Welcome to Gaia! ::

As though it had been waiting for someone to take notice of it, the moment Shyrion's gaze met the pool's dark depths, it caught her mind, throwing into it not just sounds and images but thoughts, emotions and pure facts as well.Such a welter of information there was, that knowledge condensed in Shyrion's mind though her consciousness had caught no more than a glimpse of all but the most vivid images.

She had once been known by another name, Kiehka ((kee-yeah-kah, first two sounds blended to one syllable)), though few had used it. Her mother had called her "sweetling" and "baby girl" and "child", generally as she was gently stroking Kiehka's hair or rocking her to sleep. The others in the village where she had grown up generally knew her as "Anna's daughter" or, by the more malicious, "that witch's demon get".

Her mother was indeed a witch, but of extremely rudimentary talent and skills. Though there had been powerful sorceresses in her family, she had inherited no more than a trickle of their power, thus why she was this village's hedgewitch. She had cared for the people, doing her best and coming up with useful, if simple charms such as that which promoted healing or sleep or discouraged fire. For all her good intentions though, the villagers had suffered her presence only because her talent was so minimal, and because she did her best to appear as "normal" as all the other villagers.

Even when Kiehka had been a mere babe, not yet able to crawl, shadows had acted oddly around her. No matter how steady the light, they would occasionally dance and caper madly, making the baby child she had been gurgle and clap her pudgy hands with glee. This had been impossible to hide from the neighbours, but as the shadows did nothing more than behave as though there was a wildly crackling fire where only embers might be, it was tolerated as something the child would no doubt grow out of in time.

She did not grow out of it, in fact, her power seemed only to increase as she grew older. Luckily, her degree of control over it increased apace and there were no disastrous accidents. Still, the villagers were unhappy to say the least, especially when she tried entertaining her peers with shadow shows. Even though she was only four at the time, phrases like "unholy influence" and "corrupting our young" got bandied about.

Anna had spoken sternly to those reactionaries in defense of her daughter, but by this point, based on all the angry yelling, Kiehka was already figuring out that it wasn't the best idea to play with shadows where others could see her, though she still had no idea precisely why that was such a bad thing.

Over the course of her childhood, she developed her talents to an amazing degree. She did not know this of course, it was simply that sometimes her human friends were too busy to play with her, and when such instances occured, she trooped off to the forest to play with herself where no one could see her using her own special brand of toys.

She had had a fairly happy childhood really. Her friends had been too young to really listen to their elders' superstitious murmurings and the elders themselves rarely had anything to do with the children. She had never known her father and so did not feel his lack, and her mother had always made time for her, showing her love in innumerable ways every day.

But all that changed when she was eight. By this time, she had discovered how to make solid creatures out of shadows, and how to see through her creations' eyes and hear through their ears. So it was that she was the first to see the raiders.

There were a hundred or more of them all told, all human led by a single summoner. Such a force was small by the standards of armies... but it was the largest armed force that her home had ever seen. Reinforcements to defend the town would arrive in a week or two at most... but it was unlikely the villagers themselves could last even a single day. Gaping holes riddled their walls and their moat had dried up ages ago. After all, their town was deep in human territory, centaurian raiders should have been repulsed by other human settlements long before they got within so much as a mile of the place. Thus, the constant upkeep of their defenses had not seemed all that important... until now.

With the entire village in a state of near panic, she wanted to help. She asked the village elders how she could do so, but they brushed her off, some brusquely, some mouthing meaningless assurances that everything would be fine. Thus it was that when she heard some people bemoaning the state of the walls and how they wished they had better defenses, she leapt at the idea.

Since it was dusk, she had plenty of shadows to work with, and she snatched all of them up to spin into a heavy cloak of darkness that she draped all along the town's walls, shaping itself to be how the walls should have been, whole and complete. The sudden absence of shadows within the town boundaries lit the place up like a beacon and the reactions of its people were... mixed to say the least.

On the other hand, the reaction to the yards and yards of shiny, depthless black that coated their walls was more or less universal. They thought it was creepy. Shadows or darkness were all right when they lurked about the corners and fled at the presence of light. But this... this blank, inscrutable wall.... was something else entirely.

But they had little chance to object to it. Just as the last shred of shadow had finished settling, the raiders arrived in fury of hoofbeats and ululating war cries.

At first, they thought to have an easy vistory. They were almost an army after all, well-equipped and experienced in killing, and their leader was summoner. What was a mere hedgewitch and a paltry handful of backwater country hicks compared to that?

But hours passed, and they made no progress against the dark wall. It seemed to be as hard as diamond and utterly impervious to sword or spear or even siege engine. Nothing physical so much as scratched it. Unfortunately, the raiders had resources beyond the physical. Their summoner entered the fray himself at about midnight.

She "saw" him only from the perspective of the wall, her human shell being slumped against it with her normal eyes closed. After a cautious probe, the results of which seemed to baffle him, he struck.... only to find his attack "swallowed" by her defense. His power was not so different to hers after all. Whatever power he threw at her now, she could absorb and use to strengthen her creation.

He quickly reached the same conclusion though... and that was when the true horrors started. Winged monsters and demons appeared at his call and flew over her barrier. Frantic, she thinned her wall to get it to extend upwards into a dome, at the same time gathering what shadows had grown back to spin pets to defend her neighbours.

Dragons, griffins, hippogriffs. Winged unicorns and dark, faceless angels with shadowy swords, all rose up to fight those that had entered before she'd managed to raise the barrier. Her attention was split between multiple perspectives, multiple battles all tinted in shades of black.

Eventually, all the creatures that had managed to get in were slain... but more of them continued to howl for blood outside her fragile dome. They swarmed over every inch of it, some battering and bashing while others made gruesome faces and high-pitched noises that sounded very much like laughter. Her barrier was thin enough to be translucent now, so the villagers could both see and hear them quite clearly. It was a nightmareish time, all the worse for the fact that the monsters never let up, night or day, their howls and gibbers of greed a constant cacophany. Even worse, they broke through occasionally, and though her pets always managed to intercept them before they could actually kill anyone... it was a tense period.

By the time the reinforcements arrived and drove off the raiders, a full nine days later, the villagers were at their breaking point and she herself was wan and pale, almost skeletal in fact. During the entire nine days, it had been difficult indeed to get her to pay even the slightest amount of attention to her flesh and blood body, let alone carry out mundane tasks like eating or moving in any way. She could well have starved herself to death if Anna had not been with her every moment, persistently coaxing food and water down her throat or sometimes just holding her, lending her support. She did not sleep during that time, though her consciousness did drift between battles, nonsensical thoughts flitting about and coming up with the oddest fantasies, all of which were illustrated in the many shades, colours and textures of black.

For many weeks after that, she remained unconscious. And the first time she opened her eyes, she almost screamed from how bright everything was, though it was night and only a the dimmest embers burned in the hearth. For months afterwards, she continued to be weak as a kitten and could barely totter to the privy by herself.

During this time, Anna's relationship with the townsfolk had steadily been growing worse and worse. Having seen what Kiehka could actually do, and witnessed the ferocity of her animals in fighting the summoner's monsters, they were scared. Magic was clearly even more evil than they'd always imagined, and so, anyone associated with magic was also suspect. Most especially including a certain eight-year old child and her mother.

In the future, she would remember it as the Bright Night. They came and broke into the cabin, six of them, all people she had known all her life. Mother had told her to hide and she had done so, drawing on the tattered remains of her talent to cloak herself in shadows so none could see her. She'd tucked herself in a corner, hugging her knees close to her as she watched the unfolding events.

The men demanded her mother tell them where she was. Anna refused and was knocked to the ground. After that, only fragments made their way to Shyrion's mind, bright, jagged images threaded with cruel laughter, as though it was some sort of game.

The last image she had of her mother was Anna's naked form, broken and bleeding, then screaming as they burned the cabin to the ground. She herself had been safe, wrapped in a globe of cool shadows that protected her from the flames... but it did not protect her mother. She had not been strong enough to save her mother.

Morning found her still encased in her globe though the last ember had burned itself out hours ago. Arms wrapped around her knees, she was as still as a statue, gaze blank and unseeing. When they saw she was alive, the villagers were thrown into a frenzy of fury, descending upon her to curse and spit at the globe, trying to hit her but to no avail. The globe merely rolled as they pushed it, and she remained suspended in its midst, her hollow gaze not even registering their mocking jeers and curses.

So intent were they on 'ridding themselves of the abomination' they completely forgot to watch their back. The summoner had gathered what remained of his raiders and returned to seek vengeance against the village that had thwarted him.

She took no more notice of their deaths than she had when they had lived, her mind continuing to echo with her mother's dying scream as images of what they had done flickered irregularly in her thoughts, mixing and melding with the painfully bright chaos between her ears.

The next thing she knew, she had been dropped in the Void. The summoner had disgustedly given up trying to crack her globe and so thrown her, globe and all, where he was certain she could never bother him again.

The flood of information into Shyrion's head ended there, and the pool released her with shocking abruptness.

Link is almost happy to catch the cenetaur's attention, even though it was a bit of a rude way to do it; though it would tell the creature she meant buisness. Her keen eyes caught the conversing from her distance and with a quick pump of her wings, a short glide over the confusion, and an eased landing she was right beside Leitha. The dragon kept her hands up as a sign that she had no harmful intent. By the cenetaur's expression and movements she wasn't too happy.

This next part was going to be difficult. Link had no one to translate for her. Hopefully the cenetaur could guess or catch her meaning.

"Our buisness," she signed slowly, "Is only partly with the humans here, but our affairs are mostly our own. Our objective was chaged shortly after we came here as we have two of our group missing."

((Mmm... that was good. 3nodding ))

Tanya had led the dragons on a merry romp through innumerable pool worlds. There was one where one's anatonomy was constantly re-arraging itself so one's ear might migrate to one's foot and one's torso could end up being balanced above one's head... there was the world made entirely out of food in the strangest combinations like lakes of jam and onion soup, chocolate trees with pizza leaves and clusters of jelly bean fruit.... then there had been the place where one smelled music, heard colour and saw odour... these and many more were the oddities in Tanya's head.

Though all were fairly benevolent, if bizzare, there was one world that was just a tad... disturbing. It had the joyfully wild atmosphere of a carnival and circus combined, and its rides made Wyvern and Synrai's mock-duel seem like a gentle walk on an arthritic old pony. The disturbing part of it was revealed only after the rides when Tanya urged to dragons to watch "one of my favouritest shows ever!"

They seated themselves in a large pavillion and a whole host of other humans filed in, laughing and joking in anticipation of a good show. They took their seats and just as the last of them settled, in came the ringmaster himself and several assistants.

One of them, a female, let herself be strapped onto a table, her air easy and relaxed. Everyone was smiling.

Then, without warning, the ringmaster produced a chainsaw and started to mutilate his assistant. His other assistants also produced various weapons and they all started to join in. Everyone was laughing as though it was some great game, the woman assistant as well, screaming with laughter as she bled bright blizzards of confetti. The crowd roared with approval, cheering on the ringmaster and Tanya was clapping her hands as well, her eyes bright with laughter. "Good show! That was the funnest game ever!"

And then they were back outside in the tree of darkness and Tanya paused long enough to realise Shyrion wasn't with them. "Shee Shee?" She bounded off into the branches, concentrating on finding her friend, and soon enough, she burst straight into a clearing. "There you are, Shee Shee! I've been looking everywhere for you!"

She peered about curiously, then spotted the pool. "Hey, I haven't seen that one before!" She bounced over to take a closer look, then frowned in disappointment, though on the pool's surface, the images of Tanya's past flashed more vividly than ever. "Darn. This pool's a dud. Everything's all blurry."

She thought a moment, then jumped into the pool, thinking she'd probably be able to see its contents better from within. Instead, she found herself thumping on an invisible surface a good foot away from the pool. She stomped at it and tried to reach her hand through it, all to no avail, even as its images strobed and flashed in obvious urgency, trying to get Tanya to take notice of it.

Tanya hopped off the invisible surface with a shrug, then grinned at Shyrion. "Guess that pool really is a dud. Come on, there are all sorts of other neat places to show you!"

Xan looked first to the brunette with the staff, who had spoken first, in her odd accent. The centaur continued to paw the ground nervously. Her eyes stared into Xan’s turquoise orbs, and the centaur looked back defiantly—did not know that the dragon was blind.

I am here because I came here. I have no business with humans thus far in my travels. And my business I do with them would not include the blood of their kind. Tell your kind to leave in peace. There is never a place that blood must be the price. She watched attentively as Link began to wave her hands and arms in different positions, and it took her a moment to realize that this dragon was using the Silent Language. It was a useful tool amongst the raiders, when utter quiet was necessary, and so Xan understood it and could even use it herself.

Our business is partly with the humans here, but our affairs are mostly our own. Our objective was changed after we came here as we have two of our group missing.

“We will leave,” she replied finally, her heart racing, first to Leitha. “Once our business here is completed. And not before. My tribe hungers; the old trade lines between ourselves and men have broken many years ago. It was said amongst our people that one of your kind helped to bring them into being in the first place—helped to stop the eternal war between us…

“And you,” she addressed Link, “say that your business is partly with these humans. This one of your kind had a name—Silverwing. Is he with you? Or has he fallen?” She looked around briefly for the other dragon she had seen, sincerely hoping that he was not the dragon spoken of in the elders’ tales. Silverwing was strong—and it was said that when he was in a village, the establishment would magically be impervious to any siege the centauri could muster. “And what are these shadow-beings that guard the village gates?”

This question she had wanted to ask the most, for she had never seen such creatures before. In higher numbers, and under command, she guessed that they could be quite formidable…

Just as Tanya was about to lead yet another merry romp through her mind, she happened to glance back at the pool once more and gasped. She could see the images clearly this time, but then again, they were of more recent events. "Tanyeera! Shee Shee, we forgot about the party! Tan-tan's probably there right now waiting for us." She rushed up to Shyrion and started tugging frantically at her hand, "Come on, we gotta go!"

((Just a teeny tiny tip, in case you can't think of anything else. When all else fails, sit Tanya on your lap and start stroking/combing her hair. Her mother used to do that, as Shyrion should know from the info dump into her brain, and now it has an almost soporific effect on the kid. What can I say? Her mind got wired a bit weird.))

So Silverwing has traveled with them... but why has he returned now, after all these years? Could it be something to do with this summoner? Xan thought on this matter before she replied to Link, wondering what such dark beings could want from these villagers. As far as she knew, those that dabbled in dark magic seemed to transcend the problems of their times after a while... often disappearing without a trace, as ephemeral beings. She had heard of centauri summoners attacking villages, and those they attacked almost always fell. But more often than not, the summoner would mysteriously vanish, or be expelled from his home. Sure they were helpful to have around in the beginning...

At any rate, this summoner was just another obstacle to overcome to Xan. But what quarrel had he with these dragons, who only seemed to wish to help these villagers? Oh, it was all very confusing; and at any rate, it was really none of her business. She was here for the tribe, and until these problems came her way, she wouldn't worry about them.

But Silverwing, on the other hand.... it seemed he wasn't here right now... but had been here, might return. They had better hurry...

But surely he wouldn't harm them, if they were only here for supplies?

Silverwing had been a kind warrior, as she remembered from the old tales...

Xan remembered the hot, grainy feel of the sand beneath her body, and how uncomfortable it was to be out in the sun like this for long periods of time. But the tribe was once again on the move, in search of more water - perhaps an oasis on which to live for the next few weeks. It couldn't be helped. She was young then, and as yet unused to these sorts of high temperatures. But still, the elder's story kept her transfixed, so that the heat of the sun could be easily ignored. The wrinkled sage before them sat placidly, his cracked voice rising and falling with the tale he wove. It was a story of war, so there were many exciting parts included, and the young ones - Xan included - gasped as the old centaur described his experience in detail.

"...and then we came upon the city - the largest of them all built near a great river. We were several hundred in number at that time, all told.

"The leaders cried out, and we called as well before rushing the walls. What mages we had joined together to break it down - it was a great stone wall, but all at once there was a flash of light and a deafening roar as the stones fell. And after that, we leaped over into the fray, all spears and swords, scimitars and axes. It would be a grand battle, we thought! How surprised they would be to see us so full in number! Our arrows flew overhead, thick as black rain, and we watched them fly with glee... but as we watched, we saw beside us the black river begin to boil as if under a great fire. And lo! The water leaped from it as if alive, and caught our darts in its grasp! It fell like silver rain in front of our army, and froze there. We had no choice but to halt, and those that were able to get around the crystal wall fell back, unsure, because so many of us had not yet entered the city.

"How dismayed we were! And still we watched, but it seemed our eyes did not follow fast enough, for a figure was already within our ranks, and he moved like a spirit on the wind. Those around him fought back, in fear, for it seemed a black demon was in our midst; though his swords shone brightly silver, even in the dark night, and those they hit were injured, or disarmed before they could even think to retaliate...

"And as the battle grew more intense, it seemed more and more an equal match, for none gave any ground, nor took it.

"But I saw at the edge of the battle, my captain - a great warrior in his own right - and the demon, and the centaur fought in a frenzy, trying to slice his attacker into ribbons with his spear, but Silverwing always danced just out of reach of the whirling shaft, or blocked it with a quick slash of his sword. Each time the spear lashed out and hit nothing, the warrior grew more angry.

"'Why do you flee from me, coward?' I heard him call; and it is a grievous insult to call a warrior a coward, but Silverwing did not answer back.

"And finally I saw the centaur warrior leap forth, but the demon was faster. There was movement - a flash of steel - and the warrior was on his back looking up along Silverwing's blade, defenseless as it grazed his throat. He lay still, I saw, and closed his eyes, and while the demon stared coldly at him he did not move.

"I let out a cry of dismay, preparing for the worst, that Silverwing would kill him where he lay, but as I drew near, I saw him withdraw and dash off again. It was strange to me at first." And at this, the elder seemed lost in thought, and it was a few minutes before he continued.

"But it was said of Silverwing that while he had great skill with the blade, he never slew a foe, and those he met in battle there lived on to fight another day - if they were not killed by others that night."

Could it be that these dragons had come to stop the feud between them? A warm feeling came of its own accord into the young centaur. Xan allowed herself to hope... no more would they have to raid villages to survive...

"This war between the two of us... you have come to put a stop to it?" The question was asked tentatively, for Xan was unsure...

Link looked to Leitha as she spoke to see what she was saying. The reason why her and her comrades had come was a bit more complicated than the girl's simple answer. Link could manage to sum it up in a short time.

"Yes, we have come to create peace on this world, and any other world in which races feud for that matter." Link signed, "This corresponds with our need to face what beings that wish unrest on the worlds. One of these was the summoner we have battled. But I know our troubles go past that of battles between summoners and those who war . . . The one you know as Silverwing has many debts to be paid to his enemies in his fight for peace. I am not sure what many of these are or what conflicts he faces, I just know we, his comrades, face what he does as we stand with him."