Dragons Among Us.

By

R. Albert Marsh.

Connell felt uneasy.

He could feel eyes on him, studying, evaluating, curious, but at this point,
definitely not hostile. He surreptitiously let his eyes roam slowly around the
town square. He saw people of all different races going about their business,
everyone paying attention to their own immediate needs. Hawkers touted
their wares, voices bawling to out-shout the next-door neighbour, insults,
some good-natured, some not, traded between stallholders in the souk.

There! He caught a young woman looking at him, the sideways shift of her
eyes betraying her just as she turned away. She was about medium height,
with straight dark hair, olive skin, and golden oval eyes that had slit pupils,
very much like his own. She looked to be around twelve to fifteen standard,
but on various worlds, it didn’t pay to fix that in stone, as the average
Atrixian adult always looked no more than an eleven-year-old human child.

But, Connell could still feel another set of eyes on him, now, more than the
one. So he boldly let his gaze wander around, and immediately picked up the
gaze of three more, no, five more people, male and female, looking directly
at him. He could feel no malice in those stares, only curiosity mainly.

He heard a giggle, and the young woman was now standing next to him on
his left. Looking down, he was captivated by her beauty, and as he opened
his mouth to speak, a voice said, “Corrine, come away from him. He, and
we, have no time for games this day. Come now, child.”

The child gave a winsome smile, reluctantly turned away and walked off.

The voice came from a woman of indefinite years, seemingly middle-aged,

yet her eyes held the wisdom of many years. Then Connell gasped, for he
realized that he had heard no physical voice, but only in the silence of his
mind.

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Normally, most mind voices had to blocked, because sentient lifeforms
didn’t realize the amount of thought-noise they generated. But this seemed
to him to be intentional. There were undercurrents there, not immediately
discernable.

So he turned to face the woman, who was standing on the far side of the
square, and directed his attention her way. Blocking out all extraneous sights
and sounds, he imagined a chord of thought linking the two of them
together. His tutor on the Psychworld of Spirit taught him this: “Draw the
subject to you. Even though you stand apart from the subject, with distance
between you, fix the face or memory of that person firmly in your mind.
‘See’ them so clearly that it was as if they stood in front of you in person.
Even though you are separated by vast distance, from halfway around a
planet, or across the universe, you can converse or trade information easily.”

It took Connell a while to master the art of telepathic speech. When you
‘speak’ to another telepathically, you may not talk in words, as such. Most of
the time, you ‘speak’ in pictures, with emotion being the motivator. And the
tendency when you are first starting out is to ‘shout’. As his tutor, Miceon,
constantly had to remind him, ‘For the gods’ sake, boy, I’m not deaf! Stop
shouting at me! Calm your thoughts. Concentrate!”

Twenty-seven years it took him to master that particular art. By the time he
was ready to leave Spirit to take up his quest, he could converse with anyone
willing to speak with him, telepathically. However, it was considered rude to
barge into conversations with others, and so a blocking technique had to be
taught, to discourage such breaches of protocol.

Thoughts are private, and ‘mind reading’ was at best a thing to be tolerated,
and at worst, a form of ‘mind-rape’. So shielding and blocking were taught,
so that unwanted attention could easily be negated. So, even if you could not
initiate a exchange, you could still sense the undercurrents of emotion.

Then softly, gently, he ‘spoke’.

“It is fine by me if this child wishes to be here”, he thought. “But I respect

your authority. May we meet another time, and share in proper hospitality.”

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The woman, and the rest of the party, jolted in shock at this exchange. It was
clear that they did not expect to find another telepath here in this part of the
world. Within seconds, all were gone, having melted into the crowds that
swarmed and flowed around them. He could sense shock, chagrin, and an
trace of angry derision. Suddenly, Connell felt lost, as though something was
taken from him, and the feeling of loss he felt most keenly, and try as he
might, he found no internal reason for it. Being an exiled orphan, Connell
had no knowledge of home or hearth; he did not even know from what world
he was.

All the Brothers and Sisters in the monastery would tell him was that an
itinerant trader who’d found him, as a babe, alone, in an escape pod in deep
space, had handed him in. The trader had named him ‘Connell’, after ‘a
partner I once had, one of the best, gods bless him, but sadly, now dead!’

Since then, until he was old enough to travel, he’d taken his leave from
Ascension, the Monastery world, and sought after his past. Now, two
hundred years later, his search had landed him here, on the desert world of
Shumer.

Later that night, as the stars known locally as The Maiden’s Bracelet, slipped
toward the far horizon, Connell lay on his bed, too wound up to sleep. Those
people in the village square. Who were they? Where did they come from?
Why show themselves to him now, of all times? Did they work for his
enemies, or did they have another purpose in mind?

Such questions as these had kept him awake till almost dawn, and he felt
tired, his eyes were gritty, and he needed a bath to wash away the smell of
his sweaty body. So he threw off the covers and did just that.

Twenty minutes later, nursing a hot cup of Chark, a local delicacy made
from the ground beans of the Kofa tree, he inhaled the earthy aroma, and
sipped at the hot steamy liquid.

The kofa immediately took effect, and Connell could feel his tired muscles
unknot and relax. As his mind became alert, he decided come what may, he
would find these enigmatic people, and solve the mystery of who, what,
where and the why of them.

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It was twilight when Connell woke the stable boy, slipping him a handful of
copper coins to get his train of droms saddled, packed, and ready for travel.
He had no idea really how to find them, only the memory of the childs’ good
natured giggle that seemed to guide him, out beyond the Burgha, and into
the flaming mouth of the open bleds.

Hours later, and Connell slit his eyes against the glare of the desert. He was
traveling in a north-north-westerly direction, and with each passing mile, he
could feel the knot in his guts clamping and unraveling in turns. Mentally he
sent his consciousness out into the distance, scanning this way and that, in
what in another time and dimension would have been recognized as ‘radar’.

Picking up a faint return ‘pulse’, he analyzed what he’d found. Something

huge, natural in size and make-up, and something, or several something’s
that were sentient dwelt there. Could mean natural flora and fauna, but could
just as easily mean a different kind of life form.

Settling his sword to a more comfortable position, Connell shifted his body
to a more upright stance, and clearing his mind, went into a light trance. At
once he lifted up from the vessel that contained his essence, and floated free.
The colors of desert and sky leapt toward him, and with regret, focused on
the object of his search.

As he flew through the ether, he assumed his favourite form, that of a

dragon, with golden green iridescent scales and large powerful wings. The
sense of flight and freedom made him want to sing and shout for joy, and
ecstatic, he rushed forth in exultation.

Far in the distance, his sharpened senses made out the shape of an
escarpment, and above them, cavorting in frolicsome play, were a host of
sinuous shapes, that became…dragons! He had done it! He had found more
of his kind! Joy turned to wonderment, and he rushed blindly on, lost in
sheer happiness.

And then, suddenly, they were gone. The air above the escarpment was
empty, as if they had never been. Connell wanted to roar his frustration, and
try as he might, could not penetrate the rock of the natural fortress.

In his spirit form, Connell could walk or fly through walls, or just about any
‘solid’ object. On Terrazin, he had flown through a mountain to locate over a

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dozen miners trapped in a cave-in, several of whom he discovered were
already dead.

So, this outcropping here in the middle of a desert on a backwoods planet

should have posed no problem whatsoever. Except…every time he closed on
it, he ‘bounced’ off again, wounding his pride, more than doing any physical
harm.

Fixing the location of the outcropping in his mind, Connell memorized the
layout and any salient features, sure he could find his way back again.

After a while, Connell started to feel queasy and faint, the effect of being out
of his body for too long, and the efforts of his spirit travel draining the
corporeal body of energy. Thinking of his body, he willed himself back.

His eyes snapped open, to find the droms standing placidly in a trough
between two high dunes, deep in shadow, out of the sun. Taking a moment to
center himself, Connell then dismounted awkwardly, gained his footing, and
set about making camp for the night.

In the early hours of the morning, Connell snapped awake. Sweeping the
immediate area around his campsite, he sensed three lifeforms, spaced in a
triangular formation, sitting, or standing, atop surrounding dunes, all
equidistant from his campsite. They didn’t seem hostile, or curious, or…
anything. They were just, ‘there’. Connell sent his awareness closer to one of
the lifeforms, an energy mass without shape or form, and sensed it, ‘they’,
were waiting for something, someone?

Moving slowly, he stood and turned around in a circle, pinpointing the

entities. He could see nothing with his physical eyes, so shifted his
awareness onto the next plane. There! He could see them now, shifting
dancing pillars of light that shimmered and glittered, the colors of their true
astral selves putting the stars to shame, they were that beautiful.

Now he could sense amusement, which, for some odd reason, made him feel
childishly defensive. Slowly, he became aware of a low humming sound,
more felt than heard. Something was coming, and the sentinels were acting
as a beacon that drew it near, their astral forms glowing brighter with each
passing second.

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As the very air around him thrummed with energy the light each entity
radiated fanned out in a circle to encompass the campsite. A wall of pure
energy lit up the night that seemed to come from everywhere, creating no
shadows at all. Then, as the humming reached a crescendo, a beam of golden
hued light shot down from the sky, to land in front of the startled man.

The pillar of light spoke then, in a voice soft and gentle, full of love and
compassion so sweet it made him want to cry. “See with your human eyes,
my son,” it said, and shifting his awareness back to the physical plane,
Connell beheld a woman so beautiful, so fair, he gasped, and resisted the
urge to fall to his knees in worship.

She stood as tall as he, hair, falling to the middle of her back, dark as the soil
of Gumran, her skin as fair as the sands of Tuermaline, her poise as strong
and graceful as the statues of Old Earth. Humor quirked her lips as he
blatantly stared, an indefinable something about her that drew his being like
pollen draws bees. Her eyes, golden with flecks of amber, were slitted like
those of the ones in the marketplace of Temouli. She waited patiently for
him to speak, seeming to know that this moment was a monumental shock to
his senses, and after an interminable time he did eventually calm.

Connell could no longer stand, and did fall to his knees. His mouth worked,
and he croaked, “Who, what are you? Is this a dream?” The woman walked
over to him, took his face in her hands, and smiling in her gentle way, said,
“No, my son, this is no dream. We, your people and I, have long awaited
your coming. We are the True Beings, scattered across the Universe in a time
of trouble and calamity, and are finally joining together, never to be parted
again.

We will tell you all you need to know in times to come, for we have eternity
as our backdrop. This you need to know now, however. We, your Father and
I, had to send you far from us, because those who sought to harm you drew
ever closer, so a decision was made. You have never been alone, loyal
Sentinels always near in time to help you. Some even taught you all you
needed to know, at the time.”

Connell gasped, and asked, “You mean…” and she replied, “Yes, Miceon
was one of ours! He despaired of ever teaching you the disciplines you
needed! But, welcome home, my son! You are the last of our kind to be
reunited, and your little sister is driving us all to distraction wanting to see

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you.” Connell saw the face of the girl-child in his memory, and her laughing
eyes caused him to smile. As a thought came to him, his Mother raised him
up, and told him, “Yes, Connell is your true name. The ‘itinerant trader’ was
you uncle. The world of Spirit was the only safe place we could put you,
holy ground inviolable to even those of our enemies”.

Then, as the power and majesty of the moment caused human hearts to
quiver, she turned toward the reader and said, “So, Dear One, always
remember this. There are Dragons among you. You may even be one
yourself. Do not despair of your future, because only time will tell what it
holds in store for you. We watch, ever mindful of your attempts to find your
place in the grand scheme of things. If you do not hear our words, know we
speak to your hearts, and in your dreams. Believe this. We are with you, my
Children. Hold fast. We love you.”