by Marc Secchia
Straw-head, he chirped.
Hualiama slipped off the bed to land with a bump on her tailbone. “Ouch! You said–did you?” Cupping that scrap of fire-life in her palms, she stared into his fire-eyes, her own eyes suddenly brimming, her heart leaping with insane hope. “What did you just say?”
Eep?
Say that again. Holding up a handful of hair, she said, What is this?
Straw-head.
Flicker! Hualiama clapped her free hand to her mouth to forestall her yelp. Instead, a huge volley of sobs burst out, hand or no hand. You’re Flicker, reincarnated … how?
Earnestly, the dragonet shot a string of hatchling-babble at her, but ended with a very clear, querulous, Straw-head?
Mercy, you are … he cocked his head aside exactly as Flicker used to, with a sage air.
All that was Hualiama quaked in awe.
Gently, she pressed a miracle into the hollow of her neck, murmuring his name over and over. Blue-hair came to sit with her, holding her Human form, reaching over her shoulder to stroke the crooning, purring dragonet with a wondering finger. He arched his neck in pleasure, and mock-nibbled at her earlobe and her twin’s fingertips.
In all the Island-World, in a place beyond the world, there were two girls and a dragonet called Flicker, and their joy.
After a time that touched eternity, Human-Lia asked, “I don’t suppose you have any answers regarding the psychic bastion?”
“No, but we could ask him,” whispered Dragonsoul.
“Flicker? He’s only a baby.”
“No, him.”
Pushing aside her tumbled hair, Hualiama recoiled at the sight of Fra’anior bending his burning eye upon the colonnade. What struck her most forcibly was the tenor of his nearest fire-eye, a deep, rich apricot in the main with streamers of indigo, gold and dozens of colours swirling through the vast, torrid surface of that orb; his manner bespeaking love as vast and abiding as the mightiest reaches of the Island-World.
In a voice like many flutes produced by the upper draconic palette, Fra’anior said, “A beautiful family reunion. What happiness is mine! Never would I have thought this possible; not I, nor any of the Ancient Dragonkind. Perhaps Dramagon imagined such a goal as the pinnacle of his work, whereby he might live immortal. While we Ancient Dragons live long, it is not our physical forms which burn eternally in the great fires of the Dragonkind. Yet Amaryllion Fireborn birthed a purpose in thee, Hualiama, and thou hast brought it to fruition–indeed, to rebirth.”
“Yet I must counsel thee with words of warning.” His voice deepened. “When Numistar and Azziala and Shinzen, and indeed, the remnant of ruzal within thee, apprehend this power thou hast demonstrated, my shell-daughter–such a power even I, Fra’anior the Onyx, never wielded by all the might of my magic–they will conclude that the pursuit of the First Egg is but dross in comparison with what is the possession of thy right paw.”
“Has not Numistar Winterborn achieved the same?” countered Hualiama’s Dragoness-form.
“No. She imprints and possesses, subjugating flesh by her power. But the original genetic weakness of aging holds true, even given a perfect imprint. Flesh will fail. No matter how many times she renews her herd of thralls, Numistar knows in the deepest coldness of her soul that what she holds in containment will age, and die.”
“And how exactly are different?” inquired Human-Lia.
Again, his fires muted with apparent concern. “Shell-daughter, you literally absorbed a fire-soul into your soul, nurtured it, and returned it to enfleshed life. True-fires be spoken, you contain within your mortal flesh a second-soul-aspect, able to coexist in oneness and peaceably–for the most part–” his eye-fires danced with a teasing air “–and manifest at will, which is a skill you are learning. Thus, you traverse the boundary of flesh and spirit and return, whole and beautiful. So very … beautiful.”
His tremendous belly-fires roared and wept like a rainstorm, proclaiming the depth of his feelings.
“I … I grow maudlin and foolish,” Fra’anior muttered, sounding trenchant yet unrepentant. “Time marches to its own drumbeat. Hear mine conjecture. Dragon-powers exist in latent forms, especially the higher magical powers which usually manifest after the fledgling years. Likely, this bastion-ward ability lay present but dormant in thy psyche until the trauma of thy birth in fire. It revealed the second true-facet of thy nature, and Balance was restored to thine being. With Balance came the knowledge of joint physical needs. Aside, I must adjure thee to experiment with Shapeshifting regularly–at least once or twice each week–to ensure that both forms are physically nurtured. Thou hast made much progress in the emotional and spiritual reams, as is evidenced by this place, representative of thy soul-life. Now, ensure also the physical manifestation is appropriately cultivated.”
One Hualiama or the other made to reply, but Fra’anior added quickly, “Moving on. I posit the bastion, duly awakened, did flourish in thy being–growing stronger and more well-formed, especially as Azziala unwittingly abetted the process by providing conditions of considerable duress. Thou knowest, the spoken Command still impacts thy physical flesh. Unfortunately, that appears to be an unavoidable consequence. The Empress surely knows this, and schemes to employ this knowledge against thee at an opportune moment.”
“Mercy,” said Human-Lia, succinctly.
“Makes sense,” agreed the Dragoness, gravely. “We thank thee for thy counsel, mighty shell-father.”
Fra’anior’s great eye twinkled–literally, with cascades of white, inner sparks. “A duty most congenial, and an honour to this old fire-breather.”
“Ha, formalities and nonsense,” snorted the Human girl. “Just call him ‘Dad’.”
“Dad?” squeaked blue-haired Lia.
“Dad?” bellowed Fra’anior, amused to the tune of a huge, instantaneous thunderstorm.
Then, the two girls inclined their heads simultaneously. “I think we’re in trouble. Grandion …”
Darkness swallowed the scene. Screaming, they pitched into a depthless void.
* * * *
When his eyes opened, it was to light upon a charnel-house. For a gut-twisting, stunned second, Grandion could but stare. One thought dominated his mind. Cannibals!
Taboo. This was taboo …
Where was he? Underwater? A dozen Land Dragons–they must be, these creatures were too outsized to be anything else–lay near the base of underwater mountains, tethered there by tentacles or hawsers, and though the scene should be dark, it was lit by some kind of bioluminescence in the environment coupled with wide strips and dots of a brilliantly luminous material on the flanks of the mountains. The light was plentiful, allowing the Dragon to perfectly apprehend a scene out of the darkest nightmares of his kind. The Land Dragons had been trapped and flayed. Millions of white dragonets swarmed over and inside of the bodies, feeding voraciously. In the distance, two or three such scenes were repeated. So much golden Dragon blood ran from the partially-consumed carcasses that it cascaded in curiously sluggish rivers down the dark slopes, feeding an enormous, pulsating host of predators and scavengers that had gathered to partake of the bounty–only, they dared not approach the white dragonets.
Grandion understood why.
Those were not natural Dragonkind. The foot-long dragonets ate with one purpose, with one motion, with one mind. The super-mind controlling this uncountable mass of smaller fire-souls pervaded the entire area with a bitter, physical aura of a kind he had never before apprehended. Yet he knew. This was Numistar Winterborn. Crushingly enormous. The arctic breath of snows was her signature, which the Tourmaline Dragon had only ever experienced in the height of storms over the Island-World, yet this felt colder. More profound–a spiritual cold, he sensed. Her spirit was replicated in each of these dragonets, individually tiny, yet in their millions, attaining to the magnitude of an Ancient Dragon.
At last, he understood where this realm was. This was where Hualiama found herself–yet what was she doing here?
Can’t escape. Grandion …
She needed him! He spared no thought for gloating. A pure, draconic fury burned in his breast as Grandion apprehended the peril of her situation. Somehow, when they needed each other most, the oath-connection came into its own. They became more. Across the leagues, they melded in ways that made a Dragon’s heart-fires swoop and swoon. Yet what could he do?
I am here, Dragonfriend.
A stout declaration. Her delighted gasp was practically the only movement she was capable of, for the air surrounding her–he snorted in surprise as her underdeveloped hatchling Dragon-senses delivered their payload of data and impressions to his watching mind–was as still and inflexible as glass. Numistar! What power was this, that she could command the very flows of the air?
Obeying his instinct, Grandion reached within Hualiama for the knowledge he needed of this realm. No, the avaricious paw would not reach further, to that … Onyx power … within her? He reeled. She had travelled beneath the Cloudlands! She had healed Siiyumiel. His muzzle shook side-to-side in a very Human-like gesture of awe. This girl–this Dragoness! He could not keep track of her doings. But she did not appreciate the level of toxins present in her system, many operating in the magic plane, in ways he had never imagined. She could not endure much more.
The Tourmaline had great strength, but Numistar’s might was that of an Ancient Dragon. No strength of his paw could tear her loose.
Siiyumiel! he cried. Shine your light …
Given the Shell-Clan Elder’s angle of approach, the light-of-Dragonsong that reached his senses was only the periphery of the main beam. Not enough! The equation was simple. Siiyumiel’s Balance-magic did nothing whatsoever to weaken Numistar’s hold on Hualiama. Grandion wanted to grit his teeth, but even that was a struggle. Quick-wings. He racked his brains for a solution. Something to make Numistar flinch. They must force her to withdraw, for he sensed, more a seventh-sense intuition than any concrete insight, that her power was neither fully developed nor perfectly coherent as yet. When it was …
Hualiama, can you conceive of a strategy, a vector?
Vector? his hostess wheezed. Vector … means light. Grandion projected puzzlement. Prism.
Aye! A prismatic effect should modify the light’s course–but how?
Swiftly pouncing upon the hypothetical constructs flickering through her exhausted mind, Grandion struggled to make sense of what he knew was at best an esoteric branch of shield-physics. What use had prisms when no standard draconic attack used light? He remembered Sapphurion teaching him unusual magnification techniques, but a certain fledgling Tourmaline had been too preoccupied to listen to his shell-father. Yet he and Hualiama drew together, pooling their knowledge, and with his strength, they modified her shields fundamentally.
As he faded, drawn back to his sleeping body, Grandion cried, Siiyumiel, we need your light!
Chapter 18: Treble Ambush
The Tourmaline Dragon’s awareness hurtled back into his body so precipitously, his paw twitched and jumped three feet. It brushed Human-flesh. The boy twitched. Too late. He wriggled, but his strength was far too tiny to shift Grandion’s grasp.
“I see a mouse trapped in mine paw,” said the Tourmaline, cracking open an eye. “How did you enter this place?”
“On my two feet,” hissed the boy.
“Sneaking past one hundred Dragons?”
“They were sleeping.”
Grandion stared into the stormy grey eyes, taking in their air of defiance, the hunted, ragamuffin air of the boy he had trapped. He remembered this boy. Dragons seldom forgot. He said, “I see a warrior fallen on hard times.”
“A warrior?” spat the boy. “Do you know who I am; what I have become?”
“What do you seek here, Jinichi?”
The boy jumped as Grandion plucked his name out of the halls of his memory, from his search for the lost Scroll of Binding. He remembered unblinking grey eyes watching the Tourmaline Dragon over a campfire as he made inquiries of their Council of Elders. His people were the Nikuko, a feared and hated warrior-caste with legendary magical powers, at least in the legends of the East. The Dragon still remembered those eyes. They had made his scales itch.
Now, the youngster of perhaps fifteen summers had to iron a tremor out of his voice. In his clipped Eastern dialect, he said, “I am Jinichi. Informally, I am known as Jin. I am the last of my people.”
“You seek revenge.”
“Aye. No. I seek … the impossible.”
“Sneaking through a cave filled with Dragons is technically impossible,” the Tourmaline pointed out, striving to identify the exact nuances in the boy’s manner. “But you have magic.”
“Don’t say that!” he yelped, waving his free arm. The other was trapped by Grandion’s curled talons. By his scales, the wretch stank! Had he been bathing in some foul Human midden? He wore his hair long, apparently to disguise the layered tattoos on his cheeks and neck.
“I am Dragonkind. I speak the truth as I perceive it. Why are you here?”
“I cannot say.”
Grandion had no need to simulate anger. The blazing of his eyes was clearly reflected upon the boy’s golden Eastern skin, and in the dark pupils of his eyes. “For a sneaking wretch, you’re remarkably untalkative this evening,” he said, dourly. “You reek. But your manners stink far worse. A warrior without honour counts a dog as his superior.”
Although he used an Eastern saying he had learned from scroll-lore at Gi’ishior, the impact of his words was far deeper than he could have imagined. The boy blanched to the colour of draconic white-fires, then screamed incoherently at the Dragon. Before he could think further upon the matter, Grandion stretched out his paw and dunked the lad in the nearest water-trough.
Just washing this stinking Human, he announced.
He lifted Jin out. The boy started screaming again. Splash.
I’m hazing him for bad behaviour, Grandion added, drawing a few sniggers from the Dragons resting nearby. The boy gurgled and kicked; the Dragon held him under. Hopefully not too long. Dragons could hold their breath for over fifteen minutes. How many for Humans–perhaps five?
Well, his struggles weakened all too soon. The limbs convulsed. The Dragon hauled him out. Oh. A slap of the paw between the shoulder blades, and Jin vomited water. “Can’t swim?” Grandion inquired, unkindly.
Hualiama would have slapped him; called him a mean and nasty beast. One hundred fangs gleamed in his jaw. He should not disprove her words.
The boy tried to roll away, his body somehow clinging to the shadows, but a snick of talons arrested that idea. Pressing one talon against that reed-thin neck, the Dragon rested a paw upon his captive. This boy was far too good at sneaking about. He needed to understand this peculiar brand of magic, and the inexplicable draw he felt toward the youngster. Half-drowning him, whilst providing a moment’s entertainment, was probably not the answer. Why not … Hualiama’s Way?
Grr. That Dragoness was burrowing under his scales and into his hearts.
Leaning in close, Grandion said, “Jinichi of Roninida Island, do you wish to become a Dragon Rider?”
For the first time, he read fear in those clear grey eyes. “No–” the Dragon let his talon press just a little against the voice-box, not enough to draw blood “–yes! Yes, but I can’t! I dream of Dragons–curse it! Don’t you understand, Dragon? I have lost my tribe, my sword and my honour. I’m nothing. Nothing! Worse than a dog. I’ve lived like a sewer rat on these streets, stealing mohili bread to live.”
“Then we are alike.”
Jin could only stare at the Dragon. His throat worked, but no words emerged.
“I dishonoured my people. My entire race. When I first met you, I was a disgraced Dragon honour-bound to an impossible quest. A dog, not a Dragon. Yet I have learned that honour bestowed by others is worthless. What truly matters is the honour of deeds of word and paw, and the pure-fires of a true heart. Can you live with the man you see in the mirror, Jin? You need to
ask him these questions. You are Nikuko. You have powers. You dream great dreams. I say you are Jin–Jin the Apprentice. Do we understand each other?”
Very slowly, the throat bobbed again. “Aye.”
“Good. Then first, you need to learn about the Dragonkind. You’ll find a scrubbing-brush against that far wall. I’m itchy.”
Jin dared to waggle an eyebrow. “Itchy?”
“All over,” Grandion clarified. “After that, there’s a hundred other Dragons in here who’ll need cleaning, scrubbing and polishing. When you’re done, I expect you to be able to recite their names, colours, lineage, history and powers. I will question you. Any mistakes …” He hooked a talon toward the water bucket. “Understood?”
“Draconic notions of honour are … peculiar,” ventured the teenager.
The Tourmaline sheathed his talons with a studied air. “Boy, nothing makes a Dragon more irritable than itchy scales. Learn fast.”
* * * *
Hualiama floated in tantalising light, yet her awareness was dim. Dulled by exhaustion. The force surrounding her body varied as she flexed her wings; she existed upon borrowed strength.
Numistar. Aye. She must fight Numistar, but she was so weak. Shifting restlessly, Hualiama again felt the distant draw weaken and change, then strengthen once more. So leaden of wing. Neck lolling. Oh. What was that bellowing?
Fight! Orient ten degrees starboard and forty-eight vertical!
Uhh … Siiyumiel?
With a wriggle, Lia oriented herself in what she thought might be the right direction. Someone who was used to walking with two feet on the Island was accordingly not accustomed to three-dimensional spatial navigation, but she had plenty of experience piloting Dragonships. Two further corrections, and suddenly she sensed the flow of magic intersecting her position escalate, as though an earthquake had cracked open a terrace lake. Suddenly her wings, freed from external governance, could flex. Siiyumiel immediately shot through further detailed instructions, directing the Star Dragoness into the middle of his highly focussed beam which speared in from over four miles distant.
