Hello, everyone!
I hope everyone has been doing well. Good luck to all of you in finals or finishing them up! And I hope all of you have been having/will have restful holidays.
As always, I want to thank NomexGlove, Samateus-Taal, Zerac, Epclaymore, MysteryWriter175, NightfuryDreemurr, VigoGrimborne, JustAnotherRandomPoster, and picothea for all of your reviews on the interlude! I truly appreciate all of you who take the time to share your thoughts.
Without further ado, here is the next chapter! Hopefully I will be able to upload again fairly soon!
Chapter 12
nameless
Warmth. Moss-scent. Soft, deep breathing. Scales pressed to my hide.
The sensations bloomed as I crawled out of the nothingness of my sleep, as if I were lost Under and searching for a pocket of air. I would have drifted back into the deep cold—I somehow knew I already had several times before—were it not for the sound of flapping wings.
"How was it?" a dragon directly above me asked. Killed the Sea Serpent.
The other dragon sighed.
Killed the Sea Serpent tensed. Something pressed tighter against my side—a wing. "I told the fool to be silent on the matter."
"It seems he decided that he knew better," said the other dragon—Fought the Leader. Footsteps and gentle vibrations in the ground signalled her approach. "Saved the Swimlings never liked her—always complaining about having to swap responsibility with her, always saying she was late and shouldn't be alone with the swimlings." She paused. "Many of our flock see this as a bad omen."
Killed the Sea Serpent snarled. "Of course they do. The fools. Why do they go looking for reasons to support this—this—superstition!"
Fought the Leader's voice was smooth and calm despite the rage reverberating through the nest. "What did cause it?"
Killed the Sea Serpent fell silent. Voice tight, she growled, "I don't know."
I dared to peek my eyes open. All I saw was a dark, gray-blue smudge; Killed the Sea Serpent had drawn her wing completely over my head.
"So, what now, then?" Fought the Leader asked.
"I need to show them this foolishness for what it is."
"Killed the Sea Serpent," Fought the Leader said, "may I be blunt?"
She stuttered in surprise and said softly, "Of course, Fought the Leader."
"You keep calling this superstition," Fought the Leader said. "When she emerged from the Under for the first time, can you describe all of the events that happened? From the beginning?"
"What does this have to do with anything?"
"Can you just do it, please?"
With a sigh, she relented, "Raced the Auroras was the one who saw her emerge. She was worried about her small body and white scales. She could tell that she was blind. So she broke tradition and brought her to the rest of our flock. We didn't…" her voice tightened, "…we didn't know how to tend to her, and we had just lost Healed the Flightling, so we called for help from the other species."
"And then what?"
"Why is this so important?" Killed the Sea Serpent snapped. "We all know what happened."
"Because you have never addressed this one important thing," Fought the Leader said sternly. "When she was brought before all of our flock and the other dragons, what happened?"
Killed the Sea Serpent's tone took on that of defeat, as if she had been fighting not to say it. "The world went dark and cold. All of the animals and insects went away. We looked up and saw that the sun had turned black from the moon. And then…"
She trailed off.
"…they disappeared," Fought the Leader finished. "The sun and the moon disappeared, and we heard a terrible roar."
She didn't respond. I felt the wing press tighter against my body, which had suddenly run cold.
I remembered the day. The baffled concern of all the dragons surrounding me. Why was I like this, what had gone wrong with me? Why was I so small, so blind, the color of bone long-since polished by the sun? And then the cold and dark—suddenly I thought I was Under. I didn't know it was strange until the terror and confusion strangled the kindness out of all the dragons around me. There was screaming that it was me. Omen. Curse. Fire. Many lunged forward to end my life where I stood, snapping gnarled teeth and raking their claws at a helpless flightling who had never known the Above.
Killed the Sea Serpent had dove over me and used her body as a shield, her wings a blanket of gray-blue, just as they were now.
"We thought the world was ending," Fought the Leader murmured. "All of us."
Killed the Sea Serpent gave a bitter laugh. "All of it lasted for only a few minutes. The crystals still glowed. Nobody mentions that anymore."
"We still don't know what caused it," Fought the Leader said. "The sun and moon were gone, Killed the Sea Serpent! The first ones continued to live in that moment, but nothing else changed. The only thing that was unusual before it happened was her. And now, nobody knows if that will happen again, or if it will be permanent if it does. You must remember how easy it is to grasp for explanations for something so frightening. You know how Outsiders will say anything to justify their magic and fake gods; do you think that we are immune to the same kind of thinking?"
At the word magic, she stiffened. "No," she growled. "I don't."
"So," Fought the Leader said, "I'll ask you again: what now?"
o.O.o
When I awoke the next morning, Killed the Sea Serpent was sitting at the entrance to her nest, the golden sunrise swirling in a light fog around her.
"You're awake," she said without the slightest hint of surprise. She turned her head towards me, her eyes the same color of the light pooling through the crystalline cavern. The luminescent scales on her neck glowed magenta. "No responsibilities for today."
I blinked in surprise. It wasn't unusual for dragons to simply spend time in the Shell, although they were responsible for their own hunting. It was unusual for Killed the Sea Serpent to pass up responsibilities, though.
"I'm sorry," I croaked without really knowing why. I rose on shaky legs, grimacing as phantom pains streaked through my limbs.
"It's not your fault," Killed the Sea Serpent murmured. She stretched her wings, catching the light in them. "It never was."
"What do you mean?" I said, brows furrowing.
She shook her head with a snort. "Just…the way the others treat you."
I lowered my head. Without thinking, I blurted, "I overheard your conversation with Fought the Leader. I'm sorry."
She actually laughed. "Oh, I know. You jerked like a flightling having a bad dream when you woke." She glanced over at me. "But, I'm glad that you were honest. I will be as well. We both know this superstitious nonsense is rooted in…whatever happened that day. Fought the Leader was right, as usual." She rolled her eyes in exaggerated exasperation before growing serious. "I need to set a thing or two straight."
I crept over to her, head below hers and tail dragging on the ground. Sitting down beside another dragon felt like asking to be clawed away. I steeled myself and did it anyways, wincing from habit before calming myself. "I'm so thankful for everything you've done for me," I whispered. "But…what can you do?" Resting my eyes on my feet, I said, "I don't want you to have to fight other dragons for me."
"I am your leader," she said. "That's what I'm supposed to do."
"But…" I grimaced, my mouth working and my tongue heavy, like the shameful words were fighting to go unsaid. "What if…what if I am a curse?"
She was silent. I risked a peek up at her and immediately regretted it. Her eyes were laced with sorrow, her brows drawn tight and ears and frills flattened against her skull. Guilt flooded through me—stupid, stupid of me to bring it up, to force her to try to justify why it wasn't true, even as she opened her nest to me and cared for me when nobody else would.
"You are not a curse," she said sternly. "Do you hear me? You are a good dragon. We just need to show the others what I have already seen, alright?" She gave me a short lick on the forehead, like I was a flightling.
A shudder went through my body. Then guilt and dread. The simplest contact with another dragon lifted my spirits for hours, as sad as it was. Yet I felt like it was all a dream on the brink of shattering, leaving me feeling more alone than ever before, now that I had felt what it was to belong, even if only a little bit.
"Come on," she said, opening her wings. She sprung from her nest and snapped her wings and tailfins into the sky-winds. I followed with my sight-sounds.
She took us away from our flock's territory, which encompassed the very edge of the Shell. With the border's opal mountains at our tails, we struck further inland, away from the ocean. We flew through the upper levels of the Shell, well within reach of the warm sunlight. Crystals and stone pillars jutted out of the stones at steep angles. Waterfalls fell onto plateaus, kicking up mist and forming lakes that flowed into smaller waterfalls. Trees waved their branches in the wind. Huge fields of long, flower-speckled grass rustled like a green ocean. Ocean-salt-scent mingled with the smells of greenery, fertile earth, and nectar. Bugs buzzed about, birds flitted about in their usual chirping panic…
…and dragons flew.
All flocks had their own territories. The Shell was so big, though, that there were areas between for everyone. There were even specific places that were for multiple flocks to gather, though I had never visited.
I stayed as close to Killed the Sea Serpent as I dared once I began to hear the voices and wingbeats of other dragons. Dragon-scent wafted on the wind, dozens of different species all together in these common-grounds. My sight-sounds bounced off of so many things that most dragons would have quit, but I was able to pierce through the chaos. There, a dragon of the same species as Defeated the Outsiders. A little below, resting on a pillar, a species that walked on two legs and shot spines from their tails. Tussling in an aerial play-fight above were young dragons shaped like our species, but with many spines, longer necks, and two tails.
Killed the Sea Serpent alighted on a sun-dappled field in the shadow of an enormous tree. A waterfall blasted into a lake several wing-beats away. The lake smelled of ocean, which meant that it was not safe to drink—but there was a good chance it had fish in it. It didn't flow into another waterfall, so I knew there must be an outlet somewhere in it that led Under.
"Are you sure this is…safe?" I asked, remembering my last adventure into the Shell. My burns had healed, but the memory still stung.
"Of course," Killed the Sea Serpent said in confusion. Then, remembering who she was speaking to, amended, "Ah, I see. As you know, all species have their own little territories throughout the Shell. However, most of it is open to all. It would be hard to wander into someone's territory, and besides, I wouldn't let you."
I sniffed at the air, taking in all the dragon-scents. "It doesn't smell like anyone in particular."
"Exactly. And, listen," she said.
Above the waterfall, wind, and bustle of the foliage, the sound of chattering dragons was just as loud as a flock of birds.
"I never…" I paused, taking it all in. Unnamed dragons needed escorts, so I had hardly spent any time wandering the Shell in all my seasons. I had thought it strange; but after the nameless male's and my encounter with Defeated the Outsiders, I suspected it was also to protect young, ambitious dragons from causing trouble just to earn a name.
Killed the Sea Serpent was silent, waiting for me to gather my words.
"…I suppose," I mumbled, "I'm not used to dragons being so kind to one another."
She nodded, her expression forlorn. "Well, let's see to getting you adjusted, then."
We stayed on that pillar for some time, watching and listening to the dragons around us. It took me some time to sort it out through my sight-sounds, but, eventually, I realized that dragons of different species were all spending time together. It seemed completely alien to me, as a dragon who had spent all of her time within her flock, spurned from the others. The more I paid attention, the more I noticed all of the different kinds of dragons playing, flying, and eating together.
So when three dragons, all of them of different species, landed on our pillar, I was terrified—but prepared.
"Hello, Killed the Sea Serpent!" a female greeted.
"We're not bothering you, are we?" another female asked.
The last one, a male, remained silent, a footstep behind the others.
"No, you're not," Killed the Sea Serpent laughed. "Have we met?"
"N-no, but we saw you fight all those suns ago!" the first dragon said.
"You were amazing!" the second added.
"And you!" the first said to me. "You're the—"
The male cut her off with a hiss. I stepped closer to Killed the Sea Serpent, eyes low.
"What are your names?" Killed the Sea Serpent asked. She wrapped her tail around me, which eased some of the tension out of my muscles.
They introduced themselves: one female was Fed the Flock, another was Survived the Storm, and the male was…
"Escaped the Monsters," he muttered, looking away. He was a four-legged species and he crouched low to the ground in a shut-in posture I was all too familiar with.
I looked up in confusion. Even my flock leader paused.
"Well," she said, "that must have a story behind it."
"I have an idea!" Survived the Storm said. "Let's all hunt together, and we can share stories."
"She wants to be a storyteller," Fed the Flock explained. "Which means Escaped the Monsters and I have to suffer through the same stories over and over and over while she practices them."
"You say you like them!" Survived the Storm cried, offended. "You owe me a fish, just for that!"
"Yes, Fed the Flock, you owe her a fish," Escaped the Monsters approved. Through his serious tone, though, I could hear just a little bit of amusement.
Killed the Sea Serpent turned to me. "What do you think?"
I glanced up at the three blurry forms in front of me and focused on her golden eyes. She would keep me safe. So, even though every instinct in me screamed to politely decline and slink away, I said, "I…suppose…I'm hungry…"
"Perfect! I know exactly where to find a good fishing spot!" Survived the Storm cheered. She spread her wings and used her two powerful legs to launch herself upwards.
"Wait for us!" Fed the Flock squawked, right on her friend's tail.
Escaped the Monsters let out a long-suffering sigh. "Well, let's see if she gets lost finding the fishing spot again."
Our odd group meandered through the Shell. Crystals sprouting from pillars glowed as we passed them, some warming the air if we drew close enough. Other dragons travelled this way and that, and with each one that came close, I crept closer to Killed the Sea Serpent. The familiar smell of the ocean gave way to that of lush foliage and fertile soil, flowers, and the wild smokey-wind smell of dragons.
"So," Killed the Sea Serpent said as we flew. "Who gets to go first?"
"Fed the Flock!" Survived the Storm said.
Her friend groaned. "Why don't you go first? This was your idea!"
"I need to think of the best story! It's not every day we get to hunt with a flock leader and…uh, well…"
I kept my eyes low.
"You are nameless, right?" Survived the Storm asked boldly.
"Don't ask that!" Fed the Flock hissed.
I lurched in surprise. "Y-yes," I whispered.
"Oh, thank goodness! Well—I'm sorry—it's not that it's good, I just worried you had a name and we hadn't asked," the dragoness said with all the casual ease of a conversation about the weather.
Nobody said anything, which put the pressure on me. I stammered, "W-well, you needn't worry, then…"
"Oh, perfect! This is so exciting!" she cheered, doing a little spin midair. "I have so many questions for you!"
"Please excuse her," Fed the Flock apologized. "She probably fell on her head as a flightling."
"I sure did!" Survived the Storm sang. "Ask my clutchmates!"
I pinned my ears and somehow managed to hunch over midair. "I-i-it's fine," I stuttered. Why did Fed the Flock care if her friend was rude? Why was she apologizing to me?
"Are we almost there?" Escaped the Monsters interjected. "Some of us are expecting food."
"Where?" Survived the Storm asked. Then she jolted. "Oh! The fishing area! Yes, we're, uh, almost there!"
We were not almost there. We flew around pillars, plateaus, and crystals, scaling over forests with enormous trees with canopies filled with tiny dragons. Eventually, we headed towards a lower part of the Shell, where the pillars were more loosely spread out. An arched bridge of stone stretched high overhead, wearing a dense curtain of vines. I tensed, remembering being tangled in the things all too well, and made sure that my wings and tailfins were firmly shut when I passed through them.
"Finally," Fed the Flock groaned.
Below, a canopy of trees shifted and flowed like the waves of an ocean. It was a forest nestled on an enormous plateau, its grasping branches reaching far over the gaps leading deeper into the Shell below. In its center was a shimmering turquoise lake.
We swooped over it, drawing ripples across the reflective surface. It smelled of fresh water.
"Ah! There!" Killed the Sea Serpent called. She twisted, tucked her wings, and dipped into the water.
I snapped my wings to the side and dropped into the lake's embrace. The water was cold, but not as much as I expected. Below, among freshwater plants waving in the currents, little glowing stones shimmered like the stars. They were crystals, keeping the water warm in the presence of dragons. Shadows darted between the lights and grass: fish.
Sight-sounding, I found Killed the Sea Serpent and began swimming parallel to her. The fish were all spread out, hiding in the water-plants, under crystals and stones, and burrowing into the silt.
Something below the mud caught my attention; the tiniest shifting in the elevation of the floor. I focused my sight-sounds on it. With all of my concentration on the patch of mud, I could feel changes in the density of the muck below. Little vibrations in little pockets…little heartbeats.
Stopping just before the patch, I opened my wings and strained them against the water. It felt like flapping with my wings covered in vines. A powerful current erupted from my stroke, hitting the silt and throwing it up in a cloud. Dozens of fish hiding below tumbled in the water, wriggling about in panicked dismay.
I darted in after them, corralling them towards Killed the Sea Serpent, heart hammering with excitement. She kept them bundled tight with my help. Together, we pushed them up towards the surface, taking every opportunity to chase any stray fish into the shoal. Soon, they were pressed against the blinding-bright surface, a mass of writhing shadows scrunching together and leaping out of the water.
The other dragons swooped from above, snapping their jaws in the water to catch their fill. Killed the Sea Serpent and I waited for all three to snatch their meal. With a piercing cry, my leader shot forward. I did the same, snatching fish as they scurried from their fate.
When we surfaced, my jaw was filled with food. I clamped my serrated teeth through their flesh and grinned around them, panting for breath.
"That was amazing!" Survived the Storm called from the shore. "I love hunting with your kind!"
We paddled over. As Killed the Sea Serpent dropped her fish down a safe distance from the water, she looked at me. "Good job finding those fish," she said. "I hadn't noticed them when I passed over there."
"So we have you to thank for the food!" Fed the Flock said, although she seemed to be looking at Killed the Sea Serpent instead of me. I was just close enough to see the suggestive way her eyes darted between my leader and myself.
I ducked my head self-consciously. "Oh, I'm sure you would have found them," I said.
"Maybe not," Killed the Sea Serpent said. When I did nothing but shoot a meek glance up at her, she chuckled and said, "Well, Fed the Flock, you were going to tell the first story, right?"
Fed the Flock let out all the air in her lungs in a huge sigh. "Fine," she said. She slurped up the remains of the fish she was eating and chewed thoughtfully. "Hm…how about…oh! I heard this one from a storyteller when I had just finished my flightling lessons."
I lifted my ears, squinting so that I could see her better.
The storytellers of the Shell kept our history. They passed all they knew from one dragon to the other, memorizing each tale word-for-word so that the passage of time would not alter them. They spent most of their time within the Shell, traveling from group to group and visiting flightlings.
The stories enamored me, but I did everything I could to avoid them. Their most recent tales involved the disappearance of the sun and moon…as well as me.
"There was once a time when the Shell walls were higher," she began. "When the…the…uh…"
"When the forests were still young," Survived the Storm supplied. "And before seeds drifted on the sea-winds to bring us flowers and grasses."
"Do you want to tell the story?" Escaped the Monsters grumbled. His friend chuckled, shoving her shoulder against his.
"Right, before the seeds flew over," Fed the Flock said, sounding relieved to have help. "It's said that the edges of the Shell formed a real egg-shape in the sky. There was a single hole torn into it, where the fake gods pierced the Shell too early, taking its power with them and dooming us dragons to be small and mortal."
I tilted my head, interested now. I had not heard this story before. I did not know dragons were not meant to die.
"But some of the dragons began to grow into giants," Fed the Flock continued. "Because this story is also the story of the giant dragons."
"I love this part!" Survived the Storm whispered to us, wiggling in place.
"Shh!" Escaped the Monsters said.
Fed the Flock laughed. "You love every part of these stories. So…for several seasons, only a few dragons were growing. But as they got bigger and bigger, while all the other dragons remained small, it became clear that something was amiss. Even more, it became harder for them to hide, and they began eating more and more of what food was in our home. The little dragons began to keep a close eye on them, creeping after them in the dark. So, one day, when the giant dragons thought nobody was able to see them…they were caught.
"The giants snuck to the opening of the Shell, snatched some of it in their great jaws, and gobbled it up."
I gasped. To eat the Shell—the last vestige of the first ones—their protective embrace of all our kind—and only to grow big!
Fed the Flock nodded. "I know," she growled. "They were traitors to us all. But the little dragons forgave them and decided to guard the opening. Those dragons became the first ever to do patrol responsibility. The giant dragons were scornful, but did not eat the Shell anymore. They stopped growing. The relationship between giant and little dragon was strained, but peaceful, although the little dragons never forgot that the giant ones were willing to sacrifice safety for power."
At my side, Killed the Sea Serpent shook her head with a sigh.
"So…life went on. Dragons were forced to spend all their time fishing in the pools and Under. There were hardly any plants or mushrooms at all. It was hard to find food for everyone, now that the giant dragons were so big. They languished on the edge of starvation always. But the dragons knew that the first ones had not left them to die, and kept faith that more fish would return.
"But the giant dragons posed a problem again. They ate all the food and took up so much space. When they fought each other over meals, they trampled the crystals, mountains, and little dragons underfoot. The ones that flew claimed to be burdened by the Shell, trapped with no sky to fly in. And so…the giants decided that they were big and strong enough to survive outside the Shell. They knew they would become Outsiders once they left, but they chose their fate. They turned their backs on the first ones and their hatching-grounds and ventured Outside."
I balked, eyes wide. Even during the worst of it, I had endured my low status among my flock and kin. The thought of choosing to leave the Shell was alien, sinful. A shudder crept over my body. To leave, to become outcasted, would be to plummet into the cruelty of the outside world and fake gods.
It was a fate worse than death.
"Stupid, weren't they?" Fed the Flock said, no doubt noticing my expression. "You can almost pity them, but if they had just waited…anyways! The big dragons were met with a world stolen from the first ones. A world where fake gods ruled above all and scorned the dragons of the Shell. Some welcomed the heresy and became some of the first dragons to…eugh…use their magic. But some were horrified by what they saw. There were lands that blocked the ocean and went on and on without end, with hardly anywhere to swim and fish at all. There were monsters, creatures that hunted them, like they were the prey. There were places where there was no life at all, great canyons of stone or ice. So, many of the fools decided to return."
Escaped the Monsters snorted derisively. Survived the Storm shook her body as if to deflect the thought. I glanced at Killed the Sea Serpent, who was close enough for me to make out her expression.
She looked…forlorn. I tilted my head, but had no more time to think on it before Fed the Flock continued her story.
"The dragons who stayed true to the first ones did not take pity on them. Though the giant dragons could scoop them up and swallow them all whole, they told them that they had made a choice, and a bad one. They and their offspring must live with it forever. Well, the big ones weren't happy about that. So they tried to force their way in.
"They attacked with fire, ice, boiling water, magma, brute force, everything!" She flared her wings, forcing Escaped the Monsters to duck. "The little dragons tried to hide in the Shell…but it is only a Shell. It began to crack under the assault, and with every piece that was chipped away from a traitor rather than the egg-teeth that should have been, the little dragons grew more and more angry. So when the Shell finally cracked and tumbled into pieces below, the little dragons were ready. They took flight, swarming around the falling remnants of the first ones, and together, across the entire Shell, horizon to horizon, they fought back!"
She rose as tall as she could on her two legs, as if she had just emerged to battle herself.
"With all the dragons of the Shell working together, they drove the giant dragons away, scorning them twice over for their foolish decisions. The giant dragons were doomed to a lifetime of hunger and savagery. By holding true to their ways, the little dragons had won!"
Killed the Sea Serpent shifted. The interested expression on her face was so fake that even I could see it. Her ears were pressed flat to her skull and her wings were tense at her side. She glanced over at me and must have seen the worried confusion in my eyes, because she shook her head like it was covered in water and straightened up.
"And…that's it," Fed the Flock ended the story suddenly.
"No, it's not!" Survived the Storm squawked.
Fed the Flock pawed at the ground sheepishly. "That's the exciting part, anyways. Which is what I remember."
"Ugh! I'll finish it," Survived the Storm said. She rose dutifully–then spun on her feet, snapping her wing and tails open. "It was a bitter victory!" she exclaimed. "The little dragons fell back into the Shell, weeping over the shattered pieces covering all of the land. They thought that they were no longer protected, that their home was destroyed. But…"
She waited.
"But?" Escaped the Monster sighed. I tried to suppress a smile, but failed.
"But the dragons soon discovered that the first ones had left them one final blessing!" Survived the Storm said. "The Shell remnants broke into tiny pieces, dissolving into the soil. Like a real egg, the Shell was meant to nourish—not dragons, but other forms of life which we depend on! With the Shell reduced to cliffs on the water, seeds were able to fly into the valleys with their new soil. Plants began to sprout, bringing birds and bugs and fish with them. Food became plentiful. And so, even though the big dragons betrayed everyone in the Shell and destroyed our home, the first ones still provided for those of us who held faith in them. We came into the world fully that day, truly ready, even if not in the way the first ones intended."
My smile faded. Something about the ending seemed…off.
"What?" Fed the Flock asked me. "Did you not like the story?"
I looked down. "It was wonderful," I whispered.
"Well, then why are you frowning?"
"W-well…" I stuttered. "It just seems strange to me. The big dragons needed to be exiled for all of that to happen. Why didn't the Shell fall earlier?"
Fed the Flock paused, considering, and turned to Survived the Storm. "Well, future storyteller?"
"An excellent question!" she exploded. "I was hoping someone would ask that!"
"Oh, here we go," Escaped the Monsters said.
"There is a lot of debate among storytellers on that subject," Survived the Storm said. "But what it comes down to is the core of it: why was there no food?"
She waited long enough to force me to answer.
"Because the big dragons were eating it all," I mumbled, flicking my gaze between her blue eyes and the ground.
Survived the Storm nodded. "And why were they eating everything?"
"Because…they ate the Shell and got so big?" I asked, confused now. The story had been very clear.
"That's right," Survived the Storm said. "They chose themselves over everyone else. A decision made by a few dragons out of thousands changed the fate of all. If they hadn't used the Shell to grow so big, then food would have been plentiful. But they did. And so the Shell needed to fall, but not just for food. The little dragons needed to learn their own strength when they worked together. They needed to learn the importance of community and sacrifice. And they needed to learn about consequences…especially the consequences of accepting the Outside and the fake gods."
"I…see," I said, turning the thought over in my head. It seemed to make sense. The giants were selfish to try and force themselves above the others, after all. In doing so, they made themselves the lowest of all dragons, and raised the little dragons that they had tried to overpower far above them. Another thought—a frightening one—came to mind, and I asked, "Where are the giants now?"
"Some have tried to return," Killed the Sea Serpent said. "But not in my lifetime. They are driven off just like any Outsider."
I shuddered. To think, all this time later, the giants remained, always hungry, always wanting in…
"Well, that was a very good story," Killed the Sea Serpent said, her voice a little curt. She turned to Escaped the Monsters and asked, "What I'm curious about is your story. The story of your name."
Whenever a dragon earned a name, the storytellers in that area would learn the tale and spread it. Because of the sheer number of dragons in the Shell, though, only the names of important dragons were carried on. Still, every dragon was given the privilege of having their memory presented to others.
Which meant that when Escaped the Monsters spoke, hunched over and avoiding our gazes, it was a big disappointment.
"There was once a dragon who flew too far from his flock on patrol responsibility. He was hunted by monsters. Through sheer luck alone, a strong storm defeated the monsters and he was able to escape. The end."
"…I see," Killed the Sea Serpent said, eyes flicking to the others.
The silence stretched out between all of us. Unlike me, Escaped the Monsters bore through it, refusing to be pressured into speaking.
"What…" I flinched when he snapped his head up to glare at me. "…what are the monsters?"
He glared for a moment longer before ducking his head. "They look like walking saplings," he growled. "They stand like a two-legged dragon, but one that is stiff and hurt. Their entire bodies are flat and thin, like a sea-worm. Their legs hang from their shoulders. Their pelts are patchy, with fur in some places, scales in others, and squishy fleshy stuff, too. Their faces are flattened like they were pressed into a stone, and their eyes…" he shuddered. "…their eyes look deep into you, like they can see your thoughts. They have no wings, no tails, no spines, but they can sprout claws from anywhere, and they can bite you even when they are far away."
Throughout his description, I sunk lower and lower, back arched and wings and tail drawn in. "What do you mean?" I whimpered.
"I can't explain it," he said, "but when I flew close to them on their…their…thing, they looked at me and…and bit me! When I looked down, a tooth made of stone was buried in my leg."
"They have stone teeth?" I said.
He nodded. "Stone teeth and claws. But it's different stone. It's shiny, like the crystals. But instead of making you warm, it makes you cold…so cold." He looked down. In a lost tone, as if he had forgotten we were there, he went on, "They put me in a giant jaw. The teeth closed around me, but it didn't swallow me. I could see through the teeth, and they stared at me and squawked like birds. When the storm came, I knew that it would swallow me, so I used all of my strength to break free. I hurt my wing-shoulder badly and barely made it home. Still…every time the storms come, I think of that night…"
Survived the Storm and Fed the Flock bustled close to him, offering warmth and safety. He didn't shrug them off, instead leering at something on the ground. A pang of jealousy shot through me.
"I'm so sorry you went through that," I said, pushing the unfair emotion off, ears and frills pinned back. "I wish you hadn't."
Escaped the Monsters sighed. "I do, too. But the storytellers like my name-story and use it to warn other dragons about the monsters, so at least something came from it."
His bitter tone showed just how grateful he was for that. Why couldn't it have been someone else? He seemed to say instead.
I knew the feeling. I looked down at my paws with nothing to say. There wasn't anything to say. Terrible things still happened in the Shell, and some dragons seemed…
…cursed.
"How about another story!" Survived the Storm said with false enthusiasm. "You, how about you go?" she pointed her nose at me. "I want to hear your story."
"I don't have a name, though," I said, surprised.
"Oh, I know! That's why your story is so exciting!"
"Go on," Fed the Flock encouraged me. Her genuine curiosity melted away, and she said with poorly-disguised caution, "You must have something to say about that day, right?"
I glanced at Escaped the Monsters, who still seemed distant. I caught just the slightest hint of fear-scent from his direction.
My voice barely louder than a breath, I began, "There was once a dragon born blind and small, scales white as bone…"
o.O.o
And with the painful memories came a new one, an old one, long-since forgotten, recalled only through heavy concentration, like discovering a fish hiding in the mud.
A hatchling, egg-tooth lying beside her jaw, sticky with the dried amnion of her egg, lay sprawled on the cold stones of the tunnel Under. Forgotten pieces of eggshells lay scattered around her, each piece shimmering in the crystal-light like a speck of a star. If her eyes were not still glued shut, she would have seen footprints, both large and new, in the moss.
She used all the energy in her body to raise her head, trembling atop her baby-bird-thin neck, and let out a thinning mewl.
It echoed into the depths, and her head thumped to the moss.
She was exhausted and couldn't move, frail little thing, born late beyond hope, left behind.
Time's passage was marked by the dimming of the crystal at her side. As her soul drained from the world, so too did the first ones' glow and warmth.
When crystal and hatchling both were nothing more than the flickering of a dying ember, the water shifted. A dragon popped their head above the water and sniffed at the air. With a breathless gasp, they tore across the water, kicking up enormous waves.
The crystal flared. The dragon licked desperately at the hatchling.
"No no no no…no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," they wept, nosing the cold little hatchling. "I can't be too late, I can't be, no no no, please, please…no…no…live, please, you must live, or it was all for nothing…please…
"…please…"
o.O.o
"…and so, since that day, the dragon was alone, even when the teachers were forced to train her to fly, nameless and…"
I faltered, snapping open eyes I had not realized were closed. The others had grown silent as I described my story: the day I became a flightling, the day that the sun and moon disappeared. As the words came tumbling out of my mouth, simple and emotionless as a reflex, something had shifted in the deep murk of my head, kicking up a cloud I'd never known was there.
"And…?" Survived the Storm pressed eagerly.
My head was still spinning. What was that? A dream, barely remembered? A story I heard long ago?
"Unwanted," I said without thinking, still lost in a daze, like I was trying to fly underwater.
The moment I breathed the word, I stiffened. So did Killed the Sea Serpent and the other three.
"…o-oh," Survived the Storm said. She shifted on her feet, but did not move over to me. "Well…that's much different from how I've heard other storytellers describe it."
"Of course it is," Killed the Sea Serpent grunted, her voice hard. "They like to make it sound like…"
"Like she did it," Escaped the Monsters finished. He looked up at me. "But…you really didn't, didn't you?"
The surprise in his voice sent a wave of hot, helpless anger through me, burning in my heart. I swallowed it, tail thumping on the ground, before I got control of myself and lowered my head and ears submissively. "Of course not," I mumbled. "I was just a flightling."
The three dragons all looked at each other. I shrunk low to the ground, no longer comforted by Killed the Sea Serpent's tail wrapped around me.
"Well!" Survived the Storm said, rustling her wings. "I'm going to talk to my mentor about this. It's just not right, spreading lies."
I snapped my head up.
"You—you don't blame me?" I gasped, wanting so badly for it to be true, fearing like nothing else that it wasn't.
"Doesn't seem like I should," Survived the Storm said as if it were common sense. "A small little meek thing like you, destroying the sun and moon? Now that I've actually met you, I want to laugh at the idea." She snickered. "But I wanted to hear your side myself. I wanted to ask how, why, and why stay afterwards? But now I see how silly that was."
"Silly," I repeated. My heart pounded in my ears. I closed my eyes and took in one long, calming breath after the other until I trusted myself to speak again. "Well, I…I…I appreciate you believing me." I looked at the space where I hoped her eyes were. "Truly."
"We both do," Killed the Sea Serpent said. She wrapped one of her wings around me. "You are a good dragon, and these superstitions have hurt you deeply, but that does not make you unwanted. These dragons enjoyed spending time with you." She looked at them and implored, "Right?"
"Yeah!" Survived the Storm said. "You liked our stories!"
"And you helped feed us," Fed the Flock said. "And you tolerated Survived the Storm."
"Hey!"
Escaped the Monsters simply lifted his head. Though I could not truly see him, I knew he met my eyes as he nodded.
I worked my mouth, but nothing came out. My throat thickened, this time with a different emotion altogether. "I…I…thank you," I choked out, hating how my voice shook and hitched.
For once, Survived the Storm paused to consider her words. "The pleasure is ours," she said, her voice soft and ponderous.
Killed the Sea Serpent leaned closer to me as I shuddered and forced myself to breathe deeply, in and out, counting the seconds in between. "Now," she said, drawing attention to herself, "let's share the rest of our stories."
o.O.o
Killed the Sea Serpent told a story she had heard as a flightling: how the first generation of dragons was graced with fire by recovering some of the sun that the fake god had stolen.
Throughout the story, I desperately tried to collect myself. But my mind was clouded as if I was trapped in mushroom spores.
They didn't think it was my fault. They didn't hate me.
And, long ago, another dragon had come to me and shown me kindness, as they had. The strange…memory?…that I had sight-sounded in my mind had not faded. It was still vague, mysterious, dreamlike. But I was certain it was real.
Most of what I remembered from my hatchling-times were the warmth of the caretakers and the comfort of my clutchmates. By the time I grew into a swimling, my memories were much more clear. They certainly didn't involve adult dragons making an effort to keep me safe. Down Under, I was just the same as any other swimling unless I was brought into the light. That would cause a stir among our flock's caretakers, but the blatant outcasting only happened after that horrible day.
What else had I forgotten? Who was the dragon who had come back for me?
In that foggy, half-asleep memory, a dragon had cared for me before the curse. If dragons could still care for me afterwards…
I tried to close my heart to the hope that lit within it, a tiny flame on a kindling of naivety. Part of me wanted to snuff it out before I got burned. The other part of me wanted to set it free and let it rage.
"Now it's my turn!" Survived the Storm crowed, drawing me back to the present. "Anyone have any requests?"
I shook my head, still lost in the unexpected relief and confusion. The other two did as well.
Killed the Sea Serpent, on the other wing, nodded exuberantly. "Yes," she said. "Something I've been wanting to ask since you told us you were studying to be a storyteller." Without so much as a glance towards me, she mused, "I've always wondered, where do the glowing mushrooms come from?"
My breath caught in my throat. I tried not to stare at my flock's leader. By now, most of our flock probably knew what had happened. I hoped that it wouldn't spread to the other species, but what if these kinds of questions made it more obvious?
Survived the Storm's elated body language deflated. "Oh, those?" she said. Shaking herself off, she puffed up and said, "Well, a storyteller always has a lesson! And I guess those are kind of interesting!"
Despite myself, I sat up higher and lifted my ears. I straightened my back and clamped my wings tight to my sides. Although Killed the Sea Serpent looked much more relaxed, she could not hide the intensity in her eyes.
"The origin of the mushrooms has been lost to time," Survived the Storm began. "But we still have our legends, and we know from them around when the mushrooms began to appear in the Shell. It was after the Shell was broken by the giants, but before the first leaders of the dragon species came to power. Our stories begin mentioning glowing mushrooms appearing in the shadows, and they are usually mentioned to be near crystals. Most stories describe the carpet of mushrooms we see deep in the bottom layers of the Shell, which suggests that they spread quickly when they appeared."
"Do we know what they are for?"
Survived the Storm shrugged. "Some say that they are just mushrooms whose spores flew into the Shell with the seeds. Some say that they come from the first ones, or that they're even the living forms of the crystals."
"Why the relationship with the crystals?" Killed the Sea Serpent asked.
"That is a very good question!" Survived the Storm said. "Nobody knows."
Fed the Flock piped up, "Why would the first ones give them to us? They don't taste good."
"But they can be eaten," Survived the Storm said. "Maybe they are there in case the Shell ever runs out of food again."
"Or maybe there is no reason at all," Escaped the Monsters said. "Sometimes things just happen."
Killed the Sea Serpent looked at me for the first time since bringing up the topic. It was quick, but unmistakable. "I don't think that's the case with the mushrooms. They are the only plant here that glows like the crystals."
"Yes, that has to mean something," Fed the Flock said.
"Or it can still mean nothing," Escaped the Monsters argued.
"You could be right, both of you," Survived the Storm said. Bouncing on her feet, she exclaimed, "Oh, I love this! It's so fun to look into our stories!"
"Hey, what do you think?" Fed the Flock asked me. In a soft voice, like she was speaking to a flightling, she said, "Everyone's given their opinion except you."
My ears stuck straight up. She wanted to hear my opinion? I cleared my throat and said, "I…think they have a reason."
A bad one, I didn't add on.
"And with a reason, comes intent!" Survived the Storm said. "So, what do we all think the intent was?"
Escaped the Monsters groaned. "Now you've done it," he told the rest of us. "Philosophy."
They went on, Survived the Storm bringing up more and more vague topics. Somehow, the conversation evolved into something about free will and the true nature of perfectly-perfect things, although I hadn't the slightest clue how it got there or what it even meant.
But something the future storyteller said did catch my ear.
With reason, comes intent.
The obscure memory, almost something outside of myself, like it was extracted from another dragon. The sun and moon disappearing. My blindness, small shape, odd scales. The illness the mushrooms had inflicted on me. The dragon that had found me as a hatchling and saved my life. The curse.
All of it was so much. Too much. There had to be a reason.
So, why?