New Beginnings

by Jada Fisher

  It was an entirely surreal experience, made that much more so as Fior bounded in, sidling up beside Ukrah and rubbing his head against her. Athar soon joined his wife, picking out dark, leathery-looking armor rather than shining metal pieces.

  Soon they both seemed to have everything they wanted, and Athar set about armoring himself while Eist helped Ukrah put things on. There were a lot of straps and buckles and things she didn’t understand, but she watched the God-Woman’s movements carefully, trying to memorize it.

  “Alright,” Eist said when they were all done, patting her shoulder. “Are you ready?”

  Ukrah nodded. Part of her felt plenty of fear, but she didn’t have time for that, so she just shoved it away. After all, Crispin was waiting for her.

  “Then let me help you onto Fior. It’s time to save your friend. I believe in you, you know that, right?”

  Ukrah nodded again. “Although I’m not sure why. I’m just a stranger to you.”

  “Yeah, maybe some people would say that, but let’s say I’ve got a feeling.” She winked, before seeming to consider something. She continued to wear that expression as she helped Ukrah up onto Fior’s back. “I know there’s a lot of myths and lies out there about me, but do you want to know a secret?”

  “…yes?” What kind of strange question was that?

  “I’m hard of hearing. I can catch tones sometimes, and loud noises. If someone’s talking loud enough right beside me, I’m usually able to catch most of what they say, but often I watch people’s mouths and feel vibrations. Ain outed me when I was younger, hoping to have me kicked out of the academy, but most people don’t seem to believe that someone like me could ever be almost deaf.”

  Ukrah stared at her with wide eyes. She’d met a youngling once who had lost their hearing due to a terrible fever. They couldn’t speak and often threw terrible temper tantrums, frustrated by being so cut off from the world, no doubt. But Eist was nothing like that. She was strong, and she was certain. She’d saved the entire world.

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Well, it’s not something that’s very known, so it’s almost like a secret. And friends share secrets.”

  “But you’re my sponsor.”

  She let out a huff. “Fine. Maybe friend wasn’t the exact right word, but I basically want you to know that you can trust me, alright? And I know there’s a scary something within you that you don’t understand right now, but I promise, I feel good things coming from it. Now, go save your friend. And if that power rears up, don’t be afraid to use it.”

  “What if I hurt people?”

  “Sometimes you have to in order to protect the ones you love. As long as it’s not what you default to, you’ll be fine.”

  “O…okay.”

  “Take care of her, Athar,” Eist said, stepping away.

  He bent to kiss the top of her head before swinging himself up and onto Estelle’s back. Seeing the massive man move so quickly was almost alarming, and abruptly Ukrah understood how he might have caught the God-Woman’s eye. “Of course I will. We’ll find him, and I’ll bring ‘em b-b-both home safe. Promise.”

  “You better.” She nodded then looked to Fior. “Go ahead now, let her lead you.”

  “But I don’t know—”

  “Trust yourself. Find that part of you that knows Crispin’s in trouble and hold onto that for dear life.”

  Ukrah wanted to say more. She wanted to ask what that meant and how she was supposed to separate that feeling from everything else swirling inside of her, but then Fior was striding forward and she had to clamp down hard with both thighs while holding onto his harness.

  Fear swamped her, followed by the even colder knife of terror. She was reminded of when Crispin had carried her on her back, but it was ten times more intense. Just when she was sure that she would be thrown from him, his wings began to beat, causing huge updrafts of air, and then they were taking to the sky.

  The fear dropped out of her stomach and an excited laugh burst from her throat. She was flying. Flying! After all those dreams, she finally was on the back of a dragon, and it was absolutely thrilling.

  Ukrah let go of her death grip on the harness and spread her arms wide. The cool night air caressed her skin and the moon shone brilliantly above her. It was a beautiful, peaceful moment, but that came crashing to a halt when Athar rode up beside her.

  “So, which direction?”

  Oh.

  Right.

  She was flying to save her friend because something terrible was happening to him. Guilt flooded her, and she couldn’t believe that she had forgotten that even for a moment.

  “I…” She couldn’t say that she didn’t know, so instead she took a deep breath, closing her eyes and trying to reach within her for whatever it was that was so sure that Crispin was in danger.

  She was startled by the heated, fizzing feeling that rushed through her, filling her limbs and squeezing her throat. She pushed through it to find the steely sort of certainty that flicked up her spine and coated her head.

  Without thinking, she began to lean. It was subtle, but Fior noticed it, however, and soon they were veering off in another direction, heading out of the city.

  In fact, they seemed to be going in the same direction that she had taken to find the God-Woman. If Athar thought anything of that, he didn’t say so, but Ukrah wasn’t even sure if he knew the details of their journey. It wasn’t as if she and Crispin had sat down and told them every trivial fact.

  They cut through the night, covering a distance that had taken her two days before, but Ukrah couldn’t enjoy the movement. She kept her eyes closed and her entire mind focused on the feeling within. She couldn’t waver for a moment and risk going the wrong way. Crispin was waiting on her.

  Finally, she saw it. Even though her eyes were shut, it blazed gold right below her—a small circle of trees within the thick forest.

  “There!” she hissed as quietly as she could while still making sure that Athar could hear her. “We need to go there.”

  He nodded, choosing to communicate silently, and they both descended as quietly as possible.

  While Fior was able to flit between the trees silently, Estelle was clearly not going to be able to do anything like that. Ukrah had no idea what they would do until the dragon lowered herself as close to the trees as she could before turning upside-down, allowing Athar to drop from her back into the canopy.

  Somehow, although it seemed impossible, he made it to the ground before she and Fior did. He held a finger to his lips as soon as they landed, however.

  “I think I see a hunting sh-shack a bit away. It’s hard to say.”

  “Hunting shack?”

  “It’s meant to be shelter for trappers and th-th-the like who might come out here and need rest or who are caught in a storm. But lately, we’ve been finding a lot of th-them have become outposts for all sorts of illegal activity.”

  Ukrah’s breath hitched. “I think that was what I was kept at.”

  “What?”

  “When I was with the slavers. It was a very large hunting outpost once. I think, at least. I still am learning your customs.”

  “Slavers?” The strain in his voice was audible, even through his whisper. “How long were you with th-them?”

  “Too long. But they got me across the border, so they did what I needed.”

  “Wait, you make it sound like you were captured on purpose.”

  She shrugged. “It made sense at the time. I did manage to also free many others.”

  He shook his head. “You and Eist really are alike.” That thought was so utterly preposterous that she just stared blankly at him. The God-Woman was a literal god-woman, and Ukrah was just a very lost girl. “Alright, we need to approach this carefully. I’ll come at it from the north. You go straight ahead. I want you to listen, as hard as you can, and signal to me how many you hear ins-s-side. We want to make sure who is actually hurting him and go for him, not s-s-some innocent people
who got caught in the middle. Stay behind Fior and let him do any f-f-fighting if you need. Your goal is to grab Crispin and run.”

  “Why don’t we just go in, dragons blazing?” That seemed like the far easier solution, especially considering that they didn’t know who was holding him.

  “Because if it’s a raider camp or anything like that, th-they’ll slit his throat and run. Is that what you want?”

  Ukrah’s stomach churned. “No.”

  “Exactly. Trust me, I’ve done my fair share of sneaking th-throughout my life.”

  “And what is your goal?”

  “To make sure no one’s able to chase you if that comes down to it.”

  “I understand.” For some reason, she very much missed Tayir and wished he was there with her.

  “Good, give me about ten b-b-breaths of a head start and then move in.”

  She nodded and the large man crept off, able to move through the forest surprisingly silent considering his massive size. He was taller than many of the saplings struggling to grow through the canopy.

  She waited, each moment feeling like a pinprick along her skin, before finally creeping along. Fior joined her, huddled impressively low to the earth, his shovel-like head parting foliage instead of breaking it noisily.

  The two of them made it up along the rickety, moss-and-vine-covered wall of the shack. Ukrah didn’t want to think about all the bugs or other creatures that were in the structure and leaned in to press her ear against it.

  She couldn’t make out solid words most of the time, but she did hear voices. One, then two, then four. She waited several beats, but that seemed to be it. Four men, that wasn’t so bad considering she had a dragon and Athar on her side.

  But then two more voices joined in. Alright, six wasn’t that great, but still…dragon. She was all set to raise her hand and signal to wherever Athar was, when she heard the distinctive sound of metal hitting soft flesh and an anguished cry.

  She knew that voice too.

  Crispin.

  It was like the world winked out of being for a second. One moment, she was standing there, listening to a terrible sound that she didn’t want to hear, and the next, she let out a shout and the wall in front of her burst into a cloud of ash, leaving her staring at a room of men.

  And Crispin.

  The boy was huddled on the floor in even worse shape than she had seen him in her vision. His bright, blond hair was matted with brown and red, and what little she could see of his face was both swollen and bruised like someone had beaten him.

  “Who the hell is this?” one of the men asked, stepping forward.

  “This must be the chit he was stealing all those things for. I told you he never could have killed all those guards on his own.”

  That was when recognition fully hit her, making every bit of her body turn rigid in shock. These men were wearing the same thing as the guards that she had killed. They had come for Crispin, even after all the months that he’d been gone.

  “A foreigner, huh?” another asked, stepping forward. That was also when Ukrah realized that there wasn’t six of them but ten, and there was an open hatch that looked to lead to a cellar below where she could hear noises. That didn’t bode well. “So you’re a blood traitor on top of a thief?”

  The man kicked out and caught Crispin in the ribs. The boy let out a sob and the next thing Ukrah knew, she was rushing forward.

  She barely managed to pull up short before she nearly impaled herself on several spears and swords that were suddenly produced by a line.

  “Let him go.”

  “Sorry?” one of the men closer to Crispin asked, producing a dagger from his pants. “Who are you and why should we listen to some little sand flea?”

  Athar’s words echoed in her head about how they could slit Crispin’s throat at any moment and they wouldn’t be able to stop them in time. Had her impetuousness just killed her friend? The thought made her burn with so much anger that her hands began to shake. The men seemed to take it as fear, however, and laughed at her.

  “You don’t want him,” she said instead of rising to his bait.

  The man approached Crispin, flipping his dagger as he did so. Ukrah assumed that Athar was biding his time, trying to figure out how to save the situation since she had messed it up. But she couldn’t fail Crispin. She needed him. She had lost everything in her life, and he was the first person who was kind to her. He had saved her with food and water. He had risked his life to get her the supplies she needed to get to Eist.

  She wouldn’t let him die for her.

  She’d die first before she ever allowed that.

  9

  Breaking the Seal

  “Surely one young boy who stole a few supplies isn’t worth all this effort,” Ukrah said, trying to keep her tone even. Part of her hoped that she could somehow convince them of their folly, but another part of her hoped that she could stall enough for Athar to save the day.

  “Stole a few supplies? He killed our men!”

  “No, that was me.”

  The man let out a sound that was something like a snort, and several of the others laughed. Crispin sounded like he groaned some sort of warning for her to go, but that just earned him another kick.

  Ukrah had no idea what spurred her to speak, but her tone was low and dangerous when she did, her accent intensifying. “Touch him one more time and I will feed you your own hand.”

  He laughed again, sitting in a chair and continuing to flip that dagger. “You know, I think you really believe that. You’re awful uppity for a slave, aren’t you?”

  “I am no slave,” Ukrah hissed. “I’ll give you one more warning. Let him go and you all can leave. I’ll forgive everything you’ve done so far.”

  “Oh, you’ll forgive us? How gracious.” He stood, shaking his head like he was thoroughly amused. “I tell you what we’ll do. We’re going to kill your friend here and drag his body behind our horses all the way home. As for you, well, I like you, so I think we’ll just take you to a slaver’s post. Minus a tongue, maybe. I think you’d probably catch a higher price if you couldn’t mouth off so much, yes.”

  “Shame though,” another said, lowering his spear ever so slightly. “That seems to be at least half of her charm.”

  “What’s the other half? Certainly not her face.”

  She didn’t know who said that, but they all shared another laugh. But they could mock her all they wanted as long as they didn’t hurt Crispin.

  The leader let out a snort. “This has been fun, but I need a good night’s sleep for our ride home tomorrow. So, let’s finish this, yeah?”

  He took a step toward Crispin and everything seemed to happen at once. Ukrah dove forward again, but the row of sharp weapons responded, causing her to slide to a stop and fall onto her own rear. A roar sounded outside, and abruptly, a massive red jaw was bursting through the wall while Fior came barreling in seemingly from nowhere.

  “Dragons!”

  “She brought a rider with her!”

  Everything was a full-on cacophony as nearly a dozen men came pouring out of the cellar—which definitely wasn’t just a cellar, considering how many of them were in there—and the sounds of a real fight started to fill the place.

  Of course, such a burst of action was plenty enough to distract the men, and she took that moment to dash between them, intent on getting to Crispin.

  It was risky, she knew as much, but she didn’t care.

  “I’m here, I’m here!” she cried as she dove the last bit, rolling over to him. “I’ve got you.”

  He tilted his head ever-so-slightly, and Ukrah almost choked. His eyes were so swollen she couldn’t see any of the white or the color, just swollen and bruising flesh with far too much blood dripping and encrusted in rivulets around it.

  “I know it’s gonna hurt, but we gotta go.”

  She grabbed him, wincing at his breathless groan, and pulled him up to his feet. He swayed pretty heavily, and she had to bear the brunt
of most of his weight. Granted, he wasn’t exactly a big guy, so it wasn’t that egregious of a task.

  But getting them both to safety without getting stabbed just might be.

  Ukrah kept low, doing her best to dodge between folks. It helped that Fior was spinning and snapping up a storm, kicking holes in the wall and throwing people with his tail, while Estelle’s whole head was trying to make it in the hole she had created. As for Athar… Well, she didn’t know exactly where he was, but she did hear sword hitting sword, so chances were that he was in the fray as well.

  He was probably going to be pretty mad at her for ruining the plan, but she couldn’t help it. Seeing someone who mattered so much to her in such terrible pain, seeing him get hurt, burned her in a way that she couldn’t describe. She’d had to do something.

  There was no way they were making it out of the same hole she had burst into the wall, which meant they were going for the front door. For several moments, she didn’t think she would make it. The shack was so crowded, and the fight was beginning to spill into the trees. Several times, she had to kick or push someone out of the way.

  But somehow, they made it, running out of the door and taking to the woods. Ukrah had long since found that she didn’t see well at night in the civilized lands, that their trees and buildings blocked too much of the moon that she was used to guiding herself by. Nevertheless, she still hurried. Still went as fast as she could while Crispin’s feet dragged behind her.

  Every moment that passed, she was afraid he would stop breathing. That he would be gone, and she would just be hauling his lifeless body along. But she couldn’t stop to check on him either, because even a second’s pause was a second wasted. All she needed to do was get him far enough to be safe.

  She tripped over a root, and they both went to the ground. Cursing, she pushed herself to her knees, looking around for where Crispin fell. He was just a few feet from her, rasping intensely, and the sound made her wince.