My heart raced so quickly that I couldn’t keep up. Even though I could breathe under water, I was still holding my breath.
Where was he?
Wreckage drifted in the water all around us and I couldn’t see him between chunks of wood and undulating ropes, bobbing barrels and sinking pulleys.
Heron? Panic burst up into my mind. If I didn’t find him quickly, he was going to drown for sure. With a head injury and his lungs already filled with water once, he didn’t stand much of a chance on his own.
Where was he?
There!
I saw him sinking below me and I dove down, struggling to reach him. He was sinking too fast. I wouldn’t get to him fast enough to pull him up through the waves!
Please, please! Don’t let him drown!
A huge horned head plunged through the water between us. It glittered in the ocean light, blue and beautiful, tendrils and fins swirled translucently in the water as the mouth opened, rows of teeth gleaming in the dawn light, and it scooped Heron up, pulling him to the surface.
Fear surged through me. This dragon was so much larger than Ramariri had been – so huge and powerful and it had my friend right in its jaws. I was about to scream when suddenly, I was snatched up in another set of huge jaws and pulled back up into the air.
I’d expected the jaws to crush me – or at least hurt a bit, but they were gentle and delicate and the song of the sea – the song I heard every time I went down to it or thought about it at all – filled my mind along with words that were foreign and yet understandable.
Keep the little one safe.
Nasataa squirmed against my neck as the huge head arched around and set us gently on the old canoe bobbing out in the ocean. The other head laid a coughing, choking Heron down right in front of me.
I scrambled forward, pulling him into my lap and wrapping my arms around him protectively as he sucked in a long breath. Nasataa, for his part, was playing the part of scarf. He was wrapped so tightly around my neck that it was becoming uncomfortable.
Keep him safe.
This time, the sound in my mind echoed as if two voices were saying it at once and images tumbled in my mind. An image of Nasataa first seeing me and rushing toward me. An image of him in the cave with the portal and me following him. An image of him running away on the ship and then one of him leaping to wrap around my neck. It was as if the dragons were trying to tell me all about Nasataa and me in one momentary burst. It was painful and beautiful, and it explained things to me that I couldn’t have said in words.
We were bound together, the little dragon and I. I was meant to be his protector and helper.
“I will,” I said as the two huge heads stayed close, watching me with hawk-like eyes. “I promise.”
They rose then, towering above me, before plunging back into the sea. A burst of water jetted up where each head had been and then, in the distance, the length of body, or tail – or whatever that was gripping the ship – plunged back into the water, smashing the ship against the surface of the ocean and splintering the last shards of it into a million pieces.
“I don’t think you need to worry about the ship anymore,” Heron said between coughs. His head was still bleeding and I was holding him upright or he would have fallen over, but he was speaking. That had to mean he was okay, right?
I reached up, stroking Nasataa’s head gently as I pulled Heron in tighter.
They were going to be okay. They were alive and breathing and okay.
I took a deep, grateful breath.
“I don’t think you need to be so prejudiced against Blue Dragons,” I replied. “After all, they just saved our lives.”
Episode Two: Dragon Staff
Chapter One
We drifted into shore, worn and thirsty, our canoe bobbing wildly in the waves. Wind blew onshore so strongly that it confused the mind, filling the ears with whispers and suggestions of secrets. It had been all I could do to get the canoe back to the beach with Heron slumped against my chest and Nasataa wrapped around my neck.
I’d kept a lookout for sailors who might be swimming after us, but all I saw of them were small dark spots bobbing on the waves or clinging to wreckage as they made for the nearest shore. If I was honest with myself, I felt guilty that I wasn’t back there making sure they all made it ashore safely. Even if they were my enemies, it was clear that I had the advantage when it came to saving people who might be trapped in a sinking ship – after all, I was the one who could breathe underwater.
And I was the reason their ship had sunk, which made me doubly guilty. I’d gone there to sink it and it had been me calling to Nasataa that had alerted the giant Blue Dragons to the presence of the ship and the threat it was to the little baby dragon.
But if I’d stayed to help them, who would help Heron and Nasataa?
Nasataa clung to me like a frightened baby – which was what he was, dragon or no – and sent me mental pictures of lying safely on the beach or eating juicy fruit. He was tired and hungry and scared. He needed a safe place to rest and eat and he was my responsibility. I reached up to stroke his head as often as I dared without capsizing the tippy boat.
Heron was drifting in and out of consciousness. That blow to his head had been hard. If I’d left him in the canoe, he might have drowned. The old rickety canoe had a slow leak, and anyone lying on the bottom of it would have to be able to breathe water like me. Even now, he lay heavily against me, his sun-darkened skin ashen in the morning light.
I’d paddled this whole way with incredible slowness, supporting Heron’s head up on my lap out of the water, keeping his big muscled body balanced on the canoe, bailing water with a little wooden cup attached to the canoe by a string, and paddling when I could. And by the way, who knows their canoe has a leak and is careful to tie a bailing cup to it, but then doesn’t fix the hole? Who?
Our canoe hit the sand, sliding up the beach to come to a stop and slowly topple over.
I was too tired to care. And Heron was too heavy on land. We fell into a heap on the smooth sand and with difficulty, I crawled out from under him and propped him up against the canoe.
“Wait here while I get help,” I said, breathlessly. The village should be getting up now. I should be able to find enough people to help me carry Heron – or maybe we could borrow the donkey and his cart. Heron was a big man.
His eyelids fluttered open and he smiled slightly at me as he murmured, “Stay out of trouble.”
“You’re one to talk!” I replied, wobbling to my feet and hurrying toward the village path.
Nasataa had begun to snore. I could have sworn he was already bigger than he had been four days ago when I found him newly-hatched. How fast did dragons grow? I was going to find out.
For now, I tucked my hair around him to keep him from prying eyes. No one would feel safe if they knew I had a baby dragon with me, and I’d lost his pouch somewhere along the way last night. I’d need a new one or a better way to carry him.
I’d lost my sandals, too, and my bare feet trod the dirt path to the village carefully, as I watched for goat’s head thorns and other spiky debris. I was so concentrated on not hurting my feet that my father’s relieved voice came out of nowhere.
“Seleska! We were so worried!”
“Dad!” I exclaimed, losing my fear of hurting my feet and running to hug him.
He froze as my arms wrapped around him. “Seleska? What is around your neck?”
I pulled back to see him still frozen in a half-hug as if he were afraid to move.
“A baby Blue Dragon,” I said sheepishly. I made my eyes go as wide as they could trying to look innocent.
The dark cloud that rolled over his expression told me it hadn’t worked.
“That is going to be a problem,” he said.
Chapter Two
“Seleska,” my mother said again, in full lecture mode, “There is a reason that Blue Dragons are forbidden. Even their scales are tossed back into the ocean if they wash ashore. We must
have no part in them or their affairs.”
She had me backed up to a tree as she lectured while in the distance, the men of my village loaded Heron up onto the donkey cart to take him home. Elder Lutrind was fussing over him with a cool drink and herbs. I wished I was getting that kind of kind treatment instead of this berating.
“Mama,” I tried to say.
“Blue Dragons are trouble, Seleska. My father died when his fishing boat was capsized by a Blue Dragon. Your father’s brother died when he swam out too far into the ocean and was swallowed up by one of them. You can’t keep that dragon. You have to give it to the Elders.”
The cart was moving now, bumping its way toward us. I watched, worried as it drew close and stopped. Heron smiled weakly from in the cart.
“Hey, Seleska,” he said.
“I’m so sorry, Heron,” I said, slipping past my mother and ignoring her sigh and shaking head. “I should never have got you into this mess.”
“We saved the village, didn’t we?” he said with a wry grin as Elder Lutrind pushed him back to a prone position. “We stopped the ship and the cannons.”
“We did,” I said, laying a gentle hand on his shoulder.
Elder Lutrind clucked her tongue. “No touching!”
“Why not?” I asked, pulling my hand back sharply. Was Heron in worse condition than I’d feared?
“Not while you’re touching that cursed thing!” the Elder said, pointing to the sleeping dragon around my neck. “Drive on Talan. Old Horace needs the cart when we’re through.” She looked at my mother as the cart lurched back into motion. “Convince her, Halana!”
My mother rounded on me as the cart hurried away, the rest of the villagers following it.
“See, Seleska? The whole village is worried about you! You can’t keep that creature!”
“Mama,” I said as calmly as I could. “He’s my responsibility and he’s just a baby. Didn’t you take me in when I needed you? And foreigners aren’t welcome on the islands, either! How could I leave him to the elements when you showed me that welcoming those in need is such a good thing?”
My mother crossed her arms over her chest, a stern look on her face. “You were a human child, Seleska.”
“He’s only a baby,” I protested. “And he’s mine.”
“Halana,” my father interrupted, saving me from more of a lecture. He was trailing behind the last of the villagers who had helped Heron. “I’ll take her with me, alright? We’re going to go up the beaches and collect the sailors floating into shore.”
“They were about to fire their cannons on our village!” Halana protested, anger in her tone.
My father nodded grimly. “So, it seems to us that it would be dangerous to let them run free on our islands. The men of the village are going to collect them and then we will decide what to do with them.”
“Oh,” my mother looked pacified by that. “And Seleska?”
“Let me talk sense into her, while you help the women prepare. We’ll have more mouths for dinner tonight – hungry mouths. And even if they are our prisoners, they will have to eat.”
She nodded and I breathed a sigh of relief when she hugged him goodbye and shook her head at me.
“I would hug you, too, but I won’t go near that thing. Get rid of it, daughter.”
She strode away with purpose and I was left standing awkwardly next to my father just a few short paces from a knot of village men carrying fish spears and machetes.
“It looks like you lost your sandals,” my father said, handing me my tall spiky-heeled boots with a blank expression.
I frowned as I took them and put them on. They were so impractical. And I could tell he was laughing behind his stony expression. They all were.
Well, at least I got to go have an adventure instead of waiting behind and making food with the village women. I was starting to suspect, though, that everyone thought these boots were a joke. Maybe they were. I’d have to ask Heron about that when he felt better.
I strode after my father thinking about how much trouble Heron was going to be in when he was better again.
“Your mother is right,” he said after long minutes of tromping down the path.
“Would you have left me on that beach when I arrived, six years old, frightened, alone except for my dying friend?” I asked boldly. “A dragon brought me. And you took me in anyway.”
“Mmm,” he agreed but I couldn’t tell if my point had been taken or if he just wanted me to be quiet.
We walked in silence after that, following the others until shouts from up ahead alerted us that the first of the sailors had been found.
The sailor had not survived the night. Nor had two of his friends. They were washed up along the beach, their tangled limbs and awkward poses the first signs that the waves had taken their lives. Dapnee strode inland and began to dig. I hadn’t even realized that he was carrying a shovel. Two other men from our village joined him as the rest of us lifted the sailors and carried them into shore. I helped my father and two other men lift one of the dead sailors. The sight of him soured my stomach.
A pang seized my heart. These men had meant to kidnap me or fire on our village. And both those things were really wrong, but it was my fault that they were dead. Guilt made me bite my lip and look away as we carried them to their graves.
“Mark the spot,” my father said, “and we’ll make proper stones for them when we can.”
“We can have their friends do it,” Jamrie suggested. “It will keep them busy while we decide what to do with them.”
Murmurs of agreement surrounded us and more than one of the village men looked at the sleeping baby dragon around my neck.
“It would be easier to defend you, Seleska, if you would get rid of that thing,” Jamrie said, suddenly. “It’s hard to defend a girl – even one of us – when she’s carrying around poison.”
“He’s not poisonous,” I protested, but the frowns around the group told me that no one meant that literally.
By noon, we had rounded up five survivors and four more bodies. Dapnee, Jamrie, and the other village men continued up the coast while my father and I took the first five prisoners back to our village. With haunted eyes and slumped postures, they didn’t look like they wanted to make any kind of trouble, and they hadn’t said a word as we’d bound their hands with jute rope and tied them to a long line of rope as thick as my forearm.
But every one of them watched the dragon around my neck with worried eyes and I was beginning to feel like I was the one who was dangerous and poisonous.
We walked back to the village in silence, my father at the front of the line and me bringing up the rear. We were almost back home when Renny tried one more time.
“Just give it up, Seleska. It will be easier for everyone. It isn’t your responsibility.”
“Would you have given me up?” I asked him, hurt in my eyes.
“Never,” was all he said.
“Then why do you think I would leave poor Nasataa with no one to take care of him?”
And that was the crux of the matter. If I didn’t take care of Nasataa, no one would. And he didn’t deserve to be abandoned and alone. What kind of a person would choose to do that to him? It didn’t matter that he was a dragon and not a human. He mattered to me, if for no other reason than that he had to matter to someone.
Chapter Three
The feeling of the village that night was somber. Altogether, nine men and women had survived the shipwreck, not counting Heron and me. And there might have been more if the other villages or the townspeople of Abergande had found any.
Heron was feeling much better, his head bandaged up. He was under strict orders not to overexert himself, but he sat around the village fire with the rest of us, his old grin on his face and the firelight dancing in his eyes.
“I’ve heard you have everyone at loose ends about what to do with you,” he said when I sauntered up to him and sat down to share his bread and fish. I slipped a piece to Nasataa and his
eyebrows rose. “It’s going to get worse if you feed that dragon in front of everyone.”
“Then I won’t feed him in front of everyone,” I said, bristling. Why was I so much more angry at Heron for saying that than I was at everyone else? That didn’t even make sense.
I stalked off to the beach where I could be alone, my ridiculous heels making my hips sway too much. I could hear the village debating what to do with the prisoners as I left. And I heard more than one villager whispering that maybe I’d brought this down on us. After all, anyone who carried around a baby Blue Dragon was clearly bad luck. It stung. I was only trying to do the right thing. And I was the one who had saved everyone! Sort of. I had a lot of help. And no one would have been in danger in the first place if they hadn’t been searching for me here. Okay, fine, it was my fault.
As I passed the line of prisoners, I felt Branson’s eyes following me. He had survived the wreck, just like I had – though with an ear so badly burned that even the village Elders weren’t sure how best to bandage it. None of the prisoners were talking. They ate in silence. They hadn’t been willing to talk to the Elders, either. But I could tell by watching them that they hadn’t given up. Their backs were straight, and their gaze followed me sharply. They were just biding their time, waiting to escape and take me home to the Rock Eaters who were paying them.
I gritted my teeth together. I had enemies on one side and angry friends on the other. I’d heard an expression once about being caught between a rock and a hard place. This must be what that expression meant. With no allies left – not even my parents and not even Heron – I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t going to give up on Nasataa. He needed me. So, then what was left for me?
The village was out of sight by the time I stopped, settling onto a big driftwood log and pulling Nasataa into my lap to feed him the rest of the bread.
“Are you okay, little guy?” I asked gently, sending calming images to his mind. “You had a big day yesterday. That’s enough to wear anyone out!”
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