Wings of Renewal: A Solarpunk Dragon Anthology

by Claudie Arseneault

  Abruptly, the dragon lifted his head to look at them. Alek took a step back, his hand resting on Oriole's arm, ready to pull her away.

  “You have aided one who is dear to me,” Dokeom said. So close, Oriole could hear more clearly the alien way his voice shaped human words, coming from a throat so long and vibrating, with an underlying hum like a huge cello. “All I can give you in return is your lives.”

  Alek's grip tightened on her arm, but Oriole just covered his hand with hers, not daring to look away from the predator's eyes, gleaming with tawny warmth even in the bleaching moonlight. “Your name is Dokeom?” she asked, and the dragon smiled. It was not a human expression of satisfaction, but a baring of teeth and a thrumming hiss of laughter.

  “I do answer to such. And whom do I address?”

  “I'm Oriole Aston, and this is my friend Aleksander Vetrov. We came from far away, Wandering.”

  “Then I thank Oriole Aston and Aleksander Vetrov for the life of my sister. A thousand seasons hence, I will remember you.”

  Oriole felt the skin on the back of her neck prickle. Did dragons really live so long? She glanced at Faewren, and abruptly realized how unlikely it was that Dokeom had learned the human language from her. And if she had not taught him, either the Accords were more thoroughly broken than she'd thought, or this black dragon had learned it before the law was signed.

  Dokeom stood silent, crouched with his chest pressed against the rough stone. His neck arched up so he could hold it close to Faewren, and though his wings were folded, Oriole saw a flash of iridescent blue where a breeze caught the edge of one. But for that, he might have been a statue of a dragon, forgotten on the plains.

  “Thank you,” Alek said at last, breaking the quiet. “We can't offer a thousand seasons, but I'm pretty sure we'll remember tonight for as long as we live.” Oriole blinked, her mind scrambling to pick up the pieces of the enchantment. She knew how close they were to leaving, all of them, and she couldn't bear it to be over.

  Faewren laughed at the dryness in his tone, and Oriole smiled at the dragon-lady, sitting with her hand on the edge of the dragon's jaw. “Thank you,” Faewren said, and in the dragon's shadow her vest reflected the same color as his eyes. “For everything.”

  “Don't get caught,” Oriole said, then stopped to clear her throat. This was everything she'd wanted, wasn't it? A beginning instead of an ending? But why did their beginning feel so much like her ending? “And maybe keep to smaller towns next time. Easier to get out of.”

  “Oriole,” Dokeom said her name from somewhere deep in his chest, so that it echoed as he spoke. His head lifted and curled until he held it maybe half a meter above theirs. “I know what it is you seek.”

  “I'm just Wandering,” she said at once, not sure where the words came from. “Seeking isn't the point.”

  “You will find your own tale. Do not worry about ours. We already know the ending. Va krae susasrar em daosr.”

  Faewren laughed again, and Oriole wished she understood what emotions lay behind the dragon-lady's expressions. She wished she knew what Dokeom had said. “Your story will be different,” Faewren said, even as Dokeom spread his wings with a powerful snap like sheets being pulled straight by the wind.

  Oriole stepped forward out of Alek's grip even as the dragon brought both wings down with a surge of wind strong enough to send pebbles the size of grapes flying across the ground. “Goodbye!” she shouted, but in the thunder she wasn't sure either of them heard her. Dokeom wrapped his claws around Faewren, who returned the gesture with her own small arms, and they were free from the ground. The sound of his wings faded slowly, though after less than a minute the two were impossible to see in the darkness. Occasional flashes of gold or blue caught Oriole's eye, but then she couldn't tell if it was the dragon or just a star, winking at her with all the uncaring brilliance of a terrible fire, burning millions of miles away.

  About Maura Lydon

  Maura Lydon is in the midst of studying Environmental Science at Hollins University, in southwestern Virginia. She enjoys reading, writing, and talking about nerdy stuff on the internet. She also regularly plays both Pathfinder and Dungeons and Dragons, and is always on the look-out for new vict—ahem—players. She currently shares an apartment in Roanoke with her twin sister and a very friendly cat named Giles.

  The Last Guardians

  by J. Lee Ellorris

  The last of a long line of draconic guardians, Saya and her mate, Demine, had watched over the City for nearly five hundred years. It bloomed below their roost like a garden, glittering in the morning sun; sea glass sprinkled in a meadow.

  When they had first fallen in love, Demine had flown with Saya over clay-topped brickwork houses, their sinuous forms twining together between bellows of ashy coal smoke from the City's factories. Now, slower and quieter in their old age, Saya tucked herself beneath her wife's wing and watched the last of the evening trains whisper on their electro-mag tracks.

  “Demine,” she whispered to her lover. “Another sunset.”

  The larger, sapphire-blue dragon tugged her close. “Not many left, now.”

  A dragon's lifespan was only two hundred thousand sunsets exactly. She knew Demine had hatched a week before her, and that when she … when Demine died, Saya would be the only one left. Alone.

  “Hush, Saya.” Demine's soft lilting voice cracked with age and her face was creased with lines, but when Saya looked at her, she saw the loud-mouthed girl who never stopped soaring, trailing laughter in her wake. “Don't waste the time we have in mourning.”

  Tails curled around each other, Saya closed her eyes, listened to the syncopated rhythm of their heartbeats, and tried to sleep.

  * * *

  There were few places in the City where Saya could go without damaging its structures or citizens. Over the years, stone had given way to a latticework of glass and steel that offered no traction for claws and made Saya feel ungainly.

  But on the outskirts of the city was an ancient dragon temple, built long before Saya or Demine were born—a calm, quiet place, preserved by the City as a historical landmark.

  Landing on her strong hind legs, she tapped the taloned fingers of her dexterous forearms on an engraving made before even her parents' time. Unlike the confections of colored glass making up the City's buildings, the temple was bulky and strong. Damp granite columns and trees as thick as her tail wrapped the place in cool darkness. She breathed deep, eyes closed, feeling the history in the stones.

  When we're gone, Saya thought, this will still be here, an old memory of our kind.

  Demine did not share Saya's desire to leave a mark on the City that had been their home. “It is an end, Saya,” her mate gently reprimanded. “The City has moved on. It no longer needs us. It is time for us to go.”

  Five hundred years should be long enough for anyone.

  * * *

  When Saya was young, there was an entire community of dragons that watched over the human population, gently guiding them, offering advice, and saving them from the worst of disasters. Her mother had been on the council, and her father helped the humans build their enormous structures by carrying stone and ferrying workers.

  “We were born to care for them, little pearl,” her father had said, near-translucent wings a tent over her head staining the light green. “You and your brothers and sisters were all born to protect and guide the City.”

  The soft lavender of her mother's careful nestmaking tickled young Saya's nose as she asked every child's question. “But why?”

  Eyes crinkling in a smile, her father replied, “Millions of years ago, humans begged the universe to save them, and the universe gave them us. Their love sustains us and our strength keeps them safe. We need each other.”

  In those days, there were so many dragons, their shared energy could summon magic. Together they would come together and sing, calling down starlight or charming power from the depths of the sea to forge protective charms, heal the injured, or invite ferti
lity and prosperity to the human lands.

  As each member of their clan grew old and died, however, the magic weakened. And now that Saya and Demine were alone, they could barely even breathe fire.

  * * *

  On occasion, Demine would indulge Saya's melancholy moods and visit the old places with her. They would walk together, their wings sliding against each other as they wandered side by side.

  Saya took her mate to visit their parents' graves—opalescent bones lodged into the sheer cliff face overlooking the ocean. They had died so long ago that even their grave markers were gone, likely dropped into the sea and sunk deep into the sand. But Saya could feel them, a dwindling essence of spirit that felt familiar, and she whispered the names of each of them as she passed their graves.

  Ilassa. Moro. Phae. Deana. Coralyn.

  A claw drew lightly over Saya's shoulder and she turned to see her wife's face soften in sympathy. “It is good to say goodbye,” she said. “Perhaps we should prepare a farewell ceremony for the City as well.”

  Dread crawled through her veins at the idea. “I don't want to say goodbye. I don't want to leave them.”

  There had always been a dragon to watch over the City. For thousands and thousands of years, their kind had protected the people and the people had cared for them, keeping them strong with their reverence and respect.

  “Saya,” Demine sighed. “They haven't needed us for well over a hundred years.”

  As if to make her point, the sound of children laughing echoed down the rock face, and the light ringing of a harbor bell came from below. The City was thriving. It had transformed from the harsh, dark thing it had been in Saya's youth to a flourishing paradise of life. It had become something Saya was proud of; a child who had finally grown into a beautiful young woman, confident and capable.

  “They will always need us,” Saya said. A child always needs its mother.

  Her mate simply shook her head and lifted her wings to return to their home.

  * * *

  Another dozen sunsets passed. Saya had tried to count them, but their lives were too long for counting. She only knew it would be soon.

  Demine had told the City over the years that the end was coming, mentioned it at every festival they presided over. The people knew, and watched them with wistful sadness.

  “We should have a ceremony,” Demine said again. “We owe the City a goodbye.”

  This time, Saya nodded, a hot ache behind her eyes. “All right. Make the preparations.”

  It was scheduled for the next full moon, in the large atrium in the center of the City. They would open the skylights to the sweet summer air and spend the evening exchanging stories, memories of many lifetimes shared, of the partnership between humans and dragons that was coming to an end.

  The very thought gave Saya a headache.

  She flew back to the resting place of her family, dug her claws into the cliff side, and shouted into the graves. “Why are we the last? Why didn't you have more children? Why didn't we ever try to have a child?” She pressed her horned skull against the rough stone, voice dulling to a whisper. “I don't want to be the last.”

  A glimmer of warmth wrapped around her forearm where it latched onto the cliff. She blinked and stared at her long, curving talons. That warmth was still there. In fact, she thought she may have heard her father's gruff laughter amid the pounding waves below her.

  Saya thrust her entire forearm and shoulder into the cavern she had been shouting into, pawing at the gravel and dust until her palm slid over smooth, cold bone.

  And that warmth wrapped tight around her, an energy lifting in her lungs. Joy sang inside her and she laughed, expanding her wings to feel the sun on her back.

  The magic wasn't lost.

  As her laughter faded to a sigh of wonder, she heard her father's voice.

  “Then don't be the last.”

  * * *

  Demine stretched leisurely beneath Saya, her wife's body curling around hers with the comfortable ease of a lifetime spent loving each other. Another sunset had come and gone, and the haze of light from the city painted the midnight horizon in shades of lavender and grey. Overhead, satellites twinkled, pulsing with blue or green or red glitter as they crossed through much dimmer stars.

  “Sweetheart,” Saya said, struggling to keep the excitement from her voice. “What if we weren't the last?”

  Her wife's body stiffened, then carefully relaxed. “We haven't heard from any of the other clans since before we bonded. It's possible there's a few left, scattered or hidden somewhere on the planet, but—”

  “But what if we didn't have to be the last? What if, Demine?”

  She sighed. “If that were at all possible, you know it would be nothing short of a miracle, and a blessing.”

  Saya hid her grin in the crook of her wife's neck. “Even though the City 'doesn't need us' anymore, and it's good that we're leaving?”

  Demine's forearms tightened around the smaller, white-ridged dragon. “Saya, I don't want to leave the City. I don't want to leave you.” Her voice grew thick and she took a moment before continuing. “But I've accepted reality for what it is. I've made my peace with it.” She drew her talons lazily down the ridge of Saya's spine. “I worry about you. You need to make your peace as well.”

  “I'll be fine.” She nuzzled her mate with the end of her snout and hid another grin as she felt the magic humming in her bones, a tingle just below her scales.

  I don't need peace. I have a miracle.

  * * *

  They spent much of the following weeks planning for the ceremony. Demine had meetings with the City council, ritualistic ingredients to collect, and decorations to prepare for.

  Saya had her own preparations. When her mate dropped off to sleep, she'd slip from her embrace and glide down from their nest atop the mountain.

  Down the side of the mountain, gardens covered every roof in a stair-step pattern, and the metallic glint of solar paneling reflected moonlight between them. Saya angled herself away from the City so they would not hear her passing, only see a shadow in the night sky.

  She flew to the cliffs, reached deep into the graves, and removed the bones of her ancestors.

  Desecration, her thoughts reminded her. Disturbing sacred ground.

  But the hum of magic in her veins grew stronger as she wrapped her arms around the remains, the voices of her family almost audible on the sea air as she carried them to the heart of the City. You are not alone. You do not have to be the last.

  The people had taken to leaving the great dragon door to the atrium unlocked for Demine's use, and Saya quietly lifted it, slipping into the space.

  It was a garden in a bottle—delicate hothouse flowers bloomed in bunches along the pebbled paths, with vines and mosses dripping off covered archways. In the center, a pond teemed with elegant fish in reflective shades of cobalt and gold, fed by a burbling brook constructed to wind through the paths.

  It was beautiful in a gentle, cultivated way, a paradise too fragile to flourish without assistance. The atrium was striking, breathtaking even, but only kept alive through a delicate routine of cultivation by the City's trained gardeners.

  Were humans to abandon it, the rainbow of blossoms, the sweet tangle of grasses and shrubs lining the paths would be overrun with weeds and pests before a year had passed.

  Saya gripped the bones tighter, careful to keep her tail aloft and her back legs stable on the narrow human pathways as she threaded her way through the atrium, following what had become her nightly routine.

  Saya had hidden pieces of her ancestors—vertebrae tucked beneath the shrubbery, tailbones tied to the high branches of trees. The largest of the bones she buried in strategic places along the perimeter where the domed kaleidoscope of glass met the ground.

  Tonight, her preparations were complete. She had followed one of the patterns carved into the walls of the temple—the one used for revival, for the renewal of strength.

  Her memories guided
her. The first night she joined in the spellwork as a member of the clan and not a child. Gripping mother's talons in her own as she stood carefully on the space marked out for her, as she lifted her voice. Remember, Saya, it's all right if you falter over the words. Focus on the meaning, pour your will and energy into wanting this to be, and you will do fine. Eyes shining, face glowing with pride at her mother's smile afterward as she nuzzled the top of her head. You did well, daughter.

  With the ghost of that pride warming her heart, she packed the earth over the last of her mother's bones, placed beneath the shadow of a bridge. She pressed a kiss to her palm and placed it gently atop her mother's new resting place and whispered, “Thank you.”

  * * *

  The morning of the ceremony, Saya woke in Demine's arms.

  They spent a long moment smiling and nuzzling each other's necks. Saya had expected this day to feel hollow, cold, filled with dread. But instead, a surge of affection rose in her chest as she lay beside the other half of her soul, the one she had spent a lifetime loving and who never stopped amazing her.

  Neither had spoken of it, but they had both felt it. The ceremony that night would be a goodbye, not only to the City, but to each other.

  Demine would likely not last another day.

  “Stay with me,” Saya whispered. “Let's not leave the nest until evening.”

  Demine chuckled and pressed her face to her love's. “Sounds perfect.”