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CHAPTER EIGHT
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The three stared awkwardly at one another in the eerie glow of the cavern's bioluminescence. It was Tundor who at last broke the silence by sending his thoughts toward Lothinar.
“Are you well? He asked cautiously. “Did Candasar do the right thing by speaking this word?”
The elf pondered the question for a moment before nodding.
"My magical energy was almost gone, and what little remained was sustaining my unconscious body while under the water. I probably would not have awoken unless Candasar had done as she did. She revived me.” he sent to both dragons.
If Lothinar could read the expression correctly, Tundor looked relieved.
“I am grateful, but it has cost both of you a great deal. If I am not mistaken, one of your potential children has perished because she helped me.”
“Our potential children?” Confused, Tundor looked from the elf to Candasar with a strange light of recognition dawning. "You mean an unlaid egg died? But we are not mated."
Lothinar gave Candasar a curious look. He reached out and placed his hand on her. He seemed deep in thought.
Candasar squirmed awkwardly beneath the elf's hand. His touch seemed to reach further inside her than the surface of her body. Tendrils of magic probed and inspected. She jerked away.
"No, the ova are not yet fertilized, but they are ready to be. I can feel their magical potential," he said after a few seconds.
“You were in heat!” Tundor exclaimed. “That is why the two males attacked you, and it's why I've been feeling so confused and protective!”
Candasar hung her head, perhaps in embarrassment, perhaps in the way of apology, before answering.
“It came as a surprise to me,” she said, “I have always had good control of my own body and have previously been able to plan such things better. The meat you gave to me has awakened something new. I lost control. It was not my intent to begin this so soon”
“So soon?” Tundor replied with astonishment. “Is that why you saved me? As a way to fertilize your eggs?”
Looking at the female water dragon, Lothinar could almost see her blush, if that were possible for a dragon.
Candasar glared at the elf; she avoided the question. Instead, she asked one of her own.
“Tell me, Lothinar, what right did your people have to damage our bodies and take from my people what we once were?” she asked angrily. The power of her thoughts reverberated with anger in the elf's mind.
Lothinar paused, suddenly considering what a vulnerable position he might find himself in if one or both of these creatures decided to settle an old score. He had left his bow and even his clothes back on the lake shore.
Fighting a couple of dragons while naked in a dark cave was not on his list of things he wanted to try. He tried reason instead.
“What was done to your people, by mine, an age ago, was done during a period of war and misunderstanding. “ He said quietly, sending the sincerity of his belief along with the words. “Dragons were FEEDING on elves and the methods that were used were done in our defense!“
“That was not me!” Candisar angrily yelled into the elf’s mind, then looked sorrowfully towards Tundor and continued, “That was not….us. Must we remain so….diminished, even now, for the mistakes of our ancestors?”
”What was done can not so easily be undone.” Lothinar answered quietly, paused, then said more firmly, “And it certainly is not up to me!"
Candasar felt her anger and frustration growing even though she knew that the elf spoke the truth. She knew she needed time to process the events she had recently been through. The attack and attempted rape, Rage, anger, and grief all boiled together in her mind. The embarrassment of the elf correctly ascertaining that she had intended to mate with Tundor and the young dragon's resulting odd look of surprise caused her emotions to swirl from embarrassment to fear and shame far too quickly. She was unable to get a hold of them. Finally, she could take it no more.
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”Get Out! And that means BOTH OF YOU!” She yelled.
Tundor looked at Candasar in surprise, then back toward the elf.
”So, Lothinar, do you know anywhere we could stay nearby?” He asked
”You two need to decide that outside!” She bellowed.
Both the elf and the dragon jumped quickly into the water. Lothinar took some satisfaction in the fact that the dragon fled first.
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’Lothinar awoke, chilled to the bone. A mist had developed overnight, and the hillside below the cave where he and Tundor had taken shelter was shrouded in a cloud of white. The still air was thick and damp. The young elf was slightly disoriented at first. Then the memories of yesterday came rushing back into his mind.
So much had happened. The young dragon had seemed willing to follow him away from the lake and up toward some caves he knew of. They were not too far. Tundor was not inclined to strike out on his own. The uphill climb must have been hard for him, but he hadn’t complained once. The elf felt surreal looking across the cave at the still-slumbering dragon, a creature from myth and legend. He was getting bigger. Lothinar didn’t think that Candasar’s cave was going to be an option for Tundor much longer, even when she eventually took him back. And he was sure that she would.
The light in her eyes when she looked at him was unmistakable, and there was something else. She had plans. She wanted her children to fly. She had sacrificed everything for it, and Tundor’s unique attributes certainly factored into that.
The elf smirked as he considered how the young male dragon might feel about the eventual pairing. He had seemed surprised when he figured it out, but not unwilling. Lothinar felt he was somehow becoming a “third wheel” in their relationship, and he wondered how he had ever gotten into this position. If he admitted it to himself, he grew increasingly fond of the forthright youngster.
They had come upon Candasar just as she was being attacked by two large water-going males. Tundor had not hesitated but leaped from the cliff into the water, killing the first, much to Lothinar’s surprise, as Tundor could barely swim. Lothinar joined the battle with his bow, shooting and eventually killing the second. How had that happened? It had seemed so obvious at the time. Had he not intervened, the female would have been raped and most likely killed. Although now thinking about his involvement, It certainly would not have been the first time that the aggressive large males had taken advantage of the much smaller females. It was the way of nature, he supposed. Was his telepathy with Tundor causing the dragon's desire to protect Candesar somehow shaping his feelings?
After the brief battle, with Tundor's help, the elf had hidden the body of the first dead male well. Returning later, however, he found the second one, containing two of his arrows had sunk deep within the lake. It would eventually rot and rise creating complications. Trying to elicit Candasar's help, Lothinar had swum into her lair, discovering by surprise the powerful magical attributes she possessed. He had not expected that!
He had been emptied of all life force and almost killed when the healing spell he had tried to use on her was gobbled up by her natural talent for magic. She had begun pulling his already overtaxed magical energies from him by the force of her overzealous, if unintentional, will. It was embarrassing, but he had completely collapsed. With him unconscious, somehow, the two dragons had managed to reverse the spell and return the life force that she had taken from him back to his body. He was lucky that they had figured out how to do it before he expired. The cost of this power transfer back to him was that one of the magical eggs she had been nurturing was unintentionally drained. Its life force infused him with stored magic. The egg had unfortunately perished.
Understandably, this had broken Candasar’s heart. In her hurt and confusion, she had also lashed out when Tundor had questioned her motives for rescuing him. Candasar had argued with him and angrily ordered them both from her cave. The elf and young male dragon had not wasted the opportunity to flee from her wrath. Lothinar hoped that her anger would soon cool and not make their already precarious situation worse.
Looking back behind him into the cave's rear, Lothinar looked at the form of the dragon, still deep in sleep. Yesterday's exertions had taken their toll. Tundor had, without complaining, lugged his substantial bulk up to their rocky resting place. The caves were high in the mountains and far from anything the young dragon had previously known. The dragon somehow seemed to trust him. Lothinar, too, found that without really knowing why, he was starting to feel a deep kinship with this creature, one that he had been trained to fear and distrust his entire life.
Well, he thought, I might as well see about getting us both some breakfast! Silently he rose and crept from the cave mouth into the mist-covered dawn. Swept up by the beauty of the mountains he began to hum, then sing a very old song.
His voice carried out across the mountain.
"When the morning mist comes creeping
‘round the cat-tails, softly over stillness breathing
Past the softly croaking symphony of frogs in fern
Deep within my heart, the stillness turns
My thoughts once cluttered and askew
To peaceful places found anew.
Then creation's wonder fills my soul
for lighting flash and thunder roll
though dazzling power in display
are no more splendid than this day
when mournful cry of passing bird
can plumb the depths of things unheard
For silence calls its special name
for those that listen and feel the flame
of life's pulse pounding out the beat
of planet's pull and sun's sweet heat
as onward spins the arch of time
while I but watch and see it shine."
Lothinar loved that song. He had heard it often growing up. The last lingering notes seemed to linger on the breeze as a bird called to greet his mate on their morning exercises.
Suddenly, he heard a sound behind him. He turned to see the dragon lowering his head to squeeze out of the cave’s opening.
“Good morning, Tundor! " he said merrily. I wonder what this wonderful day will bring?”
As hard as it was to accurately read dragon expressions, it seemed that Tundor had a horrified look on his face.
"Was my singing that bad?" he asked the dragon.
Then Lothinar noticed the dragon's eyes. They were looking past Lorithar and over his shoulder.
“It brings me, my son, " his mother said in a familiar voice as she stepped out of the mist, holding him motionless with her eyes.
"I hope that I'm not intruding. I see that you have made a new friend."
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