Paradox - Progeny Of Innocence (bk2) (Paradox series) Read Free Page B

the desert lands. She was the chosen one, and held all the wisdom and knowledge bestowed upon her by the Dreamtime Gods.
    It was said that on the night she was born, the Dreamtime Gods had gazed down upon her in wonder from heaven as she suckled at her mother’s breast. The Gods, humbled by her beauty, gifted her with all the wisdom from the Dreamtime. Then, on the day that Diyari took her first step, the Dreamtime God of Fire instructed the sun to shine brighter so as to cast Diyari’s shadow out across the flat desert lands, turning them red beneath her feet. Her shadow would be a beacon for her people. At night, the Dreamtime God of Air exhaled and lifted the sands, forming red, mountainous dunes to protect her from harm while she slept. The thorny sand-dragon lizards that the Atnangker children had once played with in their hands had grown overnight on her seventh birthday, and now stood thirty hands high. Her Dragon Armies were plentiful, and hers to command at will.
    At sunset, when the sun melted into the horizon, Diyari ordered her people to spirit the peaceful Bakhna underground into a catacomb of caves with brightly painted rock walls depicting the dreamtime legends of all Atnangker people since the beginning of time. The dark-skinned children with their large black eyes and flat noses giggled as they ran their fingers through the shimmering silver hair of the white Bakhna children, making the tiny bells jingle noisily. At night, safely entrenched underground, the Atnangker tribal women taught the children, black and white, to make jewelry from shiny seeds collected from the Bat’s Coral trees that were spotted scantily across the vast desert lands. When sleep drew near, the children huddled together and slept silently, curled up in blankets and camel hides on the floor around small clusters of fires to keep them warm. Only the crackling fire and the occasional tinkle of a bell when a child squirmed in sleep pierced the eerie silence of the underground fortress. Outside, the winds tore and howled throughout the night, shaping and shifting the mountainous red sand dunes until each trace, each footfall was swept completely away.
    During the day the Bakhna people, draped now in heavy camel skins to protect them from the scorching sun, were whisked from one Atnangker tribe to another under the protection of Diyari and her cortège of personal guards. And each night was spent safely underground around crackling log fires, listening to dreamtime stories told by the elders of the tribe.
    The last days of their journey, where the sand dunes began to fall away, although still long and tortuously slow, had been made easier by traveling by camel and the thorny sand dragons.
    Overhead, the giant eagles flew in from the south. Their piercing squawk called out raucously and guided the Bakhna closer toward home. Their massive bodies dipped then rose gracefully on the shifting air currents. When at last they reached the sanctuary of the Crossing and were almost home, the Bakhna, tired and weatherbeaten, knelt, and in small voices they gave blessings to Diyari and her desert people for their kindness. The Bakhna people gifted the Princess and the dark-skinned children with tiny bells and ribbons from their hair. In return, the Atnangker people gave beaded bracelets and necklaces made from the shiny red seeds.
    The Crossing was a sacred place, where it was said the Dreamtime Spirit Gods had stood and parted the lands. The Dreamtime God of Earth stretched out his long finger and drew a line in the sand to mark the place where the vast red desert lands ceased and green mountain ranges began. Then the Spirit God of Water, with just one of his tears, created a raging river in the deep line drawn by his brother’s finger. With just seven strands of their long hair, the Dreamtime Gods made a braid and constructed a bridge that stretched across the fathomless waters from one side to the other. So the dreamtime legend went.
    The Bakhna