I started my testing before dawn, away from the basin.
The vent, while warm and comfortable, was too close to the tribe and Aerlinn to be experimenting. More importantly, I do not know how they would react to a manifestation of Dark Sorcery, so I climbed to a shelf of stone above the valley but hidden from patrols.
The hum answered the moment I called for it.
It stirred in my ribs like a second heartbeat before spreading through my bones and muscles. Unlike my fire, which always was hot and eager in my throat, the power was ice cold and calm as it flowed through my blood.
I held the reinforcement as long as I could before I exhaled, relaxing my grip on it. Once released, it slithered back to the reservoir in my chest. Spent and recuperating. Not affecting my emotions.
I continued to practice its use and see what else I could do. It merged with my flame with unnatural ease and made my fire sharper, more piercing, but limited it are of effect.
The hum receded.
Again. Inhale. Gather. Release. Stop.
By the tenth time, the rhythm felt easier and there was no resistance like when I first started. The pressure still built, but now it was like an eager puppy waiting for direction instead of a reluctant wolf.
I stopped there and climbed back down as the sound of activity below increased with the rising sun.
That became the routine.
I would wake before the tribe and practice my "magic" away from prying eyes. No one questioned my disappearance though they were obviously noticed. Aerlinn observed. Ráni watched. The rest of the tribe didn't seem to care much.
The first thing I learned was that the power liked movement.
I could combine it with my flame, but it seemed to prefer doing its own thing. For now, just reinforcing my body. At first, I only used it to reinforce the appendage I was attacking with, swiping at the air with my claws. They sank deeper into the rock and cut the air in a piercing whistling. The more I used the less temperamental I was. I needed to find a way to use it constantly.
The months passed and my control improved.
First, one limb. Then, two. Three. Eventually I could move and maintain the flow through me. I pushed myself to walk and climb further and further. Training my recovering body and control at the same time.
I kept the power hidden from the village throughout, unsure of their reaction.
Still, it was no secret. When I returned from my training, Ráni would give me a contemplating look but never asked me anything. I was sure he had an idea.
Aerlinn would silently watch when I came back trembling from over-exertion or out of breath from using too much power. She said nothing and only offered me water. Thankfully, not poisoned. I think.
The seasons turned. As much as they could in a frozen wasteland.
Snow buried old paths and melted as new ones found their way. Children who once pestered Aerlinn with endless questions started joining her on hunts and helping dress the kills. The younger hunters grew broader in shoulders and more experienced in their step. Ráni's beard thickened and grey started to creep in at the edges.
Something I teased him about with fondness.
Aerlinn remained.
Sometimes she would leave for a few days and return with new arrows or little bits of information she shared with Ráni. Most of the time she hunted with the tribe, listened to the stories, and chatted with me in between.
She started to smile more and laugh at silly jokes. The loneliness that cloaked her figure when we first met slowly melted away.
I noticed more than I wanted to. More than I should.
The second thing I learned was that I could extend the power away from my body. The first time it happened was by accident.
I was standing on a ridge, watching the southern skies without any particular concern, when I had the idea to use the power outside of my body. I concentrated and the pressure started building behind my eyes, my brain buzzing, as I felt like I was lifting a mountain as I extended my senses to a pebble on the ground. The effort was monstrous as I lifted the thing about two inches before it clattered to the ground.
My control spent and the exertion in magnitudes, I passed out.
Aerlinn later found me and I was subjected to weeks of teasing.
The years became decades in that way. Softly and without notice, time flowed.
I hunted as I needed to, watched the valley, and kept testing. I had forgotten.
My body was long-lived. I would see a thousand years, according to my Mother, in the blink of an eye. I had never thought about it until I attended the old lady's funeral. The one who gave me a bone necklace when I first settled them in the basin.
Ráni had noticeable wrinkles and the children were grown up. Aerlinn and I stood among friends and people we had known since their birth, not aged a day, and for the first time since my mother's death, I felt despair.
The reason Aerlinn stayed near me even though she was better integrated into the village than even I and the hidden sadness I sometimes glimpsed in her eyes. I finally understood.
Watching the pyre burn, I gently curled my tail around her as she watched on, stoic and unflinching. Glancing at me, she relaxed into the scales, her lithe elven body not heavy at all. Dragons never really stopped growing but I had finished my rapid growth period, so she weighed nothing.
I couldn't even enjoy her embrace, my mind clouded by grief and sorrow.
Time waited for no one though and the specialty of humans is the ability to adapt. A new elder took her role and the village moved on, in what felt like the blink of an eye to me. I resented it for a while before realizing I was being an idiot. I was human once too.
I discovered a third use for the power a while later.
I had noticed a small change while reinforcing my body. A claw narrowing slightly before returning to its usual shape, the angle of a joint shifting to better allow my tail to smack an orc across a valley, and my scales tightening closer when an orc with a mace got lucky.
At first I thought it was my imagination, but then I tested it deliberately.
I focused on one claw. The hum gathered as I tried to compress and force my intent through it. The length shortened by a fraction and returned to normal once I was startled out of concentration. I expected backlash, but none came.
That changed the course of my testing entirely.
I pushed the boundaries of this new ability, not recklessly, but with determination. I kept it small, a claw first. A talon next. The thickness of a scale on my foreleg. The set of a joint in my shoulder. Tiny changes, held for a few breaths, then released.
My body resisted, like trying to squeeze one more pickle in a jar, but eventually it started listening.
I changed after the funeral. I could not bring myself to be as involved with the tribe as I once was, though Ráni never left me alone. I found myself thinking in solitude or chatting with Aerlinn about her day.
I know I shouldn't. It's not healthy. But I was built for solitude, literally.
The scars along my ribs faded under new scales that grew in. My wing healed back to full use, though the rough scars that healed remained clearly visible. My shoulder stopped bothering me and my flight time returned to my prime. My patrol area expanded to the same size as before I left for Utum so long ago.
One evening, the hunters returned in silence, an uneasy air about them. I immediately noticed and made my way out of my cave, having left the vent years ago. I looked to Aerlinn, but she was frowning while staring at a rock, not sure what it did to upset her.
Turning my head to Ráni, he just shook his head at me before glancing at Aerlinn. The rest of the hunters were also giving her curious glances. I am confused.
Turning back to Aerlinn, I watched her as she worked though whatever was going on. Eventually, I got no clarification as Aerlinn went to sleep still frowning.
The next morning, she told me she had to leave. I had just finished up my morning training and returned to a packed bag and a fully geared Aerlinn sitting on it, stewing. She was clearly upset to leave, but I stopped and settled in to wait for her to speak.
Finally, she lifted her head and softened her gaze as her eyes met mine.
"I have to leave," she all but whispered. Her eyes dropping as irritation flashed through them.
"Where to," I asked, amused.
Hearing the amusement in my voice, her head snapped up and a glare bore a hole into my skull.
I couldn't help but grin.
She could only roll her eyes, a semblance of a pout forming at the corner of her lips.
Adorable.
The humor eventually slipped from her face as she regarded me with seriousness.
"For how long?" I asked tentatively.
"I do not know," she replied, frustration clear.
The answer stirred an unpleasantness in my chest, different from the hum. I swallowed it before it reached my face.
"Why now?" I asked.
She adjusted the strap on her shoulder. "Because I am a scout and my King expects a report."
A king. A kingdom. I had almost forgotten about the rest of Middle-Earth. The only reminder being the occasional Orc raids.
"Which one?"
She held my gaze for a moment before it drifted to the south. "One that still remembers the dark things of the world, even if most would forget."
"Does this 'one' have a name?"
"Lindon. Ruled by his highness, King Gil-galad."
She said it with a firmness and respect I had seen in my old life, when his old friends who went to war talked about a respected officer.
Ráni approached then, interrupting our conversation, a bundle of dried meat and furs in his hands. I felt shame for almost snapping at him.
He offered them to Aerlinn with a tender smile, like a father seeing his daughter leave to confront the world.
She accepted it with a nod and the three of us stood there in silence, the kind hunters seem to understand as not a 'good bye', but, instead, a 'see you again.'
The tribe gathered as she started making her way out, pack secured. Children tugged at her cloak and cried when she rubbed their heads. One of the older women pressed a small bone charm into her palm and started lecturing on staying warm while everyone watched on with tears in their eyes. The hunters clasped forearms and smiled at her. She was one of them.
None of us knew if she would ever return, not even herself.
I remained where I was, watching it all happen. I think a part of me still didn't believe she was leaving, just like that. No warning, no time to prepare.
Abruptly as she entered my life, she left just as quickly.
As her waving silhouette disappeared over the edge of the basin, the anger, disbelief, and sadness welled inside of me. I am selfish. I am ungrateful. I wanted her to stay despite her duties.
Maybe she comes back and this is all pointless, maybe she never comes back at all.
My roar ripped the sky. The earth trembled at my anger, but more than anything I wanted to let her know.
She had a home to come back to.