When we finally stopped, we were near the top of the largest hill in the area. The snow had stopped falling a bit before and the clouds had cleared out enough that some thin winter sunshine brightened the day around us. I brushed the snow away from a patch of earth, peeled the backpack off, and stretched out on my back, not caring that the ground was rock hard and about as cozy as a block of ice. I stayed there so long that Lily landed on my neck, propped her hands on my chin, and leaned right into my face.
“Are you okay, Grant-Man?”
“I’m fine. Just give me a minute.”
She chuckled and then set about opening my bag and checking on the egg. The ground really was too cold to lie on for long— especially without that portable egg-heater on my back— so after a couple of minutes I forced myself to sit up. Under Lily’s watchful gaze, I took our cargo out of the bag and unwrapped it from the blanket.
“Where would you like it?”
“I’ll show you.” She flew over to a rocky outcrop and dove down into a crevice between two boulders. “You can put it here,” she said. “I’ll find some other stones we can use to block it in. We don’t want it rolling away again.”
“Absolutely not.”
It didn’t take long until the two of us had completed the new nest. With as walled in as the egg was, I’d be surprised if even the hatched dragon could make it out. Lily would not have to chase this egg again, I was certain.
When we were done, I sat on one of the boulders and took out the lunch I had packed. Lily gasped in delight when I pulled out the container full of berries. She hadn’t specified which type she wanted, so I’d bought several kinds— strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries. I’d never been more in awe of the wonders of hothouses than I was just then, watching a little fairy quiver in excitement over a box of fruit she ordinarily could enjoy only in summer. She scooped up a strawberry larger than her head, flitted up to my shoulder, and leaned against my neck as she sat down. I’d swear she was purring in contentment.
“Thank you, Grant-Man.”
“You’re welcome, Lily.”
We ate in silence for a while, just enjoying sitting in each other’s company. The warmth radiating from her body against my neck was enough that I no longer missed the heat from the egg on my back. Although, I suspected my own thumping heartbeat and rushing blood had much to do with it, as well.
I did not want to disturb the peace of our unusual little picnic, but the short winter afternoon was already growing old, and there was something I had to tell Lily— as much as I hated it— before I left her on that hilltop.
“Lily?”
“Yes?” she mumbled. It sounded very much like I had just woken her up.
“May I tell you something?”
“Yes,” she muttered again. I reached up and lifted her from my shoulder because I needed to make sure she heard me. She stretched and yawned in my hand and finally managed to come more fully awake.
“The school term is ending in a week,” I told her. She looked at me with a patient expression on her face, waiting for me to get to the point. I really was going to have to spell it out for her. “I’ll be going home during the break before the next semester starts,” I continued. Still no look of realization. That, or she doesn’t care as much as you do. “So, once this term is over, I won’t be able to come visit until after the beginning of the new year. It’ll be about a month.”
That finally caught her attention. She stiffened. “Oh.” That was all she said.
It wasn’t quite the reaction I’d been hoping for, to be honest. And yes, I knew it was horrible for me to want her to be as miserable without me as I was going to be while missing her. But the truth was she had come to mean a lot to me— more than I could have imagined when I first met her— and the fact that those feelings might be one-sided was something I wasn’t sure I had the strength to face or examine. To be blunt, it was dispiriting.
“I should get going,” I said. I set her on the boulder and stood up. I packed up the blanket and the trash from our lunch as quickly as I could without looking like I was trying to flee, which, in actuality, I was. I just wanted to get back to the dorm and lick my wounded in pride in solitude.
“Grant-Man.” She spoke up just as I was getting ready to head down the hill. I turned to look at her. “Will you have time to visit me again before you leave?”
“If you’d like me to come.”
“I would,” she answered. “Very much.”
And with those words, a fist unclenched itself from around my heart. It felt as if I could breathe again. Hell, if I had had wings like Lily, I might have just flown to the moon.
“And you’ll come to see me again after you come back from your trip home?”
“As soon as I can.”
She flew right up to me and placed a tiny little fairy kiss on my cheek. “Thank you, Grant-Man. I’ll miss you. You’re the best person I know.”
“Aren’t I the only person you know?”
She just smiled. “I’ll see you soon,” she replied. “And be safe on your way back to school. No more tumbling down hills!”
And with that, she dove out of sight.
5
Midwife to a Dragon
It felt so good to be back home again. Back in my own room, and in my own bed, and surrounded by people who knew me well and were— more importantly— my kind of strange. For the first couple of days, I didn’t do much other than relax in the tranquility of that comfort.
And then the reality of missing Lily set in. I hadn’t gone more than three days without seeing her since I met her, but all of a sudden, three days stretched into a week, and then into two. I had known going into break that I was going to miss our frequent meetings, but I hadn’t anticipated just how rough on me the separation was going to be. I could not stop thinking about her, and I really had little interest in doing anything— because she was not there to experience it with me. I couldn’t call or text her like normal friends and couples did. I considered talking about her with Pierce, but I ditched that idea almost immediately. He would have been absolutely over the moon when he heard about her— and he would adore her from the moment he learned about her, even without a personal meeting. I wasn’t quite ready to share her or risk another guy’s attention on her, even if he was just my kid brother.
By the time New Year’s came and went and I finally got back to school, I felt ready to jump out of my skin. At the absolute earliest moment possible, I hiked out to see her, even though it meant trudging through the snow again. She zipped out to meet me as soon as I rounded the last corner in the trail and practically smashed into my face, her arms spread as wide as they could go in an embrace that barely stretched across my cheek. I cupped my hand over her and just held it there for a while, savoring her enthusiastic humming and the warmth of her against my cold skin.
“I missed you, Grant-Man.”
“And I missed you, Lily,” I replied. “Miserably.”
She squeezed my cheek a little tighter and then let go. “I’m so glad you came back when you did.” If someone could bounce and fly at the same time, she was doing it. “I want to show you something.”
She grabbed my finger and tugged me in the direction of the nest. As soon as we got there, she pointed and said, “Look.”
I did as she wanted and bent down to get a better look at the egg. And failed to see what it was she was so excited about. It looked exactly the same as I remembered it. “I’m sorry, Lily, I—”
“Shh!” she commanded. “Just listen.”
I shut my mouth and listened— and heard nothing. Not for a while, anyway. And then, very faintly, I thought I heard a squeak at the same time that the egg, ever so slightly, twitched entirely on its own. I jerked away from it without thinking. I may have squeaked a little, myself.
Lily giggled. “Isn’t it exciting?” she bubbled. “It’s been almost a year, and now the time for hatching is almost here!”
It was exciting— and a little
terrifying, too. I still wasn’t sure I wanted to be anywhere near a live dragon, even if it was a tiny hatchling. “How much longer will it be?”
“Sometime within the next day or two. They do like to take their time. This one hasn’t pipped the shell yet, though, so it won’t be any time today, I don’t think.” She landed in my hand and grabbed my thumb. “Would you like to see the baby hatching, Grant-Man?” she asked earnestly. “You could come back tomorrow morning and stay with me while we wait.”
She gazed at me with such childlike eagerness that I couldn’t refuse. Not that I wanted to, despite the fact that this was not the first time I wished that anything dragon-related was not involved. Classes didn’t start for a few more days, so I could easily spare the time. And after a month apart, the prospect of spending a lot of hours with Lily was very tempting, indeed.
I hauled myself out of bed early the next morning and headed up the hill with a backpack full of spare clothes, blankets, and food. Without a good idea of how long this whole event was going to last, I didn’t want to get caught out in the cold with no way to keep warm. And I definitely didn’t feel like starving myself in the meantime.
Lily and I fitted ourselves down in the space between the boulders with the egg and settled in to wait. Lily was as nervous as a mother hen. She couldn’t seem to stay in one place for more than a minute or two. She would flit over to the egg to inspect its nonexistent— at least, to me— progress and then zoom back to my side, only to repeat the process again a few minutes later.
“Is everything going okay?” I asked after her fifth trip to the egg in less than ten minutes.
“Oh, yes,” she answered. “Perfectly peachy. Come and look.”
I crawled the couple of feet to the egg and looked at what had captured her attention. I hadn’t been able to see it from a distance, but now that I had my face right up to it, I could see that the little dragonling had chipped a long line out of the eggshell. Even as I watched, a new piece flaked off and fell to the ground.
Despite my earlier reservations, I felt myself being overcome by Lily’s infectious excitement. Something new! Something different to observe and learn! And a new life coming into the world! “We’re close?”
“Maybe,” Lily answered noncommittedly. “Hatching is hard work, so the dragonlings rest a lot during the ordeal. It’ll probably be a few hours yet.”
And she was right. Throughout the day, she and I kept our vigil in our little cave between the boulders. It started snowing again around noon, which was about the time when I climbed out to stretch my legs. In the open, the temperatures were bitterly frigid— with a wind that sliced straight through my clothing— but down in the cave, it was pleasantly sheltered and warm due to the heat coming off Lily and absolutely pouring out of that dragon egg.
Evening came up in a hurry, and still no dragon. As much as I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of spending the night outside, I was even less enthusiastic about hiking down the hill in the dark, only to risk coming back the next morning to have missed the main event. I set about making my own nest out of the blankets and pillow I brought, and I eventually managed to find a position that wasn’t too uncomfortable.
“You should get some rest,” I told Lily as I stifled a yawn. “You’ve been flying around all day. Aren’t you exhausted?”
“I’ll be fine.” She was sitting near the egg. Her nearly boundless energy from earlier in the day appeared to be used up. She hadn’t moved from her spot for fifteen minutes, at least. That must have been a record. “There will be time for sleeping once the baby is hatched.”
From what I’d heard about babies, I knew that that was far from the truth. I also knew arguing with her about it was pointless. She was going to do what she felt she needed to do. She has been through all this before. Maybe she’s right.
I was not going to be awake for much longer, though. My eyelids grew heavier with every blink, and soon, it took too much effort to even move my limbs. I made one last effort stay awake by pinching myself, but not even that helped, and I dropped off into dreamland.
“Grant-Man!” The urgent whisper— and the tugging on my earlobe— finally dragged me up from sleep. “Grant-Man!” she called again. “Wake up!” Another strong tug. “You’re going to miss it!”
Once I finally sat up, Lily relaxed a little. But only for a moment. Her vivacity was back at full strength, and she bounced up and down while she waited for me to come fully out of my nap. She zoomed over to the egg and peered down at it, motioning me with her hand to do the same.
I scooted over and leaned down. One entire end of the egg was broken away, revealing part of a tightly coiled, reptilian body covered in blood-red scales. The dragon’s head was tucked underneath and not yet visible. Two legs that ended in wickedly clawed feet grasped the edge of the shell and strained against it, struggling to break free entirely. Everything I’d learned about wild animals taught me that it was best to leave the baby alone and allow it to hatch on its own, but it was so very tempting to help break away some of that shell.
I don’t know how Lily knew what I was thinking, but she picked up my hand in both of her arms and guided it toward the dragonling. “It’s okay to help him now,” she assured me. “He’s safely hatched. He just can’t seem to find which way is out.” She picked away a fragment of shell. “They’re so adorably amusing when they’re new.”
I took her word for it on that one. Those claws didn’t look amusing to me. But there was something endearing about watching what would become a wild, ferocious beast getting bested by something as flimsy as an eggshell. There was a large chunk of shell that had cracked most of the way off of the main piece but was still not completely loose. I pinched it between my thumb and forefinger and snapped it off, and the baby dragon came tumbling out immediately after.
He was a good two feet long— at least— and a beautiful, metallic shade of crimson. A slight red glow seeped from between his scales, as if he harbored a raging fire within. Tiny tendrils of smoke escaped from his nostrils, making me decide that I did not want to be directly in front of him if he grew agitated for any reason. Hell, even if he hiccupped. No sense tempting my fate with his fire. He shook his body like a wet dog, and then turned and contemplated me with bright, emerald green eyes.
Lily landed on my shoulder and squealed in happiness. “Isn’t he gorgeous?”
“He is.” I had no argument there. He was one of the most majestic-looking creatures I’d seen. It made me wonder what a full-grown dragon looked like. “So, what now?”
“Now, we wait until morning,” Lily said. “Nothing much will happen until then, unless you’d like to play with a baby dragon.”
“Why not?” Who else could say they’d been playmates with a dragon? And I knew I’d likely never get the chance to do so again.
As it turned out, it was much more petting than playing, as the little guy was still too small to do much more than slink around a bit and then flop down for a nap. He was more than happy to let me run my hands over his scales, though, and when I finally grew bold enough to pick him up, he curled into my arms and began purring like a cat.
That was all the convincing I needed to decide it was time for me to go back to sleep, as well. I softly lowered the serpent to the ground so I could lie down, and then he immediately burrowed under my blanket and coiled up against my chest, ensuring I had zero chance of freezing to death before morning.
Lily came over, did a quick check on her young ward, and then gave me a feather-light kiss on the forehead. “Sleep well, my boys,” she whispered.
I awoke as the sun’s first rays of the morning found their ways through the boulders and into our little cave. The hatchling was still asleep under my blanket, and although Lily wasn’t sleeping, she was snuggled up against my neck.
“Good morning, Grant-Man,” she said as she felt me begin to stretch. She gave my cheek a squeeze and then flew off my shoulder.
“Did you finally get some rest?”
“So
me,” she answered. “But I was more than content to watch over the two of you as you slept.”
A few months earlier, the idea of anyone other than my mother watching me while I was asleep would have creeped me out to no end. But I liked the idea of Lily doing it. It meant that the dragon was not the only one occupying her thoughts and attention.
I stroked the side of the baby, the smooth warmth of his scales soothing against my palm. He stretched and yawned, puffing out a wisp of smoke as he did. “Will he stay here with you long?” I asked.
“No,” she replied. “Guardians guard eggs, not dragons.” There was an unmistakable tinge of sadness in her words. It had to be bittersweet to spend so long ensuring the welfare of the egg, only to be denied the ability to see the hatched dragon thrive and grow. She watched the hatchling with a wistful expression as he began exploring around the cave.
“I’m sorry, Lily.”
She smiled a little. “Don’t be sorry for me,” she said. “I knew what I was getting into when I asked to be chosen as a Guardian. I do feel bad for you, though.”
“Me? Why?”
“Because you didn’t ask to be involved in all of this, but I dragged you in, anyway. And now the baby has grown attached to you— and you to him— but you won’t be able to spend time with him, either.” She looked up at me. “In fact, you should probably go. None of those who will be coming for the baby today will be happy to see you.”
“But I’m not ready to leave the two of you yet,” I protested. “I was gone for a month, and I only just got back.” I had to cringe at the slightly whiny tone in my voice. Not a toddler, Grant. Time to start acting like it.
Lily flew over and leaned against my chest. “I know, Grant-Man. But humans are not to be trusted, remember?” She shuddered. “You don’t want to see what could happen if they show up and find you here.”
I sighed. “Okay,” I relented. She was right. I really didn’t want to provoke whoever was coming— whether they be other fairies, dragons, or something I had never heard of before. And I absolutely didn’t want to risk bringing their wrath to bear on Lily.
A Paranormal Easter: 14 Paranormal & Fantasy Romance Novellas Page 47