In the late afternoon, Ottaine was sitting on her old bed with a backpack by her feet. Only three other girls from Civilian and Crimes were to spend the last night in the dormitory but they were away in the Released Peacock pub. They invited Ottaine but she preferred staying alone with her thoughts. She took a long walk in the area, looking at the familiar buildings and landscapes for the last time. She passed the krools stalls and sat there thinking of that day a long time ago when her friend Verlar miraculously didn’t die…
#
As a veterinary profiled high school graduate, Verlar was chosen as a Keeper’s assistant in his first year. He had already known how to deal with wingfingers, the flying dragons. He mounted them many times delivering messages to cutters on the sea when he was a boy in a small fishing village. Wingfingers were not military dragons, the Army had krools for that purpose. The giant killing machines, rams on two legs. They had to be tamed from the very beginning, from the day they hatch, stay with people all the time to get used to their smell. Completely different in looks and behaviour both wingfingers and krools, with some other dragons too, shared the same characteristics like scales and feathers on part of the body, and a very sensitive smell.
Training krools was not a complicated process done in a breeding colony where every adult had already been trained. The chicks’ mothers were showing their children how to trust humans and obey them. But then, after a few years, a difficult adolescent time was coming.
It was the beginning of their second year and Verlar got into big, big trouble when one adolescent krool, a beast that should be kept in a paddock surrounded by an iron cage, preferably electrified, escaped the pen and entered the main lawn in the dragons’ area.
The alarm sounded too late. Verlar was already on the field walking towards the stalls, with nothing to protect him and nowhere to hide. The gates were closed and he couldn’t blame the keepers, their priority was the safety of themselves and the whole community in the Academy’s ground. One person’s life was third on the list. Now, the promising future Krool Master was facing death running at him at full speed of a ten feet tall furious carnivorous dragon. A young female krool, too young to be left unattended, was outside her stall angered by a fight with her siblings. Imagine a human teenager overstimulated by hormones and adrenaline, now add aggression and lack of moral restraint, animal instincts of a predator and you have a deadly weapon. Not even at war were ever teenage krools used at battle. They were known for being too aggressive and impossible to tame, unlike wingfingers, or ornichicks (still used for sport on the Solummger island and for short-distance transport on the continent) whose youth was the best time for breeders to start proper training. With krools, after the initial few years, you had to wait till adulthood to continue taming and training. An adolescent krool could not stop if it smelled blood, hungry or not (actually, the breeders say they are constantly hungry).
The female running at Verlar still had her brother’s blood aroma in her giant nose, which was calling to her prepubescent nervous system. The keeper, the principals and some of the students were watching the scene with silent horror from behind the walls. They saw a human figure standing frozen while the deadly reptile ran at him, the gigantic jaw opened, showing teeth each the size of a human hand. Death seemed imminent. And suddenly, the man ran at the beast with full speed, screaming at the top of his lungs! The krool slowed down, taken by surprise, and so did the man. The dragon changed her route and now was trotting in circles around the tiny silhouette. Verlar copied the movement, his head down and hands crossed at the back, imitating the krool’s posture with short paws. After a few circles, the dragon suddenly leapt out in attack but Verlar quickly jumped towards her too, opening his mouth and showing his teeth that at best would pull out one feather. The krool stopped and hesitated. Then, still clearly furious, she took two very slow steps back. Verlar stepped two steps away too. And then things took an unexpected turn: he took one step to the right and just when he did, the dragon stepped to the left mirroring what Verlar did. At this very moment Verlar had won. In the next few minutes, the dragon and the man were dancing slowly, narrowing the circle, with the man’s lead. Verlar changed his posture, now he was walking upright and relaxed. The krool lifted her head too, closed her big jaw, she was sniffing loudly, eyes were now round and curious. With the last strike, Verlar approached the dragon and put his hands on her huge body and then sat down. The krool sat too, calmed, her sixteen feet long body next to a human, surrendered. They stayed like that for a while, in silence. When he felt it’s the right time, Verlar stood up and looked the krool in the eyes until she was on her legs. He reached for his training stick and rope attached to his belt but hesitated and put them back. He simply turned away and walked towards the stalls. The krool followed him.
#
Lost in her thoughts Ottaine hasn’t realised how much time has passed. The gong sounded, the students left their dormitories and dispersed to their classes. She rushed to the canteen to grab something to eat and got ready for departure. In the dormitory, she met with Yaru getting ready to leave.
‘Good luck, Yaru’ she said cheerfully, ‘and thanks for keeping the secret’.
‘No problem, Ota. Everybody figured it out anyway. And Greghom never denied anything, only smiled. So, good luck to you too. Hope to see you one day.’ said Yaru and waved to her, closing the door behind her.
‘Right, time for me to go.’ Ottaine sighed and went out to meet Greghom.
#
They went to the railway station with the other last forces. There they said polite goodbyes and every group boarded a different train. Greghom and Ottaine travelled northeast, in one of two carriages pulled by a blue steam engine. The southern railway was famous in the country for painting its fleet radiant colours. The legend said, as not reliable as any other tale, that it started when an archaeological team discovered a collection of toy steam engines in a very, very old basement.
After two and a half hours of a pleasant journey during which Greghom briefed Ottaine about life in the Domicile, they arrived in the city of Alugandra, one of the oldest in the modern world. Unfortunately, there was no time for sightseeing. Greghom headed straight away to the Avial Station where wingfingers from the coast were always available for hire.
‘Did you know that, according to the legend, wingfingers were the first to be brought back? That’s how the dragon project started, before the Great Error. And that all dragons are a little bit smaller than their ancestors from the day before humans. It has something to do with the chemistry of the world. Literally, not figuratively,’ he said.
‘Yes, I know that. Verlar told me everything he knows about dragons, and he’s quite an expert in the field.’
‘Oh, of course, Mr Vorgeghom. I wasn’t there when he tamed that krool and became an instant star, but I heard the story many times from my colleagues.’
‘He says he used to be into dogs and horses, but now he’s interested in reptiles, birds and of course dragons. His dream is to visit the Nogo forest one day... of course, he knows the entrance there is forbidden. But a dream is still a dream.’
The Nogo forest... sharing its border with both Skey-Er and Landhapis... hmmm Greghom started thinking, remembering the meeting he was taking part in recently. But it doesn’t make sense. Nothing would emerge without the knowledge of the International Scientific Club. No, it’s not about that area. The forest is as safe a place as it has been for over a million years.
‘Are you an experienced wingfingers rider? I wonder if we should hire one or two?’ he said this time aloud.
‘I’m afraid I’m not good at it. The village I come from is in the midland, we don’t see many ocean-side animals there. I did fly them a couple of times but only on a short distance.’
‘One strong dragon then. We will fly a little off the route but this way we will avoid the hard passage. We’ll take the dragon back to the seaside base on the east and there we’ll board a plane that will be waiting for us. It will take us straight to the Domicile. I know the travel is troublesome but this way we will be at home before the sunset.’
Home... Domicile... I am one of them now. I’m going to my new home, Ottaine was thinking when they were adjusting the luggage sack to the dragon’s legs. The forecasts were good so they left the windshield on the lectica open and enjoyed the flight. Dragons may not have been cheaper than aeroplanes but more reliable. If serious and fatal accidents involving flying machines were 1 per every 10 000 flights, accidents with wingfingers were 1 in every 100 000 and none recorded fatality. The problem was they were not adapted to living in the interior, far from the sea. Their diet and behavioural needs made it impossible to use wingfingers for long journeys far from the coast. There were, of course, plans for breeding locations with saltwater reservoirs in the middle of the Solummgerian Island, but influential animal rights institutions put a stop to those schemes. Some still existed in the continent, gossips were saying that even Skey-Er built its own wingfingers colony by an artificial seawater lake.
Wingfingers were being called ‘horses of the air’ and ‘an intelligent aeroplane’ although the intelligence itself was debated, to put it mildly. Dragons couldn’t be compared to horses or dogs, not to mention crows. Farmers valued trises for their strength and endurance, the army used dangerous krools for military purposes and everybody knew that a once properly trained krool will remain loyal and obedient at all times. Wingfingers were gentle and very social voyage companions, long-necked herbivorous dvudums in their dwarfish form (a selective breeding result) were used in construction and engineering (and due to their high self-efficiency didn’t require a lot of attention in the reserve compounds). Every known dragon was useful in this or another way but they were not as smart as fairy tales would state.
#
The flight was uneventful. Ottaine enjoyed the breathtaking view of the coast and the sunny weather. They landed in the FingAir company compound in Armino city where they took a break to eat and rest. The guests and waiters in the restaurant looked at them with curiosity: an essudus travelling with a young woman two days after the traditional Graduation Day? Greghom and Ottaine received the same number of whispered comments. When Greghom went outside to Demand from a citizen, a little boy came to her, despite his mother’s protests, and asked if she was an essudus too. She replied that yes, she is but not a grown-up yet.
‘Strange’ said the boy with a childish lisp.
‘Yes, strange. I feel strange. I didn’t know I was one until very recently,’ she told him.
‘Oh, but I knew you were, straight away.’
‘Really! How? Because I travel with an adult?’ she asked with a smile.
‘No, because you look at my mum like she was something good to eat,’ said the boy laughing.
‘I... what?’ stammered Ota. Indeed she gave the boy’s mother, sitting two tables away a few looks, but simply because of her extraordinary handsomeness.
‘No, boy, I just think your mum is a very beautiful woman and it’s pleasant to look at someone pretty,’ she explained.
‘Naaah, you look at her like something to swallow, not to look at. My dad looks at mum like that sometimes,’ said the little one.
Ottaine laughed and exchanged an amused look with the woman.
But a few years later she remembered that conversation with a four years old boy and this time she knew the child could see things way beyond her comprehension.
After the break, they took a cart towards the airport located on the western suburbs of the city. There they were welcomed by workers who seemed to know Verlar Greghom very well.
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‘Hello, mister special! Heading back... oh my! Tolrik! Tolrik! Come here quickly! Is this your new student?’, a man with light skin and elvish-grey eyes stared at Ottaine.
‘Yes, that’s right Mr Snevayyan. This is Ms Ottaine Lileghom, a new graduate who will start her further training in the base.’
‘Hello Ms Ireghom, how do you do? ‘ the man shook Ottaine’s hand vividly. She could only nod and smile at the mispronounced name and he disappeared inside the hangar waving for them to follow.
‘An Avio-1300 with extra luggage space for you, sir?’ ‘Let me see... I suppose a standard will be sufficient. We don’t have many bags as you can see’, Greghom pointed at the luggage left by the door.
‘This beauty then.’ he walked them towards a plane that Ottaine recognised instantly.
‘Avio-1440 Eolla!’ she exclaimed.
‘Yes, yes! Old but gold as we say. The best model in the last decade. Beautiful and very reliable. They were produced with various interior leather colours. This one is very rare, all white. Requires a lot of effort to keep it shiny and the holes in the chairs are tricky to cover but we have our tricks, haha’! Winked the aviator. ‘Get her ready to fly?’ he directed the question to Greghom.
‘Please. We want to get home before dark,’ and he turned to Ottaine saying: ‘the view will be breathtaking.’
And so it was. Greghom was an excellent pilot catching the wind and changing the altitude when necessary to admire picturesque meandering rivers or early autumn explosions of colours on the mountain slopes. Ottaine had to admit it was very difficult to choose between the two flights she had today: on a quiet but more bouncy dragon back or noisy but controllable aeroplane?
Lost in thoughts she fixed her eyes on a funny looking rock. They were flying towards it, lowering the altitude. Only after a good ten five or more minutes, Ottaine realised the rock was a building! The walls were smooth but their colours and shallow carvings made a camouflage that played a trick on her unexpecting brain. The Domicile had a simple shape of a horizontal rectangle, three storeys tall and the length about 1.5 longer than the height, with a towerish extension on the left side. When they made it closer and slightly to the right she saw the building was stuck to the mountain flat top with its back and only the top floor was above the ground. In other words, it was made a giant step on the uneven surface. The front was facing an abyss protected by a ten metres wide yard and an iron fence. There was a not-fancy looking door in the middle of the rectangle. On the right-hand side, she could see carved steps going all the way down like a hiking path. Behind the building, on the hilltop, there was a lawn with something that looked like a garden, a training ground and a landing field.
‘Welcome to the Domicile,’ shouted Greghom through the engines’ noise when they landed.
‘How long did it take you to realise the rock is not a rock?’, he asked cheerfully, taking out their luggage.
‘Hmmm, we were maybe six hundred yards away, hard to say. After a while for sure.’
‘That’s what I love about it. It always plays a trick. The painting was designed by... I forgot the name again. It was about three hundred years ago, during the...’
‘Skey-Er’s Revolte,’ she finished. Of course, the famous partisans moved to the mountains and were operating from there for three years before King Mirr signed the Cart of Privileges that changed the status of migrant workers. The revolt, named after a continental country from where many labour workers came in the old days, changed Solummger’s policy in many ways. It civilised it and unlocked a chain of events that resulted in Solummger being now the most developed country in the known world... which was not very wide, tiny to say the least. Anyway, since then the island was intersected with railways, the crops on fields were harvested by machines, and the development of weaponry working with steam and iron, thanks to modern industrial technology, made the country fracture of the size of Skey-er or Landhapis the military and economical power. Now everybody wanted to keep good terms with Solummger. Its nearest neighbour from across the sea, Landhapis, much less developed than Skey-Er lying further to the West, was putting all the diplomatic efforts to be friends with the kingdom.
#
Solummger’s prosperity came from its diversity. It was not a coincidence that it was the only place where elves still lived. Solummger was, in general, the most heterogeneous nation. The variety of faces, eyes, hair, body builds were unknown on the continent. The Skey-Er kingdom was something opposite. Its people were the most homogenous if not by ethnicity then by look: brown-skinned, curly black hair and the highest number of round-eyed (not epicanthic) people – about seventy per cent. They were told to be descendants of the oldest of the ancient tribes in which they were sometimes compared to elves. But elves were a mix of all fair-faced people regardless of their origin, eyes and every other physical feature. The Sjaell ‘orthodox’ claimed they were the direct descendants of the original elves, or Leukos as you could sometimes hear them saying, but everybody with access to a library could quickly find enough evidence to contradict their claim. Even the fairest ones like the Asdraghom family knew they had the almond eye and black hair ancestors that made enough blood in their veins to ridicule every hypothesis about elves’ ‘pure’ blood. On the other hand, the Skey-Er people could make such ‘pureblood’ claims too if they bothered. Thank goodness they did not.
Even if they did, they were far away from Solummger’s perspective, at least geographically.
For centuries not only travellers but also refugees (of wars, religious intolerance, economical troubles) were coming to the Solummgerian island, searching for peace and settlement on this ground. Solummger, once decimated by the bog disease, hunger caused by tremendous draughts and of course the last volcanic eruptions that shook the ground and washed it with ocean’s waters during the queen Cilwajad reign two and half centuries ago, became hungry for more and more fresh blood. At first, the newcomers were treated as second category servants until the ‘Skey-Er Revolt. Since then, everybody who could prove their worth by either years of labour, scientific degree, local community noticeable input or starting a family with a local citizen, or having children graduating at least secondary school, gained citizenship. The strategy worked out – it was easy enough to try and some newcomers happened to be clever scientists who managed to find a cure for the bog-fever and later on some others helped to create a system of water reservoirs and water ducts that stopped the lethal aftermaths of draughts that were happening in more or less ten years intervals. It’s necessary to say that the vast majority of those brilliant minds were from Skey-Er, educated in one of their famous universities. It’s also worth reminding that the rail was invented in Skey-Er but it was Solummger engineers who made it efficient and put the development into action.
Today however the borders were closed to anybody but highly skilled professionals. In return, Solummger’s foreign policy was to help the allies instead of inviting them. It was a difficult task. Landhapis was rather conservative and resistant to change. While Solummger embraced the industrial progress and Skey-Er tried the best to follow up (the only restriction was lack of some natural resources and difficulties caused by recent wars’ fiascos), Landhapis stayed in stagnation. It was an agricultural country whose main if not only asset was rich and fruitful soil and a climate that allowed it to cultivate most of the edible plants. Landhapis’ navy wasn’t impressive but had a good number of highly performing cargo vessels that were crossing the sea with bribes in the shape of exotic fruit, cotton, eucalyptus liqueur and soy to the rich Solummger. Bribes to stay friends and allies.
Skey-Er was in a worse position. The climate was more continental and therefore more extreme, the country had vast deserted areas and irrigation problems. The ongoing conflicts with the easter neighbour over some disputed lands made any economical cooperation very difficult. The country didn’t have access to the sea, from the west it was bordered by impenetrable poisonous marshes and the northern border, just like Landhapis’, was forever closed to people by international law. Even if it was not forbidden to enter the Nogo Forest nobody would risk stepping into that land which gods know what awful creatures occupy. For all those disadvantages the Skey-Er kingdom put a bet on education. It was not an accident that the railway was invented by engineers and scientists from Skey-Er. For years their academics were working on theoretical use of steam power, hydrogen energy, iron and copper technology and innovative philosophical approach in taming the elements. When a rich potential buyer appeared on the scene Skyer-Er sold their intellectual goods and patents to Solummger. Unfortunately for them, the political and military alliance race was won by Landhapis.
#
Ottaine felt in the Domicile like a fish in water from the moment she stepped inside the dark stone walls. Even the constant cold of the rooms she took lightly. She wouldn’t if she were not told that once she ‘transforms’ she will have no problem using her body energy much more efficiently and exactly to her liking. Increase or decrease heart rate? No problem? Slightly putting up or down the body temperature? Easily. Fighting cold? What fight!? Ottaine was so happy she couldn’t remember the last time she felt this way. She probably did, at one and a half years old or so. The Domicile, being here, being the Special... It was not easy to act like an adult. And she wasn’t the only one.
Eluik said he felt the same although outside he was managing to keep his face looking bored. He was from the Northern Military Academy and arrived one hour after Ottaine and Verlar Greghom, accompanied by a tall woman with slanted eyes and white wavy hair she wore in a bun at the back of her head. She was Greghom’s old classmate (Ottaine found this out later on and was surprised by it since Loileh – that was the woman’s name – looked at least five years younger than him) They were best friends even though most of the time they stayed on the opposite sides of the country. Now, however, since there were new recruits, they were to stay in the Domicile for the first month of the training.
Apart from them, there were six other essudi in the Domicile. Ottaine and Eluik met them that evening of the arrival.
#
The curiosity was clearly seen on their faces. One of the men, looking early seventies and very ‘leaderly’ and charismatic stepped forward and said:
‘We are very pleased to welcome you here, sir, madam, among essudi. I can imagine you both are still a bit surprised by being one of ‘them’. It’s a pleasure to welcome two of you after five years of young essudi’s absence’.
Eluik gasped in surprise.
‘Yes, we are not numerous and since there is no pattern to how often an essudus is born... Sometimes there are dozens of young people inside these walls, some years we are stuck here with our own company. We have been stuck for five years now. All right. You will be shown to your rooms and after fifteen minutes you are welcome to take a tour around our ‘mansion’.
The young people were taken to the second floor where, like in a hotel, they found a long corridor with doors on both sides. They were given rooms not far from each other but within a comfortable distance allowing acoustic privacy. Both rooms were overlooking the valley and distant mountains. After the whole life of living in a lowland, this was something that took Ottaine’s breath away the moment she looked through the window. Another moment of heart stop was when she opened the door on something that looked like a built-in wardrobe. It was a real, big (not very big in fact, but for her it was massive) her own and private bathroom! With a toilet, sink, bathtub and separate walk-in shower! And. A. Big. Mirror.
The rest of her room was a double bed (yes, double!), a small sofa, desk and two chairs and a wardrobe. Apart from these luxuries she and Eluik discovered three minutes later a small lounge at one end of the corridor, with more sofas, a fireplace and shelves filled with books and board games.
‘Hey, I haven’t introduced myself properly, I’m Ottaine Lileghom, Southern MA. I come from a small village in the Plains.’
‘Nice to meet you. Eluik Rolaghom, Northern, a town in the north, you most likely never heard about it. Do you have elvish blood? Oh, I’m sorry, I see you didn’t like this question. I meant no offence, it’s a matter of pure curiosity. Your straight hair, prominent cheekbones, oval face and your aquiline nose... you know what I mean’.
‘No, no! I’m not offended, I’m surprised. I have never thought anybody would take me for an elf. I don’t know my ancestors beyond great great grandparents, but according to my knowledge part of my family came from the northern continent, too many years ago to remember when, where people with such bone structure lived for centuries.’
‘If you mean the Great Old River Land then according to ancient scriptures I once had in my hands, they were Elves too. This whole „elvishness” becomes debatable when you dig deep enough.’
‘Right? My best friend, Kyeta, she’s the most elvish elf you have ever seen, she’s from Sjaell, obviously, and she would side with you.’
‘Sjaell? But elves living there are very xenophobic? Aren’t they?’
‘They aren’t. Some are, true, but they are in the minority. I was there only a month ago with Kyeta and other friends. Indeed I met some racist people who had never left their little country. Some. Most of the people in Sjaell are not stupid or xenophobic or...’
‘Alright, alright! I’ve got it. See, I’m a boy from the other end of the island, I just stupidly repeated a stereotype I once heard and never pondered over it. My bad. I’m glad I’ve met you so you could straighten my way of thinking. So, your friend Kyeta, you say she would side with me?’
‘Yes. Even though she’s from the place where people have been breeding with each other for generations she would say this whole skin thing is overrated. The customs and culture that’s another thing and in Sjaell they have their songs, stories, cuisine et cetera. As for the rest, she once told me ‘fair hair and blue eyes are ephemeral and in a long time not even worth a second look.’
‘Well... I would not agree with the last sentence...’
‘Oh, neither would I! I’d die if I couldn’t look into her eyes ever again!’
‘I’d kill to look into such eyes! I’ve met a few elves but only one had non-slanted eyes and they were not blue. Hmm, maybe I would sacrifice you to a god of curiosity!’
‘I would haunt you in your sleep and during private moments forever. Think it through.’
‘I like your attitude,’ he gave her a friendly tap on the shoulder. ‘Oh no, Ota – can I call you ‘Ota’? Let's not be late on our first day. The tour, remember?’ And they run the stairs down.