SEVEN
My heart pounds so hard I think it’s going to burst out of my chest. I reach instinctively for my magic, wanting to shield myself somehow as the dragon bears down on us—
She skids across the cave, small stones flying up around her claws, and practically pounces on Ari like a dog greeting its owner, her chin knocking him flat on his back.
“Easy, easy,” Ari says, reaching up and running one hand under her chin. “I missed you too. Careful… easy. That’s a good dragon.”
The dragon tilts her head back, letting Ari rub further under her chin. Her tail snaps against the ground in… contentment?
Ari manages to roll over and stand, stepping carefully around the dragon’s claws. “She gets a little overexcited,” he says, looking somewhat sheepishly at me. “She’s been growing really fast, and she hasn’t quite figured out yet that she’s too big to keep doing that.”
“Oh,” I say. At the sound of my voice, the dragon’s eyes dart toward me. “Um, hello, dragon.” I want to look at Ari, but I’m afraid to take my eyes off her. “Does she have a name?” I say to him.
“Not yet. I haven’t figured out what to call her.”
I understand the dilemma. It seems impossible to find a word for a creature so massive, so incredible, so magical. Her life force is like nothing I’ve ever felt before, sparks of energy flying off it in different directions.
The dragon snorts, still staring at me.
“I know you’ve never met another person before,” Ari says gently to the dragon. “But you like people, remember? This is Bryn. She’s going to be your friend too.”
The dragon snorts again. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I’ve never had to read dragon body language before.
But I’m Seeker Jakob’s daughter, and soon to be the next Seeker of the Wild Realm. I can handle this. Papa taught me what to do.
When approaching a strange dragon for the first time, move slowly. Keep your hands down at your sides. Keep your breathing steady and soft—dragons associate breath with fire and may feel threatened if they sense a big exhale. Back away from dragons that bare their teeth or snarl. Only approach dragons whose spines are relaxed.
I glance at the dragon’s back. Her spines are lowered, almost level with her scales, rather than sticking up defensively. She’s relaxed.
I take a slow, careful step forward, barely breathing, my hands pressed flat to my sides. The dragon watches me.
“It’s okay, Bryn,” Ari says. “I can sense her emotions, remember? She’s curious, but she doesn’t feel threatened.”
I don’t know if I trust Ari’s gift or not. Maybe he’s wrong. Maybe he’s lying. Maybe he lured me all the way up here so I’d get eaten by a dragon. That would certainly be a way to get rid of the competition.
The dragon’s spines stay relaxed. I take another step forward.
She’s even more exquisite up close. I can make out the patterns of color in her scales—she’s not really solid silver, but shimmers with all the colors of the rainbow when you look closer. Her wings are tucked carefully at her sides, her massive claws gently kneading the earth.
“Hello,” I whisper.
She blinks at me, and suddenly something sharp tugs at my magic. I gasp as my gift is pulled forward, nearly knocking me over. The green glow of my gift fills the air, colliding with sparks of bright silver. The dragon’s magic.
“She uses her magic to get to know yours,” Ari explains belatedly.
Where my gift touches hers, it swirls and bursts in bright explosions of light. My magic feels warmer suddenly, and stronger, like I have all the life force in the world.
The dragon’s tail thumps excitedly against the ground, and she releases her hold on my gift. I stagger as magic floods back into my body all at once.
“Whoa,” I say.
“She likes you,” Ari says.
The dragon lowers her head and rests it on top of her front feet, her curiosity about me apparently satisfied.
“Don’t take a nap,” Ari says to her. “We have work to do.”
The dragon huffs.
“How…?” I start, trying to figure out what to ask Ari first. “I mean, how?”
“How am I keeping a dragon hidden outside the village?” Ari guesses. “Or how did I find her?”
“Both.”
“I already told you about the egg.”
“You didn’t tell me where you got the egg.”
Ari sits down in front of the dragon. I don’t sense much magic coming from him, but a soft yellow pulse plays across his hands, so he must be doing something. I sit down carefully, making sure I can keep both him and the dragon in my sight. I don’t trust either one of them yet.
And the dragon is too beautiful to look away from.
Ari seems to be deciding what to say. I get the feeling that he’s unsure whether to trust me, just like I’m unsure whether to trust him. Neither of us knows the other well to begin with, and being rivals for the competition makes this even more fraught.
“Let’s just say that I found the egg and leave it at that, okay?” he says finally. Apparently I have not be deemed trustworthy.
“You’re going to have to give me a little more than that,” I say. “In fact, you’re going to have to give me one good reason why I shouldn’t tell the Seekers about this dragon right now. She belongs in the Realm, in safety, where she can be with other dragons.”
“I know that. And I will take her to the Realm eventually.”
“So why not now?”
“It’s complicated.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Sorry, but that’s not a good enough answer.”
“Look, I—I have a good reason for not telling the Seekers, at least not yet. I can’t tell you what that is, and you’re just going to have to trust me on that.”
“I don’t. Why should I trust you when you don’t trust me?”
Ari looks down at his hands, watching the soft golden light of his gift play over them. “I think there’s one thing that both of us can agree on. We both want to be Seekers because we love magical creatures. Right?”
“Sure.” There are also a million other reasons, but I don’t correct him. I want to see where he’s going with this.
He looks up, his eyes meeting mine. “So you can trust me when I tell you that I want to do what’s best for this dragon and keep her safe. And right now that means not telling anyone about her. Not until I figure something out.”
“So you want me to, what, just not tell anyone that you’re hiding a dragon outside the village?”
“Yes.”
“And you won’t tell me why?”
“No.”
I frown. Hiding magical creatures goes against all of our village’s rules. It’s dangerous for the villagers if someone should stumble upon a dragon and dangerous for the dragon if she gets hurt. So many things could go wrong.
And if Ari and I get caught secretly hiding this dragon, we’ll be in big, big trouble.
Which is why I shouldn’t agree. But it’s that fact, more than anything, that makes me believe he must have a reason. There must be a good reason he’s hiding the dragon if he’s willing to risk getting caught. He’s probably not doing this just to have an advantage in the Seeker competition.
Though, admittedly, that’s exactly why I’m doing it.
Maybe Ari’s right. Maybe he really is keeping the dragon safe by keeping it secret, and maybe he just doesn’t trust me enough yet to tell me the truth. In his position, I probably wouldn’t trust me either. But it still doesn’t feel right, not when it goes against everything I’ve ever been taught about caring for magical creatures.
What would Papa do?
Papa’s priority would be the dragon, of course. He’d do whatever was best for her.
But how can I know what’s best for her when I don’t know what it is that Ari’s supposedly protecting her from?
But maybe I don’t have to make this decision right this second. I can
try to find out more from Ari, get to know the dragon, get more information. That seems smart. Once I know Ari better, maybe he’ll tell me more. Or maybe I’ll realize that he can’t be trusted and go to the Seekers. In the meantime, I’ll keep a close watch over the dragon.
There are several glaring problems with this plan, one of which is the fact that I’m now equally guilty of hiding the dragon and will get in just as much trouble as Ari will if anyone finds out. But there’s also a major advantage, one that I can’t overlook: caring for this dragon is exactly the kind of training I need to win the competition. It’s not just caring for the dragon herself, either.
Because once she learns to fly and can carry passengers, she could take us into the Realm.
“Okay,” I begin. “Let’s say that, for the moment, I agree to help care for her and keep it a secret. What exactly would I have to do?”
“It’s pretty simple, really. She mostly sleeps at night and hunts in the mornings, so it’s really only in the afternoons that she needs to be watched; I’m a little worried about her getting bored and wandering off when I’m not around.”
“So you haven’t warded this place at all?” Not having any kinds of spells to keep the dragon here is asking for trouble.
Ari holds up one hand, the golden light sparking across it. “I’m not much good with boundary spells.”
I have to admit that I’m not either. While technically anyone in the village can attempt a boundary spell, only those with the defender gift will find it easy. I knew I’d have to learn it for the competition, but I thought I’d have proper training first.
“How is she able to be so close to the village in the first place?” I ask. “Shouldn’t the Seekers’ boundary spells that protect the village prevent any dragon from coming so close?”
Ari nods. “I think it’s because she was actually hatched here. If she were born in the Realm and then tried to travel here, the boundary spells would stop her. But she was just an egg when she was brought out.”
I want to press him for details on how, exactly, a dragon egg was taken out of the Realm and brought here, but for now I decide to let it go. “So how are you going to set the spells to keep her from wandering into town?”
“I should be able to do it once they teach us in training,” Ari says. “I just need to learn how.”
“So what do I do in the meantime?”
“She doesn’t really wander off as long as there’s someone here to entertain her. Just show up and keep an eye on her while I’m at training, make sure she’s eating, that sort of thing.”
“How exactly have you been feeding her?”
Ari tilts his head in the direction of the cave’s opening, and I nod. That makes sense. Dragons typically go for larger fish and sea creatures in the ocean. They’re strong swimmers who can dive deep and hold their breath for ages, hunting prey in the depths of the sea. Of course, they’d also eat large land animals if we’d let them, which is why Seekers are careful to maintain the protective spells around the territories of other creatures in the Realm, as well as the village and surrounding farms. Wouldn’t want dragons carrying off our sheep.
“But she flies back here when she’s done hunting?” I ask. “She doesn’t get closer to the village?”
“She doesn’t fly yet. She mostly just swims to hunt fish.”
“What do you mean? I saw her flying when we walked up.”
“She hovers sometimes,” Ari says. “But it’s mostly straight up and down. I don’t know how to teach her to move around once she’s airborne.”
I don’t know how to do that either. Papa never said anything about teaching baby dragons to fly. They’re supposed to have their parents around for that.
“Poor dragon,” I say. “She’s an orphan.”
“Maybe not. Maybe her parents are up in the Realm, searching for her. They’ll be reunited eventually.”
“Maybe. But now she’s all alone.”
“No, she isn’t. She has me. And now you, if you’re up for the job.”
“Of course I’m up for it,” I say indignantly, and Ari grins.
“Somehow I had a feeling you’d say that.”
“So what else do you need me to do?”
“Here,” he says, getting to his feet in one quick movement, “let’s wake her up and I’ll show you.”
“Um,” I say. Waking a sleeping dragon does not seem like a good idea.
But Ari is already approaching her. He kneels down in front of her head and gently rubs her nose, right between her nostrils. “Hey, dragon. Time to wake up. We need to show Bryn your tricks.”
The dragon cracks one eye open, assesses Ari, and closes it again.
“Come on,” Ari says, giving her scales a pat.
The dragon huffs through her nose, blowing Ari’s springy curls back, and I tense. If she added flames to that breath, she could easily have set him on fire.
Ari seems unconcerned. He reaches into his coat pocket, rummaging for something. “Look, dragon. I brought you bilberries,” he says in a singsong voice.
The dragon’s eyes fly open. In the space of a breath she raises her head, stretching to her full height. Her tail slams into the ground so hard it trembles under my feet.
“She loves these things,” Ari says, placing a small red berry between his fingertips.
“I can see that.” The dragon is flicking her tongue in and out of her mouth.
“Let’s show Bryn what we’ve been working on,” Ari says to her. He takes a few slow steps backward. “Stay.”
“Ari,” I say, “dragons are not dogs. They’re much more intelligent. You can’t expect them to follow commands like that.”
“But Seekers train dragons all the time,” Ari argues.
“Right, but only because they form a mutually beneficial partnership with the humans who train them,” I say, quoting Papa.
“This is mutually beneficial. In this case, she wants the berry, and I want her to learn to stay put so that she doesn’t get into trouble when we’re not around.”
“I don’t think—”
“Watch.” Ari takes a few more steps. The dragon is watching him very intently, her tongue still flicking in and out, but she doesn’t move.
“Good dragon,” Ari says. “Now, catch.” He lobs the berry up into the air.
The dragon’s wings snap open, and she leaps forward so fast I have to scramble out of her way. She shoves up from the ground, her wings beating frantically, with so much force that the tremors knock me off my feet. Above me, the dragon stretches her jaws and snatches the berry out of the air.
Now that I’m slightly less overwhelmed by the sight of a dragon, I can see what Ari means about her not really flying. She hovers in place in the air, swallowing the berry, her wings flapping somewhat jerkily. Then she drops to the ground directly below, and I have to roll hastily to the side to avoid being swiped by her tail.
“This game keeps her entertained for hours,” Ari says. “So just bring some bilberries with you and you’ll be fine.”
I brush the dirt off Mama’s coat and stand up, a little shaky on my feet. “Does she know any other words yet?”
“I don’t think so. We’ve just been working on ‘stay.’ She doesn’t really like that one.”
“I told you, dragons are too intelligent to want to stay on command.”
“Well, she might not want to, but until either of us learns how to put up a decent boundary spell, she’s just going to have to learn to stay put.” Ari tosses another berry, and the dragon snatches it up quickly, not even needing to go airborne this time. Her tail thuds the ground again in satisfaction, and I brace myself against the impact. Getting knocked off my feet twice in a row would be embarrassing.
“She really needs a name,” I say. “We shouldn’t just keep calling her ‘dragon.’ ”
“What did you have in mind?”
I glance at the dragon, who’s now lowered her head in Ari’s direction and is snuffling for more berries. Her silver
scales gleam in the moonlight.
“Something… something about her color,” I say. “It’s so unique, the way she kind of shimmers. She needs something that fits how unique she is.”
Ari sweeps a loose clump of curls behind his ear, considering. “Like ‘moon’ or something? ’Cause she’s shimmery and silver?”
“Something like that,” I agree, “though Moon doesn’t seem quite right.”
“Star?” he suggests.
“Closer,” I say, “but Runa has a horse named Starlight, so we need something different. More unique.”
“Who’s Runa? That’s the girl who lives on the farm we met at, right?”
“Right.” I forget how little time Ari spends with the rest of the kids in the village. Everyone knows everyone in the village, but Ari is mostly a stranger. A question mark.
Which reminds me how little I should trust him.
“How about something in the old language?” Ari asks, distracting me from that thought.
“Huh?”
“For a name,” he says, giving me a quizzical look.
“Oh. That could work.” The old language feels fitting for such an ancient species as dragons. Nobody except for the village elders speaks much of the old language anymore, though, so I don’t know many words. “Do you know any of the names?”
“Svana?” he says. “I think it means ‘swan.’ ”
I glance at the dragon again. She’s huffing at Ari, demanding more berries. “Still not right,” I say. “She’s not exactly graceful like a swan, is she?”
Ari ducks a blast of hot air as she snorts at him, his curls ruffling. “Fair point,” he says.
“How about…?” I close my eyes, trying to think of an inspiration. I want something related to nature—I picture a landscape bathed in moonlight, where the flowers shine. “How about Lilja?” I pronounce it just like they did in the old language—Lil-ya. “It means ‘lily,’ ” I explain. It was my grandmother’s name, according to Papa. I never met her, but he told me stories about what a strong naturalist she was, and I always thought her name was fitting.
“Lilja,” Ari repeats, looking at the dragon. At the sound of the name, she tilts her head and blinks at him. She’s probably just trying to figure out how to get more berries, but still, her attention seems like a good sign.
Seekers of the Wild Realm Page 6