Soul Bonds Book 1 Circles of Light series

by E. M. Sinclair

  Soul Bonds

  (Circles Of Light - Book One)

  E.M. Sinclair

  Copyright 2006 by E.M. Sinclair

  Smashwords Edition

  In Memory Of

  F.K. 1880-1970

  M.H.I. 1920-2006

  For John and Ben, with love always

  Cover Painting - ‘Farn’ by Bethan Town-Jones

  Cover Design by David Dempsey

  Chapter One

  What had woken her? She checked the safety of her five eggs then extended her senses to test a wider area. There, above her head, through several feet of rock, came a sound. She rose, her wings folded close to her great body. Her nesting cave was hidden from the main entrance by an almost right-angled curve giving her maximum protection, and towards this curve the She-Dragon moved.

  Her graceful neck lifted her head cautiously to the edge of the corner. White sunlight filled the cave mouth but nothing moved. More clearly now a clatter of rocks spattered across the opening, accompanied by a grunt. A creature fell onto the narrow ledge and rolled into the cave.

  The She-Dragon’s golden eyes expanded as she probed the creature’s life-pattern. Mainly blue, pale, fuzzy, of a subtly different shading than the Dragon patterns she was most familiar with, but clear enough. Young. A female. The creature began to rise, it was briefly silhouetted against the white light before it came unsteadily deeper into the cave and dropped in a heap.

  The Dragon’s nostrils flared. So, a member of the two-leg tribe – but why here? She probed the creature again and was dismayed to find the colour had paled, the life pattern blurred. A howl of despair streaked through the haziness making the Dragon blink with sudden pain.

  She advanced now, the only sound the faint slither of her tail, and drooped her head over this small creature. She lifted it delicately in her jaws and turned back into the nesting cave.

  Kija, the She Dragon, had never had contact with the two-leg tribe. From her earliest solo hunts, she had always sought food from flocks and herds well away from the places where the two-legs gathered in their strange dwellings. Most of the female Dragons did the same, although the males, hunting more often in groups, frequently descended on the fatter herds guarded by the two-leg creatures.

  Kija gently put the limp form beside her eggs and settled again on the sandy floor. Faint light came from the cave entrance – sufficient for the large golden eyes of the Dragon to examine her trophy. It was very small indeed, smaller than a newhatched Dragon. Her long, delicate face bent closer and she realised with some surprise the creature had two hides. The green hide was baggy on its arms and legs, but the fore and hind feet and the face were pale, sand-coloured, and tight fitting. Its head was covered with thick black hair and black hairs lined each eyelid.

  A click sounded again but this time Kija recognised it. She turned her attention to her eggs and probed lightly over the five. To a Dragon using special sight they all seemed to throb with a deep yellow pulse, but one was showing a clearer golden pattern. Kija hummed deep in her throat and the life pattern quivered in response. ‘Soon now.’ Kija projected the thought gently. She returned her attention to the strange creature. Its pattern was steady now but faint. Its body smelled hot and dry. Kija was unsure whether it was just sleeping or in the sleep before death. Did the small one need liquid, Kija wondered? She had brought many mouthfuls of water from the lake a mile below her nesting cave during the last few days, to form a small pool in a rock basin beyond her eggs.

  She dipped her muzzle in the pool then touched the small one’s face with the wetness. Kija drew back a little to watch. As nothing happened, she repeated the face wetting once more, then settled herself comfortably again. She would not leave the cave now until her children were safely out of their shells, so this small creature would have to wait too – if it lived. Kija slept lightly, her Dragon sight aware of any change in the five eggs or the still unmoving small one.

  The sunlight had dimmed a little in the cave entrance when Kija opened her eyes. She checked her eggs immediately to find two more had intensified in colour and had stronger life patterns. But something else had roused her. She gave her attention to the strange one and found its colour too had intensified and its life pattern pulsed far more strongly. The hairs on its eyelids flickered and its mouth opened slightly as Kija watched. She dipped her muzzle in the water once more and dampened the sleeping face. She made no attempt to probe its mind, just projected calmness and strength. The eyelids flickered again and Kija saw unfocused green eyes gaze in her direction.

  The small body stirred. The eyes blinked and then gradually focused in the dim light. The creature levered itself suddenly backwards with a strange high squeak. Kija’s mind was nearly swamped by the flood of distress and fear that poured towards her from the small one’s body. She began the deep soothing hum, which she’d used to encourage one of her eggs, at the same time sending pulses of friendliness to the small one.

  The green creature took a breath, which shuddered right through its body. ‘You’re a real Dragon aren’t you?’

  Kija stopped humming. It had made odd noises, was it a form of communication? She probed gently into the coloured haze of its mind and had a clear picture of herself reflected back. Very carefully Kija formed a picture of the small one to replace the Dragon in its mind. ‘Tika – small one.’

  Clicks distracted Kija again. One egg was vibrating now and Kija concentrated entirely upon the imminent appearance of her child. Tika, her uninvited guest, watched as the huge Dragon lowered her face to the egg. Even to human eyes, one of the eggs was about to hatch. The chills of apprehension still rippled through her despite the Dragon’s calming thought projections, but curiosity proved stronger than apprehension.

  The Dragon’s eyes, many-faceted prisms, were flashing in rapidly changing colours, a topaz gold predominating, as a crack splintered through the centre of the egg. Tika watched, almost forgetting to breathe, as the crack widened and a thin delicate snout emerged. She laughed out loud as a small Dragon climbed shakily from the debris of shell. The adult Dragon hissed in dismay as her child’s head turned to the sound of laughter and his eyes began the rainbow whirling of prismatic colours.

  The human child stilled as the Dragon child’s eyes met hers. Kija sent a mind cry to her sister Dragons nesting nearby – what to do, what to do? A Dragon child always looked first into the eyes of one of its own kind and through that first long look imbibed a firm foundation of Dragon ways. This child of hers was eye locked with a small two-leg creature – what knowledge could he drink from her eyes when she saw Dragons as fearsome beings?

  A surge of conflicting advice poured into Kija: ‘Leave them.’ ‘Break the lock – there is time to lock with him yourself.’ ‘Kill them both at once.’ That last was Nula, her thought patterns harsh and cruel as always.

  But Kija’s child was moving, his eyes glowing orange, moving towards Tika – the stranger. He was projecting strongly – thirst –terrible thirst – then hunger. And Tika stretched out her two upper limbs and embraced the newhatched Dragon, which was nearly the same size as herself. She guided him carefully to the pool of water Kija had made for just this purpose and let him drink. As he drank, Tika’s hand rested lightly on his back between his wings and then she half turned to look at Kija.

  Kija received impressions, of awe, of confused disbelief, and of a strange warmth. But Kija had no time to spend on this worry now, two more eggs were cracking and she sent a sharp warning to Tika to stay by the pool while she locked eyes with another son and then a daughter.

  When Kija had nudged the two new children to drink at the pool, she studied the remaining two eggs. One woul
d hatch within a few hours but the other one would take another night perhaps.

  Kija looked at her first hatched son. He was resting against Tika, his eyes partly closed, still projecting hunger but it was not such an urgent need as the thirst had been. There was a call outside the cave and a flurry of heavy wings. Kija transmitted her thanks for the fresh meat that one of her neighbours had brought for the children’s first meal.

  Then the She Dragon turned her gaze back to her first son. His name would be Farn, but what was to happen to him? Dragon-born bonded with a two-legged one. Would the rest of the Treasury allow the pair to live? Kija could recall no precedent for such an event and her heart was heavy as she looked at two so-different children lying sleepily against each other on the sand of the nesting cave.

  Over the next few days, until the last of Kija’s eggs had hatched, Kija paid little attention to Tika. She had offered the small two-legs some of the fresh wapeesh meat brought by other females but the two-leg child would not eat it. Kija’s clan sister, Krea, dropped a branch with fruits still attached to it on the cave’s ledge and these Tika ate.

  Tika slept nearly as much as the Dragon children during these first days. She had run away from the town far, far down the mountain, and after the first shocked terror of realising where she found herself now, she relaxed and accepted the situation as inevitable.

  Whenever Farn woke, so did Tika, and while his siblings huddled against their mother, Farn leaned heavily on Tika. As Kija fed her children from the freshly killed wapeesh she placed small sized pieces of the meat beside Tika who then fed them to Farn.

  Tika woke more frequently than the new Dragons and at these times she sat watching Kija. The great Dragon’s eyes whirred constantly but Tika felt only a buzzing sensation, couldn’t understand any of the communication Kija was obviously having with other Dragons. Tika was aware of other Dragons being close by; at least one who was bringing food to the cave, but how many others she couldn’t guess.

  When she locked eyes with Farn she had felt herself being turned inside out – all her thoughts, feeling, memories gushing from her into his eyes. She had also felt Kija then, putting other things in her head, which in their turn emptied into Farn.

  Six days after Tika’s arrival in the cave, Kija led her children to the outer entrance. Tika walked beside Farn who seemed bigger each day. The sound of heavy wings warned Tika and she shrank back against Farn as a huge green shape surged towards the cave’s ledge. She felt Farn protesting and Kija’s sudden burst of anger. Then the green shape was gone. Eyes blinking in the light of sunset after the cave’s shadows, Tika gasped. Dragons! So many of them! Draped on crags, lounging at ease on tumbled boulders.

  This was the other side of the mountain Tika had somehow scaled on her escape from the town – a plateau of gigantic rocks strewn over a shallow bowl between towering peaks. As she looked more closely, she realised all the Dragons were looking towards herself and Kija’s five children.

  She shivered as she focused on a very large green Dragon whose eyes were fixed whirring red prisms – Nula. The name was in her head and for the first time since Kija had spoken to her when she’d first woken in the nesting cave, she heard Kija again: ‘Beware small one, this one intends you harm, and you too my son.’

  A smaller honey coloured Dragon glided from a high perch and landed neatly on the ledge. Tika felt warmth and affection enveloping them all. This Dragon was Krea, clan sister of Kija, the one who had first brought wapeesh meat to the cave.

  ‘So handsome a brood!’ Tika understood clearly. Then ‘And a two-legs! Does it really communicate?’ Tika heard Kija laugh.

  ‘Yes, but even less well than new children! If the Treasury accepts these six children, would you care for Farn and the two legs, Krea?’

  There was a pause, Tika had the sensation of being turned inside out again, and then she heard the amber-scaled Dragon agree.

  ‘Of course I will – you know I like a challenge.’

  There was laughter felt from several different directions and Tika was aware of Kija relaxing slightly from the tenseness she’d held since their emergence from the inner cave.

  ‘They should die. Now.’

  The voice was loud and harsh in Tika’s head. She looked immediately at the green Dragon, Nula. She was slightly smaller than Kija, her scales a shifting darkness of greens. There were several dark scars along her back and one on her face, pulling the left eye crooked.

  Several voices called ‘No!’ and one added they should wait for the full Gathering of the Treasury to decide the issue. What was a “Treasury?” Tika wondered, with vague thoughts of the men in the Lord’s house in the town. Krea’s mind voice murmured that a Treasury was a full Gathering of Dragons, males and females both. At the moment, the females were gathered here whilst Kija hatched her eggs, the males were far off, hunting and playing.

  Nula and two rust-scaled Dragons lifted above the rocks and wheeled out of sight. Tension fled from the remaining Dragons. Kija sighed. ‘I see no harm in this two-leg child. She bonded with my son Farn and I have the notion it was intended to be thus. I have called her “Tika”.’

  Several voices called ‘Welcome!’ and Tika felt herself blushing. She pressed closer to Farn, uncomfortable at being the focus of attention. She sensed amusement gradually fading as these Dragons rose against the fiery sky and departed the plateau.

  Kija turned to her second son and three daughters. Her eyes blazed, then she turned and drifted in a gentle glide from the ledge across the width of the rock strewn bowl. The four young ones watched closely then rustled their wings rather self-consciously. One daughter gulped audibly and launched herself towards the great golden figure of her mother. She dropped perilously, but a few undignified flaps restored her equilibrium. The three remaining children followed in her wake.

  Krea gazed at Tika. ‘I think we may remain here a few days,’ she said thoughtfully.

  Farn cried that he too must do his first flight – he was first born, he MUST fly now.

  ‘Very well,’ Krea agreed. ‘Watch closely.’ She glided slowly away from the ledge as Kija had done. Farn took a deep breath, and followed.

  As Tika watched Farn flying after Krea, she realised Kija and her other children had vanished beyond the high rocks. She felt appallingly alone suddenly, exposed on the open ledge. She followed Farn’s attempts to copy Krea’s movements precisely, and only as both Dragons returned to the cave did she realise how close to panic she’d become. She could see no way down from here – the ledge jutted out over a sheer drop of several hundred arms she guessed. There was no way around the sides of the cave and certainly no footholds down from there even should she get round the overhang.

  Krea instructed Farn on adjustments he should make in his practice flights and sent him back and forth across the rocks. When he landed panting slightly and stumbled towards Tika’s outstretched arms, Krea called a halt. ‘Both of you go back further into the cave,’ she instructed. ‘I will fetch food quickly, before darkness comes.’

  ‘Flying is wonderful Tika,’ Farn murmured. ‘Why can you not fly?’

  ‘Because I have no wings,’ she retorted snappishly.

  His eyes flickered, the prisms glinting blue and silver in the deepening darkness. ‘You can, you can! You can ride on my back!’ He purred his strange chuckling laugh at her. ‘On my back,’ he repeated. He yawned mightily. ‘And I am so hungry.’

  ‘Krea will bring food soon,’ Tika soothed him while her mind blazed with the idea of herself, Chena, slave pet of the Lord of Return, seated on the back of a great Dragon in flight across a vast sky.

  Chapter Two

  Krea kept Farn and Tika at the cave for four more days. Farn practised his flying powers until he was trembling with exhaustion. Then he curled against Tika and slept deeply. Krea spent some time away from the cave, returning with meat for Farn – usually two or three hoppers rather than the large wapeesh. Krea discovered, after some considerable probing, that Tika could eat
meat only if it was burnt. This mystified the honey coloured Dragon, but she obligingly belched fire over one of the hoppers. When she turned to give the scorched meat to Tika, she was bemused by the way the two legs had shrunk against the cave wall. Fear emanated from her in great waves.

  Krea left the meat and removed herself from the cave. She soared high into the evening sky, coiling higher and higher as she pondered the small one’s reaction. She called on a short distance range for Kija, but clearly she and her children had already travelled far.

  When Krea returned, she found most of the burnt meat had been eaten and Farn sniffing at the remains with a disgusted curl to his lip. Tika seemed calmer although Krea felt a continuing hint of nervousness from the two legs.

  ‘Why were you so afraid Tika?’ Krea asked gently. Before Tika could reply Farn interrupted:

  ‘Because two-legs don’t make fire.’

  ‘We do. We do make fire. Just – not quite the way Krea did it.’

  ‘Aah. So how do you make fire?’ Krea asked.

  ‘It takes a while. We use stones – flints –, which make a spark when you bang them together. Usually, if a fire goes out, we borrow a little piece of fire from someone else’s.’

  ‘That sounds complicated,’ Farn said, and he sat up and belched. Krea moved surprisingly fast for her size as a few flames flickered from Farn’s mouth and nostrils. He belched again, and choked. It sounded to Tika as if Krea was as near to anger as she’d so far witnessed. Farn closed his mouth, and hiccoughed as tears and smoke streamed down his long snout. Tika hugged him, mopping his face and murmuring sympathetically to him.

  Krea settled herself and remarked, mildly enough, but leaving no doubt that she meant each word: ‘You will not attempt any tricks such as fire-making Farn, until I have instructed you thoroughly.’ Her eyes glowed softly as she waited for his agreement.