Pledged in Blood - Chapter Thirty Five (Patreon)

*****

Chapter Thirty Five

Belief 

*****

I awoke slowly, with visions of shining stars, and the melody of their dream-song still echoing in my waking mind. At first, I could hardly tell reality from dream, nor was I inclined to try. I yawned and stretched my forelegs, my front paws splayed. As I blinked sleep from bleary eyes, I struggled to mentally reassemble the pieces of last night’s fragmented events. I remembered bits and pieces of a conversation with Nesh, and an impossible dream. For a moment, I could not remember which was reality, and which the dream.

When my stretch ended, I pushed myself up to my haunches, glancing around the room. Soft blue light lingered from a glowing light stone placed in a corner, but my companions were gone. Our traveling supplies were gone as well, with only my own cargo pouches remaining in a pile. Most of the books and things we’d explored the night before were now more neatly stacked and organized than when we’d found them. The journal with Melakar’s farewell letter in it protruded from one of my cargo bags. Nesh must have thought I wanted to take it with me. After a moment of thought, I decided to do just that. 

I rose to my paws, wondering how long every one else had been awake. I was not usually the last to rise, and I appreciated them taking care not to wake me. They all knew I’d had a traumatic evening, though, and Nesh likely told the gyphons I’d joined him, late in the night. Memories of our conversation brought a smile to my muzzle. I’d enjoyed our chat. It was a pleasant way to put some of my pain aside. 

A stinging in my paw pad suddenly reminded me of the rest of the night’s events. I froze in place, visions of stars and sand and Melakar all swirling in my head. Images of an urd’thin pup, dancing and conducting the symphony of creation, in time with my song. A song brought to me by Melakar. I slowly lifted my paw, staring at the tiny wound I’d inflicted afterward. It was still there, a small, pink line edging my gray pads. 

I was almost surprised to find I’d really cut myself. I padded across the hall and peered into the other room. My blood, now dried, stained the stars carved upon the stones. I believed now that they were stars, even if I did not understand everything they represented. I knew not if the lines were meant to show their connections to one another, or to illustrate the shapes of constellations I did not know. Or were they worlds, built by the god-child, and tied together by those he visited?

Before I realized it, I was humming the song, again. So often, the gossamer fabric of dreams was shattered and dissolved upon waking. No matter how it was grasped at, it faded as shimmering dew under the sun. A melody sang within a dream was almost inevitably lost shortly after waking, and yet, I remembered every note of Melakar’s song.

That was what it would always be to me, now. Whether it truly came from the stars themselves, or the shamans of old, or even from the child-god of Nesh’s people, it was Melakar who first sang the song to me. I might have sworn myself to the stars and their supposed wisdom, but to me, the song would always be Melakar’s. 

The scent of roasted meat drew me towards the courtyard. Blue Jay and Sparrow were seated around a small fire built upon the flagstone. I suspected they’d built it there so that Nesh could cook his breakfast and prepare his morning tea without disturbing my slumber. One of the gryphons had hunted some manner of goat, and they were now doing their best to roast large portions of it alongside the fire.

“Good morning, Ella!” Blue Jay offered a cheery morning warble. “There’s food, if you’d like.” 

“So I see.” I settled down near the fire’s warmth and helped myself to their half-roasted kill. Compared to what Nesh cooked for himself, their attempts were rougher. The fur was all charred off, but so too was the outside of the flesh, while the inside was still raw. Considering how much I enjoyed raw meat, I certainly wasn’t bothered. “Thank you, I shall help myself.” 

Sparrow tore a bit off, thoughtfully tasting it before glancing my way. “Kraas thought to try and cook it, just for fun, but as you can tell, his attempts were-”

“I’ve never tried to cook anything before!” Blue Jay glared at her, grinding his beak.

“And it shows.” Sparrow shrugged her wings, then offered me a smile. “Feeling better today, I hope?” 

“I am, actually.” 

I wasn’t quite sure how to organize my thoughts, just yet. But as I ate, I gave them the basics of Melakar’s letter. Neither seemed especially surprised to hear that Melakar had feared traitors amongst Nesh’s people. In truth, I had to admit, as Sparrow suggested, that simply fearing them did not make them real. I kept Melakar’s confession of undying private. Given the way I’d cried myself to sleep the night before, they were probably able to guess as much, anyway. 

When I noticed them staring at the little wound on my paw, I set my teeth. Though I’d offered my blood to the stars, I hadn’t considered the repercussions. I was only honoring the promise I made to them. But now I realized scent of blood would have been unmissable to creatures with powerful senses of smell like gryphons. There’s no way they could have missed my addition to the wall carvings.

“Yes,” I said, lifting my paw glancing at the small cut. “The blood was mine.”

Sparrow gave a little chirrup. “Couldn’t well have been anyone else’s. Is that…something you want to explain, or…?”

Blue Jay swished his tail across the plaza. “We thought perhaps it was some sort of dragon mourning ritual, a blood-offering to something Melakar cared about.”

“Not exactly.” I set my paw down and licked my muzzle clean from my meal. “I…don’t really know where to begin, though. I should explain, but I’d like to talk to Nesh first, if that’s alright.” 

“Certainly.” Sparrow flicked a wing open, pointing it towards the fortress’s upper battlements. “He was trying to find his way up there, last I saw him.” She folded her wing back, then reached out to gently touch my paw with hers. “But, Ella. You don’t have to explain anything you don’t want to.”

“I appreciate that. I’ll return in a little while.” 

After bidding them farewell, I went to find Nesh. I moved enough away from the gryphons so that the downdrafts from my wings would not interfere with their fire. Then I leapt to the sky, pumping my wings. A few wingbeats was all it took to carry me above the fortress’s many walls and towers. As I circled above it, I spotted Nesh wandering along the upper ramparts. He looked up when he heard my wings, and offered me an awkward wave with the kettle he carried in one hand. In the other, he held his tea mug. 

I tucked my wings and dropped back down, alighting alongside a rooftop parapet. I had vague memories of visiting the fortress’s rooftops before, with Melakar, so I was reasonably sure it could hold my weight. Given that it had been built with dragon sized creatures in mind, I imagined even the upper stories and ceilings had been designed to support them, or defend against them, as the case may be. 

I shook myself after landing, settling my wings against my back. Icy winds swept across the fortress, whistling through the crenelated spaces in the battlements. After the warmth of the fire and the relatively sheltered nature of the courtyard, the morning chill was a rude awakening that left my wings aching. I held them tight to myself to try and warm them. It was nothing I was not used to, but the air always felt most frigid at first exposure. 

“Good morning, Ella!” Nesh turned towards me, gesturing with his tea cup at stony fortifications all around us. “Beautiful, isn’t it? I’m more sure now than ever that it was Mennanar who first built this place. Though, there’s evidence of some restoration work done by a later-era power, but I’m not quite sure who that might be.” He turned a slow circle, his gaze sweeping across everything. “Still, gorgeous. Entire tomes could be written about this place, I think. Scholars could learn all sorts of things about the building techniques Mennanar used, the idea that they may have had dragon allies, that they were building major trade routes this far out into the wilds…” He chuckled, pouring fresh tea into his mug. “Sorry, I’m rambling. I’d offer you tea but I’ve only brought the one cup.” 

I only shrugged my wings, settling onto my haunches atop the cold stone. “That’s fine. And you’re welcome to ramble all you like.” I curled my tail around my paws. “Were there ever other human empires who allied with dragons, to your knowledge? I know my clan held trade agreements with various peoples, in the ages long before even my elders were conceived. But that may well have been far before your people started recording their history.” 

“Indeed,” Nesh said, setting his kettle down. “I can’t help but imagine a lot of the history you reference is from thousands of years ago. Afraid Diandrios doesn’t exactly have a lot of detailed historical knowledge from that long ago. I rather doubt anyone does. Suppose I could look into it, in some of the great libraries back in the capital.” He blew away coils of steam wafting from his mug. “In relatively recent terms, I don’t know of anyone who had extensive alliances with dragons, no. Seems like Mennanar may have been the exception there. I do think there were some nations who used to war with dragons, that sought to capture them alive rather than slay them. To force them into servitude, that sort of thing.” 

“So your people are agreeable to enslaving demons, just not befriending them.” I rumbled amusement, flicking my tail tip. 

Nesh held up his mug and an empty hand, warding off the playful accusations. “They weren’t my people, Ella.” Distaste wrote itself across his face in scrunched lines. “And I certainly don’t condone any sort of slavery. I’m sure saying, I seem to recall reading about ancient empires that had dragons under their command, that they’d captured in battle. Probably gave them a choice to serve, or die.”

“A difficult decision.” I arched my neck, gazing down at Nesh, mantling my wings. “But I would choose death, and I would take as many of them with me as possible.” 

Nesh’s face twisted up further. “Yes, somehow I suspect you would.” 

“That said, I would not begrudge those who valued their life above their honor.” I licked my nose, my thoughts drifting. Before I’d met Nesh, I had been considering just such a decision. Would I die for my value, or flee with my life? “You know, Nesh…” I sighed, the proud curve of my neck drooping. “It is thanks to you that I did not have to make such a choice, myself. If not for our meeting, I suspect I would have thrown myself against your army, and battled your people until they ended the era of dragons in our valley.” 

“I know, Ella.” Nesh leaned his head against my chest plates, stroking my scales with his free hand. “I know. Let’s just both be glad it didn’t come to that.”

“I am, Nesh.” I lifted a foreleg to gently embrace him. “I am.” 

Eventually Nesh pulled away. He finished his tea, then went to his kettle to pour himself more. “So, anything happen after I left that you’d care to talk about?” He turned back towards me, smiling. “Mind you, if you don’t want to talk about it, I won’t pry. I just hope you didn’t cut yourself too deeply.” 

I lifted a paw, glancing at the little wound. “Hardly.” I set my paw down, shifting my weight. Suddenly, I could not find a comfortable position against the cold stone. “I am not entirely certain what happened, after you left. I think I fell asleep, and I dreamt of him.”

Nesh sipped his tea, nodding. “Of Melakar? And the dream led you to make some kind of offering of your blood?” He glared at me, eye-ridges furrowed. “I’ll admit, I was a little worried. It seemed an awful lot of blood. But then I considered it rationally, and it didn’t look like that much blood for a dragon.” Nesh waved his cup. “We all assumed it must be some kind of dragon ritual.”

“Not…exactly.” I rocked back against my tail, struggling to find the right words. “And I’m not sure it was a dream.”

Nesh’s expression softened into a smile. “Go on.” He took another sip of his tea, patient as ever, and happy to let me find my way through my thoughts. 

“I’ve dreamed of Melakar before, as you know. But I think this was different.” I lifted my head, gazing out across the island, and the half-frozen lake beyond it. Morning sunlight glowed on white snow, and glittered off cracked ice. “Maybe the dreams have always been different, and my mind was just too closed off to the idea. I think maybe Blue Jay’s people are right, and…” I hesitated, unable to force the words out. I did not fear Nesh’s judgement, but rather, the frightening prospect of admitting I’d begun to believe there was more to life, and to death, than I had ever rationally imagined. “I think it was him, Nesh. I think it was really Melakar.” 

Nesh’s eyes widened as if he’d never expected me to admit to such a thing. He took a slow breath, and another equally slow sip of tea. “What makes you think that?” 

I did not even know where to begin answering that question. I opened and closed my muzzle several times, thinking up and immediately rejecting several explanations. I doubted anything I could say would have any sense to Nesh. Finally I sighed, and shook my head. “He sang to me.” 

Nesh chuckled, blowing on his still-hot tea. “And I take it that’s something he used to do, when you two were together?” 

“No.” I shook my head again, a sharper, more decisive movement this time. “That’s not it. But…after you left, I stared at the stars. I imagined Melakar out there, singing to them, willing them to sing back, the way his letter said he heard them in his dreams. So I spoke to them, I dared them, I begged them, just to sing to me. Just to prove him right, to…to show me that…maybe he really was still out there. In that moment, I wanted so desperately to hear their voices, to know the Singers were right, to believe, to genuinely believe that Melakar’s spirit might persist. So I begged them, I challenged them, I pledged myself to the stars on my own blood, if they would but sing to me.” 

Slowly, Nesh lowered his tea cup, sucking in a low breath. All at once, he must have realized why I had bled myself upon the stone-carved stars in the chamber below us. “They didn’t. Did…they?” 

“Not at first.” I licked my muzzle, my wings trembling at my side. “I waited until I was sure it was all just another grand delusion, and I turned to go inside. And…” I lifted my paw and cupped it as if cradling another dragon’s cheek. “There as Melakar. As real in that moment as he ever was in life. Flesh and blood and warmth, and breath. And song.” I turned my eyes up to the sky, imagining all the myriad stars hidden away behind daylight’s blue veil. “He held my held in his paws, and he sang to me, in the infinite voices of the stars.” 

“Gods, Ella,” Nesh said. He rubbed his forehead, then drained his tea from a shaking cup. As he waited for me to continue, he poured himself more. 

I took a few deep inhalations to steady myself before continuing. “Dream, reality, earth, cosmos, it was all one and the same. It dissolved me away, and there was only song, and star. Melakar bid me to find my melody, and find it I did, and I sang it to the stars. And they grew and grew, brighter and brighter, their impossible song pulsing louder and louder, their music was…was everything. And then…” I hesitated. Speaking the finer details of the vision aloud seemed almost taboo. It also made it sound all the more surreal, as if it was only a dream, after all. “And then there was sand, as far as I could see.” 

Nesh went completely still. 

That, more than anything, sent a scale-clicking shiver through me. I tilted my head, gazing down at him, suddenly uncertain. Had I said something that rattled him? When he only waited in patient silence for me to go on, I pressed ahead. “Melakar was there, in the desert. With…” 

In my head, I saw him. The tiny, gray-furred urd’thin pup, all big ears, tiny horns, and happy smile. He danced across the sand, conducting the symphonies of creation itself. Worlds sprang into being in his wake, rising and falling in his footsteps, cosmic lifetimes spent in an instant. All the while, Nesh stared at me with strange intent. There was a tension in his gaze now that was not there before, and I wondered if I should try and diffuse it. 

“If I said I met your god, Nesh, would you accuse me of blasphemy?” 

“No.” Nesh shook his head. 

I forced a smile to my muzzle, hoping to earn the same from Nesh. “You might think otherwise, if I tell what I think your god looks like.” 

Instead, Nesh only stared at me, his cup trembling ever so slightly. “Tell me.” 

For a moment, a single, foolish moment, I feared I had angered him. That I had uttered some hidden blasphemy I couldn’t possibly have known about. And then I realized it was not anger in Nesh’s gaze, but instead some strange mixture of hope and fear. Whatever I’d said had struck something in him, but it was not blasphemy I had uttered. Quite the opposite, in fact. 

“Your…your god-child…” The words were suddenly stuck in my throat. I had to dredge them up, force them across my tongue. “He’s an urd’thin pup.” 

Nesh dropped his tea cup. It bounced across the stone, its wooden clatter the only thing that broke the sudden silence that smothered us. Nesh stumbled back from me, bumping up against the stony battlements. He gaped at me, took a shuddering breath, and tried to speak. “You…you couldn’t possibly know…I never…I never told you…” 

Never would I have thought he’d believe me. If anything, I’d have expected him to deny it, to tell me it was only a dream, to call it blasphemous to suggest that their god-child could be something as lowly as an urd’thin. Instead, it was as if I’d stumbled onto some forbidden truth that those outside his faith were never meant to know. Nesh put a hand over his mouth, turning away to stare out over the frozen island and the icy lake beyond it. 

I rose to all fours, and padded over to Nesh. Gentle as could be, I curled a foreleg around his middle and pulled him against my chest. Nesh sighed, a strange, whimpering sigh, collapsing against my limb. He wrapped his arms around it, returning my hug. He stroked the scutes of my foreleg, leaning his head against me. 

“Ella, do you remember,” Nesh said, his whispered voice like a lonely vessel adrift on an ocean of uncertainty. “When you first took me into your home, when I saw you crying over Melakar?” 

“Of course.” The memory was a cold claw in my heart, but I let Nesh continue without further interruption, simply holding him. I had not expected my story to cut him to the core, and the fact it had frightened me in ways I could not put to words. But I would hold Nesh as long as he needed my comfort. 

Nesh gave my limb another idle stroke, tilting his head to gaze up at me. “I told you, much later, that in that moment, I believed the gods put me there for a reason. To save you from yourself. I believed that, with all my heart, and yet never would I have believed the gods would come to you.” 

I shivered at the thought. The idea had been there, skulking about in my mind like an unwanted worry, ever since the dream. But even when I offered my blood to the stars, I had not allowed myself to think too deeply about it. Never in all my life had I truly believed in the stars that sing, or the Sky That Shelters. I’d certainly never believed in any gods. But Nesh believed. Nesh had always believed, and it seemed I’d just offered him evidence of his own faith. 

“I cannot help but wonder, Ella.” Nesh rested his head against my chest. “If the gods intended for me to help save you…what do they intend for you to accomplish?” 

I swallowed hard, my throat suddenly dry. “Please don’t put something so momentous upon me, Nesh.” 

Nesh slowly pulled away from my hold, turning around to face me. He took my forepaw between his hands, gently squeezing. “Ellamyriss, my dear friend, you’ve already put it upon yourself. You swore to your dead lover’s soul that you would build an empire, and save your people.” His grip tightened, and his voice sharpened. “You challenged the stars to sing to you, to prove to you they were real, and so they did. They brought you Melakar. And Melakar brought you the god. Ella, like it or not, you’ve bound to yourself to something bigger than either of us. And I think…” Nesh released my paw to pat my chest. “Somewhere, in that great big dragon heart, you already believe it. You’ve pledged your blood to your deities, and you’ve sang to mine.” 

I hung my head, almost wishing Nesh was wrong. But he wasn’t. That dream, that vision, whatever it was, it had shaken me. It had changed something in me, in the way I saw the world, and the things I believed in. Much as I might come to long to have my simple, cold, rational world back, it would never be quite the same again. It terrified me, and it shamed me, to think that all the old tales and myths, all the beliefs I had discounted as nonsense might somehow be true, even if only in part. 

But it also gave me hope. If the dream was real, then that meant Melakar was real. Dead and gone from this world, but somewhere out there, he still existed. That when I saw him in my dreams, when he cradled me in his paws, in my slumber, when he sang to me and the stars shone only for us…

It was real. 

Then did that mean that…everything else was real, too? Even…

“I saw it.” I lifted my head again, fixing my gaze on Nesh. “My empire to be. I saw it rising from the sands. I sang it into being, and the little god brought it to life all around me.” I looked around us, imagining structures rising up all around us. “He danced, and gestured, and…conducted the music, and every note was another part of a city. Houses, towers, buildings, roads, people. Dragons everywhere, but gryphons too, humans, urd’thin, everyone.” 

Nesh lifted trembling fingers up towards my muzzle to gently cup my chin. “Then you know what he wants you to do.” 

I pushed my muzzle into his palm, closing my eyes. “If he wanted us to succeed that badly, he should have protected Melakar, instead of letting him die.” 

Nesh squeezed my chin, his voice quiet but firm. “Don’t blaspheme, Ella.” 

I only grunted. “Or what? He won’t disturb my slumber any more? What a shame.” 

“Or he won’t let Melakar visit you anymore.” Nesh released my jaw, then shook a finger at me, a bit of mirth returning to his voice. “You’re going to have to watch what you say from now on, now that the gods are actively listening to you.” 

“Oh, please.” I tossed my head, snorting. “If even one quarter of this is true, then your gods clearly don’t give a gryphon’s balls about blasphemy. Otherwise he’d have just struck me dead and been done with it.” I laughed to myself, even if Nesh didn’t share my laughter. Finally, I sighed, and tilted my head, regarding Nesh. I spoke again with a more somber tone. “So, your people really believe your god-child is an urd’thin? In the dream, I could only assume that the pup was, in fact, the creator your people believe in, and yet, I was certain you’d accuse me of sacrilege if I dared suggest he was anything but a human child.” 

Nesh chortled, running a hand back over his messy hair. “Well, he’s not really a human, either. Or an urd’thin. Or…or anything we can comprehend. He’s a god, Ella, a being of cosmic power we can’t possibly fathom, with the ability to create life from nothing. Or, as one Scripture tells it, ‘He had no name, for he was The First.’ That said, plenty of people, perhaps even the majority of people, do believe him to appear as a human child.” 

I arched my neck, flattening my frills. “But, you do not? You reacted as if the fact I had seen him as an urd’thin pup was some great revelation, some secret I was not meant to know.” 

“Because, in a way, it is.” Nesh held his hands up as if to ward off a coming army of questions. “The specifics are complicated, and would involve a longer explanation than we have time for, I’m afraid. But the basics are that, in some branches of my religion…” He dropped his hands, then raised a single finger. “The one my mother believes in, in fact, and she’s where I got my faith from. She had a sort of…story book version of Scriptures, and…well, it summed it up like this.” He took a breath, and cleared his throat. “And so He gazed across the vastness of creation, and looked upon the urd’thin, smallest of His people, ever trod upon, ever cruelly mistreated. And so an urd’thin He became, for if they were to suffer for what they were, then He would suffer with them. And as an urd’thin He would appear to all others, for if they would not accept wisdom from one so lowly, then wisdom they did not deserve.” 

“So…it’s like a test.” I licked my muzzle, lifting my spines again. “Of your people’s empathy, of their faith, and of their kindness.” 

“Something like that.” Nesh nodded, folding his arms. “Of course, given how poorly the urd’thin people have been treated, and regarded, historically speaking, that didn’t sit well with many branches of the faith. It’s…the sort of thing wars were fought over, in the past.” He grit his teeth in distaste. “One of the major churches disavowed that entire section from the sacred texts, and in most people’s minds, the creator-child would appear as a human. The fact many of us actually believe he’d appear as an urd’thin is sort of state secret, something we wouldn’t tell outsiders, or bring up around those who believe otherwise. It’d just lead to arguments, or worse. But as soon as you mentioned it…I knew.” He sighed, clucking his tongue. “It’s hard to believe, even for me, but I knew it had to be him. Hell, as soon as you mentioned the sand, part of me knew what was coming. It was just…too many things you couldn’t have otherwise known.” 

I scratched at the stone with claw tips. “What about the sand? I saw you go quite still when I brought it up.” 

“Again, we don’t have time for a detailed explanation, but, the belief is that when the world began, it began as a great, empty desert.” Nesh swept his hand across the horizon, and I imagined him painting the frozen landscape into a sunbaked desert. “That even a good, first coming to terms with his own powers, had to practice making life to get it right. He had to find the right balance within the rules of life and death set by the mother, and the father. And so he worked until he’d created creatures who could survive the harshest of lands. After that he moved on, and set all the rest of the world’s life in motion, gave it the means to grow and spread, and even adapt. But he always had a soft spot for the desert, and when he builds other worlds, that’s always where he begins. With a desert. In every tale I’ve ever heard about someone meeting the creator-child in a dream, in a vision, or what have you? It always starts with a desert. And…there’s no way you could have known that, unless you’d met him yourself.”

“So it seems I have. And here I was, thinking you’d be horribly offended if I dared call your god an urd’thin.” 

Nesh rubbed the back of his head, laughing. “Well, it’s not exactly knowledge we spread around, let alone discuss publicly. If you hadn’t spoken of him, I’d have never told you. And to that end…” He waggled a finger at me. “If I were you, I’d be careful who you tell about that dream. And…when we reach the city, please don’t discuss what I’ve told you about our faith in public.” 

I chuckled, flexing my wings. “Who am I going to tell, Ayrah? We’ll be lucky just to find her. Even if I do, I’m sure we’ll have more important things to discuss than the fact your people secretly worship an urd’thin.” I waited until Nesh opened his mouth to retort, then cut him off. “I am going to tell the birds, though.” 

Nesh only sighed and rolled his eyes. “At least they know when to keep their beaks shut. We should probably get ready to go, but…tell me about him?”

“I saw him in a dream, Nesh.” I pushed myself up off my haunches, stretching out my hind limbs. “I didn’t exactly have time for an extensive chat.”

Nesh shot me a withering glare, then slapped my shoulder. “You know what I mean.”

“He was young.” I padded to the edge of the fortress roof, peering over the battlements. Down below us, the gryphons were busy putting out their attempted cooking fire. “I’m hardly an expect on urd’thin, but he looked little more than a pup. The sort of adorable little fluffballs I’ve occasionally seen running around their villages, or staring, wide-eyed at me from behind their parents when they occasionally came to trade with what was left of the clan.”

Nesh leaned up against the crenellated stone, working his jaw in thought. “He is supposed to a child, after all.” 

I traced a claw tip around old marks in the stone. “He seemed very…joyful. He was dancing, all the while. And not…” I rumbled amusement. “Not particularly well, either. The way a child might dance, without care for who could see him, or how silly he looked. Yet, when there was song, his movements were somehow always in time to it. Almost as if the song gave him life, instead of the other way around. And I could see…” I gestured with a paw towards the horizon. “Entire worlds in his footsteps. Histories painted by the sands he stirred, borne and replaced by another in an instant.”

“There is,” Nesh said, sounding a little hesitant. “A theory among some scholars, both religious and scientific, that we are but one world of many.” Nesh pointed towards the sun. “Some of the advances made in looking glasses and telescopes have given astronomers a better look at what’s out there, and its increasingly clear there are other celestial bodies out there. Now, that doesn’t mean they’re inhabited. The moon looks empty, after all. And some would call the idea of other worlds blasphemous. But not everyone agrees. Think about it. If you give a human child paint, and brushes, you could never limit them to a single painting. They’d paint more, and more, until they were out of paint. But…a god-child, with a limitless imagination?” Nesh sighed, gazing up at the sky. “They’d never run out of paint.”

“So…” I licked my nose, not entirely certain I wanted to follow this stray thread back to its weave. “You think I saw…actual other worlds? Not just…random visions, or…or moments from history?” 

Nesh held his hands up. “I’ve no idea what you may have seen, Ella. I’m only saying it’s possible.”

“These…these other worlds.” I swallowed hard. “Would they be…completely different? Different lifeforms, different people?” 

“Well…I’d assume so, but…” Nesh folded his arms, turning towards me. “Why? I can tell you’ve something else on your mind now.” 

“Is it possible that…” I flicked my tail, trying to find the right way to explain an idea that suddenly tickled at the edges of my consciousness, an itch I could not quite scratch. “You used the analogy of a painting. What if…instead of painting something new every time, the child kept…refining the same painting? Or painting the same thing, but with people in different places, or elements swapped around? Till he found what he liked best.” 

Nesh scowled, nudging his boot against the stones beneath us. “There’s…theories, to that extent. Never put much stock in them myself, and they’re sort of…well, let’s just say they’re not generally accepted dogma. More the sort that philosophers of both religion and science might debate about at private forums, or after a few too many drinks. But…why?” 

“His eyes,” I said, considering the god-child’s gaze. What seemed simple in the dream now seemed impossible to describe in the waking world. “The pup’s eyes. They were…they were everything. As if he did not look at me with eyes at all, but with infinity itself. As if it was…the cosmos, every star in existence, all staring at me, together. Thinking about that, I cannot help but imagine if they are other worlds, then…maybe there are other versions of those worlds, as well. Infinitely. Infinite versions, of infinite worlds. I…” I ground my teeth, flaring my spines in frustration. “It made sense in the dream, but it was also gone so quickly.”

Nesh put his hand upon my shoulder, gently stroking my scales. “Dreams are like that. Let alone dreams brought to you by the gods. Unfortunately, that’s the sort of thing we can only speculate at.” I only grunted, and Nesh’s hand stilled upon my scales. “Was…there more?”

“Perceptive as always.” I turned my head to gaze down at Nesh. “Melakar was there.” 

“Singing to you, right?” Nesh turned back to the battlements, but leaned against me. 

“Yes, but that’s not the moment I’m thinking of.” I took a deep breath and held it till my lungs ached. “When I saw the city, the…the capital of my would-be empire, I think. You were there, alongside me. But so was Melakar. Not…” I licked my muzzle, swallowing. “Not as a vision, but…alive, as a companion. I didn’t pay it much attention, at the time. We kept singing, and everything dissolved, but…thinking back on it, now that I’m awake? It was as if he’d never died, and instead, he succeeded, and we’d built our empire together.” 

“Yet, if you and I were together, wouldn’t that mean he was dead?” Nesh tilted his head back to gaze up at me. “If he was never shot down, I’d have never gone with them to find his remains.” 

I shrugged my wings. “I don’t know, Nesh. Perhaps he was shot down, but not so grievously wounded. Perhaps I still captured you, but you made you tend his wounds, instead of mine. It’s just…” My words all trailed off into a heavy sigh, my heart sinking. In the end, it didn’t matter. Melakar was still gone, and I still had to do this without him. 

“You want to believe he’s still out there, somewhere, I know.” Nesh turned to gently hug as much of me as he could. “Do you want my opinion, or just my comfort? I’m happy to provide either.”

“Share your thoughts, Nesh.” I opened a wing and draped it across his back to return his hug. 

Nesh took a slow, steadying breath. “Firstly, I think important to understand that Melakar is gone, and you will never see him again in your waking moments. If there is another world, where he still draws breath? You’ll never go there. Do not hope for what simply cannot be. But Secondly…” He tapped my scales for emphasis. “I do believe Melakar’s spirit persists, I do believe you saw the god-child, and I do believe he’s guided Melakar’s soul back to you, to help you accomplish something wonderful. Maybe other worlds do exist, maybe you did see some version of him that still lives. But that was not to give you false hope. Your Melakar is dead, and gone, able only to visit you in your dreams, now. But if that’s what you saw? It was to show you what you can accomplish.” Nesh eased out from under my wing, and gestured for me to lower my head. When I did so, he gently took my muzzle between his hands, and stared into my eyes. Iron strength filled his voice. “What you will accomplish. And you will have my help, every step of the way. If the gods will it, Ella. It must be done. It shall be done. We’ll build your empire, together.” 

“Thank you, Nesh,” I said, bumping my muzzle gently against his face. “Your support means more than I suspect you’ll ever know. For now, I shall take comfort in the thought that it’s really Melakar, in my dreams. And that someday, somehow…maybe I’ll be with him again.” 

Nesh hugged my head for long, quiet moments. When he finally pulled away, he rubbed the soft area between my nostrils, grinning. “But not until after you’ve built an empire for you people, secured their future, and preferably, lived a long, peaceful life after that.” 

“Let’s not push our luck too far, Nesh. For now, I’ll settle for the first two.” I nuzzled his hands, then gave his palms a tender lick before lifting my head. “Come on. We’re already late to return to the skies. We’d better go find the birds.” 

“Very well.” Nesh fetched his mug, and his kettle, then returned to my side. “Care to give me a lift?” 

“Certainly.” I eased onto my haunches, and gently scooped him up in my front legs. 

“Before we leave,” Nesh said, settling into my grasp. “You should tell the gryphons about your dream. At least…the basics of it. They might not believe it as I do, but it won’t hurt for them to know why you bled all over the wall.” 

“I suppose you’re right.” I curled my neck to smirk at him. “I’d also better tell them your people secretly worship an urd’thin child.” 

“Oh, I’m sure they’ve heard worse about us, living in our capital.” Nesh clutched his now mostly cool kettle under an arm, hooking the other around my foreleg, cup still in his fingers. “Ready when you are.” 

I hopped over the battlements, flaring out my wings. I did not pump them, having no real need to ascend. Instead I just kept them stretched to their full extent, catching as much air as I could. I banked slightly, gliding around in a very wide circle. As I approached the courtyard, I extended my hind legs. I touched down on my hind paws, hopped a few times, and then deposited Nesh onto the plaza before dropping onto all fours. 

As the two of us walked back towards the gryphons, something else occurred to me. If Melakar’ spirit really was visiting me in my dreams, then I was doing to have to do something terrible. “Nesh,” I said, glancing down at him. “I’m going to have to do something painful.” 

“What’s that?” 

I snorted, tossing my head. “I’m going to have to tell Blue Jay he was right.”