"The Dragon Isles Chapter 01 Kader´s Grief" by Katherine Bates

Awakening and Kader’s grief

The Orchard Moor:

Marn Emerald sat with Dilwyn, his stallion, on the river bank, looking back at the sleeping figure they had found the night before, trying to work out exactly what he should do with the young woman.

Dilwyn rubbed his white muzzle through Marn’s long black hair as a way of trying to help his closest friend think, messing up what was already a ragged tangle, and received a sharp angry look from the brilliant emerald eyes that were set deep into the soft, almost girly, face of Marn. The white stallion looked hurt and turned away, cleaning the hazel blaze on his white chest in the most dignified way possible, pretending to ignore his friend as Marn turned back to watching the young woman.

Marn had no idea what he should do next, he’d never rescued anyone before, he wasn’t sure if he had even rescued her; he had an idea that you generally took them back to where they came from, but that didn’t exactly seem appropriate in this situation; Marn was stuck. He’d just have to wait until she woke up, if she did wake up that was, Marn wasn’t that certain that she was actually alive; and, until then, he could watch her, just in case anything strange did happen.

She seemed to be fairly petit, long black hair covering nearly all of her back, a few strands laying over her thin, angular face. Her face wasn’t sharp though, just thin, it still had the soft features that made a face feminine and attractive; she just needed feeding. Her feet were bare, the soles tough and thick like leather, but despite that they seemed neat and elegant, the legs above them well shaped.

Dilwyn caught him staring at the young woman as he lifted his head from cleaning his chest, “Don’t stare, Marn,” the white stallion told him through their mind connection, more of a feeling than words, but that was the best way of interpreting it, “it’s rude to stare.”

Marn looked up, shaking his black hair out his eyes yet again; he must remember to cut it sometime soon.

“I’m not staring, I’m watching, there’s a difference. Anyway, I’ve no idea what happened to her, I’m watching to see if I can find a clue.” He spoke aloud to the horse, though he could have quite easily have spoken back through mind, he felt safe with the girl asleep and no other humans around, you never knew what their reaction might be to magic, or the talent as some called it. Dilwyn rolled his eyes,

“We know what happened, we saw.”

“No, we didn’t, we saw what we saw, and then we found her, difference.”

“Pah!” the white stallion snorted loudly, “2 plus 2 makes 4, not 5.”

Marn hunched over at this, his brow creasing, casting the emerald green eyes into shadow, the thin mouth pouting a little. Marn loathed fighting with Dilwyn, his only companion, apart from the hawk Oosix who was always off hunting, but the stallion had touched a sore point, he couldn’t let it go.

“Be quiet, Dilwyn, you know I can’t count.”

Dilwyn nodded proudly, he could, and trotted away elegantly, the racing and jumping blood in his veins making him one of those horses that could never keep still, always had to jump about, be on the move. Marn stared after the white stallion in momentary hatred, he knew he should learn to count, it was useful when you were a warrior, but he could just never get the idea of it; he saw how many of the enemy there were, and worked it out without the need of numbers, it was only Dilwyn who liked to tease him and report, in numbers, how many there were.

His dark brooding on the subject of numbers and counting was broken off by the girl stirring from her sleep. It surprised him so much that he’d half drawn his sword from his belt; his long dagger was already held in his right hand, ready to defend himself. He relaxed as he saw it was only the girl and crawled over to her, turning her over carefully as her eyes opened slowly, the lids fluttering back.

They flashed a bright blue at him, showing him clearly in the pupils the memories of her past, scenes, a second frozen in time. And then they closed again as her breathing became deeper and more regular; when her eyes opened once more, there were no images, indeed, there was not even colour.

#

Isle of Arian, North Sea:

Jasral Ebony turned the pendant over in his hand, studying its pearly whiteness; the elegantly carved double spiral felt nice in his hand, the silver pearl trapped inside the cage rattled with the sound of a wind chime; he smiled to himself, even if it wasn’t what he wanted, it was still a lovely trinket. He looked up from the pendant to the nervous looking man who stood on the other side of the desk, smiling hopefully.

“Where did you find this?” he asked quietly, using his soft, coaxing voice to lull the man into answering whatever question came his way. The man twitched nervously in the presence of the leader of the Dragon Blood-kin,

“The Orchard Moor, Sir,” the man answered, “near a stream in one of the little valleys.”

“Which valley?” Jasral placed the pendant onto the desk atop of his leather-bound journal and stared the man in the eye. The man shifted uncomftable under the gaze of the sharp blue eyes, moving his feet from side to side in tiny shuffles,

“I don’t know the name of the valley, but I could show another.”

“Could you find it on a map?”

The man nodded and moved closer to the desk as Jasral drew out a map of the Orchard Moor. The man glanced at the black lines on the yellowing paper and pointed to the valley in which the temple of Shana’dun lay; the temple was legendary among the dragons. Jasral nodded and marked the point with a pencil whilst he pushed a cloth bag across the desk, filled with gold coins. The man took it quickly before Jasral Black had a chance to change his mind and hurried from the tower room.

Jasral picked the pendant up again and stroked one the twists on the cage, he wondered who had worn the pendant, why they had left it behind, and most importantly if it belonged to his lost child. He moved over to the window and leant out, rubbing Kader’s nose without thought.

Kader Black, the second oldest dragon in all of Elnoon, snorted and gestured he wanted to look at the pendant. Jasral smiled at the dragon, his only friend in his world (he didn’t even trust his wife) and opened his hand. Kader’s black crystal eye came level with Jasral’s hand. The eye, at least the size of Jasral’s fist, did not blink as it looked at the pendant even though the black dragon had three lids to do so with, but simply stared and stared.

“Did it belong to who I think it did?” Kader asked, now sniffing it gently, careful not to knock it off of Jasral’s hand. The leader of the Dragon Blood-kin smiled slightly,

“I hope so,” he muttered, “if it is, at least the Dragon Kin won’t have got to them.”

Kader said nothing at this remark, the Blood-kin might be in opposition to the Dragon Kin, but in his heart Kader was still a Kin member and he regretted being part of the rebel force. He snorted softly and looked away,

“At least they would have understood dragons. They’ll have no idea if they’ve been living in the Orchard Moor, especially if they were at that temple there; it has changed since we were last there.”

Jasral nodded sadly, “It used to be a nice place, that orchard was a lovely haven for dragons.”

Kader snorted again and said nothing, choosing to look out over Arian, trying to recall what the island used to look like when the Kin had been in charge: a beautiful place where any dragon had felt at home, with caves in the mountainside and small villages for those humans and elves who did not wish to stay with their dragons in caves or whose dragons were still too young to lay claim to a lair.

He sighed, the sound more like thunder than anything else, echoing in his cavernous throat. As the second oldest dragon and being a black, he was also second largest, 60ft from nose to tail, his scales more like plates that anything else, his wings expanding to over 200ft; he missed being a fighter dragon though, at this size no one dared bother him.

He sighed again, reminded that his strongest link to the Kin was his nephew, the only dragon older and larger than him, even if he was a white, who were generally smaller than others. They had never fought, even when Kader had become part of the rebels the two had stayed clear of each other in battle; they could not bear to kill a blood relative, it went against the upbringing they had received in the lands far to the north of Elnoon.

Jasral looked up at his dragon, over the last three hundred years they had become more distant, they had been close at the start, but Jasral had always felt that Kader had only gone along with the rebellion because Kader’s nephew had refused to take on the leadership of the Dragon Kin and hadn’t liked any of the other possibilities.

“I’ll get someone to find them, we may get lucky and then maybe you and I can go find somewhere alone to spend the rest of our days.”

Kader snorted, unimpressed, “You had better get lucky, I am not spending much longer here.” And with that he took off, gliding from the edge, sweeping over the fortress of Arian, scattering smaller, younger dragons before him.

Jasral turned away, Kader was becoming more and more distant, and he never seemed happy to talk about the possibility of Jasral finding his heir to the leadership of the Dragon Blood-kin. He ordered a servant to fetch his most skilled tracker and then went back to the desk, putting his feet up on the varnished wood and staring at his boots with an intensity unwarranted by the battered leather.

He spoke only briefly to his tracker, handing over the maps and a knife with Jasral’s personal symbol on and outlining what had to be done.

“Take a horse from the stables,” he said as the man began to leave, “I doubt dragons will be welcome on the mainland, and whatever you do, don’t lose them.”

The man nodded and turned away, sliding the dagger into his belt and frowning; it would take him several weeks to go across the land by horse, a dragon would be much faster. But orders were orders and he had to obey them. He still thought this whole searching thing was a waste of time, as did most other people in the Dragon Blood-kin; they had lost so many people to the mission already it was hard to justify it now. He resented being called upon to go, he most likely would never return; just like his older brother who had been sent the year before.