Maternitas

As she flew over the dry Southern plains, Nestor could see that the world below was healing. Slowly, but it was healing. It was clearer and cleaner every time she deigned to venture from the valley.

She screeched in approval of this, the wind rushing smoothly beneath the wide, powerful span of her open wings. She dived a little. The others who followed echoed the sound and dove with her in a small dance of celebration. It was fresh; it was life; it was now.

It was daybreak. The sun shimmered just above the craggy mountain range that sat to the east and a warm brightness penetrated the morning chill. Nestor’s scales lit up - dazzling emeralds and flecks of gold when they caught the light. The others stayed close in tow, slowing with her as they approached the farthest plain.

It was not often that any of the weyr flew this far from the valleys; or this close to the human colonies. But Nestor knew intuitively that today they must and the others had faith in her wisdom.

The tone of her cry transposed in a flash into a shriek of anger - when the stench of burning oil flooded her nostrils and heavy plumes of toxic black smoke could be seen emanating from various holes within one of the dusty, lifeless plains some way to the west.

Again, the rest echoed her calls until the sky and everything beneath it was bursting with a distorted, mournful wail that made the trees shudder and all the animals scamper fretfully into hiding.

The thunder pressed north.

Beyond the farthest plain a thin green strip of forestland began to materialise, becoming thicker and thicker until they were soaring above it, casting menacing shadows over the trees, which were so compounded it looked as though they were flying above an uneven blanket, woven with a thousand strands of green, each of a different texture and hue. The whole forest seemed to exhale as one, as though to counter the poison of the smoke to the west; and the sound that rang through the air changed again to that of a rallying battlecry – no less alarming than the howls of grief and fury that preceded it.

Long years had passed since the weyr had risen first, destroying the ancient cities; factories; quarries; plants; works; yards; mills with furious, incessant flame, infinitely more powerful even, than what had been razed from the ground for centuries by the others.

It was understood that this was the age of dragons. Every creature still living - even those who lived beneath, knew: dragons reigned now.

Abruptly, Nestor was silent and so, dutifully, were the others. Her flight slowed almost to a stop – then she began to circle – straining brusquely, sharply through the fresh morning; through the thick layers of fauna below – in an attempt to hear again the sound that had captured her attention.

Her companions circled too, in neat, concentric cycles. They wove around one another in an elegant and fearful sky dance. Nestor tuned her sharp ears into the sounds of the forest, unpicking each rustle; every murmur. At length, again she heard a soft, sad groan and proceeded to dive in a measured downward trajectory toward the treetops; navigating when she reached them between the branches until she gracefully landed on the forest floor.

The others did not follow, but rather continued to circle above – each vigilantly tuned in to Nestor’s will. Neither entirely sentient, nor animal but something in between, they communicated through instinct, each attuned to the needs of the weyr, and of the wider world.

Nestor observed her surroundings methodically, her giant, amber-flecked eyes scanning everything in the periphery; her flared, cavernous nostrils seeking out the subtle scent of something she believed was present; something that did not belong there. The thing she sought.

And there it was. Stumbling clumsily through a nearby clearing: a human child, desperate and alone.

***

It was sunrise and Fan’the had survived another night cold and unprotected. She was too young to know consciously what sunrise was. Yet, like the creatures who abided with her in the forest, when her faculty of sight slowly returned – with the thin, sharp blades of light that sliced through the branches of the monstrous trees that surrounded her - she resumed her futile waddle through the thick woodland.

It was the second morning she’d woken up since being taken, and left here. Her stomach was gargling with emptiness; her bones aching with cold. Bouts of crying came in waves and between them she moved about in a state of complete bewilderment, with no cognisant awareness of why she was alone, or so hungry or shivering. Her limited instincts – to drink water, when she came across it; to seek shelter when it rained - had sustained her during the past day and a half, but she was becoming weaker, moving more slowly.

Sometimes it was light, sometimes it was dark, sometimes it rained, sometimes sunlight burnt straight through the branches of the trees and down to warm her – but there was no notion of time. She could have been there for ten hours; ten days; ten weeks – loneliness flooded her child’s heart and stung and weighed heavily inside her – though of course she did not understand why.

She stumbled over a patch of enormous roots, heaving up from the ground, entangled fiercely with one another – when she arrived in the clearing and saw Nestor.

***

Mhy’sur scrambled desperately across the final stretch of desert. She had not slept in two days; had barely stopped moving in that time. Cracks had started to form in her lips, which has shrivelled like the petals of a dying flower. Her bare feet were calloused and blistered from the hard gravel; the muscles in her thighs and back burned with aching, and yet her will propelled her onward.

Unconsciously, she let out a stifled sob when she saw the edge of the forest. She had made it. She dropped to her knees and pressed her head to the harsh, arid ground. Sweet relief! It was so tempting for her to relinquish her pain in that moment – to drift away and succumb to oblivion. Her bones ached for it. But the fierce lion that was her will once more came upon her mercilessly.

Lacking the strength to stand again now that she was collapsed, Mhy’sur crawled across the rest of the way to the edge of the forest, ignoring the sharp little rocks that scratched her hands, knees, belly as she dragged the exhausted mass of her body toward the green.

The further she crawled, the more signs of life appeared around her. The brittle, crusty remains of an old olive tree to her right; sharp, prickling hawthorn to her left and so on, until the plants were plentiful; and some still living.

She had never seen a living plant.

The ground around her altered too, as she crawled. The dry, sandstone into which she dug her fingernails transformed into soft soil – cool and moist and earthy. She paused momentarily to breathe it in. What a smell - like life itself.

She reached a plant that she could see had collected on its delicate leaves minuscule drops of morning dew. She picked one, then another, and another – licking each incessantly until every droplet had coated her dry tongue. Another sob.

On she crawled and the plants around her grew taller, thicker and the weeds became shrubs; the shrubs bushes; the bushes small trees. On and on this went until she realised that she was within the walls of the woodland and the trees around her rose into the sky like monoliths, some of which she could barely see the tops of.

The sight of this drew Mhy’sur into a trance. Of course where she had come from there were structures; buildings; mechanisms; machines that stood so fearfully tall, as the trees around her now. But this was different. These were entangled by thick roots with the earth itself, breathing and alive and enormous.

A muffled noise, like a whisper, pulled her from her reverie. Could it be? She strained to hear it, quiet but continuous like a tinkling drone somewhere in the far distance. A soft babble of water.

Through strained ears, she tracked it with the fortitude of a predator, scrambling back onto her feet and darting silently, deeper and deeper into the forest until she found the little brook, where the water tumbled languidly over rocks and pebbles in a narrow, meandering stream. She flung herself toward it and started lapping like a dog, the cool, sweet water infiltrating and reviving ever corner of her beaten body. She stayed this way for some time, dousing her face and matted hair and hands and knees frantically, as though after this there was a chance she would never see water again.

Her plight was interrupted suddenly, by a terrible sound, a droning wail that bounced between the thick trunks of the trees and through the ground and across the sky, causing Mhy’sur to whimper and recoil. Such a frightful sound. There was only one thing it could be. She must continue, immediately. In her panic, she resumed her desperate pursuit further into the forest.

***

The little girl had not yet reached that stage of development where she was able to identify danger. Danger like a row of pointed teeth the size of her torso less than a meter away from her. She had forgotten her hunger and was transfixed by Nestor’s sharp glare; by her fierce, shining eyes and bejewelled wings. She did not feel afraid. Rather, she stood and stared at Nestor, entranced by her sharp, ferocious beauty.

Nestor did not react either. She exhaled deeply. Again. Again. Again. Until little wisps of smoke floated up from her nostrils. She tensed, flooded with fury. It had been years since she encountered a human. She was not pleased to see one now.

And yet, as her nature dictated, she remained calm, unreactive. She hated them with a ferocity that burned inside her – but she could also see that this was a child – that what stood before her in the clearing was innocence.

After some time being still, staring at one another, Fan’the took a step forward. Then another. She lifted her small, pudgy wrists up toward Nestor in a desperate bid for help and care.

At first, the dragon recoiled. But then, upon seeing the fear in Fan’the’s eyes and the clean streaks that broke up the patches of mud on her cheeks where endless tears had streamed down her face, she was overcome with a wave of maternal pity and put her head down toward the girl’s outstretched arms. Fan’the ran her fingers along the uniform scales of her head, each one of which was almost the size of her little hands. She was fascinated, and entertained – and for the first time in two days had the comforting sense that she was safe and so she let out a giggle as the scales moved back and forth beneath her touch.

***

Could it be? Surely, it was delirium, finally setting in. But what if…? Mhy’sur was sure she heard it – Fan’the’s little voice, from somewhere not too far away. Strangely, she sounded… happy? She was sure she must have been imagining it. But hope is a cruel thing that lingers until it has had the chance to be extinguished entirely.

There it was again, more distinctive this time, closer.

She fumbled urgently toward it but the picture that came suddenly before her as she tumbled amid the trees was too much to bear and she let out an inhuman wail; a shriek of intense, potent grief.

There she was, Fan’the, alive! But – oh! - inches away from one of them. From one of those demons grandmothers told stories to their grandchildren about underneath at bedtime. One of the beasts that destroyed their lands; their cities; their lives; that forced them into their dark existence and roamed still freely across the fresh, endless skies of the place that once was theirs. One of the monsters that hated all humans and would never stop until every one was burnt to dusty ash.

Oh Fan’the!

Mhy’sur’s wail alarmed both of them who turned instantly toward her. Fan’the leapt in joy away from the dragon and toward her mother who scooped her into a tight, steadfast embrace upon her chest and wept at the smell and feel of her.

Something in Nestor snapped. An innocent child she could tolerate, but seeing a full grown human was too much and she lurched violently onto her back legs and her wings flew open so quickly that the wind they created nearly knocked the mother and child to the ground. The dragon was rearing up; the smoke from her nostrils becoming thicker and blacker, moans of anger swelling up erratically out of her throat.

Mhy’sur flung Fan’the to the ground behind a nearby tree, telling her sharply not to move a muscle, not to make a sound.

Then, against all her better instincts, she ran rapidly back toward the flailing dragon – as close as she dared to get – and flung herself to the ground, weeping, and pleading before her:

‘Please, please – if you understand me – do not harm my daughter. She is a little child. She has done nothing wrong. She knows nothing of war, or hatred in her heart. Please do not harm her – ‘

On and on this went. Although Nestor did not understand the meaning of the words, she did understand what she was seeing. She did understand the desperate love of a mother who grappled to protect her child at any cost. She looked small and weak, as humans always did – but there was something in her plea that moved Nestor. She did not see violence here, or greed, or malice. She thought of her own brood, waiting for her back in the heart of the mountains – and with a reluctant angry squeal flapped wrathfully and ascended until she disappeared above the tops of the trees.

Silence returned to the forest, and Mhy’sur fed Fan’the at her breast, and held her close and wept, and wept, and wept.