Nathaira - Soul of a Viper

Category:Fanfictions
Category:Fanfictions (Incomplete)
Category:Fanfictions (Fanon)
Category:Content (X.dragonlynx.X)
Awesome cover by Astralunar11! Open to other covers as well!
== emptiness ==
She awoke in a dark room.
Slowly she blinked her eyes open. Torches on the walls cast flickering firelight across the room. More of a cave than a room, she realized. There were blurry figures standing around her. Now they rushed up and loomed above her. She shrank away, rubbing her eyes.
"She's awake." Their hurried whispers echoed around the cave. "She's awake."
Her vision sharpened. There were four of them -- a willowy NightWing, a glittering IceWing, an older gray-blue-white dragonet and a younger ice-blue one. Hybrids?
"You're awake." It was the NightWing. His voice was hushed and awed.
Confusion swirled through her mind. She tried to remember.
"I -- I -- "
She was surprised to hear her own voice; although she spoke the words, they felt foreign coming out of her mouth. 
"I don't -- I can't -- who ... who are you?"
The IceWing tilted her head. "Are you alright? Can you remember what happened to you?"
"I ..." She searched her memory but could came up blank. Not a single memory before waking up in the cave. "Who ... am I?"
The adult dragons exchanged a worried glance.
"You can't remember anything?" the NightWing asked, very clearly concerned.
She shook her head. As she did, something caught her eye. Abruptly she sat up straight; the younger dragonet startled back, surprised. She held up one talon. There, in black ink: runes. Letters. A name.
Nathaira.
"I'm ... Nathaira," she said hesitantly. The name felt wrong on her tongue. It turned into a question as she repeated it: "I'm ... Nathaira?"
"Nathaira," repeated the NightWing with a puzzled expression.
She swallowed nervously and looked away. The name just didn't feel right.
"Who are you?" she asked, changing the subject. "Do I -- did I know you?"
"I --" began the NightWing.
"Of course," interrupted the IceWing, giving the other a sharp glance. "I'm Snowdrift, and this is Vaporflight, Fox and Aurora. We're ... your family, Nathaira."
My family, she thought in a daze. She studied the dragonets intently. Fox looked to be about six or seven -- her age? How old was she? -- with glittering silvery-white scales, ice-gray horns and black starlike patterns on his wings. Aurora was younger, maybe three, with pale ice-blue scales and soft violet undertones.
"Does this mean I'm a NightWing-IceWing, too?" she mumbled out loud.
"Well ..." Snowdrift shrugged helplessly and gestured at something on the ground. "See for yourself."
She climbed down from the makeshift bed where she'd been lying and saw that there was a small underground pond, reflecting the flickering torchlight. Somewhat nervously, she walked over to it and looked down. She gave a startled gasp.
Staring back at her was a tall dragonet with gleaming black scales, moon-silver wings, and striking, shadowy gray eyes.
"Whoa," she breathed. The dragon in front of her was beautiful, but a complete stranger. How could that possibly be her? That was Nathaira. But her?
She looked down at her own jet-black talons and turned her head to see silvery wing membranes. It is me. I'm her.
She sank down onto the cold, dark stone, overwhelmed. As she did, her tail swung around to wrap around her talons. She gave a little yelp and jumped back. The others looked down curiously. There was a venom barb at the end of her tail.
"Am I part SandWing?" she asked, surprised. She looked around at Fox and Aurora, and then at the two adults -- her parents? -- but none of them had barbs.
After a moment, Snowdrift said, "Your father is half SandWing." She gestured to Vaporflight.
My father.
There was an awkward silence.
"Fox," said Vaporflight meaningfully, "why don't you bring your sister to her room?"
"Sure," said Fox. He gave her a nervous grin. "C'mon, Nathaira."
She followed him into a side tunnel, studying him as she did. His tail was long and thin, and he had glittering gray icicles running down his back. There were starscales scattered under his wings, but inverted from normal NightWing starscales -- gleaming black against silver-white.
Overall, he looked to be a little bit small for his age. Kind of skinny, not very muscular. He didn't look like the type of dragon who spent a lot of time training physically; if she had to guess, she'd say he was more of a scrollwing. Still, he looked like he could be relatively quick if he needed to, just not very strong.
"How old are you?" she asked, breaking the silence.
"Six," he answered.
"How old ... am I?"
Fox glanced back at her. She realized that she was bigger than he was. Looking down at herself, she couldn't help but notice wickedly serrated claws and formidable leg muscles.
"Seven," said Fox after a moment.
"Oh." So I'm the oldest.
They lapsed into silence again, the clicks of their claws on the stone echoing throughout the tunnel.
Finally, Fox turned into a small cave. There was a stone bed on one side, and several empty shelves around the room.
"Uh ... this is your room." He gestured towards it with one wing.
"Oh," she said. "It's a little -- bare."
"Yeah," said Fox apologetically. "Sorry."
"It's fine." She hesitated. "Fox, what ... what happened to me? Why can't I remember anything? I've searched my mind over and over and there isn't a single memory. Not you, not Aurora, not your -- our parents. Not these caves. Not myself."
He looked uncomfortable. "I don't think I'm the best dragon to explain. Maybe we should discuss it with -- Mom and Dad. As a family, I mean."
She looked away. The tip of her tail quivered with impatience. "Can we do that now?"
"I -- um -- maybe you should get settled in your room first ..." Fox shifted his weight from talon to talon.
"What does that even mean?" she insisted. "I don't have any things! Where are my things?"
Fox burst out angrily, "I don't know, okay? If you want answers, go talk to Mom and Dad! I don't even know everything that happened!"
His ears were laid back, his spiky tail lashing and clattering. Suddenly he looked ashamed of his outburst and his face reddened. He turned and fled back to the main cave, leaving her alone with her thoughts.
Nathaira. Nathaira. Nathaira. The name echoed around in her mind. What kind of name is Nathaira, anyway?
She paced inside the small stone cave. The stone bed had a mattress of sand, soft grass, and maple leaves. Other than that, the room was completely empty. No collections, no jewelry, no toys, no personal possessions whatsoever. This room could have belonged to anyone -- or no one.
She wandered back down the tunnel and found the larger cave that she had been in earlier. It was deserted. A different, larger tunnel led out of the other side, and she could hear raindrops pattering from that direction. She guessed it must lead outside.
Turning back, she took to wandering the tunnels. There were at least four smaller caves that branched out from the main tunnel in addition to her own. She peeked inside one and saw shelves overflowing with scrolls, stone desks littered with inkpots, leaf designs, glass tools ... so many things. Scrolls lay strewn about, propped open by pens and paperweights; half-finished experiments were shunted off to the side to make way for new ones. She noticed a complicated talon-made tool sitting on the desk. It had a curved stone arm fitted with a thick glass lens, with several leaves and plants fastened beneath it. She wondered what the tool did to the leaves -- set them on fire, perhaps, if it were out in the sun?
The next room was full of color, so sudden and shockingly bright against the dull gray stone that she staggered back at the sight. There were leaves of different colors strung up in rainbow chains; small glass bottles containing juices, dyes, and inks in varying prismatic hues; shelves and walls covered in paper models, colored glass, stone carvings, paintings ... it was clear that the owner of this room had spent years on these creations. It was also evident from the varying degrees of quality in the art -- everything from simple ink-and-paper drawings to finely carved stone profiles. Big colorful letters painted on one wall of the room read "AURORA".
The personality in these caves was so clearly defined, so brilliantly expressed. So why would Nathaira, the oldest of the three, have absolutely zero?
The next room was bigger and had a short tunnel that branched off from the main tunnel and led to it. But the entrance was blocked by a carefully woven door of thick vines and stone clasps. She could tell just by looking at it that it required a special claw or key to open from the outside. She thought she heard voices and crept forward on silent talons, pressing one ear against the vines to listen, but couldn't make out any words. She could tell her parents were having some sort of hushed conversation.
The final cave was some sort of storage room. She saw slabs of stone and wood, boxes of dried fruits and nuts, and several more containers filled with various items.
"-- Nathaira?"
She jumped at the voice behind her and whirled around in a defensive stance. Her body automatically moved without thinking, only she understood what she was doing. She felt her talons instinctively spread for power and better use of her claws. Her weight shifted, allowing for better balance in case she needed to spring, and her barbed tail whipped upwards, ready to strike. Her talons twitched towards her chest and hip as if they wanted to take something out of a pouch -- no, unsheathe something.
She wanted to draw a knife.
But it was only Snowdrift and Vaporflight, who startled back. She curled in her claws and loosened her stance, embarrassed -- and frightened.
No evident personality. Used to carrying a knife. Instinctively ready to attack -- and kill. A shiver ran down her spine.
Who am I?
== fragments ==
She lay in the mossy bed, tossing and turning.
After encountering her parents, they had told her that Fox and Aurora had gone out hunting and would be back soon, and that she should get some rest because it was late. Her siblings came back shortly afterwards, and they too retired for the night. But no matter how much she tried, she couldn't sleep.
Snowdrift and Vaporflight had told her the whole story earlier that day. That she'd had been Fox and Aurora's older sister all her life. That she'd gone for a swim and turned up on the beach a day later, scratched up and unconscious. That they had nursed her back to health, but she had somehow lost all her memories by the time she woke up.
Nothing made sense. Why couldn't she remember anything? And if she could ... would she want to remember?
Every part of her brain screamed YES! With her memories back, she could figure everything out. She hated being clueless.
But deep within her heart, she was frightened of who she really might be. Who Nathaira really was.
Finally, after many hours of restlessness, she slipped into sleep.
She was running after Fox and Aurora. The three laughed and played together, chasing each other around a wide, grassy meadow. The sun shone down on them, bringing out hidden colors in their scales.
All of a sudden, a cloud passed over the sun. The light grew dim. Thunder rumbled in the distance. Aurora and Fox screamed, stumbling backwards. She took a menacing step towards them, claws twitching, ready to strike ...
I can't do this, she thought. She no longer had control of her own body. She watched herself step closer, and closer ... her talon drew a gleaming knife from the air ...
The three dragonets screamed as one as the knife came down. All of a sudden it grew even darker. The younger dragonets vanished, and another dragon came out of the smoke. A tall, shadowy black dragon, so dark that his scales seemed to absorb light. As she watched, his face morphed into a menacing grin, revealing jagged silver teeth.
"You shouldn't have done that, Nathaira," the dragon cackled. "Now you will pay."
She woke up with a shock. The moss and leaves of her bed were sticky and damp with cold sweat. Relief washed over her as she realized it was only a dream, but the cold fear in her heart did not fade.
She slid off of the stone bed and silently padded out to the main cave. She needed time alone with her thoughts. A little nervously, she took the entrance cave and emerged into dim moonlight. She gasped.
Lying before her was a wide, grassy meadow, just like the one in her dream. But now silver starlight reflected softly off the grass, and the sky was a black void dotted with points of light. It was beautiful.
And it was terrifying.
***
Nathaira lay on the grass with her talons crossed in front of her, looking intently at the large checkered square board and the little colored scales strewn across it. The sun was warm on her back and the ground cool beneath her claws.
"So if I move this piece," she said, carefully picking up a blue scale between two claws, "and put it here" -- she moved it forward two squares and set it down -- "I've captured this square?"
Fox, who was sitting across the playing board from her, beamed. "You're picking this up fast," he commented.
Nathaira shrugged. "I suppose it's because I already knew how to play ... you know, before ..."
Fox didn't respond right away, but recaptured a square without looking at her. "I suppose," he said finally. He glanced up at his sister, who was watching from a few feet away. 
Nathaira could feel Aurora's eyes on her and felt her scales grow hot. She shifted uncomfortably and suddenly wished they weren't outside. The little white dragon hadn't as much as met her eyes since she'd woken up in that cave. It made Nathaira wonder if Aurora, too, had seen what she had seen in her nightmares ...
"Your turn," came Fox's voice from across from her, jolting Nathaira back into the moment.
Fox had spent the last half an hour teaching -- or reteaching -- her how to play scales-and-squares, his favorite board game. It was quickly becoming Nathaira's new favorite game, too; she gazed raptly at the board, trying to analyze Fox's strategy. His position was a lot stronger than hers at the moment, seeing as Nathaira was only just learning how to play, but she'd picked up the overall gameplay pattern and had already devised a couple of strategies. It looked like Fox was aiming for her most fortified position on the board, where the majority of her scales guarded a mass of squares. No ... that couldn't be right. It must be a decoy; she'd easily defeat him if he attacked there. It was far too obvious. Where else could he be targeting? There was a group of scales off to the side that he might be trying to attack ... unless it was another trick, and he was aiming for the larger group after all ...
Making her decision, Nathaira moved a scale to protect the less well-defended group of squares. Fox moved again towards the obvious squares, and Nathaira captured another one of his off to the side, deliberately ignoring the decoy. Two turns later, his scale breached the larger group of scales and Fox won the game.
Nathaira gritted her teeth. "It was a trick! You were aiming there after all!"
Fox grinned at her, looking a little puzzled. "Of course I was aiming there. Why on earth would it be a trick?"
She stared at him. "But it was so obvious! I would have defeated you easily!"
"That was the point," said Fox, tipping his head so that the sun reflected off of his silvery horns. "I was teaching you how to play."
"Oh," mumbled Nathaira. Feeling embarrassed, she stood up and started helping Fox clean up the game. She could still feel Aurora's gaze on her back. She probably thinks I'm an idiot, or that I'm crazy. Maybe she knows I am -- she's lived with me for three years, after all ...
Nathaira felt a wingtip gently nudge her own and she jumped, startled. Fox was standing next to her, a warm smile on his face. "Don't worry about it," he said. "I can already tell you're a natural. Probably because of all the time you've spent playing it before."
Was it her imagination, or was there hesitation in his voice?
Plucking a last green square from the grass and dropping it into the little bag Fox was holding up, Nathaira turned around and then hesitated before trying to meet her sister's eyes.
Aurora may have been young and pretty, but her gaze was colder than the IceWingish chill radiating from her scales. Nathaira tore her eyes away, but there was still ice in her heart as she stumbled, dejected, after Fox, back to the caves. Back to the home of Fox and Aurora and Vaporflight and Snowdrift. Back to the cold, bare room that could have belonged to a stranger. Back to the family that felt anything but hers.
***
"Nathaira?"
She was lying on the grassy mattress of her stone bed. She shifted, turning to look at the entrance to the cave; leaves pricked her uncomfortably as she did so.
Snowdrift stood at the door, watching her uncertainly. "How are you doing?"
Nathaira gazed at the IceWing without speaking. No matter how hard she tried to remember, or to think of her as "her mother" in her head, Snowdrift was still little more than a stranger to her.
"What did I call you?" Nathaira asked abruptly.
Snowdrift gave a little jump, and then asked with a puzzled expression, "Sorry?"
"You and Vaporflight. What did I call you? Mom and Dad? Ma and Pa? Mother and Father?"
"Er ..." Snowdrift frowned. "Mom. Mom and Dad."
Nathaira didn't respond. She shifted on the bed again, not liking how the maple leaves rubbed against her scales. She picked one up and examined it. It was bright red and thick, with a leathery texture and edges that were coarse and prickly. Last night, she'd been too preoccupied to care about the leaves of her bed, but now she was noticing more than ever how fresh they were.
"Mom," she said hesitantly, the word tasting unfamiliar in her mouth, "How often do you -- we -- replace these mattresses?" She gestured to her bed.
"Oh, not too often," said Snowdrift, still looking confused. "A good mattress usually lasts us several years. Er -- yours is new," she added, "your old one had worn quite thin. I didn't want you to be cold on your first night since-- well."
An awkward silence seemed to stretch between the two of them. Nathaira gazed at the bare stone wall opposite her, refusing to meet the IceWing's eyes. Out of the corner of her vision, she saw Snowdrift shift uneasily. Something cold seemed to trickle down Nathaira's spine.
It's not just the obvious newness of this mattress, Nathaira thought to herself uneasily. She was in an incredibly vulnerable position, laying with her legs folded underneath her on the mossy, uneven surface of the bed. The soft mattress sank under her weight, which would make getting into a fighting position an incredibly difficult feat.
It made her feel horribly weak and sluggish. Nathaira hated it. She wished she could just dump the entire mattress on the ground and sleep on the stone.
"Is something wrong, Nathaira?"
Slowly she turned to finally meet her mother's eyes. They were wide and blue and ... frightened.
When Nathaira spoke, her voice was colder than ice. Only the slightest tremble in her words gave away the horrified rage pulsing through her blood.
"Tell me, Mother. What made you decide erase my mind?"
***
"Erase your--?" Snowdrift look startled.
"My mind, my memories, my personality -- call it whatever," snapped Nathaira. "Don't think I haven't noticed."
"Noticed what?" There was a scared look in the IceWing's eye now. Haunted, even.
Nathaira slid off the bed and stood facing Snowdrift, her muscles tense. She took a deep breath to keep her voice steady as she said, "The way you look at me. You and Vaporflight both. The way you look scared when I talk to you, the way you jump when you notice me." Her words were tumbling over each other now. Control. Control. But her voice only rose. "The way you avoid me. The way you change the subject or look nervous when I bring up my past. THIS ROOM HAS NOTHING!"
Snowdrift jumped, her eyes wide. "I--"
"Fox and Aurora," she snarled. "You see their rooms and you can instantly tell what kind of dragons they are. They have so many things, things they've made, things they're passionate about. Me? NOTHING! This room is completely bare, with nothing but a stone bed and a fresh mattress. It's as though I have no ... personality ... at ... all." These last words were drawn out in a low hiss.
Snowdrift gaped, speechless.
"Fox alone," Nathaira said, her voice shaking now, "Fox alone of the four of you has tried to find me, to reach me, to talk to me. But even he doesn't answer all of my questions. Even he gets nervous when I mention anything from before. And Aurora ..." Her voice cracked. "Aurora ... she h-hates me."
She sank to the ground, her limbs quaking, as she remembered the cold hatred in the little dragonet's eyes. A single cold tear slipped down the side of her face. She could feel shadows closing in around her, embracing her, suffocating her light. She was her own victim. That beautiful, knife-wielding silver dragon was coming for her next.