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He could remember the day clearly — the day that soldiers came to the village. And he could remember the looks of fear and distress on the soldier’s faces when the blue dragon killed them all. He remembered seeing the smallest details — the sweat on the men’s temples, and the jitters in their arms. The scowls and lack of mercy. The way their swords shimmered.
He remembered using his eyes to see beyond, to the hearts in their chests. He remembered making them stop. He remembered fear, and seeing so much and wishing to close his eyes but not being able to — and, he could remember an old man leaning over him. And, after that —
He could remember waking up and never seeing again.
From explicit detail to a thick blur that only allowed vague impressions of light — it was a harsh change. The administer to these effects had said it was well deserved — that night, he’d said a lot of things. Things that the blue dragon hadn't been able to understand. He understood later, much later, but at the time, he’d only known confusion and fear.
Perhaps he was spiteful because of that.
(He could remember being blinded. He could remember the inability to move his limbs, and the stuffy pressure on his chest. How he couldn’t close his eyes even as a steaming spout rose above them. The paralysis had been awkward and uncomfortable. He could remember how an old, wrinkled face had peered down at him with a eerily blank expression — he could remember the crippling pain of hot oil).
The last thing he’d ever seen was the old man’s weathered lips telling him that it was “the only way to ensure the village’s safety.”
He didn’t feel angry at them for it. Or — maybe a little. He understood, at least. He’d killed all those people by doing what Ao had told him not to do; he’d taken off his mask to do something his swords should have done instead. He wondered if the burning he felt had happened to any other blue dragon in the past, or just him. Maybe this was a punishment carried out through the ages. There would never be a way to know.
They took him to a village made out of caves.
On the journey, they tied a rope to his hand and lead him through rocky terrain. He fell over a few times, but nobody ever helped him up. When he didn’t get up fast enough, he was dragged. He was only dragged twice, and for very short periods — he learned fast.
Then, he sat isolated from everyone in one of the largest passages. He was lead by an elder who barely spoken a word to him other than to tell him to stay away from the others. He hadn’t told the blue dragon why they’d moved from their other village — the village where Ao was buried — but… the blue dragon could guess.
The blue dragon was left alone in the back cave. His eyes hurt. They were covered in bandages under his mask. He touched the surface of the mask, over his eyes, and felt like a limb had been taken away. And it had been. He would never see a man again, and he would never see a soldier die. He’d never again see a beating heart through dark tunics, and he’d never watch them stop.
His head told him that he should be relieved.
He wasn’t.
(The floor was tough and gritty. He was scared).
He had a lot of time to think, that first night in the cave. He didn’t know where he was exactly, he didn’t know if there was a way out other than the way the elder had gotten in — wherever that was. He should’ve known, he should’ve remembered the number of footsteps. The direction his toes pointed when he walked. But he hadn’t been counting.
The blue dragon remembered the day Ao had lost his vision. How he’d rejoiced, but then had been sad. “I’m free,” He’d said, and then he’d died. The blue dragon didn’t feel any of the joy that Ao had felt that day. There was nobody to take over his duties. Who would protect the village now?
He couldn’t see far. He couldn’t see his hand when held up to his face. In the darkness of the cave, he closed his eyelids and couldn’t spot the difference.
He didn’t understand why the villagers would take away his sight. There was no one to stand guard. Perhaps they thought the caves would protect them. Maybe they would.
The cave had a draft. The blue dragon tiredly stumbled to his feet and felt the wall he’d been sitting against. He followed it around in a crooked circle to a place where it gave in. Exit. If he walked through it, maybe he’d find something to eat. He’d been very skilled at foraging, back at the other village, because Ao and himself hadn’t gotten any food from the villagers. They’d gotten their own meat too, by hunting. He’d used to be very good at hunting.
He didn’t know if he could get meat in the caves, he doubted it, but maybe it was possible to find some sort of vegetation. He could… he could find something. He just couldn’t rely on his eyes.
The blue dragon wished the elder had left behind something other than himself.
He felt his way through the passage. He took twists and turns and stumbled more than a few times over rocks that stuck out a bit too far. Sometimes he stopped entirely and wanted to sit down forever and ever and never get back up again. But he didn't. He kept on going.
(He often felt like crying, and he felt his face to see if his cheeks were wet but they never were. He couldn’t cry anymore. Something had been irreversibly changed within his sockets, and he’d never cry again. Did that make him even less of a human than before)?
He didn’t find anything to eat. In the midst of nothing, he could feel only dirt and rock under his bare feet. The blue dragon didn’t sit down, but he eventually stopped walking.
Ao. What would Ao do? After Ao lost his sight, he died. Would he die too? The villagers wouldn’t let him. After he died, another cursed one would be born. But they hadn’t left him any food. They’d taken away his sight and then left him alone.
He sniffed. Everything was so cold. He shivered, slowly sank down to the ground, and curled up into a ball. His teeth chattered, and his mask felt heavy and uncomfortable even when most days it felt like a part of his face.
He wanted to see. He wanted to see…!
The blue dragon ripped it off, and opened his eyes as wide as they could go.
There was nothing, though, and he wanted to say ‘he didn’t know what he’d expected’ but the truth was he’d entirely expected to just open his eyes and see again because surely things couldn’t change so drastically? So permanently? He sniffed, and balled his fists and hugged his arms close to his body over his eyes so that he could pretend that he could see after all, they were just covered. That that was all. But he knew the truth. He couldn’t see, and he would never again.
The blue dragon cried with a dry face, alone in a dark passageway.
He didn’t know the way back.
“Pkyuu!”
He startled and jumped back — the back of his head harshly hit a wall, and he hissed and covered the spot with both arms. His eyes were bare to the cool air. He scrunched them tight.
“Who…”
“Chu!”
Something soft crawled onto his knees. It had sharp claws. He suspected a small animal, and he thought through the possibilities — a bat, a large furry bug, a kitten — when it jumped onto his chest. He yelped and moved his hands frantically to try and get it off. He could feel the claws digging into his chest.
It didn’t come off. He was too scared to touch it after the first initial attack, so he let it be but he leaned his head as far from it as possible. “Ao… Ao!” He missed Ao. What would Ao do? Ao was dead. Ao wouldn’t do anything.
“Pkyuu.”
His breathing was heavy. He didn’t move for several minutes. As time passed, and the furry creature didn’t do anything, his breathing slowed down steadily. And when he could hear high-pitched snoring — or something like that — from his chest, he calmed down completely.
It meant no harm. Still scared, but now more brave, his hands ever-so-slowly inched towards the thing on his chest. He felt a fat, squat and soft body and a tiny head. It had small ears. Attached to it was a long, bushy tail. It was a squirrel. A squirrel had found him, in the cave.
His hands rested around it. They cupped the squirrel, and stayed there and felt the fast heartbeat, as well as the soft inhales and exhales. The snores. It was no longer quiet, and with the warmth emanating from the squirrel it was no longer cold.
He didn’t move for a long, long time.
The blue dragon’s face slowly relaxed, and his shoulders drooped. He fell asleep.
He named the squirrel Ao, and she never left after that first day. She — he guessed at the gender — stayed loyally on his shoulder, and was smart. When he’d woken up, his stomach had grumbled and she’d chirped before walking a little distance and chirping again. He’d picked up his discarded mask and followed her. All the way to a patch of grass that stuck up between his toes; potentially under sunshine, due to the subtle change in colour in his blurry vision.
She’d brought him nuts to chew on, and he’d eaten them. Then later, she took him to the cave again. And she’d stayed. It was still uncomfortable but it was better. He had a friend; Ao always chattered and filled up the silence. He wished for a bed, but he didn’t know how to get one or if he ever would. But at least he had Ao.
He knew, though, that he would need to learn how to do things by himself. He’d have to learn how to hunt, and how to use a sword again. The blue dragon had no idea how to go about that, but he’d have to work something out. His hand pet Ao absently, and he turned his head to catch the sound of her chattering. The bells on his mask ringed.
(Ao could find him, thanks to the bells. If Ao wore bells, he’d be able to find him, too).
Footsteps echoed down the sole corridor leading to his cave.
He stiffened.
“Ah, so you’re still alive. Good. Here.” A thud announced the arrival of some sort of gift. The elder’s footsteps left just as quickly as they arrived, and when the blue dragon strained his ears he noticed a soft ‘clack,’ most likely some sort of passageway door closing.
He slowly inched forward, but Ao was faster. Ao’s tiny footsteps echoed throughout the cave, and a chewing noise alerted him to the fact that the elder had given him food. Seiryuu walked faster, and his hands scoured the cave floor to find five pieces of fruit, one being munched on by a furry form. He carefully picked up a round one, most likely an apple, and bit into it. He swallowed.
Ao worked on a piece of fruit while he carefully went through two others. There were two remaining, and he told Ao to save them for later. She didn’t respond, but he knew that she understood.
He remembered how he’d easily caught the sound of the door closing. He’d not heard it before, not even when he’d first been brought in. He was pretty sure his hearing was getting better. The blue dragon smiled, but he wasn’t sure if he felt truely happy or not. Even if his hearing was better, he still missed what he’d once had.
(Sometimes he forgot he couldn’t see anymore, and tried to open his eyes before realising that they were already open).
It was hard to notice how much time passed. He slept when he was tired, and was awake when he wasn’t, and he knew that his schedule wasn’t necessarily aligned with the day cycle. Sometimes the lights were brighter, when he went to the small grassy area for food, and sometimes they weren’t. He lost track constantly. The elder sometimes dropped off food, but there was no routine to it.
It must have been around fifty rests before an animal larger than a squirrel entered the grassy area.
The blue dragon heard it loudly in the quiet area while he was practicing sword swings. Even the small trickling of water from a stream that intersected the grass didn’t block out it’s noise. By that point, the blue dragon had become well attuned to hearing even the slightest hitch of breath of a mouse. So it’s ‘silent’ footsteps were anything but.
His sword was quick to aim at its general direction when it’s footsteps skewed towards him. His practiced arms positioned high and aimed to slash down, when a sharp claw slashed at his legs and knocked him to the ground. This hadn’t happened since Ao had first started training him. The blue dragon wheezed out a rattling breath, and whipped his sword around his body with no grace.
He had a feeling that if a swordsmaster were to see his sword strokes, they’d be very unimpressed.
It did the job, however. The sharpness and speed of the blade was enough to make up for the lack of technique. While the blue dragon bled, so did the creature; a dull thunk announced the separation from the head and the body. He still didn’t know what the creature was, but —
He won. He was blind, but he’d still won.
It wasn’t impossible for him to fight.
The blind blue dragon won.
Blood ran down his leg, but that couldn’t diminish the joy he felt so brightly. Maybe he could still protect the village after all! He just had to practice.
The animal — a wolf, he soon recognised by the feel of its snout — was soon cut up and cooked in a bastardised fashion by the river. He sparked a fire by rubbing together dry sticks. He spiked the meat on skewers and positioned them above the open flame. They tasted bland, in the end, but they were filling.
And the wolf pelt, he separated from the body. No doubt the byproduct was ugly, but it was his and it was something he’d accomplished. The pelt was cleaned to the best of his abilities, and carefully wrapped around his body.
It was warm.
He wondered if anyone else would have been capable of what he did. Whenever he trained — whenever he sensed other presences through the noises they produced — he couldn’t help but think that what he did was only possible because he was a monster. He’d never heard of any other blind person capable of navigating like himself.
There was a singular other blind person in the village, someone who’d used to be an elder, who sat alone in one of the caves night and day unless he was fed.
The village didn’t like people who couldn’t contribute. The old blind man barely moved but to eat, and the blue dragon had listened to the gossip — some of the walls of the passages of his domain were thin. Apparently, people often avoided his ‘blank stare.’ He didn’t speak, although he was able, he just stood still for hours on end. He was disliked.
The blue dragon was the only one who could navigate like he did. The only one who could learn to sense people approaching, and the only one who could walk unhindered blindly through mountain passages and still find his way back as easily as breathing simply by following the scuffling of Ao’s footsteps.
As he grew up, he learned different things. Like how his nose was useful in navigation too; in finding water sources, and other exits out the cave system. He found a bigger grassy area that way, with a large river that intersected it. He fell into it a few times. The blue dragon learned to find Ao whenever he pleased, both by listening to her chattering and smelling the soft, dull scent of nuts and berries.
He learned how to swing a sword even when he couldn’t see it, he learned how to detect when his clothes needed washing — for the sword, by habit and feeling the soft ripples in the air as the blade cut; for the clothes, by touch, by smell — he learned how to rely on his other senses.
Even when years passed, he still found himself waiting for his vision to clear. But it never did. He knew that, logically, but he still wished otherwise.
The blue dragon had a lot of time to himself in the caves. He spent that time practicing sword strokes. He spent it, too, seeking new animal attackers. He no longer protected the village — he couldn’t, not when something so necessary was lost. He protected himself, that was it — it was all he was capable.
One day the monotony changed.
It started with piercing screams and shouts. Then crying, and just as quickly, silence. Then more yelling. The blue dragon shuddered and huddled his body close by the pile of soft leaves that made up his bed.
An attack. Somebody, or people, were attacking the village — and there was nothing he could do! He couldn’t see them, he couldn’t fight people! Only animals. Only ever animals — another sharp gasp announced the death of another villager, and his face scrunched up so tightly he could almost feel phantom tears.
There was nothing he could do. There was nothing he could do.
“Where is he? It’s rumoured that —“ Nothing he could do. “Where? We’ll find him even if you don’t —“
He rocked onto his feet.
“Ao. Stay.” Perhaps there was nothing, but he would try because this was his village. The sword in his hand felt heavy, but he walked in the familiar direction of the door. And, for the first time in years, he opened it. The stone grated on his ears as it slid open.
The screaming was louder from the other side.
Figures ran by, he could feel them through the way the wind shifted. Even as his arms shook in apprehension and fear, he knew he wouldn’t run away. He felt air being displaced nearby and he turned to face them, even if he didn’t need to actually turn. “You… enemy?” He asked. Because there was no way to tell otherwise.
The figure didn’t run away. That was response enough. The blue dragon’s sword flew through the air and met with another blade. The bells on his mask chimed vividly as he swung around. He detected where the sword came in through the sharp slicing noises of cutting air. Despite the advantages of the opponent, the blue dragon had been practicing for as long as he could walk.
Despite the most-likely ugly slashes the blue dragon performed, the heavy thud of a body announced his win. The spray of blood against his collar bone only provided confirmation. When he attempted to walk forward and felt something soft and wet under his toes, he didn’t really need the further confirmation, but it was provided. He stepped over the corpse.
And, more shouts alerted him to more opponents. Soon he entered a rhythm of blindly cutting around himself. It was like he was in the middle of a bubble and cutting the edges of it. The bodies around him piled high, and it came to a point where he couldn’t move his feet without some sort of obstruction.
Something solid and thick hit his stomach and he buckled over. In the same movement, his blade jutted out and hit the attacker. His victory was announced through a wet wheeze. He shook off the pain and stood tall as another rush of air announced another opponent.
His bells ringed, and the sound reverberated across the cave wall by his back. An unsettling feeling alerted him to a sword jabbing at his stomach; he blocked it, and turned to parry another strike. The bells rang. Sometimes, the vibrations came back quickly. Sometimes, there was more hesitance.
He started to recognise a pattern.
When the echoes were quick to come back, it meant someone was nearby. When they were slower, it meant the opposite. The blue dragon slashed and parried and the pattern repeated as new opponents continued to run at him. The shouts were loud and piercing, and their echoes provided warnings as well. He began to react with the pattern rather than just his senses, and the battle changed. No longer were his attacks frenzied yet hesitant — they changed to become more comfortable and defined.
Soon, he was striking down as soon as they came at him. Before that. He had no idea how many he’d taken down; 15, 20, 30 — but the pile of bodies around his feet were high.
“It’s him!” Someone shouted, “That’s the blue dragon! Everybody, attack!”
“He’s a monster,” Somebody else cried out. Enemy or not, he didn’t know.
He ignored them. He slashed. He slashed and slashed, and listened to the echoes. One close, one far — echo, echo. He confidently stood up tall and relaxed when the dramatic assault decreased. A mistake. A sword — too fast to block, too quiet — struck his leg, and he hissed in pain before turning around and stabbing wildly. A wet yell announced a finished opponent.
And then, everything was quiet. The piles at his feet were high. His feet were soaked — he needed shoes — and his body equally so. There had been hardly any grace to his movements, and that was reflected in the carnage. But ‘hardly any’ was still better than ‘none.’
A quiet voice interrupted the silence of the main cave, and he turned his chin to face them. “He’s a monster,” The same voice from before repeated. “How did he…?”
The blue dragon gracefully nodded, bowed, and turned on his heels. He couldn’t help anymore. Villagers lived, that he was sure of, and they’d be able to clean by themselves — they wouldn’t want his help.
And as the door of the passageway shut behind him, he remembered the slashes and the parries. He won. Against people, against many — he won. He limped and remembered the stab wound — it would heal, with time. He won. The blue dragon won.
And this time there wasn’t any pelt to cover himself, but he felt warm with his accomplishment. Sad, too, for the deaths — but a primal part of him was proud.
He limped over to his cave and sat down.
“Pkyuu!”
“Ao,” He said. Ao climbed onto his shoulder and rubbed her head against his chin.
The metallic smell of blood filled the cave, and oozed onto the floor. He could taste it in the air.
He remembered the bells. He remembered the echoes, and how they’d helped him — feeling a bit weird, but not willing to give up a potential aid, he shook his mask and the bells echoed around him. They were quick to come back. He was alone, but they came back quickly — because the cave was small, right?
He could use the bells to find out about his surroundings.
The echoes against the walls, and the floor, the sound let him know where things were. And, he bet if he practiced, he’d be able to refine it. He smiled down at Ao, and even as the blood started to congeal uncomfortably against his calf, and even when the sounds outside his passageway were wrought with distress, he didn’t stop.
He was no longer helpless, like that old man, alone in his cave.
“Ao,” He said. “Ao.”
‘I found a way.’
An elder visited after all the blood had dried.
He knew by the sound of the passageway opening. When something was thrown in his direction, the soft whistling sound and the displacement of air alerted him; he dodged it and moved away.
“I knew it,” The elder breathed. “You can still see.”
The blue dragon wildly shook his head, and the pelt swung in the air with him.
“Ha! Don’t attempt to fool me. We all saw the way you slaughtered those men. You want me to believe a blind boy is capable of that? Ridiculous!”
“I…” He inhaled. He wasn’t sure how to prove that he was blind, other than to show his eyes. But would they look different? He didn’t know if they’d changed or not after they were damaged.
And regardless, the elder wouldn’t want to see them anyway. So he was still and quiet. His mouth closed, and he waited for something to happen. He didn’t wait long.
“How?” He hissed. “I made sure. Is this the work of the devil?”
He shook his head again. Ao’s head rubbed against him underneath his jacket. He wanted to take her out, as it was soaked, but he didn’t want the elder to know she was there. He hugged her close and hoped she was warm.
Something touched his arm, and he gasped. He jumped up and cowered against the wall, and an astounded huff alerted him that the culprit — who had poked him — was the man in the room. “By all the Gods,” He said under his breath. “You are blind. But then how was that possible?”
With very careful and slow hands, he reached up to gesture to his ears.
“Sound?” The blue dragon nodded. “I can’t believe this… You will stay here.” Of course.
And the elder turned on his heels and walked away. Before he walked out, however, he said one last thing.
“I wonder, sometimes, if I should aid you or not. But I know that if you die, another cursed monster will be born to us. But them, too… I will burn their sight away...”
The door shut behind him, and the blue dragon was left in silence. His hand reached out and felt the hard, cold floor, until eventually his fingers landed upon the object that had been thrown at him earlier. His breath rattled in surprise — bandages.
The soft fabric was simple to move. He didn’t know the exact way how to apply it, as it had been years since he’d used bandages, but he could remember the way they felt against his skin. Ao had helped him put them on, once, years ago.
The blue dragon stumbled to his feet and nearly fell down again, but his strong hands helped him stay upright with help from the wall. He limped towards the nearest river outside the caves, the smaller grassy area Ao had first shown him all those years ago, and Ao climbed out of his jacket and lounged on his shoulders. She chattered and chewed on something, most likely a nut.
The water was cool. He stripped down and washed his clothes in the water, but he knew that blood stains would remain. If he could see, he could have spent time to wash it all out — but he couldn’t. There was no point when he wouldn’t know how much remained. So he resigned himself to permanent ugly blotches, and just scrubbed until the smell of metal wasn’t as pungent.
He hissed when his leg was first submerged. His hands carefully bathed and cleaned the wound, and the river carried a constant source of fresh water from the mountains. Soon, it was completely clear. He wrapped bandages around it, and rested it against the riverbank.
Then, lastly, he cleaned his sword. He spent his time rubbing it with grass and wishing for something to sharpen it with. Soon, it too smelt clean, and he rested it by his side.
When his clothes were dry, he put them on. And off he went, back to a monotonous existence. Except this time, the villagers knew what he was capable of, and would be more afraid than ever.
(But this time, he knew what he was capable of too. He could hear vibrations. He could learn to use them).
He learned how to use the vibrations and the echoes slowly. Just because he was expressing a desire to learn, didn’t mean that he learned it fast. It took over a month before he could use the echoes to detect how far a single wall was, and knowing the exact measurement of that. And even before that, it took three months to adapt to use the different sorts of chimes that his bells used. And other noises.
Noises didn’t always translate the same results. Their echoes sounded different, which meant he had to be able to tell them apart — to learn the same result at the end.
The bells and their echoes were what helped him navigate, and, depending on how fast or how high-pitched they were, he could learn about where everything was, even if he couldn’t actually see it. Sound helped him adapt to his disability.
Every now and then he’d remember those first days with Ao, with him following her chattering and footsteps. He’d grown, and so had his abilities — and he’d not expected it. That first time he killed a wolf had proved that he was just as capable as anyone else.
The blue dragon worked at trying to perfect it. He learned to measure distance by how prolonged the echoes were from his bell. He did this by counting and having Ao confirm his verbal suspicions — he would say something like “Three feet” and Ao would either approve or disapprove his theory with her chattering.
It was rarely consistent. He walked into walls too many times to count based off idle beliefs of depth, and couldn’t see objects and so too often stumbled over things in his path. Ao always found it funny.
He had to keep making sound or he wouldn’t have a clue at his surroundings. Amazingly, he often forgot to make noise, which resulted in a couple of accidents — sometimes he reckoned he was more familiar with the lakes and streams around the place more than the actual caves. At least he could swim.
The bells on his mask became a guiding light. As he aged he learned how to run through the passageways unimpeded, even through passageways he’d never been in before. And slowly he learned to find items and obstructions near and below his hips, which he celebrated by going outside further than he’d ever been before, into dense forest, confidently and filled with assuredness — and was caught off guard and attacked by a wolf — turned out, cave and forest echoes didn’t translate.
So he had to adapt, and adapt he did.
It was a lot of time and work. He spent hours with his legs crossed on different terrains, clicking his tongue and slowly moving his bells.
Until one day finally — finally! — he could move around just like any other person. Although it was harder to move in some places compared to others, he’d adapted to the swift changes, and he was able to identify what the changes meant. His bells were fluid in that he could ‘see’ from what was at his toes, to what was metres above him. And if he was loud enough, the distance increased. Also, if the environment itself was quiet enough, the distance increased.
The caves became a haven.
He revelled in what he could now do. The blue dragon was able to swing a sword and hit with complete confidence, and although he could not see details — he would never be able to read, and never be able to count fingers — he could locate large lumps of mass. He could detect people, even if he couldn’t tell them apart. When the doorway to his cave was open and he clicked his tongue, he could ‘see’ every single person in the main cave.
His days were spent training his ability and his sword. He ate and he bathed and he cleaned his teeth with a peculiar bit of cloth, but most of his time was training. He wanted to be someone who would be able to ‘see’ long distances again. He wanted to be capable of ‘seeing’ the horizon.
And he’d never be able to see the moon, or the sun, but when outside at day the heat on his back almost convinced him he could.
(And then one day someone entered his cave-system).
That was rare. The villagers usually did their best to stay far away from where he was hidden; his location was somewhat of an open secret in the village. And often a villager would walk past or use his caves, but they’d never went down the main passageway that lead to him. Just, sometimes, across.
This person was careless in their steps, and was heading his way. He could hear the rhythmic soft footsteps, and the light sounds alerted him to the fact that the intruder was most likely a girl. He frowned, but didn’t move from his spot on the cave floor. The pelt was warm around his legs.
“Pkyuu!” Ao said. He nodded once.
He was happy with staying still, when all too quickly he heard a soft conversation. The intruder — indeed a girl — and another villager talked. His stomach had a deep pit, and almost like it was warning him he stood to his feet and followed the voices, despite his wishes for the contrary. He ducked around different passageways, and the bells alerted him to barriers in his way and stones on the ground. The subtle shaking of his head made the bells chime quietly in the dark tunnels.
He approached the two villagers.
“Hey!” The girl said, and Seiryuu’s lips pressed together thinly. He didn’t know if she said it in reaction to seeing him, or because of the man, but the scuffling hinted that either way she was distressed.
He wouldn’t be surprised if she’d seen him. He was many things, but silent wasn’t one of them — his bells chimed too often for that, and even when they weren’t ringing he was clicking his tongue or whistling.
He reached forward and the bells’ sound came back quickly, hinting that perhaps the man had grabbed the girl.
He wasn’t able to see where the hands were, however. He didn’t know if they were grabbing hands, or the man was grabbing her shoulder. All he knew was that they were attached, and he needed some way to seperate them for the girl’s well-being.
The unfortunate thing about not being in battle was that outside of it he rarely could detect motion. Slow movements were nearly impossible to sense; the displacement of air too subtle. Fast attacks he could dodge and rival. So he didn’t know where the soft tugging was happening — it would be impossible to find their connection and yank them apart.
Echolocation and his senses had its strengths, but it’s faults were devastating.
“Let… go.”
Instead of making a move to try and find the hands and forcefully seperate, he regrettably turned to something else that would undeniably work. Fear. And perhaps the girl would run too, but if he was lucky they’d run in opposite directions.
“Y-You!” The man gasped. A rattling breath made clear his discomfort, and before the blue dragon would be able to lift a finger, the man had turned on his heels and dashed away. And, thankfully, it was by himself.
Leaving the girl and him alone.
He turned to face the girl, or where he thought her face might be, and he nodded just once. He then turned on his heels, but a sudden grip on his hands made him jump.
He’d used to wear gloves, once. And thicker clothes. But he’d forgone the bulkier garments in favour of exposing skin so he could feel the air more when it moved — the girl had a subtle grace to her, slow and careful, and so the grip had shocked him. Their bare skin touched.
He clicked his tongue, and was surprised to find her standing close to him. Why hadn’t she run away?
“Thank you.”
She hadn’t run. He turned to face her, and something hit him. If she didn’t run, it meant she didn’t know him. She was an outsider. And, probably, lost.
And then —
—Warriors of the four dragons. You are now our other halves. You will serve Hiryuu as your master, protecting him with your lives. You will love him, and never betray him—
His blood pounded. It felt like it was going the wrong direction. He felt unnatural heat in his fingers and toes and eye-sockets, and his heart heated frantically like a rabbit’s. He didn’t know what it was. He didn’t know if it was something that happened to normal people; he’d never been a person, rather a monster.
Was this a part of the curse? He gasped but soon held his breath and grit his teeth.
With another subtle click of the tongue, he held onto her hand and lead her to the door. His bells rang in the silence of the passageway, and the girl didn’t speak again.
Her voice had been so high, so kind. It reminded him of the way the adults spoke to their children in the main cave, and the careful cadence they used. Hers had been delicate. And she’d thanked him. It was this that lead him to help her rather than attack her — as outsiders, as Ao had said, were the enemy.
He chose to trust her for the time being.
That moment with the blood still reverberated within him, he couldn’t forget how tortuous it had felt. Everything still hurt and pounded within him.
He left her with the doorway she’d first come through. A careful hand felt the stone and the inconsistencies, and found the handle. It gave way and opened to fresher air from the other side, and it filled his lungs.
He didn’t take the girl all the way to her room in the cave, because he was wary of what he wouldn’t be able to see right away. He also didn’t know where exactly she’d come from. Maybe it was in the large cave, or somewhere else entirely. But she’d be able to find the way from where he left her.
He let go of her at the door and non-verbally wished her well with yet another nod, and before she could open her mouth to say anything, he ran away.
She found him again. Her, and a friend, who he suspected was also a girl based on the cadence of her voice. He felt like he and the girl shared some sort of link.
He was immediately alarmed. He’d stood up and screamed and attacked her. Once was chance, he doubted twice was a coincidence. Caves were his territory. Echolocation was better nowhere else. His sword, an extension of his body, moved around at a fast pace to slice her throat — when he stopped in his footsteps. Something, in him, was telling him to halt.
It must’ve been the blood in his veins. Maybe it was his sockets, which hurt more than the day they’d been irreversibly damaged. Perhaps it was something else entirely. But he didn’t kill her.
(She hadn’t sounded scared while he attacked. When he stopped, she started talking, and she sounded calm. She asked about Ao, and said the name didn’t fit. He agreed, it really didn’t).
Despite Ao’s words, the girl didn’t feel like the enemy.
She asked about him. His name. He told her. She asked for his ‘real name.’ That was it, he’d never had anything else — he’d never asked for anything else, either. Until then, he’d never thought he could have something else.
And he asked her questions, too. He asked about who they are, why they entered the village, why they were approaching him and finally, why another connection in his gut was present — not the one that lead to her, but to another person entirely, outside the cave.
She said she came to see him. She inevitably asked about his power, and asked him to come with her. She coveted it, like all other enemies. She still didn’t feel like an enemy, though, and even as he held his sword in her direction he felt no desire to stab. The other girl fretted about him, but the other was calm on her feet.
“Let me borrow your power,” She’d said.
Let me borrow your power.
(He had no power).
She didn’t know that.
He asked her questions. She told him about her kingdom. But the most important thing was that somewhere amidst the conversation, she told him that his ability wasn’t cursed — but how could that be possible?
He remembered how it had been, when he’d still possessed it. It’d been useful, but it’d not been good in any sense of the word. Perhaps maybe it would be a blessing somewhere; but not to him. How could it possibly be? He remembered Ao, years ago, and he remembered the feeling of hot oil. He remembered the spout above his eyes and the look in the elder’s face.
He considered threatening her, but he didn’t. It would be too much effort to find her and restrain her — to much effort to lift up a sword and not accidentally kill her. It was hard to differentiate between fatal and non-fatal strokes when blind.
Instead, he told her to leave.
(And to his surprise she did, she went away. But as she left, she said that his hand was warm. He heard her footsteps leave. She didn’t come back).
And he didn’t like denying something Ao had told him, because he had little else to rely on, but what about her made her an enemy? The request had been the only hurtful thing about her. His breathing was loud in the cave, and it was amidst a quiet haze of disappointment — in what, for what? — that he heard it.
Cracks. And sliding. And clashing, rattling, and caving in and he knew what it was. When he heard the sound of shouts and unsettled voices, he knew where.
It was only Ao’s words that stopped him from helping the villagers and the girls — and, if the girl’s words were correct, the other dragon. Enemy, Ao had said. That girl was by his words an enemy. But she hadn’t felt like an enemy. She’d been kind to him, and had spoken with a very soft voice.
He’d help her, then. Maybe he’d regret it if he didn’t. He didn’t want the villagers to be hurt, at least. And after he helped, maybe he’d pull her aside and tell her that her plans were already ruined because he was. “I’m blind,” He would say.
And she would say, “Alright,” And then suggest he stay in the cave.
And that would be it.
He stood to his feet and clicked his tongue. The echoes returned fast, and they lead him down a convoluted passageway, all the way to a cave in.
“He’s here,” He heard.
They were horrified, and he didn’t want to scare them anymore, so while he approached them to help he didn’t say anything. The villagers knew about his eyes, and how they were damaged, so they didn’t outright attack him but he did feel the hostility in the air. They were scared, but they knew about the reality of his eyes. They stayed well away.
He was acknowledged, by a very loud person, the dragon, who kept talking about a “brother” and how he was “found.” Towards him. After shrieking about nearly being stabbed by him — an unfortunate mistake, but not the first time something like that had happened. Apparently he’d missed the stone a bit.
He was cautious of his surroundings, maybe overly-so, but despite that and the slow first stab of his sword at the stone he got into a smooth rhythm in no time. Ao hid deeply inside his clothes and fell asleep.
And there’d been further acknowledgment, in the form of disgusted comments on his clothing. “Blood,” A villager said to a friend. “His garments are stained with it.”
He was upset about that. He’d actually thought he’d gotten everything out.
He ignored them all. The soft, reverberating thuds of knives into the rocks, and swords and grappling hands sent sound upon sound around the room. Over and over. He didn’t need to ring his bells or click his tongue, not when there were a thousand things to light his way around. It was one of the clangs that lead him to discover a breakage between some of the stones. While the others talked, he was distracted completely by trying to focus.
It wasn’t long before he found a way out.
That had been it, in the end.
Maybe in another life he’d have debated the freedom the woman had promised — Yona, she’d said, back in his cave — but he didn’t have anything to offer. So he nodded to her and was fully prepared to walk back, when a tight hand wrapped around his wrist.
“Blue dragon,” Yona said to him. “I want you.”
(Nobody had ever said that before).
His lips were very thin, when he replied “No.” And then, he thought, that was the end of it. She’d said she’d respect his decision, no matter what it was.
She was either an enemy or someone… nice, and he didn’t think she was an enemy anymore. Not after working so hard that her hands bled. The villagers had long since retreated, leaving them alone with some other indistinguishable figures that made his heart race with caution. They’d migrated to a small room far from his cave.
“Please?” Yona said, and somebody snorted.
The blue dragon shook his head, “You don’t… want me,” He said.
And, “Why not? Of course I want you! Your hand was so warm.”
A single finger moved towards his mask, and with a sullen heart, he pointed once to the space over his eyes. “It doesn’t work,” He said about his power. And his voice was clear for once.
“Your eyes?” The other girl of the group said slowly. “Like, what? You’re blind?”
The room was stuffy. He didn’t think they were expecting his nod. Somebody gasped like they were shot — Kija, he recognised, the man who’d called him “brother” — and another hummed in consideration. The girl who’d spoken made an apologetic noise at the back of her throat. Yona interrupted the girl before she could say anything.
“Why is that a problem?”
The room was quiet, save another humoured noise from somebody sitting down. It was deep, and masculine.
The blue dragon didn’t need to say anything. It was Kija who explained, and he was happy he did, because he’d spoken more that day than he’d had in a long time. His throat hurt, he felt tired, and his heart wouldn’t stop beating.
“He’s the blue dragon,” Kija said, and it was the tone of somebody at a funeral. “His power is enhanced sight. If he’s blind…”
He almost smiled. So many people had tried to attack his village over the years. Trying to find the blue dragon, the one who could see and kill easier than any man. They’d sought a monster to buy or destro. Nobody had ever won, not once, and the one time there was any chance of a blue dragon actually leaving, it was impossible — because he was worthless.
A large, wet sniffle sounded from Kija’s direction. He didn’t understand, especially as his condition was nothing to pity. He’d done well with what he had. And he would miss his sight like he missed a limb until the day the next dragon would inherit it, but he was a monster, in the end.
“I don’t care,” Yona said.
“Yona!” The other girl said. “How’s he going to be helpful? We’re going to overthrow an empire, we can’t just —“
“He’s not helpless!”
Yona had something that made the girl and her two male companions go quiet, once more. Waiting. Listening. The blue dragon didn’t know why he hadn’t already left — it must’ve been that drawing quality.
“He’s not,” Yona insisted, but he didn’t know who to. “He could find his way through the caves just fine, couldn’t he? I feel something calling out to me. He has to come with us.”
A scoff. “Yona.” The girl repeated. “We can’t recruit people based on a whim.”
“No,” Kija said. “She’s right. He’s one of us, one of my brothers. We can’t leave him behind.”
The blue dragon sighed, and moved his head so the bells on his mask jingled. Too suddenly, the argument died, and he had the unsettling feeling that people were looking at him. There must have been something said not aloud, because a minute passed in this fashion, until an amused hum broke it from the second man in the room.
“Once the princess’ got her mind on something, she’s not going to change it. Face it, he’s coming with us.”
“Who’s to say he even wants to come?” The girl asked.
“He’s still here, isn’t he?”
The man was right, it was a bit odd he hadn’t left.
The girl groaned. “Well if everyone agrees then I guess so. But I’m going to have a look at his eyes when I have the opportunity.”
He shook his head wildly. He kept shaking it, until a hand came down for his shoulder — he dodged it and stepped back, and continued to shake his head. It rang and rang.
“Oh?” The man said. Another hand reached out, the same one, and he dodged it too. Then a sword came flying towards his legs, and he jumped — then it jabbed at his navel, he twirled around and avoided it. Another jab, stab — another hop, twist. Then his own sword was in his hands and fighting back. He frowned, ill at ease, but the attacks continued until they stopped all together.
The blue dragon held his sword and panted, slowly. It had been a while since he’d had someone this talented fight back — he’d never the opportunity to seek opponents, the last people he’d fought had been the attackers years ago. He usually fought animals. Once upon a time he’d ventured out with Ao and found people to fight that way, but that had been long ago.
He hadn’t practiced as much as he should have.
(Or maybe he had, and this was just his disadvantage coming into play somehow).
“Huh.” The girl sounded annoyed, “If you meant blind in a metaphorical sense you could have just told us!”
That wasn’t it, he wanted to say, but his voice failed him. Half of his attention was still on his attacker. The blue dragon’s bells rang as he subtly moved his legs, but he noticed that the man hadn’t moved. He frowned.
“Oh, thank goodness!” Kija said with a frantically relieved tone, “I’m glad it’s just that.”
It wasn’t just that.
“Come along with us,” Yona said.
But he was blind.
(His voice failed him. His throat hurt. He was tired, too, and so he didn’t say the things he really should have).
“And there you have it,” His attacker deadpanned. “We’ve got another unlikely friend.”
But he hadn’t said he’d join. He wasn’t lying about what he was. What if they got into a situation where he had to tell the difference between two people without them talking? What if they were ever out somewhere without any walls or trees to bounce echoes off? What if they relied on him for his sight — it wouldn’t work out.
They would figure him out.
(But he wanted to go. He was doing his best to make excuses for himself to go — he didn’t like his home, other than Ao — who was still sleeping peacefully in his pocket — there was little that made him want to stay. The village didn’t rely on him much anymore. They would prefer if he was gone. He didn’t like them, either, he wouldn’t lie to himself).
The girl sighed in agreement. “Well, Seiryuu, you don’t have any protests do you?”
He gained up all his strength and inhaled deeply.
“I… I’m blind.”
He had many.
Yona answered him. “Oh? Well, uhm, that doesn’t bother us.”
He didn’t think she got what he meant. When nobody else said anything, he didn’t think they got it either. But maybe they did. Maybe this was them letting him off; maybe his fighting abilities had been sufficient to prove his worth.
Because they couldn’t really think he was lying, could they? Yona had said that it didn’t bother them. So that must’ve meant they believed him, and thought he could join them anyway. Right?
When they left, he followed.
On the way out of the village, he dropped his bells.
He immediately clicked his tongue to try and find them, but the tiny, round shape of the bells bled into the rocks. He could either leave them or struggle and pick them up. But he didn’t want to leave them behind when they helped him so much — and Ao had said, once, that the bells helped him know where the blue dragon was.
No, he couldn’t leave them behind. Even if he had to let go of his past, he needed them to see. The noise was a refuge.
So he dropped to his knees and clicked his tongue again — didn’t work — and eventually just relied on feeling the ground and trying to find the metal. His hand searched for it all around the rocks and uneven grass.
“What’re you doing?” Yona asked kindly. “Did you see something in the soil?”
No?
His hand located the bells and he stood to his feet. The bells found a home on his mask once more, and Ao chattered in his ear.
“Well,” She said, “Alright. I’m glad you’re coming with us. I know I said it before, but back in the cave you were my guiding light, leading me through the darkness...”
He clicked his tongue and heard that the others were far ahead of them, standing in place and watching. He rubbed his ear and awkwardly turned his head away. Yona was so kind. He didn’t regret his decision to follow her.
He walked to her side, and together they joined the group.
There was no wind, and he’d been a bit out of it thinking of the cave and the villagers and what they’d say when they found him gone — and he blamed those two facts for why he fell into the lake.
He’d been walking with the group and he’d clicked his tongue and felt them move to the right, but he hadn’t known why until he’d continued and plunged into cold depths of water. Spluttering and slight panic had lead him to the surface.
After kicking his legs he jogged back to the others; soaking wet and shivering. The non-dragon male was laughing.
“For someone with amazing vision, you sure didn’t hesitate in mistaking that algae for grass, huh blue dragon?”
“Oi!” Kija berated the man, “He’s tired, that’s it! If you lived in a cave all your life and then moved you’d do the same thing too!”
Too cold to listen, he ignored them as the girl turned her attention to him and started to berate him about being careful. “We’ll set up camp here,” She said after she was done. “Blue dragon, hang your clothes up on a tree and we’ll light a fire. Actually, I might as well try to wash them while they’re off. Those stains look awful — maybe I should burn them if I can’t get them out.”
“…No.”
“I’m kidding,” The girl deadpanned. “Stains are no match for me; the pretty boy genius can handle anything.”
“…Boy,” He repeated in amazement. He’d been mistaken.
“You thought I was a girl this whole time?!”
The man, Kija and Yona burst out laughing.
That first night outside was wonderful. He’d been fed food by the boy, Yoon, that was the best he’d ever tasted. And Yona was so kind to both him and Ao. Kija had a lot of energy, but he too was very nice and called him a “brother” again and again. Hak, the other man, commonly teased Kija about everything under the sun.
And in the end, he received a name.
“Shin-Ah,” Yona had called him. And he’d smiled at the beauty of the name and the irony, because he would never see his namesake.
Shin-Ah became used to life with the group. On the journey to the green dragon, he collided into more trees than he could count. Fell into another lake. This was all done in the first three days, before he got into the habit of ringing his bells every few steps. This got on Hak’s nerves — he could tell, as he’d soon started to call Shin-Ha ‘jingles.’
Regardless, the bells stopped the collisions. It also stopped the teasing comments… most of them.
He battled once or twice, and always managed to do well. He’d nearly been fatally stabbed once, but he’d survived in the end with a helping hand from Kija. Although Yoon hadn’t been pleased with the mistake.
A few times, he’d been asked to ‘scout the distance.’
For the second time that day, a week after he left the village, he heard the familiar demand from Yoon. With a deadpan expression he used his bells to find the nearest tree, and climbed up it. Higher, higher he climbed until he knew to climb higher would meant the branches would snap.
He proceeded to raise his hands and clap loudly. Once, twice, three times with the third the loudest. He couldn’t hear far, but with the louder noises he could hear further and maybe even further than what people could see with their eyes. Maybe. He had no way to confirm.
In all honestly, the group would be better of relying on anybody else for this role. But apparently he was doing well enough, because they always gave it to him. He wasn’t sure how they picked up on his echo ability because he’d never mentioned it, but someone must have and told the others — he suspected Yoon. Yoon was smart.
He climbed down and was greeted by the small group once more.
He shook his head — all clear.
(Hopefully. He’d detected something human-shaped a few miles off but it could have been a monkey or a misshapen log).
“Brother,” Kija said, “Make sure you’re not too loud when you look! People might be able to hear us.”
Apparently Yoon hadn’t told everyone, after all.
Shin-Ah shrugged, and after a few seconds of conversation the group continued.
Shin-Ah had a reputation for being both loud and quiet.
Yoon often wondered about him. That first day they’d met, he would never admit it but he’s been scared of the man; really, what was the purpose of keeping the bloodstains on his clothes? Not even Hak failed to wash his clothes properly. The way he’d languidly wielded his sword back in his personal cave had been frightening too. The cave, almost bare, had told him that Shin-ha had little he cared for.
Later, he found out that that was very much untrue. But at the time he hadn’t known better.
Shin-Ah, after he joined, rarely spoke. He said words carefully with a lot of purpose, and as such whenever he did choose to speak, everybody quietened down and listened. Shin-Ah had a penchant for finding things that they often didn’t, after all — like animals nearby to hunt.
(Sometimes Yoon forgot that, especially when he kept walking into bloody trees and lakes. Kija had told them about his power — “He can see a leaf from a thousand miles away!” But in those moments Yoon often forgot. The group had come to the conclusion that Shin-Ah was painfully clumsy. Well, nevermind, they’d signed up for it when he’d warned them at the very beginning.
“I’m blind,” Shin-Ah had said, weeks ago. Sometimes Yoon could almost believe it.
Really, falling into the lake that first day was ridiculous, the day after that was just astronomically so. But Shin-Ah hadn’t commented on the accident, just brushed it off and continued, and everyone else had ignored it too other than helping him dry his clothes again that night. It’d seemed that that was that. Two weeks later he fell into yet another lake).
Despite how quiet Shin-Ah was verbally, however, he never was completely quiet. His bells, which Yoon had half hoped he’d leave behind after he’d dropped them that first time, never stopped chiming. Shin-Ah was graceful in his movements, and so Yoon was starting to suspect the chiming was purposeful.
Every few steps, day after day, was the chiming of the bell. And every few steps was a subtle ‘click’ noise; the clicking of Shin-Ah’s tongue. The sound really grated on his nerves some days, especially on the longer ones.
He’d only asked him to stop it once.
(Because then Shin-Ah had started to stomp his feet with each step, which was definitely worse. Yoon had sighed and asked him to go back to what he was doing before. Yoon got used to the noises eventually).
He didn’t know why Shin-Ah persevered in making so much noise, but he suspected it had something to do with living alone in a cave for eighteen years, take a few potentially. It must’ve been a loneliness thing, either that or a habit of some sort.
Ao’s apathy with the movements dictated she was used to it, so he really thought it was just that.
And then one day, two and a half weeks after they left the blue dragon’s village, Shin-Ah fell into the fifth fucking lake.
If it was clumsiness, it was sure chronic.
Everybody else had avoided it. In fact, Hak had warned him about it! He’d said, “Look jingles, a lake.”
And Shin-Ah had said “…where?” Moments before plunging directly into it.
The lake hadn’t been in their path, it’d been to the left of their path. Yoon had no idea how that could feasibly happen.
(To be clear, Shin-Ah didn’t always have clumsy accidents. He wasn’t like that old priest, he didn’t trip on air or small stones. His steps were always careful and precise. It was just that often he went a bit off track, almost like he’d stopped paying attention to where he was going).
How the hell could he manage to be that clumsy? Did Shin-Ah just really like lakes?! Yoon didn’t know!
It was a mystery. And Yoon, the gorgeous genius that he was, would solve it.