A dragon’s lair may be plain or land of flair. Mardhaka’s, which I found by carefully searching during a nightly trip in the outskirts of Zenvo, could not have been spotted by a man. Yet her father knew her well, and thus so did I. She dreamed on a hole unnatural, carved by her own claws. This, on the mountainside, where the walls proudly wear dresses of lithified sand, Mardhaka had wormed her way into the underside of a boulder, like the inverse of a rabbit’s lair. Hidden by darkness, height and illusions, her home was safe from the prying of real eyes.
But, friend, there is no escaping from a fiction. Bedecked in the salt of the oneiric sea from which I arose, I plunged my hand on the bottom of the boulder, removing the dreamt skin, revealing the real wound on the stone.
I followed this artificial tunnel as it inserted itself deeper into the mountainside. Light was not welcome here, in the lair of Mardhaka. But eyes that are not need no light to see.
I took every fork on Mardhaka’s web at least once, the horizontal and the vertical ones. Cirruin’s lair was every bit unlike this one, yet part of that could be explained due to its male nature. Male dragons slept nigh anywhere, preoccupied solely about defending their lair from other animals or males that wanted to nest on it.
Female dragons tended to feel the need to hide from the most insistent males too. All that a dragon can take, it takes if it wishes so. Partners are no exception to this rule. Don’t misunderstand it, this is not equivalent to the abuses among men: It is an honor for female dragons to lay eggs for he who finds and overcomes them. To engender the hatchlings of the powerful, bring forth the next generation of rulers of both land and skies.
But Mardhaka is as much my sister as she is my daughter. I am Terus. I may be Cirruin. Or I am Cirruin, and may be Terus. Yes. That’s probably more accurate. I knew she preferred the right to the left, that she was partial towards the upwards slopes. That she liked to sleep in a room different from where she stashed her hoard of gold —which she kept only to please other dragons, because her true passion was collecting feathers, not riches.
After hours of searching, I found a long, elaborate rectrix of sapphire and jade. Plucked from a peacock, no doubt. I may have been unable to find Mardhaka in that labyrinthine place, but that didn’t mean she could not find me.
With the feather in hand, I began walking the path back to the entrance, task that was far easier than checking every last fork of the lair.
And soon enough a little trembling of the stone, an inquietude of the atmosphere made themselves present.
“Leave that feather where you found it, thief,” her voice reverberated through the tunnels. “And I may end you mercifully.”
She addressed me in the tongue of the people of Zenvo, but I was going to answer in the one of dragons.
“Mardhaka, I, Terus, have come to speak with you. I intend not to steal the feather, only to drive you out of hiding to speak face to face. You cannot kill me, girl.”
A growl reached me, and a spiral of light manifested in the tunnel walls all around. Rocks both volcanic and sedimentary shone white as a deformed sketch of Mardhaka made itself known around me. Andesite and sandstone conspired with magic to trick my senses.
“It had to be you, you who I despise, you who I am unable to terminate,” the sketch said in a voice so queer, so foreign from reality.
I knelt and bowed in direction to the mountain’s heart. “I came looking for your advice, Terus’ sister, Cirruin’s child.”
The sketch growled and shifted in a show of lashes alight. “I am Mardhaka, don’t call me my father’s child. I will never not be Cirruin’s daughter, but I am an entity of my own, and you, dreamed one, should respect that. Furthermore, and most important, you are no brother of mine, calling you so would be like striking a conversation about family relationships with my father’s droppings.”
“I apologize, Mardhaka. I believe I don’t deserve comparison with the earthly functions of my dreamer. Yet I understand your discomfort at being called my sister.”
“Discomfort is a sore understatement, dreamed one.” The sketch spoke with disdain. “That comparison can only be hated by me. The first time I found it amusing, but now I see you truly believe us to be somehow equal. Such equality is impossible, and if it were possible, it would be untenable, Terus. You are not, and I cannot be more.”
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“I am sorely aware of our realities, Mardhaka, and I am afraid my need for a favor is screaming to me to change the subject. Would that be fine for you?”
The sketch sprawled forth, covering the walls further, depicting new forms in addition to the deformed dragon. Trees, the sun, birds. So many birds.
“Speak then, what does little Terus the Unbeing need from Mardakha the Gracious? Speak, Terus, make your offer: I shall listen, and I shall answer, even if not in kind.”
I extended my arms and then embraced myself, as a man who is suddenly denuded. “What am I, Mardhaka? I am no man, and I am no dragon. Mardhaka, I cannot find answers to this question on my own. I value that which I Inherited from your father, and I value that which the inhabitants of Zenvo give me. I have befriended a couple; they are teaching me to fit among their kind. Yet I do not think like a man, I do not feel like a man. I cannot leave the dragon behind, Mardhaka, and so I believe I should hold conversations of dragons, with dragons, in the tongue of dragons. Only this I ask from you: Aid me in this journey, give me your attention, your dragon words, remind me what I supposedly am, lest I lose myself in that which I so dearly want to be. Cirruin or Terus, I wish to be Terus, but I cannot help but be him who dreams me!” I shifted to a face up position, laid against the stone by my will, or lack thereof. “I want you to answer my questions when I need to speak about matters of dragons, so I can in good faith learn about the humans of Zenvo.”
Mardhaka hummed for a second and the sketch lost his light. A minute or so later, from one of the forks, her eyes of red shone brightly amongst the murk.
“What do you offer, Dream? What can you give me that makes entertaining your nonsense worthwhile?”
I stood and looked straight at her.
“It’s not nonsense.”
“What, do you offer?” She insisted, showing her teeth in a mockery of a smile. “If you are unsure, I am always open to have a feather retriever working for me.”
“You must be aware of how difficult it is for us dreams to peddle an item for long distances. I’d have to move like real things do while carrying it. It would take me days, nay, weeks to deliver a single feather from lands afar. And it is possible I would often fail in such a task.”
“My heartbeats are worth more than your weeks, scum. What else can you bring? I don’t care for gold, you see, it’s a boring metal. Silver has an alluring hue, but it’s not something I am often craving to acquire. Bronze, copper, Iron, brass: all useful to the men that smith and wield them, all useless to me. What, Terus, can you bring me, that may interest me enough to entertain your delirium?”
She approached further, her purple scales as clear as day for my eyes, despite the absolute darkness.
“Knowledge.” I answered as a whip. “I can freely peddle knowledge for you. I am learned in the tongue of the people of Zenvo, and I am in the process of acquiring the skills to read it.”
“And how would that benefit me? I have no interest in the stories humans tell. They call dragon slayers ‘heroes’. They call our kind greedy monsters. What could men offer me that I do not know?” She said, crossing her forelegs as she lay occupying most of the tunnel’s width.
“They pour more than mere stories on the paper, Mardhaka. They have registers of their words and how they relate to each other. Two words may sound the same and mean different things and even be written in different ways. They register the world like their lives depend on it, Mardhaka, the books so sacrosanct they have a church of their own. They dress their words in colors menacing, tame and dull, or gaily gallant. Each book a carefully crafted cover, inside the pages, luscious illustrations. If you only knew, Mardhaka, what they do with colors, with their hands instead of magic. Both dream and realities they immortalize on the paper.”
Mardhaka tilted her head, as if she was considering my words carefully.
“And how, exactly, does this serve me? I care not about their words, I care not about their arts, as beautiful as they may be, Terus. Men are an unwelcome sight for me. I may exploit them, I may make deals with them. I may love them like they love their wolves and even their own children: as tools, as things to be used and discarded.”
Joining my hands in a plea, I continued. “I said they register the world like they depend on it to live, and that includes the animals that roam both the wilderness and their cities. The dogs they breed, those you call wolves: they have them classified. It turns out humans are animals of registries, as if they had a collective soul into which anyone instructed can tap and draw knowledge. Even a dragon and its dreams.”
Mardhaka perked up, straightened her neck and raised her head. “If my understanding is correct, you are telling me it is possible that the humans have gathered information on birds and their feathers.”
I felt a tinge of pleasure crept up my spine. “I just intended to offer a wide perspective on the stuff I can trade in. If it is information about birds that you desire, Mardhaka, my friends are currently in possession of a book about those that soar above the sea. Their names, facts most varied about their lives, sometimes their whereabouts in both summer and winter. This little I saw when I checked a few pages of that book, and I could bring you that and perhaps more. I am your key to access the human-made body of knowledge. And all I ask in exchange is a bit of your time.”
“You ask for something worth to me more than a flock of birds of paradise. Time. Men may hoard it more than us dragons, but it is still far too valuable. Yet, learning about birds on my own could take months or years without the aid of human scribes. I accept, Terus. Bring me information I consider worthy, and I will help you assail your concerns.”
And thus I struck a deal with Mardhaka. I followed her to the chamber where she slept, just to know where to find her, just to know that she didn’t mind me there.
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I hear distant rolling thunder. I feel like reality is angry and it comes for me. The storm shall never find me, nor my book, in this, Cirruin’s cave. I am safe. The book is safe, and it’s all that matters. This book of Zenvo, this book about Zenvo.