{Originally published October 21, 2013]
“They resemble us so little, now,”
the female mused, watching from where they stood in the shrouding mists of the
boundless ethereal plane. “Not more than a century and a half as they reckon time has
passed, yet now I barely sense the infinite void within them . . .”
“But still the dragon readily
accepts each and every one of them as kin,” the male concurred. It watched approvingly as the great wyrm
devoured each of the reindeer alive. “Perhaps its senses are simply greater
than yours?”
“Perhaps. But they are my children. Should a mother not know her own?”
“They are not your
children,” he countered. “Nor your
children’s children. Nor you children’s
children’s children- “
“They are blood of my blood,” she
replied sharply, cutting him off, “the blood of the infinite void. Some day, one of them will reclaim what is
theirs. What is ours. Their chiefs are still able to bear and wield
my blade. Until they can no longer do
so, they are mine.”
“And how will they know what is . . . ours? You have not revealed yourself to one of them since the brothers disappeared into the ruins of Reaver Hall a century past. Severin and Turbran were quite powerful, and yet their personal grudges and hatred for the other Reavers consumed them in ruinous conflagration.”
“That was but a momentary delay, my dear Saamasal Saath,” she said to him. “Severin and Turbran were clearly not meant to reclaim our birthright, I know that now. They were far too . . . volatile.”
Her eyes narrowed as she picked out
her chosen from the crowd. She pointed
at the tall woman. “Her.” She said with
certainty. “She is the one.”
Callista Armageddon felt a shiver
run down her spine, feeling a presence hovering on the edge of her senses. Looking around, though, she saw nothing, and
so returned her attention to the wondrous scene unfolding before her as the
Lord of the Vale announced itself to her and her kin.
“She felt your malice, just then,”
the one called Saath remarked. “Perhaps
she is the one you seek, if she can feel you through the ethereal plane. Most impressive.”
“She will need to be impressive,
Saath, if she is to achieve what we seek.
More than impressive. She must
also wield my blade. She must have
it. Now.
See to it that this is so.”
“All this, and we must avoid the
gentle attention of our Revered Queen while doing so? How wonderful!”
“If my young descendant is
successful, we will never need fear the wrath of Vlaakith again.”
Druustya Olavya tilted her head
back as she felt the link of Om’Gorrah wash into the ethereal and over her
consciousness, and closed her eyes. Not
once in nearly one and a half centuries had she ever missed this ritual, no
matter where in time and space she had been.
She always returned for the joining, and the moot she felt today had not
changed at all since she had shared the very first with her earthborn children,
so very long ago. She herself had stood
before the travertine terraces then, and she had raised the blade before the
dragon, affirming the bond. In time, she
had passed the blade to her eldest, and so it had been generation upon
generation, to the present.
Soon, however, soon she knew that
Callista Armageddon would meet her destiny, and then she, Drustyaa, would
perform the Om’Gorrah over the grave of her own mother. Then, Druustya would meet her own
destiny.
*
* *
“Did you feel it, daughter?” the
shaman asked Callista. “A malevolence touched us for a fleeting moment during
the moot. I have not felt it before in
that place.”
“Bah, it was your imagination,
Dazulka,” the chief snorted. The
celebration was about to begin, and he wanted to lead the whirling violence of
the dance before the great fires, as was his right as chief. As soon as the beat of the heavy drums began,
he grasped his great silver runesword with both hands and leapt into the fray,
leaving the two women to their own counsel.
"I did feel it mother,” she said,
watching as the celebration commenced. “It was . . . out of place. It was not part of what we were meant to
experience there. And yet . . . ”
“And yet?” the graying elder asked.
“It felt as if it had always been
there.”
Dazulka frowned. Something had intruded upon their
bonding. Callista would have felt it
more strongly, being born to the blood of the Armageddons, and not just brought
into it, as she had been. She would
consider the matter further on the morrow, after consulting with the spirits of
earth and sky. She turned to Callista
then and smiled. Dazulka White Tusk,
child of the boundless, shining plains of the southlands, threw herself into
the dance, just as her lifemate had moments before.
Callista withdrew to the edge of
the gathering, lost in her own thoughts and contemplating the meaning of the
bond, as well as its significance. As
she thought more about the great dragon, the memory of the intruding presence
slipped quietly into the back of her mind, and was soon forgotten.
