by A. D. Adams
He then saw what looked like a man on the dragon’s back, which seemed impossible, for he had been the only male human to ever ride a dragon. As the pair approached, they seemed less than solid, almost wispy in appearance. The man looked much like Terra, except smaller. They landed near him as he stood up.
“Lowlack, is that you?” Terra asked in a bewildered tone.
“Yes my friend, it is, and I have brought you a visitor,” Lowlack said in his familiar voice.
“But you're dead! You can’t be,” Terra’s voice trailed off in surprise as the man jumped to the ground. The man looked like the sketch his mother had of his father.
“We are here only a short time. We are no longer of this world. We now belong to another existence. We have come to advise you,” the man said, his image wavering in the wind.
“Who are you?”
“I was your father. Your mother and I lost part of ourselves when you were taken. I grieved for you and my last living thought was of you, my son.”
“Who sent you?”
“Let us say it was a friend.”
“Why have you come?”
“This world is dying and all who live on it will die with it. Unless the darkness is stopped soon, the damage will be irreversible.”
“I have been told this,” Terra said with a downcast look.
“Yes, I know, but it is your decision whether you will do something about it.”
“What choice do I have?” he asked quietly.
“You are a powerful being. You could keep a safe place for you and your family, but all others would be lost. I tell you this because the future, your future, cannot be made by another. It must be made by you, and at your choice.”
“I have yet to decide what I should do,” Terra said as he sat down and leaned his back against a rock.
“Son, I know you would like to be free to raise your family and not bound to help others. I was like you, but there are times when you must choose a path not to your liking. You have already done that several times and you will have to do it again, for the benefit of all.”
“Yes, perhaps,” Terra said in a sad voice.
“Our time here is short, we must leave soon. How are your mother and sister? I miss them terribly.”
“They are fine, I take care of them now.”
“Good! We may be able to return again, but before we go, I must tell you that there are nine magical powers. The amulet image upon the skin of your chest indicates the number of powers you have used so far. Each time you use a new power, another gem will be lit. All eight of the lower gems are lit; you can now master the ninth power. The top most crystalline gem will light upon its use. The ninth power is the only one that can truly destroy the darkness.”
“I understand, but what is the ninth power?”
“You must discover that for yourself,” His father walked to Lowlack and mounted him.
“Will I see you again?”
“We may someday return, until then, a word of advice. You have only really seen a small part of the valleys and the humans that live within them. Learn of those who need your help before you make your decision,” he said from Lowlack’s back.
“Tell my friends that I am happy, all my pains are gone and I can fly through places of unbelievable beauty,” Lowlack said, with his great head turned toward Terra.
“I will tell them,” Terra said with a smile.
“I hope to see you soon, son,” Terra’s father yelled from the back of the great dragon as Lowlack leaped from the cliff. They soared toward the great water, then sailed up in an arc toward the sun and disappeared.
Terra sat back and made a decision to visit the valley humans. He would see if they were worth the risk of his life. He climbed to his feet and changed back into the white dragon for his return trip to the crevice.
Chapter 4 - The Gathering of Power
(A struggle can sometimes begin at a time of joy.)
- The Time of the Draman -
Fienna knew what had happened on top of the cliff. She knew his thoughts and he kept nothing from her. She did not understand where Lowlack and his father had come from, but they had come. She also knew he would leave to see the valley humans soon, but before he left she wanted to go to the dragon gather.
The dragon gather rarely happened and Fienna wished to take her new daughter. Terra agreed, but had a feeling of foreboding about this gathering. He had never had a feeling like this before and did not know quite what it meant. Everyone knew Terra turned into the great white dragon - the only white one to have existed in the memories of the dragons. He was significantly larger than any other dragon. It was the custom of the dragons to introduce the young at the ancient volcanic bowl where the great gathering was held. Normally, it occurred at the time when a dragon became an adult, but many of their dragon friends had told them to introduce their daughter now. The question was how to get there. Terra had decided to carry his mate and their young one as a dragon. It would, in some ways, be his introduction also, for very few of the dragons had actually seen him in his dragon form.
In the morning, As Terra walked through the cave, his sister stopped him.
“May I go with you to the dragon gather?” she asked with a great deal of curiosity.
“I wish I could, but only dragons can go,” Terra replied.
“You went before you started to change,” she said in protest.
“True, but I have always been a dragon,” he said as he placed his hand on her shoulder and gave her a gentle squeeze and a smile.
She knew he would not change his mind, so she did not pursue the request. Terra walked through the cave entrance and found his mate and daughter waiting. He disrobed and as the nymphs, dragons and his mother and sister watched, he began to change. As he stood in his dragon form before them, he reached down and picked Fienna and their child up. As he held them in his great fingers, a bubble of light formed around the two. They felt only a gentle warming as Terra leaped into the air and flew up toward the great winds.
Along the coast of the great landmass, there were upper winds known to the dragons. When they flew into them, they could fly at incredible speeds, and depending on the height, they could control the direction. Terra, along with all the other dragons, flew into the winds that took him toward the great volcanic bowl used by the dragons for their gatherings. He dropped out of the winds, and into the bowl. They landed at the cave entrance he and Fienna had first used to allow him to watch her first gathering.
Terra perched on the edge of the cave, setting Fienna and his new daughter down next to him. They watched as dragons from the entire coastal region arrived. Terra also saw dark, ominous clouds forming on the opposite side of the bowl. As custom dictated, the oldest dragon flew to the center of the bowl and bellowed for quiet. Many of the dragons had been looking at Terra and Fienna, pointing and whispering about the sight before them. Only a few had seen Terra in his dragon form and even less had seen Fienna in her human form. They were amazed at the size of Terra, for he was a third bigger than any other dragon.
As the gathering became quiet, the old dragon asked for any news from the assembled group, and invited any dragon to fly down and give the information. As he spoke, the dark clouds flowed over the bowl and began to churn. They started to circle around and powerful rumbles shook the ground.
“Fienna, take our daughter into the cave,” Terra ordered as he spread his wings and took off.
She backed into the small cave and watched as a great bolt of lightning exploded from the clouds, striking the old dragon at the center of the bowl. The lightning then focused on Terra, and as the bolts struck his crystalline back ridge, the spikes down the length of his body glowed. Several of the dragons flew to help the old one and many others took off in a panic, only to be buffeted by the building winds. Terra's powerful voice cut through the noise of the dragons and the winds, saying, “stay down.”
Terra began to fly around the bowl’s edge at an ever-increasing speed. Great bolts
of lightning struck him on his back ridge over and over. He faltered for a moment while his ridge lit up like an exploding star. The strike seemed to have little effect on him. As his speed increased, more bolts struck him, only to be absorbed and then reflected back as blinding bursts of light. As a vortex built from his flight, the clouds began to be pulled into its center. Terra let loose a huge blast of orange fire. The fire burst out into the center of the forming vortex, burning away the clouds. As he reached his greatest speed, the vortex seemed to pull the entire sky into its center and turn as black as the deepest cave. Terra pulled up and faced the twisting mass. He inhaled a massive lungful of air and let out a flame of pure orange heat. The whole world seemed to be bathed in the power of the light as it flooded into the vortex. Streaks of the flame were at first swallowed by the blackness, but then the twisting cone set on fire from within. Suddenly, the entire tornado of fire burst upward into the high winds, disappearing from the bowl. Terra settled down to the ground and folded back into his naked human form, collapsing to his knees as the transformation completed.
“Terra!” Fienna’s mind screamed out.
“I am fine, my love, just tired,” he thought back to her.
A protective phalanx of dragons flew to surround Terra, while several dragons flew to the cave to protect Fienna and their daughter. The sky was once again as clear as if nothing had happened. Terra slowly regained his strength and rose to his feet. He walked to the old dragon, but he had been killed instantly. He looked about the bowl. Some dragons had landed, while others were flying around in complete confusion.
“Settle!” Terra said in a voice that penetrated the entire bowl.
“This was not a storm, but an attack. The force that drove the humans to this coast many seasons ago was now trying to destroy them, as well as you. We must be prepared to deal with those beyond the mountain, for they will attack again. This world is dying and it will take the combined efforts of the dragons and all others who live upon her, to save us all. I know some of what happened during the time of the Great Fight that drove the humans to the coastal lands, but I will find out more. I will soon call upon all of you to help me save our world. Each of you must decide if you will help.”
As he finished his words, he knew he had committed to fighting whatever was attacking him and this world. He concentrated and began to change back into his dragon form. He rose from the bowl and collected his family, flying into the high winds.
Chapter 5 - The Slaughter
(What many will do, one would never consider.)
- The Time of the Draman -
Terra stood looking over the crevice and wished he and Fienna could simply stay here and live their lives in peace. He now knew that was not meant to be. After the attack at the dragon gather, he understood no other creature on this world would be safe until he had dealt with the force beyond the mountains. Somehow, he knew he would need more than the dragons to go beyond the mountains and defeat whatever waited there. He decided to start where his mother and sister lived. He would not go in his dragon form, but as a human. He had already asked Dawra, the dragon mother of Fienna, to take him and his sister to the village. Fienna understood that he had to go, but dreaded his departure. The dragons and sea nymphs would protect her and their daughter. She would still know his thoughts, but she wanted to be physically close not just mentally with him.
As Dawra flew Terra and his sister, Faray, back to her home, the three saw numerous smoke plumes coming from the village. The sight that greeted their eyes from the air was devastating to Faray. The entire village was burning, and bodies lay about, unmoving. Dawra landed in the center of the village rather than the clearing that she normally came down into. Terra jumped from her back and helped his sister to the ground. Faray began to cry as they walked around the area. Everyone was dead; not one person seemed to have survived the attack. Terra held his sister, but suddenly turned away. He walked to a great beam sticking out from under a collapsed roof. He initially felt something before he heard a low whimpering from beneath the beam. He reached down and lifted a heavy piece of wood. Underneath the debris, he found Sifar, the young human that he had met the first time he came to the village.
He was curled in a ball and crying. Terra picked him up and carried him to Faray.
"Take care of him," he said as he turned in the direction of the road that led off into the distance.
Terra began to run with a speed that was beyond understanding. He disappeared down the road as Dawra took off to follow him. She could see Terra moving along the path, her eyes followed the trail and saw that it came to a small river. It then followed along the bank until it entered a rocky valley between two mountains. A large number of human males were a short distance from the valley. She estimated Terra would catch them near the center of the narrow area, where the river had carved out a small flat section of land with high vertical stony walls. Dawra thought about helping Terra, but this was a human problem, not one for a dragon. She landed on a peak above the valley, where she could see all that would happen.
The group of humans, a hundred or so, stopped in the center of the valley to drink from the river. Terra entered the valley in that oddly quiet run he had. He stood behind the men on a small rock ledge that was slightly above the group.
"You killed my friends. You owe them their lives," Terra said in a voice so powerful that the ground itself shook.
The men turned in surprise and most grabbed for their weapons. Some had odd branches strung with thin vines. They took out straight pointed sticks and placed them into the branches tied with vines and then let the sticks fly toward Terra. He again spoke just one word, "No," and the sticks shattered in midair. Those closest to Terra grabbed their ears in pain as they dropped their weapons. Ten or so managed to keep their long metal blades and long wooden sticks and charged him.
He again used his sounder power and said, "Stop."
Those charging toward him were blown back, their bones crushed. A few with long thin wood shafts recovered enough to throw them at this deadly stranger, which was the last act of violence they ever performed. As the spears flew toward him, he used the one word that destroyed all - Silla. The world seemed to stand still as his magic propelled the overwhelming sound through the valley. The shafts appeared to stop in midair and then disintegrated into dust and the humans before him evaporated into clouds of red mist. The rock walls and ground shattered into gray shards and dust, which created a reddish gray cloud of death before Terra.
Terra stood unmoving at the apex of the destruction. He heard a whimper to his left and turned to see a head of a young human poked out from behind a boulder. He walked over and found a frightened, small young human crammed into the small crevice between a boulder and the rocky valley wall.
"Tell whoever sent you more is owed," Terra said to the human with a look of anger as well as pain. Terra turned and left the human shivering in fear. The youth stayed in his crevice until sunset, when he heard a movement. He tried to push himself further into the small space, making a scraping noise. Soon a woman on a runner appeared around the edge of the boulder, looking about until she spotted the terrified shivering youth.
The woman dismounted and walked to the young one and stared down at the disgusting sight. She could smell the fear from the youth. He looked through his fingers, which were covering his eyes and saw a woman in man’s clothes, with a long knife slid through her belt and a bow slung across one shoulder. She was fearsome looking to the youth and he tried to curl into a smaller ball of shivering flesh.
The woman looked at the destruction about her. She saw the rocks and the floor of the valley shattered and covered with a reddish gray dust. It was as if an earthquake had happened, but with far more destruction. She wanted to know what the youth had seen, so she reached down, grabbed his clothes, and pulled him out, forcing him to stand. He whimpered like a small child missing his mother.
“What happen here?” she asked, as his legs gave out and he collapsed to the ground
. She bent over and again grabbed him by the shoulder and repeated her question with anger in her voice.
“A man, a huge man stood before us as we reached this spot,” the youth said in a trembling voice.
“Continue,” she said as she shook him.
“He was in a rage. The men attacked him with arrows and spears. He said the word 'No' and the arrows turned to dust. Then he said 'Stop' and men were blown off their feet. Finally, he said a strange word, and the men and their weapons exploded into a red mist. The rocks shattered and the ground cracked and moved, you could feel the power everywhere. I was hiding behind the boulder and was saved.”
“He said three words and nothing else?” she asked with a serious expression.
“He said something else. He saw me and told me that more was owed.”
“What did he mean?”
“The-the village. The men destroyed it and killed all the people,” the youth blurted out in absolute terror.
“Where is the village?” She asked, trying to control her anger without much success.
“Back down the road,” he said as he pointed the way.
The woman grabbed him and tied him onto her pack runner and she mounted her runner and road down the path toward the village.
Chapter 6 - Visits
(Good and bad all deserve a chance.)
- The Time of the Draman -
Terra returned to the village and looked over the destruction. He hoped not all humans were this vicious. He would find out soon. Terra sent everyone to the crevice. He changed to his dragon form and used his talons to create a long trench. He then found all the bodies and gently placed each one into the trench. He covered the bodies with the soil from the trench and flew into the air. He flew around and back toward the trench while breathing in deeply. Terra then sent a searing hot stream of fire at the ground above the trench. The soil melted and turned into a hard rock as it cooled, making a permanent tomb for the villagers. Terra then flew back to the crevice.