Page 37 of Dragon Fight

Pippin?Glimmer said as my heart started to beat way too loudly in my ears.

"What the hell are you playing at?” Draven said to Ada, as he appeared by her side. “I don’t know what you think is going to happen when your bloody husband and children are just sitting inside.”

“I have a present for you too, my prince,” she said with an impish smile and then pointed to me.

Pip—in?Glimmer’s voice sounded fractured inside my brain.

“Your mother sends her regards.”

“What?”

“I gave Pippin some traditional wedding biscuits, but these were made from a very specific kind of Kashian nut. They were fermented with—”

“Fire weed,” Draven bit out before turning to me. My vision was starting to play tricks on me. It seemed that one moment he was standing next to Ada and the next he was standing before me, hands on my arms. But everywhere he touched me, it burned. “Gods, you’re trying to kill her.”

“The queen made clear that you were… struggling to do your duty. You’ve gone soft, Draven. But that’s alright, I can be strong for both of us.” And she reached out to him.

“Get your fucking hands off me!” he shouted. I watched Ada stagger back as if in slow motion, my head tilting to one side as she fell backwards. Draven gripped my arms, and it seemed as though his movements were sped up as he tilted my head his way when I wouldn’t look at him. “Stay with me, Pippin. Just stay with me. ‘Spire!”

His dragon lumbered forward, and I felt like he was bigger than the sun, his dark green scales glimmering phosphorescent under the moon. I crooned some such nonsense, and tried to lift my arm to touch him but it was as though I was stuck in molasses. Then a harsh squawking plucked at my consciousness.

“I know, little queen.” Draven’s voice was so gentle right now. It was as if he was rubbing it all over my body. Darkspire dropped down low and Draven hauled me and the small dragon up onto the big one’s back, Glimmer getting loose with an irritated snap. “Hold on,” he told the two of us and then the world began to move. When I looked down and squinted my eyes, I could see a shape that looked like Ada, flattened against the ground, as all five dragons rose and threw themselves into the air.

Riding had always been such a nerve-wracking experience before, especially with Draven, but now I was floating along with Darkspire. My hands reached out to trail through the clouds, but Draven slapped them right back down again. He was always so mean.

“Hold on, Pippin. For the love of all the gods, hold on. We’ll get you some bracken moss and a helluva lot of water and you’ll be right as rain, I promise.”

I couldn’t understand what he was saying, or what any of it meant. I closed my eyes but then I couldn’t remember what I was trying to work out. I could feel the fire raging inside me, and it flared so much hotter when he held me close, keeping me pinned to his dragon’s back, especially when we spiralled downwards.

“It’s so beautiful,”I said, sliding from Darkspire’s back with little grace, then cracking up laughing when I almost fell face forward. Draven was forced to haul me upwards, right as a harsh squawk had us turning around. “You’re beautiful!” I said to the little dragon, my mouth falling open as she launched herself at us.

“By all the gods…!” Draven was forced to let me go and put his arms out to catch the dragon, but as soon as she landed in them, she was up and over his shoulder chittering madly in a way that was just as funny. I laughed and laughed until tears fell from my eyes, unable to stop myself when the small dragon jumped to me, clawing her way up my tunic and peering at my face with intent eyes. “You can’t feel her?” he asked me.

“Yes, I can! She’s bloody heavy. Nice beastie,” I said, reaching up to try to touch the dragon. After a couple of wobbly tries, I managed to pat her and when I did something magical happened. The little dragon started to glow. But then Draven intervened.

“No!” he told her, and the glow faded away. She turned her head to hiss at him and then snap at his finger. “No, they want you weakened.” He jerked his head to stare at his dragon. What was his name? Darkmoire? Stupid name if you asked me, which they— “Tell her. Show her, ‘Spire.”

Darkspire! That was it. I grinned, my jaw feeling too loose, my teeth rattling with every breath.

“Bracken moss and lots of water,” the dark-haired man insisted, casting his eyes wildly around where we stood on the banks of a lake. “Tell the other dragons to look for it. Show them what we need, ‘Spire.”

I stood there, wavering back and forth, feeling like the whole world was swaying around me with each breath, growing smaller on the inhale, then expanding on the exhale. The man and the dragons crawled over the hills and lake banks like bloodhounds with a scent in their nose. Then the purple one threw back his head and roared and the entire world shook in response. I stumbled backwards, landing on a soft hummock. The man pulled out a knife from his belt and as I stared at the glimmering metal, something on the edge of my memory pricked at me about the blade before I shouted out, “Don’t hurt the dragons!”

“What?” The man looked at me with a frown that had me crawling backwards, wanting to get the hell away from his disapproval, because it was like I could feel the sting of his gaze against my skin. “I can’t hurt the bloody…” He waved me off with a huff and then went sprinting towards the purple dragon, but my attention was caught by the small golden one who had glided to the ground near me when I’d fallen over.

She was so beautiful. I felt like I could gaze upon her for the rest of my life and I told her that, the words coming from within and just flooding out. She seemed to listen. That didn’t seem possible, but she crept closer, her head tilting from one side to the other so I mimicked her movements, the two of us caught in some kind of strange dance. Next thing I knew, the man had reappeared. He held out a wad of luminescent green moss and a waterskin.

“You need to eat this and drink that,” he told me.

“What?” But I still reached out for both things, the certainty in his voice prompting me to act. I looked at the moss, then sniffed it.

“It’ll taste bloody awful and you are going to be very sick when you eat it, but you have to, Pippin.”

“I have to?”

“Yes, lass.”

He dropped down then so he was squatting in front of me, the little dragon taking a seat by my side and chittering as he closed my fingers over the moss and then brought it to my lips. I gagged at the smell: it was too earthy, too slimy—like the stink of a stagnant pond.

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