She stopped against a cabin-sized boulder that appeared to have fallen from the heights recently. Leaning her quarterstaff against the rock, she shrugged off her rucksack and dug out her waterskin.
Drinking sparingly, she realized she’d soon need to find a water source. She grimaced. The last one she had passed was the waterfall in the lower tier of Dragon Home. That probably wasn’t the best place to return to.
Combing her long hair with her fingers, she gathered three equal clumps and spun it into a tight braid, securing its tip with a leather thong.
She slipped free of her bow and quiver with the intention of relieving herself. Worrying at the knot in the thong securing the top of her breeks, she ducked low. A shadow sliced the sunlight radiating through the trees.
A screech echoed off the mountainside. Grabbing her quarterstaff, she searched the forest behind her, expecting to find the red dragon coming after her.
Nothing moved.
Her need to relieve herself forgotten, she stepped around the boulder with long, quiet strides, careful not to tread on anything that might make a noise.
A large branch snapped from the direction of Dragon Home. She crouched against the rock, wishing she hadn’t left her bow on its far side.
Two more branches snapped in rapid succession, coming her way.
Trying hard to control her breathing, she reproached herself. Sounds travelled far in the forest—their direction often misleading. For all she knew, someone might be descending the slopes far north of her position. With great care, she stepped around the backside of the rock, her eyes darting everywhere. Where was Raver?
Leathery wings snapped twice overhead. A grey dragon circled a gap in the treetops. Hovering on the winds, it craned its neck, searching the forest floor.
Reecah didn’t dare breathe. She couldn’t tell one dragon from another with the exception of Lurker, Swoop and Silence, but it looked like the grey dragon from the waterfall cavern.
Clinging to the boulder, her hazel eyes followed the drifting leviathan until it passed beyond the gap. She didn’t fool herself. It was still up there, waiting. Watching.
Another branch snapped, closer—definitely from the direction of Dragon Home.
“Silence?” she dared whisper. Receiving no response, she glanced at the gap in the treetops. The grey dragon remained out of sight but she heard the flap of its wings.
Several branches snapped in rapid succession. Through the trees, a flash of crimson caught her eye. Scarletclaws!
Forgetting her gear, Reecah jumped free of the boulder and sprinted through the undergrowth, afraid to look back and see the red dragon on her heels.
The sound of pursuit died away, replaced by one of combat. High-pitched shrieks and a guttural roar filled the forest behind her.
Her sword whapped against her right leg, threatening to trip her—its tip catching her boot as she high-stepped fallen trees and moss-covered rocks.
Raver’s call pierced the forest. Searching the air, she stumbled and stopped. The motley raven flew up behind her and settled on a vambrace she held out. Steadying him with her free hand, she leaned on her quarterstaff to catch her breath—the forest eerily silent.
The absence of sound wasn’t necessarily a good sign. Growing up on the mountains had attuned Reecah to the nuances of nature. A quiet countryside usually meant a predator prowled nearby. Though, given the noise she had made running with abandon, she may have been the reason.
Self-assured in the mountains, she was out of her element in Dragonfang Pass. Disconcerted at being lost in the realm of the dragons distorted her ability to think rationally. Tendrils of panic trickled through her.
“Vine covered wall! Vine covered wall!”
Raver’s voice startled her. Where had he heard that? The raven’s ability to master human speech always amazed her, but she was beginning to think his intelligence went beyond that. Up until a little while ago she hadn’t imagined him capable of uttering a coherent thought on his own.
Frowning, she inspected him closer. No one had spoken those words out loud. Silence had mind-spoken them. How did…?
Reecah wondered whether Raver was attuned to dragonspeak? “Can you hear Lurker?”
Raver tilted his head and blinked as if processing her question. He bobbed his head. “Hear Lurker! Hear Lurker!”
Reecah was dumbfounded. Surely Raver hadn’t understood. It had to be a coincidence. He had repeated her words, not answered the question. Or had he?
She swallowed the implications. Searching the still forest, she put it off as absurd. And yet, she was about to ask him another question when he launched from her forearm.
She followed his flight high overhead, circling nearby trees. Emitting a shrill caw, he winged his way toward the steep slope of the mountain climbing beyond the treeline.
Without warning, his flight ended in midair. He stopped flapping and turned to look at her from a distance, somehow hovering above the forest floor without the use of his wings.
Reecah squinted. Camouflaged against the backdrop of the forest, Raver stood upon a high wall covered in ivy. The dragon tombs! She’d found it—or rather, Raver had. If not for his intervention, she would’ve run right by it. Even knowing the wall was there, it blended in so well with the forest that if she took her eyes off it and came back to where the wall stood, she had difficulty picking it out again. Raver’s presence enabled her mind to process the fact that a wall bisected the trees a short distance away.
Nearing Raver’s location, the wall distinguished itself from the landscape. A magical illusion had kept it hidden from view. Parting the vines with her hands, the leaves around her quivered like they were ruffling in a breeze. In the deathly still atmosphere of the forest, the sensation was unnerving. A feathery tingle ran up her spine as solid stone met her probing inspection of the wall.
Three times her height, the wall ran through the trees in both directions, blending into the foliage and disappearing. Beyond the barrier, the mountain rose out of sight.
Wondering how to get past the wall, she considered climbing the vines. A glance sideways revealed a rectangular doorway.
Her skin crawled. Either the entrance had materialized when she wasn’t looking or she had lost her mind. The doorway hadn’t been there moments before.
She observed the serenity of the forest. Nothing moved. As peaceful as it seemed, the small hairs lifted on the back of her neck. There wasn’t anything remotely natural about this place.
Against her better judgement, she poked her head through the doorway. To her left, toward Dragon Home, the wall receded into oblivion, but on her right, another moss-covered stone wall bisected this one, rising straight up to lose itself in the trees.
She almost balked and fled back into the forest. The towering second wall should have been visible outside the perimeter wall.
Trying hard to still her nerves, she examined a red stone path at her feet leading beneath an arched entranceway through the second wall—the tunnel-like passage thicker than the outer wall was high.
A broken gate of lashed tree trunks lay buried beneath fungus and moss on the far side of the path while its counterpart hung neglected from the near edge of the short tunnel.
Raver startled her, squawking his impatience and flying through the archway.
Inhaling a deep breath to calm her building excitement, she searched the skies. Silence had said they would meet her. She hoped they would get here soon.
Marvelling at the manmade walls, she experienced the euphoria of accomplishment. If she was right about the ancestral tombs, they were what Grimelda referred to as the Dragon Temple.
She steeled herself and followed Raver, marvelling at how the arched tunnel appeared to be chiselled from the mountain itself.
Passing beyond the tunnel, she nearly swooned. The path veered left toward a dark cleft into the mountain, its frontage carved in the likeness of an immense dragon’s head. The path she trod passed between curved fangs taller than a large man
and disappeared into the mouth of the beast. Breathless, she stopped to appreciate the grandeur. This had to be the Dragon Temple.
An odd scraping noise arose from the courtyard where the ivy-covered wall stood. Turning to listen, her courage left her.
Silence’s words ran through her mind. “Whatever you do, do not disturb Grimclaw. He doesn’t hear well, but if he sees you, well…”
Swallowing her fear, she placed her hand on the hilt of her sword. If the ancient one was aware of her presence, there was little she could do about it now.
Turning back to the dragon head carved from the side of the mountain she wondered where Raver was. It took her a moment to realize he perched atop a dragon fang at the entrance, his mangled feet finding purchase on the stone.
Remembering that fateful day she had lost Grimelda, filled her with dark memories. The look on her great-aunt’s face just before dismissing her with an unearthly voice had scared Reecah more than she cared to admit.
The sound poor Raver made when Grimelda severed his toes haunted her dreams to this day. And the blood in the fount…she shivered.
Grimelda had been adamant that Reecah retrieve something she referred to as the ‘Dragon’s Eye,’ and return it to her. Forlornly studying the dragon’s head carved out of the mountainside, Reecah wondered what could be gained by recovering the Dragon’s Eye now. Auntie Grim was gone.
Staring at Raver, one thing Grimelda had said the night of the inferno echoed deep within her. “Promise Grimelda that no matter what happens here tonight, you will return with the Dragon’s Eye.”
Reecah squinted at nothing in particular, going over the words…no matter what happens here tonight…no matter what happens…no matter what!
Of course! Grimelda had foreseen her death. She had come right out and said it. Then what would posses her to demand Reecah bring her the Dragon’s Eye if she were dead? Unless…
She shook her head. It made no sense. Perhaps, her aunt hadn’t expected her shop to burn to the ground, but the more she thought about it, the less convinced she became. Auntie Grim had an uncanny way of prophesizing the future. The old crone had mentioned on more than one occasion that she had been expecting Reecah. She thought it had been an old woman’s mutterings, but now she wasn’t so sure.
Raver squawked a warning and took to the sky.
The suddenness of his distress filled Reecah with dread.
A shadow blotted the light, and the earth shook under the weight of the biggest dragon Reecah had ever seen—its hooked claws crunching into the path between her and the mountain entrance.
Blacker than a moonless night, the dragon filled the courtyard, its massive head an arm’s length away. Sulphurous smoke wafted from nostrils larger than her head. Had she been able to catch her breath, Reecah would have screamed.
Cantankerous Curmudgeon
“You don’t look worth my while. How did you get in here?” a deep, gravelly voice sounded in her head. “I’d be better served disemboweling you and letting the raven have your innards.”
On the verge of blacking out due to fright, Reecah struggled to regain her breathing.
“It has been some time since I’ve dined on human meat. You’re nothing but gristle if truth be told.”
A quick breath snuck past the back of her mouth, followed by another. Gulping in great gasps of air, Reecah didn’t care that her knees knocked together. It was a relief she hadn’t wet herself.
“You act like you’ve never seen a dragon before.”
Reecah nodded in small, quick jerks, her gaze averted by the dragon’s twitching tail thumping against the face of the mountain entrance.
“A shame I must eat something as pretty as you.”
Reecah’s breath caught again. She held trembling hands before her. “Please, I mean you no harm.”
“You mean me no harm? Ha!” The dragon’s incredulous voice thundered in her head. “What could a pitiful human do to one such as I? Surely you don’t think I fear a pathetic creature like you. If I feel generous, I might permit you the opportunity to run. I do miss such sport in my advanced years.”
“Please Mr. Grimclaw—”
“How do you know my human name?”
Reecah swallowed but before she could respond, Grimclaw bellowed, “Speak, before I end you!”
Flames licked at the edges of his nostrils. Even if Reecah had the courage to attempt an escape, she didn’t think her legs would move.
“S-s-swoop t-told me.”
Grimclaw’s tail smashed the ground beside him. “Swoop! Who is this Swoop? Lead me to him and I’ll end him, too. Arrogant humans!”
“H-he’s, I-I mean, she’s not human. She’s a dragon.”
Grimclaw’s head pulled back. “A dragon? Impossible. Never heard of her. You’re trying to deceive me. For that, you shall burn.” He pulled his head back farther, opening his fanged maw. Flames roiled at the back of his throat.
Reecah lifted a knee and covered her head with her hands. “Swoop is a dragon. She led me here. You dried my clothes!” Her voice rose to a squeak as Grimclaw thrust his head forward—flames spewing through rows of jagged teeth.
Reecah shrieked but the stream of instant death crackled overhead. Grimclaw’s aborted attack shrivelled the loose hairs on top of her head.
Opening her eyes, she recoiled in fright. Grimclaw’s eye, the yellow orb almost as tall as she, wasn’t more than a finger’s length from her face—his great head tilted just so.
“You’re the one the dragonling claims is a Windwalker?”
She stepped back. “M-my name is Reecah Draakvriend. M-my…wait!”
“Not a Windwalker?” Grimclaw turned his head and opened his mouth wide.
Reecah screamed, anticipating a horrific death. “My great-grandmother was a Windwalker!”
Grimclaw paused, the points of his teeth poised on either side of her head.
His breath was enough to make her retch. The sight of his dark purple tongue caused her to shudder. It felt like an eternity before Grimclaw’s mouth withdrew.
Grimclaw’s nostrils twitched. His tongue licked his black lips. “And just who is this great-grandmother of yours?”
Reecah’s stomach dropped. She couldn’t recall ever hearing her great-grandmother’s name. People had simply referred to her as great-grandmother.
“I-I don’t remember.”
Grimclaw’s eyes narrowed.
Reecah held her hands out, shaking her head. “No. Wait. It’s true. I just, um, I mean I’ve never…” She started to panic and then it hit her. The stories Poppa had read to her were about a young woman—her great-grandmother’s history! Until this moment she thought they were make-believe. “Katti! Her name was Katti Windwalker!”
“Was?”
“She died years ago. Around the same time as my mother.”
Sorrow replaced the anger in Grimclaw’s eyes. The great dragon lowered his head. “Most unfortunate. It would explain why she never comes by anymore.” He cast her a sad glance. “That also explains how you got this far into the temple grounds without dying.”
She had no idea what he meant, but felt it best to let him keep talking.
“Who are Marinah and Davit Windwalker to you?”
Reecah swallowed. How did Grimclaw know about them? Swoop’s earlier comment came back to her, …Marinah and Davit Windwalker often came this way. The revelation stunned her. Had her mother spoken with Grimclaw?
“My mother and uncle went by those names, but they were Draakvriends just like me.”
A deep growl escaped Grimclaw. Reecah feared she had upset him again, but instead of becoming angry, the black dragon nodded. “Ahhh. It’s making sense to me now. I seem to recall Katti mentioning something to that effect many years ago.”
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”
Grimclaw leaned his head close. “You don’t seem to know much. Perhaps you aren’t who you say you are, hmm?” Puffs of smoke escaped his nostrils.
Reecah wa
ved her hands to disperse the caustic emission. “Katti was my great-grandmother. I never knew her last name until auntie Grimelda mentioned it to me.”
Grimclaw withdrew his head, furrowing his scaly brow. “Grimelda Windwalker?”
“I only knew her as…” Reecah imitated his puzzled expression. What was Grimelda’s last name? Come to think of it, she never knew Grammy’s maiden name either. Of course, if they were both descended from Katti…
Reecah’s face lit up. “Yes. Yes! Auntie Grim was a Windwalker, just like her sister, Lizzy.”
“Pfft! Not that one. She’s a disgrace to the Windwalker line.”
Despite her deep-rooted fear, his words fueled her quick temper. “Who? Lizzy?”
“Please! Don’t mention her name around me. If not for her, things may have been different for many of us. Including your mother. I should have eaten her when I had the chance. I know where she lives.”
A door hidden deep within Reecah’s mind squealed open, releasing her pent-up sorrow. She fought back tears but couldn’t keep the bitterness from her voice. “She died three years ago.”
“That is good news.”
Before she had the sense to stop herself, Reecah pulled her sword free and brandished it at Grimclaw’s chin. She had no idea why he didn’t like Grammy, but she refused to let him badmouth her grandmother. “You take that back!”
Grimclaw eased his head into the air. A guttural rumble shook the courtyard.
It took Reecah a moment to realize he was laughing. She wanted to impale the impertinent beast but doubted her blade would even scratch one of his scales. Helpless, she fought the urge to scream her frustration.
“What do you plan to do with that? Scratch my itchy back?”
“I demand you take back what you said about Lizzy Draakvriend, or else.”
Grimclaw laughed harder. “Or else what? You’re nothing but a harmless tick.”
Reecah's Flight Page 22
