Child of the Dragon Chapter Three

Chapter Three1

An hour later, a very sweaty, bruised and put out Amara stumbled into Urga’s cave. The gray old woman lifted her grizzly hair covered head and fixed Amara with her yellow eyes, taking in her disheveled appearance. Quirking a hairless brow, she gestured for Amara to sit across from her, the fire in between them.2

It was odd, but Amara couldn’t help but shake the feeling that Urga had expected this. There was no surprise on her face, just concern and some dark foreboding emotion that Amara could not identify.3

A calm, serene silence engulfed the pair. Urga placed her hands together, elbows resting on her knees, and rested her chin on the tips of her fingers. She closed her eyes and meditated a sign to Amara that she the old woman was giving her time to catch her breath and gather thoughts. She was grateful for this, as when she was in such a state, the wrong things tended to come out of her mouth. She remembered seeing Dao-Sing’s hurt expression after she lashed out at him with hurtful words when he had been gone for almost a week. That was two years ago.4

Confident that she was calm now, Amara met Urga’s gaze, signaling to her that she was ready.5

“What has happened this morning?”6

Alright, maybe she didn’t know what happened. “I fell out of clumsiness.” Amara hated lying. She had always been told that for every lie she told, she would have one less year to live. Amara had long grown out of such childish notions and tall tales, but the moral remain.7

It’s also helped that her guardians knew when she lied.8

Urga fixed Amara with a slightly amused look of disbelief. “Oh? I was under the impression that something was amiss.”9

Amara stammered that she was badly mistaken, but as she squirmed under Urga’s intense gaze, she knew she would have to tell her.10

“Well, this morning…” How could she tell Urga of what had happened? What did this hermit of a witch know about hurt from the one you love, the one who’s always been your guiding light? Urga knew nothing of this.11

Well maybe she did. Urga and Dao-Sing had a long history together, a history Amara knew nothing of. Even so, Amara felt like she would be betraying Dao-Sing if she revealed his behavior this morning.12

Or Urga would take her away again.13

“Yes? You were saying…” Urga’s raspy voice interrupted Amara’s thoughts.14

“Oh, well, yes, this morning. Well, you see, Dao-Sing was, I mean I-” Why was this so hard to say? Amara glanced at Urga sheepishly and saw her waiting look, full of raised brow and inclined head. “Well, looking back on it, it seems rather silly. Merely my overactive mind coming to wrong conclusions.”15

“And what events would produce such conclusions.” There’s going to be no getting out of this, Amara thought with a resigned sigh.16

“Dao-Sing was cold to me this morning. I could feel it in his voice. It was like he hated me or something.” Amara could hear her voice rising to a shrill whine, as it always did when she was upset. I must sound like a spoiled brat, and on my birthday no less!17

“Cold, you say? Cold how?” Urga inquired with a quirk of her brow.18

“His voice was like ice. He spoke to me in strict, formal way, like I was a complete stranger. He didn’t even wish me a good birthday! It’s not like him!” Amara doubled over onto herself, breaking into sobs of confusion and soul cutting pain. “What did I do?” she whispered through her tears. “WHAT DID I DO?”19

Suddenly, there were strong arms around her, holding her to a sagging bosom as gnarled hands rubbed her back and caressed her hair.20

“Hush, Amara, hush,” Urga said in a low soothing voice. Her lips pressed lightly against Amara’s forehead. “You have done nothing wrong. Dao-Sing has a violent temper and when something upsets him, he is cruel to everyone. You are lucky that he only gave you harsh words and nothing more.” As if to prove her point, Urga allowed her fingers to lightly brush Amara’s scarred cheek. Amara shuddered as she thought of what could have happened if Dao-Sing had shown less restraint.21

“Why was he upset?”22

Urga’s caressing hands stilled. Her entire body seemed to stiffen, tense with something Amara didn’t know. “Urga?”23

“It is not for me to tell.”24

The finality and cold tone of her voice told Amara that she would get no further answers out of Urga.25

Urga held Amara for a moment longer, calming her sobs until the tears stopped flowing. In Urga’s arms, Amara found comfort and peace. To her, time stood still. All there was were the gentle hands caressing her back and feather kisses on her brow.26

An eternity later, or so it seemed, Urga pulled back, striating herself and walking back to her original spot across the fire. She took a handful of some sort of herb dust and threw it into the flames. The flames turned a sparkling purple, the feminine color.27

“Today you become a woman,” she said. “No more of this childish immaturity and boyish behavior. Dao-Sing cannot keep you from the world forever. Someday you will have to enter it and live by its rules. This you cannot ever achieve if you remain a wild heathen.”28

Amara’s eyes widened. She would have to leave the valley? And abandon Dao-Sing? It was too unreal for her to even begin to comprehend. She knew nothing other than the valley. How would she ever survive in the real world?29

And just how was Urga going to make her a woman?30

Amara opened her mouth to question Urga, but quickly closed it at a sharp look.31

A quiet seriousness claimed Urga’s face as she gestured to Amara, directing her to sit in the center of the fireplace. Amara would have protested, but something about Urga’s gaze drugged her into compliancy.32

There was not intense, burning heat consuming Amara, rather the flames gently licked her. It was much like Jen’s warm, tickling tongue. Urga must have but some special herb into the fire to dull its bite.33

Amara heard a soft chanting and suddenly, she was aware of everything. The usually light patters of Urga’s feet became the giant clomping of a wild boar. Amara could feel the vibrations of life in the stone walls, the slow groaning of growing moss. There was life where Amara had thought there only death, the most obscure particle of dust becoming vibrant and living.34

And herself. She was aware of every drop of blood, every one of the soft hairs on her legs down to her broken fingernails. And her pulsating core, which had been quiet and lifeless, it sparked and danced with life.35

“Ud varg nathshala comacn”36

It was Urga’s rock like native language which she would never identify. She never understood it, has Urga would refuse to teach it to her. But now, while the words she could not comprehend, she knew what Urga was saying.37

Suddenly, a juggernaut of colors attacked Amara’s senses. Reds and blues and greens of all shades and colors Amara could not identify. Then everything faded away. There was no more Urga, no more colors, no more fire.38

Amara was suspended in an abyss full of twinkling stars. There was no sound, no feeling; just existing. A feeling of weightless emptiness pervaded her body and mind. Nothing existed except that moment. It was serenity.39

A white, hot flash interrupted her serene moment, coursing through her body in strange waves of heat and pleasure. Splotches of color dotted her vision and the cave gradually appeared again as Amara’s senses came back to her. Her chest heaved; Amara felt as though there was a vice around her lungs. Her weight came back to her, only it felt that at least three times what it normally was.40

And her vision; so very different from what she had seen before. There was a practical sharpness to her gaze, noticing out of place jars and the unsanitary dust upon some of the medicines. What had happened to her?41

She looked up to Urga, but no longer saw her as an old, untouchable aspiration, but as an equal.42

The corners of her mouth wrinkled into a faint, welcoming smile. “You are a woman now.”43

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Amara sat under the forbidden pear tree, gazing at the sunset with a new, hard meaningfulness. How did that ritual that Urga performed turn her into a woman? Like the sun, one could not turn a person into something new within a matter of minutes or however long that ritual took. She had always said it was experience and years that changed a person.45

Then why did she feel so different?46

Amara saw things differently. No longer did she feel any childish fascination with the ripples of the lake or the strange crawling bugs that tickled her skin. In its place, there was an emptiness that churned into a sadness that Amara could not explain. She felt lost, like a very small child who was looking at the huge world for the first time. Was this how a woman was supposed to feel? Or would it wear off, leaving the strange urge for some sort of fulfillment that had settled in her soul?47

A crack of a twig altered Amara to another presence; a presence that was not one she had ever felt before. She turned sharply and saw a human there. At least, she thought it was human. The stranger had the same tanned skin and black eyes as her and its hair was black, though shorter than hers. It was taller than her, broader in the torso and longer in the legs, but Urga said that people of every race were different in appearance. But this stranger had different features that Amara thought all those of her race had. It chest was completely flat and its tight leather pants outlined a bulge in the apex of its legs that Amara did not have.48

Was this a male of her race?49

Yes, he had to be. Amara studied him. His face had high cheek bones, full soft lips and compelling black eyes framed with long lashes. Her eyes racked over his muscular body and felt a strange heat consume her, much like how she felt in the fire. She found him handsome. She didn’t know how she did, but she did.50

She went back to those compelling eyes that were boring into hers. She felt her heart flutter as they sparkled with interest.51

They remained that way for a moment, male and female just staring at each other with interest and unknown attraction coursing in their veins. Finally he spoke.52

“Who are you? I thought no one lived in this valley,” he said in a voice deeper than hers, yet not as deep or as beautiful as Dao-Sing’s.53

Finding her voice, she replied, “Amara.”54

“Amara? That’s a pretty name.”55

“Thank you.”56

He sat next to her under the tree, his hip and forearm nearly brushing against hers. Amara became suddenly awkward by their closeness, claming up inside and out. She scooted a little away from him.57

“What is your name?” she asked.58

“Coran.”59

“Coran,” she repeated, rolling it on her tongue.60

Coran cocked his head, a question in his eyes. “Your accent is different. I’ve never heard anything like it.”61

Now Amara was confused. “Accent? What is that?”62

Coran looked incredulous now. “You don’t know what an accent is?”63

Amara felt her face burn with embarrassment. Apparently knowing what an accent was is something all humans should know. Desperate to escape her own stupidity and Coran’s disbelieving gaze, Amara rose and ran, despite Coran’s shouts for her to come back.64

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Asleep on her pallet by the dying fire, Amara reflected of everything that had happened that day. Dao-Sing’s coldness, the ritual, Coran. So much change in just one day. She just wanted to sleep and forget it all, hoping it would just another bad dream. As the fire completely died, Amara’s lids fell shut. But just before she completely lost consciousness, Amara felt a pair of strong arms encircle her waist as a body laid down next to hers.66