Dragons and Destiny Read Free

my
vadeln I have found. She is in trouble.”
    “Danger
trouble?”
    “No, her trouble. I must go to her. She needs me.”
    Sanei looked at
the young Lind. Alyei had never sensed any emotive outgoings from a
human before and Sanei would have been prepared to bet the most
succulent haunch of his next meal that of all the Lind in the
patrol Alyei would have been the last Lind he would have expected
to bond with a human. Those Lind who were destined to become
vadeln-paired usually showed signs during their early years; it
became a want, a need; and Alyei was over twenty hot seasons old.
He had never shown the slightest wish to make intimate contact with
any member of humankind.
    “If you feel
this,” announced Sanei with resignation (he was about to lose his
best scout) “you must go. If you feel that she needs you this
strong and from so far away then I think you are destined to be
together. I will tell those who need to know where you have gone
and be careful, our kind are not often welcomed in the human domtas
in these mountains. They are a strange folk.”
    Alyei nodded.
Here at the coast where they were patrolling along with the duty
Ryzck, the villagers were friendly to their Lind protectors. The
further north anylind went the less was the welcome.
    “One more piece
of advice. When you reach this human do not commit as vadeln unless
you are very sure. Now go.”
    Sanei watched
as Alyei loped away and beckoned to another two Lind. “Go follow
him but do not let him see you. This is something he needs to do on
his own.”
    Alyei, unaware
of the two mentors travelling in his wake, made good time but try
as he might, he could sense nothing of the human girl during the
day although at intervals he stopped to listen. When night fell he
stretched his mind northwards again and sensed her although it was
not as strong as that first contact. By now he was now running in
the ward inhabited by those the Lind called ‘unfriendly persons’ so
he avoided their villages and settlements. When hunger beckoned he
grabbed an injured wild kura who had fallen into a ravine and of
which he made a fine meal.
     
     
    * * * * *
     
     
    Julia was
existing in a despondent hell, complaisant on the outside but
inside she was screaming. The betrothal binding was imminent. Julia
had by now ‘met’ her intended although no words had been spoken.
This was not unusual. The man was older than she had expected,
indeed she now learnt that he capped her father’s age by some
years. Stooped, grey-haired and wrinkled, he had looked at Julia
with a certain look in his eyes that made her feel most
uncomfortable.
    The third night
she went to bed feeling more miserable than ever. There was no
escape; she would be married to that old man and when he died, then
what? Probably she would stay on at her son-in-law’s house as
unpaid housekeeper. Again her emotions began to seep out. Alyei,
resting on the top of a small hill not far away, latched on to it
and followed it to its source.
    Julia,
half-asleep, began to be aware of a ‘presence’. She thought she was
dreaming. In her dream began to talk to this ‘presence’, to answer
the questions and respond to the invitation. Still thinking she was
living a dream (one from which she did not want to wake up) she
pushed her mind out as the ‘presence’ was telling her to. There was
an instantaneous moment of recognition from Alyei then before Julia
had the chance to back away he threw welcoming and loving thoughts
in her direction, of comradeship, of friendship and of the end of
loneliness.
    Although
panicking more than a little with the force of emotions that were
threatening to overwhelm her, Julia didn’t break the contact
although Alyei half-suspected she might.
    : Who are you?
:
    : I Alyei am.
Alyei of rtath Gainsya. You are Julia :
    There was a
snap as the mind-link cemented between them.
    : I can feel
what you are feeling. How is this? :
    : Because our
minds are one :
    Alyei mentally
thanked the old