Dragons Within

There weren't always dragons in the valley. It was once a peaceful, pristine landscape of forest and meadow, old growth trees and wildflowers, leading down to the crystal-clear waters of the River Arneth, which meandered, lazily between the mountain ridges either side of Caronvale.

Now though, the land was desolate. Scorched trees, dry river bed, bare soil where meadow grass had once bowed to the eastern breezes, and black soot where vibrant mosses had been reclaiming dead branches and fallen trees.

Caylen had been born near the spring of The Arneth, high up on the foot hills, with snow above the tree line and forest half surrounding his mother’s small cabin which was set in a clearing overlooking the valley and the market town of Caronvale in the distance. His father had died before he could stand, killed in one of the old wars of men. Without a father to hone the sword of his masculinity, Caylen grew to be a sensitive boy, gentle and passive; different from the boys of the valley, who played with wooden swords, captured and tortured the creatures of river and vale, and developed strong bonds of brotherhood on their turf, the cobbled streets and alleyways of the town.

Caylen had little contact with other children, but every now and then, women, and sometimes men, would make the long journey to his house to visit his mother, Ayana. Sometimes, they brought a child with them, sometimes a babe, yet to be weened. He always felt different from the children his age and found it difficult to converse. But before he had time to discover a way to break the ice, his mother would always usher him outside: “Go play in the forest and see if you can find some mushrooms for dinner.”

Always the same words. Then the door would shut and she’d be with the visitors till the sun was high overhead. Caylen spent the time in the woods, watching and listening to the forest beings, both seen and unseen. The dragonflies, birds, frogs and lizards, rabbits and hares; they all spoke to him, in their own unique way; they all had wisdom for him and they never seemed scared of him, as they were with other people (his mother excepted). He even met a mountain lion once, which had come down from the caves beyond the tree line. She was bleeding from a wound in her front paw and was limping. Caylen had called his mother and as soon as she saw the wound, she opened the door of the house, asked Caylen to get the mugwort, yarrow and plantain from the cupboard, boil some water and bring some of the clean rags she always kept in a draw near the table. She used a pestle and mortar, poured liquids from different bottles of colored glass in with the now brown/greenish mash in the bowl, and, holding it in iron tongs, warmed it over the flames. All the while she whispered words Caylen couldn’t quite hear, but they had the melody and tone of a song.

When the incantation ceased, a multi-colored flame sparked from the bowl and she let the potion cool on the table while she cleaned the wound in the lion’s paw. Not once did the lion complain, but lay still on her side and breathed with deep sighs on each exhale. When the potion was ready, it was poured over the wound and part over a rag which she tied around the paw as a kind of poultice. Ayana then moved her hand, gently and gracefully over the entire leg and chest of the giant animal for several minutes. Caylen was transfixed and felt like he was in a different world. The whole episode was like a dream and it was as if the essence of the surrounding mountains, forest, streams and ponds, had been invited into the small space of the cabin. Caylen knew these essences so well by now. They were his friends, along with the animals. He could literally smell them: the scent of the trees - pine, fir, oak, beech, birch, ash; the firmness of stone – sandstone, lime, chalk, slate, quartz, granite, marble; the ebb and flow of the waters; the wind of many directions; and the fire of the sun. They were all here, dancing in Ayana’s hands, over the heaving body of a massive lion from the caves of the Altor Mountains.

Caylen became used to this feeling, this sensing. It was the same atmosphere in the house when people came to see his mother. It lingered for a while after they left. They would always leave with a quiet word of thanks and sometimes tears of gratitude from the women and solemn nods from the men; and always the same smells, the same taste of the air, the same feeling on bare skin and sensations deep within the belly, would be there.

“Why do these people come here, mother? What do they want?” Caylen asked one evening, as they sat by the fire, stew steaming in the cauldron over the flames.

“One day, I will tell you. But right now, just notice the feelings that you already have in your body. This is the knowing you grew up with. This is your learning,” his mother replied.

Far away, nestled on a warm rock inside a cave, deep in sandstone mountains, the hard shells of four black eggs begins to crack. The cracks spread until each egg opens to reveal the still soft bodies of reptilian creatures. Four legs each, small horny growths around the head, tiny claws, sharp little teeth, barely visible, no wings. The wings would come later; in time.

The four come together on a stone outcrop, under a beam of sunlight streaming down from a vent in the cavern ceiling that warmed their bodies. They huddle and embrace each other, tails intertwined, claws grabbing and pulling each other in, heads resting on the body of another, eyes slowly closing.

Caylen grew steadily; still with a gentleness and innocence that attracted wild and free beings to him, but also with a noticeable development of strength. It wasn’t a muscular, brawny strength. It was deeper than that; like water, washing over rocks as waves lap at shorelines. They may be gentle, but in time, even the rock gives way; slowly, subtly.

He was soon a young man, having weathered fifteen winters. He could chop wood, carry water, tend a garden, repair buildings and make tools. He felt proud of himself for the ability to help out his mother. She was, after all, the only person he really talked to. He could hunt too, but didn’t like to. When he did, though, he was respectful to the will of the unseen ones – the spirits of forest, the ancient ones who lived in the elements – earth, water, sky and sun. Whenever they gifted him an animal to kill (usually a deer or rabbit, sometimes a mountain goat), he would always approach the carcass with reverence, say a prayer of thanks and solemnly carry the body back home, where every part was used as food, to make tools, clothing and bedding, or part of Ayana’s apothecary.

One day, Ayana called Caylen to her. He found her looking out over the valley. She stood tall and proud, chin lifted, eyes glinting, back strong. He’d never noticed her majesty before, but here it was, lit up by the morning sun and embodied in a person he’d only ever known as mother.

She pointed to the track that led up to their home, following the river bank all the way from Caronvale. Someone was walking towards them, still far in the distance; just a speck of color, in a sea of green grass, the glinting of sunlight on the river to the left of the path they took.

“Today is when you discover why people come here to see me,” Ayana said as she looked her son in the eye. She smiled, softly, and put a hand to his cheek. There was a look of sadness in her eyes, which Caylen didn’t understand.

“It’s going to be a hard road from here on,” she said. I was hoping to delay it for longer, because I so love the place we live and the peace I have with you. But the spirits who spoke about this time, so long ago, before your father even, will not leave me alone now. They keep on at me, every morning and every night, pushing, pressuring, saying: “It’s time! It’s time!” So, here we are, and how you’ve grown…into such a handsome, strong man. I couldn’t be prouder. But it’s going to be hard. There are things that will happen soon which I can’t tell you about, but they’ll require great strength and courage from you. And you’ll be alone.” She winced when she said this and Caylen could see tears well in her eyes.

She continued after a deep sigh. “I can’t do this with you; you have to go through it alone.” There was empathy in her voice and Caylen could feel all sorts of things in his belly and heart, but he didn’t understand what was being said, what she so wanted him to know. And he knew his mother well enough to know that she offered only what was necessary in the form of words. Communication with too many words was, for her, a sure way of creating confusion.

“Those people are going to be here soon; a mother and her daughter. The girl is dying. She needs magic; herbs aren’t enough.” Caylen couldn’t even distinguish two people amongst the blob of color walking their way and was about to ask when Ayana said: “Look from within, not with your eyes. Feel, as you already do with your animal friends.”

Caylen thought of the creatures he met in the forest every day. He thought of the trees who told him of things happening far away, that they knew of through the vast network of roots and webs underground, that stretched as far as the eye could see and beyond. He brought his attention down to his belly, focused on the light there, and listened. Almost in an instant, he felt two sets of footsteps walking the path that would eventually wind its way up to his home. He saw the shoes that carried the feet; saw the faces of a woman and a girl, wearing red and blue woolen shawls over long dresses, yellow hair tied in a leather thong for the woman, and four braids for the girl. He was drawn into the heart of the mother and felt the anguish there…he captured glimpses of her memories – the birth of the girl, tears of joy as she held her newborn who would later be named Senna. Then sudden pain as the man she’d wedded hit her, repeatedly…yelling…blaming. The images continued: watching the girl grow and learn to walk and play, and then more beatings; then the daughter’s pain…and Caylen was drawn straight into the body of the young girl, straight to her liver where dark streaks of infection could be made out with every sense in his being; disfunction that he could feel but not give language to. He just knew there was a poison here that prevented the body from functioning properly, and the poison was spreading to other parts: the kidneys, the stomach, the heart. He felt his own heart skip a beat, and his whole body reeled as it echoed the girl’s pain.

His awareness returned and he stood, wide eyed, staring at his mother with the same fear the little girl felt every time the pain got bad. He looked at her with more than a little awe as understanding dawned on him. He understood what she had been doing all this time…what she had done with that mountain lion, so long ago, and all the other creatures that would randomly turn up at their home and his mother would tend to them. Almost all would leave healed. And now he understood what she did with the people that came to her and what each healing entailed.

Ayana laid a comforting hand on Caylen’s shoulder and led him into the cabin. “What does Senna need?” She asked. Caylen wrinkled his forehead at first, wondering why she would ask him that, when he didn’t know the first thing about healing or magic. But before he could voice the question, he felt the girl’s pain again. It was an energetic signature that reminded him of when he might stumble across a dying tree in the forest, or an animal that had drowned in the river. It left a scent, beyond what the nose can smell. Something that could be picked up through the pores of the skin, seen as dark shadow by the inner eye, felt as a constriction by the belly, where lifeforce is drained and can no longer flow through all the channels of the body.

As he familiarized himself with this essence of disease and dying, something else pulled him, physically, towards the shelves where his mother kept all the herbs and tinctures and prepared ingredients. His hands were drawn to several different dried plants, including Goldenseal, Shepherd’s purse, Usnea and Mullein. Birch bark, essences of gorse flower and white chestnut, and several other ingredients.

He was about to begin pounding the herbs, but stopped as a hauntingly beautiful sound rose from deep in his being, as if a choir of faerie and the elves of the old world were singing in his belly. “Let the sound come,” Ayana said. “Don’t force it, nor try to control it. Force brings separation and the return of the dragons. Surrender brings everything together in unison, and heals all.”

So, Caylen surrendered, opened his throat and mouth, and let the sound spring forth. His lips shaped words he didn’t know he knew, and the song came softly, yet with great power. Each ingredient he touched brought it’s own song, but the songs merged together, seamlessly, as though inviting the ingredients to merge too in particular ways, and as the song worked on him, his hands worked effortlessly on mixing the herbs and essences, grinding them or dissolving them, heating them or cooling them – an alchemy that involved the voice and the dance of his hands, the movement of energy in his body and the steady container of consciousness, as much as it did the plants and medicines being worked with.

When the song ended, Caylen looked up to see the woman with the blue shawl and blond hair watching him. Her daughter, with a red shawl was watching him also, from a seat under the kitchen window. He was surprised that they’d already arrived and entered the cabin without his knowing. He felt like he was in another world and was just waking to this one. His mother stood near him, smiling. “Almost ready,” she said to the girl. Turning to me, she said, “Now we need the greater magic. Call in the elementals. You know how to do this. You’ve played with them all your life.”

Caylen thought of the forest he had as his playground; the river, his bath; the mountains, his guardians; the sky, his dreamscape; the sun, his beacon of light; the soil, his steady companion. And as if by magic, the hues of every color of the rainbow began to be drawn towards him, emerging from earth and sky, tree and river, sun and moon. The very lifeforce of the solid mountains and expansive sky flowed into the cabin and settled into the space between Caylen’s hands, and began to weave a spell of life as the ancient ones, here since the world began, danced and spiraled together; ethereal mists of color and light, imbuing the potion Caylen had in front of him, and taking control of his hands to make them dance too, moving with graceful ease to guide the energies towards the girl’s body. She looked afraid at first, but was mesmerized by the dance. She drank the potion offered and accepted Caylen’s hands moving close to her chest and belly and side, but never touching.

Some time later, Caylen felt like he woke from a deep sleep. The energetic mists had dispersed and he found himself alone in the cabin. He heard shouts from outside and looked out the window to see the mother and girl with a man he recognized from the memories he’d seen of the woman. His mother was also there, being shouted at by the man. “Don’t need your witch magic ‘ere in these lands anymore. It only brought misery and demons in the past, you hag!” Caylen felt so groggy he could barely stand. When he looked out again, the man had his mother by the throat with one hand. It all seemed to happen in slow motion…and quietly…so quietly. The man raised an axe with his other hand, and brought it down on his mother’s head.

Even as the blood streamed over her face, she seemed calm and serene, looking back to the window where Caylen stood. He felt her love for a moment, and then felt her life snuff out, like a candle wick. Then he was numb. He had some vague sense of the girl and her mother screaming before sinking to his knees, then everything went dark.

Four young dragons stir in the night, sensing the change in the atmosphere. They know it is time and each one raises their head, sniffs the air repeatedly, and then lets out a rumbling, gurgling noise. The furnace within glows brighter and brighter until the glow can be seen at the back of their open throats. The gurgle becomes a roar, spark and flame sputters from their mouths, and wings unfold to be tested in the tight space of a cave that many years ago, was more than enough room for the four.

Years later, Caylen would stand in the spot where it all began: the murder of his mother, his rage and retribution, the advent of the dragons, the desecration of the valley, and the wars that followed. He would remember this time now, when he roused from his unconscious state, walks outside and sees the body of his mother lying on the ground. Fair skin caked in dried, dark red blood; eyes still open, gazing to the skies.

He would remember weeping and a total lack of comprehension of what had happened just hours earlier as tears streaming down his face and his body seeming to be choked, constricted, trembling to free itself from invisible vines that held it tighter and tighter.

And then, he would remember his rage rising like thick, orange lava at first, and then bursting up and out in explosions that matched the rhythm of his gasping breath. He felt the essence of it consume his body and then direct itself towards Caronvale. As it moved, it seemed to pull on energies from the land and water, the air and the forest. But these were energies he wasn’t familiar with. Darker, denser; serrated in texture, thick in consistency and dark in color. They reminded him of Senna’s insides; the parts that were infected. They reminded him of death. But he didn’t care. All he knew was that his mother had been needlessly taken from him, and Senna’s father would pay for such a deed.

His body would follow the rage right to Senna’s home and the door would explode in splinters of wood with just a flick of his hand. For a moment, he’d stand face to face with the man who’d killed Ayana, while mostly invisible black and red mists spiraled down his arms, creating a confluence of energy at his hands until it was too much to hold. Both arms would rise, level with the ground, and with a clenching of fists, the man’s body was crushed, as though a giant hand had squeezed it. Bones shattered and skin turned purple in an instant, and he crumpled to the floor.

This act of revenge seemed to spark a chain reaction of events that led to now. The dragons didn’t bring the famine, the war, the disease and rage. They were just a symptom of what was there already, festering in the underworld of a valley that looked vibrant and peaceful on the surface. But if old wounds aren’t healed properly, they do fester, and the rivers of life stagnate deep down, until the shadows of the ancestors come rising to the foreground and tempt the fears of people to emerge from the hidden caves, and come into the light of the sun.

The four dragons, adult now, had felt the disturbance in the ether, and were winging their way to a small valley beyond the Altor mountains. Their lair had become too small as they had grown, and just as a human baby needs to vacate the warm, cozy womb when it becomes too small, the dragons had emerged from their lair through a small hole in the roof, and had their first taste of the boundless sky. Unlike many human babies, the wider world they emerge into does not startle or scare dragons…it only reminds them of their hunger.