A Most Refined Dragon

by Paul Chernoch

  “I’ll fix food for you to take along.”

  After dousing himself with a bucket of water, Shoroko headed for the house to change. He passed the bed of purple senzas and noticed half the flowers were pulled up. At dinner, he said, “Emmaw, there’s a new pest about, tore up your flowers. I’ll set a trap for it before my watch.”

  His mother sported brown hair with a touch of gray, a mischievous smile, and a twitching eye. “I think you’ve already caught the pest, son.”

  A couple hours later, he saddled up Fear, replenished his quiver, and secured his pack. As Fear walked toward the head of the trail, Thedarra came out with the aroma of muffins following after. When he took the basket from her, she held onto the handle and leaned close. The trace of muffin parted and a wild perfume tickled his nostrils. So that’s where the flowers went. Shoroko leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. She stepped back and he rode off without looking back, because he didn’t want her to see the grin on his face.

  As he left the last of their fields four hundred lisstai from the house, he thought about how they measured distance on Kibota. A lissta equaled the wingspan of an average Lissai, so they measured their world in dragon wings. He considered the distance from his farm to the lookout mountain. If it was six hundred lisstai, then it equaled three thousand of a more personal measure, the darra-meter. Yes, measuring how far he was from Darra in darra-meters was the only thing that made sense, because the larger number made her seem farther away, and far away is how he felt.

  He followed the switchback up the mountain, dismounting when the trail became too steep. The man who had the previous shift had nothing to report, patted Shoroko’s back and left. The trees thinned, rewarding him with a commanding view. With the sun hugging the horizon, this was the only chance during his watch to look for trouble in the distance. He took out a pair of binoculars. Jessnee ground their lenses. How was his daughter doing? With the planting done he had time to swing by Jessnee’s place to check on Jafiri and Fia. I’ll go tomorrow. All clear to the north, south and east. Good. He looked west and saw smoke. Wall Ridge was as far as he could see in that direction. Is it a Lissai signal? In times of danger they blew smoke to call for help, but it was too far to make out. For a larger crisis, at the fall of night they would change to flame. Shoroko gathered branches and prepared a small fire. He would be ready to light a beacon if necessary.

  The fire took the edge off the chill. With the last of the light, he surveyed his family’s lands. If only I’d been up here when that Black tilled the fields. What a sight it must’ve been. What’s it mean? While he pondered, he traced the contours of the furrows with his eyes. Small circles shaped like monda nuts compassed a pile of rocks in the heart of one field. In the distance the furrows went to the right and left and then came straight toward the mountain. The other curves wandered this way and that. His eyes did what all Hand’s eyes do: they looked at random patterns and sought to identify order. When they found it, those eyes discarded everything that didn’t fit, and what remained was: a face.

  Shoroko saw a face. It had long, straight hair, black as the soil, and eyes that came to a point. The lips were pursed with a sad expression. It was a woman, staring right at him, only him. Who are you? She was like no one he had ever seen. Why would a Lissai draw the image of a Hand?

  He drew out one of Thedarra’s muffins and began to chew. As the sweet nuttiness filled his stomach, he smiled. Thedarra’s eyes were once as sad as yours, but not today. All day she watched while I drove the quaggas, now her eyes are full. Thedarra’s lips once frowned like yours, but not today. She is the best cook this side of the Faithful River, but now I wish I were tasting her lips instead of her muffins.

  Yes, he was sure he was looking at the face of a woman in love, a woman who couldn’t be with the man she desired. Where is your lover? Why can’t you go to him? All night he feasted on muffins and riddles. An hour before dawn, his replacement arrived, and he untethered Fear.

  While he rode down, a snake spooked Fear and sent Shoroko flying into a puddle. After his cursing, he found a spot in a stream deep enough for him to wash off the mud. Kneeling in the grass, he saw his face reflected in the water before and after his ablutions. It started out black, and ended up white. His jaw dropped. It wasn’t a Black Claw that plowed our fields, it was a White caked in dirt. It was a White with the spirit of a lonely woman from another world.

  A woman who loves me.

  Chapter 14: Mishap at Seremarid Gap

  April 8th. Sunset over Seremarid Gap.

  Before that woman in love could see the dawn on the ninth that brought insight to Shoroko, she had to make it through the previous day’s sunset. When she and her two lissairn companions arrived at the sandy plain west of Wall Ridge, the trouble was evident: a dust cloud swallowing everything before it, advancing from the desert. The irrigator had conjured ample pockets of grass and refreshed tired springs. The mountains to the north and south created a pinch point. All land-bound creatures were compelled to enter a pass two hundred lisstai across.

  Thundering hooves churned up mud and smothered the Hands stationed there with suspense and fits of coughing. Early in a migration, small, fleet animals typically outran the heavy, dangerous beasts. Those on the ground couldn’t see what was coming.

  “What approaches?” K'Pinkelek bellowed.

  The olissair focused and telescoped her refined eyes, penetrated distance and gloom, and saw. “Four legs, larger than Reds, long tusks, furry mane.”

  “Tuskers,” said Soorararas. “Early and deadly. We are not prepared.”

  Now Melissa knew what tuskers were: woolly mammoths. A change in the wind gave her a view of the fortifications. Snaking lines of parallel fences, towers, gates and tunnels dotted the field below. It looked like a stockyard. “What are the fences for?”

  Soorararas swept his wing about and described a big arc. “The plan was this. Shunt the herds by their kinds into large holding pens. Identify the hlisskans, which march at the front and are immune to Jessnee’s tranquilizers. Separate those singular leaders and pass them by Wall Ridge, while their herds are shepherded back into the desert. We airlift food to lead the herds on, and they return to their homes. The hlisskans continue on to the Census Stone, and then depart in pairs. If this succeeds, most migratory animals will be kept from entering the Clawtill Plains, consuming our food, spreading disease, attacking our nests, and hunting the Hands’ cattle.”

  “Is this customary? Has it ever succeeded?”

  “It is Jessnee’s plan,” said K'Pinkelek. “It has never been tried. We Reds are skeptical, but did our part. We hauled timbers, moved earth and rendered what aid we could. For a smaller migration, these tactics would be sound. Jessnee is clever, but this is his first migration. He will learn – if he lives.”

  Jessnee galloped in and dismounted. He climbed atop a rocky crag in the midst of the plain and took charge. Melissa circled and landed beside him. “Tuskers. Several hundred thousand strong. Are you ready?”

  Jessnee’s throat tightened and he turned away. After ten seconds of silence, he raised his binoculars to his eyes and shouted, “Ready the tranquilizers! Stations! Open pens ten through forty!” Then swirling dust swallowed him whole.

  Another quavering voice drifted in through the haze, seeking courage. Callyglip hummed, then sang.

  "Call to valley deep,

  Call to mountain high,

  Whisper of your urgent need,

  And they will soon comply;

  Raise the valleys up,

  Break the mountains down,

  Make for me a level path

  To the Census Stone."

  A double clutch of Reds arrived from the north. Some swooped in to divert groups of tuskers and prevent trampling, while others followed animals struck by tranquilizer darts until they showed signs of sluggishness. Hands by the hundreds took positions atop towers amid the stream of creatures and fired dart after dart. Enraged tuskers hurled their bodies against the fences. T
he towers began to sway. Then came the inevitable.

  “Breach! Fence down by tower four!”

  Five mammoth heads butted against the tower and it began to lean. The Hands continued to fire away, but adrenaline burned through the sedatives and the pounding continued. Two more fences were breached. Timbers snapped, brick walls collapsed, and the screaming began. The Claws deserted their surveillance activities and dove to the rescue. In short order they scooped a hundred wounded from the rubble and flew them to a rock above the fray. Jessnee lowered his binoculars and grabbed his medical bag.

  Melissa flew in and landed. “You command; I heal.” She strode about the rock and sprayed blue flame in every direction. Ten were beyond her help. In the end, the liosh ran out at the same time as the wounded. The dust subsided. Jessnee ordered that torches be lit. Nightfall calmed the tuskers.

  Callyglip cried out, “We found the hlisskans!”

  Surrounded by a heap of sixty unconscious mammoths stood two proud beasts. Each had a score of darts protruding from its side. Four Reds flew down, spat out a wall of fire and drove them eastward, away from their kind, through gate after gate, along ever narrower fenced in lanes until they were safely past Wall Ridge.

  Meanwhile, the beating of drums and lighting of fires drove the great herd westward, back from where they came. The sun rose on the ninth to reveal an empty plain, save for threescore carcasses trampled in the stampede.

  The Hands let out whoops of celebration, hitched teams of fan-fans and collected the dead mammoths. The Claws gathered upwind on a hilltop. Melissa read disdain in their eyes. While she lay spent upon the rock, she studied the activity below. Men gathered splintered fence posts into heaps, constructed huge spits, and set the piles on fire. They skinned the mammoths and began their victory roast.

  K'Pinkelek snorted. “Such coarse feasting must be common where you come from.”

  Melissa raised her head. “It is, and when I lived there, I abstained. Why do we permit this?”

  The lissair turned away when she said the word we. “We concede to Hands the flesh of animals fallen during migration by accident, if not diseased. Otherwise, their food would fail. We permit, but do not applaud such behavior, especially the cheerfulness that accompanies their revels.”

  Five lisstai away, three Reds engaged in hushed conversation. When Melissa looked in their direction, they became quiet. They are judging me. Am I the super-saurian they’ve been waiting for? “Soorararas, what is expected of the one who is to come?”

  He squirmed. To deny an answer to the one presumed by the Reds to be his hlissak would be both rude and unusual. To answer would arm an outsider with knowledge that might enable her to deceive his people. These calculations were as transparent to Melissa as his terse answer was unhelpful. “More.”

  She reflected on what she’d already done. I can heal, I can see far, I can fly swiftly, I can farm. I have manifested four of the seven gifts given long ago to the Lissai. They wait for one who possesses the rest. She closed her eyes and meditated. A slight tingle suggested an opening. White Talon felt near in spirit. Melissa called out in her mind, and an answer echoed back.

  “Keen is her sight,

  but she is not white;

  Wounds she sets true,

  but she is not blue;

  With speed unseen,

  yet scales not of green;

  In planting, and speaking

  and planning she's tried,

  Yet no black, brown or silvery

  sheen grace her hide;

  With the strength of ten Reds

  and no rouge on her head,

  Full of splendor, our sister

  comes to us from the dead.”

  Melissa pondered the rhyme. I am among Reds. All they care about is seeing strength, and I’m lying here, fried after a stampede. She probed more with her mind, but the feeling of White Talon’s presence went hazy. The window had closed. There must be more to the rhyme. If she possessed great ability, she must also possess great purpose. What was she supposed to do? What would make them trust her?

  She opened her eyes and watched the Hands raise Jessnee on their shoulders. This was his day. When Jessnee plays doctor, they applaud. When I play doctor, they shoot me down. He makes elder, while I become an outcast. When the sun was high, they presented the first mammoth steak to him. He speared it with his knife, raised it up to a great shout, and started gnawing away. When he took his first bite, all the thunder of those mighty hooves was released into the crowd. Everyone began to stomp the ground in excitement, and Jessnee… At least his dancing hasn’t improved. But when his companions paused to grab their share of the spoils, the sound of stomping didn’t cease.

  Pebbles skittered down the hill. An alarmed Red took wing and flew high to scout for a new species of danger crossing the desert, but no dust cloud showed. Then towers which withstood the tuskers’ fury began to shudder. An uneasy rolling sensation made Melissa queasy.

  From below, a Hand screamed, “Kiboteshk! Kiboteshk!”

  The unfamiliar word catalyzed in Melissa’s brain a crystal understanding of linguistics, etymology and grammar. Roots and declensions and endings swirled in her head. Ki for solid. Bota for rock. Kibota, the solid place, the place of security and peace, the world. Eshk, for tearing, for antithesis. Kiboteshk… Earthquake.

  Chapter 15: Carried Back

  April 9th. Midday. East of Wall Ridge.

  Fear flew over the grassland, hugging the course of the Floodway, whose perpetually dry riverbed was now a strong brook. The quagga was happy to stretch its legs where it could see in all directions no predators in pursuit. Shoroko felt the same. He smarted from Thedarra’s barbs, delivered when he packed to rejoin White Talon. She loaded his saddlebags with provisions and pouting.

  It would be midnight before he reached the gap, his only news uncertain smoke in the distance. After riding three hours, his consolation was that he was nearing the house of singing wire. When relations between Hand and Claw soured, Jessnee foresaw the need to establish a warning system independent of the winged messengers. Weeks before he oversaw the stringing of telegraph wire from the Wall to Four Rivers, and the construction of twenty relay stations. Advanced warnings about migration size, makeup and speed would save many lives, but Shoroko only worried about one.

  When told the line was silent, Shoroko volunteered to search for the break as a pretext for rejoining Melissa. He grabbed a spare battery, a coil of wire and insulators from Jessnee’s house, happy to see the doctor’s daughter was recovering.

  So far he hadn’t seen any downed line. He rode alongside a pole, shimmied up and attached a portable transmitter. He tapped his greeting and station ten to his east answered, but nine to the west was quiet. He climbed down and hopped on Fear.

  Soon enough the wooden shack came into view, nestled in a stand of trees amid the scrub. “Hello! It’s Shoroko. Any news from the Gap?” A gust of wind rustled the grass in response. He circled around. The door flapped in the breeze. He opened it and saw a trail of blood on the dirt floor. Running in, he cranked up the generator and flipped open the code book. Why couldn’t I have paid more attention to Jessnee in telegraphy class? Barely passed the exam. Too busy planning my revenge. He tapped out his message. Station 9, Eastern Flats. Shoroko keying. Op gone. Found blood. Report.

  One by one the other western stations reported, until station one. The Gap was silent. It was no tiny outpost, so a few wild animals couldn’t take it out. This was serious. Shoroko arranged for relief to be sent to his outpost, wrote up a report, put it in the message box, and hoisted the red flag. He ran to untie Fear. His animal’s eyes grew wide and it reared, snapped its rope and bolted. Before Shoroko could turn around, claws closed around his waist.

  Huge talons encircled his midsection and squeezed the wind from him. The ground retreated and with it his bow. His klafe was strapped to his leg, but using it meant death. They soared westward along the course of the Floodway. By flexing his muscles, he pried the ti
ps of the talons looser, which kept them from breaking his ribs or puncturing his lungs. Wheeze. He could breathe again, and look up at what snatched him. It was a rukh, and its mate flew ahead. The rukhcock carrying him had a tuft of green plumage, while the rukhen ahead was dark brown and tan. Kibota boasted no bigger birds. They nested in the high mountains of Blaze where no Hand had ever climbed. Even Red Lissai flew around their territory.

  Screech! The rukh didn’t like his squirming. Peck, peck. The beak hammered against his skull, and that was it. Shoroko swooned, and the world sped by unwatched. The water far below became a nearby stream, and his feet bobbed in its coolness. The half-high grain shimmied in the breeze and a rare spectacle flew overhead: a mission from the sea, a wing of Greens en route to Rampart, the fastest fliers of all.

  Sho-sho sat beside him, shoving pie in her mouth and dribbling all over her blouse. “Rocko, who do you suppose the Rainbow Bride will be? Do you think she’ll come soon?”

  Shoroko always acted smart in front of his little sister. He was thirteen after all, almost a man. “Why do you think it’ll be a she? And who ever called it the Rainbow Bride? That’s silly!”

  “Because of the rhyme, silly. Everyone knows it’ll be a lady. Keen is her sight, not his sight. And if she has all the powers of the seven klatches, then she has all their colors, like a rainbow, like they’re all married together. Rainbow Bride. You’ll see.”

  “Doesn’t make sense, it being an olissair. Lissairn are stronger, like boys are stronger than girls. They got the poem wrong. It’ll be a lissair.” He folded his arms and gave her the smart look.

  She gave him the Shorascal look straight back: dreamy, full of ideas, and never to be shushed by superior wisdom. On top of the look, as she was about to speak, a great revelatory smile spread across her face. “In fact, not only do I think it will be a lady, I think it will be…” She leaned in close and whispered. “A girl.” She pointed to her chest. “Maybe me.” Then she plopped back into the grass and watched a bird fly overhead. Shoroko readied his objections, but before he could stammer a reply, she made her defense. “Everyone thinks it has to be a Claw, but why not a Hand? I can see it now. You’re riding along on a fan-fan, fighting taggers and glips and torryxes. You’re strong, and you fight them hard but there are so many. The village is counting on you to protect them. The animals surround you, and you see they’re all hlisskans and you’re running out of arrows. And me? I am flying way up high.” She stretched her arms as high as she could. “With my white-eyed vision I see you. They can’t touch me, and I swoop down and carry you to safety.”