Lowering herself to her hands and knees, she felt for the edges of the cold stone beneath her, her eyes growing wider with each subsequent touch. If what her investigation told her was true, she knelt on a small ledge, barely large enough to accommodate her—a stone wall at her back and nothing else around her. A quick search with her staff confirmed that if there was a ceiling within the shaft, it wasn’t within reach.
“To me! To me!” Raver’s voice echoed from somewhere ahead.
“Raver, where are you?” Oh, what she’d give to be able to fly. To not fear stepping off a ledge and falling to her death. Examining the small area around her by touch, she carefully sat on her rump and cradled her quarterstaff in her lap. If she had only hung onto that rucksack, she could’ve used her flint to set something on fire and give her light.
She grimaced. The only thing she had to burn was her journal. Pulling it out of her inner pocket, she turned it blindly in her hands, feeling the faceted surface of the gemstone. She attempted to will it to life but nothing happened.
Pondering the gemstone’s significance did little to ease her worry. The magical bauble somehow linked her to the dragons—spurred to life in Lurker’s presence. Her brain came to a full stop. What if the power in the stone was tied to Lurker’s life?
She shook her head, unwilling to travel down that path.
Whatever the reason, something had quenched the gem’s vitality. Perhaps her distance from the dragons and the thick slabs of rock that trapped her beneath the ground.
Putting the journal away, fluttering wings grabbed her attention. In futility, she searched the dark for her little friend, marvelling at his ability to see anything, until he thumped against the wall and fell to the ledge beside her.
“Raver!” She searched with her hands, afraid he had dropped into whatever abyss lay below. Her fingers brushed his feathers, instilling her with a new fear. He wasn’t moving.
Wrapping shaking hands around his body, careful to fold his wings against his side as best she could in the darkness, she hugged him to her chest. Tears welled up, thinking he was dead, but his chest rose and fell beneath her fingers in quick succession.
Spurting out a laugh, she hugged him closer, rubbing his neck. “Silly bird. You’ve gone and knocked yourself out.”
She dreaded the thought of Grimelda looking down from wherever dead witches went if she had been responsible for leading the crone’s pet to his death. Raver had been Grimelda’s only friend for years.
The night of the inferno jumped into her head. Some friend Grimelda had been. Who in their right mind hacked the toes off a friend? Or anyone, for that matter.
Stroking his feathers, she considered his age. She was twelve the first time she visited her aunt and Raver was present. That made him at least ten.
Her thoughts settled on Grimelda. It was hard to imagine being related to such a strange woman. And yet, there was something compelling about the brief snippets of information the witch had shared. Grimelda had made Reecah’s great-grandmother sound like someone extraordinary. Magical, if Reecah had interpreted the gist of Grimelda’s mutterings correctly.
The bizarre words of their final conversation consumed her. “Heed these words well, for they’re the only thing standing between you and a long, lonely death. There’ll come a time in the not too distant future that you’ll be required to accept your heritage if you want to survive. Pray, child, you are wise enough to open your heart. Let the truth guide you.”
She hadn’t given Grimelda’s ramblings much thought at the time. She’d been too preoccupied by her aunt’s assertion of her impending doom. “…a long, lonely death…accept your heritage if you want to survive…let the truth guide you.”
What had the old crone been getting at? Surely, Grimelda couldn’t have foreseen her being trapped in such a…
Reecah’s eyes widened. “No,” she said out loud—Auntie Grim’s instructions forming on her lips. “Locate the earth’s schism to reclaim your heritage. Is this the schism?”
If she only had the faintest of light to see by.
“Think Reecah! Think Reecah!” Raver’s throaty voice disturbed the stillness of the cavern.
She almost dropped him in fright. Instead, she hugged him to the side of her face. “Crazy bird. You scared the life out of me.”
Realization set in. Raver had proven again his penchant to speak his mind. Holding him out at arm’s length to look at him in a new light, she laughed through her tears at the foolishness of her actions. She couldn’t see the nose on her face.
Raver pecked at her hands.
“Ow, you dirty bird.” Without thinking, she threw him into the air.
“Dirty bird! Dirty bird!” Raver cried, his wings flapping noisily away from the ledge.
Reecah worried he would fly into something and knock himself out again. Following his flight with her ears, he wasn’t aloft for long before his erratic, tell-tale landing could be heard somewhere across the defile. Schism, she corrected herself.
Carefully dropping to her stomach, she stretched her quarterstaff over the abyss to investigate the darkness, hoping to find the far edge of the gap. Her staff found nothing.
Letting her arm hang down in surrender, Auntie Grim’s words bombarded her. “…accept your heritage if you want to survive…let the truth guide you.”
She gritted her teeth. What did it mean? She rubbed at the side of her head in frustration. Why hadn’t the crazy old woman said what she meant instead of speaking in riddles? If she truly was Grimelda’s great-niece, one would think…
Grimelda’s great-niece! A Draakvriend by virtue of Poppa, but through her mother and Grammy, she had descended from a Windwalker.
Grimclaw had said as much. So what?
“Save the dragons! Save the dragons!” Raver’s words startled her.
Reecah’s fingers brushed her earrings—the bloodstones embedded in her earlobes without her consent. She recoiled from the brink as Grimelda’s bloodshot visage loomed in her mind, as real as if she were right there in front of her. “When I’m gone, you’ll be the only one left on this side of the Great Kingdom capable of saving the dragons.”
She swallowed. Her heritage. Like her mother, who Grimclaw claimed to have allied with, it was time for Reecah to latch onto her destiny and take up the dragons’ cause. She saw it now. Thinking back, she’d always known it. She distinctly remembered when her family’s legacy had made itself known to her—sitting with Poppa and pointing at a butterfly. She just hadn’t known it at the time.
Why else would Grimclaw, a fearsome, fire breathing beast, prostrate himself at her feet? He sensed the truth in her even if she had not. She wasn’t merely descended from the Windwalkers, she was a Windwalker!
Raver squawked, his wings beating furiously.
Across the schism, a faint glow pierced the darkness, growing in intensity until it’s light shone so brightly, Reecah couldn’t bear to look at it.
Shading her eyes with a forearm, Reecah gaped at the sight revealing itself. She stood on the flange of an immense sculpture carved into the side of a shaft that fell out of sight—similar to the volcanic crater but much smaller in diameter.
Careful not to step off the edge of what appeared on closer inspection to be a larger than life-sized journal under her feet, she gaped at the scope of the female caricature carved out of the wall behind her. Draped in robes, the beautiful woman bore a staff in one hand and held aloft the stone beneath Reecah’s feet with her other. Some ancient sculptor had chiselled the woman’s hair from the veins of marble shooting through the dark granite of the schism. The grandeur of the scene encircling the chamber left her breathless.
The anguished bodies of fallen men, women and dragons lined the walls encircling the abyss amongst massive, stone tree trunks climbing high overhead—the trees’ limbs branched out to form the cavern’s ceiling. A myriad of gemstones sparked to life within their entangled limbs like tiny faeries dancing around the petrified canopy—their light illumin
ating the fantastical chamber in an ethereal glow.
Rising from the darkness on the far side of the schism, a great stone dragon, bigger than Grimclaw, spread massive wings around the chamber’s perimeter, their detailed folds encircling the fallen men, women, dragons and trees.
Everything about the magical environment enthralled Reecah beyond comprehension, but the dragon itself mesmerized her.
Carved out of a plume of fossilized lava, the dragon’s head leaned into the middle of the shaft, its enormous mouth parted to reveal a small cavern of its own, lined by a row of curved fangs twice Reecah’s height. Above its gaping maw, the dragon stared directly at her—one eye blackened while the other sparkled with the light of a small gemstone set in its centre like a tiny pupil.
She had found the Watcher and the Dragon’s Eye! The stone her great-aunt made her promise to return to her. It would be a shame to deface such a beautiful sculpture. And to what end? Grimelda was long dead.
Realizing she was holding her breath, Reecah exhaled and inhaled in rapid succession as she searched for a way to cross to the dragon. Unless she learned to fly, she was condemned to remain stranded upon the stone journal.
Raver squawked from his perch on the limb of a stone tree towering over the abyss. “Reecah’s diary! Reecah’s diary!”
Her journal? Why would Raver say that? Withdrawing the book from her cloak filled her with relief—its gemstone shining brightly. Tears blurred her vision. If it had any connection to Lurker, it meant her friend was still alive.
She turned the blinding glare of the book away from her face. As its beam broke that of its twin in the Watcher, the cavern trembled. Countless years of dust sifted down the walls, diffusing the light.
The journal beneath her feet shook so hard she dropped to her stomach and pushed herself backward, thinking to hold herself against the rock face. Alarmingly, she wasn’t able to touch the wall. The journal platform rattled its way toward the Watcher, extending from the wall like a flat bridge.
Raver called out a belated warning, but it was too late. It was all she could do to hang onto her quarterstaff with one hand and her journal with the other; trying to keep herself from vibrating off the side of the bridge.
Daring to glance up at the approaching dragon head, she winced, expecting the bridge to crash into the beautiful carving, but the tremors stopped abruptly, pitching her onto her face. The bridge stopped a hair’s breadth from the dragon’s bottom jaw.
It took her a moment to calm her breathing and steady her shaking hands. Rising unsteadily to her feet, afraid the bridge might collapse beneath her movement, she gazed around the cavern. The new vantage point filled her with a fresh sense of wonder at the detailed work that had gone into the lava dragon’s lair.
Looking down did little to bolster her courage. She stood in the centre of a seemingly bottomless cavern upon a tenuous platform. There was no use going back, nor could she see a way forward beyond the dragon.
She spotted a black hole at the back of the dragon’s mouth, emulating its throat. The outside of the dragon’s neck plummeted straight down, out of sight. There was no way she was entertaining that route.
Not knowing what to do, Grimelda’s plea to retrieve the Dragon’s Eye nagged at her. She had made it this far. It was time to see her promise through.
Taking measure of the height of the dragon’s upper jaw, she wished again for her rucksack and the small coil of rope at its bottom. Leaving her quarterstaff on the bridge, she took a deep breath, wiped her clammy palms on her breeks, and latched onto a longer fang shooting up from a corner of the dragon’s lower jaw. Her years of climbing the mountain heights allowed her to shimmy up with ease—quickly reaching the corresponding upper jaw fang.
She transferred her grip over the slight gap between the teeth and steadied herself for the second part of the climb. The upper fang required more concentration and all the strength she had as it curved outward, disappearing beneath the statue’s upper lip.
Clinging to the top of the upper fang, she was forced to release her tenuous grip and reach out to grasp the top of the lip. Her aching thighs strained to remain wrapped around the upper end of the tooth.
She berated herself for looking down. Hanging suspended over the gaping abyss, any mistake now would be her last. She dragged her attention away from certain death and readjusted her grip. Taking a few quick breaths, she pulled her torso over the curved dragon lip—her feet swinging wildly in the air until she got a heel up and over the edge. Digging her foot on top of the dragon’s snout, she dragged her trailing leg to safety and lay on her stomach, panting hard. How she was going to get down again was another matter altogether.
Raver dropped from the ceiling headfirst like a black stone, spreading his wings at the last possible moment and righting himself. With little grace, he alit between the dragon’s raised eyes. Steadying himself, he studied Reecah.
Reecah pointed a finger, raising her eyebrows. “One of these days you’re going to misjudge the drop and become a feathery splat. Don’t expect me to scrape up your sorry hide.”
He bobbed his head. “Sorry hide! Sorry hide!”
She shook her head, unable to keep the smile from her face. “I must admit. You did good. You found the Watcher. In your roundabout way, showed me how to cross the schism.”
“Schism! Schism!”
The mirth left her as she regarded the dragon’s eyes. Beautifully carved from the lava and polished smooth, one eye had a tiny indent in its centre matching that of the journal’s gemstone.
Her focus fell on the other—too bright to look at directly. Turning her head to one side, she squinted and joined Raver between the raised eye sockets.
Judging by the intense beam of light, the gemstone would likely be too hot to touch. She huffed. Her gloves were in her rucksack. If she survived the day and made it back to the forest, she swore to stitch the rucksack to her cloak so as to never be parted from it again.
She unsheathed a dagger and contemplated the eye from above. “How am I supposed to get it out without dropping it?”
“Get it out! Get it out!”
Raver jumped into the air. Wings flapping rapidly, he hovered beside the Dragon’s Eye, his black feathers white in the intense glow. Reaching out with his hooked beak he plucked at the stone.
Reecah cringed, certain he would burn himself, but he didn’t make a fuss. After several unsuccessful attempts, she called him off. “It’s okay. You showed me its not hot. Let me try.”
Raver dropped away and flew around to the back of the dragon.
Lying on top of the eye socket, Reecah hung down and tentatively touched a finger to the stone. Feeling nothing, she pressed her finger against it. It was surprisingly cool.
She placed the tip of her dagger at the edge of the eye and hesitated, thinking again what a shame it was to spoil such a glorious sculpture. She almost pulled herself back up, but the thought of having to come down here again made up her mind. With Grimelda dead, there seemed little point, but she had promised. Reecah prided herself—her word was her bond.
Carefully inserting the dagger’s tip behind the upper edge of the eye, she twisted the blade. Without any resistance, the gemstone slid free and fell into her upturned palm. She stared at it, puzzled. Raver had tugged and pulled at it with more vigour than she had.
As soon as the Dragon’s Eye lost contact with the dragon, it winked out and a deep rumble thundered throughout the cavern.
Standing upright, Reecah searched for the cause of the disturbance.
The slab blocking the stairwell at the far end of the bridge had slid into the wall, exposing the stone steps.
Reecah nodded. By removing the eye, she had sprung the means to her escape. Now if she could only get back down to the bridge before it retracted.
She approached the end of the dragon’s snout and looked down. A straight jump would likely cause her to turn an ankle at the very least. If she wasn’t careful, she might not be able to prevent herself from
falling over the side of the narrow causeway.
She dropped to her knees and prepared to hang down as far as possible before letting go, but stopped. The clinking of metal-shod feet descending the stairwell echoed throughout the cavern.
Her lower lip trembled and her heart sank. For anyone to enter the Dragon Temple, they would have to get by Grimclaw. The only way to do that would be if they had killed the ancient guardian.
A torch’s flickering glow illuminated the bottom of the stairwell. Confirming her worst fear, two black-clad knights clattered onto the causeway.
Momentarily distracted by the splendour of the cavern, their attention fell on Reecah.
“There she is!” One of the knights pointed. “Quick. Tell J’kwaad we found her and the dragon altar.”
The other knight disappeared up the stairwell leaving Reecah facing a man at least six and a half feet tall.
He strode to the centre of the causeway and stopped, pulling a crossbow from over his shoulder. Watching from behind the upturned visor of his pointed helm, his attention never left Reecah.
Reecah searched the cavern for another way out. She was trapped.
The knight bent over his crossbow, reached down with both hands and pulled the string into the open nut, securing it into place. Levelling the stock, he dropped a quarrel into place and took aim. “The prince will reward me for your head, you nettlesome witch.”
Reecah’s Flight
Something had caused the knight to miss his shot. Whether it was Raver suddenly taking flight or the puff of smoke that escaped the stone dragon’s throat, Reecah didn’t care. She had bigger things to worry about. The dragon’s head had moved beneath her feet.
Cursing his rotten luck, the knight stooped over his crossbow and pulled the string back into firing position. Notching another bolt, he stepped closer and took aim.
Reecah contemplated running off the front of the dragon to jump onto the knight, but she couldn’t see that ending well. Even if he missed his shot, falling four times her height onto an armour-plated man didn’t seem like a sane thing to do.
Reecah's Flight Page 25
