Dear readers, tonight with us are two dragon riders from a world where dragons are considered demons and Dragonriders are hunted and killed as witches.

I’ve heard the two of you are from one of the mountain villages. Can you tell us what it was like to grow up there? How are the people different in the mountains?

Noren opens his mouth, but then Silmavalien leans forward, and he gestures for her to start.

“I don’t know a lot about how the people are different,” she explains. “I really haven’t met a lot of people down here. But I can tell you a bit about how I grew up.”

She reaches out and takes Noren’s hand, and he smiles. She goes on. “The mountains are beautiful! I love them so much better than the plains! The trees, and the heights rising above you, and the valleys!

“As for growing up … My life was a lot like everyone else’s in Treas. My father was a good hunter, and when he taught my older brother, I often watched when I could. Noren was learning the same skills from his father, and he noticed and started going out of his way to help me and teach me how to do all the things he was learning. We spent a lot of time talking, and he told him all about everything. His frustrations, and his triumphs, and his first deer.” She smiles. “Everyone knew what was going on, of course, but most people didn’t take much notice. I’m not the only woman to hunt, but there aren’t that many of us. So people mostly ignored it.”

Noren grips her hand a little tighter. Perhaps he can tell she really has no idea where the plains-city people are coming from, and is just going on about her life. She turns to look at him.

“Sil, love,” he says, “I think this kind young man has no idea what you are talking about.”

She laughs a little nervously. “You go on, then, since you know more than I do.”

She leans into Noren, as he takes up the thread. “You asked how people are different in the mountains,” he begins. “In case you were wondering, dragons are just as maligned there as here in the plains and the cities. The bards often came through with their stories about them, the same ones you know I’m sure, and we didn’t have any stories of good dragons, either.

“Apart from that, I’m not sure where to begin either. I can only tell you that when I came down here, it was very confusing, and it took a while for me to stop doing things that made other people uncomfortable or suspicious that I had bad intentions. It was a very different environment in Treas, where everyone knows everyone else at least a little, than it is in the cities, where you’re living so close to so many people you don’t know at all, or even the towns down here, where travelers come through all the time. There, the only travelers we knew were bards, apart from every now and then, when we would host another village or two for a big festival.

“So there’s a kind of trust between us you don’t have in the cities. It’s not perfect, Silmavalien didn’t get to telling you, but her brother married a woman who was … well, the sort of person who’d lead the ‘Dragonriders are witches, burn them!’ mentality, and she was a nuisance to be around. But people’s relationships are clearer and we’re not worried about each other doing things that I don’t know how to mention.

“At first I really didn’t appreciate the different environment down here, and even now after spending a number of years working as low-priority courier, I still don’t. I just know better what to avoid, and being a courier helped. There were ways it narrowed and defined my interactions and made that easier. So I hope that’s … kind of what you were asking.”

Yes, it is. It was good to hear what both of you shared, and I think this is a question you might like, Silmavalien. What did you enjoy about your life growing up?

Silmavalien looks up and smiles. “Apart from Noren? We’ve always done so much together, since I was old enough to run and talk. Umm … probably what I miss most is the festival nights, especially the singing.”

Her voice takes on a cautious, wistful edge. “Now you mention it, I used to look forward to the bards. I loved the stories. But now … now that I know they’re all horrible lies, it’s hard to remember that well.”

She pauses, and the smile comes back. “But festival nights! I liked listening to the songs, and I liked to sing, sometimes together with other people, but I used to sing for everyone, sometimes our old songs that we keep, that I’d learned from hearing others sing, but I’d often sing alone, maybe a new song or one I made, or one of the old songs that’s for just one woman to sing. I loved all of it, and now, well, I wouldn’t give anything for the dragons, and Songeth often sings with me or for me, and I sing for them, too. So it might be even better, but it isn’t the same.”

That sounds lovely! You mentioned you were a courier for a while, Noren, but I take it that is in the past now. What do the two of you do now?

Noren plucks at his cloak as if he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it while he answers. “So I’m a Dragonrider. At this point, that means I take care of Elninya, which means getting oil and oiling her skin regularly, since she’s one of the poor ones who has something wrong with her skin, and it cracks easily, and I help Sil take cares of hers. I’ve no idea how she managed so long alone, since she had a number of them with her.”

“Not very well, I admit,” says Silmavalien, leaning against him. “Though maybe I did okay because the animals are on the other side of the mountains tend to be pretty fat, and that makes some parts of it easier. Plus, once they could all hunt for themselves, taking care of their skins was a relief besides the fact that we weren’t hungry all the time anymore and that was with me spending almost all my time hunting! I suspect their skins suffered then, but I was probably too tired to notice.”

Noren puts an arm around her and continues. “And the other thing is, that we have to always be ready to fight the nightmare. Fear and hatred can ruin your life, and it almost made me into a real monster myself. So that’s what I am here to do. To stand against fear and hate, against the forces that drive us to fear and hate each other as the enemies, whether that’s being so afraid of death I start treating you as the enemy and hate you for what I think you might do to me until I can do horrible things to people who never hurt me, or whether that’s the stories that teach people to look at dragons as enemies who can curse them to eternal torment, and so they try to kill them all.”

Since you mentioned the stories, what did the two of you think when you first saw a dragon?

Silmavalien leans forward again, the smile on her face glowing brighter than ever, yet thoughtful. “At first, I’m not sure I had time to think. Or space maybe. I don’t remember it very well, or mostly I just remember … bonding. I know I thought Minth was ugly, but he was ugly for quite a while after that! And I know the first thing in my heart for him was love. Just … love. I can’t even describe it. It opened up a whole new world, and I think that was when I knew Love has to be real, and Love is a person, and the whole world has to come out of Love and return into Love! It took me a long time to realize that, though.”

She pauses for a moment, her eyes almost glazed over with the brightness, then says, “Airrock tells me you’re wondering something else, so I’ll try to answer that question. Once I … after we bonded … There wasn’t a moment when I feared Minth might be a demon. I knew he wasn’t, and the thought could not have occurred to me. But I knew everything I’d believed was a lie, and all the stories were horrible, and I didn’t know what to do. More than anything, I had to keep Minth secret, since if anyone discovered, we’d both be burned alive. I was never going to let anyone kill Minth! So, I knew I had to think about how to keep him hidden, and fast, and feed him, so it was a really good thing I was learning to hunt and had made my first kill a few weeks ago. At least, I think it was a few weeks ago.”

She pauses to take a deep breath. “And after that … after that, why? Just, why? Why did whatever gods there were let this happen? Did we not matter to them? Why didn’t they care about these hatchlings being killed like this? Why?” She shakes her head. “I still don’t know why. I’m hoping he – or they – will answer me soon.”

She falls silent, and Noren takes up the thread in a subdued tone. “It was very different for me,” he says. “I was always a bit of a skeptic about the stories. I didn’t see how people could really know all these things, true or false. So for me, it was a moment of Oh, dragons are real. Well, that explains some things. And Elninya hatched outside the gates of Delenois. I still had to hide her, but it was nothing like the trial it was for Sil. I may not understand why she made some of the choices she did,” – his face shutters as if he’s deliberately not talking about something that will upset both of them – “but I truly admire her. How she kept things together and managed at all … It is amazing.”

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think Silmavalien just told us what was the most terrifying moment for her.

Silmavalien shrugs. “Maybe not the most terrifying, but in its own way. It will do.”

Noren, what was that moment for you? Was it when you must have thought you and Elninya were going to be burned, or did you know rescue was coming? Did you fear it wouldn’t get there in time?

Noren flexes his hands and his eyes grow distant but bright. “Not really, no, and I had no idea I was going to be rescued. I and Elninya both knew we were going to die. But …” He shrugs helplessly. “When you know you’re going to die, and you can’t do anything about it, eventually you get to the point you realize that fear and anger don’t help you in any way at all. And when I was finally taken out of that cell …” His gaze turns inward for a moment, and then almost wild. “Gods above, Arrows of Light, the sky! The wind! The colors! That grass! That cloudy sky was the widest thing to me, and to breathe the wind after what the air was like in that cell! And … death was going to be like that, too. I just felt it … Freed. Relief.”

I know you two are together, but do you have any friends? Or are you the only people here who know the truth about the dragons?

Silmavalien edges forward. “No, we’re not. My best friend, Keya, is a Dragonrider, too. Her dragon is blue Tanz. Her whole family knows, and there are a few other Dragonriders, too. Some of the dragons are new hatchlings. They’re not here. They’re safe, in the same place where my Veine is going to lay her eggs, so they’ll be safe, too.”

All right, that is good to know! I have no idea why you two and all these dragons are putting yourselves in all this danger here, but you don’t have to tell me, and it is good to know these aren’t the last and only dragons in the world, and if you all die, there are more and they’re safe! And, speaking of that …

I know you mentioned fear and hate as the nightmare and the enemy, but is there anything you really do hate? This nightmare perhaps?

Silmavalien looks like she doesn’t quite know what to say. She leans into Noren again, looking like she’s on the verge of tears, and he strokes her hair while he answers. “Not really. There was a time I hated myself. And there was certainly a time I hated the evil I’d done and still could do, hated the fact it was there inside me, and the anger and fear was eating up my soul. It was certainly better for me to hate that evil than not to care, so that was the best I could do then, and I suppose I might even say it was good. But to me, it seems, if you can not hate, that’s better. Even hating the nightmare can turn too easily to hating those who are used by it, and even hating yourself when you’re used by it … it’s not really the most helpful. It can too easily be turned into the nightmare itself.”

He looks away, as if someone else is speaking to him, then looks back at you. “That’s my experience, and I’m not alone in it. But Onyxalis hates the nightmare, or at least there’s a lot of anger there, and that doesn’t seem to hurt him.”

Silmavalien straightens a little, and he stops speaking for her. “I don’t know if it’s hate either, or even anger exactly, but I know Onyxalis’ understanding of how to respond to wrong really helped Jareth understand some things. Even now, the way he talks about vengeance makes me uncomfortable, but it helped Jareth. I don’t know anymore than that, though …”

On that, I will let you get back to whatever it is you are doing! I imagine you must be very busy and perhaps you don’t want to spend the time you have right now on me. And I wish you the best! I don’t know how many other dragons there are, but I don’t want you or any of these to die here! Even if I only know two of their names. Minth and Elninya, right? Oh yes, you mentioned a Veine and an Airrock. Both of those are dragons too, right? And Songeth! Are Onyxalis and Jareth dragons, too?

Silmavalien smiles, trying to force the tears away a little. “Yes, they are. You caught that well, and I wish you the best, too.”

“So do I,” says Noren, standing. “We all have to fight the nightmare in our way, so never think you’re alone. And, yes, I do have to go.”

Raina has been writing fantastic tales since she could write stories with the words she could read. She writes dawndark fantasy with rich world-building, characters who feel like real people, and a touch of the philosophical or spiritual! She believes that the magic of fairytales does not need to pass away just because of modern beliefs about the universe and galaxies. And she definitely loves dragons and volcanoes.

You can find Silmavalien and Noren on the pages of Return of the Dragonriders trilogy: DragonBirth, DragonWing, and DragonSword.

Browse our archives for past interviews, or follow the site by email (bottom-right) to know immediately when your new best-book-friend makes an appearance.