Nianki looked where he pointed and nodded when he spoke, but the mechanism didn’t interest her. As the basket slipped behind the thundering falls, she put out her hand and let the edges of the torrent briefly tear at her fingers. She smiled again. Here at least was a force she could admire.
Amero tied off the basket, and they entered the cave. The thick stone walls muted the roar of the water enough to allow for normal conversation. Nianki, gazing upward, boldly walked into the center of the cavern. Hands clasped at his back, Amero followed her.
“The dragon made this?”
“He clawed this room out of solid sandstone,” was Amero’s proud reply.
“Amazing. I wish we’d had him with us at the Thon-Thalas.”
She wandered here and there, admiring the water pool and hearth and examining his various tools and experiments with polite curiosity. Amero watched her explore for a while, then said, “Nianki, we have to talk.”
She turned his copper sheet over in her hands. “About what?”
“We’ve found each other after all these years. You have a life on the plains, while I — ”
She dropped the copper carelessly. It clanged on the floor. “Why don’t you join us? It’s a great life — riding, hunting, seeing the wide plain unroll beneath your horse. There’re the elves, of course. I’ve not given up the fight to free the south and east from Silvanos’s hands.”
“Nianki, my life is here.” Amero sat on the edge of the stone hearth. “This is my place. These are my people.”
Her smile faded. “I thought you’d say that.”
“You’re welcome to stay as long as you like.”
“Thanks, brother. We may stay a while to gather supplies and our strength before we move on.”
Amero looked away to where the stream flowing down the wall pattered into the pool. They’d found each other after almost eleven years, and already they were speaking of separating again.
“Where will you go?” he asked.
She considered a moment. “North. The hunting’s better there, come winter. We’ll cover the northern plain, maybe even follow the coastline to the far northeast. I hear tales of other humans there, living in treetops. They also say the black-skinned folk cross the sea in great dugout canoes and trade along the shore. Maybe some of them will join us.”
“I think you should stay here, Nianki,” Amero said urgently, “We’ll combine our people into a single band. We’ve a lot to teach each other. Why, I’m close to learning how to make my own copper tools! Once I’ve mastered that, I’ll make bronze. The mountains are full of minerals, and the valleys are good for crops and flocks. Your people can teach us your way with horses.”
She dipped a hand in the cold pool. The hard face of Karada had replaced the smiling visage of Nianki.
“And who will lead this united band?” she scoffed. “You? Me? Both of us? Think again, brother. Your villagers won’t stand for orders from a wanderer like me, and my plainsmen won’t listen to a soft-handed foot-walker like you.” He opened his mouth to protest, but she said more softly, “Even
I wouldn’t follow your orders, Amero, and I don’t think you would follow mine.”
He nodded sadly. “Will you come to visit now and then?”
She grinned. “Every Moonmeet, if I’m able, I’ll come — so long as you hold a feast each time!”
He rose and embraced the sister he once thought he would never see again. As she felt his fingers tighten against on her back, scarred Karada was briefly big sister Nianki once more. “Cheer up,” she said. “Knowing you’re alive makes a difference.”
“And to me,” he said.
A shower of water announced the return of Duranix. Amero and Nianki stepped quickly apart, embarrassed by their mutual affection, and to escape the torrent of water flung off by the huge dragon. Duranix shook his head. His barbels jangled metallically against his chin and muzzle. Nianki was taken aback. She had never seen Duranix in his true form, and her hunter’s instincts were aroused by the looming creature. She tensed to fight or flee.
“Ha,” said Duranix, grinning. “I leave for a while and Amero brings a mate to my cave. What next? Pups?”
Nianki threw back her head and laughed. She laughed all the harder at seeing her brother’s face turn brilliant crimson.
Furious and more than a little embarrassed, Amero exclaimed, “This is my sister! The one I thought long dead!”
“Ah,” Duranix said. “Karada is your sister. How can that be?” Duranix studied them. His pupils narrowed to slits. “I don’t see the resemblance.” Amero’s face showed anger again and the dragon added, “Humans look so much alike to me, you might all be siblings. I’m sure you know your own sister.”
Nianki gave a snort of smothered laughter.
Duranix clomped heavily to his platform, each ponderous step intended to shake the water off his back. He climbed smoothly onto the dished-out ledge and idly picked up an ox leg bone lying nearby. All the flesh had been eaten off already, but the dragon gnawed the ends of the bone. His wickedly curved teeth scraped against the bone.
“Does he always eat like that?” Nianki muttered.
Amero rolled his eyes and climbed the steps at the front of the platform. He cleared his throat. Duranix bit through the bone with a single snap of his jaws. Nianki flinched. Amero, used to his companion’s habits, said eagerly, “Did you find anything?”
The dragon’s casual manner vanished. He tossed the bone aside. “Sthenn was here. I could smell his trail from five thousand paces high.”
“Who’s Sthenn?” asked Nianki.
“Is he still around?” Amero asked gravely.
“No — or if he is, I can’t find him.”
Amero’s anxiety was evident and Nianki demanded again, “Who’s Sthenn?”
Her brother explained about the green dragon, the yevi, and his ongoing rivalry with Duranix. She listened with a grim expression.
“This green dragon created the yevi?” she said. Amero nodded. She made a fist, pressing it to her lips. “Elves in the east, dragons in the west… Is there anyone who doesn’t want to drive us off the land?”
Duranix exhaled sharply, and the resulting whirlwind blew Nianki’s hair across her face. She regarded the bronze dragon warily and said, “I have to wonder — maybe I’m fighting the wrong foe. The elves, arrogant as they are, are beings not unlike us. Some of them have notions of honor. This green dragon sends packs of unnatural beasts to do his dirty work for him. Maybe he’s the one Karada’s band should be fighting.”
“I wouldn’t recommend it,” said Duranix. “Sthenn is more than two thousand years old, by human reckoning. He’s clever, cruel, vindictive, and unpredictable. He never forgives a transgression, no matter how slight. As long as you are nomadic savages, wandering the plains, he will take little notice if you kill his pets. But if you show up at his lair with an army, he’ll use every trick and tool at his disposal to destroy every last one of you in the most unpleasant fashion he can think of, and in his long life, he’s thought of many.”
Amero felt suddenly cold. Unconsciously, he stepped closer to Duranix.
“You talk like you’re afraid of him,” Nianki said to the dragon.
Duranix raised his head. “I am afraid of him. He killed my mother and my clutchmates — my siblings, as you would say — for no other reason than it pleased him to do so.”
“How did you escape?”
Duranix’s claws flexed, scratching loudly on the stone platform. “I didn’t,” he said. “Sthenn spared me on purpose. He deliberately killed my family then let me live.”
“Why?” asked Amero. Duranix seldom spoke of his own past, so this was rare information to him.
“I spent a few centuries wondering that myself. I believe Sthenn let me live so that he could terrorize me. Over the course of his long life, Sthenn has grown jaded. One thing he still savors is fear. He loves being the object of dread and goes to elaborate lengths to instill it in others. It’s easy enough to frighten lesser creatures, but there’s little for dragons to fear except another dragon. Making me afraid of him is a powerful pleasure.”