Dragon's Wish
Page 10
I don’t recall what happened next; I was too busy taking comfort from my brothers who had no one to offer them any back.
We buried her there in that long valley we named for the dragons, us, that first inhabited it. For many years, the Native tribe that lived there before us shared it with us. And then the Europeans came and peace became a precious thing, all too fleeting.
But Basilisk Valley survived it all.
I married Llyr Murphy when I was in my fifties and we had just one daughter years later. Though I never forgot where I came from or the tragedies that had been visited upon us by hatred and prejudice and ignorance, I was more my mother’s child than even I realized. I took the tools of wisdom and Mama’s affinity for plants and herbology and expanded on them, adding to the small journal I had secreted away on that long ago night and making it my own.
Eventually, we realized that we were not the only Dragon clans that had made our home in the Americas. There came a need for the ancient Celtic knowledge we possessed, so much of it lost along the way. Emma and later her son Finnegan preserved the valley and made it into a haven for dragon’s and more, welcoming all who needed a place to call their own. There was talk before I died of developing it into a camp for dragons where they could learn of their heritage and the old ways and where they didn’t have to hide who and what they were. I wish I could have lived to see that.
But I was an old woman by then. Dragons by nature outlive their human counterparts. We aren’t immortal—far from it. But it’s not uncommon to see the oldest reach the 200 mark. I surpassed that, passing this journal to my daughter Emma, on my 202nd birthday in the winter before I died and joined my mother beneath the cottonwood tree.
Finn and Fergus never left the valley. Finn met a beautiful girl from a neighboring Wampanoag tribe and together they had nine children. I used to tease him that he competed with the entire valley to see just how many children he could produce. Maybe he was making up for Fergus, who never married nor had any. Instead, he spent his time spoiling all of ours. Aidan never fully recovered from Mama’s death. He shared my Da’s bitterness. Neither could fully let the past go, though I believe they tried. Da built the valley and saw it prosper in the next twenty years after Mama died. But he still died young by a Dragon’s standards, barely seventy eight when he passed in his sleep. Some wondered if he had contracted the cancer, a disease that held no mercy and for which Mama’s herbal medicines had no effect. But my brothers and me? We knew it was the pain of a broken heart that called him early. He missed his wife and I know the day we lay him to rest at her side was when he was finally at peace.
It also marked the day that Aidan left our Valley. I never saw my brother again and I think that was as he wished it. Too many memories he was unable to live with, so he ran from them instead.
I was an old woman when my Emma told me she thought she’d found him in some tiny town in the Tobacco Root Mountains. The last I knew, all the letters she’d sent had been returned unopened. But even if I wouldn’t be there to see it, I knew she wouldn’t give up. She had a dragon’s heart, and a woman’s courage. She would find a way to pass our legacy forward and preserve our heritage. I was counting on it.
I HOPE YOU ENJOYED Dragon’s Wish, where Sadie’s story began almost 300 years ago. Get the series now. Rule 9 Academy is available on Amazon at the links below.
Fire Born Dragon
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Valley of the Dragons...coming in August 2020
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