by B. C. Sirrom
~*~
Two years later…
Maddie was eating lunch when their cozy little life took a left turn into ‘What-the-Hell’-ville. Actually, wearing her lunch was a more accurate description. Ava turned to the sink to grab a cloth; it wouldn’t do to leave applesauce to set, too sticky to mess with later. That thought made her laugh softly. If she didn’t know better, one would think her mother was there, bustling about the kitchen, fussing good naturedly about the mess. Maddie shrieked just as Ava reached the cloth. It was a frustrated sound, one that had been increasing in frequency as her child grew older. Ava had never been around children younger than her, so every day was a new experience. The dirty diapers were a gross but necessary evil. For the most part it was a wonderful experience.
Turning toward her daughter, she was unsurprised to see that MiMi had fallen to the floor again. The hand crocheted monkey was her toddler’s constant companion and the last gift Ava’s mother made for anyone before she died. Maddie’s hand stretched out and she grunted in the ‘I Want’ tone that Ava suspected was standard speech for toddlers. She stopped and bent to retrieve the doll but halted her movement when the doll began to float up toward her daughter. Speechless, she watched as Maddie gleefully snatched the monkey out of the air as soon as it floated close enough. Her daughter had just moved something with her mind. From three feet away without wobbling; which meant she had been practicing. Which also meant that her precocious daughter could manifest her heritage much earlier than puberty. Ava took in a breath and held it, hoping to stave off an impending sense of panic. Since Maddie was of mixed parentage, there was no way to predict what type of gifts she would manifest. Only knowing the father’s first name and that he was a very dangerous man further complicated things.
Letting her breath out in a gusty sigh, she summoned a grin for her daughter and clapped. “Yay, Maddie! What a big girl you are!” her daughter clapped and squealed, a vigorously wobbling elbow sending her bowl to the floor. Maddie looked over the edge of her tray and said, “Oopa day!”
Ava kissed Maddie’s head and looked in the general direction of the sticky mess on the floor. Keeping her tone upbeat she exclaimed, “Uh oh!” and looked at her daughter with comically wide eyes. “Mommy has to clean that up now!” Maddie clapped her hands and laughed before focusing on her monkey again. Ava wondered who she could ask for advice. Her dad would have been the best person to ask for help, he was always the most level headed of their family. His death two years before Ava met Maddie’s father ruled out that option. She had a few acquaintances but no one she truly considered a friend. Certainly no one who knew anything outside the human world. As far as informed parties, the only other person who came to mind was her former Sentinel, Dwys. She went through the motions of cleaning Maddie’s hands and face on auto-pilot as thoughts of him brought up just about every painful memory she had.
When she was taken in by her birth parents’ Clan, she had been assigned a Tutor; as all offspring coming into their maturity were. What the Clan Elders hadn’t considered was the reality of a maturing shifter who hadn’t been raised within the community of the Red Dragon Clan. Her birth parents had fled the Clan so they could marry but had both died when she was a baby. So, Ava Drake, or Tywyll Gobeithiol as the Elders named her; had been adopted and raised in the outside world by fully human parents. Tywyll Gobeithiol meant Dark Hope. She smirked at that name and shook her head. The Clan Oracle must have inhaled way too much incense before she chose Ava’s name.
The Elders’ ignorance of what it would be like schooling a teenaged dragon shifter raised by humans was further complicated by their choice of Tutor. Ava giggled as she bent to wipe up the messy floor; finally able to laugh past the embarrassment of her first drama ridden crush. Her original Tutor had been one of the more sociable males of the Clan. His appeal combined with the news her adoptive parents had been killed and her emerging teenaged hormones proved to be a nearly fatal mix. It certainly resulted in a literal meltdown of a local barn when the male in question had bluntly turned down her awkward advances.
The best thing the Elders could have done was assign her a Sentinel. Dwys Cywir had planned on retiring but after much debate and negotiation he agreed to both mentor and watch over their newest Clan member. Dwys was the most revered and respected Sentinel in the clan. Ava knew she had put the aging shifter through hell but he had always been patient and if not kind, close enough that she grew to respect him. Near the end, she loved him almost as much as her dad.
Ava finished cleaning up and smiled softly at her daughter. In a rare moment of patience the rambunctious toddler had nodded off in her high chair. It was a quick trip to place her in bed and then Ava was alone with her thoughts and worry, which dredged up old memories as she tried to decide how to handle this new development. When the Elders banished her, Dwys’ first betrayal had been refusing to defend her. But he was the only one that might be able to offer practical advice.
Recalling the day she’d learned her mentor was as fallible as the rest of them pulled her into the memory of her last meeting with him.
