Dream of Dragons

by Alex Alcasid

  “Lind! Lind, hurry, please!” Kae cried. The dragon was clear of the Firestone Keep, but lacked the space to take to the sky. Lind roared mightily and leapt onto the wall that circled the main city of Sagna. His claws gouged the stone as he hauled himself to the top. With more space for his wings, the dragon began to flap his wings, slowly climbing into the sky.

  Below him, the flow of the lava began to spill out from the main gates of the Firestone Keep, burning the drawbridge on contact, but soon filling the moat that was dug to ward off invaders and continuing on down to the town. As the dragon flew higher up, the haunting sound of Haedria’s laugh, growing fainter every second, rang in Kae’s ears.

  Kae clung onto the short spikes that dotted Lind’s spine, holding on for dear life. One arm was looped around Loren, holding the princess close to her. Far below her was a streak of silver, shambling as fast as it could through the Sagnian city. It was the soldiers of Aldoran making their retreat. A blot of dark fur dashed through the line of the soldiers, leading someone that tried frantically to keep up with it, along with a Beastman having a slightly easier time. Cassendir, Kaiten, and Ma’trii were alive, but no one knew for how much longer. The flow of lava was quickly catching up to them.

  “They can’t make it away fast enough!” Kae cried. The howl of wind from every beat of Lind’s wings as he circled the sky above Sagna whipped Kae’s words away. She pointed down to the city, towards the mass of townspeople and soldiers that were fleeing for their lives. “We have to help them!”

  In her arms, Loren stirred. The princess groaned softly, but Kae did not hear. She felt the familiar rough scales of the family’s dragon under her skin. But it was cold, windy, and the dragon kept moving. She opened her eyes and realized she was not a young girl, sleeping in the arms of the dragon as he rested in the caverns beneath the castle. They were flying, and a voice frantically called for help.

  Loren found her footing and grabbed onto the dragon’s spikes. Kae looked back, and the two locked eyes; one dark, the other gold. The princess crawled up the dragon’s back, forcing herself against the wind, and managed to straddle Lind’s neck with a good grip on his spikes. Far beneath her was the kingdom of the Red Sisters, rapidly nearing extinction. Her friends, men loyal to her and her family, and innocent civilians ran for their lives, pushing and trampling each other as the crowd made its way through the streets of Sagna. Loren saw, and patted the dragon’s neck. Lind nodded.

  “Loren!” Kae screamed against the wind. The huntress braced herself as the dragon pitched forward, diving down towards the city at a rapid pace, his wings folded close to his body. The wind stung Kae’s eyes, and she did not dare risk letting go of the dragon’s spikes to shield her eyes. The princess looked back at Kae and smiled reassuringly. The dive continued.

  As the ground rose to meet them with ever increasing speed, Kae shut her eyes and screamed. The colors of the ground, sand, trees, and buildings of the city began to blur together, screaming towards them. Just as Kae’s heart threatened to stop, Lind threw open his wings, the air filling them and stopping their descent abruptly. Kae heard Loren inhale in time with the dragon taking a deep breath.

  A jet of golden dragonfire burst from Lind’s mouth, moving in a slow line through the center of the town. The flames cut through the stone of the earth, several houses, and a large firestone statue of the queen, melting it just as surely as the lava would.

  The dragonfire scored a long, deep line into the earth, leaving the melted rock still glowing from the heat. From the newly formed trench, a high wall of the gold fire rose, shimmering and casting a warm light. The rolling wave of lava approached it, gaining speed as the road down from the Firestone Keep was downhill.

  When the lava reached the wall of dragonfire, it stopped. Some of the glowing, melted rock spilled into the deep trench, pooling inside it and filling it up. But even as it filled the trench, it did not overflow. Instead, the lava piled higher, held in place as if the wall of dragonfire was a solid thing. The lava that touched the dragonfire rapidly began to cool and emit a thick mist that spread into a cloud that stretched the entire length of the trench. The wrath of the mountain was stopped.

  “Loren.” Kae breathed, peeking out over the side of the dragon to watch what was happening. “Loren, you and Lind are amazing. You’re amazing.” She stammered.

  The princess turned back to Kae, smiling sheepishly. “Honestly, I have no idea what I’m doing. I just think something and, well…” Loren patted Lind’s neck, and received a low rumble deep in the dragon’s chest. Lind was laughing. “He just knows! He has his own ideas, and I can feel it. I don’t know Kae, it just happens.”

  “You are amazing.” Kae said again, staring at Loren with wide eyes.

  The princess chuckled awkwardly. “What?”

  “Do you understand what you just did, princess?” Kae gestured down at the partially destroyed city of Sagna and the rapidly cooling lava from Mount Volknar. The wind caught her arm and threatened to throw her off balance, so the huntress pulled back and clung tightly to Lind’s spikes. “You just saved a city. You save our friends, your soldiers, and the people of Sagna. Gods above, Loren! You saved the people of Sagna from their queen!”

  “I…What?” The princess’s eyes were wide, uncomprehending. The weight of the situation only began to dawn on her once Kae had put it into words. “All I wanted was the cure for my mother.”

  “You got that!” Kae quickly patted her pocket and darted her hand back to its handhold. “And you’ve done so much more!”

  “I killed a queen…”

  “Yes you did, but honestly everyone is better off without her.”

  A roar of noise from the ground made both girls look over the side of the dragon. An enormous crowd of several thousand people were cheering and clapping at them. They were well into the fields outside of the wall surrounding the city. Loren and Kae saw men and women of all walks of life, children clutching their toys and the hands of their parents, even soldiers bearing the sigil of the Red Sisters on their chests. Their upturned faces bore expressions of pure joy, some with tears running down their faces.

  Kae turned back to Loren and smiled. “Princess, they’re cheering for you. For you and Lind.”

  Loren looked over Lind’s side again.

  All who were able to evacuate the city in time were gathered on the fields, staring up at the blue and gold dragon hovering in the air above their ruined city. They cheered for the woman who had killed their queen and were…happy.

  “We should land, princess.” Kae said, breaking Loren out of her reverie. “The Warmaster and Spymaster are down there, I think. I saw them running out with the Aldoran soldiers.” Kae paused, then gasped, pointing down at a spot on the fields. By the edge of a crop of corn was a man waving at them with a glowing blue arm, a wolf, and a lion Beastman. The lion roared to the sky, triumphantly waving an axe. Beside him, the wolf threw his head back and howled. “There! Our friends made it! Ma’trii made it!” Kae broke into a laugh, made frantic with relief. The fear and worry that the huntress was unconsciously holding back left her in a torrent, and she laughed with tears streaming down her face.

  “Loren, we’re alive! And it’s because of you, we’re alive, we made it out of there.” Kae said, out of breath. “Everyone made it out alive.”

  Underneath the two girls, the dragon rumbled again with a laugh. The wall of golden dragonfire still raged high and strong, the barrier of dragon magic keeping the wrath of the mountain from continuing any farther. Yet again Haedria’s magic was bested by the dragon she wanted so badly.

  Lind flapped his powerful wings and descended towards the fields surrounding Sagna. Large fields of corn, wheat, and barely were dotted around the sides of Mount Volknar, relying on the volcano’s rich and fertile soil. The magic of the Dagan line, rulers of Sagna, was said to appease the volcano’s wrath so that it would not erupt and destroy the city and its surrounding territories. Having the queen herself use Mount Volknar as a weapon
— the source of so much life and livelihood in the area for so long — was not even considered a possibility by many Sagnians.

  The dragon landed in a clearing between gently swaying stalks of corn and wheat. The wind from the dragon’s wings blew the crops, bowing their heads as he landed. Lind seemed to crouch, pressing his body low to the ground then angled one of his wings downward to help the girls dismount his back. Loren leapt off the dragon’s back first, then reached up to help the huntress off.

  The princess held out her hand, and Kae took it. Their hands touched, and Kae looked into Loren’s eyes. The princess was busy watching Lind’s scales for possible stable areas on the dragon’s hide for Kae to set her feet as she climbed down, and didn’t notice the fierce blush spreading across the huntress’s cheeks. Kae coughed awkwardly, and dropped her gaze, hopping from the dragon and dropping the last few feet to the ground.

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Once Kae’s feet touched the ground, she was swept off them again.

  The huntress landed hard on her back, pressed into the dark soil of the Sagnian fields with a wolf’s paws on her chest. Ma’trii whined and licked her face, nudging her with his head and clawing at her. “Ma’trii!” Kae laughed, pinned down. She tried to get up, but the feral wolf Beastman kept her down, howling and whining. “Ma’trii, I missed you too! I’m so glad you’re okay! Are you hurt? I’m fine, I’m fine! Hah, you smelly wolf, get off!”

  Loren watched the two roll about on the ground. Her eyes faded to their normal color, no longer shining with the dragon magic she did not understand. She looked up to the dragon, her childhood friend and confidante, and felt his rumbling laughter in her chest. The princess smiled up at Lind, relieved and thankful.

  “Loren! You foolhardy thing, come here!” A booming laugh sounded near the princess’s ear and she was quickly swept up by sweaty, furred arms. Kaiten held Loren in a bear hug, laughing. His patchy mane was a mess, plastered to his face from mixed sweat and blood. His jerkin was badly damaged and cleaved right through in some parts, showing deep cuts into his skin. “I thought you were dead! Loren, I swear by my father’s name, if you ever run off and get yourself captured like that again—“

  The princess broke into a laugh as the Beastman prince picked her up in a hug as if she was as light as a tiny rabbit. He swung her around and held her so tightly to him that she couldn’t help but giggle. “I’m sorry Kaiten! I didn’t mean to get captured, you know that! But what about you, how did you find us?”

  “Instead of heading to Rhodia to reclaim my throne, I went straight for your castle.” Kaiten said, still keeping the princess pinned to his chest. The mage-scholar Cassendir came up behind them, having followed along much more slowly. He meekly smiled and waved at the princess, his eyes very drawn and tired. Loren waved back at him as best as she could with her arms pinned to her sides, and Cassendir sat heavily on the ground. “I told the king and queen everything!”

  “Everything?” Loren gulped.

  “Everything.” The lion prince huffed. “I told them what you told me, of how you crossed the Plaguelands all on your own with your motley crew of friends you’ve picked up along the way.”

  From the ground, Kae yelled. “I heard that!”

  “And how you found me and the princess Seraphis at the northern outpost. Then our trek through the northern lands with Gershwin, coming down the other side of the Kilrough Mountains, then us having to part ways on the road once the bandits came. The queen is still alive, but she’s growing weaker every day. The king could not leave the kingdom, or his wife’s side, you understand. So he sent the Warmaster and Spymaster. We traveled day and night just to get here.” Kaiten sighed sadly. “We may have lost a few men and more horses from exhaustion.”

  “Oh.” Loren’s face fell. “I’m so sorry. But what about Lind? Did he join you when you left Markholme?”

  Kaiten shook his head. “The dragon didn’t leave his roost the entire time. I didn’t see him till he was above us, tearing the sky apart with his roar and slamming into the Firestone Keep. I don’t think anyone in the castle told him. I’m not sure anyone can make a dragon do anything. Except you, of course.”

  Loren stared up at Kaiten. Then her gaze turned to Lind. The dragon was watching her out of one curious, golden eye. “He knew I was in trouble.”

  “I don’t doubt it, princess.” Kaiten finally put Loren down on the ground. “We Beastmen believe dragons to be like gods. They are ancient, with magic we cannot understand. My father used to tell me tales of dragons, and whenever he would speak of their magic, he would always stress that theirs was a magic of life.”

  “A magic of life? In what way?”

  “Where dragons live, nature prospers.” Kaiten shrugged his shoulders, winced when he realized one was sore, and massaged it with his hand. “That is what my father would say. I believe he meant plants and crops would grow, animals would be plentiful. Things like that.”

  Loren did not reply. She looked curiously back at Lind, who rumbled again, deep in his chest. The dragon slowly closed his eyes and looked away, curling his wings and tail closer to his body to rest.

  The princess sighed, her hands on her hips.

  Behind her, the crowd was surging forward, wary of the dragon but excited to greet their savior. Standing off to the side, beaming with pride, were the Warmaster and Spymaster. The princess had saved them all on her own. The queen mother would be amused to hear the tales of her daughter’s adventures, and would probably scold them for having let the situation get so out of hand when it did. Sairus and Isran shared a look, and winced at the thought.

  The townsfolk of Sagna came, clamoring to see the princess. Men and women spoke over one another, with farmers and merchants trying to hand Loren a gift or a tribute. Magic stones with glowing veins were thrust into her hands, along with an ornately forged decorative dagger, a basket of fruit, and cheap but glittery bangles. The princess laughed good-naturedly, but Kaiten quickly saw how overwhelmed she was getting. The girl still wore the roughspun prison robes from the dungeons, some bits of it were hanging by frayed threads. The Beastman prince laughed loudly, the sound booming in his chest in a way that reminded Loren of the prince’s late father, and kindly told the crowd to move backwards and give the princess some space. She had a rough day.

  Being escorted back across the Kilrough Mountains was a bizarre experience. The Warmaster and Spymaster insisted on escorting the prince and princess, along with their friends, personally. They were each given horses, much to Kae’s disappointment, and told to ride alongside the battalion of Aldoran soldiers. The journey home was much more slow going, as everyone was wounded and exhausted. Warmaster Sairus attempted to rally the troops and boost their morale to get the line moving quicker down the path, but after a few minutes of quickened marching, their pace slowed again. The panther Beastman could only sigh and lead the troops at the front of the line beside Sypmaster Isran.

  “We take the path west from Sagna and onto Hardwick, my lady.” Warmaster Sairus explained as he pulled his horse up beside Loren’s. The princess had been given a spare Aldoran surcoat to replace her ragged prison clothes. It was too long and ended half way down her shins, but the cloth was of her family’s colors and that brought some bit of joy back to her. “We passed this way on the journey towards Sagna.”

  “Thank you again for your swift action, Warmaster. Spymaster.” Loren said, smiling and nodding to the men. They smiled back, a fondness in their eyes behind layers of formality for the young princess they had raised and protected since she was a girl. “I dread what would have happened to me if you did not arrive when you did, or if you did not believe Kaiten’s tale.”

  “I’ve heard many things, horrible things, about the Red Sisters of Sagna, my lady.” Isran said. The Spymaster’s hood was down, exposing long dark hair and a scar above his sharp, shrewd eyes. A coarse stubble was sprouting on his chin, the beginnings of a beard. “As soon as we heard what had happened, and where it had happened,
we could not simply stay behind the steady walls of Markholme. Your father burned with a desire to come to your aid, my lady, but he had to stay at your mother’s side. We are honored that the king put such faith in us.”

  Loren couldn’t help but chuckle. “I’m sure he did. I can imagine what he looked like, pulling a sword out from his belt and waving it around, red in the face from screaming orders.” The princess sighed, a melancholy smile on her face. “I hope they are alright.”

  The two Masters shared a look. Warmaster Sairus spoke. “They are well, my lady, but as you know, the queen…”

  “Yes, I know. I came all this way for an antidote, and we did retrieve it.” The princess sighed. “I only hope she can hold on till we get there.”

  “It should only take us another few days, my lady.” Spymaster Isran said, looking to the sky. “We will reach Hardwick within a few hours, rest and resupply at the Aldoran outpost there, along with getting fresh horses. Most of the men need medical care as well.”

  “Please have the men seen to immediately. They fought well in Sagna, and deserve some well needed rest.” Loren said, and the Masters nodded. Warmaster Sairus kicked his horse into a trot, leading the way and attempting to rally the troops again.

  The Spymaster held the reins of his horse a fraction tighter and made to follow the Warmaster to the front, when he suddenly looked back to Loren, a concerned and confused expression on his face. “My lady, if I may.”

  “Yes, Spymaster? What troubles you?”

  Spymaster Isran turned his sharp gaze on the princess. His expression did not change, but his eyes always looked like they could see more, see beneath what people showed. Loren shrank involuntarily back. “Why are you riding with us in the first place, my lady? You would have been at the queen’s side faster had you rode Lind back to Markholme.” He said cooly.