In the Valley of the Golden Dawn

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. They have been there for so long now though, that it is difficult to imagine a time when dawn was greeted with anything other than their percussive trumpeting. And as time is wont to do, it has blurred the edges of history with the delicate but invasive tendrils of legend. Just how did they get there? If you ask a priest of the Draconian Order he will tell you some wildly boring tale about the hand of God descending from Heaven to right the wrongs of man with these conduits of heavenly power. Conduits, it must be pointed out, who have no interest in Heaven or priest, let alone their very aggressive god. If you ask an acolyte from the Society of Flame they’ll tell you a mysterious cosmic event brought with it a pantheon of eggs, birthed by the great Mother on a distant star. Historians from the Eternal Archives can never agree enough to come up with a comprehensive story of their own so people have stopped asking them, despite the fact that they are the only ones with access to the dragons themselves. That is the great crux of finding truth. Facts are never as persuasive as feelings or the beliefs they harness.

Persita has never been one to get carried away with her feelings. She feels what she feels. But she also knows what she does not know. Which is just about everything. Sure, the historians can be confusing and cryptic, but at least they understand the significance of knowledge. And she just wants to know. She wants to know what the dragons know. What she’s going to do with that knowledge is just another thing she doesn’t know, but that can be dealt with later. When she knows all the other things. Getting inducted into the Archives, however, is almost impossible. And impossibly expensive.

This certainly isn’t enough to deter her, just cause the occasional existential spin-out. And it is during one of these rather self-indulgent episodes that she is struck by inspiration. Thoughts of the (mostly old) men who sit on the Council of Induction lead to a bone-deep frustration. Why should it be these elitist old men deciding who gets to learn based solely on who could line their pockets? Shouldn’t it be the dragons themselves who choose their students? Shouldn’t it be the dragons themselves?! No one but the historians is allowed into the Valley, but that is only because they are rich enough to pay all those mercenaries to guard the pass. That and the Immolation of High Priest Betrude is figuratively burned into the collective memory.

Really, though, approaching a dragon with such arrogance could only result in catastrophe. Persita is not arrogant. A bit brash? Sometimes. But she knows enough to know she doesn’t know enough to be arrogant about anything, let alone in the face of a dragon.

So a plan begins to emerge.

How to Get Past the Mercenaries and Into the Valley and In Front of a Dragon and Not Get Et.

Simple.

Sitting up, her fan of indigo hair cascades once again down her back, a few strands dancing around, seemingly of their own accord, in the exchange of energy between her hair and the rug. She smooths them down as she clambers to her feet and begins rifling through her desk for her library token. An endeavor of this magnitude would require preparation, and where better to prepare than the library?

**********

The smells of scrolls and burning sage greet her as soon as she shoves the door open. She realizes she probably doesn’t even need her token as Ezral nods distractedly in her direction with a dismissive wave. When was the last time they even checked her token? It is possible she might spend too much time at the library.

In subconscious affirmation of that realization, her feet take her on a winding path, through the musty stacks and ancient carved stone shelves, to the exact section she needs while she throws furtive glances around the stacks and tables. No one could possibly know what she is planning just because she is looking at books about mercenaries, but the nervousness sets her hands to quivering regardless. One such shaky appendage pulls a copy of The Rise and Fall and Subsequent Rise of Mercenary Protection In the Southern and Western Spheres from the shelf. The old tome creaks in her nervous grip as she gathers a few more similarly titled works and quite a few maps of the Valley.

Perhaps my purpose in the Archives will be to come up with better titles she thinks to herself just as her precarious grip loosens and she drops an old scroll. The clanking echoes sharply in the nearly empty hall as she winces. Deep breaths you goblin she chides herself as she awkwardly gathers her reading materials. The soft susurrations of her breathing exercises follow her to her favorite table. Tucked away in a recessed corner, she pours over the various texts, absorbing as much information about mercenary practices, culture, structure, battle formations and fighting styles as she possibly can.

“Sita!”

The enthusiastic but whispered greeting startles her and she emits a tiny yell, “BAH!”

Someone from a table around the corner shushes her rather aggressively and she whispers “So sorry!” to the mystery shusher as her cousin slides into the seat next to her, laughing softly to themselves.

“Yeah Persita, no need to shriek!” Her cousin whispers glibly.

“What the fuck Peri?!” She whispers back angrily.

“What?!” They feign ignorance, eyes wide and pale eyebrows high.

“What are you doing here? Don’t give me that stupid fucking face either.” Sita returns acerbically.

Peri slaps a hand to their chest on a dramatic gasp, “Such language!”

“Peri!” She returns in an exasperated whisper.

“I was just doing some research for work, one of my clients wants a scaled down early 4th Era Flame Temple in their garden. Huge pain in the ass.” As one of the most sought-after designers in the Western Sphere, her cousin also spent a lot of time in the library doing research for their clients. Peri casually flipped over the cover of the book she was reading “Maps, Surveys, Grids, Soils, Fauna and Flora of the Early, Late and Contemporary Eras in the Valley of the Golden Dawn AKA the Valley WHEW what a title! Who comes up with this shit??”

“The same old cretins that charge an arm, leg, spleen and first-born for induction.” Sita’s brows furrow in latent rage.

“Why won’t you just let me pay the induction fee for you?! You can pay me back if it bothers you so much!” Peri couldn’t even count how many times they had offered at this point but Sita’s Angry Eyebrows move not an inch.

“You know why! They would never accept me. They’re greedy enough they would induct me if I passed, but they would never accept me.” Sita’s molars audibly creak as her jaw pulses with her furious clenching.

“They don’t need to know!” Peri’s riposte matches her frustration.

“They always find out. Always. Remember Jaed? They drove him into hermitude! Jaed! All because his sister lent him only part of the fee!”

Peri sighs. They had indeed forgotten about Jaed. “Why do you even want to be a part of such an institution? You never have anything good to say about them and yet this obsession has lasted years. Years Sita! Why?” As their frustrations mount in the discussion they both begin to escalate from fevered whispers to forbidden decibels and on Peri’s impassioned ‘WHY?!’ Ezral rounds the corner to lambaste them with a simple but terrifying look. The cousins simultaneously raise connected palms, touching their fingers to their foreheads in the silent gesture for apology.

Sita noiselessly gathers her research while Peri helps, their close bond allowing them to coordinate wordlessly. With her cousin close on her heels, she finishes putting everything away and begins the winding journey out of the stacks. Both send Ezral a sheepish wave as they exit. The cooling evening breeze ruffles the iridescent strands of their wildly different hair as they saunter down the steps, leaving the shared frustrations behind them in the stacked shelves of scrolls and books.

“What were you researching anyway? Why were you reading all that dry nonsense about the Valley? And all those mercenary books?” Peri slips their hands into the pockets of their soft, billowy pants while matching their cousin’s shorter gait.

Sita sighs at their inconvenient and perennially sharp observations. She trusts Peri more than any living being, but this is not the sort of operation one involves others in. It is bad enough that she is even considering it, Peri would never actually let her go through with such a foolish undertaking.

“Oh I got in an argument with Sael about mercenaries the other day and how long they’ve been in the Valley so I decided to do some research and prove her wrong the next time I see her.” The ease of her lie both impresses and worries her.

Peri grunts in response. Sael argues with everyone about everything so it is an effective cover. Plus Peri avoids Sael at just about any cost so they would never address it with her. Despite the success of her cover, Sita’s stomach sours a little at lying to one of her favorite people.

The pair continues on in easy silence, eventually reaching Sita’s small bungalow, all that is left in her life of her mother, and Peri’s favorite aunt. The biggest fight the cousins ever had was when Peri suggested she sell the small cottage to cover the cost of Induction. It had taken almost a year for Sita to speak to them again.

“I’m glad you didn’t sell it.” Peri breaks the silence with their mind-reading. Sita takes a large, deep breath and lets it out slowly. The familiar soft and heavy wave of sadness that always comes with talk of her mother settles over them both.

“Me too.” She steps away from her cousin to climb the few stairs to her porch but then turns and walks back. In a rare show of earnest affection she grabs her cousin's large, elegant hand and places it over her heart while reaching her other, much smaller hand across and placing it over the same spot on the firm plane of their own chest. Peri’s delicate eyebrows shoot up in surprise but then they lean in to the ancient gesture, completing the tradition by pressing their forehead to hers. Without a word, Sita gently turns and climbs the few stairs to her door.

Before closing herself in she throws a saucy wink and blows a kiss to her cousin who stands watching her, an inscrutable look on their handsome, aristocratic face.

**********

As the slow descent of night creeps in, Sita plots in earnest. Rummaging through all her various drawers she finds some fitted black pants and a long, split-side, hooded tunic to match. The pearlescent cast of her pale blue skin always catches light so she breaks off a section of one of her kohl sticks and crushes it to a fine powder that she rubs onto the parts of her not covered by her dark clothing. A trick she learned from one of the old tomes she had poured over earlier. Soft black boots and a fitted wool jacket complete her covert mercenary-dodging, Valley-skulking uniform. Appropriately clothed, she pockets the map she traced in the library and slides her dagger into place at the top of her boot.

Now or never she bolsters herself, as she slinks out of the cottage and into the newly minted darkness. Navigating through the City takes very little; having lived there her whole life she won’t need the map until reaching the woods on the outskirts. There are many paths that cut through the woods with which she is intimately familiar, but no one bothers with or tends to the few that lead into the Valley.

When the Historians first established their foothold in the Valley and brought in the mercenaries, there were, of course, a few foolhardy young folk from the City piqued by the mystery and some misguided sense of adventure. Every single person who attempted to sneak into the Valley to see the dragons ended up as a disembodied head on a spike along the Pass entrance. That was several handfuls of centuries ago and remains an effective deterrent to this day. That and the guaranteed disappearance of anyone who speaks out against the Eternal Archives’ monopoly on the Valley.

Sita shakes her head as she makes her way, a physical manifestation of her attempt to banish those fears. She still isn’t really sure what makes her think she can succeed where others have not, but something is driving her forward. It’s not something she knows. It’s not something she feels. It’s just there, moving her along; a dormant instinct roused by her frustration and determination.

As the buildings thin out and the woods approach, she stops behind a tavern and uses the ambient light to examine her map one last time before the stygian darkness of the woods. Her fingers quiver ever so slightly as she refolds the map and slides it back into her pocket. Once again she is accompanied by the soft, rhythmic susurrations of her breathing exercises. The patterns in the exercise give her something to focus on as she navigates overgrown underbrush and aggressive foliage. Knowing that these paths are untended and then navigating them are two very different things.

In the scroll Mercenaries for Hire: How to Make Money From Death the author had dedicated a small section to espionage, detailing how scouts and spies could move noiselessly through even the most difficult terrain. Sita pays close attention to every muscle, every joint and moves with great intention while holding the directions in her mind’s eye. She wants to stare at every strange shape and flinch at every random sound, but instead she focuses only on her breathing, the movement of her body, and the directions from the scroll.

According to everything she had read, the section of the Valley with the sparsest guard coverage is along the North-Eastern quadrant. Now carefully wending her way through the thick forest she understands why. No one in their right mind would come through here. It isn’t just trees with long-reaching branches clawing at her, but thick thorny bushes and dense, fibrous webs of moss and lichen. Her small knife helps but she thinks wistfully of the large forester’s short sword her cousin uses for landscaping and hiking. Asking to borrow it would have raised far too many questions, so instead of hacking efficiently she saws and cuts laboriously.

Quite abruptly she reaches the sharp edge of the ridgeline that dips into the Valley. Though still wooded, the slope has far less cloying underbrush and she is able to move rather quickly from tree to tree until reaching the Valley floor. She pauses for a moment on the soft, flat ground, doing her best to catch her breath silently. She needs to be able to continue on with as little noise as possible. Her chest rises and falls as she takes in her new surroundings. There is no time to celebrate this first success if she is to make it to the Sleeping Caverns along the Northern Edge. Although she would give just about anything to be in the Valley for the Dawn Trumpeting, it would almost certainly mean her death.

Staying just inside the tree line she continues her mission, ignoring the suspicious voice in her head wondering how it is possible she hasn’t even seen signs of other life, let alone been cut down by the famed curved mercenary sword. There was only space in her mind for being as invisible as possible. Everything else is just a distraction. Soon she smells the damp warmth of what must be the caves, minerals and moisture hanging in the night air with something else she does not recognize, something sweeter and slightly… alien.

The strange sweet smell grows as she approaches the first cave opening. Everything she has read and prepared so meticulously simply melts away at the sight that greets her as she creeps in. Curled around itself like a sleeping marsh cat, the dragon is so much more than she had anticipated. Of course she’s seen them in the sky, cutting swathes through the air currents thousands of feet above the Valley, made tiny by distance. Standing now, engulfed in that mysteriously sweet air of the cave, only a few feet away from the largest living creature she has ever seen, she is overcome, overwhelmed and quite possibly underprepared. The condensed moisture glitters like jewels along the rugged cave walls, reflecting off of the dragon's multifaceted scales.

There is so much about the scene to absorb, but within moments of entering she hears the unmistakable scrape of boot on rock and whips around to see a startled guard. Her burnished copper skin glints in the faint glow of the cave. Where was that glow even coming from? Sita’s mind pings with so many questions and a decent amount of panic.

“Where the fuck did you come from?” The guard asks with trace amounts of shock in her voice.

Before Sita can answer she hears movement behind her and whips around again. The previously sleeping dragon has raised its gigantic head. As Sita watches, that beautifully scaled wedge of a head tilts in curiosity, back and forth a few times, taking her in. The neck is long and graceful and snakes a serpentine path to an even bigger body. It is difficult to tell just how large the creature is as it is still wound around itself, but judging just by the size of the head it must be massive.

“Renn has asked you a question, rather rudely, but still, it begs answering.” Nothing on the dragon moves and yet this voice emanates. Sita can’t tell if it is in her chest or her ears or her mind.

She clears her throat and gives the only answer that comes to her “I came from the city.”

The dragon huffs and two clouds of steam billow gently from the arched nostrils followed by the same strange, emanating voice. “I suppose a vague question deserves a vague answer. Renn, would you like to rethink your question?”

Sita turns to the guard again, having temporarily forgotten she was even there. Renn had removed her helmet while Sita was facing the dragon and she is taken aback yet again. Renn is certainly not from the Western Sphere. Her eyes have an almost reptilian shape, curved but slanted with a sharply oblong pupil, three thick long braids the color of freshly spilled blood fall back from her bright, copper face. She’s one of the most beautiful people Sita has ever seen. Everything is a contradiction; sharp and soft, full and lean with high cheekbones and aquiline nose.

“You don’t need to be such a smartass Minny. She startled me. She literally appeared out of thin air! Besides, if I actually question her without a member of the Council present you know they would demote me, at the very least. Self-important pompous windbags, all of them.” This last was grumbled under her breath.

“Minny?” Sita repeats the name in bewilderment. Of all the things she has prepared herself for, a dragon named Minny is not one of them.

“Minerva! I named myself after a deity from a different realm. The Council tried to name me Varneuva. What a stupid fucking name.” Although the words float mysteriously through the air as they had before, Minny’s delicately scaled lip lifts in a sneer at the Historian’s attempt at an appropriate dragon name.

Sita opens her mouth to respond but Renn interrupts “I’m going to go get Tyne, he’ll know what to do.”

Before the words are all the way out a tall figure detaches from the shadows of the cave mouth and a familiar voice cuts through the sticky air “You will do no such thing.”

“Peri?!” Sita exclaims just as Renn asks “Periseph?!”

The figure in question steps into the soft mystery glow of the cave and sure enough, the handsome face of Sita’s cousin is limned in the pearly light.

Just as everyone is adjusting to this rather singular sequence of events, Minny begins to huff rhythmically, pushing air through her magnificent fangs in a staccato beat. It builds quickly and seems as if part of an echo until Sita realizes the accompanying beats are coming from the other caves.

“Shit. Dawn is approaching. We can’t do anything until after they sing.” Renn curses resignedly as Minny continues to build her song, using the acoustics of the cave and the other dragons to weave together sounds Sita has never heard before. The only part that is ever heard from the city is the triumphant trumpeting at the very end.

Sita starts to feel strange, and colorful spots of light begin to dance around the edges of her vision. Lightheaded, she starts her breathing exercises, not even realizing she is seamlessly weaving her breaths with the dragon’s percussive song. Minny never breaks the beat but her eyes snap to Sita, languid neck suddenly fast and sharp. Her massive head is now all that Sita can see, framed in the dancing light spots still creeping in. Instead of the usual calming slow down, her breathing builds with the dragon. As Minny begins a new layer of sound, melodic and strange, almost hypnotizing, the gray light of dawn warms and brightens. It is almost as though the song is calling the light to it.

Quick bursts of trumpeting can be heard from other caves, yet another layer in the complicated and mysterious song. Sita is fully entranced, breaths coming sharp and fast and rhythmic, weaving through Minny’s own music. She stares into the fathomless pools of the dragon’s eyes. She had thought they were black but constellations and clouds of color start to show themselves until that is all Sita sees. The song crescendos into a powerful climax and as soon as Minny’s melodic trumpeting stops, Sita collapses into a nebulous pool of darkness.