#test run lore

“You’ve survived in the swamp since you were a hatchling, haven’t you?” Karno said.

Gwaihir nodded. “Oh, forever and ever.”

Karno sighed. “See, that’s why I respect you. Even considering that you’re like this, you know how to manage yourself. If you didn’t, you would be dead.”

Gwaihir tilted her head. “What do you mean by ‘like this’? Oh, listen to that frog -- isn’t it beautiful? That’s a river warden. They suffocate their prey before they eat them, which some call cruel, but I wonder if it’s truly crueler than being eaten alive.”

“Like that,” Kuros said. “What does the frog matter?”

Gwaihir frowned. “What do you mean? Everything matters. It’s all part of the swamp.”

“The swamp is an obstacle.” Karno stretched his neck. “It’s here to challenge us, to pit us against itself so that we may prove our mettle. But the frog? It isn’t a threat to us; it isn’t dinner. So it doesn’t matter.”

“The swamp isn’t here for you.” Gwaihir’s voice turned suddenly cold, even angry. Karno had never heard her like this. “It doesn’t exist to serve as an ‘obstacle’ in your little schemes. It doesn’t care what you want. It is for itself. And the frog is part of it. If you don’t respect the little pieces, you don’t respect the swamp. And if you don’t respect the swamp, it will kill you.”

“We should have eggs,” Komaran said.

“What, like, for breakfast?” Callery said.

Komaran blinked for a moment, taken aback, then laughed. “No. Dragon eggs.”

“You want to have kids?” Callery stared at Komaran, then looked at Theus. “I mean, I guess that’s betwixt the two of you, all things considered, since I won’t exactly be, uh ...”

Theus realized what Callery meant: since he was the only male dragon present, if Komaran wanted eggs, he would have to father them.

“Komaran ...” he said.

“Look,” Komaran said, “anything could happen to any of us at any time --”

“And you want to bring hatchlings into that environment?”

“That’s been our environment since we were hatchlings! But, look, we have plenty of food -- with more claws to help, we’ll be safer. And beyond that ...” Komaran took a deep breath. “It might be selfish of me, but if we die in here, I don’t want to go unremembered. I’d like my story go on, my line to go on.”

“She has a point about the workload,” Callery said. “Plenty o’ clans pop out eggs to have free help, and trying to get through here with just the three of us is wearin’.”

She had a point about the other thing, too, Theus thought: he remembered the others who’d died, Gwaihir and Karno and Zyere and Dusk. To die unremembered was to die the final death. For a while there’d been just him to carry their names, and then he’d told them to Komaran and Callery, but still ...

“You think we’ll ever get out of this swamp?” Komaran said.

“It has to end eventually,” Theus replied.

“Unless we’re walking in circles,” Komaran retorted. She pointed at a dead tree. “I could have sworn I’d seen that tree before.”

Theus struggled to hide his annoyance at the suggestion. Since he led the party, he couldn’t help but feel that Komaran was blaming him for their lack of progress. Not to mention: Maybe if you got off my back and shifted your own hide, you could steer us in the right direction. Someone who could not be bothered to walk for herself could hardly complain about the way those who did walk chose to do so.

Callery spoke up from behind Theus. “What’s your compass say?”

Komaran and Theus were both quiet for a moment before Komaran answered: “What’s a compass?”

“Y’all don’t -- ” Callery stopped herself. “Y’all’ve just been wandering around with no idea where you’re goin’?”

“Well, when you put it like that ...” Theus said.

“Seriously, what’s a compass?” Komaran sat up on Theus’ back and craned her neck towards Callery. By now Theus had turned to look back at Callery, so he could see her take something from her bag, a small disc.

“A compass tells you which way’s north,” Callery said. Theus thought she spoke more slowly, but not quite slowly enough for him to accuse her of thinking them idiots. “That way you can set a direction and stick to it. You check the compass to make sure you’re not goin’ in circles.”

“Why don’t you take the lead,” Theus said, his tone making it very clear that this was not a question.

“So I know how I got here, and Zyere won’t shut up about how his caravan left him behind, and I’m assuming Gwaihir formed out of a sentient cypress log,” Dusk said, “but I don’t know what you’re doing in the swamp.”

“I told Zyere this already,” Karno said absently, clawing his way through a particularly stubborn bramble.

Dusk shrugged. “I wasn’t there, was I? So I still need to hear it.”

Karno glanced down at the smaller tundra -- not so much smaller, anymore; she was growing rapidly. “You don’t need to hear anything.”

“Then I want to hear it.” Dusk folded her paws primly under her and looked at Karno expectantly.

He gave in. “Fine, but I’m only talking if you help me cut a path.”

Dusk looked askance at the bushes. “I’ll get burrs in my fur. Ask Gwaihir; you know they’ll just part before her like magic.”

“Gwaihir’s busy getting food. We can’t let her do everything for us. We’ll get soft.”

Dusk ran a claw through her fur. It wasn’t as silky as it could have been, in better conditions, but it was considerably nicer than it had been when Gwaihir had found her. “What’s wrong with being soft?”

“It gets you killed,” Karno snapped, more heatedly than the question really deserved. Dusk reared back a little, and Karno went on angrily, “Now, are you going to help? If not, leave me to my work.”

“I don’t think I am, actually.” The tundra raised her snout in the air and picked her way primly through the mud, calling, “Zyere! Can you tell me that story about the harpy and the guardian again?”

Karno turned from his own target just in time to see the ball of compressed roots and vines strike Gwaihir full in the chest. With a roar, Karno sprang onto the offending janustrap and put it down, then turned to Gwaihir, expecting her to be all right, because of course nothing could really hurt her ...

Gwaihir lay on the ground, breathing labored, a wing folded over her ruined chest. Zyere stood over her, eyes wide, tongue flickering in worry. He said, “Gwaihir? Are you all right?”

When Gwaihir didn’t answer, Karno hurried to her side. Her brown eyes rolled towards him, then closed. Her sides no longer heaved with her breath.  The oily greenish liquid that had once run under Gwaihir’s skin spread in a puddle around her.

“Gwaihir?” Zyere said in a small, lost voice.

“We should burn her,” Karno said, his voice harsh. Zyere looked at him with eyes that were, for once, sincerely pitiful rather than calculated and pleading.

But even as Karno spoke, Gwaihir’s body began to sink, her flesh turning brown and viscous and sloughing away: as Karno and Zyere watched, Gwaihir’s corpse became a pool of mud in the dirt of the swamp.

“Oh,” Zyere said. “That’s new. Or do Earth dragons just do that when they die?”

“No.” Karno stepped forward, but even he didn’t quite want to touch the mud that had been Gwaihir. “She loved the swamp. Now she’s part of it. Maybe it loved her back.”

Callery fell first, under the claws of one of those little cat things that Komaran thought were so cute. It didn’t seem as cute with the nocturne’s blood dripping from its fur. Komaran screamed as she fell, and then Theus leaped in to dispatch the augite protector, but it was too late. Callery’s hat lay in the dirt; so did the rest of her.

“No -- no ...” Komaran ran and picked up the hat. “No! Not Callery!”

“Not Callery?” Theus asked, his eyes narrowing, too emotional -- though that emotion felt more like anger than anything else -- to be polite. Not Callery? Would she rather it had been me? Herself?

“She had a plan!” Komaran cried. “She wanted to get out of here -- she knew what she was going to do! Us, what do we need to survive for? We have nothing! No future! Callery was moving forward!”

Theus looked down, feeling cold. We have nothing. We are nothing. “We have our eggs, Komaran. Soon ...”

Komaran clutched Callery’s hat to her chest as she stared up at Theus. “Eggs ... do you really want to bring eggs into a world like this? Where anything can be ripped away whenever? We can’t ...”

“Will you stay?” Komaran asked.

“Stay where?” Callery replied.

“With us. While we’re nesting.” Komaran shifted where she sat, looking across the campfire at Callery. Theus had gone to gather more wood. “I know you’re not like us -- you’re traveling to actually get somewhere, not just wandering around. I understand if you don’t want to waste your time --”

Callery shook her head. “Don’t be silly. I couldn’t leave my friends behind like that.”

We’re friends. Komaran’s heart leaped at the word.

“I’m not in such a hurry to get where I’m goin’ that I’d abandon you at such a vulnerable time,” Callery continued. “Besides, safety in numbers -- if I leave y’all, I take a pretty good chance o’ never gettin’ there. And I wanna meet the kids!”

Meet the kids. Komaran found excitement fluttering in her stomach. They really were going to nest, and have a family, and then she’d never have to worry about being alone ever again.

“So how long have you and Komaran been traveling together?” Callery asked, while Komaran was off fishing in a nearby pool.

“Since we were hatchlings,” Theus said. “I found her hiding in a bush when I was barely much older than she was.”

“Right, the no-parents thing.” Callery looked guilty. “Sorry if I shouldn’t’ve asked.”

“No, it’s all right.” Theus folded his forelimbs under him. “I don’t even remember my parents, so I don’t feel too attached to them. I ... I think Komaran might have issues with hers, though.”

The truth was, Theus thought more about Karno and Gwaihir than he ever did about his biological parents. They were the ones who had made him feel safe and looked out for, in the brief time before they were gone. Zyere and Dusk had made decent substituted, but they just didn’t have the other two’s surety.

“You must be pretty close, then,” Callery said, referring to Theus and Komaran.

Theus frowned. Did Callery have a point with this? “I suppose.”

Callery sighed. “I like traveling with y’all, but I know you don’t like me. I’d like to thank you for letting me come along anyway.”

Where did you get the idea I didn’t like you? Theus didn’t bother asking, because he knew the answer: he had, on occasion, been cold and curt with Callery. It was perfectly reasonable of her to interpret this as dislike. The truth was, while Theus found her manner of speech irritating, he didn’t outright dislike Callery; he just didn’t care one way or the other about her.

“I don’t hate you,” Theus said aloud.