J'SKAR

I

He stared into the toddler’s eyes. It had stopped crying. It looked back at him, eyes wide with shock and wonderment. He scanned its body. It was a tiny, plump male wrapped with light leather blankets. Around its face tissue, a tint of red was concentrated in its nose and ears. It was feeling cold. J’skar felt his tail relax and slowly curl up. He couldn’t help but feel the little human was a part of nature, a part of the green grass, the wind and the trees. It was motherless, too. And he wouldn’t be surprised if it died from frostbite soon. J'skar approximated four hours.

“What am I to do with you?”

Leave. Humans are trouble. Even if the infants pose no threat, the human hordes will come back looking for it.

Then return it.

J'skar felt another voice speak.

Ha-ha. And get shot from the sky with their fireballs? Don’t disrupt their way of life, J’skar.

Then what would you have me do? J’skar looked around the camp. The debris laid on the ground like black tar scarring the earth. He turned his head back to the toddler.

I can’t leave it to die.

Nonsense. Let the stone-colored wolves find it. They hunt for humans all the time.

A few seconds passed. He noticed the forest had fallen silent, like a frozen statue. The wildlife were silencing their mouths and hiding in the borrows. He felt the air breeze on his nose, and watched the wind rattle the trees, moving through the forest like an agent of the night.

I can’t leave it to die.

Then you have made your choice.

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II

Bartholomew Pines limped through the forest, holding his stomach. Pitches of black hit his vision every time he blinked. He was broken. Tired. He felt his body sludge through the wet mud, the rainfall splattering on his brown locks of hair. Must. Find. The. Road. He was operating on instinct now. His body was summoning all the spirits of world and the blood of his ancestors to move him through the wreckage. He couldn’t think of anything else. Not of all the pain that was soon to come. The life he would return to. The harsh, coldness of reality. He couldn’t possibly make sense of anything but his breathing. His breathing and the rain.

Jack.

He immediately winced. A giant wave of pain crushed his body and ripped him apart. My boy. My baby boy. Is he alive? He must be. He must be. Bartholomew thought how likely it would be that bandits would roam Sage mountains. All the damn reports were wrong. The foolish archaeologist, who didn’t take heed of Bartholomew's warning of the Mountain Spirit. Humans should not plot homes in the mountains. The Spirits don’t like their way of life disturbed. They will incur wrath and find a way to drive you out. Set fire to your home and rip apart your limbs. A Farmer’s tale, the archaeologist called it.

‘Those stories were made up by desperate peasants to make sure their children wouldn’t wander off and starve in the wilderness. No offence, Mr. Pines.’

What about Jack? Did the bandits find him? He could still hear the shouting, as he’d approached the camp. The flame torches waving on the burly arms of hooded men, with black fur cloaks and red paint under their eyes. The manic anger ringing in their shrill voices. He had felt his heart pound, and immediately he charged toward his tent to find his son. Then- a sudden flash. His vision turning white. The rumbling vibration from underneath the ground- and somehow, he had passed out....Woke up, to a giant wreckage of smoke behind him, and large boulders of rocks blocking his path.

It was all such a blur, he couldn’t wrap his hand around it. His mind went back to the camp tent, where he had left Jack. He remembered him in the corner of the room, tightly wrapped in blankets, his beautiful face calm and asleep. His mother’s eyes.

No. Jack is alive. I know it. I’ll come back and find him. Make my way back to the village. Find the Royalist men. Tell them what happened.

Bartholomew lifted his hand from his stomach. He felt a sharp sting and a warm sludge of blood leak from his shirt. It felt cold and exposed. He pressed his hand against his wound and applied pressure. He looked up, and saw a grove of trees surrounding a pond. He recognized the arrangement. It was the route that he and the settlers had taken to reach the mountains. The route that the archaeologist had suggested. Bartholomew knew he was on the right path. He would find his way to his village- hell could unleash the spirit of the devil himself, he cared not- he would gather all the men, the villagers and the royalists, and find Jack-nothing would get in his way. Not even the Mountain Spirit.

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III

J’skar glided steadily across the mountain peaks, with the toddler resting on the scales of his head, behind his horns. He made sure to fly in straight paths and keep his head still whenever he changed directions to keep the toddler balanced.

The moon was shining above them, illuminating the tips of the trees and mountains. It was a cool night. J’skar’s eyes flickered downwards every now and then, noticing the markings on the ground. The footprints, the ashes. The humans were making their home in these lands, and were slowly disturbing the spirits of the world. All creatures know their place, know who they serve. They hunt, they eat, they mate, they sleep. None dare disturb the fabrics of the world. None except humans- with their deceit and treacherous ambition, their tiny nibbling fingers and restless bodies, building tools and structures, expanding their homes and destroying nature.

Dragons were of the ancient kind. Noble and true. Protectors of the earth, and fear-mongering guardians of the living lands. They served the moon and sun, and honored the cycles of life. Which included the rituals of roaming the mountains and extinguishing humans from their invasive nests.

If that were true, why save the little human?

J’skar couldn’t find an answer.

Never in a hundred years had he ever saved a human being. Perhaps cleared a path, or hunted a bear that had been preying on a group of human-men. But never had he actively saved a child, and taken them on his back and flown away. It was warm-blooded, had fragile muscle tissue and an early-developed brain- and yet, there was something in its eyes. Something true. Something possessing life, in its purest, most natural sense. A potential for greatness, but a vulnerability to be swept away. A need for love, food and care. But somewhere in his soul, a deep fire. It reminded him, a long time ago, of a dragon he once knew.

A dragon with its mother's eyes.