A Most Refined Dragon

by Paul Chernoch

  The bewildered Silver swiveled his head back and forth, settling on Olsurrodot and issuing an unspoken plea.

  “Melissa risked her life to spare White Talon,” said Olsurrodot. “Trust her. She has been drenched in rainbows.”

  Mirrorwing bowed again. “If you wish to rescue Silverthorn, my news could not come at a more urgent time. Wisdom and skill at locating and animating ancient devices will not suffice. When Garden Klatch departed into oblivion, we met not only with misfortune, but treachery.”

  A damp wind rose and darkened the west end of the lake. The sails strained before the gale and the barge picked up speed.

  “Furl the sail,” said Mirrorwing. “Drop anchor. If I must trust you, I will not risk what others with ears might do. When my tale is told, you may dock and unload your cargo.” While the crew complied, he began. “The goal was simple: enter Nehenoth, close the door to new arrivals, halt the census, and return.”

  “Surely the whole klatch was not needed for this?” said Melissa.

  “Twenty volunteered. The rest were not needed, they were forced. After five migrata of careful research, we’d finally repaired the garden gate. With fragments of old diagrams yet lacking understanding of the words written on them, we set out. It is a dark and forbidding place of perplexing directions and disordered gravity, so we carried provisions to last a year, feeling foolish over such extravagant caution. But after we entered, the migrants of the sea arrived. Against all nature, they bypassed their customary route and swarmed over our island. The amphibious and the air breathers, great serpents and monstrous sea birds slithered and flopped and clawed their way up to the hatchery. In hours, a whole generation… lost.

  “For safety, while herders deployed to face this scourge, our klatch sought refuge in the great cavern where the gateway stood. A few flew for the mainland to enlist help from Seakeep. They never returned. Three wings of Browns from Menagerie arrived for a scheduled banquet, unaware of the danger. They fought bravely, and fell with my brothers and sisters.

  “We expected the wave to break after a few days, enabling us to leave the cave and rebuild. After a week, our strength was spent, and still the swarm pressed in. Desperate, we activated the gate and fled to Nehenoth, hoping to emerge when the call of the Census Stone compelled them to move on. We shut the door, and it would not open again. After two months, the food ran out, then the water. We began to die.

  “Refusing to submit to the inevitable, Silverthorn and a handful of us made a thorough exploration of our certain grave. We found the irrigator and replenished our water. It was too late for the olissairn and the glissonds. We survivors found a grey road and marched, too weak to fly, until we came to the end of our strength. We fell before the arch of another ruined gate, never expecting to wake again. And so Kilgain found us, and saved us, and saved us every day until now.”

  The water lapped against the barge. The timbers creaked. The wind whistled. None spoke.

  “I visited all the ancient gates on the other side and can follow the deceiving roads,” said Mirrorwing. “I know their rough whereabouts on Kibota. I have seen the mechanisms, can arrange the parts if they be not damaged, and repair some if they are. We can get through.”

  “How did you become trapped?” said Shoroko.

  “By disobeying my lord. Damaged doors seldom open into a safe place. I tunneled with all the fierceness of a Red through fiery rock. Drowning in the cool underbelly of the river was the last pleasure I thought I’d ever know. I should have died for my insubordination. Help me redeem my error.”

  Melissa placed her paw upon Mirrorwing’s. “You spoke of treachery. Explain.”

  He flexed his claws and drove them into the wood of the deck. “In Nehenoth there was a seeing stone, like the one in White Talon’s cave. Until the mechanism was wrecked, we could see dimly into the cavern on Garden Isle. I stood guard, watching the snarling, writhing chaos as lizards and giant crabs and rukhs and snakes consumed our provisions and then each other. When the signs of movement lessened, I saw a claw… sheets of flame… blackness. A claw alone I could have mistaken, but not that. Senseless beasts lack motive and intellect to smash our apparatus. I couldn’t tell if that claw was silver, red, brown, white or green, but a Lissai forever cut off an entire klatch. This evil must be avenged.”

  Olsurrodot snarled, howled and stomped his feet. “In two weeks, a new hlissosak is to be chosen in Silverthorn’s place. White Talon is hlissak no longer. Lady Poonrapi lacks ambition. That leaves Anspark and Tongaroi to contend for the title. If either was behind this cowardly attack on Garden Isle, then all Kibota will reel under his malicious tyranny.” The elder Lissai called to the captain. “Raise the sail. We must not delay.” Impatient at the crew’s slowness, he seized the tow rope in his teeth and leapt off the barge. Even Melissa’s wings would be no match for those strokes driven by fury.

  Meanwhile, Mirrorwing took up a spot at the stern, looking back, and thinking back, and staring at his reflection in the lake. Did he hope to see a second pair of eyes look back? Only Melissa’s ears were sensitive enough to hear the words he canted to the wind.

  Glissy, Glissy, wing to wing,

  Tail to tail, in suffering,

  Our oll, sweet promise of the years,

  Our hatching day that seemed so near,

  But nature most unnatural

  Surged from the deep,

  And claws – the wrong claws,

  And feet – the wrong feet,

  And teeth – the wrong teeth,

  Shattered shell,

  Battered shell,

  Our hopes sank,

  They sank, they fell,

  When shattered shell

  Disgorged too early,

  No ollhatch for you,

  No glissond for me,

  No shining olissair or lissair

  For our family.

  Glissy, Glissy,

  All the olli of the years

  Before me, dashed as well.

  For water,

  Yes for water, did I leave your side,

  And brought a pitcher

  Through Nehenoth's dangers,

  It was in my claws,

  It was sweet and cold,

  Each drop a lively oll,

  A sphere of life;

  See this water?

  It is pure,

  As your love was pure;

  My Glissy,

  I took too long,

  I poured and poured,

  And kissed and poured,

  And cried and poured,

  But the grave was thirstier than you,

  Thirstier than me,

  And you were gone.

  Glissy, Glissy,

  How you dazzled, dancing in the sun,

  Shimmered under happy moons,

  Your mane tickling at my snout,

  Your name a poem on my lips,

  Glissy, Glissy...

  * * *

  Jessnee remained in Pentown to install the oshtukamat and train operators. Not accompanying the expedition to the cave housing the gateway made him ill-tempered. Nevertheless, Shoroko understood the writing, Mirrorwing knew the parts, and Melissa could lean on her bachelors in biomechanical engineering to fill in the gaps (with perhaps a miracle or two). Orokolga could smash walls.

  Mirrorwing flew ahead, accompanied by Melissa, avoiding the town altogether. He didn’t want anyone to know a Silver had returned, and the barge crew pledged silence. Shoroko rode Orokolga over the grassy hills east of the lake before plunging into dense forest, while Olsurrodot lingered in town to spin a yarn for Browns on the docks about the herb gathering they planned to do up in West Menagerie Heights. All the Browns were interested in was examining Olsurrodot’s patchless eye, and bragging how their battle scars were still intact. After many migrations fighting alongside Reds, he was not impressed.

  Shoroko studied the maps and writings while he rode, ignoring prowling legions of creatures long in tooth and claw. Nothing wanted to tangle with Orokolga. When
they neared the site, he expected to slash vines and brush with his klafe to uncover the cave mouth. Instead, they entered a clearing bordered in flowers before an unobstructed entrance. From the cave’s shadows came the flickering of a candle and the fragrance of singewood.

  “I see no Hand footpaths,” said Orokolga. “It’s a shrine to the Lissai, tended daily. We must be quick and quiet, or find ourselves having to explain our activities.”

  Shoroko dismounted and waited until Melissa and Mirrorwing circled and landed. Shoroko pulled a torch from his pack and Mirrorwing obliged by setting it alight. “If this place is well tended, that will have deterred looters. I’ll take that as a good thing.”

  “I’ll stand watch by the entrance,” said Orokolga. “These passages are cramped for one of my size. If you find an obstruction requiring strength, fetch me.”

  Shoroko and the two Claws walked toward the dark passage at the back of the hall. They passed a statue of a Lissai leader draped in garlands. Mirrorwing tarried, finding in the stone two eyes as sad as his own. Shoroko marched past. He didn’t want monuments and memories; he wanted danger and a chance to prove himself. They wandered halls and searched rooms, but no menacing eyes gleamed from the shadows. No tremors collapsed the roof. He never got dizzy from explosive mine gas. No angry Claws protested their desecration.

  The tunnels and grottos were roughhewn, unlike other Claw architecture. “This place was built in a hurry,” said Shoroko.

  The smaller caves were workrooms, with stone tables, shelves, and resin boards with notes scrawled on them. None were permanent living chambers. Many were occupied by statues. Wherever writing could be found, Shoroko held his torch close and read. “Our gratitude forever. K'Olblu the Wise, who stopped the smoldering plague.”

  “The smolders,” said Mirrorwing. “Nearly killed our entire people. The fever makes the liosh sac rupture and a fire burns your insides up. The name of K'Olblu was forgotten. We are unworthy. I shall restore his name in our day.”

  Many inscriptions were to doctors and researchers who combatted illness at the cost of their lives. Some walls were covered in anatomical charts, or complex formulas Shoroko couldn’t understand. Then they found the holding pens. They were formed from clear bars resembling glass which even Melissa could not shatter. The doors stood open, their prisoners long ago set free. Level after level of enclosures were connected by wide, roughhewn stairs.

  “Was this a prison?” said Melissa.

  The first pens were large, capable of holding a lissair. Later ones were smaller and had perches, suitable for birds. The cages on each level were arranged in concentric circles. At the center they found a wall covered in writing. Shoroko translated. “Sanitary procedures for the Holding Pens of West Menagerie Heights… Washing of paws required… Wear masks at all times… Clean pens every two days… Symptoms to check for and record… Lacquer nail covering improves sensitivity of claw thermometers… How to safely draw blood from small animals… Grind herbs finely when preparing anesthetics… How to restrain the giant alissaren…”

  “Alissaren,” said Melissa. She walked to where Shoroko stood reading. Besides the words were diagrams, illustrating knots, the proper thickness of rope, and where to fasten the restraints. The animals depicted were unmistakable. “Dinosaurs.” She scanned the writing, then spotted an overturned resin board in a pen. It was one lissta long, and half as high. The olissair entered the pen, flipped the board up and propped it against the bars. “Read this, Shoroko,” said Melissa. Writing covered the board, but became illegible near the end.

  “This is the account of First Healer Azureana, the last scribe. Forgive us for what we have wrought. I, together with First Engineer Vermillion Weld, perfected an automatic, self-sustaining assistant for administering the hlisskanijunger treatment. We believed that this would permit us to continue the merciful work of our people during this crisis, with resources depleted, until the danger passes. My fear is that the work will continue, but our solution will prolong the crisis across numberless years.

  “The story of our people is universally known in our time, but soon we will forget. If you can read my words, then you may not need them, because my fears may not have come to pass.

  “To be Lissai is to love life and protect it wherever we find it. We found endangered life on another world. We resolved to rescue a representative pair of each kind of creature when its numbers declined to a single breeding pair, and constructed here and in Nehenoth gateways to afford them passage to our world, where we would care for them in perpetuity. The treatment we developed endues them with profound resilience and healing powers, and beacons implanted in each will draw it to a place where it may be counted and its health reviewed, before being released to roam free.

  “In all this noble work, we did not anticipate the Cataclysm. Instead of one arrival every few years, we welcomed one a day, then one an hour, then one a minute, when finally they flooded us by the thousands. This quarantine facility was erected hastily to protect us from disease, prevent dissemination of foreign seeds, and stabilize the health of our new dependents.

  “It is one year since the Cataclysm began. The flood of creatures has subsided, but the damage is done. The winds spread the seeds – what will come of it? Many of our new ‘hlisskans’ escaped confinement before we could purge them of disease. Lissai by the thousands have perished from the plagues, and we cannot extinguish their dispersive agents, because we have made them immortal…”

  Shoroko read about diseases, villages that were no more, and the anger directed at their leaders. He read of measures taken that proved useless and the attack on the facility that ruined the visible equipment, but did nothing to halt the arrival of more unwanted visitors.

  “My sympathies are with the angry and despondent who attacked and killed my colleagues. Had their violence halted our proud and ill-considered venture, then our folly would have been buried with us. I am imprisoned here, where once I restrained the powerful and bloodthirsty creatures transported from that tragic, dying world. If only these bars would imprison the products of my science!

  “Lissairn and olissairn I counted as friends burst in, wild, untamed and barely capable of speech. I could not point my claw at an alien disease or poisonous flower and say, ‘You are to blame!’ Last week twenty scribes assisted me. Ten they slew, but the other ten my science destroyed!

  “The life we poured into the hlisskans – I thought it came from potions and electrical currents and rearrangements of the cellular order. All that we did, but it merely formed a conduit. We opened the animals’ spirits to receive a precious vitality, but that life was drawn from us. Without knowing the cost, we poured our life into these mortal creatures. Will we by this forever render our own souls poor?

  “I am the Last Scribe. No others can read or write. Our wisdom will fail, our world collapse into ruin, and still the sapping of our souls will carry on. Forgive us for what we have wrought. I, together with First Engineer Vermillion Weld, perfected an automatic, self-sustaining assistant for administering the hlisskanijunger treatment. It lies beyond our reach, and soon beyond our knowledge. Forgive us…”

  Melissa looked at Mirrorwing. “I understand now. My soul is not lissine. I am immune to the spiritual drag that wears your people down. I am not a super-Claw. I am an average one, according to the original standard of the Lissai. If we find a way to turn Azureana’s machine off, then Claws may revert to their former vitality, restore this world and recover their potential.”

  While Melissa exulted in the possible upside of success, Shoroko exulted in something else. Melissa called the Lissai ‘They’.

  * * *

  Mirrorwing and Shoroko were ready to leave. Thousands of years before, an angry mob wrecked the place, and shrine keepers had tidied up, leaving nothing mechanical in sight.

  “Don’t you get it?” said Melissa. “The Lissai forgot how to read. If I were the last person left who could read, and I only trusted other people who could read, I would write clue
s on the walls that pointed the way. Maybe Azureana hid equipment and documents in a safe place. Look harder.”

  They split up, noted every place having writing, and called Shoroko to read it. After two hours, their efforts were rewarded.

  “The handwriting on these resin boards matches that in the holding pen,” said Shoroko. “This office was Azureana’s.” He traced his fingers along each line, then summarized. “Two levels down. A supply closet has a false back.”

  Melissa and Shoroko ran out the door, but Mirrorwing lingered behind, sniffing.

  They hurried down two flights of stairs and found the closet. After a little prodding, the back wall swiveled to reveal another room, lined with shelves. They held boxes of rust and powder.

  “So much for spare parts,” said Melissa.

  Mirrorwing remained outside the hidden office, because it was too small for all of them. He paced along the hall, sniffing.

  On the wall hung another resin board, which Shoroko read. “To disable the machines that transport animals to Kibota and endow them with long life, obtain from inventory or fashion parts meeting these specifications…” Lengthy procedures and diagrams followed. “Assemble the parts according to this pattern… Calibrate the machine by…”

  The last section bore the heading ‘How to operate’, but its words were illegible.

  “Rukh muck,” said Shoroko. “The most important words look melted. Maybe there was a fire.” He knelt down and inspected the ground. “I see charcoal. They must have doused the fire quickly, or the rest would have been erased, too.”

  “I doubt that,” said Melissa. “What are the chances only the most important words would be affected? Someone didn’t want that soul-sucking machine turned off. Azureana was remorseful, so I doubt it was her. Who’d have the strongest motive to prevent the device’s destruction?”

  Shoroko scratched his scruffy chin. “It’s creator?”

  “Vermillion Weld,” said Melissa, “couldn’t bear to have his great achievement torn down.” She stared at the writing, even though she couldn’t understand it. From the corner of her eye, she saw Shoroko hold a leaf up to his nose. She bobbed her head and made it obvious she was about to turn her head. His hand returned to his side, and the leaf was gone. She sniffed the air. Similar to mint. She blushed. He thinks I stink! Fury rose inside, but she remembered she had no liosh. Can’t burn him, can’t ignore him. Oooh, when Jason gave me that Cartier perfume, I got fuming mad and returned it. What I’d give now for a bottle – make that a case – of Le Baiser du Dragon!