A Hatchling for Springtide (Santaclaws Book 2)

by Marc Secchia

  He beckoned them on. Quick!

  Auroral Storm Diamond hissed as the tentacle tightened, stretching his grip.

  You are storm, you’re fire, you are Dragonkind! he urged.

  Keee-irr! Her paws clenched tighter.

  Down inside the chest, the body thumped against the side. That thing was substantial. Its mass would work against them unless they could find a way to sever the tentacle, forge-welded as it was to the dragonet’s tail, but a couple more fruitless passes of his ska’etaz convinced him that it had to be holding together by some magic he did not understand.

  We’ve got to flash free, he decided aloud. Hold tight! I’ll need your lightning power –

  A massive, terrible alien voice grated, SSCHHHHAAAALLL …

  Icy terror crawled across his scalp.

  A loud rattle reverberated inside the massive treasure chest. The creature heaved, but Keir still held fast, his joints and sinews creaking under the strain. He would die before he gave up. Heave!

  SSCHHAALL …FEEEAAA … SSST!

  The ghastly distortion of speech shook him to the core.

  The Elves sprinted toward them up the unsteady slope of coins, readying their weapons. Eyes wide with alarm. Here came Kalar and Shanryssill, rounding the edge of the treasure pile, white-faced with worry. He slashed furiously at the tentacle. Five times. Ten! The other Elves leaped up, firing into the depths even before their feet touched the rim. The creature thrashed back and forth. More tentacles came writhing out, trying to gain a grip on the hatchling – almost as if nothing else existed in its perception but that source of magical life.

  Grabbing the dragonet’s muzzle with his free hand, Keir gazed into her fiery orbs and shouted, Fight! Ye have to fight it! Fight!

  KERRACK!!

  Lightning forked out of her tail, racing down the tentacle in crazy patterns. The mass of sapphire balls exploded toward them as the creature threw itself upward in agony or fury, he knew not which. Keir grabbed the dragonet, falling Elves, anything he could reach, and hurled them away as it crashed against the ajar lid, shaking the treasure chamber with its thundering.

  DRAAA-GOONN! SCHALL …FEASSST!

  Over my dead body! he spat back.

  A flailing mass of grey tentacles spilled out of the chest. A silver beak-like mouth clashed against nothing. Then, a familiar double-bladed war axe came spinning past his head so close, it must have trimmed a few of the unrulier ends of his hairstyle. It hurtled into the centre of the creature’s torso. As it fell back with an aggrieved bellow, the lid of the chest slammed shut with a hollow boom. Wow. Nice throw, Dad!

  Keir picked himself up one limb at a time.

  The dragonet nuzzled his knee contritely. He patted her with a shaking hand. “Sure dinnae enjoy that for a surprise, did we?”

  Krrrr-krrrr.

  “Cursed creature!” Kalar growled. “Ate my favourite axe. Ye alright, lad? Dragonet? What’s broken, or … nae? Now’t?”

  “Thanks for the help, everyone,” he whispered. “We’re alive. Sure beats the alternative, ye ken?”

  His father smacked his shoulder. “Just ye keep it that way, y’ hear me with both pointy ears? Or ye and I will be having words, son!”

  “Over my dead body?” he spluttered.

  With that, his father and the Elves who had rushed to help, dissolved in fits of helpless laughter.

  Chapter 14: Diamond Dinner

  WHEN RHYL TWITCHED HER eyebrows in just that way, Keir had learned to expect trouble. When both his cousin and his mother started in tandem, he braced himself for a volcanic explosion.

  It did not come in the way he expected.

  “Drink this, son,” his mother said, handing him a mug. “Ye have the shakes?”

  “Aye.”

  Ashamed. Some warrior he was, shaking like a leaf after an encounter – well, an ambush by some otherworldly, Dragon-munching monster? Not the point. Pride might be closer to the truth.

  “Aftermath of the adrenaline rush,” Shanryssill added. “Yer father’s the same.”

  “Oh.”

  “Off exploring by ourselves, were we?” his cousin added, dabbing a herbal poultice upon the dragonet’s tail. Auroral Storm Diamond hissed unhappily. “Ye lie still, ye troublemaker. Enough nonsense for one evening. What got into ye anyways, a bad case of the silly-itches?”

  Riril … rhe dragonet sighed and lowered her muzzle. She did not want to look Keir in the eye. Especially not since he had been stung by that creature and his left arm now had a neat line of four egg-sized swellings down it. His mother pronounced that it was a reaction to some kind of necrotic toxin and for safety’s sake, wound a tourniquet about his arm just above the elbow. Then, she proceeded to infiltrate the swellings with a magic-infused remedy to flush out and neutralise the poison.

  Keir bit his lip as a searing pain ran the length of his arm. “Santazathiar’s … oath! Mom, that’s –”

  “The price explorers pay for lack of caution,” said she. There went the eyebrow, off at a perilous tilt reserved for mothers on the warpath. “Next time ye toddle off exploring caves and ancient treasures, may I gently suggest ye learn to avoid crocodile-like monsters, magical lightning storms, and the temptation to crack open random treasure chests? All apparently bad for yer health, ye hear me?”

  “Aye, ma’am.”

  “Nasty business, this necrotic poison. Eats the tissue faster than anything I’ve ever seen before. Ready for round two?”

  Keir bit back on a parentally disapproved word while she loaded up her needle. He wiped his eyes with his free hand. Leaky, eh? This poison had already scorched his nerves all the way up his arm. What it would do with the rest of his body did not bear thinking about.

  “Ready?” she repeated.

  “Give it to me.”

  To his surprise, his mother stooped to kiss his cheek before lining up the needle’s point with the first puncture wound from the beast’s stingers. She smelled of jungle lilies, despite the day’s effort. “Ye fret a mother’s heart something terrible, that ye do,” she said kindly. “And ye, our wee Christmas miracle – learn ye to look after each other good and proper, hear me? That’s hardly the last monster a Dragon and her Guardian will face together, mark my words.”

  Gasp!

  Thanks for the extra dose of freaking him out, Dragon mother.

  Sh-rrrr, agreed the dragonet, curving her body to try to lick the burned patch on her tail.

  Keir bit his lip. Hard.

  Having licked herself thoroughly, his beautiful scrap of diamond vexation turned her tongue to his wounds. Someone may have been guilty of wincing, complaining and hissing his way through the treatment in an attempt to impress a proper awareness of guilt upon his hatchling … on that note, could he not imagine better, more mature ways than childish payback? Aye. At times like these, he wondered who was teaching whom.

  Twenty minutes later, Kalar returned with the twins in tow and a fine double-bladed war axe in hand. “Found me a decent weapon as ye suggested, lad, over in the armoury section. Somebody even inscribed a name on the hilt. Skullcleaver, Bane of Ogres. Like it?”

  His mother’s left eyebrow arched. “Aye?”

  Father made an unrepentant snort. “I’m now’t planning to use this for chopping kindling, woman! Now, for ye, little Storm, we brought ye a wee snack from that fourth chest. Empty of wee beasties, to boot. Nae fun to be had in there.”

  Auroral Storm Diamond brightened visibly as he brought a leather bucket close to her muzzle to let her have a long, appreciative sniff. She went very still indeed.

  “Finest stash of mauve diamonds I ever did see,” he added meantime.

  Shanryssill said, “Mauve, ye say? I dinnae ken such a colour is of Tyanbran. Perhaps they come from the deep Dwarven mines?”

  Kalar reached out to touch her cheek fondly. “Ye …”

  The incipient parental naughtiness halted as, lurching abruptly to her paws, the dragonet noisily buried her muzzle in the bucket. So desperate was
she, she made little growling and mewling sounds as she set about the demolition of the entire bucket load, achieving the feat in thirty seconds flat. His father vented a guffaw of amusement.

  Keir decided he had never seen so much wealth destroyed in so short a space of time. Remarkable. A touch frightening, admittedly. All those tales about draconic appetites must indeed have a toehold in reality, at the very least, and he had an inkling that more of this awaited in their future. When she had needs, a kingdom’s budget was apparently no consideration. Nor was the legendary hardness of diamonds. What under good Mauve could her fangs be made of, and as for her stomach – wow! Jewel-guzzling fiend!

  Burp! Smacking her lips which now sparkled with diamond dust, she gazed soulfully at Kalar. Krrrr … mmm-rr?

  More? Holy Santazathiar!

  “Och aye, second helpings of diamond dinner for yer Majesty?” he chuckled, sounding rather more shocked than amused. “Yer wish is my order. Laran, Fayri, ye keen to do another run?”

  “Count me in!” Fayri grinned.

  Auroral Storm Diamond looked more than satisfied with her feat of gluttony. She even changed colour. Mauve, azure and deeper amaranthine hues undulated through her white diamond scales in complex patterns too quick for the eye to properly register. The dragonet limbered up her spine with elastic luxuriousness, acting much recovered from being stretched like a soldier’s exercise-band earlier, and moved over to sniff at the lumps on his arm with a pensive air. A second round of magic, prickling more uncomfortably than the first, ensued.

  Had she just eaten to furnish herself for his needs?

  Keir scratched her chin fondly. “Fetching colour, chameleon lass.”

  Krrrr-krrrr?

  “I’ll be fine. Long as the arm dinnae drop off.”

  The skin stretched over those lumps was already turning a lovely black-green colour. His mother laid her hands upon his wounds, singing her Elven magic to urge the organic medicines to work.

  The dragonet lowered her gleaming muzzle to press against his chest. Keee-irr rr-rrt? Srr-eee.

  “Aye, we’re good, ye mischief,” he said. “Dinnae ken ow’t existed in this world as would snaffle ye up for a wee snack. It was like a sea creature, right? I mean, like I’d imagine a sea creature to be from the ballads … what d’ye think, Dad?”

  “I wish we knew even a smidgen of the Dragon lore, son,” he said. “I have many thoughts – a bit like ye in that, aren’t I? What if the Certanshi ken more than us? Did they have Dragon Guardians of their own? How does Sankurabi Bloodfang command River Trolls, should that rumour be true? I knew now’t of natural predators of the Dragonkind, but the Cyantar Ocean is a realm of wild immensity. I’d say similarly for the deep Synaxa Jungle. Too many secretive beasts about, and the most secretive of all were those Dragon Guardians, aye?”

  “Aye, Dad. However, we should focus –” he grinned as he aped a thick mountains accent “– right here, in the noo.”

  In her usual after-meal routine, Storm cleaned herself with a vigorous tongue bath. He could do with one too after this encounter, after that cold sweat of terror which had chilled his very soul, never mind everything else attached to his bones. Although he was not getting his armpits licked. Gross, no way. Certain draconic habits did not fill him with enormous fondness; here was a prime example.

  “Och aye, the mysterious noo,” his father echoed. “Let’s get our wee bairns to sleep. Talk later.”

  * * * *

  Keir told a bedtime story about Santazathiar that grew to encompass nine children, two kittens and a dragonet, and he even caught his own parents and the elderly Garamyssill couple listening in. Then he tucked his sisters in and whispered an Elven blessing over them. Rhyl teased him about being good with children and Keir, to his annoyance, found his ears heating up like twin flags. Honestly. Had there been a class at school called self-control, he would have failed it outright.

  After that, he took most of the adults for a walk to the middle of the treasure cavern, where Santazathiar himself loomed in all his majesty. Staggering. Even Councillor Varanthyal acted overawed. They gazed at the plaque and huddled in the shadow of Santaclaws, perhaps wondering as Keir did what manner of weaponry or magic could even hurt such a behemoth. Yet his wound was clear. The flesh of his flank had been blown open like a fruit exploded from the inside – and this, he recalled with a tingling sense of reverence, was the price he had paid for rescuing the Human survivors of Olde Earth.

  What a cost.

  Had Santaclaws foreseen what he might suffer as he launched his Dragonwing that fateful day, with the purpose of rescuing a people not even his own? Was this the fabled nobility and altruism of those Dragons of old?

  Come such a day, would he be prepared to risk all?

  Perched upon his shoulder, the dragonet’s tail tightened about his neck as they gazed up at the mighty, wounded saviour of the Humankind. He sensed her agitation through the closeness of their connection, and in the sensation of her complex heartbeat pulsating a counterpoint with the rapid fluttering of her breathing against his right ear. She had not reacted like this to any of the other Dragon statues, even though she had taken a keen interest in them. The dragonet’s breathing hitched several times. Her sheathed talons kneaded the muscles of his shoulder restively.

  Working her way up to a question, was she?

  Keee-irr, wirrit? she inquired on cue. Her fore-talon delicately indicated the mighty statue.

  That’s Santazathiar, o storm-of-my-heart. The greatest Dragon who ever lived.

  Wirrit … wirrit?

  Remember, you were but a beautiful egg when we were here together, he reminded her. He told her what he knew of the tale of Santaclaws. How he had defied dissenting voices to fly to the aid of the Humankind and brought them to safe new homes in and around the mighty mountains of the Amarinthian Bulwark, and paid the ultimate price for their freedom.

  The scales beside his ear and the coil of her tail grew heated.

  With rising urgency, she asked again, Keee-irr, wirrit?

  I don’t understand, darling. Sorry –

  Wirrit! Wirr-wirr-wirrit?

  As he queried her in different ways for several minutes, the dragonet only grew more agitated. His frustration peaked. How to get through to this obdurate diamond-head? She leaped down to the ground and circled his legs, rubbing against him as she gazed upward, panting. Even when he tried to catch her eye to establish their bond, she refused – her attention and all her concern, was clearly for the stolid, unmoving figure of the Dragon. She must sense he was different to the other Dragon statues they had seen. She knew. That was his intuition, too. Santaclaws might look dead, but … was he? Was he truly? Could stone ever appear so miraculously lifelike?

  His nape tingled.

  You’re thinking, why’s he so much better preserved than the others?

  Keir only realised he had spoken his thought aloud, when the dragonet stood up on her hind legs, tapping his hip excitedly with her forepaw – just as Aramyssill sometimes did, he realised a startled second later. Wirrit, Keee-irr, she agreed excitedly. Wirrit! Srrr … rrr?

  Santazathiar? I don’t know, my diamond. If I did I would tell you in a second – but we’re thinking the same thing, aren’t we?

  Keee-irr! Ke-ke-ke Keee-irr!

  She bounded about him chirping and squawking in joy.

  Indeed. He grinned, Ah, I know I’m a bit on the slow side on occasion …

  Her effervescent excitement led him to suggest to the Elves that they use the ladder at the rear of the plinth to ascend to the platform, as was clearly purposed by whoever had built the access there. Ten minutes later, all the members of their party from the youngest teen to Grandpa Garamyssill stood beneath the belly of the Dragon.

  Overawed.

  It was only as one tried and failed to measure up to the height of a Dragon’s paw arch that one truly knew what it was to feel miniscule. The ceiling-obscuring grandeur, the sheer scale of the body, the thickness of his thews, the
finely detailed sinews of his almighty muscles, left Keir breathless. He could compare most of the anatomical details to his own hatchling and find clear parallels; only, they were magnified to an extent that made him chuckle and hunker down to stroke Auroral Storm Diamond’s supple back.

  “Ye ever imagined anything like this behemoth, lass?”

  Old Grandpa Garamyssill could not stop rubbing his eyes.

  “All the stories, my beauty. Every last tale of this Dragon scarcely does him justice. And they’re all true. Dinnae yer scales tingle in sheer wonder? Ye think magic cannae be real? Look around ye. Take in the sweep of his wings and the size of his paws. Take a good, long look at yerself. And then, think again. He was a living mountain. A legend. A hero.”

  Auroral Storm Diamond craned her neck so far, she lost her balance and fell over in a squirming heap. Spluttering in annoyance, she twisted back up onto her paws, shaking her muzzle and rolling her eye-fires in a childish expression of annoyance – such a mimic! That was a stroppy Arami if he had ever seen one.

  “Now, let’s see here …”

  Flexing out her left wing, Keir gazed up at Santazathiar’s outstretched right wing, and frowned. Structurally, they were not quite identical, were they? The shoulder and elbow joints showed clear similarities, but from the area of the wrist where the great crimson Dragon had a spray of arched wing struts to support the flexible surface membranes, his dragonet possessed an additional, secondary wrist joint. Two wrists? He flexed the surface gently, trying to work out what it meant. Her wings were slimmer in structure, perhaps built for speed and agility rather than the power of those thicker, sturdier appendages up there?

  With his curiosity piqued, he began to search for more differences. Santazathiar’s scales were mighty armour plates. Hers struck him as more supple, rounded and tapering at the ends as opposed to the sharp-pointed scales of the belly eighty feet above his head. His musculature was mighty and mounded whereas hers was slenderer and wirier overall – like a burly Kalar the Axe as opposed to his lean son – but she was clearly exceedingly springy, too. She could leap like an Elven champion.