by Emma James
Margila came to her senses and sat up. The first thing she noticed was the post wasn’t there anymore. The rocks looked different. She wasn’t on the mountain where the village people left her. She was somewhere else.
The sun climbed overhead. She must have slept all night long. How far had the dragon taken her? How far away was she from her home?
She lay on a flat rock. A bowl of towering boulders surrounded her on all sides so she couldn’t see beyond them. Only in one direction, several mountain peaks jutted against the sky. She must be on another mountain.
Heat radiated up through the rock on which she lay. The boulders protected her from biting wind howling among the crags. She flattened herself on the rock to keep warm when she saw the dragon slither out from across the bowl.
Its red eyes burned, and its nostrils smoked. It dragged its huge body over the ground toward her. The ropes still tied her wrists and ankles together so she couldn’t run away. She cowered lower, but she couldn’t get away.
Its head bobbed one way and then the other. Its tongue flickered in and out of its mouth. She closed her eyes. Her end would surely come now.
Her eyes popped open when a distinctly male voice spoke to her. “You have nothing to fear from me. You are perfectly safe here.”
She stared at the dragon. The voice couldn’t have come from anywhere else.
“What is your name?”
She swallowed hard. Could he really be speaking to her? “My name is Margila.”
“I am Tanak. How do you do?”
She didn’t answer.
“Are you comfortable enough, Margila? Is the rock warm enough for you?”
She couldn’t speak. She could only nod.
“You must be hungry and thirsty. I will bring you food and water later, but first I want to talk to you and get to know you. Tell me about yourself. What sort of people do you come from?”
She looked all around her in search of something to explain this incredible turn of events, but nothing came to her aid. Looking at him and listening to that voice posed an incomprehensible puzzle she couldn’t solve. He was a giant lizard. How could he talk to her? She stared at the ground.
“I’m just a village girl, like all the others. My father is Alderman. Other than that, I’m nothing special. You must have eaten hundreds of others just like me.”
“I do not eat girls, Margila. I told you, you’re perfectly safe on this mountaintop. I brought you here so you would be comfortable and I could look after you until you choose to leave.”
Her head shot up. “Until I choose to leave? Do you mean I can choose to leave whenever I want? But we hold the lottery every year to select a virgin maiden to sacrifice to the dragon. That’s what I’m here for—at least, that’s what I was on the other mountain for.”
“You do all that to sacrifice a virgin maiden to the Raveniss, but our people do not eat human beings. We take the virgin sacrifice to live with us in our stronghold to the north.”
She blinked. What in the world was he saying? “That’s impossible. Everybody knows the sacrifice dies.”
“The sacrifice dies—to the rest of the village. After the people leave her on the mountain, one of our people comes to get her, and she starts a new life with us. The same thing will happen to you.”
She started to sit up. “Then let’s go. I choose to leave right now.”
“Not just yet. There is one piece of business we have to attend to first before I can take you away.”
“What is that? I’ll do anything.”
“Don’t promise that until you hear what it is.” He curled himself up into a ball, but he still towered over her. “Our people have inhabited this planet long before humans. We have not always been at war with humans, but now the humans have decided to wipe the Raveniss out of existence. I suppose you know all about that.”
“I know the Raveniss devastate our crops and wipe out our villages. That’s why we had to instigate the sacrifices. That’s the only way we could keep the peace with the dragons.”
“Humans started the war between us. They hunted us almost to extinction. We only attacked their villages to defend ourselves. That’s why we need females, to increase our population. As long as we had females with whom we could mate, our population survived. The knights of old killed too many Raveniss females, so we had to take human ones.”
Margila shook her head. “That’s impossible.”
“I’m afraid it’s all tragically true. You’ve heard the stories in your village from the time you were a young child—all about the brave knights hunting the dragons. After several generations of that, we didn’t have enough females to stay alive. We laid waste to a few villages. After that, we sent our proposal to the Aldermen. We would leave the humans in peace in exchange for a virgin maiden each year at the Harvest Festival. The Aldermen agreed. That is how you come to be here.”
“So what are you saying?”
“Dear Margila, I can see you’re a strong and smart young woman. You must mate with me. Then I will take you to our stronghold, where you’ll dwell with me and my people.”
Margila tried to struggle to her feet, but with her ankles tied together, she fell back down on the rock. “Mate with you! Never! I could never think of mating with a monster like you. I would rather die.”
He didn’t flare up in anger. He only regarded her from his place. “Then that is what you will do.”
“How could I mate with you? Our bodies don’t even fit together. You would kill me if you tried.” She succumbed to hysterical laughter. “You’re out of your mind for even suggesting it.”
“Do you really think you would be doing anything differently from all the other young women who’ve come here before you?”
Margila caught her breath. “What about them? Have you mated with all of them, too?”
“Not me. A different dragon earns the privilege to come each year. I’ve waited many years for my chance to take a mate, and I won’t turn back until I succeed. You will stay here, on this mountaintop, and you will never see another living face until you agree to mate with me and bear my offspring. Only then will I take you to our stronghold in the north, where the Raveniss live with their human consorts and our hybrid children.”
Margila slumped down on the rock in despair. “Please don’t do this to me. Please, can’t you just let me go?”
“I cannot do that. Anyway, you have nowhere left to go. You cannot return to your village, and you would die in these mountains without me to take care of you. This bowl is the only volcanic caldera of its kind. Underground lava heats the rocks. If you went outside this bowl, you would freeze to death before nightfall. I couldn’t let that happen to you.”
“Don’t try to be nice to me. I’m your prisoner, and you want to coerce me into mating with you. You’re disgusting to me, and you always will be. You might starve me or force yourself on me, you might even starve me of company until I submit to you, but I will never give myself to you of my own free will. I can promise you that. I will hate you for the rest of my life.”
His wicked head hovered on the end of his serpent’s neck. “I have no plans to starve you or force myself on you, Margila. The Raveniss are a benevolent people, despite what you may have heard. We do not mistreat the humans who come to live with us. We treat them well, and they come to love their Raveniss mates as much as if they had chosen them themselves. They fight for the Raveniss and support our people’s cause.”
“Well, I won’t. You’ll never turn me against my own people. Do you think I could ever forget the way you killed my fiance back there on the mountain? You’re a vicious killer. Don’t deny it.”
He purred under his breath. “So that gangly creature was your fiance? How quaint! Did he think he could harm me with that toothpick of his?”
“He made you bleed, didn’t he?”
Tanak got to his feet and lumbered around in a complete circle. “Take a look for yourself.”
He turned his shoulder toward her, but Margila could see no si
gn of a wound or even a scar. From what she could see, the skin had sealed itself up and completely healed.
He curled himself up again. “I did not kill that man, whatever you may think. I only knocked him down so I could take you away. He’s still very much alive.”
“How can I take your word for that, after what you did?”
“Because I heard his heart beating. The Raveniss have increased senses. I heard his heart and his breathing, and there was nothing wrong with him.”
Margila bent her head into her hands and groaned in despair. She couldn’t get the image of Marcus, lying helpless and unconscious on the rocks, out of her head. He could have been killed for love of her, and now she would never see him again.
Tanak watched her. “Why do you grieve over such a trifling little man? Our people used to roam freely over this planet. We used to hunt our food in the forests and dive into the oceans to fish. Then the humans came, and they slaughtered us by the thousands. Can you imagine mothers with babies and even old people too old to fly anymore, cut down by men exactly like your beloved fiance? Then the villagers invented stories to tell their children about how deadly and evil the Raveniss were for trying to defend themselves.”
“I didn’t know. None of us knew.”
“You knew. Do you deny you heard the stories of dragon slayers, along with all the others?”
“Of course, I heard them, but I didn’t understand...None of us really understood.”
“You understood from your own perspective. No human ever bothered to consider the situation from our perspective. All you know is kill, kill, kill. Nothing will satisfy you but blood.”
His words brought back her father’s comments about Major Bloodkist. That gave her an idea. “If you let me go home, I’ll explain it to them. I can make them understand. Then we can all live in peace on this planet.”
He studied her with searching eyes. “You know that’s impossible. No one will ever live in peace on this planet again.”
Her head shot up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Your people have brought in a fleet of ships to fight us. They’re moving toward Phomentina right now, aren’t they? Don’t bother to deny it, because we already know it’s true.”
She stared at him. How could he know that, when most of the villagers didn’t even know? Her father and Councilor Dunroy must be the only men in the village who knew the truth. “I won’t deny it.”
“Then don’t say anything more about getting your people to understand. The humans will never understand. They don’t want to understand. All they want to do is fight until no Raveniss remains alive, on this planet or on any other.”
“You’re wrong.”
He turned away. He stretched his wings and beat the air with them. “Never mind. I will go out and hunt you something to eat.”
“Can’t you untie me before you leave?”
“I can’t run the risk of you trying to escape. Stay here and stay warm. I will return shortly. Then we can talk further.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Margila woke up hours later to a strange whining hum buzzing toward her. She sat up and looked at the sky. Some kind of vehicle glided overhead. It buzzed from one side of the bowl to the other and disappeared. A moment later, another crossed going the other way.
She settled down to more fruitless waiting when Tanak appeared over the side of the bowl and landed in front of her. He dropped a bundle tied in canvas at her feet. “What’s this?”
“Open it. It’s food and water. I think you’ll like it.”
She did her best to untie the string holding the bundle together. It wasn’t easy with her hands bound, but she managed in the end. She found a large dish of roasted meat and a flask of clear, cold water. She guzzled down the water and tore the meat with her teeth. She didn’t realize how hungry she was, but the meat made her mouth water.
Tanak paced around the bowl and looked at the sky. “I see they’re escalating their campaign against the planet. I only hope my people are safe up north.”
Margila glared at him out of the corner of her eye. Now that she took the edge off her hunger, her animosity returned. “Where did you get this meat? Did you steal a cow from one of the villagers? Who tied it up for you? I don’t think you could do that with your claws.”
“I didn’t steal it from anyone. I killed it in the forest on the other side of these mountains, and I cooked it with the fire from my own breath. You’re welcome, by the way. I can see you enjoyed it. That’s the most important thing to me.”
His words shamed her, and she sat back on the rock to chew her meat. “I’m sorry. Thank you. It’s delicious. Did you see many of those ships flying over?”
“I noticed a bunch of them hanging around the village and another group heading north to scout our territory. I imagine my people will be arming for war right now.”
Her heart beat with a faint hope. “Don’t you think you ought to join them? They probably need you fighting with them.”
“Not yet. I’ll go when you’re ready.”
“I’m ready now.”
“Does that mean you’ll mate with me?”
“Yes, I’ve decided. I’ll mate with you.”
“I mean, will you mate with me of your own free will? Don’t answer that. I can tell you’re getting ready to lie. You don’t really want me. You just want to get out of here. I won’t take you until you’re ready to give yourself to me with your whole heart and make the Raveniss your own people. Until that happens, we’ll stay here.”
“What if those ships wipe out the rest of your people? What will you do then?”
“Then it will be more important than ever for me to win your love. The two of us will be the only Raveniss left alive on the planet.”
Margila pulled her head down between her shoulders. “I will never be Raveniss. No matter what I do, I will never join your people.”
He collapsed on his side with a heavy sigh. “Very well. Have it your own way. I’m tired. I’m going to sleep.”
“How can you expect me to give myself to you when you keep me tied up as a prisoner here?”
He buried his head on his big front paws. “If I untied you now, you would run away the first time I left you alone. You will come around in time and agree to be my mate.”
He closed his eyes, and in a minute, a loud rumbling snore came out of his body. His sides rose and fell with his breath. Margila studied him. She loathed him more than ever, especially for his kindness. She resolved not to let his care break down her hatred. He was only being nice to her to get what he wanted. In the end, she was nothing but a prisoner and a slave.
She looked all around the bowl for some sharp rock on which to sever the ropes that bound her. The rock on which she lay gave her enough warmth to keep her comfortable in her thin dress. When she tried to rub her bonds against the corner, it crumbled into sand. She crawled off it to search for something harder, but the moment she hit the ground, the cold seeped into her bones. Tanak was right. She couldn’t survive if she ran away.
She retreated to her rock and lay down in despondent despair. Should she starve herself? That was the only way to thwart his plans. She already gave herself up for dead when she took part in the lottery. She would lose nothing by killing herself, but she could strike a blow against the Raveniss.
Then her eye fell on Tanak. He slept in peace a few dozen yards away. He trusted her, as far as she could move tied hand and foot. Maybe he told her the truth, and the Raveniss really were a peaceful race. She couldn’t deny her own people harbored murderous intentions toward the dragons.
No one ever talked about why the dragon-slaying knights first set out to annihilate the Raveniss from the face of the planet. Even the village’s own legends said the dragons didn’t come in force to devastate the crops and burn the village until centuries after the dragonslayers first waged their campaigns against the dragons.
The humans never once considered leaving the dragons alone to live their lives. Why
had they slaughtered so many dragons, when they weren’t dangerous in the first place?
How many innocent virgins has the village sacrificed over the years? They could have avoided all of that, had they left the Raveniss in peace.
Then the reality hit her like a ton of bricks. All those virgins weren’t dead, the way the villagers thought they were. They were all still alive, living their lives and raising their children with their Raveniss mates. What were their lives like? What were their children like? If only she could catch a glimpse into that world, even if only for a fraction of an instant, she might make her decision easier.
She would never know the truth, though. Tanak would never allow her to know what their lives were like until she agreed to mate with him. She shuddered at the thought. She could never do that. She could never give her body to a thing like that, a devil serpent. The very thought disgusted her beyond endurance.
