Dragonrider Academy: Episode 1

by A. J. Flowers

  “Vivi,” I corrected him, then frowned. “How do you know my name?”

  He chuckled as he casually wrapped an arm around my neck and forced me toward the campus. “I know a lot about you, Vivienne. I know that you’re from the goddess tribe of lost enchantresses of Avalon.” He tapped the birthmark at my shoulder and I winced as if he’d touched a bruise. “It’s probably reacting to the realm shift you just went through. How are you feeling? Nauseous? Hungry?”

  I felt both of those things, but I wasn’t going to voice them to this jerkwad. “I’m fine,” I snapped. “I just want to go home.”

  It was getting harder to tell myself that all of this was a massive hallucination and that I was still asleep on the beach. The sun blared down and the sounds of distant dragons rumbled through the air. Killian’s warm arm around my shoulder felt very real, as did the magical cord that still linked us together and strapped around my wrist, cutting off the blood flow every time I tried to pull against him.

  And yet, even though every fiber of my being told me that I should be terrified, another part of me was listening. Contemplating.

  Accepting.

  If this was real, then it explained so much about me. Why I couldn’t make friends. Possibly what had really happened to my father.

  Why I was such a freak.

  “Who was the woman under the water?” I asked softly, granting the male at my side this brief moment of compliance as I worked to match his longer gait. It was only so that he would feel comfortable enough to exchange information, and then I’d work on my next objective—to get out of here.

  “You don’t know your own relatives?” he teased. His hand casually toyed with a curl of my hair, but the motion felt friendly, natural. He’d said that we were partners and even though I’d just met him, even though he’d restrained me against my will, there was definitely this strange sense of belonging I had with him that I’d never experienced with anyone else. A part of me wanted to trust him, wanted to lean on him for support and let him explain this strange new world to me.

  Luckily, that insane part of my brain was small enough to tie up into a neat little package to be shoved aside.

  “You’re a descendant of a race of women who have goddess blood. Not much, mind you,” he said, tapping me on the nose again. “But enough to travel realms. Enough to be recruited to Dragonrider Academy by yours truly,” he grinned as if he’d just done me a great service. “You’ll like it here. I promise.”

  Was he for real right now? Even if I could wrap my mind around everything he was telling me, he was suggesting that I leave my human life behind and pursue… what, exactly? “Why am I here?” I asked, determined to find the true answer to my question. “What is… here? What is a dragonrider?” I flinched away, forcing him to stop. “And why would anyone want me?” Goddess blood or not, I wasn’t a prize. I was the girl in the library who escaped to places like this in my imaginative mind, but I’d always been able to leave.

  He leveled his gaze on me with those whitewashed eyes that threatened to drown me all over again. “I know it’s a lot to take in, Viv, but you’re just going to have to have a little faith here. You’re needed. Dragonriders protect the realms from evil.” He leaned in closer. “Like the evil that took your father. Do you really think he just randomly drowned? No. The Lady of the Lake isn’t the only thing in those waters. There are creatures that want you dead, Viv, and the best way to defend yourself, to defend the people you love, to keep everything the way it is supposed to be, is to become a defender of life. Dragonriders do that, Viv. We protect people. We keep people safe.” He glanced back the way we’d come, his gaze turning wistful as the wyvern around his neck ruffled small wings and settled closer into the groove of Killian’s collarbone. “And we avenge those we’ve lost.”

  Huh, maybe there was more to this guy than I’d realized.

  “That’s nice and all, but I need to get home, Killian,” I said, using his name for emphasis. He wanted to pretend that we already knew each other, that we were going to be fast friends and I’d just go with this craziness like I wasn’t about to have a psychotic break. “My mom is going to think I drowned. I need to get back and—”

  “She knows exactly where you are,” he clarified. He tugged out a piece of paper from his uniform shirt’s pocket. I hadn’t noticed before, but he wore one of those school uniforms like he belonged in some Ivy League school, except he kept the upper two buttons undone to complement his rebellious look. He handed me the slip of paper and waited for me to unfold it.

  I blinked a few times at my mother’s handwriting.

  My dearest daughter,

  If you’re reading this, then you’ve been recruited to Dragonrider Academy and I’ve officially failed to protect you like your father and I wanted. I know it seems crazy, but this is a part of your heritage that we tried to shield you from. I’m writing this letter as I am pregnant with you, while the Dean herself waits for me to finish. She’s going to make sure this letter gets to you if you’re recruited—which is a day I hope never comes.

  Your father didn’t want children, because he knew this would be a possibility. I’m not entirely human, Vivienne, and neither are you. We come from an ancient line of women that go by many names. Human history and fiction books refer to them as Druids, Seers, Enchantresses, Witches, and many other names that attempt to describe what mortals can’t understand. You and I have the blood of the goddess in our veins. With that comes the potential to move between realms, among other things. It makes you uniquely qualified to be recruited by those who protect the realms, an unseen force that keeps so many lives safe.

  I’m grateful. Your father was a dragonrider and rescued me at the cost of his dragon’s life. I escaped Avalon as a child and we will never go near the water again, no matter what happens, no matter if I am called back, I will ignore it. I’ll be honest with you because I have to tell myself that you’ll never read this letter.

  If I’m being honest, and you are reading this letter, then I will say I know you are capable of anything. I feel your strength as you kick inside my stomach and I can’t wait to meet you, to name you and to spend my life making yours better.

  Be strong, my daughter, and know that you’ve been brought to a powerful place where you’ll be tested over and over again—but you will survive, this I promise you.

  And I will make sure you will never be alone, because my heart is with you.

  Love, Mom.

  My entire body trembled by the time I finished reading. My mother had said those exact words to me as part of the lyrics to a little bedtime song.

  You will never be alone, because my heart is with you.

  No matter what, I will find you. I will cross oceans and worlds to be by your side again.

  You will never be alone.

  She’d sung that to me because she knew I might one day read this letter and I would need to know that she would come for me.

  My knees buckled as the realization of everything came over me all at once and I found myself caught in Killian’s arms. He held me with ease and his wyvern shifted open one eye to check out the disturbance. A brilliantly blue iris with a sliced lizard-like pupil examined me for a moment before it closed again.

  “It’s a lot to take in, I know,” Killian said, his low velvety voice calm and soothing. “But you’re here now, so let’s get you on campus and to orientation and… oh.” He looked down at my lack of attire and chuckled. “Well, to the dorms first, then. You’re going to give half of the student body a nosebleed dressed like that. What part of Earth do you come from, anyway? I seriously need to visit this culture where the dress code is so… sparse.”

  Shivering, I wrapped my arms around myself and took a deliberate step away from the warm male who made my insides do backflips. I’d nearly forgotten I was only wearing my bathing suit and how inappropriate that might be in this situation. “Yeah, clothes sound like a good idea,” I admitted.

  I wasn’t getting back home like this. Ev
en with a wistful look back at the retreating ocean, I knew that I couldn’t go the same way I’d come. Somehow, I’d traveled to a different realm, an entirely different world where dragons were real and so was the danger that had killed my father.

  He hadn’t drowned from being trapped by an undercurrent.

  He’d been murdered.

  A cold chill swept through me as I rewrote all of my memories. Even if my father hadn’t wanted children, he’d loved me fiercely. I couldn’t remember much, but I knew that without a doubt. Something had brought me and my mother to the water when I was a child and he’d died to protect us—to protect me.

  I turned back to face the impossible scene spanning out before me like a painting. The dragons I’d spotted earlier were larger now, and one in particular had broken off from the winding herd until I noticed the elegant rider atop its back.

  My heart pounded in my chest when the emerald dragon began its descent. Large, glimmering scales swept over its entire body and made it sparkle like it held green fire in its belly. Smoke drifted from its nostrils, suggesting that the illusion wasn’t an illusion at all and I was in serious danger of being burned alive.

  Killian didn’t seem too concerned, though, and casually draped his arm around my hips, bringing me in closer to him. The only hint that he’d tensed was how he briefly dug his fingers into my skin before relaxing them again.

  The dragon landed and the ground jolted underneath my feet, making me want to scream or run or do anything other than stare at this creature from my position of weakness. Killian stood his ground and forced me to remain still, so I followed his lead. He’d expressed that I was of some value to him, so I held to that fact to keep me safe—for now. He wouldn’t let anything happen to me or he wouldn’t get what he wanted.

  A female rider jumped from the dragon’s back, sauntering over to us as she glowered. She wore a feminine version of Killian’s uniform, except an emerald pin glistened at her left shoulder where he had a bronze one.

  She turned her glare on me as she propped her hands on her hips, taking a moment for her gaze to dip where she noted Killian’s hand on me. “So, you finally found yourself a recruit,” she said with a sneer. “Where did you drag this one in from? One of the fae worlds? She looks so small.” She leaned in closer and her nostrils flared. “She smells like one, too. Like sunlight and stench. You really think she’s going to last two days here?”

  “She’s human,” Killian said as he ran his hand up and over my shoulder as he covered my birthmark. I glanced up at him, wondering why he’d lie. My mother’s words came back to me.

  I’m not entirely human, Vivienne, and neither are you.

  The female’s eyes went wide, revealing striking emerald irises that rivaled her dragon’s colors. The beast folded its legs under it, thundering the ground again as it settled into a comfortable position. By the way it lazily narrowed its eyes and ticked back its ears, the beast thought it was going to be here a while.

  “Human?” the female shrieked. “Are you insane?”

  “It’s not your call, Jasmine,” Killian said, his tone flat. He sounded different when he spoke to someone else, as if his voice lost that sensual bite it had to it when directed at me. Maybe he wanted to mesmerize me, somehow, or control me through compulsion. If humans weren’t customary here, it meant he wasn’t human either, and I immediately started searching for clues to figure out what race he might be.

  What was fiction? What was real? Could he be a vampire? I leaned in to get a look at his teeth while he talked. They looked perfect to me, so not that. Unless he was like the vampires in the books where the fangs could pop out like switchblades. Or maybe he didn’t have fangs at all.

  Or maybe he was a shifter of some kind. He had that dreamy look to him that would make all the cheerleaders at my school go bonkers.

  My thoughts were interrupted when Jasmine started shouting again, this time while she grabbed me and yanked me out of his embrace. “You need to send her back, you moron. Are you trying to open up a rogue tunnel by bringing her here? Earth is a hotspot with wild dragons gaining territory every day. What kind of damage is her presence doing right now? Did you even think about that?” She jostled me again as she glared, looking into my eyes. I wasn’t sure what she saw there, but she didn’t like it. She faced Killian again as she shook me. “Are you just lonely? Is that it? You’re tired of me rejecting you, so you think you’re going to make me jealous with this little twig of a female?”

  Killian snapped his fingers and a jolt of energy traveled through the cord that bound us, making Jasmine shriek and jerk away as she released me. Her dragon shot its head up and its nostrils flared while a strange rumbling sound built in its belly.

  “Tell Emerald to chill out,” he said, his words stern but gentle. “If she burns up the new recruit, you’re going to be on tunnel duty for eternity.”

  Jasmine ground her teeth while she glared. My stomach dropped and I finally found my voice enough to protest. “What the heck is wrong with you people?” I shrieked, yanking against the magical bind between myself and my captor. Killian didn’t budge. “You’re talking about me as if I’m not even here.” Maybe I was used to that back at my high school, but this place was supposed to be different.

  I definitely wasn’t the only freak here.

  “It doesn’t matter because Killian is going to send you back and reset your memory,” Jasmine insisted, taking out a dagger from a leather strap at her side. I stiffened, but didn’t move as she swiped down, severing the magical bond. Killian allowed it as he watched the exchange. “If you’re smart, you’ll run right back in that ocean and go back home,” Jasmine said, pointing at the distant waves.

  “She’s not going home,” Killian insisted, his intoxicating gaze falling back to me as his voice changed again, growing sultry and kind. “Because you want to be here, don’t you?”

  He wanted me to make my decision. He’d given me my mother’s letter, even knowing what it said.

  But he said that he knew me, which meant he knew that I had nothing waiting for me back home. No friends other than a stray bird. No real family other than my mother—and if I had read her signals correctly, she’d come find me eventually.

  What I had if I stayed was a real chance at figuring out what happened to my father… and maybe finding out more about myself and what was wrong with me before my mother arrived and got me out of here.

  And maybe, what I’d find what I’d been missing all along. I’d find meaning for my life, hope, and purpose.

  I looked back to the campus with the drifting dragons, the magical shimmer in the air and the sense of wonder that felt like I’d falling head-first into one of my favorite fantasy novels.

  “I’m staying,” I said with finality.

  Because whatever craziness I’d gotten myself into, running wasn’t the answer. I’d been running all my life.

  It was time to take a stand.

  Jasmine’s jaw flexed while she considered her response. “Well, then, I guess we’re going to have to do this the hard way.” She offered her hand for me to shake. “Welcome to Dragonrider Academy.”

  When I went to take her hand, she retracted it and tapped her dagger, causing it to shimmer as it extended into a long elegant weapon. She crouched into a fighting position and raised the blade.

  “I hope you brought a sword, because I challenge you to a duel.”

  “Jasmine,” Killian complained as he rolled his eyes.

  “No, you said she’s not leaving, so we’re going to play by Academy rules. I challenge her to a duel.”

  He frowned. “Then I volunteer to fight on her behalf.”

  “No,” I snapped, making them both to turn and look at me. “Nobody fights my battles,” I said, and I crouched and curled my fingers into fights.

  I probably looked ridiculous as I bent my skinny legs and faced off with a legitimate female knight in my bathing suit, but I still had my pride.

  Sort of.

  Killian
smirked, seeming pleased as he took his dagger from his belt and pelted it into the sand. “Very well, recruit. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  I took up the blade and shrieked as Jasmine launched in to attack, her massive dragon lazily watching the exchange as it rested its maw on its legs.

  What had I gotten myself into now?

  I’d never fought a day in my life, but I’d read plenty of fight scenes in my favorite fantasy novels and that counted for something.

  And coming here… it had changed something in me.

  Adrenaline made my heart thunder in my chest as I dove out of the way and blindly swiped with my blade, but my movement felt guided by an external force that thrummed through my veins. I knew I wasn’t going to hit my target that way, but that guiding instinct told me this was how I’d get her off guard. I regrouped as I did a somersault roll to get in closer to the female. Daggers were short-range weapons, but the last thing I needed was to be out of her reach where she could use her superior skill to jump in and hit me with a well-aimed strike that I wasn’t trained for.

  I needed to make the first move.

  Jasmine kept her eye on the blade, just as the strange guiding force had predicted, all while I moved in close. I didn’t need to stab her. I just needed to make a point, and I had a feeling that this was my first test, one of many at Dragonrider Academy. I needed to prove that I wasn’t going to be scared off by the first challenge that came along.

  As predicted, she blocked my blade with hers, keeping it a safe distance from her vital organs.