by Marc Secchia
Pip whispered, BE REVEALED!
Despite the softness of her interjection, power shivered the chamber. Magic flared along the walls as the horiatite ignited like magnesium tossed into a fire, first highlighting the existing score and then shifting and morphing to something altogether new.
Abazan cried, “Start there! All together, on my mark!”
His wild conducting smacked Aranya across the back of the head, but she did not care. She focussed on the new music as Sapphire carolled upon her shoulder and the Chrysolitic dragonets found their way to the smaller harp’s strings, plucking them with their wingtips as they danced with joyous abandon. Why did dragonets always respond to music in this way? Behind her, Dragoness Lyriela sight-read the score with aplomb, but Aranya was having trouble following even a couple of notes at a time. When her stiff fingers fumbled, the strange magic seemed to shy away, but when she succeeded the tumbling runs and arpeggios evoked playful runnels of water and dancing fountains and the tinkling miniature waterfalls of Immadia as the winter snows began to melt. The impression was clear; the emotions, intense. Winter storms passing. Water flooding, flowing, nourishing. The suns’ warmth infusing the streams to create wholesome environments for fish to play … yet, she kept erring.
Sucking in her lower lip, Aranya reached deeper. Strings could be plucked not just by fingers. Instinctually, she deployed her telekinetic power. No master musician was she, but she had enough control – as fast and accurately as she could read the score, now she could play as if she had ten fingers that actually wanted to behave themselves. The smaller harp’s music swelled. The prickling sensation switched to trickles of bizarrely cooling liquid fire.
Without warning, the room plunged into darkness. Iridiana yelped; Aranya caught her hand with her own, and found herself clutching a dragonet’s paw.
On the smooth, curved wall behind the stage, a backlit image appeared. A masked girl!
Gasps greeted this appearance, as if the denizens of the Concert Cavern had beheld a ghost. The girl pictured was petite and slender, with a mass of tumbling brown hair shot with gold and azure tumbling over her shoulders and down past her waist – Shapeshifter hair, or Aranya was a chattering parakeet. She wore an exquisite Fra’aniorian lace gown of antiquated cut in a vibrant turquoise that deepened toward sapphire in the train. Her eyes were concealed by a dainty, bejewelled mask featuring no apparent eye holes, and her elfin chin had a very slightly malformed appearance, as though her jaw had been badly broken, once.
The glowing apparition walked straight out of the wall until she came to stand right in front of Aranya’s Dragonharp. In a young-sounding, musical voice she addressed the air:
“I am Auli-Ambar Ta’afaya, the Dragon Librarian. Most cordially do I greet thee, blessed seeker, who has discovered in the hour of their greatest need, this resource I created for the future in accordance with a prophetic imperative bequeathed me by Amaryllion Fireborn, the Ancient Dragon who once dwelled beneath Ha’athior Island.” Her speech was quaint, almost archaic in its cadence. “By his soul name, I declare the veracity of my words, and upon my speaking his soul name, my own unique magic shall verify the purposes of your hearts. Should any within this chamber fail my test, they shall be instantaneously slain. When you are ready to proceed, say, ‘We are ready.’ ”
Aranya inhaled sharply. “Anyone want to leave now?”
“No,” said Beran. Other voices in the hall echoed the same.
She studied the apparition in silence, aware of Pip and Iridiana’s breathing nearby, obliquely observing how the hatchling dragonets gathered beneath Sapphire’s outspread, mothering wings. She had to assume that Auli-Ambar had recorded this speaking image while she was yet alive, but the magical constructs used to create this effect had no parallel in her experience. She could not even begin to parse their nature. She needed to trust the Dragon Librarian – a hard ask given her enigmatic personality!
She said, “We are ready.”
The glowing girl said, Declare thy name and heritage, o seeker.
I am Aranya, Princess of Immadia, daughter of King Beran and Queen Izariela, who was daughter of Istariela the Star Dragoness and Fra’anior the Onyx Ancient Dragon, and these are my friends. I am a Star Dragoness.
Auli-Ambar began to sing in a language Aranya had never heard before, in a voice of such resonance and extraordinary clarity it seemed to have no place emanating from such a slight frame. The skirling melody wove its own magic. In a moment, glowing, wavering lights appeared above each person and Dragon’s head, right down to the smallest of the Chrysolitic dragonets. They burned with a rippling quality, like light transmitted through a clear lake to a sandy bottom, but again without apparent heat.
Magic coalesced from her voice, feeding the light constructs until Aranya felt constrained to speak a word of warning. “Be ready.”
The apparition sang with piercing sweetness, VERIFY, BEZALDIOR!
A torrent of blankness plunged into her mind.
Aranya came to with a wild start, realising that her inmost thoughts and motives had just been plumbed and she had no idea how it had been accomplished. Abazan lay at her feet, stone dead. The stool crashed behind her as she leaped to her feet with an inchoate cry. Dad! Iridiana … Pip … the dragonets, they were all fine. So were Lyriela and Ta’armion, but a commotion at the Concert Cavern’s doorway appraised her of the fact that three of the Under-Scrollkeepers, three of the council of seven who ruled Human affairs at Gi’ishior, had also summarily perished.
Be judge and executioner both? A soul must shudder!
The apparition raised its hand in a beckoning gesture. Follow me, Aranya of Immadia.
* * * *
With a backward glance at her companions and father, Aranya followed the apparition as Auli-Ambar returned the way she had come. Straight into the wall. She raised a hand by way of protection, but found herself passing through the undulating coolness of a barrier again unlike anything she had experienced before – not only teleportation, she realised, but perhaps a temporal shift, too.
She was underwater.
Underwater!
Maybe. All around her was a world of frosted blues, more shades and hues and nuances of blue than she could ever have imagined; all was product of a magic utterly alien to her experience. What kind of fire was this – Water Fire? She chuckled at the notion.
“Indeed,” chuckled another.
Aranya whirled. “Auli – Auli-Ambar Ta’afaya?”
How were they even speaking? In this place the girl stood – floated – unmasked, her huge brown-golden eyes aglow with magic. Her outfit made Iridiana’s standards look positively puritanical. The material was iridescent turquoise in keeping with the highlights in her hair, but consisted of the briefest of briefs and a pair of shapely shell-like coverings moulded to her torso. Her body had an aquatic appearance, with fin-like fringes apparent upon her arms and legs. She seemed to experience no trouble breathing underwater. Just like herself. Aranya touched her mouth. A clever, obviously semipermeable membrane protected her mouth and nose.
With a winsome smile, Auli said, “Welcome to the realm beyond the third sun, o Aranya.”
“The – uh, third sun? Are you alive? Am I – what is this place?” Her hands waved languidly before her face. “And tell me, by Fra’anior’s own flame, why do you have to be so blasted mysterious and difficult to find? Roaring rajals, that came out badly. You are Auli-Ambar, the Dragon Librarian?”
“So many questions.” The brown eyes did not exactly look at her. Aranya wondered if she saw by magic, or if the girl was truly blind. “This is a peculiar realm with its own, distinct laws, Aranya, so I have twisted its magic and gravitation in permissible ways to allow us this brief space. Aye, I am alive. Aye, we are speaking in person. Here is my Arkurion the Mercury Blue.”
A lithe, piscine Dragon swooped by with a welcoming flexion of his wing fins, his mercury-like scales gleaming more splendidly than a fish’s finest raiment. He called, Sulphurous greetin
gs, noble Star Dragoness!
Hail, noble Arkurion! Aranya said, bowing formally. The Dragon flashed away, apparently playing in the powerful currents of his environment. He’s beautiful, Auli-Ambar.
I think he’s beautiful, too, she said diffidently.
I must thank you from the bottom of my heart for saving my Aunt Hualiama when she was an infant.
Thank you, Auli returned. “If you wish to learn about my secret realm and my story, ask the Dragons to show you to the forbidden vaults beneath the Dragon Library. In chamber seventeen, you must sing this song.”
Whatever be mine for the day,
Whatever must be revealed,
Wilt thou not rise to mine paw,
Be thou scroll or book or leaf?
“There you shall find way to the Scrolls of Fire, which are located in the second-greatest Library of Dragon lore in the Island-World. Another puzzle within a puzzle. My apologies for all this subterfuge – I’m inordinately fond of riddles, and Amaryllion Fireborn was very specific about how I ought to protect particular secrets. Indeed, Hualiama Dragonfriend also knows this Library’s location, and you are Star kin. You could learn it from her, perhaps.”
“Hualiama?” Aranya considered her words, meantime watching Arkurion dancing behind Auli. This whole place was a magical construct! Something was profoundly askew with the way the waters flowed and even gravity misbehaved. At length, she said, “If you mean that you located these Scrolls of Fire at the Dragon Academy, fetching them might pose a small problem.”
Auli’s left eyebrow peaked. “Oh?”
For the first time, the Dragon Librarian appeared discomfited. Aranya knew she had guessed correctly; she also knew that this mysterious personage knew a great deal more than she was revealing. The awareness of great knowledge practically seeped out of her pores. Perhaps she should not feel so self-satisfied at having set Auli-Ambar off balance, but then, this was a girl who hid her secrets incredibly well.
The Princess chose to reply with her best pithy Immadian air of understatement, “Aye. Right now, the entire Academy is trapped inside a First Egg of the Ancient Dragons and headed into orbit of our planet. Did you anticipate this outcome, noble Dragon Librarian?”
“So magnificent and fierce, these Star Fires burning within you,” Auli replied tenderly, reaching out to caress Aranya’s cheek. “May wholeness be made manifest – within your person, as in our Island-World.”
She shivered. “Don’t.”
The Mercury-Blue Dragon fluted, O Star Dragoness, my Auli-Ambar understands your pain as few do. Read her Scrolls of Fire, once you have leisure following this mission which consumes your thoughts. Speak your need.
She searched the girl’s mien. Mercy! Her empathy was as piercing as starlight; almost unbearably exquisite.
Trying to conceal the powerful feelings that this simple touch had churned up, Aranya shrugged and explained, “Basically, we need to fly to the Mystic Moon minus oxygen to rescue the First Egg either from Infurion or a tyrannical trio of Shapeshifters from Herimor, or both. Failing which we unleash Dramagon’s creatures and the nightmare of his wrath upon our world.”
The girl’s eyelids blinked in ultra-slow motion, emphasizing the strangeness of her orbs before she tilted her head skyward – where Aranya thought the sky might be, anyways. It was nigh impossible to tell in this realm. The girl seemed to be gazing across ten thousand leagues. Despite her peculiarities, Aranya sensed that she was inclined to help. Perhaps she was just an incredibly private person? Make that, insanely private?
“I see them ascending on course for intercepting the Mystic Moon in eleven days’ time, approximately,” said Auli-Ambar. “They are well advanced in their schemes, these our enemies.”
“Vile spawn of Dramagon’s nostrils!” Arkurion roared behind her, churning the waters into a frenzy.
Aranya wanted to heave a sigh of relief, but the watery environs rather prevented that. This really was the strangest place. She wished she could work out where it was or how this was possible, but Auli-Ambar seemed to be reading her thoughts effortlessly.
The girl said, “Dear Aranya, prophetic necessity has a way of interfering. You know that imperative as well as I do, and it has and does frustrate me as much as it frustrates you, trust me. I wish to know you well, one day. Even as a friend.” Twirling her hands in front of her, she produced a burning scroll out of – well, mid-water, Aranya decided – with impressive sleight of hand. This unreality was most unnerving. She was not sure if it was water, at least as she understood it! The liquid seemed rife with unfamiliar, conflicting forces. “Here is a key snippet of lore I have prepared especially for you. A Scroll of Fire, if you would. With this, you shall fly higher than ever before.”
A million questions burned upon her tongue, but this place seemed to have scrambled her mental processes. She reached out to clasp the cool scroll, burning with its azure non-fire. It immediately disappeared into her flesh.
“Huh?”
“It’s a psychic scroll. You summon it with your mind. Hence, Scroll of Fire.”
Aranya bit her lip. Really?
“I know that this is hard to understand,” Auli-Ambar smiled. “Draconic fires perish in this realm, but you as a Star Dragoness could learn to flourish here. Go now and save us all, Star Dragoness. I bid thee, as said the Dragonfriend, ‘Go burn the heavens!’ ”
The magic was drawing her away, causing the fluid scene to fade.
The girl raised her hands in a gesture of blessed-sending. “Greet your twin Iridiana for me. Tell her that her Chaos is an integral part of this realm; that it is birthed and venerated here …”
On that note, Aranya stepped backward only to fall farther into space than she had allowed for. Thump! She landed on her tailbone. Or on a dracotortoise’s bone-hard shell, or something to that effect.
“Thanks, Iridiana.”
“Sorry. I was trying for a cosy posy of flowers,” she laughed. “Find anything interesting in the six hours you’ve been driving us insane by your absence?”
“I found fine seating for the royal rump.”
“If you desire a spiky cactus for a throne, Your Highness, that’s one way to ask for it.”
* * * *
Aranya kissed her father upon the cheek. She loved doing this as a Dragoness, because Beran always made a fuss. “Sulphur breath!” he snorted, waving his hands energetically in the air. “Nasty case of halitosis, my petal.”
Dragoness Iridiana kissed him from the other side. “And this?”
“Sweeter than a Fra’aniorian flower garden,” he averred, casting a sly glance at Aranya.
She unsheathed a talon and mimed gutting random Kings with it.
“Pip, are you sure you’re ready?” he asked, for the sixth time.
The Pygmy said, “No, but only a foolish warrior waits for the jungle to grow. I will be ready by the time we reach the Mystic Moon. It is not a question.”
To Aranya’s surprise, he reached out to pet Sapphire, who had taken up residence in Pip’s arms in preparation for the imminent take-off. “You’ll take care of this band of rascals for me, alright, Sapphire? I’m relying on you.”
Sapphire purred happily. “Kingy clever. Kingy noble. Kingy … nice?”
“And I thought Zip was the shameless one,” Aranya lamented. “Mount up, Pip plus rascals!”
With Pip and the dragonets aboard, the sisters sprang skyward, passing by roost ledges packed with the growing Halls population, despite the very early hour. The merest blush of rose tinted the eastern horizon. Overhead all was deep purple sprinkled with white. She worked her wings powerfully, enjoying the initial sense of stretching and warming as she worked the tiredness out of much-abused muscles. Despite a full night’s rest and solid meals for both her Human and her Dragoness, Aranya felt edgy and, if she were honest, far crankier than a Nak woken before noon. High to the southern aspect was a pearly speck of white which was out of place in this auroral sky; the First Egg. There was one shining reason for
her nerves.
Suddenly, they passed Ja’arrion and Va’assia standing shoulder to shoulder upon the broad balcony outside of their roost. The Shapeshifter Dragons raised a great bugling and roaring which seemed to ignite the volcano; suddenly a wave of sound buoyed them upward, and the Amethyst Dragoness opened her throat to unleash a sonorous bugle of her own in response.
Iridiana shuddered, but managed to hold her form.
Then they were winging up above the rim. The panorama of Fra’anior Cluster spread out around them. A deep crimson glow emanated from the ever-active caldera, illuminating the many verdant Islands from beneath, edging them in red-golden foliage while the interiors as yet remained dark and mysterious. Lightning flashed away to the south, over Ha’athior. Outside the rough oval of the volcano, the Cloudlands had just picked up their first hint of dawn’s breath, delicately gilding endless fields of clouds until they touched the horizon. Blue was high and Yellow almost hidden, while Mystic could not as yet be seen.
The Iridium Dragoness matching her wingbeat for wingbeat vented a long, hearts-felt sigh. “Fra’anior made all this?”
“Aye. Big, big paws to fill,” Aranya smiled.
Pip patted the Amethyst Dragoness’ back. “My first Dragonride was upon the back of a crusty old Red Shapeshifter called Zardon. He flattened my cage and winged me away to the Academy. I still remember it so clearly … he gave his life for mine.”
Her voice hitched upon that memory.
Aranya deadpanned, “Seems he had passably good taste in Pygmies, eh?”
Pip’s laughter trilled into the gathering dawn. Then, she said softly, “Would you like me to share a snippet of Zardon’s poetry with you?” When they enthusiastically agreed, she declaimed:
The blazing wings of dawn spirited me away,
Dragon-swift above the suns-rise,
Flying to my destiny beyond the clouds.
After that, for a long time the only sounds that broke the silence were the leathery flapping of wings and the slight creaking of wing struts responding to the changing pressures. At last they ascended into the first vermilion rays of suns-light, having left the great volcano five miles in their wake. How small it seemed now; the Island-World, brooding and immense.