Dragon-Bound Bard: Teaser Chapter

Aunt Rose

Silverdale, the Present:

Returning to herself, Tarissa's fingers continued to wander through a muffled version of her Dragon Variations. After an evening at the Cat, remembering the day at the Silver River Fair made her heart ache. She took a deep breath and changed her thoughts. No more lost egg this night. The hour was late, and she had visited that valley of regret too many times. Instead, she picked out the melody of the song she had performed in front of the king and queen long ago in Tazzelton. And three years ago, at that same Silver River Fair, she had sung with Euphenny, the famous bard from Newham.

Tarissa sighed. She still sang for people, but she served drinks in a common pub and sang as part of her job. Yes, they cheered and applauded her songs, but they also pinched and patted her rear. She slept in a bed in her aunt's home, a long way from the capital city where the king and queen lived. She missed her mother. She missed her egg. But she also missed . . . Underneath it all, she had a restless itch to . . . and that was always the question that bedeviled Tarissa. What did she want?

The hour was late. Tarissa's eyelids drooped. She blinked several times and laid aside the mandolin. Working at the Cat in the evening left her body tired, but performing her own music before an appreciative crowd gave her a spark of energy that had to abate before she could go to sleep. This night, instead of finding sleep, memories of growing up in Tazzelton crowded her head. To reassure herself those recollections were real, she got out her mother's journal. Tarissa kept it hidden in the alcove where she stored her special things. Given little enough privacy by Aunt Rose, Tarissa knew her mother had intended her memory book for her daughter alone. Tarissa was too tired to read tonight, but she flipped the pages. The leaves were a little yellowed on their borders, but it was all here. Her mother's words were still alive, so it was real. She kept turning pages until she came to the last page of writing. By the time her mother had written it, her shaky, ill-formed penmanship made her weakness obvious. Sara was near her end, but the last thought she had penned for her daughter was clear. It still gave Tarissa strength. It said simply, "I love you, Tarissa."

She sighed wistfully and laid the book on the small table beside her bed.

#

The sun was well up and the morning old by the time Tarissa woke the next day. She blinked and sat up. In the middle of a forceful stretch, her eyes passed over her bedside table. Her mother's journal was gone. She gasped and swung her legs off the bed. Down on her knees, she searched the floor and under the bed. The floor was bare. The book was gone.

Aunt Rose. The thought twisted her stomach with alarm. Nothing of Tarissa's was private in Aunt Rose's mind. Even if Tarissa paid her every week for her room and board, her aunt still demanded a complete accounting of everywhere Tarissa went and everything she did. Aunt Rose had pretensions of belonging to Silverdale society, and she had not been happy when Tunis had found Tarissa a job at the Crooked Cat. However, that job had given her aunt an excuse to charge rent. Tarissa worked late evenings, a schedule that had brought her long lectures from her aunt about the implications for Tarissa's reputation. Immoral as her aunt may have considered it, the woman was happy enough to pocket the majority of Tarissa's earnings.

Tarissa was certain Aunt Rose had taken the missing diary. The woman had a habit of stopping into Tarissa's room at odd times. Tarissa also knew her aunt felt free to go through her things while she was gone. If Aunt Rose had come into her room while she slept this morning and had seen the diary . . .

She hurriedly pulled on leggings and a tunic. The more she thought, the greater her suspicion—and anger. Full of both fear and outrage, she left the room, careful to not slam the door. Stepping carefully down the hallway, she peered around the corner into the hearth room. Aunt Rose sat in her favorite reading chair by the window—studying her mother's diary.