Mercedes Lackey - Elvenbane

His scales sparkled in the sunlight like tiny gems themselves, emeralds and sapphires, each brushed with a dusting of gold. Her tunic was too dust-covered to sparkle, but when it was clean, the larger scales looked less like jewels and more like enameled metal plates, very similar to some of the elven-work Shana had seen.

She poured her jewels into the palm of her hand, focused her eyes on them, and concentrated on what Keman had told her. First, I find the center, the place where all the power comes from. Foster Mother said that's where you balance, too, and I know where that is ...

She stared at the pool of light and color in her hand, and tried to find that elusive balance-point. The gems glowed at her, each one seeming to be alive, and she finally closed her eyes and "looked" for that same glow inside herself.

I ... think this is it ...

There was a place, just about at her navel, that seemed to pulse with the same, living glow she imagined in the stones. She thought very hard about that place, "squeezing," as Keman had told her, and was rewarded with a definite strengthening in the "glow." It was becoming very hard to think, or rather, to form thoughts into words. Was that good, or bad?

She squeezed harder. Now she felt the power elsewhere, running through her with little tingles; it seemed to be coming from the pile of sun-warmed gems cupped in her palm. Feeling hopeful now, she encouraged the flow, and it did, indeed, increase.

She gave up on trying to put her thoughts into words; doing so felt like trying to swim through mud. Instead she concentrated with pictures and feelings. Now she began picturing herself as she should be; a tall, strong dragonet, as tall as Rovylern, but much more supple, with scales of purple and blue, like the amethysts and lapis she held in her hand.

She saw herself, deep in her mind's eye; saw the way her wings would lift to the sky, the whipping cord of her tail. She built up every detail, down to the smallest scale, and all the while she kept up the pressure on her power-center, until she felt as if she were about to explode from tension.

Then she released it all, in a burst of power that left her inner eyes dazzled for a moment. She opened her real eyes, fully confident that she would find her gems cupped in a purple-scaled claw.

Only to find them still held in a very human hand.

Sunset filled the crevice with scarlet light, as if Shana sat in the heart of a great ruby. The light poured in from behind her, illuminating the entire rear of the crack, and her shadow stood etched blackly into the red-glowing rocks. It was beautiful, but Shana had no eye for beauty just now. She was exhausted; her arms quivered with strain, and all she wanted to do was lie down and rest. Sweat dripped down her forehead, beaded on her upper lip, and ran down the back of her neck.

She had been trying for hours to work the change from human to dragon with no more result than when she'd tried it the first time. The power was there , she could feel it every time she started. She was doing everything right.

And yet nothing whatsoever happened when she released the power.

She stared at the hand that clutched her gem cache, the knuckles white, the hand quivering, and suddenly knew that no matter how hard she tried, she was never going to be able to shift. It wasn't a matter of being too young, nor of not having the power. She had the power, and she had been able to speak mind-to-mind long before the others of her age could. She had everything she needed...or rather, almost everything.

Because Myre and the others were right. She was an animal.

All the taunts that Myre and Rovy had thrown at her came back to her with the clarity of the hatred that had spawned them.

Myre: " Alara picked you up as a pet for Keman. Mother found your two-legger mother dying, and took you because she felt sorry for you ."

Rovy: " Alara's brought Keman lots of pets. The only difference between you and them is that you won't admit you're a pet !"

Myre: " Beast. Two-legger! Animal! You're nothing but a rat, a great big rat !"

"Rat! Rat! Rat!"

The taunts rang in her mind, and Shana flung the jewels away from her with a cry, hurling them at the stone of the crevice. They pattered against the stone like hard little raindrops. She scarcely heard them.

She was too lost in her own blackly bitter thoughts; the things she was only now piecing together.

Foster Mother would never tell her about her real mother. Alara only said she "knew" her, and that Shana's mother had died in the desert. Then she'd change the subject when Shana asked what her mother looked like, what kind of a person she was. Alara wouldn't look at her, either. Foster Mother had acted as if she were hiding something.

Myre had been full of details, though...details Shana had always dismissed as false, until now.

The rest of the Kin treat me like I was some kind of animal, too . Keman said that was because Shana was stuck in this two-legger shape, but if it was her real shape...

... then I am an animal to them .

She could think of countless times when the adults had talked to Keman about her as if she weren't there, or couldn't understand them, and when they had something to tell her to do, they used the same kind of voice on her that Keman used on his loupers.

Alara had never treated her that way...nor Father

Dragon. But they were the only ones among the Kin who didn't. Shana had always thought that was going to change once she could. After all, it was easy to think of her as an animal while she wore an animal's form.

Foster Mother taught her just like Keman...but when she talked about the Kin, she never had said that Shana was one of the Kin. She didn't talk that way to Keman...

Only to me...

So it wasn't just a malicious story. And Foster Mother knew it. That was why she taught Shana a little differently from Keman.

I'm not one of the Kin. I never will be. I'm an ugly old two-legger. Somebody's lunch, if he wasn't too hungry...

Tears welled up in her eyes as she clenched her hands into fists, fingernails cutting into her palms. They spilled down her cheeks, burning their way through the mingled sweat and dust, as the last rays of the sun faded and the light disappeared from Shana's little pocket, leaving only the blue glow of dusk.

Her chest tightened and ached, her throat closed, and more silent tears followed the first. She felt cheated, somehow, or betrayed.

Why didn't they tell me? Why didn't they tell me? If Myre knew what I was, then Keman knew, he had to...why did he let me think I was Kin? Why didn't Foster Mother tell me? She found me! She knew from the beginning what the truth was !

She cried silently, sobs shaking her thin frame, and hugged her arms to her chest in a vain attempt to keep the ache from overwhelming her. Arms that would never wear scales, or sprout long, fierce talons. She would never fly in the Thunder Dance, never be a shaman like Foster Mother.

Never.

Why didn't they tell me?

The question produced a curious change; hurt became anger, and while the tears continued, they grew hotter and less frequent.

They didn't tell her because they didn't care. They were just like all the rest! They didn't care because she was just an animal and she didn't matter.

The sense of pressure she had been creating while she tried, in vain, to work the shape-shift built up inside her again. She hugged herself and rocked back and forth in impotent rage. It's all their fault. It's all their fault! They don't care and it's all their fault! I'll show them ...I