Draka

When I returned to the ‘bandits’ camp,’ as it were, it was no surprise to me that I didn’t spot Rib or Pot until they showed themselves, safely hidden away up one of the denser trees nearby. I wasn’t happy about it, but I wasn’t surprised.

The tree was far enough away that they wouldn’t be able to hear anything that was said, but that hadn’t been the goal. Nor would the sentries have been likely to hear us if I talked to the cousins from the ground, but rather than do that I walked up to the trunk, shifted, and wound myself up until I’d joined them in the branches. It felt so good to not need to hide what I could do from them, and I had a moment of petty satisfaction as they instinctively pulled back from me when I basically appeared next to them.

“Have you seen anything interesting?” I asked once they’d taken a second to recover.

“A big fucking lizard just appeared out the shadows and I almost fell down and broke my neck,” Rib said. “That was quite something. Other than that, not really. They changed sentries shortly after you left, and the new ones are just as suspicious of each other.”

“Don’t know how many weapons they have,” Pot added. “The guy with the sword handed it over to the woman who relieved him, though the guy with the axe was replaced by a new guy with a hammer.”

“Another tool, not a weapon?”

“Yeah, like a carpenter’s hammer,” Rib said. “Come to think of it, other than the two dead idiots, the ones who attacked us all had forestry axes. I didn’t think much of it at the time since we were busy staying alive, but seeing it like this I wonder if those swords were the only ones this group have.”

“Yeah,” I said. “These are not bandits. Maybe they’re trying to be, but these are just… people, aren’t they? Too desperate or stupid to know better. And now they’ve run into a group much badder than themselves and they’ve lost two people, possibly their best fighters, and everything’s falling apart.”

“That sounds about right, yeah,” Rib said, and Pot nodded.

“Well,” I told them, “I’m going to get in there and see if I can hear anything.”

“What if they see you?” Rib asked.

“What if they see me? What are these people going to do? I’m going to want you two to confirm that you recognise the survivors of the group that attacked us, but I’m pretty sure that I don’t need much to justify just wiping them out if they so much as look at me funny. What happens if they see me depends entirely on them.”

It was early twilight, but still dark enough for me to shadow pretty effortlessly. Neither of the sentries noticed as I entered the smaller half of the camp, moving silently among the tents but hearing only the sounds of restless sleep. It was the same when I moved to the larger half, just the crackle of the fire and the occasional sounds of the sleepers.

Just by the tents there was a dense thicket of bushes, and rather than return to the cousins I decided to hole up there. I found a sizable hollow within that smelled like something had lived there for a while. It was almost large enough for me, and while I must have made at least a little bit of noise when I shifted back, my form pushing out anything that was in the way, no one reacted. There were some thorny brambles in there which couldn’t hurt me, but also a lot of fragrant late-blooming flowers, which was nice. It felt almost like a nest of sorts in there, and was really pretty cosy.

As sunrise slowly approached and then arrived the camp slowly filled with the sounds of people waking from restless sleep to a new day of hardship, with groans and grumbles instead of the satisfied sighs and ‘good mornings’ that I was used to. It made me that much more convinced that this was no organised band of bandits. The way that the camp was divided I got the feeling that I was dealing with a very tenuous alliance of two groups, and with how poorly they were outfitted and prepared I wondered if they weren’t some kind of refugees, though from what I didn’t know. I remembered Rallon mentioning refugees from the north, and kicked myself for not asking more about them or the situation.

The idea that they were refugees got some support when a handful of kids came out of two of the tents, ranging in ages from a toddler to a girl of maybe ten, their tired looking mothers coming after them. Between the five tents in that half of the camp there were a total of twelve people, but only three of them looked like they would have been able to put up any kind of fight.

The mood was, to put it lightly, shit. I could only assume that at least one of the dead had been a friend or family member of most or all of them. One older woman looked particularly hollow eyed as she set about preparing some simple food for the others. She had an air about her that screamed ‘grieving mother’.

What I had seen also changed things pretty drastically. I was not going to be wiping this camp out. I was not going to be killing any kids. That was a hard no. Neither half of me wanted any part of that, and it extended to their mothers as well. As for the others they couldn’t really hurt me, so I probably didn’t need to kill them either. If Mak or the others wanted to mete out their own justice for the attack that was a whole other thing entirely, but I was in a mood for mercy.

I didn’t learn anything useful. I heard some names, some short snatches of conversation relating to the doings of the morning, but whatever had brought them there didn’t come up, either because it wasn’t important or because it was something they didn’t want to talk about. Either way I decided to check out the smaller camp to see if they were more talkative.

The people in the camp were keeping busy and the scrub was fairly high, so I didn’t expect to have any trouble staying hidden despite the brightening sunshine. The path I’d used to get into the thicket was too narrow for me, but I made an attempt at just pushing through before I strained myself to shadow out despite the light. Even turning around made a slight rustle, and I only got my legs out of the hollow before the rest, especially my wings, caught and started making more noise than I was comfortable with. Oh well. It wasn’t that much of a hassle to darken the existing shadow enough to let me shadow out, nor did I need to hold it long. As soon as I was out of the thicket, though, I shifted back and crept along towards the other group of tents, keeping low to the ground.

Either I hadn’t been as stealthy as I thought about my movement or the small amount of noise I’d made had been enough, but as I crept I heard the unmistakable sound of a child’s voice calling, “Mama! Mama! I saw a snake, Mama, in the bushes!” It was enough to cause a minor commotion and make me stop and look around, but no one seemed to be looking for me, being more concerned about a snake in the bushes by the tents. “It was black and big like this,” I heard the boy insist from behind me, loudly enough that I saw heads popping up from ahead of me. That did it. With some annoyance I pushed and shifted, gliding along as a patch of shadow around the edge of the clearing.

There were no convenient bushes near the smaller camp, so I considered posting up in a tree. Finding a dense enough tree wasn’t always easy, though, and I couldn’t find one that suited me. Most leafy trees in the forest were types that spread their branches wide with leaves only at the ends, and the ones with much denser foliage, which I preferred, weren’t common at this altitude. Rib and Pot were in one which had a good overview of the camp, but it was too far to hear anything. The conifers that were dense enough were usually too short to climb, though they were good for hiding under on the ground, but the ones in the hills were mostly pine with a tall, limbless trunk and an open crown.

With no bushes and no convenient tree to hide in, I ended up just slinking into the shadow of one of the tents and staying there in shadow form, listening. It was still a bit of a strain to maintain, and it was getting too bright for me to see anything without shifting back, but it was any potential conversation that I was interested in, anyway.

“Just one more Sorrows-beloved thing to worry about,” a defeated male voice said. “Snakes. I hate snakes.”

“It’s no worse than up north,” said a woman firmly. “We’re still alive, aren’t we? More than we can say for most.”

“Aye, like Tork and that Sweet Creek woman he fell in with,” the man replied. “Would that I could have talked them out of it…”

“And would that none of this had ever happened. Young braves with their heads full of stories. No one blames you but you, husband.”

“Them Sweet Creekers do. They think we should have all piled in, fools that they are. Never seen a killer a one of them, and that’s what I saw, and that’s what they were. And now Tork’s gone, poor young fool.”

The woman’s voice turned soft and comforting. “Come, Jek. Here, hold Alda and feed her her mash. Your brother doesn’t need you any more, but your daughter does. I do.”

That was all I needed. From there on I would have the humans take over and decide what the next appropriate step would be, and then we could put all of this behind us and get back to what was important. I needed to report what I’d found in the south to Rallon. Kira needed to be properly questioned, though I’d decided to listen to Herald and Mak and not let anyone actually hurt her to force any answers. Then we could get back to utterly destroying the Night Blossom and I could be rid of the anger that kept bubbling inside me and relax properly.

We also needed to be back in the city for the men’s arrival, which couldn’t be far off. It was odd to the point of suspicion that nobody had heard from them for a while, but I wasn’t worried about their safety. They could take care of themselves. It would just be nice to know when we could expect them, ideally on which ship. And how much money they were bringing. Couldn’t forget that.

With all that in mind I scooted back out among the trees, circled around, and picked up the cousins. Rib saw me at the base of their tree, and through some awkwards sign language I got across that I wanted them down. Pot was sleeping but roused easily enough when Rib poked him, and without a word they both shimmied around to the side of the tree most hidden from the camp and climbed down that way.

“So, family groups,” Rib said when her feet were on the ground. “Kids and all. Not your typical outlaws, I’d say. Did you hear anything?”

“They’re from two different settlements,” I told them, “and they don’t seem to trust each other, if the separate camps weren’t clear enough. Sounds like the two dead ones might have been a couple or something, probably all that was holding the two sides together. God only knows what’ll happen now. Either way I want you all to talk it through and decide what to do. I’d be fine with just letting them go.”

“So do you want us to come with?”

“Yeah. Let’s leave it until evening. Even if these people break camp they won’t get far, with the kids and all.”

“I’m honestly glad the bear came our way,” Pot said, paralleling my own thoughts from earlier. “I don’t like to think what would have happened if it came across this lot.”

It wouldn’t have been pretty, I knew that much.

We covered the few miles back to the gate quickly. It was closed, so I opened it up to let Rib and Pot in and found all the others sleeping, or just having been woken up in the case of Herald and Ardek. I quickly told them what we’d found and what I wanted, got Herald’s reassurances that everybody had behaved perfectly, and then shut them all back in and returned to my nest to sleep. As much as I wanted this whole bandit/refugee situation dealt with, and as much as I preferred to get the humans there before sunset to make the whole situation a little less dramatic, I was still in pain from fighting that damned bear, and I needed some proper rest and recovery. If that meant oversleeping and dealing with everything another day, so be it. I was satisfied that they were no threat, and they were not my responsibility, so I didn’t much care about what happened to them.

Well. That wasn’t entirely true.

When I woke, feeling whole and rested, I had a fresh perspective, a problem, and a feeling that I didn’t know what to make of.

The problem was that I wasn’t as indifferent as I’d thought that I was when I went to sleep. These people were in my territory, and in a way that made them my responsibility. I was unhappy about their situation, especially the kids’. Besides that, they were running from something, and I needed to know what, in case it became a threat.

The feeling, in a word, was Mak. I could quite literally feel her, somewhere to the south. It was a little like that nagging feeling I’d sometimes get when I thought that someone was watching me. There wasn’t anything more than that, just a presence, a feeling of distance and direction, but it was more than enough to make it very obvious that something had happened. Something had changed, but whether it was in her or in me I couldn’t tell.

I still didn’t rush to get back to the humans. I needed time to consider, and when I got to the ledge I could see the barest blush of dawn over the sea. I must have been banged up worse than I’d thought, because I’d slept a whole day and night away. I was pretty damn hungry, too, so that would have to be the first thing I dealt with. Being hungry made me more draconic, and I needed a rational and somewhat compassionate mind that day.

Once I’d hunted, brought my prey back to the ledge, and eaten, the sun was well above the horizon. This was the last of the weaker old goats in the nearby population. I was going to need to go farther afield in the future, I mused, and let the local goats recover.

As I flew down my sense of where Mak was got stronger, to the point that I might have gone the last few hundred feet straight to her with my eyes closed if I didn’t mind smashing my face into the rock. I hoped that my people weren’t all asleep yet. I was sure that none of them would complain if I woke them, but they’d still be annoyed, I was sure of it.

Thankfully the gate was open. Ardek and Kira were sleeping just inside, but the sisters were sitting outside in the shadows that the trees still cast across the place. The sun was still too low in the sky to light the pit and would be for at least another hour, judging by how slowly it was creeping down the rock. As I flew Mak waved a greeting, Herald turning around to face me as well.

“You certainly took your time,” Herald said with a smile and a quick hug.

“I needed more rest than I had thought,” I told them. “What about you two? Mak, how are you feeling?”

“Quite well,” she said. Something was obviously up with her; her shoulders were hunched and she seemed to have trouble looking directly at me. “The pain is gone, and everything has healed right. I only need to eat and rest. Herald told me how you spoke to Kira. Thanking her for healing me. I admit I did not expect that. Thank you.”

“Everyone else seems to trust her well enough. I will bow to your collective wisdom,” I said, trying to sound dismissive about it.

“That is good to hear.” Mak lowered her head. Then she seemed about to say something, but remained silent, her eyes flicking to Herald.

“She needs to know,” Herald said gently.

Mak sighed. “She does. Draka, there are two things I need to tell you. First, I believe that Kira might know something about the Night Blossom.”

“What?” I said, leaning forward. “Why do you think so? What does she know?”

“We have no idea what she might know,” Herald said, “only that she seemed to recognise the name when we were speaking to Ardek. Then the attack happened, and we have not had a good opportunity to speak to her about it. But that is not what you need to tell her, Mak.”

“No, it is not, is it?” Mak took a long, slow breath, visibly forcing herself to relax. “The other thing is that I got an advancement as I slept.”

I sat up straight at that. This, I thought, must be what had changed, and I felt a rush of curiosity and excitement. “That is great!” I told her honestly. “Congratulations! Should you not be celebrating this?”

“Perhaps. Probably. Yes, yes I should. And while it is a minor advancement I am sure that it is a strong one. Life changing, I would say. I have been speaking to Herald about it.”

“Do you intend to keep me guessing, or will you tell me?” I asked, trying not to sound too eager. “You say that I need to know.”

“Yes.” She closed her eyes and said, “I got two choices, as we always do. The first one does not really matter, though I considered it, even though it was not really… me. I saw myself as a warrior, tirelessly striking down my enemies. It seems easy to interpret. Better strength and endurance, probably. But the other relates to you.”

“You are still making me guess,” I chided lightly.

“Yeah. Apologies,” she said, then opened her eyes and looked at me with a grain of confidence. “I saw myself in your shadow, Draka. Very literally. Going where you go, growing as you grow. I chose that path without hesitation.”

Now, that was something. I didn’t know exactly how I felt about that, but it was all good, that was for sure!

“I believe that I have bound myself to you,” she said, her voice and posture growing steadily bolder, “drawing on your strength in some way. I would say that I hope that it was not presumptuous of me, but I can feel that it was not. I can feel that you are pleased with my choice.

“Are you sure of what you have done? What it will do for you, and to you?” I asked. I sure as hell wasn’t, but I could guess. And if it meant that me getting stronger did the same for her, she would have a vested interest in my growth. Not that I expected her to betray me again, but still.

“I am as certain of my choice as I have ever been of anything. I already feel stronger and more resilient,” she said “and the Tekereteki comes more easily, I think, although that might just be practice. For those benefits alone, I am very satisfied. But more than that, I could feel you coming.”

“I can feel you, too,” I admitted. “Ever since I woke up today, I have known where you are.”

Mak smiled at that, nodding in acknowledgment. “Before that, perhaps an hour ago, I could feel your satisfaction, distantly, and it gave me peace. I can feel how pleased you are with my choice, and it makes me happy. I can feel how you trust in my judgement, and it makes me trust in myself. When I say that I am bound to you, I do not only mean that I benefit from your strength.

“Draka,” she said, her eyes bright and certain, “I am yours.”

And this, I told myself, full of smug satisfaction, is how a cult is born.