“Oh, Mavis, I am going to miss you when you die!” Mary sniffed, barely holding back her welling tears, as she lovingly hugged the injured, dragon mother and queen, fully realizing she would never see her again. “And I promise I’ll look after Regor for you.” She sniffed.
“Now hush, my child,” said Mavis gently, “there’s nothing in death for either of us to fear. My passing is as natural as the hatching of my Egg. And you and Roger are now of my blood. You will come to learn, the great heritage of the ancient Sivads is now yours to share, both in the bounties of our magicks and our knowledge. And as you grow, you will learn more of this and you will find you have your own powers to discover too. But as you both learn; you will increasingly share the many responsibilities that True Dragon knowledge brings.”
“But, d-d-do you really have to die and explode?” Mary asked her, only really caring now about losing Mavis. “Is there nothing we can do for you, nothing at all?” she asked, pleading, her eyes now red and swollen and the tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Yes, Mavis, isn’t there something we can do to save you? Roger interjected, near to tears himself. You’ve done so much for us… and anyway… isn’t… isn’t it you who always says… I mean… says there’s always a solution somewhere to any problem?”
“I will always be with you, dear children; remember, we have mind-melded and have been heart-bound too; And I only pass on to a new chapter in another story. Here and now, though, it requires we serve the current story the very best we can. And our own Stories never really end you know. For my passing, it is not a problem to be solved… but it is more like… well, yet another sort of a solution. Remember, I will be watching over you, always. Meanwhile, you must continue this story yourselves; it’s an important one, so make it a worthwhile one… and ultimately, make it a happy one!”
Roger now stepped forward. He didn’t know what to say and stood there biting on his lip and looking glumly down at his feet. But he then mustered up enough courage to put a hand onto Mavis’s scaly head and say his own heartfelt goodbye.
“Well, g-g-goodbye then, Mavis. You’ve been… I mean, I’ll miss you too… and without all your… well, we’d both be, well, you know… so th-th-thank you, Queen Mavis, it’s been a great honour to know you. It really has!”
He stumbled to a faltering, embarrassed silence; surprised at having found all the words he’d needed to express his true feelings, despite being tongue-tied and feeling overwhelmed, having to leave this wonderful and wise Queen of the True Dragons behind to die.
Mavis looked Roger deeply and intently in the eyes and he felt himself momentarily lost within her large, lambent pools of wise and ancient intelligence; As if he was slowly sinking, swimming gently down into their warm and golden depths.
“For good or for ill it is you two who have been chosen. Mavis replied. “Above all others, on or in this Erf, it is you, Roger, and Mary too, who we must now turn to.” Then Mavis fine-tuned her telepathic communication so only Roger could hear her. "And at this very moment, Roger, you are particularly needed, for your friend Mary here, is hurt, and so I rely on you to defend and protect her as well as my precious Egg, from all the dangers and harms that may fall upon you. Are we agreed, my valiant Son of the Sky?”
“Yes. I understand, Mavis; I agree, and I promise, I’ll do my best, after all, as you say, there is always a way… isn’t there!” Roger telepathed back, as courageously as he could. “We’ll make it somehow. We’ll find the way!”
“Then, very good, my sky-child; You are learning but now I must rest and so rebuild my energies for what is soon to come. I must be prepared. Go now and also know that for a short while we will still be joined in thought. I will be with you both - up until the very last second of my final ascension to the Sky Spirits. And if I am needed, I will answer. Now fare you well - and may the Great Spirit of the Erf be your guide forever!”
Mavis then turned again to Mary. “Farewell, my faithful young Egg Bearer. There will be further lessons and others above and below who will also teach you, as well as serve you too. Now, children, please stand together; I must give you my final gift.”
She opened her jaws wide and breathed out a long, billowing cloud of magical blue flame, this time engulfing them and permeating every cell of their aching bodies and giving them a faint, pale-blue aura. This glowed all around them and also lit the sloping stairway ahead, that disappeared up into the ever-deepening darkness. Their only route to freedom!
“You now have the protection of a much deeper Blue Dragon Flame. This will protect you as you climb the slope to the Skylands. Remember, trust in the power of the True Dragons - and in each other too; All three of you. As you do, you will each grow and will learn and will be of great comfort to the other; now, Goodbye and Fare Well.”
Roger took hold of Mary’s arm and gently helped her to get onto the first step. She had put the Egg safely and snugly up her jumper and tied her coat over it with Roger’s scarf this time. She now did indeed look like a very fat woman or a very pregnant one, and was fully aware of that embarrassing fact.
“Don’t you dare say a word!” she hissed to Roger, quickly stopping the witty remark that he was just about to make, dead in its boyish tracks.
“I didn’t say a thing,” he said, with a slight smirk. “Now keep right behind me, Mary, we’ve got this blue light for now and then only got my old torch to light our way and I don’t know how long that will last.”
“Well, at least we know the only direction we got to go is upwards,” Mary smiled at him, “and look, there’s one of your discarded hankies, Roj, we’re right where you came down.”
The two weary children made their way up the murky, stepped slope, cautiously stepping forwards and ever onwards and upwards. The dull, red glow of the Dragon’s Cavern slowly dimming behind them, Mary still limping slightly and Roger’s torch searching as a weak smudge of pale, yellow light in the all-enveloping darkness ahead.
“Goodbye my Sky Children… and Fare Well.” came Mavis’s thought, telepathing to them, as they made their way, step by step, up their Stairway to Heaven.
“Be your Selves… and you will find the way!”
Dragon’s Erf is continued in Book Two – Dragon’s Inferno!
EPILOGUE:
“Oh, Morgrave, Morgrave; by all the Ancient Demons of the Core. How did you get yourself so helplessly trapped? Don’t you know, my royal brother, all True Dragons have powerful magicks and skills that rival even our own?” Lord Morgrim disparagingly telepathed to his imprisoned twin brother King Morgrave.
“Don’t waste your breath or my time, scolding me, Morgrim,” Lord Morgrave, the King of the Core, hissed back defiantly. He had been trapped beneath this mountain of rock for some days now. But ordinarily, this would have meant nothing. Hundreds of tons of Erf’s mantle-rock, usually for him, would be much like a tadpole swimming about in a muddy pool.