4. Ondine Ninetails was shocked and confused to hear an almost pleading whisper from this monstrous being before her.

A sound of desperate relief seemed to ride the top of these two words spoken by the beast that Rose out of the sea.

Hearing these two words flashed a memory of a sculpture she had seen on the side of the Sylvan castle : two knights upon a single mare.And for a very brief momnt wondered where that memory came from.

This confused Ondine even more and her head began to spin with more fear and confusion.

While Ondine froze and waited to see if she was to be the meal for this creature, she also quickly looked a all she could observe that might offer escape. As she looked around toward all directions, she had the strange sensation that this one beast completely surrounded her on all sides and that it was pointless to even try. She settled in to a more defensive stance and vowed to herself that she would fight with all she had… to the death, if necessary.

The dark beast that so resembled Ondine’s own reflection she had seen in still pools of mercury, spoke again with a hiss of embers in a rainstorm, ‘No ,my child, you are not my prey. You found your way to me as I found my way to my source endless eons ago.

The beast pulled its massive head back and nodded slightly.

“And none too soon.”

He looks to the moon as if its light might disappear at any moment.

“As you can see I am almost entirely of the sea. My form now makes its final return to the mother of All. She holds me both warmly and coldly in a forever embrace. When this dark season’s Moon rests to the far horizon the legacy will be yours. You are my seed to creation.

Your body remembers and came to me across the migration of souls for the words of the mind.

Yes,’ the beast sighs a whirlpool across the surface of the still water to the east as he speaks,”your body remembers and has returned to me, your mind will understand my words, and you will carry this seed as I direct you in both memory and mind.

As all of creation, you are the ultimate alchemy. ..Life’s question and yearning for itself.

And with a threatening grin and pause... He draws even closer than before and whispers in an ancient tongue, “I am your father.”

Ondine understood the words, for the Green language or Language of the Birds was imprinted in every dragons cells from the ancient o f ancients. She begins to tremble and loose consciousness, but forces herself to maintain alert while cowering back in silence to both take these words in and to listen.

She sees her Father is about to speak.

He then looks quickly toward the moon, “So short a time to tell you all. But listen carefully and do not speak."