Page 1 of I Married A Syllen

Chapter 1

Taelen

Agentle nudge tugged at my consciousness. I wanted to push it away, ignore it, and snuggle deeper into Mother’s comfortable embrace. Her amusement resounded loudly through our connection seconds before she detached from me. The loss of her veris intertwined with mine left me bereft.

I forced my eyelids open even as I attempted to heave a sigh. They resisted me, even more than my lungs. For a brief instant, in the fog of my awakening, I wondered if I had somehow gotten sick. But I never got sick. And then I remembered.

This was the end of the Long Sleep.

After a few more efforts, I finally managed to open my eyes. Despite the dim lighting in the chamber and the shadow provided by Mother’s knot, the lights still stabbed at me. A few blinks later, I managed to glance into the room. Obviously, no one awaited me as I would be the first of my people to rise.

Feeling weak and groggy, my limbs heavy, I unfurled from my curled-up position to exit the knot that sheltered me for the Goddess only knew how many centuries. Standing on shaky legs, I leaned against Mother’s trunk for support. Movement above me drew my attention. A grateful smile stretched my lips when Mother lowered one of her tendrils towards me. I lifted my face and parted my lips. The tip of her tendril opened, and I greedily swallowed the kingo she fed me. The dense milk was sweet, slightly spicy, and provided me with the burst of energy I desperately needed.

“Thank you, Mother,” I said, my voice hoarse from disuse.

The beautiful blue flowers that adorned her branches bloomed. Seconds later, the flowers of all the other Mother Trees filling the circular chamber also bloomed. It warmed my heart to be greeted with such affection.

At the back of the cave, the statue of the Goddess Etreya seemed to stare at me. Flanking her, two younglings also sculpted out of the stone wall gazed lovingly at her. Clear water trickled out of her eyes and into the pond in the center of the chamber. That it no longer ran red confirmed that the time of our awakening had indeed come.

Moreover, my heart soared at finding the chamber unscathed despite the extensive passing of time. So often during the Long Sleep, I feared the off-worlders might return and destroy us during this most vulnerable period. Granted, the Mothers and Sentinel trees were not helpless. But the foreigners possessed technologies that had proven quite lethal when we first battled them before driving them away.

I stretched until I felt a little steadier on my feet, my gaze flicking over all of my people still dormant inside the shelter of the Mothers’ knots. Some of them had a ways to go before they were rehydrated enough to be able to awaken. But my osheos—my first warriors—Nym and Drannor were moments from rising as well.

After drinking a bit more kingo, I gingerly headed out of the chamber. On my way out of the cave inside which it had been carved, I deliberately walked in the shallow stream that shot out of the pond and ran the length of the corridor to the exit.

The watery curtain of the waterfall in front of the entrance of the cave blocked my view of the exterior. And its rushing sound deafened me to everything else. While some of my peers disliked it, I loved the fact that it was always like an unexpected revelation appearing before me the moment I stepped around the cascade.

And what a marvelous reveal it was!

Even though the Long Sleep had lasted centuries, to me, it felt as if I only went into that slumber but a day ago. Despite that, my senses realized they had been deprived of the wonders of this world for far too long. The Drossara River ran at the foot of the waterfall. Its water glimmered under the sun as if illuminated by countless precious gems bouncing on the surface. Grass, bushes, and colorful flowers adorned the tall mountains sheltering the basin leading to the chamber.

I lifted my face to the rays of the sun hanging high in the clear blue sky. A bout of coughing rippled through me as I attempted to inhale deeply the fresh air and its wondrous scents. After so many years collapsed while in deep hibernation, my lungs would need a moment to relearn how to function normally.

I walked down the stone steps, discreetly carved into the rock, which led down to the river. As I approached, the trees lining the bank also flowered. I couldn’t help the silly grin stretching my lips at receiving such a hero’s welcome merely for waking up. Obviously, I understood that the land had to rejoice to finally see its children walking again. It still felt odd.

However, another thing felt even more odd. I could have sworn something or someone was observing me. But I couldn’t see anything. Could it merely be the trees or some wild creatures peering at me? I forced myself to ignore my gut saying no. After such a long period asleep, my senses were probably just rusty. Anyway, the Sentinel trees would warn me if there was any cause for alarm. And right now, they expressed nothing but peace and happiness.

I lowered myself into the water, a shiver of pleasure coursing through me at that long-lost feeling. Silencing my urge to dive, I carefully advanced until the water covered my gills. A hiss tore out of me at the burning sensation when I first attempted to breathe through them. On top of not having been used in far too long, they almost felt glued together. Grinding my teeth through the unpleasantness, I took shallow breaths until they started behaving normally.

At long last, I dove in and began to swim. I reveled in the wondrous feeling of weightlessness and freedom that swimming always gave me. This close to the waterfall, there were never any fish or other sea creatures. I almost traveled farther into open water so that I could enjoy their presence again. However, now wasn’t the time. This swim merely sought to reawaken my body enough to tackle the task that awaited me.

As the Thesh of Drossara—the lead warrior—it was my duty to ensure that the land was safe to welcome our people again. I needed to assess the state of the surrounding areas, our village, farms, and hunting grounds before the rest of us awoke.

As I swam back to the shore, the thick roots of the Sentinel trees sent a pulse through the water warning me of strangers approaching. To my relief, the lack of urgency indicated they weren’t enemies. Despite my very recent awakening, I trusted my ability to fight if needed. But this would not be optimal.

I emerged only to see a Nordjarimm flapping its majestic, feathered wings as it descended towards the shore of the basin. They were magnificent creatures, half birds, half mammals. The four-legged mounts had cleft hooves on their hind legs and reptilian talons on their front paws. A golden tuft of hair adorned the top of their bird heads, and similar long, silky strings dangled from each side of their beaks. Although they were pacific creatures, one would be foolish to underestimate the lethal properties of the very long twin tails that extended from their rumps. At their tips, a leaf-shaped, reddish appendage with ridged darts could stab or electrocute any predator that threatened them.

However, the rider retained my attention. Initially, I assumed it to be the Thesh of one of our neighboring villages coming to ensure all was well with us. But this was no Syllen. The instinctive anger that should have swelled within me at the sight of an off-worlder didn’t come. Although I had never met that male, he was no stranger to me. Over the last stretch of the Long Sleep, Mother told me of him and of a few others who were friends to the Syllens.

He landed a safe distance away, slowly dismounted, and took a few careful steps towards me. While I examined him with curiosity, he stared at me with an air of pure awe that I found a little disconcerting. And then, his hair flowered. Not only did that warm me from within, but it also prompted my own flowers to bloom.

A powerful emotion flickered over his strange features as he hastened towards me. I had never met an off-worlder who resembled our own people so much. Although he had vines, leaves, and flowers on his head like us, they were intertwined in those soft strands called hair. We had leinis—thick, tentacle-like appendages covering our heads instead. He also possessed a set of antlers that fascinated me. His ears were rounded like humans instead of finned like ours. He didn’t have gills or palmed hands like we did. However, similar to the Syllens, a leafy skirt covered his genitalia. He also shared our vines and veris, which ran the length of his arms and legs, and the swirling embossed patterns on his flesh called yevins, which were unique to each individual.

Somehow, his species and ours were kindred.

“Greetings, brother Mares,” I said warmly, touching two fingers to my chin when we stopped in front of each other.

He slightly frowned, a hint of confusion fleeting through his green eyes, a shade darker than mine. It dawned on me then that he didn’t speak our tongue. For a silly reason, I assumed that our similarities possibly meant that we also shared a language.