The bear man squinted his green eyes in shock, while the other’s mouth pulled into a grin. “You’re Dragonkin!” he exclaimed, flicking his wrist and putting out the fire in his hand. He glanced side to side as my companions came out from behind their trees, Ava taking place at my side. “Hello!”
“You’re the one who shot me,” the other said, eyes landing on Nira.
Though he looked rather unsure of us, he didn’t appear to be as angry or menacing as he had been as a bear. Nira shrugged, saying with a friendly smile to try and put him at ease, “You did come bursting out of the woods.”
He pursed his lips to hold back a smile, and his eyes looked her up and down with something of an impressed glimmer. “It was a good shot, and I suppose I’ve had worse.” The very next moment, his wounds began to heal, and he winced only slightly with pain as the cuts sealed themselves, disappearing in a matter of seconds. It was the second of his abilities.
“Playing it off now,” Nira teased, but her eyes were wide with intrigue, and she was leaning slightly forward as if to get a better look. “Tactful, I see.”
“He’s not the one who needs tact,” Ava muttered under her breath, and I couldn’t help but laugh as I returned the chain around my neck.
Neither could the other man, who chuckled as he extended his hand to me. “I’m Skif.”
“Kiena,” I replied, shaking with him and then reaching out for the other’s hand as Skif moved on to my companions.
“Denig,” said the bear man, asking with a friendly smile, “what was that you hit me with? Lightning? Gods, that was painful.”
“I was trying to kill you,” I pointed out.
“Try all you like,” Skif said, grinning at the glare Denig gave him. “Can’t kill other Dragonkin with our own magic.”
“Come here, Haunt,” I said and knelt down, checking her for injuries while I nodded toward Denig. “He seemed right ready to kill me.”
“Couldn’t have done more than bruise you with my best magical effort,” Denig said.
“I didn’t know if there’d be any of you left out here,” I mused. Haunt was fine, if only a little battered, and she sulked off into the woods once I let her go.
“Where did you come from?” asked Skif.
“Valens,” I answered, standing again. “Outside the capital, Guelder.”
“No Dragonkin have left the mountain for over five decades,” Skif mused. “And I’ve never heard of any coming back. What line are you?” I cocked my head, unsure of what he meant. “May I see it?” he asked, motioning to my necklace. I took it off and gave it to him, and he turned it over in his hand. “Never seen this one.”
He showed it to Denig, who said, “Nor I.”
“Lightning, though,” Skif said, handing the necklace back, “that’s an element. Could be related, you and I.”
“Could we?” I asked in surprise, slipping the pendant over my head. I’d never met another blood relative other than my mother, and the idea that I might actually have one was exciting.
“Elder Numa might know for sure,” Skif answered, nodding. “We could go and—”
Denig cleared his throat, cutting off whatever invitation Skif might’ve been about to offer. “Forgive my suspicion,” Denig said, “but why are you out here? You wouldn’t be looking for Dragonkin if you didn’t think there were any of us left.”
I glanced side to side at my companions, unsure of whether or not I should tell the truth. If Skif and Denig were anything like my ancestors, then they were here to protect dragons if there were any left, and for all I knew, they wouldn’t even want us searching for one. But I didn’t want to lie either, because Denig seemed too perceptive to fall for it, and just maybe they would help. “We’re searching for a dragon.”
Denig got visibly tense, and Skif did a double take. “Dragonkin don’t hunt dragons,” Skif said, and though it was subtle, he began to rub at his palm with the fingers of the same hand, and I picked up the faint smell of smoke. “To hurt one would cost your entire bloodline its magic.”
“Not hunting,” I said earnestly. “We’ve no intention of doing any harm.” They both just watched me, waiting for an explanation. “We’re at war, I was hoping to get help.”
“War?” Denig repeated.
I nodded. “The king of Valens invaded Ronan, in the south. He’ll take Cornwall too if we don’t stop him.” They looked at each other, and Skif shrugged at Denig.
“You don’t know that we’re at war?” Nira asked in shock, and I was just as surprised. Surely they had someone who occasionally left the mountain to gather news from the outside world. “It’s been going on for sixty years.”
“Our only concern this deep in the mountains,” Skif answered, “is keeping the dragons safe.”
My eyes lit up, and I could no longer be surprised about them not knowing of the war. They still kept the dragons safe, after all these years. That had to mean… “Does that mean they’re still alive?” I asked, unable to keep an excited smile off my face. Our journey might not have been for nothing. We might not have wasted this last week and a half, and we’d make it back to Cornwall and maybe with a dragon that would help us win the war. My hoping wasn’t done in vain. “The dragons still live on the mountain?”
“They are,” Denig said, wary eyes scanning my expression. “They do.”
At Denig’s confirmation that the dragons still lived, every one of us grinned, but though my heart was nearly soaring with excitement, I didn’t want to get ahead of myself. “Could we meet them?” I asked. “Could we converse with one to get help?”
Skif’s eyebrows furrowed, and he let out a huff of laughter as though he thought I was joking. “You don’t converse with them,” he said. “You get close enough to their home and they’ll defend it.”
“But I’m Dragonkin,” I murmured. “Surely they’ll recognize that?”
“They do,” Skif agreed. “That’s why they don’t hunt us, but that doesn’t mean we go marching into the mountain caves after them.”
“That’s not why they don’t hunt us,” Denig said, passing Skif a look that made him roll his eyes.
Skif motioned at him. “He thinks the dragons are docile because one saved him as a boy.”
“They are docile,” Denig argued, in the annoyed kind of tone that said this wasn’t a new discussion. “You’re the one speculating.”
“Tell that to Old Ovata,” Skif said, glancing at each of us to catch us up on the story. “Who got dropped from the sky into the village at night by a dragon only after he’d been poisoned to death by its breath.”
Denig clicked his tongue. “Ovata was a greedy fool with foul intentions, and the dragons knew it.”
“They’re docile,” I cut in before Skif could come up with a retort. “Enough to understand us.”
“What?” Skif asked in shock.
“How do you know?” Denig prompted.
“I’ve seen it,” I answered, eager to convince them that showing us where the dragons lived was the best decision. “I’ve come face to face with one in a memory, and I’ve seen that they can be controlled with magic.”
“Not adult dragons,” Denig replied.
“I’ll go anyway,” I said. We’d come too far to turn back now.
Skif shrugged. “It’s your funeral, I suppose.”
I looked at Denig, asking, “So you’ll take us?”
“I didn’t say that,” he answered. I opened my mouth to protest, but he said, “Just because you might survive meeting one doesn’t mean that it’s what is best for the dragons, and that’s what we’re here to ensure.”
“We’re at war,” I pleaded. “Do you know how many lives we could save if we got help?”
“At risk to the dragon’s life,” Denig argued, “the very thing that we were born to protect.”