The Bird and The Dragon

Ayu stepped restlessly around his grandfather’s library, touching the backs of books stacked neatly on their shelves. She was thinking about her two separate families and her position between them. Mother’s side of the family had always been part of Ayu’s life. There had been birthdays, funerals, disagreements, and celebrations, but rarely. Mom had only one sister and their parents were old, grandmother was already so senile she didn’t understand the death of her daughter. At the funeral, the old woman had thought Ayu to be Enidtha.

Ayu had inherited her mother’s brown hair, but unlike her mom, Ayu had never grown to have soft, smooth curves. Her chest was flat, and her hips narrow, and Ayu had noticed that the build of her body was like the women living in Parisya. Even her nose was like theirs; narrow and curving slightly upwards, not broad like mom’s or straight like Kvenrei’s. The nose was a minor thing, but it irritated Ayu, for it was one of the too many issues that had been kept a secret.

Kvenrei, whom Ayu was starting to consider as his dad even if she wouldn’t say it aloud, was irritatingly lacking initiative. The young woman couldn’t understand how Kvenrei was content with only enjoying the quiet days and reading stories to baby Meina when the world was moving on and his influence was needed in the city.

Everyone seemed to accept Kvenrei’s indecision and slacking. Ayu had hoped Captain Pakhui would push the matters, but the soldier concentrated on his duties and there was no one else to force Kvenrei to act. Ayu had done her best to talk sense to his father, but he didn’t seem to listen.

There was a knife on a shelf. Ayu picked it up sizzling with frustration. The whole place was full of objects from all over the planet and even from the old world. The knife’s blade was granular and milky in color. Ayu checked it quickly with her dragon sight searching for hidden matrixes, but there was none.

The knife was an object that had seen the world ending, its blade and handle embedded with a fine net of unknown materials, probably waiting for a surge of energy to engage their functions. Ayu concentrated and urged the resonance to move in the net, making the blade brighten, turning it more transparent as the energy flowed towards the edge and a fraction outside the edge.

Ayu stopped feeding the blade before anything happened. Southerners’ ancient technology was interesting, but Ayu had been told to be cautious. She feared she had already done too much, but holding the blade helped with the frustration. At least the blade had done something useful in the past and was still willing to serve, unlike her father.

“You are growing up as skilled as your aunt Jesrade,” a male voice said behind Ayu. The girl tightened her hold of the knife turning to face the speaker. It was strategej Patrik. The man was darker than his brother, but the facial features had many similarities; the shape of the eyes, the straight nose, and the high cheekbones.

The strategej wore dark trousers and a dark jacket, an outfit any gentleman could wear on an afternoon stroll. The jacket’s uppermost buttons were open showing the straight collar of the pale blue shirt below. There were no signs of a day spent riding, the man was immaculate and smelled fresh.

Patrik raised a finger to his lips. “Hush, Ayu. I will not harm you or your family. I only wanted to see my father’s home.”

Ayu hesitated but kept the knife. “You are not supposed to be here. I will scream.”

“No one will hear it. Your father will not help you, unfortunately, he can’t help even himself.”

“What do you mean? You and your company agreed to leave when he forbade the access.”

“I share Kvenrei’s sorrow on the passing of our father and sister. I obey the dragon’s wish, which she made clear and no harm will come to you or your family.”

The strategej watched the young woman, his expression solemn, a vertical furrow between his eyebrows. It was difficult to estimate Patrik’s age, but Ayu was sure he was older than Kvenrei.

“Kvenrei has spent his whole life running away from his responsibilities. He could have stayed here with our father, but he didn’t want that part until the last moment. Have you noticed how it summarises his whole life story? Running away from the responsibilities to return when it is almost too late; when his actions confuse the things more than they help and hurt the people who already have arranged their lives to compensate for his absence?” Patrik said.

“He was absent a lot, but he has been a good father,” Ayu said stubbornly, meaning her words.

“If you say so. But he misses the skills, knowledge, and contacts needed to tend to Ikanji’s heritage. In his sorrow, he is too stunned to act.”

Ayu’s shoulders slumped, for Patrik spoke the truth. Ayu was sure Kvenrei was not sleeping or eating properly. He showed an occasionally cheery face for his kids, specifically for Meina, but behind that facade, the man broke down under his grief. “None of that is your problem,” Ayu said.

“Quite the contrary, it is not only mine but the whole nation’s problem,” Patrik said softly. He observed the books giving no regard to the knife Ayu was holding. “My brother has decided to cast himself into a role which requires him to be both strong and cunning. The border lord of these lands can not show weakness. This is not the time for sorrow, nor for immersing himself in the quiet life in the countryside. You know Ayu, there is a war in the south? And you know, every time they have fought the war has eventually spread to include the hot segment.”

Ayu nodded. The strategej had a sword, and probably had no reason to count Ayu as a threat. The girl set the knife back in its place and stepped away. She put on an indifferent look, but couldn’t keep from glancing at her uncle. Patrik was a picture-perfect aristocrat.

“You are his oldest child. If your father fails you must pick up the pieces,” Patrik said slowly, like thinking aloud.

“Speak your proposal,” Ayu said.

There was the shadow of a smile on the man’s lips, like a fish briefly surfacing, hardly visible before diving back to the depths. Should Ayu have known Patrik she would have been suspicious. “Very well. You are an observative young lady. I am sorry Ayu, but you will not continue your mother’s career in the clothes business. You may inherit these lands in time. Before that, you will be a part of the narrative to carry the New Freedom over the current war.”

“Why would I agree to be your puppet?”

”Because you don’t run from your responsibilities.”

“What is in for me?”

“You get me as an ally. My recommendation for Commander Anhava. Invitation to the upper class of society where you belong by birthright. I can also teach you the sight, unlike your father.”

Ayu watched his uncle, who looked sincere. The common opinion considered strategej Patrik to be a man of honor, worthy of trust, and free of corruption. The same rumors knew about the strategej’s failed marriage with two kids and how he had afterward taken the good of the nation to his only passion. The dragon had chosen Kvenrei and Patrik had obeyed her, and Ayu remembered Kvenrei’s warning about trust.

Ayu thought about how his father considered no one worthy of trust. He probably didn’t trust even his children but had kept everything hidden from them. The strategej would be a wise choice for an ally. At least he had both political and military power, unlike his brother. “What would it mean?” Ayu asked.

”You would spend time in Sandau, but that you would do anyway, should you continue the shop. You would participate in the social gatherings, to become a flag and fire for the ainadu, a living reminder about our history.”

Ayu was nineteen years old and didn’t want to live in far-away Parisya, with only the sea and horses as her company. The proposal sounded great. A relative, who took her seriously sounded even better, and Patrik’s words sparked ideas and ambitions in Ayu’s heart. “What about Kvenrei?”

“He will carry on with his life the way he has chosen. He is my dear brother, but his decisions must not endanger the nation. What do you say, Ayu?”

“I’ll consider this,” the young woman said, even if she had already decided to accept his uncle’s proposal. “I’ll have to travel to the city to oversee the business. I’ll tell you my decision then.”

The strategej nodded. ”I’ll visit you to hear your decision. Please, spare some time for me, I’ll treat you to an evening in the city, and take you to meet some people you should have been introduced to a long time ago.”

Agiisha stood in the middle of a dark room, cold and immobile like a statue. She was naked in the darkness, wearing only her aura, which flowed ethereal and smokelike. The dragon was alone. Her mind wandered inside the currents of the great matrix, which was stressfully small and barren here in Watergate. It only remotely resembled the verdant flow where the dragon once used to dive with her siblings.

But unlike those too-distant flows, this stagnant, little pool was hers all alone.

The place had only fragments of memories and no input from the dragons, the tiny dataflows dissolving too quickly into the background noise. There was no interference, no new ideas being born from the communication. There were only a few simple minds asleep in the orbit, their thoughts slow and without form, distorted by stasis and after a century they provided no entertainment for the dragon.

When Ikanji had escaped the trap Jenet had set Agiisha had seen the old strategej’s mind and memories leak and disintegrate to the great matrix like spores carried by the wind. It had been beautiful, but a great waste.

However, not all the memories were gone. Some fragments were still floating around and one of those passed Agiisha. It was a memory of a single moment. It carried the freezing wind which bit through the thin clothing, and the sweet warmth of blood soaking into the fabric. The blood was warmer than anything Ikanji had felt in two weeks and felt so good. The realization of a lung pierced by a bullet was still to be formed and the memory carried only the moment of comfortable warmth.

There was another fragment originating from the strategej, a piece of a complex matrix, and when Agiisha observed the two pieces collided and merged.

This was a new and interesting thing, a variation to the emptiness. Agiisha locked the information in place in the great matrix. She looked around and picked another piece of Ikanji dropping it to the space she had just created. The data aligned and merged again, but this time with only a single, thin filament of information exchange.

Several subprocesses were brought online and cores awoke to provide processing power. The doors to the dragon’s lair in Sandau closed and the machines guarding her human body activated. Agiisha turned her mind to the great matrix, enjoying her new play, discarding her old playthings on the orbit.