Cairn: A Dragon Memoir: Legends of the Aurora, #2

By Rebecca Ferrell Porter

What do vengeful whales, an orphaned fawn, and tattooed dragons have to do with the Northern Lights? Everything. 
Troika never knew life in the lair. Orphaned the night of his hatching, he trudges through the world painfully unaware of what it truly means to be dragon. Then the voice invades his dreams, and he knows what must be done. Ignoring Aurora is unthinkable, but Troika has already fulfilled his destiny, and he has no reason to risk his life for dragons he barely remembers. Still, nobody denies an Elemental, and certainly not a dragon of the Sapphire clan. But is she calling him home to die, or will he expose the brutal killer before he becomes the next murder victim? 

Silver Medal Winner - 2014 Independent Wishing Shelf Book Award 
Best of 2014 Design Crowd Winner - Book Cover 

This fun coming of age mystery penetrates the world of dragons, a society filled with smoke and lies where honorable wishes are warped by vague memories and unfathomable greed. 
The Legends of the Aurora trilogy fuses natural phenomena to a veil of magic, and guides you on an action packed adventure dripping with humor into a Norse landscape populated by reinvigorated trolls, dragons, and fairies. 
Interview with the Author 

Why a female lead? I'm certainly not the first to chose a female protagonist for my fantasy novel, but it seems trolls are often portrayed as male. I decided to bring the softer side of trolldom to my readers. Gaven's struggles will rip your heart out, but she will find her inner core of steel, I promise. 

Many people think of fairies as sweet or at least benign, but you have taken an opposite approach, why? I'm most influenced by the old stories, and if you've read them, you already know the fey were not sweet and innocent to our ancestors. Besides, somebody had to be the bad guy. 

You add a lot of humor to the dangerous situations, is that difficult? Not at all. I'm always conscience of my readers and when things get too heavy, I add a dash of quirky fun. Dragons, and more often trolls, have been portrayed as angry creatures by many. I've chosen a different path. 

What makes this Historical Fantasy? The Legends of the Aurora trilogy poses an alternate history to real historical facts. I begin with Blue on the Horizon in 1897 Norway. Then Cairn: A Dragon Memoir is set 13 years later in 1910. The trilogy will end 63 years after it began, or the length of one human life, one very special human's life. It's Historical Fantasy because I'm sharing the adventures of mythology creatures set in our known past. The reader may even recognize the humans as possible ancestors.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rebecca Ferrell Porter
• Release date: Mar 8, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524293918

Book preview

Part One

Madness

Chapter 1

The madness was descending. Troika’s vision had narrowed and his ears felt muffled, but he could smell the hot breath of the crow sleeping in the tree above and the waterlogged feathers of the ducks along the far shore. This time, he would fight it. He was determined to consume only the vegetation, but he feared he would soon be little more than an empty larder with gnashing teeth to speed delivery. Troika inhaled deeply, struggling to quiet the madness before it overwhelmed him. Again, the scent of duck came. Eleven—no, thirteen slumbering waterfowl were close. The five males and eight females would be lean after the long winter, but meat was meat. He must fight back. He focused on the cattail just beginning to break the water’s surface. He knew the heartbeat that the first mouthful of food passed his gullet, he would be lost to the madness, but if he could begin with cattail, the animals might have time to flee. Troika stood at the edge of the river that defined the western boundary of Elvsmyr, but he could not feel the mud between his toes. The madness had taken that sense as well. The full moon, reflected in the ripples at the base of the cattail, sent waves of light toward him. Hawksquat. He would have to swim if he wanted to eat cattail tonight.

It was a battle between his needs and his desires. He sensed food on this side of the river, food more appropriate for a dragon, but he had never shaken his passion for cattail. He tried to ignore the tantalizing aroma of carrion floating on the breeze, but his instincts were winning. Troika turned away, but he slipped in the mud and toppled into the water with a splash. At least the ducks had taken flight. They would be safe, this time. Troika detested water. Even before his feathers had pushed their way through the crevices in his scaly skin, water had repelled him, but the Fates had chosen the river.

Troika pushed against the current. Still fed from the snow pack lingering in the deep shadows, the river was frigid, the flow, strong. He wasted no time devouring the cattail shoots, and only narrowly resisted the urge to yank their succulent roots from the mud. They would live to be eaten again. With the first intake of solid food in five moon cycles, his digestive system roared to life. Cramps twisted his body; the urge to eat was overwhelming. He barely noticed when his eyesight changed. Colors dissolved, well, most of them. Green jumped out from a gray world, but his instincts sought the motion of prey. The madness was deepening.

He made his way back across the river where he stood on the bank, dripping. His partially feathered body, shivered in the wind. Without thinking, he spread his wings and shook them violently while curtains of water flung from his flight feathers. A heartbeat later, his scaly flesh began to quiver, faster and faster, until it had expelled the water from both scale and feather, but he could still feel drips coming from his crest. Annoying, but he pushed it aside. Hunger propelled him forward. He stumbled on thick, muscular hind legs, his arms reaching out to shove anything edible into his mouth. He dived, face-first, into a bramble of vines. Tender shoots disappeared down his throat. His teeth, designed to rip meat from bone, sliced through the vegetation as if it were nothing. He pushed on, tearing everything green from the earth until the haze of hunger began to lift from his brain.

That was when he remembered the dream.

Hibernation was a necessity for dragons. The deep sleep had come for him as soon as the last tree had surrendered its leaves to the coming snows. Troika had returned to his cozy cave and settled on his nest, already groggy. He did not remember much after that—at least not until tonight when he had dreamed of the nursery and his mother at his side. He remembered her warmth and he could still hear her heartbeat pounding in his ears, but then the voice had intruded.

Your clan is in danger. The voice was both heavy with emotion and light as fog.

Troika recalled shifting, dislodging a stone from his nest. I never knew my clan. What is that to me?

And the Guardian is dying.

Troika had limited awareness of the Guardians, but his scales knew their importance. It was like that so often. His scales were steeped in the knowledge of the dragons, but he had been denied the memories. It was not supposed to work that way, but he had been separated from his clan on the night of his hatching.

Yes, Troika you are truly special. Only the Promised One would understand without contact with the clans. You must come home, Troika. Your clan needs you.

It had been many seasons since a voice had invaded his dreams and the demanding tone had flared his anger. Who are you?

The voice took on a melodic quality. I am known to all, but seen by few.

The cloaked conversation had grown tedious. I was sent away, harnessed to a destiny far from my kind. I’ve done what was expected of me. I have nothing left to give.

Then all is lost. The world as we know it will be no more.

His path had always revealed itself in dreams, and Troika knew this message was important, but he had already fulfilled his destiny, hadn’t he? He sighed, as the heavy mantle of duty settled on his shoulders. It seemed the hideous hags of Fate had dipped their bony fingers in the pool to stir his soul from its comfortable existence.

The hags of Fate always won. He would be leaving soon. He had better learn to use his wings for more than warming his twisted tail, but first—the madness was again taking control.

Hideous hags of Fate.

Chapter 2

Leaf pulled her hair back and twisted it into a knot. It would not hold. It never did, but it bothered her when it hung in her eyes. For the first time, she considered snipping it short, but she just as quickly banished the thought.

She could see Troika in the distance. Fresh from hibernation he would be ravenous, dangerous to be around. When he was younger, and smaller, the trolls had welcomed him to their midnight feast, but then, he had grown larger than the human’s bull, but only by half. Then, in his seventh turning of the seasons, his wings matured. They were studded with glossy, black feathers and his armored breast was buried beneath a dense covering of downy feathers. Leaf rather liked the trail of feathers snaking up the back of his neck to an expressive crest that betrayed his emotions. Volumes were shared by those vivid blue crest feathers. But as Troika had grown, he had undergone a metamorphosis greater than the mere cosmetic. His snout had extended, and dozens of saber-like teeth had appeared. Still, the trolls had accepted these changes. They loved Troika and when the madness of the hibernation had passed, he loved them. However, the spring he emerged on two legs the situation was forever changed.

Troika had once tried to describe the madness to her. He had said it was as if his brain had been removed from his skull and placed on a spit. It sizzled and burned, crackled and popped. He had no memory of his frenzy, only the spit, and the raging flames. He had admitted he could see their faces, wide in horror, their throats screaming, but their words never penetrated the smoke. Except, one voice did. Hers. Leaf and Troika shared a bond that was wrapped around the madness. It was her duty to protect him from the flames.

Leaf climbed her favorite maple. The vine pathway still wrapped around its trunk, but it was now a sapling transformed into a tree. Her favorite branch hung at a dizzying height, but Leaf was fearless. She loved the way she felt up in her tree. Even the wind felt different, and for once, everyone was forced to look up at her, a thrilling victory when you are the shortest troll in the village.

Leaf watched Troika emerge from the river; his massive wings were black against the moon, and the rich scent of the earth wafted up her nostrils when he shook the muddy water from his feathers. A heartbeat later, he was coming her way and she melded with the branch. She knew dragons required meat and she did not want to be on his menu of madness, but when he passed below, she had to fight to keep from plucking the burrs from his crest. He was in need of a thorough preening, but it would have to wait.

Troika moved away, further upriver, on the hunt for even more food. Baby bunnies, rodents, and animals too old to run would meet their doom tonight. Leaf reached out for the lullaby. The earth’s song had always come to her when she needed it, but it had grown incredibly responsive these past few seasons. She closed her eyes and allowed the lullaby to take some of her pain. She felt nauseous when she was near death. So nauseous, she had decided to forego meat in her own menu. The cooks were confused at first, but then they had shrugged. The fields provided a surplus of fruits and vegetables. What did they care?

Thoughts of the fields always brought Leaf back to that night. The one when Slug had given his life for hers. He too would have changed, and even though he did not want to end up tending the fields like his parents, Leaf knew it would have been his fate. Slug had had a gift. Plants had seemed to reach up for his touch, but Leaf could not linger on thoughts of her fallen hero. She needed to stay focused on Troika. Someone had to watch over him in his madness. When his belly was finally full, he would collapse, and she would be there to guide him home. She only hoped he had the wherewithal to stay away from the humans. In the distance, Troika was slowing, the madness, falling away. She ran along the vine to the ground. Troika needed her.

Troika did not know where he was. He remembered the river, the cattails, and the first flowers of spring, but he could feel fur wedged between his teeth. It had happened. Again. At least no one was around to see it this time. He fell to the ground with the earth’s song vibrating in his ears, and his bloated belly tightened. What if the voice in his dream belonged to the songstress? Troika knew the she was a trickster. His mother’s memories had been clear when they had seeped into his scales. Never question the song; you must not listen for the words. If only there had been more time. Time. The voice was calling him home: home to the lair, the clan living inside, and the memories that clung to their scales.

Clever Crones of Fate.

Chapter 3

Leaf’s bare feet were practiced in the art of silence, and it was a good thing because she needed to approach the dragon carefully. She had spent many nights stalking the forest animals just to see if she could get closer and they never sensed her presence. She was fascinated by the variety of animals living in the valley, but the dragon required extra stealth in the early spring.

Troika shifted, and raised his snout to sniff the almost imperceptible breeze. The madness has dimmed—for now, little one.

Sunshine. She had been noticed. Mor is losing the sky and the sun won’t be far behind.

Troika rubbed his distended belly. I really tried this time, but I can feel their blood mixing with my own.

Leaf fought to keep her recent meal of roasted onion in place. I know. I heard them screaming.

Troika moaned, and let his head fall back against the earth. I’m sorry.

It was the madness. They understand. Leaf was not naïve. She understood the importance of the predator in a healthy world, but she did not have to choose to be one.

Liar.

She winced. The animals had been frightened, but she took solace in the instantaneous nature of their deaths. She had struggled to understand Troika’s needs, but trolls and dragons were very different. Still, Leaf felt drawn to Troika, and she understood his reluctance to expose his unique nature because she was unique as well. Her mother, Gaven, had been conjured from bits of troll mole and magic but she looked very much like the other trolls—if you ignored her sky-blue eyes and the three pale-blue fairy wings jutting from her spine. But Leaf’s father, Uredd, was pure troll. Born at the fabled—and doomed—village of Breen, he was revered as the slayer of fairies. Uredd had succeeded where Slug had failed. A mix of both magic and troll, the Fates had seen fit to give Leaf the appearance of the fairies, but she had been spared the embarrassment of wings. Leaf had smooth, pinkish flesh and long, wavy brown hair that never seemed to tangle. Leaf was a short, ugly trollkin.

She knew she should move past her trollkin seasons and grow up, but until her true fate materialized, she remained rooted in place and chained to a false fate. She had discovered the secret locked inside the amber, except Leaf knew it had been an accidental discovery. From her earliest memories, she had played with stones. She would rub them against each other or anything handy. She called them her worry stones, but she never hung on to them for long. Only one rule applied: never bring a worry stone home because it carried all of her uncomfortable emotions. As the stone wore down, her feeling drifted away on the wind, and it had worked. At least until one morning when she had lingered too long at the river. The sun was already shooting its blinding rays across the horizon when Leaf had dashed inside their home at the base of the oak tree. She would never forget her horror when she realized that night’s worry stone was still in her bloody grasp.

Leaf was still stunned by the serendipity of the morning. Just before hurling the amber outside, the sunlight had filtered through the thin, honey-colored stone. That heartbeat, Leaf discovered the magic. Inside that simple sliver of stone, the sun lost its power to blind, and a new dawn had begun for the trolls. But this was not Leaf’s true path because she felt no connection to the amber. It was merely a lifeless object resting on her palm when she ground the golden gem into sunshields.

Amber had become Leaf’s nemesis, but she still cared about the grinding station. Folger had recently come upon a large chunk of amber nestled between the gnarled roots of a delicate willow. Extraction had taken many nights because Leaf had insisted they do everything they could to save the tree. Eventually, the willow gave up its prize and Folger had hauled it off to be ground. Demand for sunshields never waned as word of the discovery spread throughout the villages. That was why Leaf had been waiting for Troika to wake from his hibernation. It was a welcome break from her tedious fate.

Come on Troika. Get up, before the humans find us in their pasture.

The dragon stayed flat on his back but he raised his head. His long, flexible neck made moves like that possible. Leaf stifled a chuckle. The floppy feathers on his crest were ragged and falling out. Looks like it’s time to molt, too.

Troika ran an unsheathed claw down his breast. Nope, these are new.

Well, those crest feathers are a mess. Trust me. You have more molting to do.

Troika started to stand, moaning when his bones crunched against one another as his weight repositioned on his frame. Hawksquat, I missed the midnight meal.

Leaf rolled her eyes. She could not imagine where he put it all, but he always stuffed massive amounts of food down his throat after hibernation. It would subside, eventually. Come on, I’m sure we can find something to eat. She reached into her pocket with practiced fingers and quickly tied her sunshield to her head. A flick of first finger and the amber flipped down over her eyes.

A few trolls had gathered in the dawn near the cooking pit. Most of the elders were adapting to life under the sun. But Sint, the former curmudgeon of Elvsmyr, seemed to relish the warmth, although he rarely stood in the sun’s path. The stragglers parted to allow the dragon passage. Leary eyes were locked on Troika’s every movement while he devoured the last of the rutabagas and slurped the lingering grease from the cauldron. You can relax, the madness has quieted, Leaf said before retreating into herself. She was tired, and the stress of the night was taking its toll.

It was only when Sint shoved a fluffy dandelion into each hairy ear canal and honked like a lovesick goose that she laughed. It was difficult to remember what Sint had been like before the battle, but if she squinted, she could still see the sneer on his thin face when he had screamed Abomination at her. That was all in the past now. Sint finally had the reward he had always wanted: friends.

Leaf heard Smekk long before she saw her. Her best friend’s giggle came from amidst a cluster of male admirers. She had been shocked when Smekk had not taken a mate at the last Promise Festival, but she was not surprised by the male attention her friend commanded. Smekk was gorgeous. From the top of her mole covered, lumpy head to the bottom of her broad feet, Smekk was all trolless.

Trolless—there it was again. Leaf was well past her seasons at the learning stones, and already far down her false path, but she continued to cling to her trollkin ways. Leaf wanted to grow up, but not if it meant a life of drudgery. She knew the work was important, but there had to be more.

Movement near the river pulled her attention from Smekk. Gaven appeared under a waxing moon, her three wings glinting as she walked toward home. Leaf yawned and decided to follow her. It had been a long night, and Troika was already wandering back to his nest. He would be safe, for now, so Leaf trudged home.

Her mother seemed surprised to see her. Are you ill? You never come to bed at dawn.

I’m fine, Mama—just bored.

Gaven smiled and revealed her lovely, crooked teeth. Avoiding the grinding station again, aren’t you?

Leaf looked away. Maybe.

I was heading out to gather some mushrooms. The morels are best when picked with the dew still clinging to their craggy caps. Would you like to help?

Leaf shrugged and retrieved a basket. It was not exactly what she had hoped for, but she followed her mother up the hill to the corpse of an elm tree. They dropped to their knees and began to paw through the forest litter in search of the camouflaged fungi. Leaf was wrapped up in the tedious exercise when Gaven again spoke. Are you excited about the Promise Festival later this summer?

Leaf took a deep breath. If that’s your not-so-subtle way of asking if I’m ready to find a mate, the answer is, no. Besides, nobody wants me. I mean, look at me, I’m hideous. Leaf knew she was ugly. Her skin was too smooth and her hair was too soft. Nobody wanted a skinny troll who looked like a fairy.

I wish you would stop saying that. There’s somebody out there for you ... there was once, and there will be again. 

Leaf ignored the painful memory of what once was. She knew her mother was right. After all, Gaven had found Uredd or rather Uredd had found Gaven in an awful kitchen at Skummel. Leaf’s father had been the first to look into her mother’s blue eyes without fear.

Leaf sucked on her bottom lip. I’ll think about it. She knew her mother wanted to see her happy, but Leaf also knew her happiness had to first come from within.

They finished filling the baskets and stood to stretch the kinks from of their backs. Let’s take a different path home. I’m in the mood to see the human farm. You never know what might be going on over there. Gaven raised her arms in a wide arc and stretched her wings with a flap.

Leaf cocked her head toward the crest of the hill. No human roar came back so she reckoned it was safe, but the humans were often doing all sorts of bizarre things. There was little to fear. Mother and daughter could both summon the magic and with the help of a bloodstone, a bubble of invisibility would form. Sounds like fun. Maybe we’ll get to see the goats. Uredd had never stopped talking about Bell, the goat he had learned to milk in the old valley. It was one of Leaf’s favorite adventure stories.

Gaven laughed. "Well, anything can happen, but if we do this, promise me you won’t tell him. Your father has been jabbering non-stop about that blasted bucket of milk. Sunshine, he can be annoying."

Leaf giggled. Gaven rarely swore, and never in front of her daughter. It was odd that sunshine was still considered a profanity because here they were, standing in a warm patch of sunlight, but traditions died hard.

They began to skirt the ravine leading to the top of the hill and the human farm that lay just beyond. Suddenly, Gaven grabbed her hand and Leaf felt the lullaby rushing toward her, drumming against her ears. She did not remember pulling the bloodstone from her pocket, but there it was, in the palm of her hand, warm and smooth where she had rubbed the rough away, but she had to be careful. Bloodstones were not worry stones. They were far too valuable. The magic was near, so near the vibrations tickled her bare feet. The lullaby had risen to the earth’s surface. Danger was very near, but Leaf’s mind quieted. She felt lighter, free from all worries under the song’s protection. The soft pop signaling the arrival of the invisibility spell sounded a heartbeat later. Inside separate spells, Gaven and Leaf saw one another as ghostly shadows. Gaven looked to the spine of the hill and Leaf followed her gaze. A tall human with loose tresses falling in bouncy orange curls stood in the dappled light of the forest. Leaf sniffed the breeze. The tang of goat clung to the human, along with other odors not of the natural world.

Anna ... her mother sighed.

Leaf knew her mother was instantly lost in her memories because Anna had once been very important to Gaven. The human stooped to pluck violets from the forest floor, something Leaf had done that morning while trying to dodge her duties. Anna began to weave the violets into a vine. When she was done, she tied the vine in a loop and placed it on the crown of her head.

She’s grown now; she will have forgotten me. Anna had loved Gaven, but many seasons had slipped past, and humans were unpredictable.

Anna gazed across the valley in search of something, and smiled.

She always seemed wise for one so young, Gaven said. The breeze shifted and the stench of the goats arrived several heartbeats before the hairy beasts crested the hill.

Papa should be here. Leaf could not wait to tell him about the goats.

Hush, this is our secret. Gaven had not moved.

Anna’s hand fell to her midsection and rubbed her belly. The motion rumpled her skirts.

Maybe she ate too much. Leaf was becoming bored, again.

Anna turned to the goats, and arched her back. The soft folds of her skirts clearly revealed her pregnant belly.

That’s not a meal. Gaven’s eyes glittered under her amber sunshields.

Anna called to the goats, shooing them back over the hill, and they all disappeared back the way they had come.

Leaf released the magic by passing it back to the lullaby, but Gaven stayed transfixed. Leaf decided not to disturb her as she made her way back to the village.

Chapter 4

The madness returned the next night, as Troika had known it would. It was a beast, hungry and untamed. Troika had no command over it. It would return, again and again, until it had feasted itself out. Troika heard his growl, a sign the madness was taking control. He could feel snot hanging from his nostrils, but he made no attempt to remove it because it would serve to warn the villagers.

The next thing he knew, he was lunging at the trading post. Sila, the post’s mistress stood her ground, frantic and near despair. Her whole was life was wrapped around the post and all of its contents, but Troika was no longer in control. Over the seasons, the trolls had learned how to survive the madness, but Troika knew the post sheltered their food stores. He could smell it. Sila