Dragon School_Dire Quest Read online

  “And if it is?” My words sounded weak, even to me.

  He held my gaze before he spat violently and stalked off. For a man who had just saved my life after smiling for two days straight, he sure was in a mood. He must not like the Lightbringers.

  With a rapier intellect like that, I’m surprised they let you leave the Dominion.

  Was there no mercy for someone who had just been snake-bit?

  I’m merciful. That won’t stop me from having fun at your expense.

  I stumbled to my hammock and fell into it. Good thing it was hidden by Bramba trees from where Renn was. Hopefully, Raolcan would wake me up if Renn decided to kill me in the night for being a Lightbringer.

  I’m right beside you, spider. I’ll flame any creatures that try to harm you – even Gold Dragon Riders with big grins.

  Chapter Ten

  I couldn’t sleep all night. The moon was too bright and the stars - a spray of milk across the midnight sky – looked wrong, like they were slightly out of place. I tossed and turned, feverish, sweating and plagued with fearful dreams. When the last one ended with Renn choking me, I woke with a gasp.

  The only sound in the pale dawn with the lapping of waves against the Brambaraft. With a sigh, I fished Talsan’s little book out of my pocket and began to read. I doubted the Ibrenicus prophecies had anything to say to me now that I was so far from Savette – after all, they were written about the Chosen One, not me – but it was strange how comforting they could be.

  In dark lands, the light flickers under a cover. An ember against the night. A last gleam in a charcoal death.

  Yes, very comforting indeed.

  “Are those the Ibrenicus Prophecies?” Renn was standing right beside my hammock.

  I gasped and fell from the hammock, landing roughly on the roots below. By the time I’d picked myself up again he was gone. With a tsk of irritation, I fished the map out of my pocket. There were only two notations left. I read the next one.

  Between bow and hook chart your course to the mouth of the bowl.

  Again, it was about as clear as mud.

  It wouldn’t be if you’d looked at the stars last night, Raolcan said.

  I felt my cheeks heating. I hadn’t even read the notation last night. I’d been too busy thinking about how miserable my snakebite was and how I couldn’t trust Renn – even if he had saved my life.

  You should probably thank him for that. Does the line on the map go north?

  It did.

  So would the course between the hook and the bow constellations.

  What would I do without Raolcan?

  The whole world wakes up asking that very question.

  I rolled my eyes and searched through my packs for my other leather jacket. This one was wrecked until I could repair the torn sleeve. I changed quickly, took care of necessities, and loaded Raolcan. I didn’t see Renn again until I was mounting up. He hovered nearby, silent. What did he want?

  Water. He thirsts.

  Well, why didn’t he just ask for it?

  He’s torn inside.

  Hopefully, he wasn’t planning to kill me now that he’d just saved me.

  I honestly don’t know. Still, a grateful attitude never hurts.

  I loosened the nearest waterskin from where it was tied and threw it to Renn. “Thank you for saving me from the red adder.”

  He left without acknowledging my thanks. Oh well. The sooner we got to Baojang, the sooner I’d be rid of him. Raolcan launched into the air and I held on tight, grateful to still have my best friend with me. Why did everyone else have to be so complicated?

  Not everyone can be as amazing as I am. It’s a gift.

  We flew north without looking back, angling slightly east. I was looking for a bowl – or anything really except for sea and sky. Renn was behind us. I’d checked a few times just to be sure. After all, if he hated Lightbringers so much, then maybe he wouldn’t want to follow one.

  It was a long day with no break from the strong winds that kicked up or the glaring sun. By midday, we were both exhausted, but there was nowhere to land. But late in the afternoon, I saw a line on the horizon. Land.

  As the sun began to sink in the sky, we reached a peninsula that ended in a dish-shaped formation of black stone. We’d found the bowl. Raolcan set down wearily on the land by the bowl and I was grateful to Hubric for insisting on all the water. Even here - finding land at last - there was no fresh water in sight. I slipped off his back, but before I could offer him water, Ahummal skidded to a stop beside me.

  “We need to talk,” Renn said, ominously. He leapt off of Ahummal, grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the middle of the bowl.

  Raolcan spun, flaming so close to him that it singed the hair on his other arm.

  “Easy! Get your dragon under control! I’m not going to hurt you. Didn’t you bind him in place when you landed?”

  “I thought you knew a Purple,” I said.

  Renn stopped and spun to look at me. His face was haunted.

  “Talsan didn’t ever bind his dragon either. He claimed he didn’t need binding.”

  “Talsan Woodcarver?”

  “Did you know him?” Renn asked.

  How did I tell him that his friend hadn’t died in Casaban after all? That instead, he’d been captured there and then died while protecting me? I bit my lip. There needed to be lessons on how to have these hard conversations.

  “He was a Lightbringer just like you,” Renn said. “And he died, just like you’re about to.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “What do you mean? If you’re planning to kill me, then you won’t be far behind.”

  He made an exasperated sound and threw my arm away like it hurt to touch me. “Why do you have to be so difficult? Why couldn’t you just have been smiling and trusting and easy to work with from the start?”

  Why couldn’t he be honest and open? “I’m not a High Castelan with a sky silk dress and doting parents.”

  “Well, neither am I! I just want you to understand!” He was frowning. Why did he have to yell like that? Yelling just made me jumpy.

  “I just want to know if I can trust you.”

  “You’re just so difficult!”

  He was just so dramatic. He needed to calm down. Leng would have been cool as a sea breeze if this were him.

  Unless he’s kissing you and then he seems to lose his capacity to stay calm and logical.

  I couldn’t afford to think about Leng right now. Wherever he was, he had his own troubles to worry about and I had my own to deal with here.

  “Calm down,” I said gently. Clearly, I would need to be the one to sort this out. “Why don’t you start at the beginning and tell me why you’re here.”

  “Is that Lightbringer symbol real?” He crossed his arms, but it was uncertainty that filled his eyes. He was just as worried – just as skittish – as I was. “You’re really a Lightbringer? What does Ibrenicus say about the Chosen One?”

  “The Chosen One brings truth to the Heart of the Dominion,” I quoted.

  He seemed to relax a little but he continued to press me. “What does it say about the ‘Bride of the Morning.’”

  I quoted the whole prophecy this time. I was getting as bad as Hubric. “Offered then denied, Bride of Morning, Dark’s only hope of peace.” I swallowed. There was no point dancing around this anymore. If one of us didn’t try trusting the other, then we were both going to go insane. “I know it by heart because I read it in the book Talsan Woodcarver wrote with his own hand.” I slipped the book of Ibrenicus Prophecies out of my pocket to show him. “And because it’s about the man I’m traveling to Baojang to see – Prince Rakturan, dark’s only hope of peace.”

  He took the book from my hand for a moment, studying it before returning it. “It is Talsan’s.”

  He ran a hand through his hair before rolling up his sleeve to show me the ink there – the sign of the Lightbringers. He pulled his own leather-bound book from his pocket and handed it to me. On
the front page, it said, ‘Ibrenicus Prophecies, copied by the hand of Renn Woelran.’

  “So, our cards are on the table,” he said, with a ghost of his former grins.

  “You still haven’t told me why you’re going to Baojang,” I said.

  “Can we make a fire first?” he asked. “It’s a long story.”

  By the time the fire was lit, our tents pitched, the dragons settled and unloaded, and the tea brewed, he seemed ready to talk.

  “It was Talsan, Calanda and me. Calanda is a Red. We were all Lightbringers and friends. We’d heard rumors of the trouble in the north and Talsan had heard a rumor that the Ya’kar were open to negotiation. We were already thinking of a way to broker peace somehow – or at least communicate with them – when Casaban was attacked and the city sacked. I lost Talsan in the fighting. Calanda died before my eyes, leading a charge with the remaining Red dragons against the ships. There just weren’t enough of them, and the other side had Magikas. Our Magikas turned on us. It was a bloody, desperate day.” His face was tight with pain. “I fled with some other survivors. But war is upon us all now, and I’ve been talking to the others in my Color and to any Lightbringers I could find, but all I have is a name and a city. No one else thought that was enough to go on, but if we don’t at least try ...”

  “And so, you were looking for a way to negotiate.”

  He nodded.

  “Following me feels like the most haphazard way possible to do that.”

  He shrugged, but his old grin was back. “Well, it sure beats flying the long way around. I’m not quite sure where we are, but we’ve clearly reached land somewhere near or in Baojang. That Brambaraft was a clear sign that we’d reached the right continent.”

  “Can you show me your Lightbringer sign?” I asked. Maybe this was why Hubric was so keen on getting me marked. How else could you confirm that someone was a part of the secret society? I already missed Hubric. He always knew what to do at these times. He’d probably even know where we were in Baojang just by looking at the stars.

  If you ask me, I’d say we’re a little east of Abalang.

  Really? So close to our destination? There was still one more notation. It had said, ‘look for the lights’ which could really mean anything.

  Hubric sent you down this path for a reason.

  We still seemed to have a lot of water. Why did Hubric harp on that so much?

  Maybe the reason is yet to be seen. Let’s trust him. After all, he has never sent us down a bad path.

  Renn finished rolling up his sleeve to reveal the sign of the Lightbringers – a rising sun over a hill. Well, he’d proven who he was, hadn’t he? So why was I so suspicious, still?

  You don’t trust easily.

  Why did I long for the certainty of Leng, Savette, Hubric or Shonan? They all felt so far away as if distance had made them less real. If only Leng really could roll us all up like messages and keep us in his belt.

  “Look,” Renn said excitedly. “I see lights to the west. There must be a city there. We can look in the morning.”

  The last notation. We were almost at our destination, so why was I so nervous? Why did the nearness of it eat at me as much as the distance between myself and those I loved?

  Because you’re not an idiot. You’re capable of guessing what might meet us in that strange city. But we’re the only allies Savette has to trust with this. Be hopeful and courageous. Courage isn’t fearlessness - it’s hope in the face of fear.

  As usual, I fell asleep with his thoughts in my mind.

  Chapter Twelve

  I was growing glad for the water by the middle of the next day. The city was still only a silhouette on the horizon, growing larger and then smaller and then larger again in the wavering way that things far off do under the heat of the sun. From the bowl to the city, the landscape was sculpted rocks in towers or on stepped plains, in dips or heaped in piles, but all the same uniform reddish brown without a river, creek or lake to break it up. Trees – if they ever had existed here – had given up years ago and grass huddled in dried tufts, only the most stubborn surviving.

  We stopped three times for breaks, the dragons needing more water than usual. I even wet the scarf Leng had given me, twisting it around my head to bring me some relief from the relentless sun. It still smelled faintly of him, and I clung to that smell like a precious memory – one tiny reminder of home.

  You will return before long.

  But would I? Home felt far away. I wouldn’t even speak the language in the city we were aiming for.

  I’ll help.

  Worry mingled with anticipation as the city slowly grew in the distance. After seeing so many skycities, it felt strange to see one sprawled across the ground almost as if it had been left there accidentally.

  “Abalang,” Renn said at our last stop. We still had almost half the water we’d left with, even sharing it with him and Ahummal. We’d stopped one final time for water as the city approached. Raolcan assured me we’d be there within the hour. “Keep an eye out for Sentries. They won’t hurt you before questioning you - unless you give them a reason to – but they won’t like the dragons. They think the skies belong to them.”

  “Will they think we’re enemies, flying in there like this? I’d hoped to sneak in.”

  “You won’t be able to arrive undetected, but people of many nations come and go. Some from the Dominion will be on dragons. I doubt the guards will think it’s strange.”

  “Even with a war going on?” I was getting more nervous.

  “As in, do I think that they’ll see two lone riders as an invasion force? I doubt it.”

  I wasn’t so sure as we launched into the sky again. I’d be suspicious of an enemy in the sky above my city. Which reminded me - why did the sentries think the skies were theirs?

  Because there aren’t many dragons in Baojang. If there were more of us, we would show them how wrong they are.

  Well, what could they do from the land to prove that? Shoot arrows? Wave flags?

  What makes you think the Sentries are on the land?

  Because they weren’t dragons. Or were they?

  Oh no, they aren’t. Try not to freak out when you see one.

  Wait. What? The city was so close now that I could pick out individual buildings. They rose in slender, carved spires and rounded domes. Around the city, a sleek, white wall rose high, narrow slits carved into it from high above. There were no resting points for dragons, though open towers were placed evenly along the length of the wall. Hovering above the wall, were hazy figures.

  Sentries.

  I locked my gaze on one, frustrated that my eyes were no match for Raolcan’s. It wasn’t sitting on the wall, it was above it, but it wasn’t flying in loops like dragons did when they stood guard. A dragon would never hover in one place like that.

  We can’t. We don’t fly that way. We need forward motion to provide lift. We have wings.

  And these things didn’t? I strained my eyes. I knew I was missing the sights of the city below. I had a vague awareness of tents surrounding the city – of thousands of people coming in and out through the yawning gates – or lines of shining men in conical helmets on parade – but somehow, they seemed unimportant compared to measuring up one of these sentries.

  Four more rose up from the city to join the one I was staring at, and together, they moved toward us in formation. It was different from a dragon formation. Where we would dive or swoop in graceful arcs, they moved in jerky up and down motions like bees. And it wasn’t just those four. Hundreds more rose up from the city, as if our presence in the sky had stirred up a nest of them.

  I swallowed. I already didn’t like this. A few more moments, and my eyes finally focused on the lead Sentry. I swallowed down bile. Nothing should look like this. A man sat astride a single, horrifyingly huge eye. Billowing behind him and on either side – like the frill of a gold dragon – were hundreds of scintillating hair-thin tentacles, barbed hooks on the end. Lightning flashed in tiny
bursts from their ends, like the edges of a storm. And a buzzing almost-sound just outside my hearing set my teeth on edge.

  What could four of these things do to a dragon? I had a horrifying idea of them wrapping their tentacles around Raolcan, the lightning in them freezing him into immobility,

  That’s pretty much what they do. Their mouths are hidden on the backside under all the tentacles. They have an acid in them that dissolves their prey.

  I didn’t need to know that.

  Slowly.

  I really, really didn’t need to know that.

  Time to find out what kind of a bribe they want for entry.

  Bribe?

  We should have made sure you studied those books on culture better ...

  Chapter Thirteen

  They met us in the open sky before we reached the city. Their riders wore metal breastplates over their leathers with flares over the shoulders. Their helmets were conical with a single spike at the spire and cloth wrapped around the base. A colorful cord hung down at the back, dotted in elaborate knots. Doubtless, the color and knots meant something.

  Rank and allegiance.

  Their leader – or at least the one at the front with the largest array of knots in his cord – raised a hand, drawing up in front of us. Raolcan reared back, doing his best to keep us balanced in one position, his wings swirling in a way that made me think of treading water.

  The leader barked out a series of sharp words as Ahummal drew level with Raolcan.

  He is introducing himself as a Sentry of Abalang. He is asking if the Crescent Prince – the ruler of this city – has our allegiance. He demands water in return for entry to the city.

  Well, that was fine, but how would I speak? I didn’t know the language. I’d just assumed there would be a translator somewhere.

  Without hesitation, Renn replied to him in similar sharp words.

  Renn introduced you both. He is negotiating better housing for Ahummal and myself. He’d like us housed at the inn. The Sentry insists we remain outside the city. He has agreed to give all our water in exchange for entry to the city.