating Akros behind these walls?"

  Lady Evelyn studied her daughter carefully before answering, Portia’s use of the word “father” instead of “dad” was not lost on her. “Centurions do not make their decisions based upon fear. The decision was made based upon which plan had the best chance of successfully protecting the most people. This is it.”

  Portia wondered how much of her fear her mother could detect. She was trying so hard to control her facial muscles that they hurt.

  “But this decision wouldn’t be based on fear; it would be a smart decision.” Portia explained. “The castle is easier to defend, it would give us a much better chance of winning and the very presence of a full company of Centurion Knights that could ride out and strike them from behind would surely cause the Hungarians to leave as soon as possible before they could do a lot of damage.”

  "It’s possible that we could hold out for a time," her mother finally answered. "But you don’t win battles by hiding behind walls, at best you can only hope that some disaster befalls the enemy before they breach your walls. Walls have their purpose in preventing a defeat, but they seldom play a part in winning a victory. Even if we were able to hold out here, think of the devastation that would be brought down upon the rest of the Eastern Marches. These are the very people your father and I have sworn to protect; he must go out and defend them. The job of defending the castle will fall to us."

  Portia bit back the torrent of words that welled up inside her. They would do no good here. Lady Evelyn's lingering look and impassive face shared nothing and left Portia wondering how much her mother really guessed about the feelings of fear that whirled inside of her and threatened to drag her under. Portia felt exhausted from the nightmares that interfered with her sleep and the suffocating fear they inspired. The young woman desperately wished that she could rush to her mother's arms and pour out everything that was in her heart and have her mother make everything okay but she knew that she could never do that, her mother was too strong and fearless, she would never understand.

  Portia saw her mother's expression soften, "You are much stronger than you know," the Gray Lady said as she tenderly touched her daughter’s cheek. "Courage is not the absence of fear, courage is going forward and doing what needs to be done despite your fear."

  Tears welled up in Portia's eyes and her whole body began to tremble. Her mother took her into her arms and held her tightly.

  "But you and Daddy never feel fear," she sobbed.

  "I feel more fear than I can possibly tell you," her mother said gently. "I fear the Hungarians and what they will do to us if they get past the river. I fear for your father and all the men who are going with him. I keep those fears inside where no one can see them but God. Well, no one but God and your father. I learned long ago that showing fear to others when they are looking up to you to be strong can be disastrous."

  "But isn't that kind of like lying?" Portia snuffled through her tears. "Pretending not to be afraid when you are?"

  "That’s why I did not say that courage is the absence of fear, everyone feels fear at one time or another. Are you confident that the Lord will carry out his will in all of this and that his will is best?"

  "My mind believes that but my heart struggles with it."

  "Many a woman has allowed herself to be led down the path to destruction by following the feelings of her heart. Your heart and your feelings will lead you astray if you let them. I know that you and I have not always agreed; that we have, in fact, butted heads like two stubborn goats on many occasions. I know that there have been days when you did not feel loved, but your feelings do not change the truth and the truth is that I have loved you with all of my heart every moment of your life. God has given you a heart and feelings for a reason, but you are not to follow your heart or be ruled by your feelings, you are to follow God and be ruled by what you know to be true."

  Portia tried wiping away the tears that stained her face. "Then what’s the point of having feelings?" She asked.

  "If we had only a brain without a heart, we would see only the tasks that needed to be done without seeing the importance of the people around us. If we had only reason without emotions the world would be a dreadfully dull place made up only of black and white, and shades of gray, checklists, chores, and duties to be completed. Joy and love, and even fear and sorrow, give color and texture to our world. They help us to see the beauty of a butterfly flying over a meadow, the value of a baby in her mother’s arms, the tragedy of a dead soldier lying on a battlefield. We are far better off with feelings that push us forward and pull us back than we are without any feelings at all." Lady Evelyn smiled rather sheepishly, “I must admit though that they can make life a lot more challenging even while they are making things more interesting.”

  Portia hugged her mother tightly for several long
moments before she asked the question that was really in her heart, "Do you think we’ll ever see Daddy again?"

  Lady Evelyn returned her daughter's fierce hug before she finally answered, "He is in God's hands, and I trust that whatever happens, God's will is best." She knew this was not the answer her daughter wanted but it was the best that she could give. She held Portia for several moments before finally pulling away. "I must go now and begin preparing the castle's defenses. We probably have a couple of days before Akros arrives with his main force, but the Hungarians are well known for the speed at which they travel so we may only have hours. Remember what I said, you are stronger than you know. You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you. Believe it."

  Portia nodded and watched her mother go down the same stairs her father had gone down only minutes before. It was just like her nightmares.

  The handmaiden walked into the antechamber and sat down before the tiny altar built into the corner of the room for devotions and prayer. It contained a simple bench for sitting and a couple of pillows on the floor for kneeling. It faced a Centurion cross hanging on the wall with a tiny shelf next to it holding a votive candle and a favorite verse -Psalm 46:1- carved into the wall above it. Portia looked at the cross and tried to find inspiration. A Centurion cross looked like a sword pointing down at the ground with an over-sized guard and a crown of thorns on top around the hilt. Usually it was deeply meaningful to her but this time it just reminded her that her father was going off to war and would probably die. She read the verse; “Deus noster refugium et virtus adiutor in tribulationibus quae invenerunt nos nimis” God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in the midst of trouble, she translated to herself. She got down on her knees and began to pray, Where are you Lord? I am in the midst of trouble and I need your help.

  The sound of wailing suddenly filled the room and Portia leapt to her feet. Greta, the governess, came rushing out of the family quarters and into the antechamber.

  "Marcia is missing!" She sobbed. "I’ve looked everywhere for her." Portia's heart leapt into her throat again, a position that it had finally vacated only a few minutes before. My dream is coming true! Portia put her hands on her head and tried to will herself to calm down, the other woman's panic was infectious, and Portia knew that giving in to it would only make matters worse.

  "Lord, please be my refuge and strength. Please, please, please! Send me your help in the midst of this trouble!" She shouted at the ceiling in desperation.

  A knock came at the outer door of the antechamber. Its unexpected suddenness was like a clap of thunder and both women looked at it for a moment in stunned silence. Portia wasn’t sure what she had been expecting when she yelled her prayer at God, maybe a sudden feeling of peace or an inspired idea.

  “Umm, thank you Lord?” was all she could think to say.

  Greta flew to the door and threw it open, only to find Brendan standing out there. The nanny rushed past him out into the hallway looking for Sir Gerard or Lady Evelyn but saw neither.

  “What are you doing here?” Portia blurted out. “Why aren’t you gone with the rest of the knights and squires?”

  “Your father told me to stay here and look after you and your mother. That’s why I’m here, I’ve moved my stuff into the ground floor of the keep and I came up to see if there was anything I could help your mother with.”

  “Why would my dad ask you to stay and help us?”

  “He feels that something very strange is going on right now with the Hungarians, the Norse, and the winter wolves, and he believes that the castle might benefit from my ‘unusual talents and different way of looking at things.’ Either that or he’s leaving me here because he doesn’t think I can handle myself in battle and he’s just being very polite about it. Of the two possible explanations, I prefer the first one,” Brendan said with a smile.

  "We must find your parents immediately and tell them what has happened!" Greta begged frantically.

  "And what has happened?" Asked Brendan in a calming voice.

  "Marcia has disappeared!" Wailed Greta, "She’s been taken by Tauschung, I know it!"

  "Tauschung? Who’s Tauschung?" Inquired the squire, refusing to rise to Greta's desperate panic.

  "The dragon, you buffoon!" Came her biting response. “Many years ago, Sir Gerard killed Feuertod, the red dragon, but its mate Tauschung, the black dragon, was never found. It has come back for revenge!”

  "A dragon invaded the castle and carried off Marcia without being seen?" Brendan asked dryly.

  "Maybe he was seen! How would you know he wasn't seen if we haven't asked any of the guards?" Greta retorted angrily.

  "I don't know how things are done here in the west but in the east if the castle guards saw a dragon invading their castle and carrying someone off, they would all be running around yelling, 'Dragon! Dragon! Stop him! Stop him!' at the top of their lungs. Perhaps here in the west, dragons are so common that guards only make casual remarks to each other about it. 'Now take a look at that Jerry,'" said Brendan imitating a guard on duty pointing at the sky, "There goes another dragon flying over the walls with a young girl. That's the third one this week.”

  Greta stopped in mid-tirade, stunned, "Are you really such an insensitive brute that you would make a mockery of Marcia's disappearance?"

  "On the contrary," Replied Brendan very curtly, "I am taking the disappearance of Marcia very seriously, it is the suggestion that she was carried off by a dragon that I am making a mockery of."

  Portia intervened; this was getting nowhere.

  “Tauschung means ‘Deception’ in German. More people in this area speak German than Frankish. We usually speak Frankish in Centurion castles since our foundations were laid down by Charlemagne and his Twelve Peers, but we also speak German. There are old stories among the local peoples about the mate of the red dragon that my father killed twenty years ago. It’s a black dragon and black dragons use treachery and deception to achieve their goals. Greta is saying that a black dragon, who is a master of deception, might have been able to get into and out of the castle without being seen.”

  Brendan pursed his lips to stop himself from saying anything. He was clearly skeptical about it all. Dragons preferred the wild places to live in, and Brendan was from the well settled and very civilized east, they probably never encountered dragons there. Portia suspected that he didn’t believe in their existence at all. He turned and looked at the handmaiden.

  “Do you believe any of these stories about dragons?”

  “I know that my father killed a red dragon about twenty years ago. It was terrorizing the people for a hundred miles around. I’ve never encountered a dragon myself, but I believe in them. I don’t know that the red dragon had a mate but if the locals say that he did I have no reason to doubt them.” Brendan shook his head and looked back at Greta.

  “Okay, apart from the revenge motive, why do you think a dragon took her?”

  “Because she was in her room and then she was gone. I was in the antechamber spinning some flax to make linen thread. She could not have walked past me to get out the front door without my seeing her. I was being very attentive since I was tasked with watching over her during this troubling time. I went to check on her to get her ready for bed and she was gone. I checked the rest of the quarters and she was nowhere to be found. If she is not in the quarters and she didn’t go through the antechamber, then the only other way out would be off the balcony. She must have either flown from the balcony or was carried off by a flying creature big enough to carry a person. I can feel dark forces are at work right now. The stories say that Feuertod’s mate was never found so, either Tauschung has come and carried her off for revenge, or she is learning dark magic from Dr. Sheraton and has taken to flying,” Greta finished with some sarcasm of her own.

  "Where is the last place that Marcia was seen?" Brendan inquired.

  "In her bedroom," Greta replied, with a sullen note in her voice.

  "Then let us begin our s
earch there," Brendan said crisply. "Portia, would you please lead the way?"

  Portia led the way, muttering a prayer under her breath, Please Lord, let him be helpful.

  Chapter 28

  “It is truly said, ‘Broad is the path that leads to destruction’. For every truth from God there are a thousand lies from Satan and a thousand ways to get off of God’s true path.

  The Centurion Handbook of Practical Advice – Chapter 1: Proverb 1

  The Black slept well. In her dreams she was watching her unwitting servants bring Marcia to her. Of course, they thought the brat was going to bring them a great ransom, but the Black had other plans for them. She was going to ensure that their greed got the best of them. Greed was such a wonderful emotion; it could drive a human to so many different actions. It was her second favorite after pride.