Fey’Ka’El looked at the human who stared back at him. ‘Had she long ears, she would still look fearsome. Her eyes look murderous, yet… at least right now, we share one common thing…’

He let out a heavy sigh, ‘We have no idea how to talk to one another!’ He mentally cried out, and his long ears twitched as anxiety took hold. The woman who stared at him, snapped her eyes to their twitching. A smile spread over her face.

He twitched them again, her mouth opened, and she did something he recognized, she laughed. He gave a smile in return, ‘This we can do… this we understand.’

He pointed to his ears. She looked where he pointed, and he made them wiggle as much as he could.

Ayente couldn’t help herself, from the moment they twitched, something about the way they wiggled made her laugh, first at the absurdity and then at the absurdity that this was how they could come to peaceful understanding. She slapped her thigh as peels of laughter poured out like water through low ground. Behind her, she could feel her tribe coming to ease as they heard her laugh. Just behind her to one side, Seyi laughed as well, deeper, richer than herself, but just as true.

Fey’Ka’El stopped the wiggling of his ears, but kept his smile. He then pointed to his ear, and looking at her hopefully, he prayed to his ancestors, ‘Please do not let her be an idiot.’ He said its name.

He saw the glimmer of understanding as she touched her own, and forced it to wiggle with her hand, then held it, and said a word he too had never heard.

All three of them visibly relaxed before one another’s eyes. She turned to Seyi. “He is peaceful, do you agree?” She asked, looking slightly up to the intelligent member of the Spirit Horse tribe.

“I do, he wants to talk.” Seyi gave a sharp nod. “We need to show he is safe.”

Ayente thought it over, looking off into the blue sky for a moment, she came to an answer and nodded. “Just play along.”

She put her hand to Seyi’s back and drew him to where her spear was, picked it up, and held it toward him as if to fight. She then jabbed it back into the ground with a solid and audible force, held out her hand, and when Seyi did the same, she clasped it hard and smiled, laughed, and gestured toward her people.

‘Thanks be to my fathers fathers and mothers mothers that she is no idiot.’ Fey’Ka’El thought as he watched the curious woman with the monster eyes and the horrific scars that were slowly forming on her face, perform her little act.

When she returned to him, she spoke, “Ayente.” She then extended her hand.

“Fey’Ka’El.” He said, and reached out. When she put her hand to his forearm and squeezed, he did the same. After her smile formed, she gestured to her people.

When she gestured that way, she didn’t wait, she released her hold and walked away with Seyi, allowing him to follow her if it was his choice. ‘If she had come to us… we would have killed her, I am sure of it…’ It was unpleasant to think that way, particularly as she yanked up her spear from the earth with such ease and the ugly black tip was clearly touched with blood. His sensitive nose caught it from multiple places in the area, and as he drew closer, she was clearly headed straight for the dragon.

When she drew close, she raised a hand to him, a polite wave, she then held her hand out to Archos. “I show him our peace.” She said in his own tongue.

“That is good. So he knows I do not hurt you all.” Archos answered with a deep nod of his massive head, he held out his talon, she took it and clasped him. He did the same, making her hand disappear, but being visibly gentle with her flesh to avoid even a cut.

Fey’Ka’El watched with relief, and when their hands dropped, Archos pointed to his head and said, “Archos”.

“Archos.” Fey’Ka’El repeated the name slowly, his eyes closed briefly and he took a very deep breath, his hands open, his entire body screaming honesty, he took a great leap forward.

“Are you a dragon?” He asked, and watched the dragon’s enormous eyes widen expansively.

“You know my tongue?!” Archos asked rapidly, “How can this be? Are there more like me among you? Have you seen us? Do some of my people live with you? How did they get here and if they are not here now, did they get home? If they got home, how?! Tell me! I must get home! I have a brother to avenge when my work is done here! If you know, tell me, and I will offer you what is in my power!” The words tumbled out far faster than he intended, his mouth and scaled lips and tongue going so quickly that even he himself could barely follow what he said.

Fey’Ka’El had little luck himself, but Ayente was as surprised as Archos himself. Her narrow deadly gaze became wide open and she asked in Archos’s language, “How do you know his words?”

Fey’Ka’El lowered his head and clamped his lips tight shut until they finished and stared at him.

When silence was total again, he spoke, again in Archos’s language. “Your kind came to mine in the long ago, only one, and left his language behind him. My father’s fathers and mother’s mothers passed his tongue on so that if another ever came again we would be ready.”

Archos asked his questions again, more slowly and patiently, and felt the crushing weight of disappointment.

“The one who came to us, he died fighting a monster to protect us. He killed a titan, but died of his wounds… your kind are honored among us, they taught us clothing and magic of the land, among other things. We call your kind ‘the sky teachers’.” Fey’Ka’El explained, “The story we tell, as he is said to have spoken of it, is that he swam to us from another world.” Archos’s scaled brow twitched at the hint of similar travel.

“Was it near here?” Archos probed, his head lowered and he leaned forward so that he was only a few inches from Fey’Ka’El’s face.

Fey’Ka’El felt the hot breath, like wet flame the heavy breath came out of the dragon’s nostrils, and the teeth from where the scaly lips pulled back revealed a row of knifelike teeth. The sharp red eyes stared like the incarnation of death deciding if it was his time or not. Yet he felt no wrath, only a desperate hopefulness from the dragon, something he had not expected.

“Please.” Archos said with a shaking urgency as the word came out, “A brother was murdered, I must find my way home to make his death right… to avenge him. To punish the killer… does your kind understand these things?”

Fey’Ka’El lowered his head in silence as the words rushed at him, though the desperate catch in the dragon’s voice hit him hard, there was no help he could think to offer, not even of hope. Not really. Still, he tried. “It was near here that he came, or so we heard, he pointed near this way, but not quite. A place with a mountain, but he did also try to go back that way, for seasons, only to fail before he came and found us. He saved us from the children of the titans, led us to safety… he was… well, it was told to him by a traveler that there was a place where dragons went and did not come back from. But whether they died or went home?” Fey’Ka’El spread his arms open, “That we know not.”

Archos perked up, “Do you know where that is?”

“Where the suns sets is all we knew, to know more, you must go there yourself.” Fey’Ka’El said matter-of-factly.

Ayente spoke up then, in the common language they shared, “You are one of the deep ones, the deep ones never come here. Yet you have, why?” She tapped the butt of her spear absently on the ground and put her other hand on her hip, “Your kind would normally kill us first.” The way she glared without a sense of humor or hint of a smile told him she spoke from experience.

He hung his head. “We only protect ourselves, your kind come to our wood, you are dangerous to our sacred places, our homes.”

“That you think it right, is cold comfort to the dead.” Ayente retorted, her grip on her spear shaft tightening sharply.

“So it is with ours. In answer, I say to you it is because we saw what you did to the fenrisu. Fen’Maki’s pack has worked much harm on my people for many seasons, and yet you killed him and many of his number, if not all. This is no small thing. A thing no child of man has ever done before, not that we know of.” Fey’Ka’El explained and looked away from the scarred Ayente’s fearsome eyes, to the dragon that had since straightened up.

“And there is that. I saw you. We did not see the fight, we saw that you were there, we withdrew when Fen’Maki came on, even with our long killing bows, those present were few, and Fen’Maki’s pack was many many. We thought to come and find you dead and learn what we could.” He gestured between Ayente and Archos, “But you live.”

“We fought, we killed them all. Fen’Maki was brave, but…” Ayente mimicked his gesture, parting her arms from her body, “we won.”

Ayente’s ears however, had pricked up at the mention of magic. Before she could ask more, Seyihe touched Ayente’s shoulder, “I could not understand you.” He gave a small frown and scratched his head, “What did you say.”

Ayente inclined her head in apology, “Oh… yes…” She mumbled with a tiny blush and then explained all that had transpired.

“We have the same story of a dragon going toward the setting sun, and never returning, though we have no memory of its language, our stories say it guided us for years before it sought the way home. Why it went that way, we no longer remember.” Seyi explained, waving his hand toward the direction of the sunset, Ayente passed his words on to Archos and Fey’Ka’El.

“Then that is the direction I must go… eventually.” Archos stated in no uncertain terms, using her own language… “When my word is kept, and,” he laid a talon on Ayente’s shoulder, “your people are safe again.”

She put her hand over his thick talon, the warmth barely seeped through his cool, smooth, dark scales and she looked up at him with tears springing to her eyes that she kept from falling. “I know… but… please stay as long as you can… I do not want to miss you.”

Seyi quietly internalized three revelations…

‘She cares very deeply for him.’

‘He plans to leave her and them.’

‘It will not be until they are safe, meaning he will help her as much as he needs to.’

Uncertainty about how to feel about these things welled up in him. But it was information, information he needed to pass on to the chief and his mate.

Fey’Ka’El took in the display of emotion between the human woman and the dragon, though they had reverted to her language briefly, it was evident how she felt, and his sense of danger spiralled out of control like a wind that picked up a leaf and carried it to the sky. ‘Those who fight for need and greed can be sated, those who fight for the safety of those they love, will slay titans.’ So the story went.

In his earliest years, he recalled the story learned at the knee of his great grandfather, who said he witnessed the clash with his own eyes, a claim Fey’Ka’El had always believed, because of the passion the old elf had given to his words…

‘So the titan came for flesh and blood, but the dragon fought for the love of us, who he saw as his children, as the wind fought the mountains, they clashed and father dragon called on us to flee, but though we fled, I watched from over the shoulder of my mother, the way he bled for us, he dominated the air with grace, but had to close to win against such a monster… I watched him live and die, powerful, glorious, beautiful and strong, and satisfied at the end of his hours, that his endless life had bought us our years. Beware the dragon’s wrath, it will keep you warm when it embraces you, or burn you to nothing if you put yourself against it….’

The way his old grandfather had used his hands to mimic the dragon’s wings, the way he shook his behind to imitate the swaying of the tail, Fey’Ka’El recalled the way he laughed at the silliness, yet watching the way the tail swayed behind the beast now? ‘Spot on imitation, oldster.’ He recalled, briefly mourning his passing even after nearly a thousand years.

Fey’Ka’El took a deep, resolute breath, and spoke in the dragon’s tongue, “In the long ago, in the time before my grandfather was even a gleam of lust in the eyes of his father, a dragon brought great change to our people, and in his time, the same dragon is said to have sacrificed itself to save them from a titan… that you…” he nodded towards Archos, “come again? I believe change comes with your kind, and though my people may oppose it, I believe we must adapt as well. I would talk with peace among the human tribes.”

Ayente put a hand to an uncomfortable Seyi’s arm and translated, and the brown eyes sparkled with comprehension and the sense of opportunity striking. “The Spirit Horse Tribe would welcome the deep ones coming if it is peaceful. Our young women and men are fair, and we do not always have enough mates… also I have taken to lone walking for the giving of things needed, for things needed and wanted. Your forests are not home to us, as we follow the plains, but your woods have things our plains do not, and our plains have things your forests do not. If we bring the good things you do not have, and give us things we do not have, both will have good things.”

Ayente spoke in the language of Archos, and the deep one’s smile lit up like the sun. In one another’s eyes, across the boundaries of race yet again, he saw a kindred spirit, this time in Seyi. He thrust out his slender but powerful arm impulsively, his golden eyes sparkled with the same light of opportunity, and his ears wiggled wildly.

Seyi stared down at it in a moment of surprise, his mouth falling open for a moment before he saw the opportunistic gleam in the golden eyes of the deep one. The moment he saw it, he clasped the forearm of Fey’Ka’El as one might a treasured companion.

“May I call you friend, Deep One, Fey’Ka’El?” Seyi asked formally.

Ayente translated the phrase, and Fey’Ka’El, said in return, “If I may call you the same, let that be the first good thing given between plains and forest.”

“The first of many things… in the shadow of a dragon, I know no better omen.” Seyi replied with passion and pride, which Ayente carried with her as she passed their words between one another.