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CHAPTER NINE
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Tundor stood stock still, and interestingly enough, a tiny wisp of flame and accompanying smoke drifted out of his slightly open mouth. Quickly, he snapped his jaw closed, trying to look innocent. Lothinar had been frozen in shock, but he suddenly turned toward the dragon making indecipherable faces. These eventually stopped but were soon replaced with a fairly rapid shaking of his head.
The words ”No, no, no, No, NO” began coming out his mouth in syncopation with the head shakes. Finally, he just stopped with a very forlorn look on his face. Though their telepathy was far from perfect, it seemed the elf was somehow hoping that Tundor might be able to disappear. The dragon could only respond with a mental shrug. Whatever the consequences, Lothinar's mother had seen him. He realized that he lacked the social skills to be able to help.
”Well, don’t just stand there, Lothinar,” the beautiful elf woman said. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your dragon?
Lothinar turned around. Indecipherable words began to come out of his mouth. They sounded like,
”Not my dragon, not MY dragon, He isn’t even a real dragon. Look at those tiny wings. He can’t even fly”
Tundor tried to not take offense at the words because they were mostly true. He could not deny the many obvious ways he fell short of the definition of Dragon. Even so, it hurt a little that the elf had disavowed their new friendship so quickly. At last, stepping around her stuttering son, the elf woman reached over to gently touch the dragon on the nose.
“I’m this foolish boy's mother, Ardwella,” she said. “I am glad and actually not that surprised to finally meet you.”
“My name is Tundor,” he thought towards her in his mind's speech. And although I have more than a few questions, I am very glad to meet you as well!”
Lothinar watched his mother touch the dragon. For a horrible moment, Lothinar thought the Dragon might kill his mother, solving the problem in one cruel snap. When Tundor did not, he was incredibly relieved and yet suddenly terrified. He began to think quickly. "What was she doing out here? How could she possibly find me?" And the most important, "What was she going to tell his father?"
When he had visited with both his parents the other night, it was she who had said that she had felt sorry for the fallen dragons. Had she somehow known? That was a possibility that didn’t make sense. What was going on here? What was he missing?
His mother turned around again and faced him again, apparently unconcerned about turning her back to the thousand pounds of scales, fangs, and smoking nostrils just behind her vulnerable back.
Wait a minute! When had Tundor started smoking?
”Why don’t we let Tundor go about his business? Maybe he can hunt for a bit while we chat.” she said as if it was the most normal thing in the world. “I have some food for us in my pack but it’s not the type or in the quantity that would do much for a dragon.”
‘Lothinar could only nod stupidly. He sat down with his back against a tree as the dragon moved past him and out into the nearby forest. His mother folded effortlessly into a cross-leg position a few yards in front of him. She simultaneously swung her backpack around to the front and released the drawstring.
“Are you two going to be fine alone here?” Tundor telepathically sent from somewhere off in the bushes.
Unfortunately, Lothinar could hear the sounds of him simultaneously urinating noisily. At least it was downwind.
“We will be fine, thanks Tundor. Oh, and it's a little too close for the pee-ing. And please, anything else you need to do out there, we are going to want plenty of distance!”
”Oops! Sorry! After I take care of….that other thing, I’m going hunting. I’m really hungry. I don’t suppose you want me to bring you anything back?”
Surprising him, Ardwella replied, ”Well, you know we don’t eat meat, but perhaps before you head off, you could grab us a branch of pine needles from a young tree. I think this conversation is going to take quite a while, and I’d like to make tea”
”No problem, be right back!”
‘Lothinar could hear crashing and snapping sounds out in the forest, and soon the dragon returned dragging a small pine tree behind him”
”That should be plenty. Thank you, Tundor.” his mother said, making her preparations and starting a small fire.
Gazing at her son she got a peculiar look on her face.
“Now, where do we begin?”
——————-
Initially, Candasar sulked in her cave, allowing her emotions to settle. Eventually, she fell asleep. The truth was that she had been exhausted. The events of the last several days had taken their toll.
After she awoke, she briefly lay in repose before quickly finishing the rest of the deer that Tundor had brought her. She then took a short swim through the tunnel to the outside. The daylight dazzled her eyes. Except for a few birds circling, it was quiet. The banished elf and dragon were nowhere to be seen.
“Good!" She said to herself Yet a nagging thought began to occur to her. She might have just destroyed all her careful planning and hard work. She had to find a way to get Tundor back.
The damage to her neck from the fight with the males and even the cuts she had received saving Tundor seemed completely healed. She grimaced when she thought of the lost egg that had paid for it all.
Only after the elf had tried to heal her had things gotten so complicated. This whole situation was very frustrating. If she had just been able to follow through on her plan to keep Tundor to herself, she might already be on the way to motherhood. But, she had to admit, she probably would not have survived the encounter with the two males. She would have been raped or even dead. She at least owed the elf for that.
That body with the two arrows had to be out here somewhere. Grabbing air and diving deep, Candasar began searching. Although the water was fairly deep, It did not take long to find the body. The male dragon's distended abdomen had already begun to bloat and fill with the rotting gasses that accompany death. It took her several trips, but she pulled out the arrows as best she could, although the one in his skull was stuck fast. She was only able to break off the shaft. She carried the arrows a good distance away and chewed the wood to the smallest splinters she could. Then she allowed the pieces to float away in the currents. She even moved some large rocks into position and wedged them up against the body to hold it in place. It wouldn’t last forever, as it would probably rapidly decompose. But when the body resurfaced, it shouldn’t automatically point back to the elf. Unfortunately, with her undeserved reputation, two missing males could lead the council back to her. Someone would, no doubt, come looking. Even so, that was the best she could do for now.
Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad for the elf to owe her another favor. She could probably mislead the clan elders for a while. It was very likely that if the elves began looking into these events, they would have ways of being more thorough. The chore done, she wearily returned to her nest. She needed a nap.
———————————
In an elven home, some distance away, a male elf stared at a sword that hung upon the wall. He didn’t like it. He enjoyed his peaceful life. Now everything was changing. He had realized when he found the arrow with the teeth marks in it, that something was up. He should never have told Ardwella about it. Instead of being worried, she had grinned ear to ear.
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"I have waited so long for this!" she said. "My dreams for our son are finally coming true!"
"The boy is playing a dangerous game," Albarad said. "Nothing good comes from associating with dragons!"
Ardwella had given him a strange look, but the very next morning, she packed a small knapsack and headed out herself. She was determined to find traces of the dragon that was destined to fulfill the prophecy handed down through her family. The prophecy had something to do with the sword. And worse yet, their son.
He had heard rumors about her family, but the stories were events that had happened a very long time ago. Why is ancient history showing up here now? It frustrated him that there was no food on his table, and now he was going to have to do the cooking himself. He feared the repercussions that might arise from the actions his son had been willing to take. These were things that any "good elf” should know better than to do. Worst of all, in the dim light of the room, it was getting hard to ignore that the ancient sword had started to glow. He sighed, then turned around and headed into the kitchen to make some breakfast. It was going to be a long day.
———————-
The pine needle tea, although not his usual favorite, certainly was fresh. To be honest, it wasn’t just pine needles that Ardwella tossed into the water. His mother had added another small bag of something aromatic before bringing it to boil in a ceramic pot over a small campfire that she seemed to have produced from thin air.
Lothinar was impressed. He lived out in the rough more than most, but he didn’t think he could have put a cookfire together so quickly. The pot, he observed, was definitely not new. It bore the blackened marks, scrapes, and scars of hundreds, if not thousands, of tea-making episodes. It was well used, but it obviously had been well made. He had never seen it before, and that was one of the other things that surprised him.
“You think you know your mother’s teapots.” he marveled.
Whatever else was in the tea, it made a perfect counterbalance and compliment to the piney fresh needles.
Lothinar caught himself smacking his lips and pushing his empty cup forward toward his mother, who just smiled and reached for the pot.
Neither he he nor his mother had spoken as they had drunk their first cup, as was the custom. Lothinar suddenly considered that asking for another cup might come across as attempted stalling, so he set his cup down to cool on a nearby rock and leaned back against the tree.
”So what are you doing up here, Mother?” he finally asked.
”Is that how you’re going to play it?” His mother replied with one of her characteristic raised brows. “What am I doing up here? I can do better than that! What are you going to do when the rest of the wardens realize that you have been shirking your duties and have taken up with a dragon? And not some soggy wet beast with flippers and fish on their breath, but a real arch-type throwback from before the war!”
”I don’t know!” Lothinar almost wailed, his voice cracking. “I didn’t set out to do this. It just happened. I feel like I’ve lost control, and somebody else is pulling my bowstrings!”
”Take another drink of your tea,” his mother said, pointing at his cup on the rock. “It will calm you down”
As he sipped, his mother poured the rest of the tea into the fire, where it steamed and threw up a little cloud of ash. She then set the pot aside to cool. Finally, she turned to him. She seemed to have an uncharacteristic difficulty in meeting his eyes.
“This might be a good time to tell you about your grandfather, “ she said.
—————-
Tundor had given them their space and taken care of business twice: once before his first deer and then again after the second one. He made sure to do both well away from the little campsite, which he was currently watching.
Now they were just sitting there quietly talking, and not telepathically. He was getting better at understanding their language. But as fast as they were talking, he couldn’t make out that much. They seemed to be fine, and not surprisingly, he was starting to worry about Candasar. The last time that he had seen her she hadn’t seemed in her right mind. Her thoughts had been clouded with grief when she had thrown the pair of them out. Tossing the elf, he could somewhat understand, but why him?
Despite not wanting to leave the mother and son, he found himself trundling rapidly down and over the hills he had climbed yesterday. He was heading toward the lake and, last he checked, an angry lady dragon. Maybe she would be willing to take him back if he caught her another deer!
The “Letta” power word had made hunting possible for a dragon without wings. Making the word stuck in his throat and putting his tongue in a precarious place with his fangs. Despite that, he could belt out the two syllables fairly reliably at this point. He wasn’t sure he could keep up with the magical power demands, but somehow that seemed to be getting better too. Tundor didn’t think he could cast with it all day, but as long as he was only hunting for two and eating well between uses, his magical reservoir seemed to refill fairly quickly. It was nice of the elves to provide this pristine hunting ground with plenty of fresh tasty deer for him to gorge himself on. He had started to wonder about that.
Of course, the dragons in the lake had no real way to move about on land as he now did, and there was little chance of them getting a deer. Sometimes a herd of deer, when spooked by the men down at the other end of the lake would, in panic, try to make a swimming crossing. But the dragons, by habit, avoided the humans and their village. They didn't want to gather the attention of human spears and arrows.
Nearing the place where the forest ended at the beech near Candasar’s cove, Tundor, with half a deer in his jaws, was trying to move fairly quietly. That was easier this time because he had eaten a bunch of the front of the animal himself. This allowed him to discard the antlers. He had learned how hard it was to move through the trees with pesky antlers hanging up on every tree and bush. It slowed things down. His new policy was to eat the front first so that he could stealthily sneak off with the rear haunches if something unknown were approaching. The smell of blood sometimes drew predators. Lothinar had called them mountain lions.
Even some of those bears he had dealt with on that first day would occasionally make an appearance. Lothinar had said that they were more aggressive in the fall as they hungrily prepared for hibernation. He had explained that his aggressive encounter was due to the proximity of a young cub, removing the mother’s sense of self-preservation. Since his first experience, Tundor still steadfastly avoided what Lothinar had called skunks. The dragon had to admit that the trip up to the cave with Lothinar had done wonders for his zoological vocabulary. He wasn’t as interested in the Botany lessons for what he thought were obvious reasons.
As he neared the forest edge and peeked out over the water Tundor was dismayed to see Candasar in an argument with a pair of females. They had to be much younger than her, but Tundor was impressed again with her timeless beauty and obvious strength. Her scales shimmered a beautiful blue, while the other females had scales that were only a flat grey.
“I don’t care what you say about them not showing up here!” one of them hissed. Beldor’s little brother clearly said that he was going to court Candasar yesterday, although I don’t know why he would waste his time on an old cow like you!”
”And Timrun’s sister said he was coming along for moral support, “ spat the other Dragoness.
”I told them both no, and they swam off together somewhere. Maybe they found love elsewhere.” Candasar replied with a smirk.
But even from here, Tundor could hear a strange tremble in her voice.
“And I don’t believe either of them had anything in mind that was moral.”
"We will sssee, “ said the second again. “Timrun’s father is on the council and I’m sure that they will want to speak to you! Those two will be found and unravel your lies”
“Let them come!” Candasar replied, “I have nothing to hide. Could I have survived a lust-filled encounter with them without a scratch?” She asked, rotating before them to display her beautiful flanks
”You could if you just rolled over and let them have a go at you, which is what I heard!” Said the first.
”The rumor of my promiscuity is fantasy, “ Candasar said firmly but evenly. “And if they had succeeded, they would certainly have returned bragging. For one of them to mate with me, I would have been dead, I promise you!”
”The council will come, and we will force the truth of these things from you!” said the second. She was practically screaming. They both looked back angrily as they rapidly swam away.
Candasar, now alone in the cove, seemed to shrink and wilt. She was obviously frustrated and despairing.
Tundor dropped the deer.
Running across the beach, he began splashing through the shallows. Hearing the noise, she turned.
It seemed that she flew to him!
—————-
‘The elven team of lake wardens was having their monthly gathering. Someone was missing. In the years Lothinar had served with them, he had never missed a meeting, but now, unimaginably, his chair was empty.
“Well, we might as well get started,” sighed Cantrell, the head warden. “I’m sure whatever it is, it must be important. I will personally catch Lothinar up to speed when I see him” he looked around the room at the other slightly grim-faced Wardens.
"And make no mistake, I will certainly be seeing him soon. Jontain, let’s start with you. Report!”
Ardwynn, the only female elf of the group, looked nervously around the table, hoping one of the other rangers might offer a hint of what had become of Lothinar. For quite some time, she had held him in high esteem. This was not like him at all. She had worked with him on a reconstruction after a lightning-strike fire. His ability to use his magic to restore damaged areas to pristine condition was unequaled. Perhaps she could find him before Cantrell did and give him some warning on how upset the Chief Warden appeared to be.
Whatever Lothinar had going on, she would like to help. It didn't hurt her motivation at all that Lothinar was a very handsome elf.
———————-
They met in the shallows, Tundor already standing hands taller than the large dragoness. Her elegant neck intertwined with his thicker one. He found he didn’t mind. Not at all.
”I’m sorry, I couldn’t stay away,” he mumbled but suddenly brightened. “I brought you a deer, Uh, well, half a deer,” he admitted, beaming what he had recently learned Lothinar called a roguish grin.
”Did you hear any of that confrontation?“ Candasar asked timidly, not fully meeting his eyes.
”Yes, he admitted, “It was kind of hard to miss. If we are to believe them, the council will come.”
”Bring me that half deer”, she said. “I’m going to eat it all, and in a while, if you would be so kind, please go and get me another. I don’t know what to do, Tundor! The only way for us to get out of this mess may be to grow wings and fly out of here!
He was glad to be back! That sounded good to him!
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