by D K Drake
“Sorry,” she said, shrugging, “but I’m almost out of cream. Now hold on to Hamilton’s arm while I cut you loose, and don’t let any part of your skin touch these leaves again.”
“That sword is sharp. What if you cut me?”
“I’ll be careful.”
“Be very careful.” This was much more humiliating than telling her about leaping into sticky bushes on purpose. He just wanted to get back to the cave, curl under his blanket and never look at her again. “Let’s get this over with.”
Gesha and Hamilton both moved to stand in front of Javan, Gesha by his left foot and Hamilton by his right. Hamilton held his left arm out so Javan could grab it. Once Javan latched his hands on to Hamilton’s forearm, Gesha began cutting away at Javan’s shirt.
Javan held his breath as the sharp blades on the sword easily sliced the brown fabric while narrowly missing his skin. In less than a minute, Javan pulled himself into a sitting position. The front of his shirt fell into his lap while the back of his shirt still stuck to the bushes.
“Okay. Progress,” Gesha said. “I’m going to use what cream I have left to unstick your belt and swords. Then I’ll cut your pants off.”
“Whoa!” Javan bent over into protective mode and covered his pants with his hands. “How about I cut my own pants off?”
Gesha let out a sigh of relief. “No problem. I’ll just get your belt unstuck for you.”
“Okay.” Javan sat up and felt her breath on his bare skin as she carefully reached around his waist to apply the cream to his belt. After what seemed like forever, the bushes released their hold on his belt. He carefully took it off and gave it to Gesha. She handed him his sword in return. He waited for her to turn around, but she kept staring at him.
“Come on, kid,” Hamilton said. “Cut, cut, cut.”
“Not while she’s watching,” Javan said under his breath through gritted teeth.
Hamilton rolled his eyes. “Gesha, the kid’s shy. You mind not looking?”
She giggled and turned around. That didn’t stop Javan’s cheeks from flaming with embarrassment as he carved his pants to shreds and let Hamilton lift his mostly naked self out of the stupid sticky bushes.
His legs wobbled a bit when they first hit the ground, and he had to use Hamilton as a prop to keep from falling. “You all right, kid?” Hamilton asked.
“I just need to get the blood flowing again. And I need to pee.” Javan let go of Hamilton and leaned against the tree he had fallen from. “You two go ahead. I’ll catch up.”
“Understood, kid,” Hamilton said. “We’ll walk slow.”
Javan watched them leave, went around to the other side of the tree and took care of his business. Then bowing his head in shame, he walked back to the cave behind Gesha and Hamilton while dressed only in his underwear, certain that life could not possibly get any more humiliating.
The next few days, however, would prove that theory horribly wrong.
Chapter 38
Elusive Dragons
and Wailing Wawrahs
Dressing in his one spare outfit upon returning to the cave helped restore Javan’s confidence, but he still didn’t feel sure enough of himself to talk to Gesha. Although he wanted to learn more about her and how she survived on her own as an enemy of the Dark King before Hamilton found her, regret over the day’s events consumed him too much to allow him to engage her in conversation over dinner. He let her and Hamilton talk by the fire while he sulked in the corner with his plate of freshly cooked fish.
That dragon had been so close.
He had seen it but didn’t attempt to jump on its back. He had heard its thoughts but didn’t try to chat with it. He had stunned it but lost his focus and sabotaged his chance to ride it.
Some Collector he was turning out to be.
“Well, kid,” Hamilton said, walking over and sitting beside Javan, “I say today was a great day.”
Javan choked his last bite of food down and looked at Hamilton. “Are you delusional?”
“Think about it. You stunned the first dragon you saw with the first stun ball you threw. You proved you’re as good with those things in real life as you are in practice. That makes today a great day.”
“Big deal. I let the dragon get away.”
“You’re new to this, kid. Making mistakes is part of the process. What you can’t do is let your mistakes take you out of the game. Focus on what you did right; learn from what you did wrong. We’ve still got five whole days left, but we’re going to need a new strategy.”
“Agreed.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“I thought you had a plan.”
“We already tried my plan.”
“That’s the only plan you had?”
“Yup.” Hamilton shrugged. “I’m not much of an idea guy. Ravier and Astor usually handle that stuff.”
“But they’re not here!”
“No, they’re not. You are. You’re smart. You’re creative. You’ll figure something out.” Hamilton patted Javan on the back. “Sleep on it, and tell me your plan in the morning. Good night.”
Sleep? How was he supposed to sleep with that kind of pressure thrown on him just before bed? He was used to following plans, not come up with them on his own. That’s what adults were for!
He watched Hamilton settle under his covers while Gesha snuffed out the fire and settled under her own covers along the wall opposite Hamilton. His bed, however, stretched across the back wall of the cave so that when he lay down, his head was near Hamilton’s head and his feet were near Gesha’s head.
Lying down didn’t help him think or sleep. He simply stared at the rock ceiling for hours listening to the whistling of the waterfall and praying for help as the deadline of his death moved closer and closer with each passing minute.
◊◊◊
Painful memories were the only things Javan collected over the next three sleepless days and nights.
Although he made countless attempts to jump from the back of his okty to unsuspecting dragons, he missed every time. His landings on the ground, on rocks, in thorns, in trees and even into water left him scratched, bruised and beaten by the end of Tuesday.
He nearly died of an acid bath when he snuck up on a sleeping dragon on Wednesday, and the one dragon he lured on Thursday morning with a small mountain of nuts Dawn Stalkers had a taste for teleported in and out of the trap so fast that Javan didn’t have time to aim his stun ball, much less throw it.
The rest of Thursday was filled with bad stun ball aim and more in-flight jumping misses. He called it a day after falling into a mound of dragon poop while trying to escape a swarm of angry bumblebees, six of which stung him.
The tension around the dinner fire that night was more pronounced than the welts developing on Javan’s face, neck and arms from the bee stings. Everyone knew he was running out of time, but no one wanted to be the one to say it.
The pain from the welts and the nightmares of being eaten by the king’s dragons kept sleep away until exhaustion finally took over late that night. But Javan didn’t awaken on Friday morning to the smell of breakfast cooking or the sound of Hamilton humming to the tune of the whistling water.
The job of waking him up fell to a slimy, slug-like companion a few feet longer and wider than Javan that crawled under his covers and delivered a deafening shriek inches away from his left ear.
“Don’t move,” Hamilton said. He was lying motionless on his stomach, his head ten feet from both Javan’s head and the head of the slug. “Sudden moves make them angry.”
“Wailing in my ear makes me angry.” Javan looked into the big bulging black eyes of the bluish green blob snuggled beside him. “What is this thing?”
“It’s a wailing wawrah.”
“It’s ugly. It’s loud. And it stinks. But is it dangerous?”
“Only if you make it mad.”
“Then I guess I won’t make it mad.” Javan tried to check on Gesha without moving his head, but the wawra
h was blocking his view of her bed. “Gesha, you okay over there?”
When she didn’t respond, he lifted himself onto his elbows to get a better view. That small movement sent the blob into a tizzy. It wailed louder than before as its nostrils flared, its ears popped up and its fins spread out, framing its hideous face. “What’s it doing?”
“It’s going to attack!”
“Why?” Javan had trouble yelling over the noise of the high-pitched howl. “I didn’t do anything!”
“You moved! Now grab your sword! Chop its head off before it bites your neck!”
“My neck? Is this thing like some kind of slimy vampire?” Javan said as he rolled over, snagged both his swords from his belt beside him and turned back to the wawrah just in time to see it open its mouth. It wailed again and spewed a stream of thick, rancid, gunky puke all over Javan’s face.
“Ahhh! How disgusting!” Javan choked down puke of his own as he wiped his eyes with the back of his hands. “Die, you stinking wawrah!”
He slashed at the blob, but it slithered out of the way and moved itself onto Javan’s legs. From there, it lifted itself up like an attacking cobra, bared its fangs and lunged for Javan’s neck. Javan caught a whiff of its rancid breath as he slid the sword under its mouth and sliced upward.
The wawrah’s body collapsed. It’s head, however, bounced off Javan’s chest and rolled across the floor, landing at Gesha’s feet. She stood there stunned, her face flushed of all color.
“Don’t worry, Gesha,” he said, working to catch his breath, “I killed it.” He was proud of himself for protecting her; she was, after all, too scared to even respond to his inquiry about her well-being just moments ago.
“Good,” she said, “but that’s not what I’m worried about.” She held up a piece of paper. “As I was out hunting for breakfast, I retrieved a message from Astor. Micah is on his way to Dusk Stalker territory with a countless number of soldiers. He’s going after Mertzer.”
Chapter 39
Outnumbered
“N
o!” Javan shoved the body of the dead wawrah off his legs and stood. “He can’t have Mertzer. Mertzer is my dragon. We’ve got to get to Dusk Stalker territory now. Isn’t there a portal around here somewhere?”
“Micah has soldiers guarding the Dusk Territory portal.” Gesha attempted to hand the paper she held to Javan, but his hands still dripped with wawrah slime. Hamilton took it from her instead.
“You’ll have to travel by okty,” she continued. “Astor has checkpoints set up along the way where you’ll have food and fresh okties waiting for you. The journey will take all day, but you should be able to get there by sundown.”
“You mean ‘we’ should be able to get there by sundown,” Javan said. “You’re coming with us. Right?”
Gesha shook her head. “You don’t need me traveling with you. I would only slow you down.”
“You won’t slow us down. And you have to come. I can’t cook; I certainly don’t want to eat anything Hamilton cooks.”
“I wouldn’t either, but I’m sure you’ll be fine.” Gesha smiled. “Just beat Micah to Mertzer, and I’ll make you a big celebration dinner when you return to Gri. When it’s safe for all of us to return to Gri, anyway.”
“Okay,” Javan said, returning Gesha’s smile. “I like that idea.”
“Me, too,” Hamilton said, “but I’m not traveling anywhere with you until you take a bath. Go jump in the water and clean yourself off. I’ll get the okties ready. Gesha, you work on getting everything packed.” He clapped his hands. “And be quick about it, you two. We’ve got to get Javan to his dragon.” Without another word, the three of them split up and carried out their assigned tasks.
Less than twenty minutes later with his hair and clothes still dripping wet, Javan met his companions by the water’s edge.
“Guess this is goodbye,” Gesha said, handing Javan his bag.
“Guess so.”
“Ah, we’ll see each other again soon,” Hamilton said. He buried Gesha in a hug. “Thanks for your help. You have somewhere safe to hide until this is all over?”
“I know of a place just outside of Torix. I should be safe there.”
“Good, good.” Hamilton released her and climbed onto his okty. “Kid, your turn. Give the girl a hug and mount up.”
Javan blushed, looked at his feet, then up at Gesha. They stared at each other in awkward silence until both moved in to hug each other at the same time. Instead of embracing, they bumped heads. “Sorry,” Javan said.
“No, I’m sorry.” She rubbed her head, gave Javan a quick squeeze and an even quicker kiss on the cheek. “Good luck, Dragon Collector.”
“Thanks.” Dragon Collector. He liked the sound of that. Especially the way she said it. “See you back in Gri. Eventually.” He climbed onto his okty, waved and flew away.
◊◊◊
He spent the first part of the flight imagining how impressed Gesha was going to be when she saw him riding into Gri on the back of Mertzer. But as the day wore on, Javan grew more and more concerned that they wouldn’t get to Mertzer in time.
After all, Micah wasn’t running a solo dragon hunting expedition; he had an entire army with him to help him trap and capture Mertzer. Plus he had the help of his dragon-hunting dad. Maybe he even had all of his dad’s dragons helping him. How was Javan supposed to compete with two Hunters, four dragons and an army of soldiers?
Javan’s resources included one Hamilton, two stalker swords and seven stun balls. Not exactly an even match. The lopsided nature of the battle he was flying into became increasingly evident as he and Hamilton entered the heart of Dusk Stalker territory just before sunset.
The clanging of the armor reached their ears first. It sounded like a massive one-instrument marching band that played the same note as loud as possible over and over again.
The sound only made the sight more chilling. Thousands of soldiers miles wide and half a mile deep stretched across the meadows and woods near where Javan had previously encountered Mertzer. From Javan’s vantage point in the sky, their helmets, swords and shields made them look like a wall of impenetrable robots striding to a steady beat in a uniform direction toward the coast.
What were they doing? Trying to flush Mertzer out by marching over every inch of Dusk Stalker territory?
Javan steered his fourth okty of the day beside Hamilton and yelled across the wings of their rides. “Do you see him?” Javan asked. “Do you see Mertzer?”
“No.” Hamilton shook his head. “All I see are Micah’s minions.”
“Let’s fly ahead of them, see where they’re marching to.”
“Lead the way.”
Javan nodded and proceeded forward. Even if they did find Mertzer first, Javan wasn’t sure it would do much good. Without wings, Mertzer couldn’t fly over the army. And with the numbers against him, he wouldn’t be able to run his way through them without being pierced, jabbed and stabbed with the swords and spears of the soldiers.
“One problem at a time,” Javan mumbled to himself. “Find Mertzer. Ride him. Then figure out how to escape.”
Javan urged his okty to quicken her pace. As they flew eastward, the sounds of the clanging army faded away and were soon replaced with the sound of crashing waves. When the shoreline came into view, Javan caught a glimpse of more soldiers. This group, however, stood in a single file line along the water with their backs to the purple ocean and facing the woods in front of them.
The only soldier who moved paced back and forth at the edge of the trees. He wore no armor but had dreadlocks and carried a shield and sword.
Micah.
“I know what they’re doing,” Javan said. He turned his okty around so that he could face Hamilton. “Mertzer is terrified of water, so they’re herding him toward the shore.”
“So he’s somewhere between the shore and the army.”
“Yes. I doubt Micah will attack until Mertzer is close to the water.”
“All we
have to do is find the dragon and keep him from getting to the ocean.”
“Yup. We’re gonna to have to fly closer to the trees to make it easier to spot him.”
“That will make it easier for the soldiers to spot us.”
“I know. But it’s a risk we have to take.”
“You’re the boss, kid.” Hamilton tightened the shoulder strap of the long sword sheath he wore across his back and pointed to the ground. “Let’s find that dragon before any of those soldiers armed with arrows shoot us out of the sky.”
Chapter 40
Hunter vs. Collector
Javan took a deep breath and plummeted toward the trees. He pulled up in time to avoid a collision, and with Hamilton at his heels, he began flying in a zig zag pattern between the shore and the marching soldiers.
The zigs and zags became shorter and shorter the closer the soldiers trudged to the ocean. Fortunately they seemed too focused on the terrain in front of them to notice anything or anyone flying above them.
Then, in a patch of bushes up ahead, Javan spotted a half-white, half-rainbow colored dragon feasting on whatever kind of fruit or berries the bushes produced. “I see him!”
“And the soldiers see us!”
Javan glanced back at Hamilton. “Are you sure?”
An arrow pierced the front left wings of Hamilton’s okty. It screeched, flapped its injured wings and began spiraling toward the ground. “Pretty sure, kid,” Hamilton yelled as he descended.
Another arrow zipped past Javan. It impaled the bill of his hat and knocked it clean off his head. “Whoa! That was close!” More arrows flew past him, forcing Javan to maneuver his way through the onslaught and land further from Mertzer than he intended.
Hamilton had survived his crash landing in a clearing just behind Javan and pulled Javan off his okty as soon as he touched the ground. “We’ve got to get to that dragon,” Hamilton said. “It’s only a matter of minutes before those soldiers catch up to us.”
