Phaedra

Lair of Bxy26
Brief:
Birthed in the Wind realm, as part of an experimental breeding project. She narrowly missed exaltation by a special interference of the Windsinger, who called her to be his representative to other flights. She is totally devoted to the Windsinger, but finds the friends and relationships she is building in Aoide’s clan to be exciting, and hopes she is not called away anytime soon. She was chosen to represent her birth flight in a mock Hunger Games tribute, where she hopes to gain recognition for the Windsinger.

Story: Unwanted Birth
The unhatched baby Mirror wriggled in her egg. It was time. She pushed and shoved, using her sharp claws and teeth to scratch at the inner surface of the shell. It took several hours before a small hole appeared in the shell. Exhausted, she rested a moment and felt the cool air rush over her, that all-important first breath that held the gift of the Windsinger. She almost thought she could hear his song.

A small patch of light glinted through the hole. By twisting around a little, she could see out--not that there was much to see. Some rustling grass, some bamboo stalks...and a long sinuous something.

That must be my mother’s tail, she thought. A fresh burst of energy filled her with desire to get out! She scrabbled at the hole again, pushing with all her might...CRAACKKK!

Free of the shell, she lay panting and blinking. The world was big and bright, and very...green was the word. She shut her photoreceptor eyes, but left the heat sensitive pair open. The long thing she had assumed was her mother’s tail moved, curling into a confusing tangle of limbs. Six wings unfurled, and four legs, and she opened her other eyes to see if light sight could make more sense of the vision than heat sight.

Only barely. The female dragon was continually in motion, only occasionally stopping to shift direction. Her patterns made it very difficult to tell where one coil ended and another began. The baby began to feel a little dizzy.

“Oh, there you are,” drawled the mother. “You certainly took your time, didn’t you?”

The hatchling blinked all four eyes in confusion. She wasn’t sure what she had expected, but it wasn’t that.

The Spiral ignored her. “We’ve got a viable hatch,” she called across the hatching grounds. Instantly a horde of other dragons, mostly Mirrors, but a few Spirals and Guardians, descended on the nestling. The last to arrive was a snappily dressed Skydancer Male, carrying a book and a pot of ink. He whipped out a feather and dipped it in the ink pot.

“Let’s see,” he began in a very controlled voice. “This will be breeding experiment #17. Greenbean, you’re the mother?”

“Yes,” the Spiral female replied, in a bored tone. “She’s number 8 for me. And I’m pretty sure that Mirror is the father.” She pointed, her entire body heading straight for the Mirror male she was indicating for about two seconds before relapsing into her disorganized curls.

The little nestling cowered, overwhelmed. She was also beginning to be a bit hungry. Almost all the other dragons were of similar coloring, and she wasn’t sure which of the four Mirrors present were male, let alone which was her father.

“Well, it wasn’t me,” one of the Mirrors piped up in a surly tone. “I wasn’t paired with a Spiral.”

The Skydancer looked annoyed. “You are both Nameless, aren’t you? Isn’t that just dandy.” He made an annoyed scratch with his quill.

The nestling peeped. The adults ignored her. The Skydancer continued his interrogations of the others, all greenish with similar patterns. The nestling glanced back over her shoulder, and realized--she should have figured it out sooner--that she, too, was of similar coloring.

Suddenly she was being poked and prodded by a sharp, birdlike claw. She squeaked in pain as the Skydancer turned her over.

“Eldritch pinstripe, check. Eldritch trail, check. Mirror, check. The problem is--” he glared at the mother, as though it were all her fault “--the tertiary gene is ghost. We’re looking for pinstripe, trail, runes, remember?”

The Spiral female gave an unconcerned flirt with her tail. “Did my best,” she said. “Now do we get payment yet, or not? I’ve got a really nice big kite I’ve been looking at, and I plan to have a good deal of fun with it before I’m ready to go through all that again.” She waved at the nestling, who cowered down again and tried not to make a sound.

The Skydancer let out an exasperated hiss. “I suppose so,” he grumbled. “I guess we could mate her off to someone else, maybe one of the Guardians?”

The two Guardian dragons began backing away. “We’ve made our three nests already. Three was the agreement. We’ve got business elsewhere.”

“Charges to find,” the other agreed.

“Fine!” the Skydancer threw down his quill in disgust. “Fine! Just go ahead and ruin the experiment, why don’t you?”

“Our pleasure,” one of the Mirror females hissed. “We quit.”

The Skydancer stood helpless for a moment, seething with rage. The annoyed dragons moved into a line, and bared their teeth menacingly. At last the Skydancer, sputtering incoherently, fluttered his wings and darted away. The others watched him go, and one by one, without even a word to each other, headed off in different directions--slowly at first, then faster as they realized they were finally free.

The Spiral Greenbean and the Mirror male who had been her most recent mate were the last to leave. “What should we do with this?” the male asked, nudging the hatchling with the back of his claw.

The Spiral shrugged expressively, ripples traveling all along her body. “I haven’t the faintest idea. Looking after the hatches was not ever my responsibility. Leave it to the Windsinger.” She rippled her wings, lifted into the air, and was soon lost in the distance.

The Mirror looked down at his hatchling. “Mirrors really ought to stick together, you know. It’s what we do. But I just can’t--I can’t bear to ever look at another dragon with a similar color pattern to my own. Forgive me.” He stepped away, and began to sing--it was the Song of the Windsinger, the ritual for exaltation.

The nestling bowed her head under the weight of the song. Her first moments of life had been so confusing, so humiliating, so isolating--she felt that it would be a release to go to be with the Windsinger. The brief moment of joy in her life had been when the breath of the Windsinger echoed through her shell.

Suddenly, there was a rush of powerful wind, and a glass-green Fae dragon fluttered between the Mirror and his hatchling. “Stop!” her light voice trilled.

The Mirror male stopped in confusion. “But…"

“It’s all right,” the Fae chirped. “I am from the Windsinger. He has other plans for this youngling.” Her sweet monotone could not sound reassuring, but the elemental symbol of the Windsinger glowed on her brow.

The adult dragon shuffled, unsure. “Well, goodbye then, I guess. I hope the Windsinger takes care of you, but I’d rather not see you again, if it’s all the same to you.” He glanced up as the Fae, who made a little shooing motion. He raised his wings and a moment later was gone.

The Fae dropped down into the nest with the nestling, only slightly bigger than the baby Mirror. “It’s all right,” she said again. “You can trust me. I know, it’s hard coming from an experimental breeding group. But the Windsinger cares for those as well. You know the Windsinger?”

Still unable to speak, the hatchling nodded.

“He knows you want to serve him,” the Fae continued. “And you will. He wants you to be his ambassador, to travel to other clans and represent him well. And the first clan he’s selected for you happens to be in the Water realm, a clan with many other representatives and lots of Mirrors for you to grow up and play with. Does that sound like a job you might want?”

The Mirror hatchling nodded happily, and stood up on wobbly legs.

“Great.” The Fae could not sound excited, but the way her crests flapped up and down had to mean something. “I’ll take you home to Cloudsong, where you can rest up and learn all you can before starting on your mission. And someday you may even be blessed with an elemental crest like mine.”

“But first,” she added, as the Mirror baby’s stomach let out a loud rumble of complaint, “let’s get you something to eat...did they give you a name yet?”

She shook her head.

“Then I will name you,” the Fae said. She tilted her head for a moment, as if listening. “All right, let’s go…Phaedra.”




Adventures at the Mistral Jamboree 2020
Day 1 * Day 2 * Day 3 * Day 4 * Day 5 * Day 6 * Day 7