[Wk49] The Fate of the Dragons, part 5
The dragons met the rest of their kind at the summit of Orachii’s tallest peak. The elves had already begun their dance, leaping and somersaulting from rock to paper thin ledge at dizzying speeds. Their auras burst from their nearly two-dimensional bodies as they flew through the air and across the pristine white circles in the clear night sky. When the dragons lingered on the summit, refusing to join in the dance, the elves began to cluster around their kin’s claws.
The elves listened as the dragons explained their dilemma. To Saftal’s relief, the dragons had absorbed her concern, and agreed they could not let the humans face the Wraicha alone.
“Can you call the Wraicha?” A dragon asked of their elven kin. “Can you fight them?”
The elves’ auras tightened in negation. “We’ve never had to,” one of the Elven clan elders said.
“These humans visited us not long ago; we agreed to peaceful arrangements but not to sharing our planet,” Another added. “They are our guests but not our kin. We honor them as such. How would calling the Wraicha would aid their fight? We might find ourselves in two separate battles.”
The dragons nodded their acknowledgment of the difficulty; they had entered into the same treaty with the humans. Saftal could feel both her elven kin and her dragon family grow heavy with the weight of the human plight tangled in their auras. Saftal watched her kin struggling with the added burden, and realized,
“They haven’t bonded. They have auras but no bonds.”
Saftal continued over the startled murmurs around her, “I’m just guessing. Maybe their bonds aren’t as strong, if they do bond? But they do not think and feel together, as we do. Their auras do not penetrate past a certain point. They still struggle with keeping their auras visible. It’s possible the bond is what protects us from the Wraicha.”
Saftal’s great grandfather, one of the quiet ones, spoke then; “If this is true, then maybe Saftal is right that we can help. Maybe our ability to bond will prevent the Wraicha from attacking.”
“Are you saying we will each bond with a human?” a dragon from a different family interjected, yellow aura spiking in alarm around her head. “There are not enough of us, not by a long shot. Further, not all of us will want to bond with a human. We would lose our bonds here. We would lose our family. Everything. That is a large price to pay for a risk.”
“We could do it slowly. It was just one Wraicha, after all. We might have time to do this slowly, “ Saftal said after a brief pause. “We could send a small group to them. A small group could start over on Veritrea, where they have their aura school. Most would stay here. Our way wouldn’t be lost, and we would still give the humans a fighting chance.”
The elves eyed their dragon kin, their auras shimmering haloes around their flickering bodies. The dragons sat in close thought until a member of the green hued family spoke;
“You will need to take our eggs.”
The elves began to smile as they saw their dragon kin shape the plan that would redraw their futures. They began to weave baskets from their leafy-thin fingers; vines slithered from nothing and knotted themselves into intricate loops and folds as the dragons listened to the mother with the olive aura talk of her children-to-be.
“You cannot hope to start over with only purple auras. You will need our eggs. I will risk the travel to bring my un-hatched young to Veritrea.”
Saftal’s aura wound around the olive-hued dragon, wrapping the gift of the dragon mother’s care in plum gratitude. Other dragons stepped forward, offering to risk the long journey so as to bring their young, and a chance, to the humans. Several of Saftal’s siblings moved to stand by her side. The elves strapped the baskets across the backs of forty-seven dragon volunteers, Saftal included.
Saftal’s aura wandered across her extended family, embracing their specific texture and hue with each tender wisp. She wondered how many twilight celebrations she would miss attempting to bring hope to the humans. She let her aura linger, a thin plum shroud on the shoulders of her kin, while the egg-filled baskets settled across her back. Their multi-colored love soaked into her chest as she pushed off from the summit. She disappeared into the night with her new clan, her heart clutching the fading rainbow of care that had raised her.