Page 60 of Redeeming the Dragon

She dug her fingers painfully into my shoulder. Her stare was intense, willing me to complete my quest and affirming that Icouldcomplete it. Because I must.

Swallowing against the dryness in my throat, I said, “I hear you.”

I dared say nothing else. I wished to say, “I will succeed, I will win, I will do this.” The truth was…I doubted. And yet, my love of Kidron—along with the help of magic and the new friends I’d met along the way—had seen me thus far, even to visiting a hidden tribe no one in Aerisia seemed aware of, save the Simathe. If I had accomplished that, who was to say I couldn’t finish what I had started?

“Good, good,” Crina said, breaking the solemn silence that had fallen. She clapped her hands joyously, reverting to her former cheerful, smiling self. “Before you go, we give you supplies and we feed you full. We give you a gift, eh? You be well prepared for the Scraggen of Moonswept.”

“Oh, I am full now,” I protested. “They fed me already.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “We feed you. Protection.”

“Protection?” I murmured. How did onefeedanother protection?

Before I could inquire, one of the women motioned for my pack, which I took off and handed to her. She scurried about, adding food and filling a canteen with water. Once the supplies had been stowed away, she returned the bag. I slipped it over my head, settling it in place against my hip.

Jyn beckoned. “Come, Blinded. Come.”

Obediently, I followed as she led me outside the camp, the other women trailing along. One of the Jearim offered Crina her arm, assistingher as Jyn led our solemn assembly to the lone tree I’d marked earlier, its yellow bark and black leaves a startling contrast to the canyon’s white walls. We halted beneath its thick branches, quivering with a load of shiny black leaves. Jyn reached up and plucked one of the shiny black leaves, which shimmered with a beautiful rainbow sheen. She folded it over, handed it to me, and said, “Take this. It be of help to you one day.”

I blinked in surprise at how closely the gesture resembled that of the fairy and the Simathe. A third gift. A third warning that they would come in handy one day. I’d no idea how, but who was I to disagree?

Accepting the leaf, I folded and tucked it away inside my pouch, along with the fairy queen’s snowflake and the Simathe’s dragon dagger.

Once I was finished, Jyn took one of my hands. Crina reached out, taking another. The rest of the women, all of whom were between their older teen years and Crina’s age, locked hands with one another, creating a circle that stretched all the way around the tree. Jyn lifted her face upwards, gazing through the shimmering leaves towards the bright golden sun.

“Endor, we call on you,” she said, “to send this Blinded where she must go. Endor, we call on you to help her. As you help her, you help the land. Endor, we call on you, help this Blinded fulfill her purpose.”

No one else spoke. Crina squeezed my hand harder. The leaves rustled fiercely—the first time I’d seen them move. The gauze veil drifted, light as a whisper, across my cheekbones.

I felt a strange stirring. A quivering of the ground beneath our feet. The tree began to tremble. The leaves danced in protest. I sensed power springing up from the ground beneath our feet. Was this what Crina had meant by feeding me protection?

“Wait!”

At my sudden cry, the trembling lessened but did not cease.

“What is it, Blinded?” Jyn demanded. “The power can’t be stopped.”

“I don’t want it to be stopped,” I said, raising my voice which wobbled with the trembling of the ground. “I have one more question. Where are the men of Brightstone? Why do I see only women? If there are children, there must be men too, right?”

Jyn grinned at me. For the first time, I saw the radiance of her mother’s smile and a strong resemblance between Crina and Jyn.

“Thatbe your question?”

I shrugged, even as my fingers locked tighter with Jyn and her mother’s, due to the increasing pressure of the wind and magic.

“I know…no children…without men,” I managed to spit out.

Jyn actually dropped back her head and laughed. “Yes. You be right.”

Then she took a deep, deep breath. I saw the rise of her chest as she inhaled, then her head shot up as she released the loudest, most piercing whistle that I’ve ever heard. Louder than a bosun’s whistle on a ship. So loud that I jolted and would have torn my hands free of the other women’s in order to clap them over my ears.

“Look!” Crina shouted, her voice sounded garbled as the magic took hold, spinning around the tree in flaming orange and red circles.

The wind had picked up, ripping the veil right off my face. I squinted towards the top of the cliffs. The final thing I saw of Brightstone was a band of warriors. Very tall and slender in build. Long, thin braids trailed past their shoulders, bound back with red headbands. They clutched spears, swords, knives, and weapons. Their ebony skin gleamed in the bright sunlight.

“We guard Aerisia’s secrets. They guard us.”

Those were the last words I heard Jyn shout. The roar of the wind encompassed me, swallowing me alive. Devoured, I sank into the wind funnel and knew no more.

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