The Old Gates

There weren’t always dragons in the valley. The valley was protected, sacred, and lush. But something let them out.

“Someone.”

Niamh fingered marks on the ground in front of the Old Gates. I looked over her shoulder and tried to discern for myself exactly what she understood from the stray this—and—that etchings in the dirt. She put a hand on her knee and stood to turn and face me — Her figure towering and strong, and her left eye replaced with gold. The orb must have told her who did this. My head craned back and upwards at the keeper of the Old Gates.

“What?”

“Someone led the dragons into the valley.”

Was I narrating out loud? Niamh shook her head. She was reading my mind again. Druids.

“Dragons are gatekeepers to the OtherWorld. If they’re here, they’re looking for someone.”

Niamh shouldered past me in a way that was casual to her and an act of war to outsiders. I stepped aside in time only to be grazed by her knuckles that held her staff — solid wood as tall as me and carved from a fallen branch of the Old Gates the last time magic tried to destroy the valley. Fastened to the top of the staff is a stone, gifted from the deities of the OtherWorld, for Niamh’s bravery. Niamh saved us then — with the help of the Clan — and ever since that day she has been the keeper of the Old Gates to the OtherWorld.

The Old Gates aren’t actually gates, rather, a large curved space of missing bark in the valley’s oldest tree. It sat, almost hidden among various other trees, but if you live in the valley, you know. There is a vibration it gives, a magical breath that both reminds us of our fortune in the valley and threatens us with its fragility. The Old Gates don’t open like gates, either. It opens with magic, incantations that I pray my Nan will teach me someday. She says I’m too young, but Niamh doesn’t seem to think so; I’ve been following in her footsteps since I could spell my first name.

I don’t remember the exact occurrence. I was young — maybe four or five — when I wandered into the woods in the valley one afternoon. It wasn’t Nan’s fault; Mother was ill, and father was off shore searching for spices and fish. While Nan was distracted, I plodded along by myself until I reached the Old Gates.

And opened the portal.

On accident, of course. Niamh swooped in just in time to close the door herself and take me away before the deities and dead could make their way back.

“There are no accidents,” she told me.

It has always been thought that the OtherWorld is a place of pure bliss and joy, but if humans can touch it, it doesn’t stay like that for long. Fables and legends that only the drunken old men of the Clan will tell once a year before the great harvest, when the worst of our kind opened the Old Gates and soiled the magic that existed inside. I wanted to see for myself, and snuck back several more times as a child but couldn’t make the door open again no matter how hard I tried. Also, the countless times Niamh intercepted me in the process of quenching my curiosity. Since the day I opened the Old Gates, I have had a towering shadow of a half-god with a golden eye follow me around. Niamh hasn’t let me out of her sight. Except for today, of course, since there are dragons in the valley.

“Whaddya mean, ‘someone?’” I caught up to Niamh, two and a half of my steps for every one of hers. “You don’t think it was me, do you? Do you think I did it sleepwalking?”

“You don’t sleepwalk,” she said over her shoulder. “They aren’t from the valley.”

I stopped my pursuit of my guardian. Outsiders don’t come to the valley. We have sentries, a wall, guards, and the Clan. We are a protected civilization of magic-keepers and traders. Outsiders don’t come to the valley; humans don’t come to the valley. I picked up after Niamh again.

“Were they human?”

“Yes, mostly. Maybe.”

“Maybe?” I caught up alongside Niamh. She was never unsure. I looked up at the back of her head, and then to the orb, which was glowing.

“Come.” She darted off down the rolling valley in huge strides and I chased hopelessly behind. I knew where we were headed, though — to the piercing shrieks of dragons and the horrified cries of our village.

My heart pounded in my ears like the old drums my father played before he left on the ships with other members of the Clan. I had a cold ache deep inside of my body, as if there was a portal to the darkest parts of the sea buried in my spine. But I continued to chase after Niamh as she chased down the sounds of war. Something happened to her when the cries of innocents rang out. She seemed to grow taller, less human, certainly less like a demi-god and more like an animal. Her movements become predatory, and the aggressors don’t know they are being hunted.

On a regular day, the valley slopes and swoops down as if the wind carved it in sweeping brush-like motions. The top of the valley is encircled with our wall, beyond that is the treeline which leads to the Old Gates. This was done intentionally, to keep the Gates separated from our village in case something got out. With dragons in the valley, though, the sloping lush hills resembled the aftermath of our earlier wars, things I’ve only ever seen in paintings or heard around fires with no detail spared. Deep scars in the ground, grown over with grass and flowers, sat adjacent to new chunks of earth gouged from the claws of the Old Gate dragons. They were angry and ill-mannered when it came to reclaiming their own. My running turned into direct, downhill leaps as I closed in on the village as well as the charred memorial garden, dedicated to my mother. I inhaled shock and soot, but knew Niamh needed me more. Flowers could be replanted, Niamh could not be brought back from the dead. Or maybe she could. Honestly, it never got that far before, and I’ve never seen necromancy practiced on a demi-god.

Niamh made it to the middle of the valley. Scattered were both the injured and dead, blackened rooftops, and a hut still on fire. Niamh lifted her staff above her head; the orb began to glow a white-hot light that put the entire top of the staff out of vision. I was still too far away to help but the light was a beacon to the Clan, who were stowed away in our last standing bunker.

Two large dragons took turns torching the stone bunker, as if trying to roast the Clan alive. (I say large, but this was honestly the first dragon I’ve seen in person. Niamh later informed me that these dragons were adolescent, meaning approximately 100-years-old.) The screams of the men inside were desperate. Niamh raised her staff and the orb became a blade of the blackest obsidian. She turned her head to yell to me either, “Get down,” or, “Get out of the way,” but the roar of a dragon charging her blocked my ears. Just to be safe, I both got down and out of the way to watch Niamh grapple the teeth of the massive beast.

I rolled haphazardly down the hill towards the stone bunker, head over foot, as the sounds of battle echoed around me. I landed on my back and glared into the bright spinning blue, unsure if I was safe, and too nauseous and out of breath to rightfully care. The primal grrrah of Niamh as she killed the dragon caused me to stir, and I sat up as the dragon let out gurgles and grunts before falling over to the wayside. She stood over it and placed her heel beside where the obsidian blade was planted and yanked it out, pleased with herself. Niamh looked at me, and her face turned sour. She hiked up her blade and threw it, presumably square at my head. I ducked, unaware of the open mouth behind me, ready to pluck me from the valley. The blade landed in between the dragon’s eyes and it didn’t break eye contact with me as it lay dying on the grass.

Niamh walked over silent, stoic, past me and to her blade which she retrieved and returned to the form of her magic orb before she scooped me off the ground. The men of the Clan filed out, charred and sweaty and damaged. They were quiet, most stared at me.

“They came ‘fer ‘yew.” Gregor Sorenson, a not-yet elder, pointed at me and looked to Niamh for confirmation.

“Huh?” I looked up at Niamh as well, to make sure she told Gregor the dragons baked his brain a little too long.

“Aye, ‘yew. That draco was right prepared to pick ‘yew up in ‘er teeth an’ eat ‘yew.”

“If they wanted to eat her they would have charred her like they were tryin’ to do to you lot of ingrates.” Niamh shouldered past Gregor and the rest of the Clan parted like leaves in the wind to avoid her; She was still very clearly in the fighting mood.

“What’re we ‘sposed to go wit these dracos?” A clansman called out.

“Stew,” she replied.

I silently followed Niamh. Something was off. After battle or a kill like the dragons, she would retire to the feasting halls for grog and meat. Everyone would wait for her to tell them just how she made it out of the fight, and she’d happily regale the crowds. Instead, we made it to the darkened front door of her home. The candles lit on their own and we were soon surrounded by a warm, glowing light. Except for Niamh, who looked like a shallow, grayer version of herself. She put an already-filled pot of water over the fireplace and gently rested her staff beside the brick. I watched her sit, waiting to be commanded.

“There,” she said. I followed her finger to the empty stool and promptly took a seat. For some reason, I felt like I was in trouble.

“That was… something. I wonder who let them out.” I stared at Niamh expectantly. She must have known, that’s why she was so upset, I thought.

“Gregor was right.”

“The dragon wanted to eat me?”

“No,” she said. Niamh rubbed her face with her hands, only smearing the dirt around. “No. If a dragon is going to eat you they will absolutely roast you alive beforehand. Those dragons were here to take you back.”

“Back where?” I sat up straight. Niamh wasn’t making sense. The valley was my home. The Clan was my clan, even if they were rough and rude most of the time. Niamh was my protector.

“Through the Old Gates.” She stood. “More dragons will come. We’ll have to leave the valley.”

“What?!” I jumped to my feet. “Me? I live here. This is where I belong.”

“I was wrong. The dragons weren’t let out by someone in the valley. They were sent here from the OtherWorld.”

“I thought only deities could send them places.”

“Yes. And this deity seems to want you back.” Niamh paced the wooden floor, creaking and clicking her heels with each step. She was thinking. She stopped and grabbed her staff off the wall. I looked down at my feet.

“You’re never wrong, Niamh, but I belong here.”

“You don’t know where you belong.” She sat again. Her tone was flat. “There’s a lot you do not know, Cora, and if we don’t leave the valley I fear you may not have enough time to learn.”