The Dragon Star (Realms of Shadow and Grace: Episodes 1-3 of 7)

THE PHILOSOPHER - SKETKEE

THINK-LIDDED EYES like scale-clad obsidian orbs stared up at the glowing garnet star, the newly attending member of the celestial congregation it so brightly outshone. The eyes blinked. Squinted, vertical irises expanding. Blinked again.

Sketkee lowered her gaze, sweeping her sight across the slumbering forms before her. She stood at the edge of a pilgrim camp. Twenty-seven people slept in or under wagons, on soft spots of grass along the roadside, or dozed while leaning against tree trunks. She and her traveling companion had made their nest for the night far from the others. While they tolerated her presence, it did no good to provoke their irrational fear through increased proximity. Even though she walked at the back of the pilgrim line and normally concealed her features beneath the cowl of a hooded cloak, she overheard the whispered names. Reptile. Snake Demon. Lizard Woman. They acknowledged her as a fellow pilgrim, but this did not mean they accepted her as a rakthor — a creature of greater height, strength, and intelligence, cloaked in a skin that all too closely resembled the slithering creatures their limited minds so mindlessly feared. While everyone in the Iron Realm had heard stories of the lizard people of the Sun Realm, few had ever seen or spoken to one. Doing so, Sketkee had found, did little to assuage their instinctual suspicions.

So, she stayed out of sight, but close enough to be considered one of the pilgrim band. It helped having a human companion. Her escort, Kadmallin, possessed a pleasant nature that put the other pilgrims at ease and mitigated the concerns they felt at having a near-mythical rakthor among them. Sketkee surmised that the appearance of the new star, as though pulled from the collective dreams of an alternate nocturnal world, would also help ease their acceptance of her presence. If a star could appear from dreams, why could not a lizard-like rakthor step from bedtime stories meant to terrify children and onto the road beside them to follow that same star toward the Forbidden Realm?

Why not, indeed? However, a more recent and pressing question consumed Sketkee's mind — how had she awoken from the very same dream to see the star it depicted? Rakthors did not dream. Images might arise during sleep, but not of any duration, and none that might be woven into the sleep-stories of human dreams. Moreover, and more importantly, rakthors did not believe in gods and goddesses and supernatural superstitions. Rakthors, and Sketkee especially, followed the Principles of Mind — with beliefs based in experience and clear, logical thought. Gods were figments of human and other peoples' imaginations, without possible proof of tangible existence. Or so she had always surmised.

What did it mean, not only that she might dream this pilgrim night-tale of a bright new star, but that she should do so on the very evening a new heavenly body, so much like the one of the dream, suddenly adorned the sky? Coincidence provided the best explanation — the most logical conclusion. But might not a verdict of coincidence be a way of avoiding an uncomfortable truth? The Principles of Mind dictated that evidence be gathered to support or disclaim a supposition. She could not yet make a valid conclusion based on the limited facts at her disposal. She would have to live with a determination of inconclusiveness until learning more.

Sketkee heard a sound from behind and turned to see Kadmallin walking up to join her. Nearly fifty years of age, he still stood tall, with the lean and muscular build of a man half his years. His right hand rested on the hilt of one the two swords that never left his belt nor his side. He took his responsibilities seriously, and his primary obligation entailed protecting Sketkee from danger. She had known him for twenty-four years and thirteen months as calculated by the Iron Realm calendar, and while many of his human charms entirely escaped her appreciation, she found his adherence to duty to be a refreshing aberration among his kind.

"New star," Kadmallin said as he stepped up beside Sketkee.

"Yes." She turned to look at the curious oddity of light once more, marveling as she always did at his need to state the obvious.

"What do you think it means?" Kadmallin rubbed his chin.

"I do not know." Sketkee frowned at Kadmallin's seemingly instinctive ability to ask the questions she preferred to ignore. She posed one of her own to her companion. "Do you still have the dream?"

"Yes." Kadmallin looked down from the sky. "Every night."

"What do you think it means, the dream and the new star?" Sketkee turned to Kadmallin. She stood a good head and a half taller than the man.

"It frightens me." Kadmallin glanced up to Sketkee's eyes and then to the camp of sleeping pilgrims.

Sketkee noted that, as usual, Kadmallin had replied to a request for thoughtful conjecture with an entirely useless emotive response. She decided then, while considering the star and the dreams, to finally confide in Kadmallin her reason for leaving her realm and hiring him to accompany her and join the pilgrim band. She had kept Kadmallin unaware of her true purpose, but she realized now, if something were to happen to her, it would be important for him to know their true goals, so he might either continue to attempt to accomplish them or find someone else qualified to do so.

Sketkee reached in the leather satchel she always wore and removed a sphere the size of a large fist wrapped in a simple black cloth. Kadmallin watched with open curiosity as she peeled away layers of woven cotton to reveal a perfectly round blue crystal that glittered in the moonlight. He leaned forward in silence, examining the glass globe more closely, his eyes going wide as he saw the movement within — a miniature night sky with thousands of gem-like gears undulating in a branching pattern of faintly glowing light.

"What is it?" Kadmallin reached out a tentative finger to momentarily touch the surface of the sphere.

"I suspect it is an ancient urris artifact. I believe it is a machine of some manner." Sketkee wrapped the scraps of cloth around the crystal and slid it into her satchel.

"This is why we are following the pilgrims to the Forbidden Realm." Kadmallin rubbed the stubble of his chin again.

"Yes." Sketkee watched her companion, curious what his response might be. She wondered if she should have told him the true purpose for their travel sooner. She had intimated, although never outright lied, that she intended to follow the pilgrims so as to write a treatise on human religious migrations for her academy. She also debated whether to tell him how she came to possess the object. She should have known he would ask the question she did not wish to answer.

"Where did you get it?"

Sketkee hesitated.

"I stole it."

"How did my life come to this?" Kadmallin sighed. "From commander of the palace targas in the Punderra capital to helping a rakthor thief follow a band of religious heretics across a land filled with bandits and militias in the hopes of crossing a hostile ocean to explore a realm from where no living soul has returned in thousands of years." Kadmallin smiled suddenly. "At least the company is pleasant."

Sketkee had not anticipated this response. A part of her found it unnerving that she should have so little success in predicting the behavior of her closest companion and oldest friend. The rest of her accepted his assessment and reiterated it.

"Yes," Sketkee said, looking up to the strange new star once more. "The company is more than adequately pleasing."