by Marc Secchia
“Oh no, I’m fully self-taught,” Alodeé chortled, making an innocent-me face. “I thought you said –”
“Yep. My confusion, incoherence and inability to fly must have flamed that notion out of existence pretty quickly. It took me a long time to find myself again, to … feel like I was living. Now, you’ve shown me that I never did.”
How tough is this? She sighed, “I’m sorry, Mom?”
“Well, I’m not – ah, about you turning up out of the violet sun, so to speak. Although, I was considering murdering you. Dragon nests are sacred spaces. Even Sanhukahn of Ruby did not dare to enter.”
Alodeé said, “I sure messed up there, didn’t I?”
“Messed up? Coincidence, that was not.” Growling at her daughter’s expression, she snorted, “This realm measures over 721 kloms in diameter, with cliffs 12 kloms tall. How, of all the tens of thousands of Dragon caves in all the cliffs, did you miraculously end up in my lair? I see I may need to flame your green behind into conviction after all, young lady!”
Fair point.
“Mom, why did you let me go? This weird two-legged invader trooped into your nest, practically whistling down a bunch of carnoraptors to the feast – I mean, sorry hardly begins to cut the plascrete, does it?”
“No, but my dragonets convinced me. Especially little Emerald.”
“Emerald? That’s a pretty name.” The dragonet perked up as if she had heard the compliment. She zipped over to purr happily at Alodeé, who laughed, “Yes you, gorgeous scales!”
“We only name dragonets at one year old,” Samodeé explained. “Until then, I call them by their crystal – by the Eye, how do I say this? Their crystal affinity, perhaps? Ugh. Translation is such a challenge. You need to learn Pyromelodic.”
She waggled an eyebrow.
“Pyromelodic Ultraflutic Crystese, or PUC for short. That’s our language.”
“Sounds complicated.”
“It is.”
“Super-keen to learn. I’m an excellent student, too.” Her Mom flicked her wings in an amused gesture at her wry admission. “Along with the whole Class U heritage, I don’t get insta-magical mastery of the mysterious language of Dragons? Canid-sucking inconvenience, I tell you. So, what did they say?”
“They all insisted that you were their real sister.”
“Oh!”
Samodeé shook her head slowly. “You see, you’re not the only one struggling to believe. Out of the mouths of babes …”
Chapter 21
Standard 1301.07.19 Estimated – In the Village.
SAMODEÉ CALLED TO HER little troops, coaching them through flying in different formations and simulating attacks on an invader, Alodeé’s head being the target. Not appreciated, Mom. She taught her the basic tones for each word she used. The colourful quintet practised different types of dives, swoops, swerves, jinks, rolls and somersaults until, about half an hour into the flight, they began to flag visibly.
Newly-hatched. No great stamina. Platinum was the first to wing over to Mama Dragon’s back to take a break. To Alodeé’s surprise and delight, the mite snuggled right up to her, put her head on her lap and nodded off within half a min. Next came Emerald, the Gold twins and finally Red, who strove to continue longer than the others and therefore almost dropped over Mama’s side rather than landing properly. She pushed him back onboard with her great paw. He barely had strength to join his siblings and slumped behind Alodeé beside her mid-back perch.
The Dragoness of Emerald peered over her shoulder, taking in the scene.
“I’m not feeling popular at all,” Alodeé lied cheerfully. The scaly brood could not get closer if they tried. Emerald lay right on top of her feet.
The wonderful, fiery eyes did that mellowing which must signal motherly feelings, albeit on the toasty end of the scale. On cue, she crooned, “Now that’s a sight to warm a mother’s heart. All my babies together at once. How’s the big sister gig treating you?”
“Er, wonderful but uncomfortable? I like it, but phew, this does take some getting used to.”
“So does motherhood to six,” the Dragoness admitted. Alodeé had the impression that she rather enjoyed sharing with someone who approached adulthood. “Wings up! Language lessons?”
“Knock me out.”
Samodeé proved to be an excellent teacher. She had her daughter singing her heart out, figuring out tonal levels, trills, rising and falling tones, cadence and inflection. Once Alodeé had a basic understanding of what was going on and what to listen out for, they worked on simple vocabulary for things she could see and point to, from the moons to wings, from trees to Dragons’ tails. She had always been a person who could do well at academics, if she felt motivated. Never before had she tried to learn a new language, although it had crossed her mind that Oraman might at some stage come in useful – oh, she needed to tell Mom about her adoption into the family.
To her amazement, language learning felt natural. Stress-free. Sure, she worked her skinny green butt off, but she remembered notes and patterns better than she could have hoped for. Might even remember a good percentage of the vocab words tomorrow.
Sooner than she expected, the jade canyon came into view and Alodeé learned the four tremolo notes for ‘lake’. Gold lake? No, the musical way was to say, lake-of-gold. Aha. She tried to sing, ‘We fly to the golden lake,’ and made a royal mess of it. Verb to the end, present tense … ugh. Too many nuances not to be getting a headache.
Samodeé declared a break.
She stretched her aching back a touch. Festering lumoslugs! Numb bum, sore throat and a huge scary mother to swat all these pesky Pygmies on her behalf. What more could a girl ask for?
Information must have been exchanged, because the Dragoness of Emerald flew a laser-cut line straight to the site of her recent abduction. The Lightning Pygmies – a name that had caused her mother no end of amusement – acted delighted to discover Alodeé alive and in the company of a Dragoness. Traitors, she thought sourly. Do-gooders. Things could have gone so differently, ending up with her skull spitted on the end of a talon. Their method of assembly, as Samodeé winged in to a neat landing between the crystal houses, gave fresh perspective to the idea of a flash mob.
Mom, it turned out, had quite the celebrity status. She heard the sung version of ‘Samodeé’ from many throats. So, they spoke … PUC? Her Mom’s explanation of recent events, containing a few words the new student even understood, instantly converted half of the village into flash-grenades.
Alodeé ended up posing with Mom to her left and Emerald to her right, while four other very jealous dragonets lurked in the background.
The whole village cheered lustily.
Make that five green dragonets. Ah and here come my weapons. Untouched. Isn’t that nice?
The motherly monster threw her a mother-monsterish sort of look.
The teeny turncoat popped up to renew the – cough, cough – friendship. Alerted by that look as much as by the rumbling inside a massive chest, which betrayed more fire lurking in case the titian-haired teenager required chastisement, Alodeé behaved herself impeccably. Barely a snarky thought, even. She thanked the girl for reuniting her with her mother. Oh and by the end of this short tale, folk were wiping their eyes. Opaque white tears? Fascinating.
The Class scientists would gnaw off their left arms to study her.
Time for another communal swim. Quite a number of the boys perked up as she stripped down at the poolside, only to collect a blazing glare from Mom. Instant model citizens.
Well, well. Having a Dragoness in the house could be fun after all.
For that indiscreet thought, Samodeé picked her up and tossed her beneath the waterfall.
Her tiny friend tapped her excitably on the arm. Krr-pirrit bish-lishii?
Another Pygmy pressed her bow into her hand– aha! Some sort of giant oryx or mountain goat stood on a spar of crystal about 170 mets off and 50 mets up the sheer jade cliff. One order of dinner, please?
&nbs
p; Sure, she’d have a go.
“That’s too far a shot,” Samodeé commented. A muscle twitched in Alodeé’s jaw. “Alright, little daughter, prove me wrong.”
Now, a huge scowl for the ‘little daughter.’ Honestly? Seventeen, Mom, not seven!
Drawing the bow almost to its full reach, Alodeé checked the wind before lining up her shot. Twang! She thought she had missed, but the arrow dipped at the last sec and the oryx fell instantly, struck though the eye into the brain. Instant heroine.
“Shot!” her Mom approved.
She smiled at the Dragoness. “I’m full of surprises.” Oh heck and that tone? “Sorry. That was incredibly stroppy.”
“I’m taking copious notes on how to have a teenager,” the Dragoness fluted in amusement, having to damp her fires. “I’ll just go fetch your perfect kill, shall I?”
“Warning, you’ve started an endless list,” she laughed.
“I’m learning,” she said, gathering her brood with a peremptory, basso bugle note of command.
They whisked off to bring home the spoils, while she collected congratulatory slaps on the arms and a random pinch on the bottom. Boys! Rounding on the rascal with her enhanced speed, she bent and planted a loud smooch atop his spiky white hair. “Nice boy,” she said, patting him in the same spot for good measure.
His friends gave him no end of ribbing for that.
A feast was evidently an event of some significance, because they dispatched runners to the nearest ten or so villages to fetch enough mouths to do the offering justice. Yep. Now she had to have her biceps checked to make sure they were real. At least they left her backside alone for a change. Whoever thought cultures that lacked a nudity taboo were a good thing?
The people whom she called Lightning Pygmies had a name for themselves, a complex whistle with a trill mid-sound. She made everyone laugh trying to reproduce the word. Next, her friend’s name, a sound like a water droplet plinking into a glass. Alodeé grinned and made her most, ‘I shot dinner for you,’ heroic effort at copying the sound. Not totally awful. Plink tried to translate her name into Pyromelodic, which she could mimic successfully, but she had no idea what it meant, until Mom returned to help out.
“Probably, ‘Rainflash,’ is the closest I can think of,” she mused aloud. “A flash of white lightning reflected in a droplet.”
“Beautiful. Dawn’s fires, Rainflash.”
The girl smirked and imitated her every intonation and mannerism perfectly, “Beautiful. Dawn’s fires, Rainflash.”
“You are Rainflash. I am Alodeé.”
“You are … Alodeé. I am –” she chirped something cheeky, “– Rainflash?”
“Excellent.”
“Excellent.”
With that much mischief in the offing, maybe they would be friends after all? Unthinking, she bared her teeth a friendly smile. The girl hissed aggressively and flashed into a defensive posture. Sigh. Time to learn the word for, ‘Sorry.’ Plus, ‘that’s different in my culture.’
* * * *
The giant oryx was a beast worthy of the name. Samodeé only brought the catch in with supreme effort. The Pygmy tribes honoured the creature’s spirit in dance and song, before falling to the carving with zeal. Purple meat? Hmm. Sure smelled amazing on the spit, however. Suddenly, her appetite rose up like a ravenous Dragon, biting at her insides. Alodeé lurked with intent, snaffling a few tasters before the party really started.
Phew. Lightning Pygmies knew how to celebrate. With log drums thundering away and trumpets blaring, they kicked up such a ruckus that the canyon fairly rang with the sound. They taught her their dances, told stories and ate until their stomachs groaned.
Beneath a miraculously starry Resurrection Dawn sky, the people slowly sank down around the fire and Samodeé took over, telling the tale of her daughter’s arrival in their land. Embellished, she was certain. Maybe that was the local style of storytelling – the trait of adding details or extra effects to create a more compelling version was hardly a Class 1 Humanoid commodity. How far she felt from home. She remembered thinking how she would find the real Alodeé out here and had to conclude – after all these revelations, she was more confused than ever.
True daughter of a true Dragon? Right.
Mid-sentence, her mother’s gaze flashed to her.
And now I’ve hurt you. Why can I not stop hurting people I love? First Dad, now you …
Rising, she walked into the night to find space for her thoughts. Holy Resurrection Dawn, this was hard. Why did people put ‘holy’ in front of a world’s name? Had the Oraman been on to something, even had a premonition, when they advanced that name?
Did she believe in foresight?
Did she believe in a world where a person could literally be resurrected as a Dragon?
Sighing, she lay on a fragrant patch of yellow grass that gleamed with its own light and pondered the deep questions of life. First, what kissing Tomaxx might be like … oh dear. That sort of snuck up on her. Crossing her arms behind her head, she watched the night breeze change direction. She had felt the phenomenon before, but not noticed how it changed the direction of all the waterfalls, reversing their course to send them flying way, way up into the night sky. A turquoise Home Lair was the only one she could see from this angle, lying somewhere north of this canyon. It gleamed like a magnificent beacon out there.
This bowl must easily be visible from space. So what was it about Resurrection Dawn that made it so tricky to find and scrambled the best tech the galaxy had to offer? If her Mom was a true Dragoness, then somewhere in the 10.9 quadrillion cubic kloms out there, they should find another race of Dragons of Emerald. Begged the question. What about her? A People of Emerald? Samodeé had been a Humanoid before; prime evidence, the existence of one Alodeé. Maybe this kind of Dragon could change forms at will, masquerading as Humanoid. Maybe they never were Humanoid at all; maybe Dad wasn’t really her Dad, not in a genetic sense? Maybe her kind were mixed in a secret laboratory somewhere, designed and manipulated, blasted with a mysterious radiation treatment …
Total crud. Shut up, Alodeé!
Panting in reaction to her own scattershot thoughts, she glared up at serenity. Yep. Maybe home had always been right here and she just did not know it.
Too many questions. Had Samodeé been born here? How had she lost her memories? Where did her telepathy come from? Who were her parents? And how, if she was not a true Humanoid as well, had she given birth to this person?
Maybe she’s a mind-twisting psychopath bent on total domination of the Universe!
Yep. That plotline had been overused in the vids, years back. Some megalomaniac was always trying to blow it all to cosmic dust. Cue a bray of evil laughter. She just did not see this Dragoness as the type.
Was it possible for any person to be as twisted up as she was?
If a person she was …
She startled as the lightest of footsteps crunched grass blades next to her head. An ankle as white as the starlight above. Rainflash – oh and Emerald, too. The pair lay down beside her, not speaking a word. The tiny girl borrowed Alodeé’s elbow for a headrest. Emerald first lay on her stomach, but then twisted to lie on her side, her head resting on Alodeé’s stomach.
Stargazing with friends. Another new way to see the world.
With that, she released her angst into that infinite cosmic well. What rare beauty graced this night. Right now, all she need do was to lie still and be grateful for each breath. Tomorrow, a new day would dawn.
* * * *
Naturally, tomorrow refused to behave itself according to Alodeé’s blueprint for destiny. A storm developed during the night, waking her with a thunderous deluge. She, Rainflash and Emerald dashed for the cover of Mama Dragon’s wings. The dragonets watched the lightning display with huge eyes, growled belligerently at each peal of thunder and threatened to bend her ribs with all their cuddling. She told them everything would be alright.
Yep. Having just moaned about these lies, that
was exactly what she did – or, could it be that hope simply reimagined the present? Hope, a force inextricably intertwined with the potency of life itself.
Usually, Isska was the philosopher amongst her friends.
She lay awake as the others dropped off one by one, watching the storm clear and a meteorite shower play sporadically over the canyon. Time to take that next step.
In the morning, the storm returned for a second round. Not dawn so much as a soggy, grey brightening. Fresh torrents gushed down into the golden lake. They would have walked down a trail used by Rainflash’s people, but the flooding made it too dangerous for travel on foot. Those with paws had no trouble, however. The eight joined Ssirinssar of Gold beneath a jade overhang at the lakeside. He smiled at Alodeé’s consternation and told her that his kind travelled the waterways atop and beneath the islands. When she asked what happened if they fell from one of the flying waterways, he told her – and demonstrated with a spot of levitation – that his kind were able to sense and draw water-linked gravity into themselves.
Personal antigrav capability? Impressive.
Via Samodeé, he gave his most brilliant morning greetings considering the nature of the day and then slithered straight into business.
“Your report of several Obsidian Shaman Flyers concerned us greatly,” he said, without preamble. “That is, the hunters that you spotted – a feat of no small note – in the place of upwelling, which you crossed by the river. I have dispatched scouts to investigate with care.”
“Ah … several?”
He stilled. “What …”
“I saw thousands.” He hissed incoherently. “I’m sure. I apologise if that wasn’t clear before – are they dangerous to us?”
“They are ancient predators upon the Dragonkind.” His golden eyes glittered with suppressed rage, with urgency. “None have been seen inside the barrier in our generation, for in truth, one aspect of the ward-workings we described to you – the translucent barrier and its attendant creatures – is to keep these beasts from our realm. How did you detect them?”