Chapter 10
- Morgan -
We walk on until sunset. I keep eating berries and nuts and the occasional piece of fruit, and Vyrathion doesn’t eat anything.
More Plood come with worthless items, and Vyrathion angrily tosses and kicks them away.
There’s mostly rocks and leaves, but also one iron piece that I think was once part of a scabbard for a sword.
“What’s that?” Vyrathion asks when I turn the thing over in my hand.
“See for yourself.” I give it to him. “It’s broken.”
He peers at the iron piece in his hand. “But it has once been whole. And there’s evidence that it was decorated. Those who decorate trash metals may also understand the meaning of beauty. I mean, true beauty. Not this garbage.” He drops the iron piece.
“You think they may have gold, too?” I ask, not sure what he means.
“One tribe must have it. If there’s any gold at all on this lump of useless dirt, at least one tribe must have discovered it and seen its beauty. All sentient species do that. Even yours.”
“And you think the tribe that made that may also have gold?”
He shrugs. “Perhaps. I have avoided the tribes because they all want to kill me. But perhaps it is the only way, now that Praxigor clearly doesn’t keep his hoard in your village and it turns out you have no idea where it is.”
“What about the Earth girls?”
“You said there’s a small chance they have gold.
I’d prefer to not wander around the jungle for an eternity looking for them and then find that they’re only wearing tiaras made from zinc.
And you clearly want me to go this way, which is suspicious in itself.
Where was this found?” He touches the iron piece with one toe.
I ask Clyde and he points.
“So not towards what you had me believe was the direction of Praxigor’s hoard,” Vyrathion ponders.
“There’s probably a village,” I tell him, not too keen on finding myself around tribesmen again. “With cavemen, just like the black-striped ones. It may be their village.”
“I have nothing against caveman villages,” Vyrathion says.
“Remind me, where did I find you? Twice? No, we will go to this village. I will quickly search it for gold, and if there is some, all is well. If there’s none, I will punish them and we will simply go on.
Come along now. Perhaps you may still be of use. ”
He walks on.
I take a moment to hesitate, and Clyde stays with me. Those villages are among the most dangerous places for me. Those black-striped men are not unique - I think all the tribes would be happy to take me captive and keep me as a tribal entertainment center.
Then I lose sight of Vyrathion in the dense greenery, and the jungle seems to draw closer and get darker and more deadly right away. And of course, those black-striped guys are very likely hunting us.
“Fine,” I mutter as I hurry after the dragon. “But you better protect me well, or I’ll be miffed.”
I catch up with him, and immediately the fear of the jungle subsides and is replaced with the fear of him, which is mixed with something else that really confuses me.
Night falls and Vyrathion sighs and groans when I tell him that I’ll need a rest. “Resting is all you do!” he complains. “Resting and eating and slowing me down. It’s a wonder I don’t leave you behind.”
I find a spot between the tall roots of a giant tree. “I just need a few hours. Just until sunrise.” I curl up on a heap of dead leaves.
Damn, I should never have left the furs and comfort of the Borok village.
Right now I could have been sitting on the penthouse plateau with the girls, sipping sour frit and trashtalking the cavemen and their clumsy attempts to be noticed.
Instead I’m sleeping on the damp ground on dirt that smells like a zoo, glared at by a dragon who thinks I’m trying to betray him and accompanied by an alien of the same type as those that abducted me and dumped me here.
“I really should find a caveman psychologist and get my head checked,” I mutter. “Even if the cure is a hard knock to the head to sort me out.”
“What was that?” Vyrathion asks, voice full of suspicion. “I forbid you from speaking spells in my presence!”
I close my eyes. “It wasn’t spells. Just a sum-up of my life. Which must be cursed somehow.”
“Servants usually speak less and sometimes even express themselves respectfully to their masters,” the dragon informs me. “Kindly be more servant-like.”
I don’t see a reason to answer, so I simply let sleep engulf me.
It’s a short night. Sunrise is still an hour away when I’m woken up by tepid raindrops, sticky with sap from the dense canopy above.
“This again,” Vyrathion seethes. “What is wrong with this blasted planet?”
I sit up and embrace my knees. “It must be the worst planet anywhere.”
The jungle is dark around us, and the rain gets more insistent. I get some nuts out of my pockets and munch on them, wishing I had coffee and a bagel, the way I do most days.
Rain in the jungle is an unpleasant thing. The drops are big and fall with great force, kept together by the sap so they land painfully hard and turn my hair into a sticky mess.
Vyrathion seems to have no such problems - his golden hair shimmers as usual. But I sense his impatience, so I get to my feet. “You want to go on?”
A couple of Plood come out of the jungle, deposit some rocks on the ground and then hurriedly depart. There’s a pile of stuff there, so they must have been delivering their tributes all night.
Vyrathion gives the pile a hard kick, sending it all flying. “Let’s go.”
I don’t bother checking the rocks the Plood brought - I think the dragon can tell if they contain gold, and right now I’m in no mood to care that much. Even the air feels heavy, and what little light there is doesn’t really penetrate the treetops.
I plod after the dragon, tempted to mutter bitterly about my state, but I don’t want him to think I’m trying to cast a spell. So I mutter silently instead.
The terrain keeps rising, and before I know it we’re standing on a hill where the trees grow less dense.
In the mist we don’t have a great view of the jungle, but I’m pretty sure I see a thin column of smoke in the distance.
And I think I can hear the sound of a hammer striking steel.
I often heard that in the Borok village.
We appear to be close to the village Vyrathion wants to check out.
There’s a constant roar somewhere near, which is either a gaggle of huge dinosaurs or the rain falling extra hard.
He looks over at the smoke with a satisfied smile. “The metal-working tribe is near. If they have any gold at all, it’ll be mine.”
As if to underline his intention, at that point there’s a mighty flash and a roar of thunder. The rain intensifies and really starts to hurt. I put my hands over my head and look around. “Can we find a place to get out of this rain?”
Vyrathion glares up at the sky. “Is this because of your spells? You think this pitiful water will stop me?”
I groan. “I have nothing to do with this! Do you really think I can control the weather?”
His eyes glint. “So many strange things happen around you that I would not be surprised.”
“Believe me,” I tell him, “if I could, this is not the weather I would pick.”
“Hmm. Be that as it may, we shall continue. Come along. I will make real use of you here.”
I don’t like the sound of that, but I like being alone even less. So I slink after him as he walks on.
We walk for approximately fifty feet before we have to stop. There’s a wide muddy river running across our path.
“That’s where the sound came from,” I state. “Don’t expect me to swim through that.”
“Oh, I expect very little from you,” the dragon says. “Only obedience. Surely there must be a way to cross this mass of water.”
The rain keeps falling hard, and now it’s making so much noise that it drowns out everything else.
The river responds by getting higher and faster.
Suddenly a large piece of the bank on the other side collapses and falls into the furious water with a massive splash.
The waves crash over on our side, splashing our feet.
“I’ve never seen it rain like this,” I yell. “Can we go back- shit!”
The bank on this side starts to collapse, first over to our left, then to our right. Before I have time to react, the piece of earth I’m standing on comes loose and drops into the river.
I scream as the ground disappears under me and I plummet into the churning mass of mud and water. In a flash I see Vyrathion, standing calmly on the bank, arms crossed over his chest, a look of distaste on his face.
Then I hit the water, my head goes under and I have to fight to survive. I’m knocked this way and that by the immense pressure as I try to get back to the surface. But there is no real surface, just waves and splashes and pieces of dirt that come falling from the still collapsing bank.
The river grabs me and runs away with me.
For a few desperate seconds I manage to stay near the surface. Rain lashes my face and muddy water crashes into my mouth every time I try to breathe. The jungle flashes past on either side in a blur of dark trunks and green leaves.
Entire sections of riverbank continue collapsing into the flood, sending waves rolling across the current.
One of them hits me head-on and drives me under. I kick upward immediately, but the river has stopped behaving like water. It feels alive. Every time I think I've found the surface, another current catches me and spins me somewhere else.
My shoulder slams into a submerged branch. Something strikes my leg. By the time I break into open air again, my lungs are already burning.
For a moment I actually think I can survive this. People survive floods. They stay calm. They float. They swim. They keep breathing until they reach safety. Then another surge crashes over me and drags me beneath the surface again.
The realization arrives slowly at first and then all at once. I can't control this. I'm not swimming anymore. I'm being carried.
The current tumbles me through brown darkness while the last of my air escapes my lungs. Somewhere above me the storm continues raging. Somewhere upstream Vyrathion is probably standing on the bank, annoyed at the weather and annoyed at me and annoyed at the entire planet.
A strange sadness settles over me. I never wanted to leave Earth. I never wanted to leave the village. And somehow, more than anything else, I don't want to leave him.
The thought surprises me so much that I almost miss the hand closing around my arm. The grip is impossibly strong.
A moment later I'm hauled upward with enough force to make my shoulder ache, and I burst through the surface gasping for air. I cough river water from my lungs while clinging desperately to whatever rescued me.
"Honestly," Vyrathion growls beside me. "Breathing is among the simplest activities. And apparently you desperately need it, like you do everything. Why do you insist on making it so difficult?"
I can't answer. I'm too busy dragging air into my lungs.
The dragon has one arm wrapped firmly around my waist while the current tries to tear me away from him.
Even so, the river is carrying both of us downstream at frightening speed. Water crashes against his chest. Mud swirls around us. A tree collapses somewhere nearby and vanishes into the flood.
For the first time since meeting him, I don't think he's completely in control of the situation. It’s not that he’s afraid, or even particularly concerned.
But he is paying attention in a way I haven't seen before.
His eyes move constantly, searching the riverbanks, the trees and the rocks while he keeps me lifted above the water.
Another wave crashes over us. When I emerge coughing, he immediately adjusts his grip and pulls me higher.
"Keep your head up," he growls.
"I'm trying," I gasp.
"Try harder." The answer is ridiculous enough that I almost laugh.
The river continues trying to drag us away, but Vyrathion has finally found something solid beneath his feet.
At first he only gains a few inches. Then another step.
Mud slides away around his boots and water crashes against his chest, yet somehow he keeps moving toward the bank.
I can feel the effort in the arm wrapped around my waist. The dragon isn't struggling the way a human would struggle, but neither is he treating this as a minor inconvenience anymore.
A few moments later his foot finds firmer ground. The current still pulls at us, furious at losing its prey, but the outcome has already been decided.
Vyrathion climbs the bank one heavy step at a time while carrying me as though I weigh nothing. Water pours from our clothes. Mud slides down the slope around us. Behind us, the river continues roaring through the jungle, swallowing trees, branches and entire sections of earth.
Only when we're well clear of the edge does he finally stop. Then he deposits me on the ground.
I immediately collapse onto my hands and knees, and for several seconds I can't do anything except cough.
River water pours from my mouth. Mud burns in my throat. I spit out sand, leaves and something that might once have been part of a plant. Every breath feels raw.
But the ground beneath me has never felt so wonderful. I clutch at it with both hands as though it might somehow escape. Rain continues hammering down through the trees, but suddenly I don't care. The earth is solid. It isn't moving. It isn't trying to drown me.
A fresh coughing fit doubles me over.
Somewhere above me, Vyrathion sighs. The sound contains a remarkable amount of disappointment. "I take my eyes off you for a split second and you immediately throw yourself into a river."
I cough again and wipe muddy water from my eyes. "Actually, the river threw itself at me."
"See what can happen when your spells go wrong?"
I glance up. The dragon stands there soaked from head to toe. His golden hair hangs damp around his shoulders. Mud stains his clothes and his dark scales. He looks thoroughly offended by the entire experience.
"You realize," he snarls as he looks down himself, "that this is extraordinarily humiliating?
That I have never even heard of a dragon looking like this?
That I am the only dragon in history who has thrown himself into a mud river to assist a servant?
Those spells of yours must be immensely powerful. "
Despite the burning in my lungs and the mud still dripping from my nose, a laugh escapes me. For some reason that seems to annoy him even more.