by Ladew, Lisa
She peeked over the side, but the water looked just as unfriendly as it had a moment before so, she settled in on her dragon, laying her head against him, her eyes watching the wisps of clouds they passed and the light of the moon on her dragon’s wings. She let her fingers relax, knowing even if she were to fall, he would catch her. He would never let her drop.
The sound of the wind and a thumping she realized to be her dragon’s heart lulled her, wiping the memory of the awful spider that had touched her from her brain, beat by beat. Her body relaxed until she felt as one with the beautiful beast beneath her. Flying. She was flying. Dreaming. But what a dream. She wanted to live in the dream forever.
***
Wake up, lass. You’ll want to see this.
Heather opened her eyes and blinked. Had she fallen asleep during her dream? She curled her fingers around the place where her dragon’s wings met his body and looked over the side.
“Oh,” she gasped. It was so beautiful. Magical even. She couldn’t explain the difference in how the land below her looked and felt from what she was used to, even to herself.
Land covered with synapses and neurons of connected lights stretched out as far as she could see, but the forest and fields closest to them caught her attention the strongest. As they got closer, she could tell her dragon had slowed his speed immensely. She peered around his head. Is that an island coming up?
Aye, that’s South Uist. And North Uist above it. The big one below them is Ireland.
He banked slightly and Heather felt a giddy laugh bubble up from her chest. She could almost believe it was her flying.
We aren’t stopping there, are we?
No. I don’t live there anymore.
Heather watched as the islands slid beneath them. A droning sound that got louder each second caught her attention and she looked around. A large plane passed not too far overhead, startling her. She looked down again, realizing just how much they had dropped. Her dragon seemed to be angling for the very center of a forest on the largest island that had to be the UK. The forest stretched for hundreds of miles in each direction, no lights to be seen.
Cairngorms mountain range and, more recently, national park, her dragon rumbled in her mind.
She watched, glad to be able to put a name to the place, as the trees grew bigger and bigger in the moonlight and her dragon dropped lower and lower. A thought to be nervous crossed her mind but she ignored it. She trusted her dragon more than she trusted any airline pilot in the world. He would take care of her completely. She knew that, somehow.
They dropped so low she dangled her feet over the side and leaned left to see if she could graze a treetop with her toe. Her dragon jostled her weight back to center.
No stunts, or Morag will get you.
Heather pulled her toe up so quick her knee popped. Graeme chuckled in her head and she settled down again.
Morag?
A loch monster, like Nessie.
They dropped into the trees, and Heather held on tight as her dragon dodged two of them, then landed lightly on the ground. He shook his head, stretched his wings wide, then knelt.
We’re here.
Heather slid off and took a moment to admire her dragon from the ground. His lovely yellowish chest, his shimmering scales, his proud, strong jaw line, muscular neck and legs. Everything about him was perfect.
She stretched a bit herself, and turned to the tiny clearing between the trees, wondering where ‘here’ was. She turned back to her dragon and there was Graeme, standing tall and strong and staring at her with hooded eyes, his torso still naked.
She smiled at him in the moonlight. “Thank you for the flight. I’ve never enjoyed anything so much in my life.”
“The pleasure was mine.”
She walked in a small circle and raised her face to the treetops, smelling the pine scent of the forest, taking it deep into her lungs. Facing away from Graeme, the air felt much cooler, and she even saw a smattering of old snow in a few places the sun had never been able to reach to burn it off. When she finished her circle, she faced him. “Are we at your place? I expected a house, I guess.”
He nodded over her shoulder. “Look again.”
Heather did and was shocked and surprised to see a tiny cottage where no cottage had been before. Dreaming. So totally dreaming.
“It was there when you looked before, you just didn’t see it. Dragon tricks.”
“Are those like ancient Chinese secrets?” she said softly, staring at the cozy, square building that looked like it was made entirely out of river rocks. Had someone hauled all of them by hand?
He chuckled and she looked at him, then back at his place. Please don’t wake up. She took a step forward, shy suddenly, but wanting to see the inside of his house. The sound of his feet on pine needles behind her spurred her on. She felt like she had hours left to dream. Surely, she could get him to kiss her in that time. If only he would open the door for her, invite her inside…
***
Graeme passed Heather and pushed open his door, scenting deeply to make sure no one had been inside, then throwing it wide for her. He recognized the smile she gave him in return. It said she was completely and totally his, and that made his guts coil into a hard little ball. He would never take her up on her silent offer, but he would do what he could to soften the blow of his refusal.
His eyes flicked around the one room, as Heather took it in for the first time. He saw the years of caked dust on every surface, and his footprints through the dust on the floor, framed by fat drop-shapes he knew had been water from his journey in and immediately back out a few weeks before. He didn’t even know exactly how long it had been. It didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered to him was enlightening the lovely female in front of him to what she really was, and breaking her heart as gently as he could.
She walked to his fireplace, coat still on but unzipped, and gently touched the inches of dust there, then turned to his reclining lair. He shook his head. She would call it a couch, not that she would want to sit on it with no cushions.
He left the front door standing open and walked to the back, throwing wide the windows there to get the stale smell out, then grabbed a piece of cloth and began wiping up reams of dust. She tiptoed through the room, picking up items from his log tables and rock counters, examining them, and laying them back down. Once, his collection of Scottish antiquities had been his pride and joy, but now it could burn, for all he cared.
She finished her circuit of the room, then came close to him. “There’s no bedroom.”
“No,” he said. “Come.” He took her hand and led her outside, around to the back of the cottage and showed her where he slept.
She eyed the roughly beaten down circle of dirt under the eaves of the house. “Is it a nest?”
“Not exactly. But I prefer to sleep outside.”
She looked at him curiously. “Even as a human?”
He looked off into the trees. “I rarely sleep as a human. I would say never, but you saw me sleeping as one, did you not?”
He caught her nodding her head in his peripheral vision and he looked back to her. Her attention had been pulled, and he watched closely, wondering if she really was that strong, that in tune with dragen life.
She bent at the waist, turning her head like she was listening to the ground, then stood, then crouched and touched the rocks at the very bottom of the house. “There’s… something below us. What is it?”
“What does it feel like?”
She dropped to her knees and ran her hands through the pine needles and leaves, over the ground itself. Graeme saw dirt collect on her fingers and for some reason he felt a stirring in his groin at the sight. She was unlike any female he had ever met, in so many ways.
“It’s a circle. It’s… calling to me.”
Graeme said nothing. He knew exactly what she was feeling. Had it been a mistake to bring her out here? Would he find himself tricked or forced by magic into something he knew he didn’t
want? He would be on his guard. Always.
She continued on her hands and knees for a short way, then found herself back at the house. Her hands ran around the dirt in a large rectangle, pushing the leaves and needles out of the way. She turned to him. “It’s a door. Right here. Why can’t I see it?”
Again, Graeme said nothing. She stared at him, her lip quivering, then turned back to the door that was not there. He saw her gather her energy as she stared at it, then she walked from one side of it to the other. Finally, she dropped to the ground and drew a circle in the dirt exactly where he knew the door pull to be.
The circle of the door pull appeared, and the wooden door leading into the cellar appeared just below it. She shot to her feet and clapped in delight. “I did it!”
She turned to him suspiciously. “Did you help?”
“No.”
“You don’t seem surprised.”
“I’m not.”
Graeme licked his lips and pondered what he had just seen. He knew she wasn’t totally human, and angels had their own magic, but still, that had been dragen magic. He’d felt it. Did that fact change anything? He didn’t know. No. It couldn’t. She was still mostly human, with soft, vulnerable skin and organs.
She pulled on the door but it wouldn’t budge. He went to her and helped, because she’d earned a look at what was down below.
The door creaked and cracked but the wood held firm. It was strong. He’d rebuilt it every fifty years for the last six hundred or so, resurfacing long enough to inspect his house, take care of the maintenance, check in with the police chief, see what the latest news was, what had changed, and if there was anything dangerous he could do. Sometimes he stayed out long enough to play with the toys of the age, like his helicopter and airplane, but always, he eventually returned to what he hoped would someday be his watery grave.
He heaved the door open and laid it on the ground opposite its hinges, then grabbed the lantern just inside on the first stair. He held his fingers to the wick until it lit.
As he lifted the light high and entered the cellar stairs in front of her, he felt a weight roll onto his heart.
Something was coming. Something that would challenge all his plans and decisions.
He pressed forward, because there was no other choice.
Chapter 20
Heather descended the stairs slowly, watching the muscles in Graeme’s torso bunch every time he lowered his foot. It was almost enough to make her forget the pinging, calling sound of the… whatever it was. She had no clue. Only a sort of coldness in her head like a fish hook embedded in her brain. It wanted her. It was calling her. The only thing she knew for sure was it was not bad or evil… and it was circular, or it’s call was.
The stairs went on for what seemed like a half a mile, the air cooling more with each step she took. She’d fallen behind Graeme, and she hurried to catch up with him to take advantage of his heat, her footfalls echoing off the walls and ceiling of the stair corridor.
The calling became louder in her head and she opened her eyes wider, trying to see beyond Graeme. Surely they had to be getting closer to it.
“Almost there,” he said softly and she heard a curious catch in his voice. His foot reached the bottom, a dirt floor that stretched out beyond where she could see. She took the last few steps herself and stood next to him.
The room opened up into what she could only describe as a cavern or cave, with a lofty dirt ceiling and tiny roots piercing it here and there. But, oh, the treasure! Piles of gold coins higher than her head littered the room. She counted them. One, two, three… seven. Seven piles that had to be worth a few million each just in the gold! It was no Scrooge McDuck swimming pool of gold, but more a Pirates of the Caribbean treasure room, with clear demarcations of gold coins, gold bars, gold jewelry, gold statues, then everything else. The silver and gems were piled together more haphazardly on the other side of the cavern, like they weren’t as important.
Heather walked through the maze of riches, grazing one hand along a stack of gold bars here, then a pile of gold coins there, her mind barely able to comprehend what she was seeing. Graeme did not follow her.
Near the back, she found a large stack that looked different, and then she realized that there was gold, silver, and other metals and gems all mixed together.
The circle was still calling her, but in her wonder, its signal was muted. She turned on her heel and strode back toward Graeme, stopping at a small chest to open it and peer inside.
“Is it all yours?” she asked, eyeing the crowns and headpieces inside the chest.
“Not all. Some is Rhen’s gold. Some gifts for other deities. I guard it here.”
“Rhen? Deities?”
“Ah yes, that is a conversation we must have.”
Heather saw a small, neat stack of gold bars with red flakes on it to her right. She brushed at them, wondering what they were. If she stared close enough, she might think they were dried blood. She grimaced and looked up at a golden chalice holding a dozen golden swords. A human hand with attached arm bone lay below the chalice as if discarded there.
She backed away, thinking of the stories of dragons she’d heard her entire life. “Is─is it stolen treasure?”
Graeme did not answer for a moment. “Aye, dragon treasure is oftentimes come upon in violent ways. I have not stolen it myself, though. Most of this has been passed to me by my family and mates as they died. I am the last dragon, so I have the keeping of all of it, until I die, and then the Scotland Police will decide what to do with it.”
Heather turned to him slowly, her chest tight.
He took a step back when he saw the intensity of her gaze. “What?”
“Don’t you know what my fire said?”
“Your fire?”
“My fire! I─it’s not important exactly what I did, but somehow I lashed reeds together to form letters and placed those letters into words. There was a message. No one ever told you what the message was?”
He took three steps forward, eyes blazing. “Tell me.”
“You are not the last dragon.”
An amalgamate of emotions passed over his face, too quickly for her to identify them all. Confusion. Fear. Disbelief. Anger. Then, something stronger. Not terror?
He transformed. One minute a man standing with a lantern in his hand, the next a great dragon, just big enough to barely fit up the stairs. The lantern crashed to the floor, but didn’t break or go out.
Heather cried out and took a step backward as her dragon whirled around with a great roar and ran up the stairs like the world’s largest and scariest horse with wings and scales.
Heather scooped up the lantern and followed him at a run, tucking her elbows into her sides and putting her head down for more speed. She did not want to be left alone in the treasure room. But more than that, she worried about her dragon.
When she reached the top, and burst out into the cold night air, she stopped. It was completely silent, and so much colder than she’d felt before. She took a few steps, cocking her head towards the front, trying not to breath so she could hear better.
No insect droned, no animals called. She tried to remember back to when they’d arrived. Had it been this silent? A sudden fear wracked her. Her dragon wouldn’t leave her alone in the woods, would he? She put the lantern down long enough to zip her coat, then bent and killed the light. It made her feel like too much of a target. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she stared into the trees, trying to see if her dragon was there.
A sound like a great scream in front of a freight train erupted into the night and her dragon appeared above the tree tops, its mouth open and hurling fire below, away from her. Woody explosions crackled and popped and trees flared and burned like matchsticks.
Heather stared, wondering only for a moment about forest services, until she saw that her dragon pulled the resulting smoke into himself as he swooped, dipped, and twisted angrily through the air. Another jet of fire cut the night in half and more tr
ees incinerated.
Even from as far away as she was, she could see the pain on her dragon’s face and feel the warmth of the fire he created. The two acted in opposite ways on her, one depressing her soul, the other lifting her spirit to heights it hadn’t reached since childhood. She gave herself over to both sensations and raised her arms to dance in the moonlight as heavy tears rolled down her face.
Graeme, she sent to him. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.
He didn’t respond.
Heather danced until her legs were sore and cried until she had no more tears, glad each time her dragon swooped her way, checking on her. When she could stand no longer, she dropped to the forest floor to rest and wait for him to be done.
The burning stopped, and still her dragon flew in lazy circles far above her head, until, finally, hours later, he dropped wearily to the ground near her and transformed into a man, standing in the center of the clearing, just staring.
Heather stood and walked to him. “That looked like therapy,” she said, keeping her voice low.
After many moments of silence, he spoke and she could smell smoke on his breath. “Dragen love to burn. It is always soothing.”
Heather held back the comment that rose to her lips automatically, then realized if there were anyone she could share it with, it was him. “Me, too. I mean, I love to watch things burn. Sometimes I ache to start fires, which isn’t good in my world. I call it the fire-lust.”
Graeme looked at her for a long moment before staring into the trees again. “We call it Grádóiteán, which translates roughly into love of fire. It is natural for dragons.” He turned to face her and his dark expression held secrets. “Have you always felt that way?”
“Yes, as long as I can remember.”
His eyes flashed. “Can you start fires?”
Heather almost laughed, until she realized what he meant. She looked down at her hands, then rubbed them on her coat like they were dirty. “What, you mean, like─like you can?”
He nodded solemnly. Seriously. For the first time since they had landed, she wondered if she were dreaming again. Her brain felt curiously hot and on the edge of some sort of overload.