Azela Incarnate

More days had drifted by before the castaways finally decided to leave the island.

Azela kept her distance from the gigantic sigil Catherine was drawing in the sand. The glitch had confidence in her companion, but saw no reason to take chances. The symbol was the width of a small house.

Catherine's reasoning was that a sigil so large was more likely to catch a dragon's attention. She didn't actually know if the magic worked that way (and in fact it did not), but she tried her best to seem confident about it.

Teresa had already led the other mermaids away from the island that morning. The risk was too great for them to stay. The mermaids were so grieved to see them leave that they wept, and though Catherine and Azela did not, the parting was emotional for them as well. Teresa had pressed her face against Azela's shoulder for a long moment before letting go, and the warmth of it stayed with her longer than she expected. The mermaids had been good friends to them.

This plan had been Azela's idea. After Catherine described how the dragon had snatched up the serpent the way an eagle would a fish, Azela pointed out that there was more than enough room to ride on a dragon's back. If it would let them, that was.

Catherine crouched at the sigil's edge with her drawing stick in hand. "I have no idea how hard it will be to influence a dragon's mind," she admitted, making another long line through the sand, "but if any random lunatic could do it, every village in the mountains would have been burned to ash by now."

She pressed the stick harder, thickening part of the design. "When I tried this back in Misyrea, the spell came from one of the oldest tomes in the temple's archives. I didn't think it would actually work, so I wasn't mentally prepared."

"Why did it go wrong?" Azela asked.

Catherine spun the stick as she examined her work. "The dragon answered the call, but I never established control. It then simply went wild." She laughed, despite the regret. "It took a full day and night to put out all the fires."

She pressed the stick into the sand and resumed drawing.

Azela took several steps backward as Catherine widened a curve of the sigil.

"I hope I got it right," Catherine muttered as she finished. She glanced over at Azela, who had retreated to a considerable distance. "What's the matter? You're not scared, are you?"

"Of course I am!" she shouted back from behind a tree. "What about you? Aren't you ever afraid of anything?"

Catherine had no chance to answer. At that moment, a dark shadow swallowed the area whole.

It arrived instantly, the light going out all at once as something placed itself between them and the sun. The wind stirred into a frenzy, and the vast summoning sigil Catherine had spent an hour painstakingly carving into the sand was blown away in seconds. And as it vanished, the same red dragon that had appeared before, as awe-inspiring and massive as ever, landed with improbable elegance atop the ruined symbol.

His thunderous voice rolled out over the settling wind. "Why hast thou summoned me?"

Catherine's mind went blank. There had been no time to form a bond. She hadn't even begun the ritual. There was no song, no hand sign, no use of magic at all. Yet here it stood before her… talking?

She had read a great deal about dragons, including debates over their sentience. None of it had prepared her to actually hear one speak. Tales of talking beasts were for children; she had long ago discarded such folklore as silliness. The god-dragons could speak, or so the legends claimed, but they were literal gods. This was something else entirely, and nothing she had ever expected.

"Holy hells!" Azela yelled from somewhere behind her.

Catherine fell to her knees before the gigantic creature. A living mountain stood before her. It dwarfed the great sauropods sometimes seen in the Mietha, and those had already pushed the limits of how immense she believed an animal could be. The reality of its power was overwhelming; standing this close felt like standing on an erupting volcano, or in the eye of a hurricane.

Never before had she been so aware of how small and helpless she was. Not even when the pirate ship beneath her was being torn in half.

"Oh, great dragon," she said, her voice meeker than she intended, "we humbly ask to exchange this sword, the legendary odachi of destruction, for the privilege of being carried by you to the village of Pandoria." She drew the blade slowly and held it out across both palms, as though offering it at an altar.

The dragon gave voice to a sound akin to laughter, a deep resonance that tremored through the sand. "And by what means would I make use of such a trinket? As a toothpick?"

Its vast head inclined, one great eye settling upon the blade with a glint of recognition. "Even were I willing to bear this thorn, I know of Katherine. It suffers no master unchosen. Upon my acceptance, it would seek to drink of my very soul. And a dragon slain by such folly would serve thee poorly as conveyance."

Catherine stared at the blade in her hands. "You mean the legends are true? This thing eats souls?"

The dragon gave another low, rumbling laugh. "It would seem you grasp not the true terror of that weapon, else you would not bear it with such reckless boldness."

For a moment, he studied them both. Something inscrutable stirred behind those ancient eyes. He laid one great wing low to the ground, taking care not to crush the nearby trees. "Climb upon my back. I shall bear you to the main isle, north of the village. From there, you may go on foot. I place little trust in sorcerers. Pandorians least of all."

Azela finally emerged and ran to Catherine's side. "Thank you, Mr. Dragon," she said, with the easy politeness of someone addressing a neighbor. She looked up at him. "I’m Zel, and she’s Catherine, like the sword. Um, if you don't want the sword, what can we offer you in return?"

"This is but recompense for the meal thou didst provide me earlier. The serpent proved most satisfying," he said.

Catherine sheathed the blade, then crossed her arms and worked to still her shaking. She didn't know how Azela could remain so composed before such a raw embodiment of power. Then she recalled that seconds ago Azela had been hiding behind a tree. The thought gave her a small and stubborn flicker of competitive courage. She met the dragon's eyes and held them. "How is it that you can talk?"

The dragon seemed pleased that she had put her sword away. His posture settled. "How else? I was taught. There are many breeds of dragon in this world. Some older, even, than the gods known by mortals. I am long of life and large of mind."

A curious expression crossed his features, one that Catherine had not thought a dragon capable of. He smiled. "Also, because I AM A DRAGON. I do as I please. In the southern lands, they called me Gohdinn. That is all thou needst know."

Climbing the great beast took time and effort. His scales were warm and slightly rough underfoot. Each one was as broad as a flagstone, and the muscles shifting beneath them made the climb feel like navigating a landscape. Once the two were settled on Gohdinn's back, he lifted himself over the island with a gentleness that seemed impossible.

It was astonishing that something so gigantic could fly at all, and nearly unbelievable that he could do it with such grace. Azela crawled up to Gohdinn's neck so that she could see over his shoulder. Excited, she waved for Catherine to join her. Catherine shook her head. With some reluctance, she admitted to herself that she would never be as brave as Azela.

"Cat! Cat! I can see the mermaids!" Azela braced herself against the wind with both hands pressed flat to his scales, leaning dangerously far forward. "Hey, Teresa!"

Gohdinn's voice carried easily upon the wind. "They cannot hear thee. We are too high." He banked slightly, adjusting course without being asked. "Shall we move closer?"

Azela pulled back just enough to glance down at the distant shimmer of water. "I don't want to scare them."

"They know I will not eat them. Come, climb upon my head."

Azela obeyed, covering the distance with little trouble. They dove toward the school of mermaids far below. As Gohdinn slowed and circled around them, Azela cried out, "Bye, Teresa! Goodbye, girls! I'm going to miss you!" The mermaid in front shouted something back, but was too distant to hear. They waved to one another all the same. It was good that they knew she was safe.

Catherine would have waved too, if she could. But every ounce of effort she possessed was occupied with controlling her body. She had finally discovered something worse than seasickness: airsickness.

The trip did not take long. Gohdinn soared at a speed that made it difficult at times to hold on. From high in the sky, Azela could see the magnificent village as they passed over it.

The towers caught the last of the sunlight and held it, burning amber and rose at their peaks while their shadows stretched across the streets far below. The sun was setting, and glittering lights had just begun to bloom across the exquisitely shaped towers and houses. She had never seen so many colors in her life. From this altitude, it seemed as though she could reach out and hold the whole village in her hand. Gohdinn did not dare descend any further, not until they were far to the north and beyond any human's range of sight.

"You may find it of interest," he said to Azela, "that were it not for my command of the elements, thy companion would lie unconscious and bereft of breath at such heights."

Azela twisted to look at Catherine, who was clinging with both hands to a ridge on his back. "What about me?"

"You require no assistance. Thou art naturally suited to survive the upper reaches." He began to spiral downward, tightening the gyre with each pass. The world beneath rushed toward them at an alarming speed, faster than if they had been falling. "Take hold of your friend and prepare to leap."

Azela's head snapped up. "You're not going to land?"

"JUMP! NOW!"

Azela scrambled from the dragon's head back onto his neck. She seized Catherine, whose cry of outrage was torn away by the wind, and the two tumbled into the air as Gohdinn suddenly surged to a speed no animal could hope to match.

The world inverted twice.

Then they crashed down through bats.

And branches.

And finally into a dense patch of thorny bushes before reaching the ground.

Catherine was furious but otherwise unhurt. They had somehow landed in such a way that their fall was broken but their bones were not. She shouted curses at Gohdinn's rapidly vanishing silhouette for at least one solid minute, then laughed and said, "Well, I suppose that's to be expected from an ancient and incomprehensible being.”

“He wouldn’t be incomprehensible if he made sense, would he?" Azela noted.

The sun had already set, but the travelers were restless and eager to move after so many weeks of stillness. Both of them were nocturnal by habit: waking in the afternoon had always felt early to them. That had only deepened during their time stranded on the island.

The forest ahead was dense and dark, broken only by the occasional gleam of insects moving through the undergrowth. The distant lights of Pandoria glowed faintly through the canopy. With Catherine in the lead, they began their trek toward the village.