A Cat's Guide to Bonding with Dragons

by Chris Behrsin

  “No, we’re not going fishing. It’s got to be real hunting.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Just make sure you stick to your promise this time, or you’ll be sorry.”

  I had been so curious about this strange world I’d been thrust into that I hadn’t even realised how much greyer the ground beneath had become. The sky was truly darkening around us, and a purple haze floated over the ground below. I looked down at it, truly not wanting to go back to that land. I really didn’t want to have to meet Astravar again, whether I had a dragon or not.

  “Just one more question,” I said. “What’s so special about warlocks, anyway? How are they any different from the king’s mages?”

  “It’s to do with the crystals they use,” Salanraja replied. “Warlocks use dark crystals; mages use light crystals.”

  “So, there are only two types of crystals.”

  “Yes,” Salanraja said. “Something like that. Dark crystals drain life and draw off its power, while the magic of white crystals focuses on creation. Mages can readily use white magic, but dark magic is now banned in Illumine after how it completely corrupted the minds of the warlocks. That’s the thing about dark magic – you use too much of it and it darkens your soul.”

  “Then what about the dragon riders,” I asked. “What kind of magic do we use?”

  “Really, dragon riders and dragons use a mixture of light and dark through a very special kind of crystal. It’s the bond between dragons and their human riders that stops dark magic corrupting us. In most cases, anyway.”

  “You mean there are dark dragon riders?”

  Salanraja lowered her head, and I felt a tinge of sadness in her soul. “Out there somewhere,” she said, “yes, there are. But they are a story for another day, because it looks like we’ve arrived.”

  Now the land beneath us smelled intensely familiar. I don’t know how to describe the sensation. It wasn’t a physical smell, as such, but rather one that emerged in the mind. It reminded me of memories rooted in my primal ancestry. The fear of not being at the top of the food chain, knowing there were things in the sky that might swoop down and lift you up in their claws and tear your flesh away from the bone. The fear of great lizards roaming the land on two legs. The fear of death, and the fear of living forever alone. This fear smelt like death and decay and all the rotten things of the soul.

  The purple mist was thick below us now, seeping all over the ground. It wove its way through the red reeds sticking out of the swamps. This wasn’t a place for cats. In fact, it wasn’t a place for any living creatures. No wonder I’d found it so hard to find food here.

  “There,” Salanraja said. “Do you see it?”

  “Do I see what?”

  “Our quarry… The bone dragon.”

  I lifted myself up onto my front paws and I climbed up to the top of Salanraja’s external ribcage and peered out from between the spikes. Then I saw it, streaking across the sky. A great skeletal beast, long and terrifying, similar to what the crystal had shown me.

  The creature veered towards us, and then it tossed its head up to the sky and roared.

  16

  Bedsheet of Light

  Salanraja was gliding closer and closer to the ground. She didn’t seem to want to lift herself up again, perhaps worried that the bone dragon might hear her if she flapped her wings even once. Or perhaps she had decided that we weren’t going to fight the bone dragon at all, that instead we would hide in a swamp until it flew away, Salanraja submerged like a crocodile. I have to admit, I preferred that latter solution.

  “That’s no normal bone dragon,” Salanraja said. “I wish the council had told me we were dealing with one of those.”

  “One of what?” I asked.

  “Shh!” Salanraja whispered. “Don’t make a sound. Not even a purr.”

  “What is it? What’s so dangerous about that thing?”

  “Are you telling me you’d be happy to meet this thing on a dark night and a new moon? Would you invite it to a party?”

  “You’re a dragon, and it’s made of bone. Just throw some flame at it and burn it out of the sky.”

  Salanraja turned back to me and looked at me with one eye. “You really think you’re smart, don’t you? You’ve got it all figured out. As long as the Manipulator is there on the ground, then its summoned creature can’t die.”

  “A what?”

  “A Manipulator.” Salanraja landed softly on the ground, kicking up some dust that glistened purple in the waning light. “It should be around here somewhere. You’ve got sharp eyes haven’t you, Bengie? Look for a change in patterns. A shimmer in the air.”

  I tried to peer through the murk, but I could see nothing. “I don’t think there’s anything even there,” I said, “and I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  Salanraja scoffed. “It’s not a ghost, it’s a Manipulator, as I said.”

  “But you haven’t even told me what a Manipulator is.”

  “It’s a warlock’s conjuration that allows him to cast spells from a safe position. Anything under the Manipulators’ control is invulnerable until you kill the Manipulator. Gracious demons, can’t you smell the thing?”

  “No, I smell the land.”

  “Just follow your nose. Once you find it, you’ll know.”

  “I—” I trailed off when I sensed something moving in the distance. One moment, it was as if the purple mist was swirling around in strange patterns, and the next I could see the gas taking on a form of its own. Faintly, beneath the patterns, I thought I could make out a shape as I might make creatures out of clouds. Then, the swirling gases started to glow, first purple, and then they brightened towards a shade of white.

  I said I didn’t believe in ghosts, but that’s exactly what this creature looked like. Or rather like the kind of ghost that the child of my owners would dress up as every year during the autumn. He’d put a sheet over him, covering him completely except for the two slits he had cut out for eyes. This thing looked much the same, like a trailing bedsheet of light dragging along the ground.

  “Ah, you’ve found it,” Salanraja said.

  “So, you can see it too, now?”

  “Of course, I can. We’re bonded, remember. What you see, I can see.”

  “You mean you can see through my eyes?”

  “Not quite. I only know instinctively what you’re focusing on. If you listen to your senses, you’d be able to do the same thing with me.”

  The bone dragon roared out into the sky again, causing the ground to tremble. At the same time, a putrid smelling wind washed over the land. I turned up my nose, wanting to retch. Then, the Manipulator turned towards us, and I felt the sudden sensation of being watched, as if the thing was examining my very soul and trying to measure its worth in magic. The conjuration slinked forwards holding something in its hand. On closer inspection, I noticed it to be a staff just like the kind the dragon riders carried around with them. Except this one didn’t have any physical shape, twisting and writhing in form alongside the rest of this wraith’s body.

  Meanwhile, the bone dragon wheeled around to face us in the sky. It opened its mouth and out came this strange purple flame. Strange, in the fact that it didn’t glow like flame but instead looked like one column of roiling gas. Yet still it burned the reeds it touched underneath it, quickly withering them into ash.

  “Get off,” Salanraja said.

  “What? No! It will kill me.”

  “Do as I say. You must fight the Manipulator, while I distract the bone dragon.”

  I screeched, then I realised that I had no choice. If I didn’t jump off, Salanraja would throw me off, and the latter would hurt much more. I growled as I ran down her tail and leapt off it, just as Salanraja lifted herself up into the air.

  I stalked towards the Manipulator, keeping down low, trying to work out where its arms and limbs were as I moved. It saw me and pointed its staff at me, tendrils of light leaking back from its body into the head. Something then shot out of it, a bolt of
purple lightning, emitting no light.

  It missed me by inches and hit the ground beside me. Out of it grew these red stems and brambles shooting out in all directions. One of these brambly stems lashed out at me, and I ducked out of the way. I looked up to see that the plant had now grown a head which looked like an elephant-sized tulip with sharp white teeth that gnashed up at the sky. It lurched down with this head, in an attempt to eat me whole.

  I rolled out of the way, then looked back to see it take a massive chunk of dirt from the ground. It spat it out, sending it scattering in large chunks. Then, it turned to me and let out an incredible shriek, so high-pitched it hurt my sensitive ears.

  “Bengie, stay away from that thing!” Salanraja said.

  “State the obvious, why don’t you,” I said. I dared to look up into the air to see that Salanraja was now fleeing from the bone dragon. She rolled to avoid a jet of flame coming at her tail, and it looked like it almost grazed her. I’d seen what that flame had done to the reeds in the swamp, and I was pretty sure that Salanraja wouldn’t fare so well against it either.

  “Hurry up and go for the Manipulator and avoid its magic!” Salanraja said. “I can’t hold on like this forever.”

  Back on the ground, the Manipulator had shot out more of those bolts in random directions, and a forest of these terrible plants had risen all around me. They’d created a foliage so thick I couldn’t see the Manipulator through them anymore.

  That was when I heard Astravar’s voice. It boomed out from somewhere behind the thorny foliage, sending a shudder down my spine.

  17

  A Warlock’s Rage

  “You fool,” Astravar said, his voice filling the sky like thunder. “You’re a cat, a rare breed, I admit, which is why I summoned you into this world. But now you think you can go up against an all-powerful warlock. You’re just a common moggie against one of the greatest mages who has ever lived.”

  I tried to find a way through the thorns, keeping down low so at least I could see the manipulator. I thought I caught sight of Astravar then. His skin was blue and was cracked just like the earth beneath him. His head had replaced the head of the Manipulator, bathing within its spooky glow.

  I had to get through to him, but those thorny stems still twisted all around me, lashing into the earth and ripping it apart. That terrible purple gas was now seeping out from the base of these plants. It smelled like petals rotting in a compost bin – so overwhelming and powerful it made me want to faint.

  The warlock’s voice boomed out again. “What should I do with you, I wonder? You might make a nice taxidermy on the wall. But no, why should I let such a supple body go to waste? You can serve as a shade, hunting the rats I summon out of the Seventh Dimension. I have a need for their husks still. Although, I think I may have found a creature to replace you.”

  I hissed at him and then, suddenly, a sharp pain lanced through my flank. It wasn’t from those flailing thorns in front of me. I had managed to evade them thus far. Instead, I felt the end of a long skeletal claw, tearing right between Salanraja’s scales. Great, I could feel her pain like it was my own. That was all I needed. I yowled out, and Salanraja let out a deep bellowing roar at the same time.

  “Hurry, Bengie,” Salanraja said.

  “I can’t get through the thorns.”

  Salanraja paused a moment. “Hang on, stay low.”

  A moment later, a shadow passed over me, and then an intense heat flared out from the landscape in front of me. A bright, amber fire filled the forest there, and I felt it scorching at my skin beneath my fur.

  “Ow!” I said.

  “Just go, you fool.”

  I swallowed and focused on the flames roaring in front of me. The plants writhed and thrashed within their midst. They no longer whipped out towards me, but rather at the sky in a dying effort to survive.

  I had to get through them. But the flames were so hot.

  But I would die if I didn’t. Or worse, Astravar would have me serving under him as one of his awful minions. Maybe I’d be like that bone dragon, unable to eat because I didn’t even have a stomach inside my body. I shuddered at the thought.

  The flames were extending even lower now, and I knew I only had a moment before I’d be unable to pass underneath them. So, I ran forward, keeping my shoulders loose so I could squeeze through the slightest gaps. The flames dashed across my back, and I grazed something. It was a thorn belonging to one of those toxic plants. I yelped out. But I couldn’t lose focus.

  Astravar had now left the Manipulator, which again had the staff raised, facing the bone dragon. It was feeding some kind of energy into it, sending up a purple gaseous stream laced with tendrils of white light.

  In the sky above, Salanraja had now found her way behind the bone dragon. She had a crimson gash on her flank, right where I’d felt myself get hit. Salanraja opened her mouth and let out a stream of flame, bathing the bone dragon in amber. But the flames weren’t enough to kill the bone dragon. Not while the Manipulator remained.

  Salanraja glanced down at me from above. “Gracious demons, focus on the Manipulator. Distract it, and maybe I can kill this thing.”

  I turned back towards the Manipulator. But it didn’t seem interested in me anymore. I heard something whip from behind me, and a fiery branch was sent spinning towards me. I dived out of the way, just in the nick of time.

  But with that scratch I’d taken on the leg, I felt weak and nauseous. Astravar again appeared inside the body of the manipulator, staring down from behind his cracked blue face with cruel purple eyes. “You cannot defeat me. The poison will kill you, eventually.”

  Yet, he didn’t turn the Manipulator’s staff towards me, instead focusing all its attention to casting energy towards the bone dragon.

  “Take it!” Salanraja screamed out in my mind. “While you have the opportunity.”

  “Take what?”

  “The crystal, you idiot! The source of its power.”

  I readied myself down low, and I didn’t hold my position too long. The light from the Manipulator was so bright now that I couldn’t see where that crystal was. But judging from the way it moved, I guessed the crystal I needed was somewhere within its chest. I crouched, then I pounced, leaping as far as I could into the Manipulator’s body, which seemed to have no physical form. I’d calculated it well, and I clasped my jaws around something solid.

  I landed, then continued to sprint forwards. Something tugged back at me, as if I was running against a strong gale. I could hardly breathe, but still I continued. A stream of white light surrounded me, and I found it hard to see what was beyond me.

  I didn’t look back.

  Then, there came a whoosh of wind from above me, and some claws closed around me like a vice. They didn’t belong to Salanraja. I whined out as they lifted me into the sky.

  18

  Cat Sandwich

  I watched the ground spin away in front of me, then I looked back at my waist to see myself gripped in a skeletal claw. It was crushing me so hard that I thought it would squeeze all the life out of me.

  “Don’t let go,” Salanraja said. “Whatever you do, don’t let go.”

  Of course, I still had the crystal within my grasp. A white stream of light trailed out from it towards that wraith-like Manipulator that slid along the ground at the same speed as us. It was as if I was pulling it along with my own mouth, and the force of it pulling back against me seemed to want to rip me in two.

  “Keep it together,” Salanraja said. “Hold it for long enough up there, and the bone dragon will die.”

  I didn’t have the will in my mind to respond. All I could feel was the life force leaching out of me. My vision went red, and I wondered for how long I’d be able to breathe. The muscles in my mouth had by this time gone completely numb, but I didn’t drop the crystal.

  I felt sick, and my head was spinning, and I didn’t know if it was from vertigo, or from whatever poisons that thorn had injected into me back on the ground. I mewl
ed, and I growled, and I groaned, but still I didn’t let go.

  The bone dragon was now lowering itself back down to the ground. If it stayed low enough, I realised, then the manipulator might regain its energy giving the bone dragon enough strength to crush the life out of me.

  Suddenly, an intense orange fire raged up from below. It burned my dangling paws, and the searing pain that rushed up made me want to open my mouth and yowl. But I had to hold on. I couldn’t let go of that crystal.

  “Incoming,” Salanraja said.

  “I wish you’d said that earlier—”

  But she wasn’t talking about the fire, which the bone dragon instinctively lifted itself away from. Salanraja suddenly emerged underneath us. Then, she flapped her wings so hard that she pressed her back against the bone dragon’s underbelly, sandwiching me in place. It felt like being squeezed in a vice, as she pushed upward, and the bone dragon fought with its dwindling strength to push back towards the Manipulator again. I genuinely thought I’d run out of air, and my eyes went blurry. I swear that I almost blacked out.

  But Salanraja’s voice brought me back to the present. “Hold on, Bengie. Don’t die on me.”

  I wasn’t dead. I was hyperventilating in the bone dragon’s grasp that was no longer so tight on me. I could wriggle slightly now. My skin within its claws had started to tickle. I looked up to see that each bone was fragmenting into oblivion, drifting away like embers of burnt charcoal on the wind.

  “We… Did we make it?” I asked.

  “Conserve your strength,” Salanraja replied. “And just never do that again.”

  “Never do what?”

  “Never make me think you’re going to die on me Bengie. We’re bonded now, and I can’t lose you. It would tear apart my soul.”

  The last vestiges of the bone dragon drifted away into the void, and the pressure lifted off of my back. I looked up into the cloudy sky, amazed to be alive. I ambled over to the edge of Salanraja’s body, every muscle aching with every step I took. Down below, the forest that Astravar’s Manipulator had created lay charred and dead. Those wilted stems now looked like black mummified claws sticking out of the ground.