Senna I

Never judge from first glance, her mom would always say. No dragon was ever what they seemed, even the harshest could have gentle claws and the gentlest could hone a harsh edge. Our hearts cannot be understood with a first scrutiny, a passing judgment. Senna took that lesson the same way as the others: still with the silence of deep thought. The same manner as her watching her mom tend to a SkyWing patient now, careful in taking out splinters. The fool was stupid enough to assume his claws were tough enough to bare cactus thorns without flinching. Wincing was probably a better word for it, for all the wheezing he'd done coming into the healer's tent.

Her mom's talons were deliberate, navigating the pained flesh, the pierced bits with precision. The scars on her mom's pale-golden face seemed to writhe and ripple as she concentrated. There was a common mistake, Senna found, that dragons made regarding her mother. She look more patient than healer, the way her scales were sunken deep with past cuts, some chunks of flesh ripped out of her mom's features, the way her face looked like a brute's with scales webbed with wounds. The shadows in the tent didn't help, coating her features in darkness.

As her mom slid the splinters out of her patient's talons, Senna wondered if she could ever reach that kind of mastery. She watched as her mother was beginning to finish, getting the usual stone bowl with water. Her mom's face glanced at the patient again. He looked disturbed, looking at his healer's ruined face. Her mom gave a small smile and, to Senna, the ugliness of her scars didn't matter. "Stay still, Sawtooth," she murmured, a gentle tone like the surface of a desert spring. "We wouldn't want you to get those wounds infected," she said, casting a rosemary into the water and shooting a glob of fire on the stonework. The water heated and began to boil as her mom kept spitting fire out.

Her mom dipped her hands into the bowl, letting the steamy water cleanse her talons. Senna knew they were like hers, stained with herbs and tipped with sharp nails. Capable of harm, but choosing to heal. Only her mom's nails were caked in old blood as Senna watched them scrubbed against each other. The white smoke rose above the bowl as the water darkened to the rosemary's simmer. Her mom nodded, giving a quick glance to make sure she was paying attention. Senna nodded back.

From there, her mom finished up the work.

After that, Senna headed towards the bridge of Possibility. Gripping her medical satchel, she recounted what she needed to gather. Rosemary, yarrow and basil. Disinfectant herbs and herbs to soothe burns. It seemed the SkyWings were getting restless these days. The great war was past, but, as her mom told her, the small fights remain. Smaller dragons with smaller bruises and wounds than those the SandWing Succession War caused. She had no reason to stop believing in her mother so far, so she kept that in mind. /Plus, SkyWings take to challenge like plants take to sunlight./

As she walked through the stone floors of the great bridge, she caught stray glances at her. Whispers between SandWing with each other or SkyWings with other tribes. She tried to ignore it, be above it, but it always stung, jabbing a thorn into her chest, when they spoke of “his spawn." Like she didn't have ears or she did, but they wanted to pass it off as a private conversation, never mind how loud the whispers could be. Just enough in earshot for her to hear. Just enough for it to hurt. She let out a hiss of air through her nostrils, not wanting them to see how much they got to her and, most days, she felt like she could hide it. With a sniffle and blinking her eyes hard twice, she marched on.

As she reached the herbal stores, she gave a nod to Sage, one of the better stocked store owners. A SandWing in her older age, her claws wrinkled and weathered, Senna thought it only polite to respond when Sage would discuss the latest rumors. Sunora, one of the SandWing laborers, was with egg and the father was a SkyWing. Someone had taken four spears from Tagate's weapon stores and he wanted blood for theft. Snoutal, a SeaWing, was accused of spitting on some dragonets without them looking. She denied it, but dragons were often suspicious of her watery ways.

A part of Senna wanted to get these conversations over with, but another part cherished them. They meant peace... far better than the stories her mom spoke of the war. “War is such a dragon concept," her mom once said. “It is not the grinding of iron, the flapping of standards, nor the clashing of swords. No, it is the creak and groan of flesh and bone that is war. And it is what makes peace." With that in mind, she tried her best to endure the long stream of rumors and gossip throughout Possibility. She bowed as Sage gave her the herbs she needed and left with as little friendliness as she could stir.

As she finished with her day's shopping, she heard more whispers, more vicious, more cruel. She heard of her father again. How the daughter of a mass-murderer was of the same elk. That a dragon who burned scavengers, allies and enemies would spread his taint onto his young. Someone who devoted his duty to Blister, the traitor, and tore a hole through the MudWings and SkyWings with claws that were caked with dead flesh and dripping with blood, old and fresh. A sinister dragon who ruined dragons with nothing more than a smile and kind words. Someone who could mask his ruthlessness with the cloth of friendliness. A dragon who dipped his dagger with sweet poison before plunging it into vulnerable backs. A singer who tied scavengers to trees and burned them whole, listening to their screams and smelling their cooked meat with a smile.

With each bit of information, she bit her scaled lips. Surely, not everyone here could be wrong, could they? But, her mother's advice rung in her ears about not judging dragons by a first glance. The first time she heard them, it might have been something she could look past. Now, the same jeers and whispers nailed themselves into her. They were getting louder as Senna noted with a hiss. She sighed, trying to keep her face calm. Then a few notes echoed through her throat and into her mind. She let out a song, a measure she used to ward off the insults and hurtful words. Her singing comforted her, shielding her from them like armor. It sounded like the winds whistling against the grass of fresh spring. She carried the tune throughout the bridge, trying to keep the water from her eyes.

As she approached their tent, she stopped singing, letting the notes leave with the wind. The first time she sung with her mom nearby, her mom froze and turned her neck so fast, Senna was scared she'd twisted it. Her mother's eyes didn't seem to see her at first, she seemed to gaze at a faraway field. Then, she finally realized it was her and she simply shook her head as she covered her face with her talons. No. It was a lesson: one didn't have to mean it to hurt someone. Senna had never wanted to hurt her mom, but she had and all she did during that time was hug her. Because she could and it was the only thing she knew from the way her mom would hug her pains away.

Entering the tent now, she caught the scent of meat. Beyond the tent flaps laid hunted meat, raw and red, oozing with blood. She always wondered how her mother was capable of that. Her mother would simply let out a heavy smile, her eyelids falling a few inches. "My mother taught me how to hunt and my healing studies taught me how an animal was put together. Once you figure that out, you know how to take it apart with precision... in a way that's almost painless," her mother said with a wince, like admitting that was a lump in her throat.

Her mother was there now, in front of the meat. Her claws were clasped together, likely in respect to the meat. Senna did the same, placing her stuffed satchel on the ground, and paying her respects in the same way she had for years now. Then, her mom's torn face smiled as she took a particular herb, basil, to flavor their meat. A sort of game her mom had set once to get her to remember herbs and their purposes more. Now, Senna played the game out of habit, not needing her mom to bring it up. The way her mom's face brighten at her remembering the flavor of the herbs made Senna smile in return.

Then, they ate. Chewing through the meat, sucking blood and juice through clenched teeth, she slurped down the raw flavors as she bit the meat through. It took time and her mom already finishing her meat, but she eventually finished. Her mom got out a cloth, wiping her likely bloody lips clean. Senna didn't mind. It only showed how much her mom cared and it was more than her father gave. There, the thought bothered her a bit, reminding her of the whispers at the bridge.

"What was my dad like?" Senna asked her mother, the words spilling out without warning. She'd asked before, but her mom had let the question linger rather than answer. It was a late night, drops of starlight shimmering through the cracks where the tent fabrics separated. From one of the cracks, a streak of moonlight shone upon her mom's face, showing a look of surprise.

Her mom blinked as her eyelids furrowed. Senna was afraid and almost glad that she would let the question hang unanswered. She was half-torn in wondering if she did want to know. Her mom's eyes were deep in thought, Senna wondering if she was trying to gather the courage to say no or answer.

"Your father..." she began, shuffling her limbs about and scratching her chin. "Your father is--was a kind dragon. The first time I saw him, he was a dragonet who was afraid of me," her mom said, letting out a chuckle at past memories. Then her eyelids were heavier. "He did not stay that way and I tried my best to calm his anger, his violence and his vengeance, staying with him until the end. He was not a good dragon when we last parted," she whispered, her voice taut with regrets.

"Was he... not good with you?" Senna asked, biting her lips at the possible answer.

Her mom shook her head. "Never with me. He was warm, he was gentle, he was the soul of kindness to me and me only near the end," she said with a sigh. "Maybe that was the problem. He loved too much. He wanted to prove his devotion to me... and that resulted in the mess of his reputation and too many corpses. The ending of a lifetime of holding love to such a high pedestal," her mom said, hanging her head with her eyes closed.

"Do you hate him?" Senna asked.

Her mom's eyes shot open. "I... he wasn't perfect, Senna. I understood that. He was a lonely dragon who could be shallow and driven to extremes. He could also be warm and gentle and..." her words trailed off, her eyes gaining a wistful look. She shook her head. "Hate is too strong and simple a word, dear. I could not accept the dragon he is now, but the dragon he was, back when we first met? That's different." She sighed. "When you're older, you'll understand." she said before gesturing her to sleep. "Sleep sweetly, Senna," she said as Senna felt her nuzzle.

After a few hours, Senna's eyes crept open at the sound of a noise. As she was on the ground of packed earth, her eyes found themselves looking at her mom's pale-golden back. She saw her mom carrying a box with flowers engraved on the wood, the carvings looking delicately made. She listened to the crack of a lid opening and saw her mom's back arched up and down, her head bowed down. She heard the sniffle and sobbing of tears and her mom's face crumpled in the darkness. "Oh, my flower," she croaked to no one in the tent, to a dragon long gone before Senna's birth.

She closed her eyes as she heard her mom weeping throughout the night, fresh sorrow laid raw. She never hated her father so much as now, despised the dragon who left her mom like this, left his mate like this and plunged their names in filthy sand. /You let love destroy you, dad and now mom's letting love destroy her too because of you. How could you do this... Why... why?/ she breathed out a faint shudder as she tried to sleep.

Yet, the sobs echoed.