"Why do you hang on to that thing? It makes me queasy." Aevan said, as Iva looked at the small sliver of stone dangling from her neck.

"It makes me strong. I don't know about you." She said. "Are you back to work now, or what?"

"I'll be heading to Kua for the big race, of course I'm hoping to watch a little this time." Aevan leaned back, watching the swarm of colorful Rustit bugs as they danced in the midday light. "But I want to head back to the desert first. Want to come along?"

Iva shrugged. "I've got some contracts I'd like to finish up," she tried to make an excuse, but by the time Aevan asked he'd already gotten up and was indicating the door. Iva rolled her eyes, they were the same stunning green as her hair, though they didn't stick out quite as much as Vanya's blue ones. Iva was much darker in skin coloration than her half brother, Iolen's daughter did resemble her mother greatly, as Aevan took after their father.

Iva still had paperwork to do, but she reasoned, she'd be able to finish it whenever she was back at the office. She wouldn't let just anyone work her files, being rather anal about that. Aevan's light-hearted attitude was easy for her to catch, though.

He seemed unusually affected by her little stone though - it wasn't the first time he'd mentioned it since the Breeder's Convention. Since it bothered him so much, she decided to take it off and leave it in the room. It would be safe there, she supposed. If someone wanted it badly enough they could have it. She could always get another piece.

One of the Alabaster mines she had thought about investing in kept belching the stuff out. Its psionic-dampening effects aside, it was a rather nice solid ore. It could be used to build homesteads, or decorational items. Or, it could be used to block out unwanted minds from private conversations.

Or again, as Iva had intended - to make a psionic stronger by practicing around it. Rather like a runner would train in high altitude to get better use of their lung capacity, Iva had so enjoyed the challenge it presented, that she had rarely taken it off in the three months since she bought it.

Her head swum a bit with the press of minds, when she did so. The people in the clinic building were in various states of mind. Aevan was a rich treat of happy-expectant-nervous, because of the upcoming Kua race and his typical spot in it (he worked the emergency medical rounds, as his Healers degree warranted). There was a woman in the neighboring hall who had just learned that she was hardly fertile enough to carry the child she had - it would be her only one - so the mix of fear, self-loathing and brilliant happiness at being pregnant at all was like a layered cake. Iva stood against the wall for a moment, and Aevan turned to check if she was okay.

"Iva, you might want to try not practicing so hard," Aevan said. His own powers merely reflected hers, though his empathy was much stronger. "Or, you maybe want to try using some other ability with it, instead of just this one... You're making me dizzy."

"Sorry," Iva said, "it'll pass, but it's just so ... well - let's go!" She laughed. She was having a hard time brushing it off, really, but in the interest of getting out of the office and seeing what Aevan might have at his desert Hold she settled her mind and followed him.

The office complex was an open, airy place. Iva's office itself was on the corner of the building, second floor of three, and was open air on one whole side, with screens keeping those big orange and yellow bugs out of her projects. Should bad weather arise, they had field generators which would keep the water out and wind to a minimum.

Aevan always wondered why Iva would even want an office like that. It was totally not her style outwardly. She was so professional it hurt. After all, she was the one who took over Vanya's finances when she got her Breeding degree, and would run his office full time if only he'd let her. She had only been about 22 when she got her 6th degree in Breeding, but was still considered a late-comer according to some of the Sengihrs out there.

Her mother thought she did an admirable job - Iolen had been one of the youngest Suzerinne in the world. Her daughter took a little more time because there were more things to consider. That, and apparently she was distracted by someone along the way.

As the pair of siblings got into Aevan's rented carriage, Aevan turned to his sister and laughed. "Look, you might as well tell me who he is, you think about this guy all the time, but you won't let me look into your head for a name."

"That's not your business!" Iva said, half shocked and half blushing because she hadn't realized how ill-hidden her thoughts really were. Maybe she'd keep that shard of blackstone with her more often, just to keep her own thoughts hidden better.

"Aww," Aevan said, pouting, and setting himself back in the thickly cushioned seat. The Bayaran driving the carriage already knew they were to head east to the edge of town. The trip into the grasslands was pleasant, if a little long. The large hoverport that supported inner-continent flights rested here, rather than on the more busy side of Telva. Over the course of the half hour trip, Aevan continued to pester Iva about her secret crush.

Iva continued not to give in. But by the time they'd reached the edge of the hoverport, Aevan had narrowed it down to "someone who is important, a Breeder's son, and not technically a relative". He snuck that last one in just to see if she was paying attention - and the swat to his shoulder told him she was.

As always.

Aevan arranged payment for the flight inland, while Iva paid the Bayaran for their carriage ride. When he'd finished, and come to meet his sister again, Aevan bounced on the balls of his feet, his very tall frame and pointed hair style attracting that kind of attention that Iva dreaded. He continued to do it, glancing around and grinning at people as they passed.

"Aevan, I swear, I am going to buy a permit to use neural stunners on you, if you don't calm down." Iva sighed as he laughed again. Several tourists and one obviously long-time resident of the area stifled bemused mocking laughter. Aevan thought this was great fun.

Eventually their flight was powered up, and the Land Master who was taking them to the nearby scrubland settlement invited them into his hoverjet.

"So..." Iva said, looking out the window of the enclosed low-flight vehicle, "what are you picking up here?"

"I wanted to check up on a dragon nest, actually. It's a private Hold, but the Land Mistress who Holds it doesn't want to deal with it. She said she'd had enough trouble with vandals and thieves in the area, she didn't want to deal with dragons too."

"What in the world would someone say that for?" Iva muttered. "I mean, if I had trouble with vandals the first thing I'd do is get a dragon as a guard!"

"Tell me about it," Aevan chuckled. Shortly, they'd arrived at the site. It was a single-story dwelling, very nicely constructed it looked like, resting on a bit of a cliff. That cliff overlooked the first stretch of true desert in this area - it wasn't much of a dune, but it was all sand, and no scrub. It apparently turned into a mud pit when the rains washed through it.

Aevan wanted to buy it, Iva could tell, but he'd have to wait until this Land Mistress offered to sell. And from the looks of it, she'd never offer. The woman who came from the dwelling was short and portly, but in a very powerful way. She strode up to the pair of Breeders and looked them over before even cracking half a smile.

"You're here then. Good. The nest is this way." She said, curtly.

Mentally, Iva felt a little ping from her brother. Though he could clearly speak with his fathers, she and he only shared Vanya's genes - and he didn't have true telepathy. She listened carefully, and Iva was happy that her practice around the blackstone was paying off.

Distantly, she felt Aevan's mind saying she's treating this like we're exterminators! As if!

"No kidding," Iva muttered quietly, the woman didn't hear.

The woman pointed at the gulley, and there in a shaded area away from the direct sunlight, was a mound that had several lumps in it.

"There it is. The creature tending it stopped coming back about three days ago. I don't know if it's because they're going to hatch, or because it's abandoned." She looked like she would have spat on the nest, if she could reach it, "so you figure that out, and decide what to do with it. I don't want dragons here. We've enough trouble."

"Certainly," Aevan said, obviously trying very hard to maintain his polite air. Iva, while professional about it, had to hold her tongue. Here was a mere Land Mistress trying to order a pair of Breeders around? Who exactly did she think she was?

They found their way down to the sandy pit, both of them quite adept at finding hand and foot holds, though Aevan felt more in his element than his sister. The day had worn into afternoon, so the angle of the sun didn't beat down on them when they investigated the nest.

"That's a dragon nest, all right," Aevan stated. The eggs were small for dragons, just bigger than Aevan's fist, and were almost the same color pale tan as the sand. There looked to be about a dozen eggs, perhaps more were buried in the soft warm sand.

"Do you think they're alive?" Iva asked.

"You tell me," Aevan said, "you've been working with that dumb stone all this time."

Iva tilted her head and looked oddly at her half brother. "Neither of us are remarkably well Tuned for dragons, you know."

"Both of us are tuned enough to know live from dead," Aevan replied.

"Well then, they're mostly alive." Iva said, taking a closer mental look at the nest. "I can't count them, though, it's strange because there seems to be some kind of interferance."

"... What?" Aevan said, and his Kshau-inherited spines went straight out from his arms. The fact that suddenly Aevan turned from a happy-go-lucky kid to a bristling jumpy warrior made Iva wish she had spines on her arms. Just to show she knew the feeling was mutual.

"You don't think it's their dam, do you?" Iva whispered, though she didn't even know why. These big snake-like dragons didn't hear remarkably well anyway.

"... No, I don't..." Aevan whispered back. "I don't think it's a dragon."

"What kind of predator takes dragon eggs?" Iva tried to ask, but then - three somethings appeared from what looked to be a shadow. Humanoid shaped, but hardly human enough to be real people - real, according to the public.

Iva and Aevan both knew that they had to have been heavily Bred by some expert in a field - and perhaps escaped after being sold to a new Owner. They were long, two of them had no legs, instead they had a torso that ended in a snakelike tail. The other had four arms and looked exactly like the sand they'd just come out of.

And the problem of course, was that neither Aevan nor Iva had weaponry, nor true attacking powers. Both could defend themselves admirably well, their father Vanya saw to that. But Aevan and Iva were healers and socialites, not combatants.

"I can sense too much draconic genes in these," Iva said, as one of the snake-tailed ones penned her in to the crumbling cliffside with a hiss. "Who would have Bred them like this?"

"Doesn't matter," Aevan said, having his own troubles with the other snakey one, who'd been so quick to move that even Aevan couldn't block his arms from being pinned to his sides. "They're here now."

"It does matter," Said the tall, four armed leader of the trio. "It certainly does." His voice was scratchy and impatient, and barely human. "That wench in her little hovel up there wanted us and she got us."

"She's a Land Holder!" Aevan yelled.

"She used to be a Suzerinne!" The creature yelled back.

Both Iva and Aevan stopped struggling at that point, and fortunately for them, their guards allowed them to stand calmly instead of moving in for the kill. They were very likely under the strict control of the tall one.

"They're your siblings?" Iva asked, gulping. Her senses told her she was correct, but would he see them that way?

"They are my brothers, yes. And they will kill you if I tell them to."

"Not a good way to get your freedom back," Aevan muttered.

"Who says we are not free?" Said the tall camoflaged man. "We have been free for years - waiting for her to die."

Aevan and Iva looked at one another from across the mound of eggs, they had been separated and pinned across the nook. "Our father would know exactly what you mean," Iva stated, "you don't have to do this. If she used to be a Suzerinne, that would explain a lot about how she behaved to us earlier."

"If you want these eggs, you could just take them," Aevan said. "They..." He trailed off, having just barely enough good sense in his head to stop talking before he said what was on his mind. A question burned in his head.

Iva answered it readily - her powers were quite strong and included something that could suck the information right out of someone.

"They're yours," she whispered. "We didn't know - Did she do this?"

"It is a lasting insult to me," the tall one said. "You should investigate her more closely before working with her."

"I was just asked to see about this nest," Aevan said, "nothing more. I do it with other clients all the time. She probably just looked me up in the book..."

The pair of snakelike brothers slithered around and acted rather impatient. "My twins would rather eat you." He stated.

"Now, look," Iva said, getting more annoyed than afraid. "You should just take the eggs and go somewhere private with them. This is Kiran - there are tons of places where escaped Slaves find to hide."

The look on the four-armed man's face betrayed anger, surprise, and mistrust.

"And you would know this why?" He said, darkly. His brothers leaned closer to their prey.

"Because -- we-" She stammered, but Aevan completed her sentance for her.

"Because we've helped a couple of them get there," he said. "White Valley, ever heard of it?"

The man's nostrils flared wide, but then suddenly he lowered his head as a Slave often would. "I have heard of it. But never found it."

"Then if you take these eggs and promise not to come back to inhabited areas until your time limit runs out," Iva said, boldly, "we'll show you where to go."

"Why would you do that?" He said, still untrusting.

"Because we have nothing to gain by trying to take you back to your Owner or Breeder," Aevan said. "And I hate to see perfectly good Breeding go to waste. You're not suited to live anywhere but White Valley."

"There are already a handful of Renegades there," Iva said. "They would probably worry about you at first, but they'd get used to you if you could get used to them."

"Because we're like this?" The odd long man growled. Iva did not hesitate to nod.

"Yes, because you're obviously Bred. But you of all people would know that you could use that to your advantage. You clearly make exceptional guards or defenders. It would give you a purpose as well as a home."

He didn't seem to be consulting with the two snakey brothers - they were clearly sub-human as far as intellect went. Instead, the tall one seemed to just ponder for a moment, and then nodded.

"We will take the eggs, and go." The pair of snakey ones began collecting up the smallish orbs.

Iva hesitated, but then asked plainly, "they are yours, yes? Not one of theirs?" She indicated the long pair.

"Mine," the taller one said, and his body began to rearrange itself into a more naga-like creature. He kept his four arms, obviously a source of pride for him. But the rest of him could pass for a desert dragon.

Iva looked down, at the eggs. There were still a number of them, buried. The brothers were vaguely digging, but not having much success.

"Most of these are alive," Iva said, "but you've already got two that are dead." She nodded at two that one brother held. The tall one narrowed his eyes and caused the other to drop them. "... Might we keep one?"

Even Aevan looked a bit surprised at that.

"N-..." The tall one said, but then tilted his head again, in deference. "... I suppose that it would be only fair. I can't ask that you find me and my kin a haven and do nothing in return for you."

Iva went and inspected the eggs, helping to dig up the last of them. In all, there were fourteen. A large nest, according to the father. Iva glanced at Aevan, and mentally asked him to check out the four-armed ones genetics. Mostly, checking for hyperfertility.

"Oh yeah," Aevan said. "It's there all right. I can see why you would want to get back at this woman," he indicated the cliffside house. "We'll both want to keep track of you, you know. How you manage."

Iva had selected two eggs - one for each of them, ostensibly, but Aevan didn't know quite what he'd be doing with one at all. Then, Aevan decided it was time to call the hovercraft pilot over.

***

"Well you know I'm going to be totally late for the races now," Aevan said, as they sat back watching the slithery trio head off in the right direction at last. They'd never have made it without help. This far from White Valley, all the way across the whole dune desert? No less than three thousand miles?

The hovercraft driver would maintain his silence, after Iva arranged a payment to his company that would pay off three more craft and maybe even Raise him to Membayar. He was intensely curious himself, about how 'people' could look these days. Most normal people thought Aevan's arm spines were quaintly 'different' ... The Land Master pilot had heard of people with multiple limbs and all, but never actually seen any until now.

Just before they had left, Aevan closed his account with the woman in her house. He left her with the distinct impression that if any trouble happened because of her, she'd be stripped of what little Status she had left and probably be out looking for a place to call home too.

They headed toward Reant, the closest actual city near White Valley. This whole trip had taken them almost two days, even traveling over the desert dunes at nearly three hundred miles per hour they could never have hoped to get these Renegades on a real jet. They had stopped mid-trip to watch the trio hunting, and the Land Master was fascinated even further by this. Maybe he'd want to organize hunts or heck, even move in with the creatures. White Valley could use a nice person like him, now and again, to help out.

Once in Reant, they bid the driver farewell, and watched him prance off to the money exchange.

"We've got two half-human dragon eggs." Aevan said, flatly.

"Yes. Yes we do."

"Why?" He asked, and Iva turned to look at her brother seriously.

"Why not?" She said. "It's a huge leap in terms of what 'human' might mean, brother dear. You saw how he treated his snake like brothers. They were incapable of independant action beyond that of their dragon genetics, but they were ideally suited to take commands from their kin."

Aevan held out first his left hand, then right, "good thing? Bad thing?"

"Good thing," Iva said, "is that they prove that it can be done, that our genetics have finally come along that far that we as colonists to this world share that much in common with it now."

"... And?"

"Bad thing, people won't accept it. They'd hardly accept you if they knew who your other father was. People still aren't comfortable with the idea that they can be chiseled apart and glued back together by Breeders like me. Two fathers - pfah. That's nothing."

"That one kid, Morgontain's prize?" Aevan said, as they hurried to the next jet port open, going to Kua.

"You remember him, he's all slick and shiny. Great hair, good eyes, powers that can't be beat. And he's got no lineage beyond a line of scribbles in Morgontain's Stud Book." Iva smirked.

"So again, good thing bad thing. Why do we want these?" Aevan indicated the eggs which Iva cradled in her arm.

"I want one to see how human it is, and if it's good enough to be educated instead of just trained, I want to use it as a guard for my office."

"And if it's not?"

"Then it gets released back in the wild, where it belongs. I don't have time for pets either."

Aevan looked at the second orb. "But you got two. I don't really have time for it either. I deal in Slaves, Iva, not ... snakes."

"I know, but that's why I chose these particular two. They weren't wholly one or the other - you can tell that, can't you?"

"Sort of. I'm better at it when things are actually born or grown."

"Well then, we'll get our chance soon, I think. They're both squirming in the shell. I hope we get to Kua before they hatch."

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