Nima and the Human Boy

s an abandoned toddler in the forest.

“I really don’t want to do this,” she muttered under her warm breath. Nima didn’t know why her mother insisted she be the one to go collect the offering from the Lake of Sacrifice. It wasn’t her fault her brother decided to be a total idiot and fight a troll when he knew what a little spite from a troll could do to a dragon.

She muttered more soundless grumble as she flew closer to the lake, stretching out her wide brown and long wings in a bid to get as much air under her wings as possible. She wasn’t used to flying and haven’t even flow down from the dragon mountain since she only had forty lives on her back. She hated coming down from the mountain. Not only was the journey too far as the mountain stretched far beyond the clouds but the air was so chilling that it was simply biting. She could not understand how her brother has been coming down every full moon for the past twenty years to collect the human offered to the dragons.

Nima could finally see the giant trees that make up the forest, trees that were there long before the dragons and the faries and definitely longer than humans. It was a very dense forest filled with wonders and dangers and feared by humans. Nima believe that humans thought dragons just roamed around all day looking for humans to snatch and eat. Very cute but dragons didn’t even eat humans.

She could see the little clearing that was the lake of sacrifice. It was a small assemble of water with a large Humbara tree branch hanging over half of the lake. It was on one of these branches that a little human boy was tied by the hands with rope and hung over the lake. Nima’s heard aches when she flew close enough to behold how little the human baby was. It couldn’t have seen more than four winters, it looked so helpless and … dead. He looked dead for his face was blue.

“poor child. Poor little child. Why did you come to this world?” nima whispered.

She voiced an incantation that released a little bit of her magic. This allowed her to morph into an eagle. She would do a lot of damages landing as a dragon. The smaller size of the eagle also allowed her to get to the boy and untie him while swooping him into the air before he could take a deadly bath in the steamy lake of sacrifice.

It was a cold human boy and he was even smaller and colder than she had suspected yet he stilled lived. That was good. She could still save him. She tried to do just that after placing in on the leave of the humbara tree. The leaves were the largest in this side of the world and were usually used in roofing and carpeting by every specie, both human and dragon.

She breathed warm air all over him. When he didn’t stir, she added more hotness to the air as she rolled him from side to side hoping the movement would rouse him. It didn’t. she decided she would have to morph into a human to better function in her quest to wake him up and so she did.

Because her dragon skin was black and white, her human female form usually ended up having deeply brown skin, her natural blues and the wildest display of blinding white hair. She absolutely loved it. But she didn’t have the time to admire her beauty as she focused on the task. It took her all of one minute to gather the nearby littered twigs around her to start a warm fire. As if a cue, she heard a wolf call out nearby and knew she would have to hurry out. The wolfs around her moved in great packs and some of them were larger than bears. It wasn’t called the Great Wolf Forest just because it sounded catchy.

“Wake little boy. I shall save you but I shall not trade your life for mine. Don’t make me fight a wolf,” she said to the unconscious boy. He did not respond.

She drew in breath to breathe more warm air on him but his eyes suddenly sprang open and he let out a great wail.

“I am sorry. Please don’t eat me,” the boy pleaded in a scared and trembling voice.

“I won’t eat you. I don’t eat humans. And be quiet. You are going to get us killed,” she told him.

“You are lying. You eat people,” he said when he calmed down enough to sound coherent.

“That is not true. I just saved your life,” she returned.

But he wasn’t far from the truth. The dragon queen was in the making. Her egg has been laid and for 20 years, the humans have been bringing sacrifice of human babies that haven’t seen more than four winters. According to legend, there was a special magic that reside both in the human brain and spine that would help the dragon queen to grow her power to such that it could not be compared to any other dragon alive and to make her wiser. Unfortunately, the usually required killing the little human to extract the ingredients needed. Nima wondered if there was another way around it.

“You promise?” he asked with eyes so wide and so full of fear that Nima heart ached all over again. His big black eyes looking like endless pools and he looked up at her, waiting for a promise from her to spare his life. She didn’t want to make that promise. But Nima suspected there was something special about the boy, it felt as if the universe was putting things in place to make sure everything works out in his favour. She decided she would try to save the boy. So she promised.

“I do. Now settle down and sleep. We have a long night ahead of us.”

As he dozed off, Nima decided she would take the boy home as directed by her mission but not to be offered to the queen. She would try and safe the little boy with all her might. So as he slept, she flew his sleeping body up the cold mountain to the dragon village that sat at the very top of the mountain, beyond the clouds that covered the sky. The seer would know what to do.

She was surprised the added weight of the little boy did it make a tad harder to fly. As it was, she did not have to summon more energy while carrying which was a good thing. She landed out of sight as she did not want the whole community to know what she was about. Her home was a few steps away from the rest of the sleeping camp. This was because her mother was the seer and was always conducting loud payer session most of the night. Her mother would know what to do, she decided as she shrunk her size to fit in between the branches of the dragon trees that were scattered atop the mountain. These tree that were bigger than life provided the dragons with shelter from hairs and storms. There were such majestic tree and have been standing since the beginning to time. Their colour was such a deep royal mauve that it looked endless.

Unfortunately for her, the first person she saw was her elder brother who seemed just fine. When she had left, he had been testifying to the pain his injury brought to his warrior body, preaching on about the importance of a good all day rest. He did not seem worst for wear. He was also in human form which meant he had transformed using magic which meant he spent the day with a lady. Nima scowled at him as she lowered the boy to the ground while morphing into a human.

“You lied. You were not as hurt as you led mother to believe,” she accused once she saw the boy was still settled in sleep.

Ony was her elder brother and the strongest warrior in the dragon clan both in dragon and human form. In his human form, he was as handsome as sin and Nima suspected he did that on purpose. He jawline was too perfect, his eyes were quite dreamy deep smoky perfect blue and his teeth, well, they were as straight as could be. A well-known womanizer, he was. He was always fleeting or fleeing from one female to the other, refusing every urging to pick a mate and settle down. Nima knew every lady and their mother would give half of their lives to be his mate but not Ony. He wanted to enjoy his youth or waste it as their mother accused. Nima did not care what he chose to do with his life as long as he did not complicate hers. Theirs was a prestigious family, only second to the royal family whom they were born to serve directly. That was why her mother, the seer was in charge until the coming of the queen. And from present evidence Ony had complicated her life so he could have fun.

“I don’t think so. My pain tolerance is very low. I hurt easily,” he said, coming closer.

“You lie. I have seen you fight on with your wings broken in two places,” Nima said, recalling the horror of that horrible fight between her brother and her father. It was after that fight that the seer, her mother had declared Ony to be member of their family, the adopted son. But that was a story for another day.

“That doesn’t mean I don’t have very low pain tolerance but that’s by the way. Why are trying to sneak in the offering instead of taking it to mother at the sitting yolk temple? What are you up to?”

Nima shuffled her feet and scratched her afro. How was she to explain her crazy plan to her brother who was as practical and straight forward as a hammer?

“I just don’t think we should be scarifying human to the egg. Do you know these offerings are human babies that…”

“Let me stop you right there. The eggs needs the magic of the human to be fully formed. It is the way it has to be,” he interrupted.

“Says who?” Nima demanded know exactly who said it.

“Says the law of magic of creating. To make a queen ruler, we need the magic of the five race. You know that, Nima,” he said, sounding like he could not believe she could be this dense. She knew about the law and requirement but there should be space for exemption, right.

“There should be space for an exemption. Maybe…”

“Maybe you do nothing,” said their mother as she came to join the conversation.

Nima did not even know why she tried to hide things from her mother, Nwanto. They did call her the seer because both her eyes were white and nothing else. They called her that because of her eyes and the fact that few things could be hidden by her if she was determined to find it, even the futures. Nwanto was also in human form. Her human form had white long hair that fell like river past her should and bum, all the way to her back and her face has a wicked beauty to it that was scary and amazing at the same time. Her skin was pure black with no a spot out of place.

“But mother...”

“Do not start. It is too early and the night is coming. I need to prepare the bath,” she said as she headed for the child.

Nima ran to stand between her and the child. Her mother pulled back and looked at her in surprise as she should. Nima had never tried to stand up to her mother. No one really tried. By all meaning and implication, she was the queen and commander of the clan at the moment. Even Ony was not expecting Nima to protest to that extent.

Listen mother, there has to be another way.”

“There could be but I don’t want to find it,” she replied.

Sometimes, Nima wondered if her mother had a heart but then she remembered her loyalty to the royal family and concluded she must. She had killed her husband and brother to thwart the coup attempt that had killed the last queen and new queen. Nima stirred her mind clear of that day.

“Dragons were here before humans. How were the ancient queens made then? Don’t tell me there wasn’t an alternative before humans. I won’t believe it.”

“Child, I do not care what you choose to believe. This human will be sacrificed and there will be nothing you can do about. Now, I shall not stand for your tantrums. Today is not the day,” he mother scolded, her green eyes changing to a burning red for an instant before reverting back to green.

It was a warning for Nima to back down and drop the subject and Nima would have if she could but she had promised the little child she would protect him. Even as it scarred her to challenge and anger her mother, she knew she had no choice. As it turned out, she found a hill to die on after all. She paused and allowed her mother walk by her and move towards the sleeping child. She was giving herself time to think of something to delay the ritual.

Nwanto bent down low at the waist and gently scooped the child into her arms like a loving mother. Watching, one would not guess she was about to suffocate the child and rip his spine from the rest of his body. She was already reciting the incantation of thanks and appreciation to the human for giving up its life and so on.

“There has to be another way,” Nima said when he brain came up blank. She turned to her brother with eyes that were blurry with tears. “Please.”

Ony winced as if she had stabbed him and looked away. She knew she was special to her brother but she wasn’t sure if she was enough of that to have him go against her mother. But if Nwanto were to listen to anyone, it would be her brother. He has her ears. Nwanto cooed to the child as she headed out of the Seer residence towards the cave where the egg lay.

“What if….” Ony began, biting his lips for a second before continuing. “What if we use lives to replace this particular offering? Would that work?”

Nwanto stopped in her tracks and turned back to look at him both in annoyance and surprise. Even Nima was surprised and confused for she did not expect Ony to actually try and stop her mother and she had no idea what he meant by using lives. She knew what lives means. Every dragon had lives on their back. They were the spikes that lined the spine of every specie of dragon. A dragon’s age and wisdom was measured by the spikes on their spine and the magic gaged by the layers of scale covering their head. When a layer of sale from the heart and a spike from the spine were merged together, they are called life for they held great magic that was equal to a living being and no dragon would ever give up their lives easily.

“Why did you do that?” Nwanto asked Ony.

“What does he mean? Is there another way? Mother, please, tell me.”

Her mother stopped to place the child gently on the floor before she started talked, as if resigned to the inevitable.

“A long time ago, before the new order of dragon, before humans, the ancient ones used to draw magic from the lives of every dragon to feed to the queen egg, every dragon but the seer. The lives had the essence that also reside in the humans. But after the first humans emerged from the dragons spine and it was found they had the same magic, many years later, it was agreed for humans to be used to nurture the eggs instead of lives,” she narrated as if she was impacting life-chaining information.

Nima was too dumfounded to talk. She looked at her mother in disbelieve. She could not wrap her mind around the fact that there was another way to obtain sacrifice without ending a life. Yes, lives were precious and not hard to grow as it. Nima only had 69 lives on her back and the 70th one just coming in. she became a full adult around the time the queen egg was laid twenty years ago when she got sixty lives on her back. Her lives where considered more valuable than that of a human. Nima however, did not know how many layers covered her heart but she knew she could give up as much as needed even if it meant leaving her heart open. She could grow a new one. It would just mean she would become the weakest member of the clan Sumnaya dragons. She would do it without a second thought.

“What did you aim to achieve by telling her that? You know her temperament, Onuora. I am cross with you,” her mother informed Ony, calling him his full name which meant son warrior.

“I apologize. I don’t know what came over me,” he said at once.

“I will do it. How many lives would it take to spare his life? I will give the lives needed,” Nima said.

Chapter one B

(My lives for a life)

“You will do no such thing. Don’t be ridiculous. You barely have enough life to be considered an adult and you want to give it away. You will do no such thing,” her mother said in a tone that broke no argument. But that was exactly the mood Nima was in. she was determined to get her way.

“They are my lives. I can do with them whatever I want and I want to use it to nurture my queen,” Nima insisted, eyes darting from her mother to brother.

“You poor confused silly child,” Nwanto began, already wondering how she would present this case to the dragons of the community. She knew Nima would get her way, it was only a matter of time. But she wouldn’t call herself a mother if she didn’t make an attempt to dissuade her massive bout of foolishness because that was what this was, mere foolishness that would cost her lives she couldn’t afford to lose. But what could she say?

……………………………….

If you read this far, please head over to the next chapter of the short story titled My lives for a life.

If you don’t mind terrible, I would appreciate any little feedback that might help me improve my writing in any way. I hope you enjoy yourself.