Arshi

Arshi was born with a beat pulsing in her blood, a rhythm in her bones. She followed the beat even before she knew what it was, stepping in time, turning, ducking, weaving to a cadence that no one else seemed to feel. The other hatchlings giggled at her. "Look at Arshi. She can never just walk in a straight line."

Arshi smiled good-naturedly at their laughter, but continued to step in time to the rhythm she heard in the wind across the ruined plains, the wash of the sea, the babble of the two clans she was raised in.


A thread of sound catches her ear as she makes her way through the tent city, and it is the beat of her blood made solid, the rhythm in her bones given tangible form. Her steps alter to match it, her head turns to follow. She follows it between the tents as the sound weaves in and out of hearing, sidestepping the dragons that rush past her, winding around and through the busy crowds.

It is a lonely, mournful sound, trilling up and down, coming back around on itself in a sorrowing surge of notes. It draws her on, past the outskirts of her clan, across the broken field, to where a grey-striped wildclaw sits on a heap of debris, staring off into nothing, strumming the harp between his claws. Arshi's feet follow the music, weaving, twisting, slinking to the slow, grief-filled song.

The wildclaw's crest flares, his head tilts toward her, and the music changes, leaving behind the gentle lament for the fallen, picking up into a more sprightly air, a song for hope and rebuilding for the sister clans. Arshi's feet follow that too, lifting her heels, flaring her wings, capering to the song with her eyes shut, lost in the music.

"Ah, a dancer," the wildclaw says as he listens to the scrape of her feet, the flap of her wings. "Where have you come from, little one?"

His harp goes silent and Arshi stills, staring up at him, waiting for the music to begin again. "Not much of a talker, eh?" he says. "Never mind. My name's Emil. Come here, and let's see who you belong to."

Arshi goes to him and he lifts her in his foreclaws, makes his way carefully toward the sound of the bustling clan. At last, after being directed back and forth, they are led good-naturedly to where her parents are working.

Emil reaches to hand her back to her father, but the hatchling resists, clutching at his shoulders. "I want to go with him, Fa," she tells her father, looking at him with clear, steady eyes. "With the music."

Her father sits back, contemplates. "You are young yet to leave the clan," he says. "But others have gone younger, and if it is what you truly want..." He trails off, looks at the wildclaw holding her. "Would she be welcome among your number, sir? Will you care for her?"

Emil smiles. "My clan leader welcomes all who come to her. I'm sure she can find a place with us. And I will care for her as if she was my own." He laughs. "Windsinger knows I've done it often enough with other strays. She will be well loved."

"Then I am content," her father says solemnly. So Arshi embraces him and her mother, waves goodbye to her siblings and follows Emil, follows the music, reaching up wonderingly every so often to touch the harp he carries at his side.

Arshi creeps to the edge of the cliff above the Tangled Wood in the darkness, weaving around sleeping dragons. It has been several days since the youngest son of the clan leader flew from this cliff, off to make his own way in the world, but the clan has remained. Several of the couples are nesting, and ever since Citrine, and then Carmen lost their young ones, the mood has been tense. No one wants to move the eggs, as they have done now and then in the past, for fear of more damage. Tempers are high, outlooks bleak, and she knows it is partly the fault of the Wood. The dragons of this clan are mainly creatures of the open air, the vast plain, the wide blue sky. The dim closeness of the wood wears on everyone.

Arshi too. She misses the sun. That's why she has woken in the darkness before the dawn, before any of the others. She wants to dance the sunrise. She has tried a few times since they set up camp here, but there have always been others on the cliff, spreading their wings in the sunshine, turning their faces toward the light. And while Arshi doesn't mind dancing in front of other dragons, the sun dances have always felt private, a conversation reserved to herself and the sun. Today, it seems she has been lucky. There is no one about, and all is dark and still.

She steps to the edge and waits, staring toward the east, where a lightening along the horizon hints at the approaching dawn. As the sun breaks over the edge of the wood, Arshi slowly spreads her wings and begins the first step, but pauses, cocking her head to listen.

There is something there on the edge of hearing, a tinkle of far-off notes, and she strains her ears, trying to make out the melody. It is different from the music she has occasionally heard from the deep reaches of the Tangled Wood, which is deep and raucous, heavy with drumbeats. Not this high skirl of pipes and ringing of chimes, still wild, but lighter, freer, and becoming louder with each moment. She cannot quite catch hold of the melody. Each time she thinks she has it in her grasp, each time she thinks she knows where it's headed, it changes direction, spiraling off into beautiful trills and crescendos she hadn't anticipated.

And suddenly the music is there all around her, washing over her, and with it comes a wave of joy so abrupt and unexpected that she laughs aloud. Her feet can't help but move along with the tune, and she lifts them high, prancing gleefully. She dances the joy, leaping high, twisting as she comes down, twirling on one hind foot and turning somersaults in the air.

The music changes then, the instruments still the same but the tune somehow harder, hotter, the melody turning and clashing against itself in discordant surges, two separate refrains racing each other, battling to drown out the other.

A wave of anger crashes over her, crowding out the joy, and she dances that too. Her feet pound the earth, her wings beat the air and she snaps her jaws ferociously at an unseen enemy. Arshi bristles and bridles, lashing her tail in furious arcs, but as she digs her claws into the earth, ready to lunge, the music turns again. It slows and softens, the tune soaring high before pouring downward again, sliding into the minor keys. It wanders through the lower registers, hitching upward in sobbing phrases before sinking back down with a sigh.

The anger fades, sorrow wells up to take its place, and Arshi finds herself weeping as she dances. All the sadness of the world seems to pour into her, every wretched thing that has ever happened weighs her down, and her steps slow. She bends low, the deep keel of her chest pressing against the earth, then rises. Her neck arches, her head bows and she weaves from side to side, a sob rising in her throat. She is still dancing, but slowly, her body stooped, her wings drooping.

The music is dwindling now, and with it the sorrow. As it goes, the music turns upward slightly, playing a variation of the joyful refrain it began with. The tune is a little slower, a little more solemn; tempered by the sorrow that has gone before. The last notes fade, leaving behind only a pale echo of mingled grief and joy and a deep longing. Arshi slumps to the ground as the music dies away, her chest heaving, her muscles limp.

She has no idea how long she has danced. It could have been moments, it could have been days. Her heart pounds, her feet ache, and she feels as limp and wrung out as a wet rag, but all she can think of is how she wanted to go on dancing to that music forever. She knows she has never danced so well as she did today, she could feel it. Every step had been perfectly placed, every arch and turn exactly right. She doesn't know if she can ever dance that way again. The song is already fading from her mind, and with it the perfect assurance she had felt. And though she tries desperately to hold onto it, the tune disappears as quickly as it came.

A noise to her left startles her, and Arshi jerks her head around to see Caoimhe, laying on a rock. She gazes outward, in the direction the music has seemed to disappear, tear tracks visible in the fur on her face. She blinks and rubs her eyes with the back of a paw, then turns to Arshi, giving a wavery smile. Arshi gazes solemnly back for a moment, then looks east as well. And for a moment she thinks she sees a twisting, pale green figure, before it vanishes into the rising sun.

She blinks. She had forgotten all about the sun dance she meant to do, and it seems incredible to her that through all that, the sun went on rising. It should have stopped in its tracks and waited respectfully until the music was done. Not moved callously on along its course while the world turned upside down beneath it.

"What - what was it?" Arshi asks Caoimhe, her voice trembling with exhaustion and too much emotion.

"Don't you know?" Caoimhe says gently, looking over at her.

And Arshi does. She does know, and she breathes his name in a wondering tone. Caoimhe nods, turning her gaze back toward the east.

Arshi watches her for a long moment, then the question bursts out of her. "Why?"

Caoimhe appears to understand her question, and considers it, gazing up into the air. "It was a message, I think," she says at last. "Though what it was, and for whom-" she casts an eye toward Arshi "-I'm not sure."

"Have. . . have you seen him before?"

"Once," Caoimhe says, her expression wistful. "A long time ago."

They are silent together for a long time, watching the morning light play over the mist. And though Arshi is not usually uncomfortable with silence, she feels the need to say something, to acknowledge the wonder that they witnessed together.

"It. . . it was beautiful, wasn't it?" she says, knowing this comes nowhere near to describing it.

"It was," Caoimhe agrees, then slips off her rock, walking over to where Arshi lies. "And so were you. You have a gift." She lips Arshi's crest, smoothing the frazzled feathers back into place, and the act seems strangely like a blessing. Before Arshi can decide what to say to this, Caoimhe is gone, slipping back between the trees toward her clan.

Arshi stays, watching the sun creep slowly upward, and makes a vow. Someday. Someday she will go to him. But not yet. Not until she has the skill to dance as well as she did today, not until she can stand before him unafraid of her imperfection, not until she has something of her own to give him. She knows today has been a gift, something outside of herself, and not her own talent, whatever Caoimhe had said.

Before this, dancing was like breathing; something she did involuntarily and without conscious thought. But now she would think. She would study and practice and learn from other dancers. And when she stood before him again, she would have something to offer.