The Last Shell
Flying unusually high, the Dragon couldn't help but feel satisfied with himself. The plains spread out below and slipped by soundlessly as he surveyed his domain; stretching horizon to horizon, he finally owned it all- the river-streaked glory of swaying grasslands and craggy outcroppings an achievement that was nearly a lifetime in the making. The felicity and freedom of carefree flight was as exhilarating as it had always been, ever since the moment he has first spread his wings and embraced the sky like a lover. Not even through four weary centuries had it ever lost its lustre. No gold or gems could part him from this, no lands or the subservience of a thousand kings. A lifetime of work he would throw away in an instant rather than be parted from this, his birthright.
_ Dipping a wing, he caught another thermal that carried him even higher, far enough that wispy streamers of cloud caught upon his wing and trailed in his wake. The thin air left him breathless and he relished the sensation, pushing himself further through the damp banks of misty cloud, savouring the burning in his lungs that the effort cost him. Unimpeded by clouds the sun shone bright, and its comforting warmth set his blue scales alight like a field of sapphires. Far below, his shadow set herds of wildebeest to fleeing, and he was reminded of a time, long ago when he had defeated the army of a worthy rival. The memory of their retreat never ceased to inspire him, a hard fought battle that-_
The Dragon found himself suddenly vexed. He tried to recall, but rather than one memory he was confronted with a battery of memories; each of them different, each of them too was undeniably a triumph over a mighty foe. Just... not his.
Curious.
Which one was his? He tried to recall, but could find no memory of it. His head was literally brimming with memories, but all of them seemed dissociated somehow, as though viewed through different eyes at different times. He couldn't recall anything of himself, no worthy deeds or accomplishments. No identity. Not even his name.
Panic surged in his chest as he realised that something was horribly wrong. The dusty visage far below now seemed to have a vague, dreamlike texture that his mind had been too unfocused to consider before, and he found himself hating it. Thunder boomed; the world that he owned, that had seemed so enticing and natural now warped and twisted to nightmares of darkness and drowning. In the same way that the familiar can suddenly become unfamiliar and terrifying he became aware of a malignancy pervading mind; something not un-akin to the warm, sleepy fuzziness that slumber brought dulling his wits. He struggled against it, throwing the weight of his will against the strange trance-barrier, fighting it with every effort of his concentration until the Dream finally dissolved.
The visage below shattered; no longer was he floating upon the air but in a warm, moist darkness. What he had taken to be thunder was the pounding of his own heart loud in his ears, the nightmare landscape in its hues of blood and shadows some kind of barrier around him, all veins and membranes. He tried to draw breath but his nostrils were filled with fluid. In terror he flailed wildly, striking at the hard surface that encased him. Limbs which in the Dream had been strong enough to fell trees seemed horribly, horribly weak and stiff. Out of fear he struck at the barrier, again and again, the burning of suffocation in his lungs suffusing the fear that blazed as bright as flame within his chest. Something in the barrier seemed to give way, and he struck at it, instinct telling him to attack that weakness. He gathered his strength and struck again, this time to be rewarded with a resounding crack like a limb being twisted from a tree, and as suddenly as his burst into wakefulness the container cracked asunder.
The Hatchling blew egg-slime out of his nose, lungs inflating as he took his first breath. Things that had seemed muted and vague were suddenly very, very real. Old senses newly used assailed him with a barrage of impressions; his mind which through the long Dream had been barely conscious, hardly even self-aware as it drifted on the experiences of others, was brought into unpleasantly sharp focus. The strangeness of it battered him in a welter of confusion and he gave a frustrated cry; a noise that should have come as a fearsome roar, but emerged as a gurgling peep.
The realisation dawned on him that he could recall no memories of himself was because they didn't yet exist. This was the moment of his birth. It seemed too unbelievable to give credit; in the Dream he had lived for lifetimes, soared over mountains and oceans; but those were the experiences of others of his lineage. They were his birthright, of a sort; the long Egg Dream that prepared a hatchling for the world beyond the circumference of the shell- a mix of bestial instinct, raking need and inherited memory. The struggles to free himself had left him exhausted, and it was all he could do to lie still and suck sweet air. What came now? Nothing in the Dream had given foresight of this...
A smell aroused the appetite in him and sent it rushing to the fore, giving him his answer; a smell that could mean food or danger and set his tiny body alive and shivering. The smell of blood.
Peeping weakly he searched for the origin of the delicious odour. His eyes would not focus but his nose and flicking, serpentine tongue worked well enough once free of the encasing egg-sack. Ah, there it was, coming from a strange metal container... a _dish?_Dormant parts of his mind still flickering to life provided the word. Warnings like claxons sounded in his head but he ignored them in reckless hunger, dragging his stiff, still-wet hatchling form across the stone floor. It took two attempts to get over the rim of the cold metal thing before he could get a decent mouthful of the delicious strips of bloody flesh within, coating himself in gore and gibbets of congealed blood as he engulfed the morsels out of ravenous, instinctual hunger. When he was done he felt a little stronger and a little more alert. His eyes remained foggy, but a dragon's other senses were still keen and his mind was beginning to uncloud. Biological imperatives sated, he could take stock of his situation.
Whatever place he had found himself in, this was no cave of his ancestors. The air was warm and dry, with none of the humidity or musty earthen hues associated with the deep places of the world. There was light here, though his eyes could not discern from what and something had been burned recently, leaving a tangy, choking residue across every surface within reach of his cramped neck and flicking tongue. Nor could he smell others, just the damp odour of plants and some other thing that had a harsher note to it, like some sort of chemical. He set about preening the slime and bits of egg-shell from his body, working by taste and touch. Nothing could account for the strange situation in which he found himself, but he was alive. Obviously his egg must have been laid here, but where were his parents? His siblings? He smelled no other scents.
He yawed widely. Satisfaction at a meal in his belly left him far too full and satisfied to doubt. He clambered back into the dish with some difficulty, his legs being barely strong enough to drag his distended belly over the lip of the metal thing and curled up with his scales outwards amongst the gory remains of the meal, hoping that it might mask his scent from any intruding badger or fox willing to risk dragon-flame for an easy meal of hatchling. There he lay and learned about sleep, as the blinking lights of his consciousness gently dimmed and faded, giving way to a new, yet familiar darkness.
***
The scent of fresher blood awoke him from a pleasant dream of flying. Another strip of bloody meat accompanied him in his impromptu nest, and it was as he sent it to join the others dissolving in his belly that he first saw the human.
He probably wouldn't have spotted her if she hadn't shifted in her crouch to take the strain off a cramped leg. His eyes had unclouded a lot as he slept, but they worked by distinguishing movement more than colour. He should have been afraid; he should have run, especially considering the long and bloody history that lived strongly between human and dragon in those days. Even newly hatched he was the size of a large cat, and although his claws were still supple and his flame years off, his teeth were sharp as the dagger she wore at her hip. By rights, she should have killed him, or he her, but even as he stood there with sinews dangling from his jaws and knowing the wrongness of the situation, instinct stayed him. Intuitions as old as time overrode any notion of caution and he knew only that this strange, two-legged thing was a harbinger of comfort and security. No dragon-dame to be sure, but perhaps a ...substitute?
They stood, eyeing each other in their respective poses, each fearing to break eye contact lest the other take it as a sign of weakness and strike. It was an odd sort of staring contest; a wet-winged hatchling barely a day out of the shell and a wary, high-strung human female, but perhaps it served some sort of purpose. He read in her eyes only curiosity, perhaps girded a little with fear. After a time it became clear she didn't intend to lash out, and he swallowed the chunk of flesh in his mouth; the human in turn sank down from the balls of her feet and settled cross-legged upon the stones of the floor and cradling more of the delicious flesh in her hand. Hunger got the better of him and he cheeped, guzzling it down greedily when she tentatively dangled it over his maw.
As he ate she began to make some kind of noise in her throat; rhythmic and pleasing to the ear. Speech, he realised, a memory surfacing from the overwhelming need to suffuse his gluttony. Dragons had something similar, but it relied more upon impressions and tone than the meaning of the words themselves. She chattered at him for some time and he cocked his head to listen, snatching more strips of the raw meat as she gingerly proffered them and cheeping for more when the pace slackened. The range of sounds she made was interesting, and pretty, though utterly meaningless to his mind. As long as she was providing meat he would be content to listen to her chatter away to herself. This wooden cave was comfortable, warm and enclosed enough that he felt secure; the air did not move, and aside from the human he could sense only mice and larvae slowly chewing their way through the ancient timbers. Young dragons were made for gorging, and when he has at long last ate his full he sought out the familiar smooth confines of the bowl for his rest, lulled into relaxation by the melodious sound of the human's voice. When next he woke there was no meat, so he settled for eating her shoes.
***
It was like a trap, he would consider in later years. From the moment he laid eyes on her his fate was irrecoverably bound to hers.
His young life was driven by instincts so acute that they became a burning need, interrupted only occasionally by the eccentricities of the human whom he followed everywhere in hope of food. Despite much hissing and scratching on his part, she insisted on picking him up to examine him from all different angles and scraped the last of the dried yolk from his scales. She sighed and chattered in her unknowable tongue, shooing him away until his persistence finally won out and she fed him again. Then he slept on her. With much reluctance, the strange human settled into her adopted the role of mother.
The strangeness of it didn't register readily. To his mind there was little practical difference; dragons normally went out into the world to fend for themselves after hatching and only for a short time would the parents would provide food fortify their brood. As the time to wander drew near, the Hatchling stayed. Fresh meat, clean water and a warm fire to heat his blood were temptation enough to keep him from ranging far. Whenever he wasn't sleeping, eating or defecating he explored the stuffy corners and musty, ancient timbers of the wooden cave; the place was a shambles of sacks, crates and old furniture all hung with cobwebs, dust and the earthenware implements that humans needed to feed. The place smelled old and well used, inhabited by the human but truly owned by the rats. Sheets covered in dust festooned many towering piles of clutter and would sometimes unleash a storm of fluttering moths and rodents if he pounced suddenly. Sparkling metal things and long-dead deer heads hung from the walls, and the stone hollow where the human liked to build her fires seemed to have been chipped and shaped into a design that was all soft curves and straight edges; things that seemed to the Hatchling unnatural in stone. There were game animals too, hanging with their throats slit in a room lined with similar stone. He would go in occasionally and lap up the sticky blood that collected in pots on the floor, but found the room too cold to explore or play in for any length of time.
His host kept mostly to herself. She always seemed to be busy with something, always either cutting firewood, preparing food for herself or out, apparently hunting, for she would occasionally return with some fresh dead animal. In whatever little free moments she had, she spent watching him; staring at him until he felt that she was peeling back the layers of flesh and bone in her mind to see what made him work. It was unsettling at first, and he hid in his bowl or climbed high into the rafters to be away from her, still not entirely convinced of her motives. For all he knew, she could be feeding him to make him better sport in one of her hunts. After a time though he came to accept it as one of the many and varied eccentricities he observed, and he would slink near as she tended the fire and swat at some piece of fabric she waved for him on the end of a stick.
What interested him mostly though were the rats. Rats ruled this place, and he made fine sport of slithering into the heaps of decaying sacks and snatching them as they darted for their holes. The chaotic not-cavern of stone and wood gave them any number of places to hide, and he made sport of rooting them out. Day by day he was growing stronger, and larger, and it was not long until even the largest rat was hardly a challenge to pin down. In the first week alone he doubled his weight and put on half again his length, and as though that were not enough he found his brain becoming sharper; problems that took him half an hour to figure out could be solved within a few seconds. He became curious about everything from the structuring of the iron dish that was his nest to the play of dust motes in the draft. Sapience was something that came slowly to a hatchling, and as much as he learned to master his scuttling limbs and counterbalance with his tail, he learned to control and make use of his own mind. Preferences and personality intrigued and scared him; the more he paid attention to his personal demands beyond an empty stomach or cold sleeping-dish, the more demands he found there were to fill, until he craved boredom to silence the insistent lust for experience that was like an itch he couldn't scratch. The idea struck him that even though he was out of the shell and could move freely, in many ways he was not done being born.
The Dream came as he slept, teaching through eyes and experiences past. But this time there was no cloying sense of wrongness with it. Instead, the Hatchling found it rather comforting.
Days turned to weeks, and before long his young mind lost count of the number of nights, and instead counted the time when the human provider was gone. Outside the snows of winter piled high and she spent less time hunting and more time cutting firewood. Her frequent and lengthy absences left him craving adventure; he had long since exhausted any supply of entertainment inside this wooden shell. Even the rats were starting to grow scarce. Occasionally he would let one live so that there might be more, though the young ones quickly learned his more frequent haunts and avoided them. Curiosity about what lay outside began to gnaw at his mind, though every time he tried to follow the hunter she shooed him back inside, making an annoyed clucking noise. Too large to squeeze through the cracks that the rats used, he was resigned to staring at the outside world though a sooty sheet of clear crystal, sniffing excitedly at the new and enticing scents that wafted though the gaps in the sill.
His chance finally came when one morning, some number of weeks after he hatched, the hunter made ready to set out on another expedition. He watched with a sullenly belligerent eye, wrapped around a rafter like a jungle snake on a tree limb as she readied her coverings, spear and curved stick-thrower, bending the leaves and hooking a string of cured sinew between the points. This time however, when she unbarred the door and lifted the latch, she stood and looked at him expectantly, making a piercing noise from between pursed lips that he associated with a summons. Heart jolting in excitement he unwound and dropped nimbly to the floor.
The outside was... different. It took his eyes a little while to adjust to the glare. White snow crunched coldly beneath his feet, and the air had a clear, almost painful crispness to it that was so different from the dead, sooty air of the cabin that he turned a quick circle in amazement. The sights, scents and noises of the outside world threatened to overwhelm him as though he were fresh from the shell once more. The newness of it set him to shivering, or maybe it was just the cold?
The human extended a gloved hand, and gently caressed the scales on the top of his head, a motion that made him give a little start. Beckoning, she led him into the trees, lips pulled back to expose her teeth as she watched him dart from tree to tree, smelling, tasting and examining the new world, hungry for the experience the way some dragons hungered for coin and gold. He caught a soft mammalian scent and launched himself into a hollow formed by two tree limbs weighed down with snow, startling some rodent-like creature with long floppy ears and big, shovel like feet. The thing shot off like a loosed arrow, and in the split second of indecision between the urge to run or chase, it was away and gone over another snow drift, kicking up puffs of whiteness in its wake. He flicked out his tongue in amazement as the human made that strange, amused clucking sound, relaxing the tension in her bow.
He feared to stray far from her. The cold worked its way into his blood, and after a while it was all he could do but to sit upon her shoulder and stay awake as she followed a trail through the woods, ever on the lookout for signs he recognised as the marks of prey; a broken twig, a paw print, the pellet-like droppings of the rodent-things. Hares she called them, holding the shed fur up for him to see. He memorised the smell; they would be more of a challenge than rats to hunt.
The quarry she sought was larger and more wary though, and as the days progressed she led him ever further from the cabin. The deer she sought were ever flighty, led by a canny old hart and swift to flee in their strange loping gallop at the merest sight to anything amiss. Throughout the day they would often see the white flash of bounding tails vanishing into the boughs before they could get close enough to land a strike. The Hatchling accounted for more than a few failed hunts; launching himself out of the trees as soon as he felt he was within range, and tiring long before he could close the distance enough to hamstring a kill. Eventually, apparently exasperated, the human picked him up and forcibly scrubbed his scales with damp mud and snow, leading him upwind of the watchful stag under a wrathful eye. For a creature with a strong odour and no natural defences or camouflage the human was a formidable hunter; her bow and keen eyes made up for what nature had not seen fit to grace her with, dropping an elderly doe before the herd took to its hooves. Indeed, it was often hard to keep track of her as she stepped lightly between the trees, and more than once he lost her altogether when some new scent or interesting ice formation caught his interest. The Hatchling found it hard to imagine that there was a more fearsome hunter on the whole mountain.
He saw for himself the folly of that assumption as he wandered alone one day, tracking a spoor through a thicket. Following the well trodden game trail through the underbrush he stopped suddenly as his forked tongue took up a new, and yet also familiar scent. He pawed at the snow, scraping down to the frozen mud beneath and looking over the shallow impressions and hoof marks scoured into the ground. Mixed among the tracks he recognised were new prints; different from the side-by-side pronged arrangement of the deer and with a sharper, dirtier smell; four points and a pad. He knew it from some of the hides in the cabin of the Huntress; though it was more muted there, salted down and dry.
The Hatchling was suddenly afraid; something in the scent told him that this was a dangerous place to be. He left quickly, eyes and ears alert for the slightest noise; scuttling through the snow as quickly as a scared rat even though the cold turned his blood and brain sluggish. He stuck to the trees where the snow was shallower and the drifts gave more cover. Icicles hung from the gnarled branches. Occasionally there would be a frigid shower of the white stuff from above as the branches gave way beneath its weight.
Rounding a tree, he discovered the source of the smell.
The wolf stared at him with the keen an interested expression, apparently trying to decide if he was edible. Reptiles typically didn't frequent the northern ranges; his scent must have been enough of a puzzle to it to overrule the usual instinct to pounce on anything smaller. He locked his gaze into its ice blue eyes, every muscle in his body alive to leap if it should charge. He didn't dare break eye contact. Or blink.
The wolf yawned, apparently deciding it had better things to do, and padded off through the snow, its feathery tail swishing lazily as it vanished noiselessly into the trees. The Hatchling stood frozen for a few moments, too scared to move until he was sure it was really gone and not just some phantom of his imagination.
Then he fled as fast as she short legs could carry him.
***
His host worked constantly, always busy with one task or another; as the weather grew warmer he noticed a change in her activities; much of the meat she took went into barrels packed with salt, and the hides she had been curing throughout winter were carefully rolled into bundles or crudely sewn into rough garments for herself. It meant she had less time for hunting, although that was not so much a care as it had been in earlier days. The Hatchling grew explosively as he learned the tricks of wind and shade that were needed to sneak up on even the wariest prey. Winter refused to die without a fight, and sent forth barrages of hail and sieges of snow to make a final stand against the onset of spring. There were fewer deer around, but more hares to chase and he hadn't seen any more wolves; he took to dragging his catch home, guiltily aware that he was eating at least twice as much as the human when supplies were short in any case. She took the prizes gratefully, preferring to boil the meat into stews and salty broths swimming with tubers and roots. The meals were somewhat less palatable than roasting, but this way a single kill could be spun out across a week. Another change, he thought.
All the while she worked, she talked. The babble grated on him at times, but he started to understand a little by simple expedient of being barraged by it. It was an epiphany to realise that words could also be used to describe things that had not yet happened, or were going to happen- or ideas so far at odds with the way he understood the order of the world that he began to take an actual interest in what she had to say. It was hard going; he could make neither snout nor tail of most of what she said, but he began to pick up on the more basic ideas and associate the sounds with actions and things around the cabin. There was intent behind the words; intent he learned quickly, and was reinforced with a sharp crack to the muzzle when she tried to teach him go outside to take care of his eliminations, oblivious to the fact that the cold caused him discomfort and removed much of the novelty of the forays into the outside world.
It was this particular pressing need that drove him to the door one particularly rough day near the dawning of spring, where he scraped ineffectually at the hide drape that now hung over the lintel; the storm had raged relentlessly for three days and she had hung every window and door with pelts to keep out the worst of the draught. He clawed at the sodden wood again, gouging out a set of lines, though the human either didn't hear him over the howling wind, or was too lost in thought to take any notice. She was sat before the fire, poking it in a distracted manner, as though she had something on her mind; for once in absolute silence. It was almost unsettling.
He batted the door and let loose a peep, followed by an irritated huff when he still got no response. He tried to remember what sound she used to describe when she went outside. After a few practice tries he finally got it right.
"O-ut." He managed. Enunciating the sounds took the combined work of throat and mouth, and he couldn't escape the feeling that his tongue wasn't shaped for this kind of speech. That certainly got her attention. She lay off poking the fire, looking around with an expression not entirely dissimilar from the one she used the one time his patience had run out and he bit her. She was alive in a flash, dropping the poker and snatching up her spear in surprise, instantly alert and staring hard into the shadows of the hut. But they were alone; she turned her gaze to him. As slowly and carefully as though sneaking up on a pheasant she padded over to him, setting her spear against the wall and hunkering down to stare in that annoying hominid fashion.
"W-What... did ye say that?"
"Out!" He repeated enthusiastically, hopping up and down on the spot for added emphasis. She reached out and picked him up as gingerly as though his scales were scorching coals, as though seeing him for the first time.
"What kind of creature are you?" She breathed, then her brain threw up a card. "Oh! Sorry."
He returned when his functions were taken care, kicking snow out of his claws.
It seemed to take her a while to get her head around the idea, although that was alright, he figured, considering he had only the most basic grasp of the language himself. She fed him titbits from the bowl, trying to persuade him to speak more, although it was not long until he had exhausted his repertoire; the words made his throat hurt. She seemed incredulous. It wasn't long before he realised she had taken him to be nothing more than a dumb animal to be trained and harnessed. She had never even considered that he might be a free thinking creature in his own right. He couldn't help but be irked at the assumption.
His host seemed to consider the idea for a while, often when gently stroking the folded skin behind his jaw that made up his earfins. She was fond of that; the folds were sensitive, and the Huntress would smile when he churred and leaned into the caress.
"Like a cat." She murmured with a small smile one evening, more to herself and the surrounding air than him. Immersed in thought, she didn't even notice when he filched the food left in the bowl. "You run around and pounce like a cat, and ye sleep near heat, like a lizard. But you're not either, are you?" He found himself enjoying her ministrations and yawned hugely, hardly paying attention to what she was saying. "No, I knew what ye were the moment you broke out of yer egg. And there I was thinking that maybe you could be trained." She laughed. "What a fool I was, eh? The lure of a pet dragon was too much to resist, but I suppose I'm stuck with you now. They'll probably kill me for this, but I never gave much heed to what they said anyway. I wonder, where did you come from little drake?"
***
Where did you come from, little drake?
It was an idle question, borne of idle chatter but one that troubled him the next few days nonetheless. It wasn't something he had given much thought to when distractions were plentiful, but now there was little to occupy his mind it began to weigh heavily on him. In the near silence of the forest he could hear it echoed and replayed by treacherous memory, and nothing in the Dreams could answer it, furthering his frustration. He even made a kind of game, about seeing how long he could avoid thinking about it- which he invariably lost every time he tried to recall what he wasn't supposed to be thinking about. Some gentle questioning of his host revealed little.
"I found your egg in a cave." She said one day, a month after he spoke his first words. It had taken her nearly that long to get over the shock. "I don't think it was a nest; there was no mud nor grass, or anything else to show that the dragon had been spending a lot of time there. She must have been sick and come to ground in all of a hurry to lay, is all I can guess; she'd been dead for at least a week when I found the place. None of the other eggs were intact; rats had gotten the rest. Yours was only whole because it was on the bottom of the pile."
"O-h," He said, disappointed.
She tickled the sensitive leathery skin behind his earfins.
"Don't look so glum, think of it as a good fortune instead. These woods are thick with wolves and bears; a hatchling wouldn't last a week on its own. No offence."
"Not ta-ken." He said thickly, balefully aware of his own near miss.
He followed her through her circuit of the woods as she checked her traps, hopping hare-like to keep out of the worst of the damp. He was beginning to know the scents and sounds of the woodland as well as the odd hole-and-corner arrangement of the cabin, and noticed that most of the woodland creatures could sense her approach from a great distance, robbing him of a chance to snap up a fleeing hare. Occasionally she would stop to inspect a pile of deer droppings, set a snare or cast her spear into the trees after a stilled pheasant which he would retrieve from its nest of thorns. He ate his share raw, greedily snapping up the innards and entrails as she butchered their catch beside a stream.
One day, a further month and almost two feet of growth after he had first inquired she even took him past the cave where his egg had been found; more like a fissure in the bare stone, and had been more than half made of ice in the thickest winter. That had now thawed leaving a much shallower cusp of rock and obscuring darkness. He sniffed around the entrance, but couldn't work up the nerve to enter; the place stank of decay and scavengers. Visiting left him in a grim mood for the rest of the day, and he only brightened when his host announced that they would be beginning a long trip into the plains before the month's end.
"The hides and pelts I've been taking are worth a lot of money to the su'landers." She explained, later in the week, taking a brief pause in a lesson on his pronunciation that she despaired at. He couldn't quite get it right, though he found that he could avoid lisping if he spoke carefully. "They make fine cloaks and garments from them, but are too craven to come up here and hunt the beasts themselves. Far from the cities, you see?"
"There are many humans up here?" He asked, gnawing on a bone. The only thing that didn't seem to be changing with the seasons was his appetite, which was as insistent as ever.
"A little few." She replied, chewing on a slice of jerky herself. "There are more in the Balnuss Mountains to the east- you'll only find hunters like me here in the Shalk. There are a few outlaws hiding in the lower passes, but I doubt they'd come this far up; it's been an easy winter as these things go."
"Wha- outlaw?"
"A criminal, a person who is hiding from justice. Not very nice people." She said with some finality, but continued when subjected to his bemused stare. "We have rules called laws, little drake, and breaking them demands a punishment. Sometimes people are killed for their crimes, especially if they've killed other people. Outlaws run from the law rather than accept their rightful punishment. Some are men who broke no law, but offended a rich person or bedded a lord's daughter and have a price on their head for it. Others might be innocent but fear an undeserving punishment, so they run, and like as not end up with the real criminals. Pointless if you ask me, but the law is far from perfect. I wouldn't see a man go to his death for a crime he didn't commit. Let that be a lesson when dealing with humans, drake. Do unto others only what you would have done to you, and you'll live along and happy life."
The Hatchling snorted. Rules tended to make sense when you understood the reasons behind them, but there were so many of them he couldn't blame anyone for forgetting one occasionally. He certainly couldn't see that killing someone would make anything better after the mistake had been made. He put it down as another of the strange human concepts that was beyond meaning or use.
He slipped outside to prowl the evening woods, noting that the myriad of snares she'd set had been baited with meat again, but the flesh was too rancid to prod his appetite when there was fresh available. He had taken to thinking of this part of the forest as his own, a small patch of trees nestled at the top end of a wooded valley that stretched out of sight to the south. They were fairly sheltered from weather here, the worst of the storms seeming to hit the opposite side of the mountain. As an added bonus the sun shone brightly in the evening, and if he could take little warmth from it there was still some satisfaction in being able to bask in the wan glow.
Even as familiar with the land as he was, he learned a valuable lesson in caution when he didn't notice the absolute silence of the birds until he caught a dirty whiff nearby on the breeze. A wolf was nearby, and to make matters worse he could smell blood.
He clambered to the top of a tree, his claws hooking into the craggy bark with ease. A wounded wolf would be more likely to attack, and he'd been standing upwind. It couldn't have missed his scent; he'd made a point of spreading it out as he walked, boldly advertising his territory- and his presence- to any creature with a sense of smell. He was heavier now, and whilst his scales were far from doeskin-soft as they had when he's first hatched, they wouldn't stand up to the bone crushing force of a wolf's jaws yet. There was nothing to do but wait out of reach until it went away.
***
Which turned out to be a bad idea...
A day and a half later it was still there, out of sight but close enough for him to hear the occasional whine as it struggled with whatever injury it was dealing with. He had thought about making a bolt for the hut, but the time for that was long passed; his blood was cold as clay and he was perilously close to falling asleep- one from which he would likely not awake. His thoughts and body were sluggish and poorly composed so that it was all he could do to cling to the branch like an oversize lizard. There were few options; he could wait, although how much longer was moot. He wasn't up to a run; but he was angry and spoiling for a fight. The one remaining option seemed a satisfactory solution.
He dropped from the branch, twisting in midair to land on his feet. The surge of adrenaline at the thought of coming battle dispelled the gnawing discomfort his senses alive and peaked for the slightest rustle that might mean a moving creature. The blood-scent was even thicker down here; the damnable creature must be bleeding badly. Good; that would make it stupid and tire easier.
He kept his body low to the ground, earfins spread wide to cover the soft bare patch at the base of his throat, tail held high so that no telltale slither would give him away. He could almost pinpoint it; the wolf was in a small grotto of overhanging trees he's used himself to pounce on hares in weeks past. He could hear it wheezing just behind a snowdrift, could smell the dampness of its breath heating the air. Carefully settling into position, he waited a minute to be sure it hadn't picked him up. Only when he heard it whine again was he certain he had the element of surprise.
He tucked in his hind legs and launched himself through the drift, sending up a spray of snow, angling to land right on its back to slash out the soft spot on the side of its throat-
And was met with a creature no more capable of fight than an egg-wet hatchling. The wolf was lying on its side amongst a sodden patch of grass and half-melted slush, the thawed dirt around it tinted brown-red with blood. Its fur was a matted stinking mess; its horribly grey tongue lolling nervelessly. A single paw lay extended, tethered to a tree by the snare that had trapped it and cut deep as the thing struggled. Blood and pus oozed sluggishly from the rent; only the breath that was coming in short, frantic pants gave sign that it still lived. He danced away, and then approached more cautiously, circling it first one way then the next just out of leaping distance. The wolf followed him with a startlingly blue stare. It didn't seem to have the strength to do much else.
"Come to finish me have you, hey?" It grunted out between pants. The Hatchling was greatly taken aback. It was canid speech, low and rough but somehow he understood the words even though he had never heard the tongue before. Evidently some ancestor must have taken an interest in the beasts and deigned to learn their language. He wondered how many other secrets his memories held.
"Yes." He said in the same tongue, surprised to find that the words came so smoothly and unbidden, far easier than human-speech. He circled closer, finding his eyes drawn to a drop of blood making its way down the metal wire of the snare and tracing it to its source; by the look of it the stupid creature had been chewing at its wound.
"Even though I passed you by, hey?" It snarled weakly. "Fine then... make it quick, lizard. I long to rejoin my pack." Its eye closed and the breathing grew still, though blood still seeped from the wound. He extended his claws and drew back a paw for the blow, but hesitated. Little could be made from the wolf's smell or features beneath its thick coating of grime and the overriding canine stink.
"You were the one from weeks ago?" He asked.
"The one and the same." It said, sounding tired. "You're bigger now, of course, though you'd still make a poor meal. Too much effort getting through your hide and not enough reward underneath."
"Where is your pack?" He said, ignoring the jibe. What little he knew about mammals suggested they never went anywhere without the rest of their family unit. The wolf found the strength to lift its head from the sludge, fixing him in the same sapphire regard that had riveted him to the spot when he was new to the outdoors. He retreated a few steps in case it felt up to a leap.
"Dead." It growled. "Hunter got most of 'em three moon-howls past. Blackrot and hunger took the rest, and the pups. Now there's just me." It paused for breath. "Can we get this over with?"
"No, I have a better idea." He said, wondering even as his mind formulated the plan if it was a good idea. Probably not, but the human had seemed so definite about her lesson on justice and fairness and balancing the account sheets of life that he felt compelled to acknowledge her wisdom in this matter. The wolf had spared him once, it seemed only fair to give it a try. "Can you hold your weight?"
"On three paws? Any day. But I'd hardly be up to it on a good set of four the way I am. You have a plan?"
"Of a sort." He said, wondering if it could even be called such. "Hold still."
His jaws weren't as strong as a wolf's but his teeth were far sharper; made for tearing out chunks of flesh rather than holding on to fleeing elk. The steel tether of the snare had resisted the wolf's attempts at chewing it but soon gave way under his own ministrations, leaving him with a bleeding gum. The wolf sighed as the line went slack, barely moving as he drew it from the deep, oozing cuts. He feared it had given up the battle until it spoke.
"Thank you." It breathed, licking at its wound.
He cautiously waited for it to get up, though even after a long while it remained motionless aside from its breathing, which seemed easier now. A tentative nudge got no response; it seemed the wolf had succumbed to exhaustion and slumbered. He pondered his next course of action. The wolf would not be able to move by itself for some time and would starve alone, and there was no sense in waiting around to see if it chose to find out just how much flesh lay on a dragon's bones. Besides, he had been overlong already and the cold clawed at him maddeningly. There was no doubt it was time to return.
Although...
The human wasn't home, although that mattered little; her scent and paths were second nature to him and it scarcely took longer than a score of heartbeats to track her down. Bundled in furs and hides and her own matted hair, she looked not entirely un-wolflike herself and reacted just as quickly and instinctually when he forgot to announce his approach.
"Ouch!" he wailed, shaking his head to dislodge the dizziness. What humans lacked in natural weapons, they made up for in ingenuity. He suppressed a shudder of horror at the thought it could just as easily have been the tip of the spear, and not the haft that struck him on the snout.
"Oh- you scale spitting spawn of a sailor and a turtle! Damn you creature where have ye been?" She lifted him bodily from the ground and engulfed him in a mass of warm hides and meat-scent. He was so relieved to be back in familiar arms that he let loose a little purr of happiness.
"There's a wolf-"
"I bloody well know there are wolves! Their tracks are all over the place, and I couldn't make heads or tails of them. I feared I'd find nought left of ye but bones and a few claws!"
"You don't understand; it's hurt.
She gave him a quizzical look, not quite questioning but nor was it quite confusion.
"Later." She said flatly. "Got to get you home, you're as cold as death."
"But-"
"Later!"
With a rebellious look he fought free and sat his rump down into the snow, tail flicking violently enough to cast showers of whiteness out behind him. She planted the haft of her spear, returning his stare levelly. After a few minutes her toes started to tap.
"Fine!" She said, casting her hands up in exasperation. "Show me to it then, so that I can put it out of its misery."
He led the way, his nose dripping blood into the snow as he miserably followed the trail back to the snowy hollow. The wolf wouldn't be able to survive anyway, he reasoned. Not injured as it was. A quick death might have been the more merciful thing after all.
The wolf was still there, and stirred when it heard the heavier, more regular tread of the human. Its crystal eyes were wide and alight with terror, flashing between him and the huntress as realisation dawned. The human lowered her spear, putting the point between the creature and herself, staring the animal down even as it shrank back in fear. The Hatchling could barely stand to watch; he knew what it was like to be pinned beneath such a predatory gaze.
"This is what kept you? It looks as though it can hardly stand." She said, not taking her eyes from it. The wolf whined piteously, trying to huddle into the drift and shield its underside, though the injured paw hung uselessly at an odd angle preventing it. It snarled long and low at him; he didn't understand the words but the meaning was clear. His wings drooped in shame at his own treachery.
"It was caught in one of your traps." He said. "I let it out."
"Why the hell did you do that?" She nearly shouted. "Tha's me bloody livelihood there!"
"Well, after what you said about outlaws and getting what they deserved-"
"Oh bloody hell! Ye don't get metaphysical with things that have sharp teeth!" She snapped, drawing her spear back for a lunge. He leapt upon the point as she thrust, driving it harmlessly into the ground.
"You did." He said. "With me."
She left off struggling to uproot her spear.
"That was different." She stated flatly, taking her eyes from the cowering wolf for the first time.
"Was it? For all you knew I could have been a monster. You said yourself that humans fear my kind, and rightly so. You took a chance then."
"I got you young, and that makes a difference. Besides, what d' ye want me to do with the damn thing? It's done in as it is."
"Just give it a chance, as you did with me. It could have killed me quite easily once, but it passed me by. Don't you think that deserves at least a chance?
"Please?" He added with some difficulty, seeing the dangerous glint fade from her eyes. He knew it was a low blow to play on her emotions, but if it would inject some rationality into her, it was worth it.
She growled and sucked her teeth, clearly not happy. Reluctantly mulling the idea over, she twisted the shaft of her weapon in hand as she pondered. The Hatchling shivered as fresh snow began to fall, and melted instantly into the pool of dirt and blood that had accumulated beneath the tree. Finally with an exasperated growl she upturned her spear, burying the point into the earth.
"I'm going to do it, aren't I? Yon scaly devil, ye could talk the flies off a horse's arse! I just hope ye can talk that wolf into handin' over his teeth too!"