fruit was ripe by memory, or she smelled them on the air and followed her nose. Once, when she scented something that excited her, the creature tried to get Mena to pick up the pace. She ran forward and back, churning up dust, urging her on. Mena's human gait was clearly not sufficient.
The creature bumped Mena's side and lowered her shoulder. Mena understood what she offered and was stunned. She kicked her leg over the creature's spine and slowly slipped on top. For a moment she clung there, spread-eagled on the back. The creature looked at her, amused. Mena tried to find a better arrangement. And there was one: sitting upright, straddling the creature's neck, snug between the nubs of the wings. With her positioned like that, the creature moved forward, falling into a loping, reptilian run that Mena would never forget.
The creature must also have known how to avoid humans, for they saw nobody the entire day. Once they pillaged an apple orchard that showed signs of tending, but evaded whatever souls might have been about. Atop a bluff on another occasion, Mena spotted a cluster of houses in the distance. She could have walked to them in an hour and named herself and been among people again. Though she was hungry, having eaten only fruit, even light- headed at times, she did not yet want human company.
Indeed, she often scanned the horizon, knowing that searchers were combing the countryside for her, people she cared for and trusted, who had fought beside her many a day. The daily journey she and the creature kept at would be making it hard for the trackers, but she was not sure she wanted to be found even by them, even by Melio. Not yet. Not until she understood this better.
As Mena walked beside the creature on the afternoon of their third day together, she said, 'You need a name. I mean, a name for me to call you. I can't think of you as lizard or bird or dragon.' Mena stroked the creature's neck. 'You're no dragon, anyway. You're gentler than that. You need a real name.' She walked on in thought, nibbling her thumbnail as she did so. The creature's head rose and fell beside her, bobbing on the curve of her neck.
'My father once told me a tale about a boy who had a pet lizard. It's a Bethuni tale, I think. The boy called the lizard Elya. He hatched it from an egg. They were together always, though the boy's father did not, at first, like the animal being in his hut. In Bethuni lore orphans of any species are sacred, good luck to those who care for them. But the father was a selfish man who wanted to control all things and didn't like the love his son showed a mere reptile.'
Mena cut her eyes over to her companion. 'No offense meant. Anyway, he disliked it so much that one night, when the boy was sleeping, he grasped the lizard and carried it out into the night. He tied it to a tree and used a spade to dig a hole. The hole was to be the lizard's grave, and he was going to kill it. Before he finished digging, his shovel struck something. He reached in and pulled out a sack of gold coins. Ancient coins, buried there long ago, coins that nobody had a claim to. And just like that he was a rich and important man. It would never have happened if not for the lizard, and he saw it as a sign from the gods that the creature was special. He didn't kill it after all. Instead, he took it home and woke his village with shouts of joy.
'That's the tale. My father told it better than I, but that's most of it. You know it's a tale and not the truth because the selfish father became generous. I've not seen that happen anywhere but in tales. But I guess we need things to aspire to. What do you think about Elya as a name? I believe it would suit you. If I call you Elya, will you answer to it?'
The creature, perhaps noting the questioning rise in Mena's voice, looked at her.
'Elya,' Mena repeated, adding a singsong quality to it. 'Elya… How do I explain naming to you?'
She tried several ways. She was glad there was no one around to hear, for she knew she would sound a fool or mad or both, but she made a game of it. She touched her nose and said, 'Mena' and then touched the creature's snout and pronounced, 'El-yaaaa.' Nothing. Not that Mena knew what she expected, what would indicate acceptance of the name. She walked off a little distance and, facing away, began calling the name. On turning around and seeing the creature, her face lit with pleasure. 'Elya! There you are.'
Mena named thing after thing, touching ground and stone and grass and sky and Mena and Elya. The creature narrowed her eyes at this, the first look of suspicion she had made since Mena had found and cleaned her body.
'You think I'm mad,' Mena said. 'You may be right. Elya. My Elya. Not your Elya, but mine.' She found a rhythm in the lines and repeated it singsong. And again, and then she skipped away singing it loud, dancing, her arms swooping like wings. The mirth came upon her complete, like a serious father suddenly playing the fool for a child's amusement. It worked.
The creature bent back her neck, opened her mouth, and coughed a quick barrage. Her neck rolled in jerky undulations so forceful that Mena feared she was choking. But then she stopped and looked back at Mena, relaxed and mirthful. Her eyes twinkled with amusement.
'Does that mean you'll be my Elya? You will. You already are. I feel it-' Mena tapped her chest with her fingers and then moved them to her collarbone and then, as if unsure which spot she meant, up to her head, where she touched a finger to her temple '-inside me. You're here.' She tapped again. 'How can that be?'
As usual, the creature offered no answer. But Mena did not need one. She knew. Elya was Elya. That night they slept within touching distance of each other, and the next morning was the one on which she awoke beside Elya with that strange feeling of contentment firmly lodged in her heart. She sat, taking in the rising sun to the east. The rest of the human world seemed far off indeed, blissfully so.
On that she was mistaken.
Elya's head snapped to attention, all relaxed slumber gone in an instant. She stared over Mena's head, to the north, head cocked first to one side and then the other as she listened to something. Mena calmed the creature with a few soothing words, with steadying motions of her hands. She asked her to stay put, and then, on impulse, she thought the same instructions. She really did not understand it, but she could not shake the feeling that she could send Elya her thoughts-not words or sentences but the import of a thing. That was what she tried to pass silently to her. Stay.
When it seemed Elya would do so, Mena turned and ran up the slope to get a better view. She crested the hill and, as the undulating landscape on the other side came fully into view, she dropped flat bellied to the ground. She had seen something, shapes where she hoped there would not be shapes. Inching forward, she peeked over the rise more carefully and saw exactly what she feared.
A wide wedge of humanity crawled across the hills. Hundreds of people, spread out far to east and west, many carrying torches that spit clots of slow-rising smoke into the air. From this vantage, they were the main feature of the world, a blight on it. They were also, she knew, her people. Near the center of the front ranks a banner hung limp from a long pole. She knew by its colors that it was the insignia of Acacia, the same one she had seen at Kidnaban years ago. As on that occasion, this sighting filled her with dread. She crawled backward.
When she reached Elya, she nearly said, 'Let's go.' Part of her wanted to flee and knew that Elya would do so with her. But she did not say those words. Instead, she stroked the creature's neck and rubbed under her chin and brushed the flat of her hand over the flare of her nostrils. 'I can't run. It's not fair to them, and it solves nothing, just prolongs it. They're my people, Elya. They love me. You understand? That's why they've come.' She cradled the creature's head in the palms of her hands. 'Elya, you can leave me. Why don't you do that? Run. Or fly if you can. I'll tell them not to hunt you anymore. No one will hunt you. I promise.'
The minute she said this, she knew it was a lie. Even if she could stop the Akaran-led hunting parties, she would never be able to stop others-tribesmen, trophy hunters, any villain looking to make a profit from killing the last of the foulthings. When word got out that Elya was harmless, it would be even worse. Still, Mena said, 'You should just go,' not believing it but feeling she must say it. She had to offer it, had to make Elya understand that she was free to choose her fate.
Elya moved her head closer, tilted it, and touched the soft flat of her crown to Mena's forehead. That was her answer.
'You should just go.'
The creature tapped her head against Mena's several times. Again, her answer.
Relief washed through Mena, suffusing her with warmth from head to toe, even as worry wrapped her chest like iron ribbons trying to squeeze the air from her lungs. 'Okay, love,' she said. 'Let's go introduce you to the world. Let's make an impression.'
There was one way, she hoped, to present herself and Elya in a manner that could stun her brave soldiers into the moment of hesitation she would need. That was why she rode toward them with her legs over Elya's shoulders and her thighs clenched tight and her arms wrapped around her neck. For a time she rode blind, letting her mount direct them. She pressed her face against the plumage and loved the touch as greatly as any intimacy
