A Flight Of Dragons

There weren't always dragons in the valley.

That was not to say that there were never dragons in the valley. The high peaks that surrounded the fertile land, dotted with farms, apparently made for very good nests during early Spring, much to the disgruntlement of the birds of prey who lived there year-round. The goats and other animals who inhabited the lower slopes made for a convenient food supply, and the thermal vents kept the nests warm while the parents hunted.

The humans, armed with sharp pointy things that were rarely fatal, but hardly fun, were mostly left alone. Most humans preferred it that way. One did not.

For Chanda, the Flight of Dragons nesting several miles away from her family's farm was an opportunity to repay a debt.

As a child, many years ago, a dragon had found Chanda when she was lost in the forest, frightened and far from home. The dragon had brought her back to the foot of the mountains they nested on, within sight of Chanda's farm, and she had made her way home from there.

Chanda had never forgotten the dragon who saved her, however, and her love of the creatures had endured from that day.

Every year, the dragons came, laid their eggs, and then left as soon as the babies were able to fly. Year after year, Chanda watched them. Year after year, she ran to the nesting sites as soon as the dragons left, finding brightly-coloured scales and eggshells as hard and flexible as boiled leather.

But some dragons didn't stay; just laid their eggs and departed. Usually, those were the most valuable, because once she cleaned out the rotting remains, after the other dragons finally departed, Chanda had the entire shell to work with. This year, Chanda had a different plan.

She'd been studying, reading everything she could find about dragons, and about raising birds or reptiles from the egg, as she'd helped do several years back, when a fox got into the henhouse and gooseyard. Chanda's older sister had married a merchant the year before, and invited their parents to come live with them. They'd accepted, leaving the farm to Chanda's brother, who had taken fox as a sign to sell off most of their livestock and use the money to set himself up in the city. Chanda had managed to persuade him to leave the stud animals and the cropland, both of which she now hired out for a fee, but as far as the fowl were concerned she'd been forced to start from scratch with the eggs that had been laid the previous night.

Baby dragons could not be so much harder to raise than the goslings that chased and bit everything that moved, especially if they imprinted upon Chanda as their 'mother', the way orphaned chicks did. Chanda had a 'nest' of blankets set up near the fire at home, and baby dragons took several weeks to develop their fire lungs, by which time she could (hopefully) train them to be considerate of the more flammable parts of her stone cottage. All she needed was the eggs.

Past experience taught Chanda that dragons laid their eggs during the day, and were nearly impossible to wake at night. She climbed the lower peaks at dusk, settling herself down to hide just out of range until the nesting area grew quiet as the sun slipped below the horizon. The next part of her plan would be the most dangerous.

Free climbing with only the moon and starts to guide and light her way was risky, but not nearly so much as attempting to navigate her way through closely-placed nests. Just because dragons were hard to wake didn't make it impossible. Chanda would prefer to get home without being eaten.

The first nest without an adult present had only one egg, ice-cold to the touch. There would be no infant dragon from that quarter. The next two unattended nests were the same, but the fourth had been laid and abandoned later in the day.

The eggs were a little cooler than they should be, but still warm, and when Chanda dared the use of a glow-stone, held to the other side of the egg, there was the outline of a small-but-solid figure. Carefully, Chanda placed the eggs into her pack, individually wrapped and padded with warmed blankets to prevent the precious burden from being shaken too much, or breaking against each other.

Carefully fastening the straps closed, and even more cautiously hoisting it onto her back, a noise mad Chanda freeze where she stood.

She wasn't the only one at the nesting site.

Poachers? Hunters? People who scavanged as she did for broken eggshells and scales?

Chanda gave herself a mental shake, and began creeping back the way she had come. Whatever purpose the strangers had, it would do her and her eggs no good to be caught, either by them or by a waking dragon.

From the roars that shook the mountain as Chanda reached the expanse of open fields at the base, she had made the right choice. Hurrying home, she settled the eggs into their stone nesting box by the fire just as the night sky lightened to the grey of pre-dawn.

It would be a week or two before the eggs hatched, plenty of time. Chanda settled down with a basket of recently-sheared wool, singing quietly as she picked up the carding combs. The midwives said that babies recognised their mother's voice; there could be no harm in the eggs getting used to hers before they hatched.

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