Elvenbane

Even though he was ready to give up, he would not begrudge her that. Whatever was left for him to do, he would. Even though it was probably not enough to save her.

He lifted his wings and spread them to the sun...and threw himself and his defeat into the cold, uncaring skies.

Alara climbed the back of the cliff to avoid being seen by any of the Kin. Right now, she was so angry that she could hardly think...she certainly wasn't going to be coherent enough to come up with a convincing lie.

Keman should be flying very slowly...and he would without a doubt have to stop fairly soon to make a kill. The fight would have left him terribly depleted. It shouldn't be too difficult to follow him.

She seethed with anger at the Kin of her Lair...at the Kin in general. Keman had been right; he'd been right since the beginning. His challenge should have been answered properly, with a responsible acknowledgment. The Kin should have protected him. It should never have come to trial-by-combat.

She reached the flat top of the cliff, and paused for a moment to rest and take in sun and the energy it supplied. She would need it; this was going to be a long flight.

The one thing that this sorry situation had done was to force her to set her priorities. What was the point of being shaman to a Lair full of bullies who did what they wished because no one stopped them, and cowards who abdicated their responsibilities because they were too lazy and too selfish to think of anything outside their own petty needs? What kind of a self-respecting shaman would remain in service to Kin like that?

What was important? To act on responsibilities, no matter what anyone else did. To do as Keman had done...stand up for what was right.

To stand behind the child who had the guts to do all of that, and shame to those who did not.

She climbed to the edge of the cliff, balanced there, and gathered herself for flight.

:Alara, wait.:

Alara stopped herself in midlaunch with a lurch, and turned to see who was behind her.

Keoke hauled himself laboriously up the cliff-face, and behind him, she saw the heads and snouts of a dozen others. She tightened her claws on the rocks and drew herself up stubbornly as they all climbed up over the edge and surrounded her.

'Don't try to stop me,' she warned. 'Keman was right...he's been right all along, and no stupid trial-by-combat with a bully is going to make him wrong. I'm following him, I am going to help him and my fosterling, just as I should have when he first ran away, and the Lair can just find itself another shaman. There is nothing you can say or do that is going to make me change my mind.'

'Change your mind?' Keoke repeated after her...and to her absolute astonishment, he was clearly surprised. 'Change your mind? Fire and Rain...we don't want you to change your mind, Alara...we want to go with you!'

'You...what?' She blinked, trying to make sense of what Keoke had just said.

'We want to go with you,' he repeated patiently. 'Myre won, yes, but she was in the wrong, and she only won because she's been working towards a challenge like this since the day she moved in with Lori. She plans on ruling the Lair. We all knew that! And we knew Keman was right, too...but there aren't enough of us to make a majority.'

'I'm sick of this Lair,' said Orola, with obvious disgust. 'I'm sick of the lazy ignoramuses that think all we need to do is keep our bellies full and sit in the sun, like a fat herd of sheep. And I am sick to death of the petty nonsense we've been wasting our time on...'

'We're tired of doing nothing,' chimed in one of the females, one of the young adults, about Keman's age. 'Every time any of us wants to do something out there'...she waved a wingtip in the general direction of the elven lands...'all we hear about is that we have to keep our existence secret. Well, it isn't secret, and it hasn't been for a while, and we don't see any reason to go hide in a cave and nope nobody finds us!'

Her frill rose with agitation, but Keoke calmed the youngster with a look. 'The real factor here is that Keman was right. We are at least partially responsible for the danger that the halfbloods are in now...and we are totally responsible for what happened to Lashana. The two-leggers are not thinking beasts; they are our equals. And the humans were here before we were; it's their world, and we and the elves are the interlopers here. We owe it to the rightful inhabitants to at least try to set things right for them, since we have co-opted a part of their world. The oldest ways taught us that we must accept and act upon our responsibilities, but we haven't done a thing. We've simply played with these beings as if they were markers on a gameboard. But they aren't...and it's time we made things right with them. Or at least tried.'

:I have been waiting most of my life to hear those words from the Kin, Keoke,: boomed a deep, yet gentle, mental voice.

As one, the Kin looked up...as a shadow half again larger than any of them could cast came between them and the sun...and the very last creature that Alara had ever expected to see winged down to a graceful and effortless landing on the cliff-top, beside her.

Father Dragon shone in his full colors, purple and scarlet, and as fit and young-looking as the most athletic of them all. He covered Alara affectionately with his scarlet wing, as the rest of the dragons gaped at him in surprise...

Even Keoke.

'I have,' he repeated, his frill rising, his huge eyes on all of them, 'waited for hundreds of years to hear those words, Keoke.' His gaze now rested upon each of them in turn, and Alara saw an entirely new expression in his eyes than she was used to seeing from him. Excitement, anticipation, eagerness. 'Many, many years ago, when first I explored this new world for our Kin, I took the form of a halfblood wizard, and I not only walked among them, I worked with them. I was in the company of those who organized the first uprising, and I remained with them to the end of the conflict...and not as an observer, nor as a simple meddler in their affairs. I was one of them. And had they not fallen to treachery, I would likely still be one of them.'

He raised his head proudly, and Keoke stared at him as if the Elder thought he had heard things amiss.

'You were with the wizards?' Keoke asked dazedly. 'Truly?'

'Truly. I helped to plan the rebellion,' Father Drag on told him. 'I have been hoping for many years now, ever since I realized that the wizards were multiplying again, that they would gather their courage and rise up against the elves. And I had planned to join them, if I could, in whatever shape I could.' He paused for a moment, then continued. 'I could not in all conscience use my position as your chief shaman to urge you to help the halfbloods...but now that you have decided to do so'...he smiled toothily...'I trust you will permit me to join you?'

Shana scanned the sky anxiously. So far, the elven lords had not yet traced the fleeing wizards here. The traps they had left at the Citadel had certainly accounted for some of their followers (and with luck, one or two of the elves), and had, hopefully, disorganized and delayed the hunt.

The herds of deer and other beasts she had driven across the trail should have contributed to the delay.

But it was only delay, and everyone here knew that. They were on the very edge of mapped territory now, and there was a good reason for that. From here on, the terrain was so inhospitable no one other than the young and the fit could expect to pass through it. If they'd had time, perhaps they could have made their way across it, children and oldsters and all, by patiently exploring it one day at a time, and making safe trails. But they didn't have that time.

The enemy was coming, and their stand would be made here, or not at all.

And many had resigned themselves to that stand being a futile one.

Shana had not told the others what Keman had said to her; she had not wanted to raise hopes, only to dash them again. She wanted to believe that he could persuade the Kin...but she remembered, only too well, how they had treated her. First he would have to persuade them to abandon centuries of secrecy. Then he would have to persuade them to act on behalf of creatures who were not Kin.

The prospects of doing both did not seem very likely to her.

If I can bring them, Keman had said, look for me to arrive in two days' time. Three, at the most. Today was the third day since he had left, and Shana had been watching for him since the morning of the second.