“Welcome home,” she said, without sarcasm or bitterness. The serpent regarded her with one rolling eye, and then suddenly redoubled its efforts to flail its way upstream. It fled from her. There was no mistaking its panic, nor the death stench upon it.

“Gently, gently, finned one. I have not come to harm you, but to aid you if I can. Let me push you into deeper water. Your skin needs wetting.” She spoke softly, putting music and kindness into her words. The serpent stopped struggling, but more from exhaustion than calm. Its eyes still darted this way and that, seeking an escape its body was too weary to attempt. Tintaglia tried again. “I am here to welcome you and guide you home. Can you speak? Can you understand me?”

For reply, the serpent lifted its head out of the water. It made a feeble attempt to erect its mane, but no venom welled. “Go away,” it hissed at her. “Kill you,” it threatened.

“You are not making sense. I am here to help you. Remember? When you come up the river to cocoon, dragons welcome you and aid you. I will show you the best sand to use to make your cast. My saliva in your cocoon will bestow the memories of our kind. Do not fear me. It is not too late. Winter is upon us, but I will guard you well for the cold months. When summer comes, I will scratch away the leaves and mud that have covered you. The sun will touch your cocoon, and it will melt. You shall become a lovely dragon. You will be a Lord of the Three Realms. I promise you this.”

It lidded its dull eyes, then opened them slowly. She could see the distrust war with desperation. “Deeper water,” the serpent pleaded.

“Yes,” Tintaglia agreed. She lifted her head and glanced about. But there was no deeper water, not unless she dragged the poor creature downstream, and there it would find no food, nor anywhere to make its cocoon. The city of Trehaug marked the first cocooning ground. It had been swallowed by the rising water level. There had been another, not that much farther upstream. But the river had shifted in its wide bed, and ran shallow and stony past the once- rich banks of silver-banded sandy mud. How was she to help the serpent reach there? Once there, how to get mud, water and serpent together, so that the serpent could ingest the liquefied muck to secrete its cocoon?

The serpent lifted its weary head and gave a low trumpet of despair. Tintaglia felt driven to act. She had lifted and carried two humans effortlessly, but the serpent was near her equal in weight. When she attempted to drag it into a slightly deeper channel of water near the river’s bank, her talons scored its softened flesh and sank deep into its open wounds. The creature screamed and thrashed wildly. Its lashing tail knocked Tintaglia staggering. She caught her balance by dropping to all fours. As she did so, her groping foot encountered something smooth, hard and rounded in the bed of the river. It turned and cracked under her weight. Obeying a sudden impulse, she hooked her claws under it and dragged it up to the surface.

A skull. A serpent’s skull. The acid water of the river had etched the heavy bone to brittleness; it fragmented in her claws. She searched the shallows with heartsick certainty. Here were three thick spine bones, still clinging together. Another skull there. She clawed the bottom and came up with ribs and a jawbone, in various stages of decomposition. Some still had bits of cartilage clinging to their joints; others were polished smooth or eaten porous. The bones of her race were here. Those who had managed to recall this much of their migration route had met this final obstacle and perished here.

The hapless serpent lay on its side now, wheezing its pain. The few drops of toxin it could muster ran from its mane into its own eyes. Tintaglia stalked over and stood looking down on it. The creature briefly lidded its great eyes. Then it gasped out a single word.

“Please.”

Tintaglia threw back her head and gave shattering voice to her anger and hatred of the moment. She let the fury run free in her, let it cloud her mind and eyes to a scarlet haze. Then she granted its request. Her powerful jaws seized the serpent’s neck just below its toxin-dripping mane. With a single savage bite, she severed its spine. A quivering ran through it and the tip of its tail slashed and spattered the water. She stood over it as it finished dying. Its eyes spun slowly a final time. Its jaws open and shut spasmodically. Finally, it was still.

The taste of the serpent’s blood was sharp and poignant in her jaws. Its pale toxins stung her tongue. In that instant, she knew his lifetime. Momentarily, she was him, and she trembled with exhaustion and pain. Permeating all was confusion. As Tintaglia regained herself, the utter futility of the serpent’s life left her shaken. Time after time, his body had responded to the signs that told him to migrate and change. She could not tell how often the pathetic creature had left the rich feeding grounds of the south and migrated north.