by Lisa Daniels
She snapped and acted irritable like the best of them, but it was no compensation for the disconnect. Not even seizing moments with people like Durza and trying to forget the world around her existed helped.
“Then what can we do? There’s no point keeping you here as a Quest Giver if you have no motivation to go home. I mean, that was the deal we struck. It won’t work.” Durza let out a heavy sigh, his brown eyes full of concern. His kind, clever face sent small pangs of guilt into Jackie’s otherwise locked heart.
One day at a time. “Well. I may as well give this whole Quest business a try. And, if you want me to stick around – even have a relationship – my needs should be satisfied. They are quite simple. Books. Access to knowledge. And the promise of artifacts and gear like Morgana’s. Because I feel quite squishy without that protection. I don’t have magic in my bones. Well… natural magic,” she said hastily, seeing Morgana’s aggressive eyebrow twitch. Okay. Don’t tell Durza about the regeneration potion in her blood.
“I’ll see what I can do.” He crouched beside her for a moment, taking her hand in his. The tender gesture made her smile and press her head against the crook of his arm for a moment. She dropped the relationship bomb on him. She didn’t believe in faffing around, or delaying the obvious. She did want to keep some secrets to herself, but if her three new friends could read body language, it would be hard to lie.
Friends. How strange. The notion illuminated her, filled her up like a blossoming flower. They were friends. Even without anyone explicitly stating the word, the way they acted around her was just so… casual. As if they had never considered for a second leaving her out of things.
A roar in the distance made them all frantically scour the scenery, tracking the source of the noise.
A deafening bellow drowned out the ambient sounds in the background, and Durza froze. “Oh, shit,” he said.
A huge, brown and black dragon came soaring over the tip of one of the mountains, spewing orange flames.
“Well, she doesn’t technically belong to anyone,” Morgana said, gesturing to Jackie. “So she’s up for grabs by any dragon with the Scent.”
“Fuck,” Durza muttered, as the dragon swooped closer, making a direct line towards Jackie.
Chapter Four
“Can’t you claim me?” Jackie’s heart bounced in her mouth as the brown dragon closed the distance, now telegraphing his intent to grab her by stretching his talons.
“I can. But I still have to fight this fucker.” Durza grimaced. “Um. Jackie, I won’t set you free. Sorry.”
Jackie suppressed a sudden, insane desire to laugh. “No problem. Can I help?”
Durza shook his head before launching himself off the cliff in human form, morphing into a huge, cyan-colored dragon, the second time she’d ever seen him shift. His light brown eyes fixated upon the incoming dragon, and Elzara and Andrea stepped out of the cave, gaping at the unfolding spectacle.
The approaching dragon instantly blasted Durza with fire, but he shook it off, unfazed, and they collided mid-air, screeching and hissing. Jackie’s hands lifted up to her mouth. She hoped Durza would win. She liked him and the easy arrangement they had with one another. She’d just completed giving out her first Quest. She’d just been given the deal to help her not be so bored on High Mountain. And now all that could be dashed away in moments.
“Should this even be happening? Isn’t he attacking a Quest Giver, that dragon? Will Durza be okay?”
“Ssh. There’s something not right with that dragon.” Morgana took some deep sniffs, even as Durza and the invader tussled mid-air, sometimes gripping, sometimes flapping away and charging one another like jousters. “Smells like old socks.”
There was a brief pause.
“Uh, socks?”
Morgana waved her hand irritably. “Or maybe he smells like someone who isn’t in control of himself. Yes. This one’s under a mind-altering spell. Probably failed a Quest somewhere. Look, he’s trying to avoid Durza now, and is going for Andrea. And she’s claimed.”
The invader dragon tumbled past Durza, taking huge, hasty flaps towards Elzara and Andrea. Elzara barked something at the princess, who retreated inside, and then she transformed as well into her blue dragon form as the enemy crunched into her. Durza let out a shriek of rage as the dragons rolled and caused rock to tumble from Elzara’s cave, and she snapped away at the intruder, who was now screaming, whipping his neck from side to side like a lunatic.
Suddenly, the invader tussled himself free and again made a direct line to Jackie. Before Jackie could exclaim, before Durza had the time to gather enough speed, the dragon had swiped at Jackie, encasing her in his talons. She yelled and beat her fists uselessly against the scaly prison, her heart a hammer against her chest, the adrenaline in her blood spiking. No. She couldn’t be taken now. Not when she finally had a plan! “Bastard!” Jackie growled, her temper flaring, seeing the world below her through the gaps in the talons, along with desperation. No. It couldn’t end like this.
The befuddled dragon above her said no words, he only screeched and spewed flames, flapping in an erratic, stomach-lurching way. The wind struck Jackie’s cheeks and bitter tears swelled up, before she chomped them down, breathing fast, trying to think of a way out of the problem.
Trying to think of a way to return to Durza, Morgana, and Elzara. To be there for that poor knight if he succeeded in his Quest and obtained the potion for whatever loved one of his that had fallen ill.
Argggh! In a fresh wave of anger, she beat her fists against the dragon. She didn’t want to leave! The dragon juddered and shot unevenly forward. She heard the familiar growls of Durza – he was on the dragon!
The flash of relief was quickly overtaken by a dark realization. If he injures the dragon too much, I’ll…
The dragon released her from his grip, completing her dire prediction. She tumbled through the air, hurtling towards the ground hundreds of meters below, the wind tearing at her clothes, the scream yanked out of her mouth. Instinctively, she splayed her arms as the drag behind her increased. The wind dominated all sound in her ears as the world rushed up to meet her.
This is it. It’s all over…
A flash of blue angled to her from the right. Elzara! The dragon had folded her wings, trying to position herself to snatch Jackie out of the air. The ground raced closer, promising to break all her bones. Elzara let out an extra burst of speed, her wide blue eyes fixed in determination on Jackie.
Meters from the ground, Elzara snagged Jackie and continued flapping forward, as Jackie’s stomach turned upside down, and the talons enveloped her, protecting her from death. She sobbed in frightened relief as the dragon set her back on the cliff above, and Morgana instantly fussed over her, shaking.
“Just as well Elzara launched herself off when she did.”
“Future potion,” Elzara gasped in response. “Not even close. Shame it doesn’t seem to work all the time, or we would have seen that dragon long before.”
“Can’t be perfect,” Morgana said, shrugging.
In the distance, the brown dragon fell from the air like a stone, crashing into the forest below. Durza flapped back towards them, his movement unsteady, and he landed hard on the cliff before shifting and collapsing in a bruised heap.
Elzara shifted as well, groaning as she clutched her back.
Jackie shrugged off Morgana’s probing hands and hugged Elzara first, who squeaked in protest, “My back!” before shambling over to Durza, who rejected her offer of a hug, but allowed Jackie to hold his hand.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he wheezed, face twisting up in pain. Jackie shook her head.
“You’re a fucking idiot. You’re a dragon. You know how dragons work.”
She flicked him on the head, and he said, “Ow.”
“She’s not wrong,” Morgana said, scratching at her nose. “Look. I’m going to rummage around my place, see if I can find a flying artifact. Obviously having you up on High Mountain without the ab
ility to fly might be an issue in the future.”
Jackie laughed, before kissing the back of Durza’s hand. His liquid brown eyes stared into hers, and his breath-taking face welled up in a mix of affection and concern.
She covered up her embarrassment by saying, “So, still want me to be a Quest Giver?”
Durza coughed out a laugh. “We can talk about that later.”
“Yes. We can.” Jackie sighed, looking around at her friends. Even Andrea, in her annoying princess way, was more of a friend than the people Jackie knew in the past. Peel that girl away from the rest, she could be okay.
Fuck it. Jackie would try this thing out. She’d stay for Durza. For the others. For herself.
Just as long as she didn’t get carried away by another dragon first.
It did mean a lot of work needed to be done. Midlife issues to sort through. Dragons to handle. Not messing up those ritual words.
And, most importantly – trying to be happy.
She kissed Durza on the forehead and his expression brightened. Elzara grinned beside them, and Morgana nodded approvingly, her dark hair flowing in the wind.
“Let’s get you home and patched up,” Jackie said, letting Durza loop his arm over her shoulder. Together, they stumbled home.
Home. What a nice word. Full of promise and a future. Jackie grinned as she stepped out of the light of day, and into safety.
The End
Captured by Tarek
Dragons Take a Princess
(Book 6)
Chapter One
Lystra came from a rather odd family. Living in one of the smallest of all of the Hundred Kingdoms, yet saturated with one of the highest concentrations of royals per square meter, Porak Kingdom found a rather interesting source of income for its people.
It seemed at some point in the past, the brave or foolish ancestors of the current royals stumbled across a dragon lair in the Wilderness. Both sides saw a chance for prosperity and unity. Given at the time most people saw dragons as “kill on sight” and that dragons saw humans as either crunchy meat treats or princess producers – this deal was the first of its kind. And possibly the last.
The dragons wanted to become the third dragon kingdom in the Wilderness. And Porak Kingdom, well, it wanted more fame and recognition, rather than an identity as the ass-end of the world.
They struck a deal that lured all Questers to trickle into their kingdom, and a deal that had witches brewing in the royal laboratories. Most other kingdoms hated witches on sight, and had an unfortunate habit of trying to burn them at the stake. Porak Kingdom employed witches to create Quest rewards. They paid the dragons to take their princesses.
So Lystra’s childhood had mostly been preparation for being taken by a dragon.
“Now, honey,” her mother had once soothed, yanking a brush through Lystra’s sandy blonde curls. Lystra remembered it hurting, and feeling as though each strand on her scalp was slowly being ripped out. “Do you remember what Mr. Timid taught you today?”
Nine-year-old Lystra glared at herself in the mirror. “I know how to do a perfect high-pitched scream when I see a dragon flying, so he can find me faster. I know they’re attracted to the color red, and I know three ways to clean a kitchen surface, so when I’m taken, I won’t need to learn as much as other princesses when the dragon gives me chores.”
“Good girl!” Her mother, Queen Nera, smiled proudly at her eighth-youngest daughter. Due to the number of children Nera had pumped out, her body was round like a potato, and she had a rather charming matronly look going for her. “I heard you were top of your class for the scream hour. Well done!”
“The rest of the class heard it too,” Lystra muttered, already at that age of finding the lessons mostly pointless. Why bother learning all these things if she was going to be taken by a dragon anyway? They did that thing when a princess reached eighteen years old where they sent them to High Hill, and a dragon just went to High Hill to scoop up whatever unfortunate princess was waiting there. She didn’t even need to know how to scream, because the princesses offered themselves up on a platter. Every year, the royal treasury accumulated gold whenever a dragon took a princess and paid Porak for its service.
Then a new stream of Questers came along to try and rescue the princesses, or to go on self-imposed requests by Porak Kingdom, all for a taste of their witch brews.
Lystra’s favorite person when growing up was Agatha the Witch, an old, ugly woman with a pointed chin and nose like a crescent moon, who let Lystra escape from her millions of brothers, sisters and cousins to watch as she brewed potions.
Now at eighteen years of age, Lystra was due to go to High Hill tomorrow for the ceremonial capture by a dragon. Nervous about it, she went down to Agatha’s lab, deep in the dungeons of their castle, past damp stone walls and broken stone steps, into a chamber lit by an ominous green light, and shrunken heads hanging from strings upon the ceiling. Agatha gave Lystra a toothless smile, making a sucking sound with her gums as she stirred a hissing cauldron. Flashes of green electricity flared up from the cauldron on every third clockwise stir.
“Ah, if it isn’t my favorite princess! Nervous about being captured tomorrow, are yer, sweetie?”
Lystra nodded, twiddling her thumbs. She sought the words she needed to convey, and reflected on them before saying, “I’ve been preparing most of my life to be a perfect princess. Learning to cook and clean. Over-preparing for my new life, actually, before I get rescued by one Quester and then probably married off to them as a reward. But…” Now she approached the meat of the matter, the thing pervading her thoughts, “what if I hate it there? What if the dragons are all cruel and nothing like what everyone’s saying they are?”
Agatha stared at the freshly adult princess standing in front of her cauldron, and made that annoying sucking noise with her gums. “Well, I’ve spoken to a few dragons in my time. They have a strict moral code when it comes to princesses. Course you always get some rogues, but the ones yer mammy and daddy are in contact with want to represent an official, respected kingdom. They will honor their agreement. Don’t you worry.” She paused for a moment, before widening her smile. “Though some of them like to bend rules. I can offer you some protection, give you a bit of a head start.”
Lystra watched eagerly as Agatha tottered over to a shelf full of potions. One was labelled “temporary,” and the other “permanent.” She rifled through the “permanent” shelf until she found what she was looking for. A small, purple and green potion rolled into her wizened palms, and she handed it over to Lystra.
“That there’s a whopper. You drink that, and the predators of the Wilderness will struggle to see you as a food source. It’s a simple potion, but if you drink it, I think you’ll have one less fear to worry about. I have it meself. Lets me walk through the Wilderness when I’m gathering my herbs without fear of attack.”
A repel potion. Trusting Agatha, Lystra uncorked the bottle and drank it, feeling the magic settle heavily onto her bones after it travelled down her gullet and into her stomach.
“Side effects can include accidental generation of a black hole that will suck your soul up for all eternity,” Agatha added, which made Lystra glare at her. “But don’t worry. It’s like a 0.001% chance. Why, you’d have to be incredibly unlucky to get it!” She guffawed, but Lystra still wasn’t amused. However, she thanked Agatha, who reassured her once more that she’d be alright. The dragons would treat her well enough. She didn’t need to worry her pretty little princess head over the matter.
Though the idea of not being eaten by the various creatures that inhabited the Wilderness appealed to Lystra, she still felt rather anxious about the whole capturing thing.
The feast she shared with her expansive family was glorious and conversation-packed as usual, though she acted subdued throughout the whole affair and retreated to bed with a weight in her gut, wondering how her new life would pan out. Although she knew princesses could be rescued in a matter of days, she also knew of
tales where some had spent years of their lives captured. Some never even returned. Those cases were rare enough, however, for most princesses to expect rescue at some point.
The next day, Lystra garbed herself in the ritual red dress, complete with a sparkling ruby pendant, and red, coruscant shoes. She went up to the ceremonial High Hill, where an appropriately constructed tower and platform awaited. Her job for the entire day was to stand on the flat tower platform and wait for whatever dragon happened to be sent from the flourishing dragon colony to scoop her up.
The wait generated undue anxiety in Lystra, who whittled away the time by sipping at glasses of water or munching on crackers. She even read a book, and an umbrella was brought up to her when the sunlight grew fierce.
Waiting for dragons sure was a tiring affair. Part of Lystra hoped that none would come at all, and she could retreat back into her castle and act like nothing had happened. Her family might be awfully upset she wasn’t accepted, but then they’d simply marry her off to a prince. Job done.
The day stretched on. She saw her mother and father muttering to themselves, and her younger sister shaking her head in a disapproving way.
“I bet if it was me up there, the dragons would be swarming to take me!” Malissa’s sharp little voice carried up on the breeze. Little brat, Lystra thought fondly. Still, she had spunk. Nice to see princesses being sassy.
She pretended she didn’t hear Malissa’s whining, and stared up at the sky, wondering if they really were coming for her.
Her heart sank when she saw a dot appear on the horizon, gradually growing larger and larger. The distinctive shape of a dragon undulated through the air, revealing scintillating red scales, the same color as her dress. She heard the crowd who had gathered to watch cheer and cry out, and her mother fanned herself, clearly satisfied to see the huge dragon head for her daughter.