Chapter 4 #2
I climb halfway to the top of the hill, when I notice it. The scent. Dragons. The opening is right above me. I take a deep breath, pull the dragoncurse bottle, and tell myself it will work well and there will be no risk.
Keeping my steps as quiet as possible, I climb up the trail and approach the cave amidst thick raindrops. Lightning brightens the ocean, and I count: three seconds until the roar of thunder. My breath pauses, waiting for another strike.
When a jagged ray of light appears in the sky again, I count to two, step by the cave, and throw the bottle.
It breaks at the same time as the thunderclap, and I wait, my body against the outer wall, where I can’t be seen by whatever’s inside it.
Dragoncurse is indeed odorless, as I smell nothing different. I hope it works.
The dragons should get dizzy and slow in four seconds, but real sleep takes longer. I count to thirty, my heart beating twice at each count.
Heavy clouds surround me, and I glimpse a dark dragon flying in the storm, still at a distance, and yet coming to kill me. My imagination, of course. I need to calm down before fear conjures more phantoms from the storm.
I step into the cave—and come across the most majestic creatures I’ve ever seen.
Two immense dragons lie coiled in a perfect circle around the eggs, their heads resting on each other’s tail tips.
One is a shimmering emerald that deepens to ocean blue along its powerful tail.
The other blazes orange, each scale a polished piece of amber and copper.
Something tells me that the green-blue dragon is male and the orange one female, but I can’t pinpoint what.
Asleep. The dragoncurse worked. Relief washes over me as I observe the stunning dragons.
A current of power emanates from them. If I could, I’d stand here and watch them in awe, humbled to be in their presence. But I have a mission. With careful steps, I approach the impressive creatures.
Two eggs rest in the center of their circle, brilliant as jewels: one red, one green.
To reach them, I’ll have to step over one of the dragons.
I choose the orange one’s tail, though it brings me within arm’s reach of the green dragon’s jaw.
A jaw that could swallow me whole. I swing one leg over, then the other, my body rigid with terror and wonder.
Each egg weighs as much as a watermelon, and I lower them into the net one at a time.
This is wrong.
My hands tremble, and I pause, then I remember all the nights I lay awake under the low roof of the restaurant, my brother’s small frame beside me in the dark.
These dragons wouldn’t hesitate to kill me or anyone in Dracolius. We’ll treat these hatchlings right and raise them with love.
Heavy rain still pours outside the cave as I hoist the heavy net onto my shoulder and step carefully over the sleeping dragon’s tail. My heart thuds against my ribs—part in anxiety, part in disbelief. I got the eggs.
Well, we still have to get to the boat and return to our kingdom, and it’s a long way, even if we sail straight. Plenty of time for things to go wrong. Maybe I should smother those kinds of thoughts.
Two steps outside the cave, and a vision twists my gut. This can’t be happening.
My heart stutters to a halt and I stand still, paralyzed with fear.
A rider blocks the narrow path, an impossible vision against the gray sky.
In his grip, a majestic silver staff, its shaft carved into intricate, sweeping wings.
An elaborate circlet rests upon his brow, and a silver robe clings to his powerful frame, soaked through by the rain.
His hair, long and dark as a starless sky, is wet and plastered to his neck and chest.
The rider does not look human. He looks like a legend come to life, a prince of some lost and terrible realm, and the sheer majesty of him pins me in place more surely than any weapon.
My hands trembling, I carefully place the net with the eggs on the ground and step back, my pulse quickening, my legs unsteady.
He raises the staff, its brilliant crystal tip swelling with light until it erupts, sending searing tendrils of energy toward me. The magic strikes me in the chest like a swarm of hot needles piercing through skin and muscle, driving the air from my lungs in a silent gasp.
The light pushes back my body, and then there is nothing under my feet—just open air and the roar of rain.
But my hands catch something: a narrow ledge jutting from the hillside just below the path. I didn’t fall. I didn’t die—yet. How long will my arms hold me?
Trembling, I wait for the rider to approach the edge and kill me. My shirt is soaked with blood, and a glance confirms the wounds are deep, an agony unlike anything I’ve ever felt.
I look down. The beach is too far below to jump, and the ledge I’m gripping juts out from the wall, leaving nothing but open air beneath me, with no footholds, nothing to break my descent. Above me, the path is just as unreachable.
Suspended, holding with difficulty to a wet, slippery rock, blood streaming down my front, I realize I’m about to meet Thantos. Of course the rider didn’t bother killing me.
There’s no surviving this.
Regret takes me as my brother comes to my thoughts. I told him I wouldn’t leave him, and here I am. Perhaps I should have listened to Laristella. Was life in that restaurant, caring for Kaio, that bad?
My mother’s face comes to mind, and I wonder if I’m about to meet her, or if she’s still in this world, somewhere too far from us, somewhere where she doesn’t need to care. The man who sometimes visited us comes to mind too, but he doesn’t have a face.
A whoosh of wings calls my attention, and I see a dragon, flying under the heavy rain, even if it should be impossible. Coming toward me.
Fear should be clawing at my throat. Instead, I’m taken by a strange, calm wonder.
His scales are a stormy pattern of obsidian and amethyst, each one brilliant, catching the rain and the distant lightning.
To be unmade by something so beautiful and become nothing but ash drifting in the wind would be a cleaner end than bleeding out on these rocks.
There’s nothing else for me to do, and I watch as he opens his jaw, a brilliant, purple spark illuminating his throat. This is it, and I’m ready. My brother has a job and a place to live, even if it’s not perfect. He’ll survive.
But the dragon’s spark fades, and yet he keeps flying toward me, his row of huge, pointed teeth on display. I always heard that dragons don’t eat people. What a time to be wrong.
My eyes close, bracing for the end. But the tongue beneath me is warm and gentle, and the mouth that lifts me from the rock does not bite down.
I’m flying. Too late now to reconsider my life goals.
Then, the teeth stop holding me, and my body freezes as I realize I’m falling.
Falling a short distance, landing on fluffy sand, the dragon above me, his powerful legs around my body. I’m safe on the ground, and yet sharp pain spreads from my chest wounds. Deep, bleeding wounds. Death is still coming.
I look into the dragon’s brilliant purple eyes, and, strangely, see not an enemy, but a friend.
He gazes at me with compassion, probably about to deal a merciful death blow.
The feeling that comes to me is love, a warmth spreading over my chest. Calm.
Not a love that wants to own someone, but a bigger, different kind of love.
Peace fills my mind. Acceptance.
The dragon then grazes his teeth over me. Instead of scraping or cutting my skin, all he does is rip my bloody shirt, then shear my undergarments. Cool wind reaches my upper body, my wounds, my breasts. I don’t feel ashamed. If anything, I feel free.
The dragon opens his jaw again, and runs his tongue over me, in a soft, soothing caress, wiping the blood, easing the pain, causing a strange, pleasant buzz,. He licks me again, a powerful energy connecting us, humming through my skin, spreading through my body.
Another graze of his tongue, and the pain fades. I reach out a hand and pat his snout, his skin so soft under my palm.
He closes his eyes as if basking in my touch. Then, without warning, he flies away and disappears into the storm. An impossible flight. Everything so impossible.
Rain pelts my body as I touch my chest—no longer oozing blood, no longer painful. I’m half naked on a strange beach, my breasts exposed, unable to comprehend the last minutes of my life.
And then it hits me: I’m alive. I survived. But now I need to return to my city.
My breath is ragged and my mind confused as I get up, then tie the shirt with the belt. I look around me, searching for Alayel, and exhale when I see him running toward me, his hair wet against his face.
“Fuck, Mayara.” He sounds relieved, angry, desperate. “I thought you were dead. Let’s go.”
He ties the rope around my body, jumps into the water, and I follow, trying my best to swim fast, even if there’s no boat in sight. At least the rain is still heavy.
We swim, and as much as I kick, Alayel’s still the one pulling me.
Reaching the boat and climbing the steps feels like moving through a hazy dream. For a second, I wonder if I died when that magic hit me, but then I press my fingers on my bloody shirt. I’m here.
The sailors approach us, but there’s something strange about the way they get too close.
One moment Alayel is greeting them; the next, an arm yanks me back, a dagger pressing to my throat as a rough hand gropes my breast. Listeno points a sword at Alayel, while a third man watches.
It’s an ambush.