His breath was shaky as he sat there in silence, listening for something to emerge from the darkness. Kaden had regained a lot of his senses through the night. Morning would be coming soon, but for now, now they were under the blanket of darkness. The others were supposed to be trying to get some sleep, but he knew that even as they laid there, they were awake and listening as well.

Their unknown enemies were lurking just beyond their view. He knew it; they knew it. Sleeping in a dangerous place was ridiculous to try. Their nerves were on high alert. They had been shot out of the sky at the edge of the water nation. That was a direct attack on the sanctity of the nation’s unified agreement.

The House of the Serpent blatantly attacked them at the citadel. Now they were being shot out of the air merely traveling. Whoever the House of the Serpent was, they were getting increasingly more bold. Having the water ambassador working for them was alarming. He wondered if they had been behind everything this entire time. Were they the ones who trapped Zuma so many weeks ago?

His attention perked as he heard rustling behind him. Feeling a presence move closer. He tensed himself before a reassuring hand was on his shoulder. Sayori slid next to him on the log he managed to find as a seat. Folding her hands over each other as she sat in silence next to him, they stared off into the darkness.

Several moments passed and she said nothing at all. Kaden didn’t care for it. He knew she had something to say. THe anxiety of waiting to hear it was eating at him. He broke the tension.

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Taking a deep breath. “Can you blame me?”

“No,” he said as he looked down at his own hands in the low firelight. “Is Taldor doing okay?”

She looked back over her shoulder at the dragon. “I don’t know. Our connection is weakened. I can’t sense their emotions like I could before. I know they’re in pain, though. You may have stopped the bleeding, but there’s still a lot of damage.”

“I did my best.”

Placing her hand back on my shoulder, she leaned over to look me in the eye as my head hung low. “You did wonderfully. You’re just not a healer. We understand that. You did more than we would have even expected. Thank you. I mean it, truly, thank you. I don’t know what I’d have done if I lost Taldor like that.”

Swallowing hard, he looked back to the dark forest in front of them. “We need to get to the temple. There are healers that can help them better than my patch job.”

“We have to go by foot and it’s going to be slow going. I don’t know how quick we can move, but…” she looked back out into the forest herself, “I don’t know what’s out there to stop us.”

They hadn’t had any sign of movement since they had taken up camp there. Kaden knew it was a false sense of security. They had weapons that were able to shoot them out of the sky. Darkness fell over the field before they were able to do any searching. There was only so much one could do in the dark.

Evonne had gone a little way out while using her fire magic to light her way. They felt uncomfortable with her being out there alone and plead for her to return. They were not in any position to scout. Zuma and Taldor needed time to rest.

Zuma had been truly sleeping the entire time. They had briefly opened their eyes and grunted at Kaden when he went to check on them to let them know they weren’t unconscious, just resting. He didn’t know how much power he had used that belonged to them. If that’s what he had done at all. Zuma had helped, he knew that, he just didn’t know how.

There was still so much about the dragons that he didn’t understand. He didn’t understand where any of their magic truly came from and how they were able to use it as they did. He didn’t understand why some magic became elemental from the different dragons. If someone knew, he was sure they’d probably have exploited it already.

“We’ll get to the northern temple and we’ll get Taldor all fixed up. Then we can get back to our pilgrimage.”

She scoffed and leaned back, her chin pulling up toward the speckled canopy of stars above. “You think we’re just going to go back to the pilgrimage like nothing happened? We are victims of an act of war. Who’s war? We don’t know. Too much has happened lately. We won’t be going on the pilgrimage as normal.”

He let out a deep sigh. “Then how will you all present to the matriarchs? How will you go through the trials?”

A smile danced across her lips. “These are the trials, Kaden. We’re being tested even now.”

His eyes followed her to the sky as they watched the stars blink lazily above. The dust of the heavens painted across the black abyss. It made him think of the rarity of magic and how only a select few were blessed. The matriarchs looked into one’s soul and decided if they were honorable enough, if they embodied a specific trait enough, to receive a magical blessing.

So how was it that the ambassador could exhibit such cruelty? He had once been blessed by a water dragon matriarch. That meant he showed and represented incredible compassion. How was it that he was able to use that magic for such horrible things? Someone had once told him that just because they got magic when they were young, that didn’t mean that as adults, they were the same as they were when they were merely a child.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Maybe this is why the matriarchs were so concerned. Their blessings were used for malicious means, the opposite of what they had given them for. Magic was being abused, and they were the ones who had given it out in the first place. Of course, they felt responsible. It was no wonder they were willing to act. Using him as the fount, though? That was the strange thing. Why him?

Day came quickly and they were up just as the sky started to change colors. If they didn’t get moving soon, their reprieve wouldn’t last long. They were in enemy territory. It wasn’t a leisurely camping trip.

Sayori had gotten Taldor to their feet, but it was slow moving. They were wincing in pain with each step they took. They weren’t going to be able to make through it very quickly. Evonne and Reese had joined together to scout around the camp in the morning light. The trees were thick, causing a dark canopy above. This actually helped them in traveling. Without the light breaking through as much, the underbrush wasn’t growing as thick.

Reese was walking up with something in his hand as they were finishing packing up the few bedrolls they had out. Holding out a strap of fabric, he said, “this is all we found.”

“It’s just green fabric,” Sayori dismissed. “That tells us nothing.”

“No, it tells us a lot. Right, Kaden?”

Kaden looked back and forth between them. “I have no idea what that means.”

Reese’s arms slumped, and he groaned. “I was hoping you’d be able to identify it in your own homeland. Yeah, it tells us nothing.”

Behind them, Evonne was walking up with her hands on her head. “There are scrapes in the dirt from where they pulled their bodies. Some of them were closer to us than I’m comfortable with. We didn’t even hear them last night. It felt as if we were alone out here and yet there’s evidence that we weren’t.”

“What were they doing if they weren’t attacking us?” asked Sayori. “What was their plan? Shoot us out of the air, then let us hang out in with the plant life?”

“Maybe we’re too close for comfort?” Kaden said and in return he got several raised eyebrows. “In the air, from a distance, we can’t hit them with our own magic. But down here, we’re a lot closer. We can hurt them.”

“True,” said Reese as he was stuffing the strip of fabric into his bag. “I don’t know why they wouldn’t just use those same ballistas down here though, those were damn effective against the dragons.”

Sayori shook her head. “Whoever they are, whatever they want, we don’t have time for them. We need to get to the temple and quickly.”

IN a quick movement, she stomped her foot and the dirt roped around Taldor’s legs before hardening in strange positions. “Hopefully those will help with pressure and support and we can move a little quicker. Taldor, please take a few steps.”

The dragon obeyed and was able to move a little more quickly than before. Whatever braces she had put on, it helped. Kaden was impressed she had even thought of doing such a thing. Sayori was incredibly resourceful. He wondered if this was a trait of all earth mages or if it was just her. Time would tell.

“Okay,” Reese clapped. “I’m flying.”

They all groaned and chided him.

“No,” he said. “I’m not going far. I’ll use my magic to bounce any arrows off. We need to know where we’re going. So Bee and I will do some quick surveying of things before dipping back down here with you all. We don’t know where we even are!”

Kaden had to reluctantly agree to it. They had been behind him when they flew. He was right, his wind magic would bounce off any onslaught of projectiles. After some bickering between him and Evonne, of all people, Reese was in the skies with Beelin.

“Do you think he’ll be okay?” she asked Kaden.

“He better be. We need to know where we are.”

He worried that Reese wouldn’t be able to see them in the dark canopy of trees. So he had them wait until he came back. When he did, he told them that yeah they were in the middle of nowhere. There were only miles and miles of trees. He was able to figure out what direction they needed to head, though. They agreed he would only do it every so often, keeping with them for the most part.

They started moving shortly after. The trees they were in towered high above and were incredibly thick around. It was a wonder that they were even standing as tall as they were. The dragons had no issue walking between and around them. Taldor and Zuma were close to one another as Beelin and Jerri patrolled around them.

No one spoke as they moved through the forest. Outside of the initial skirmish, they found no more evidence of the attackers. There were no ballistas, no tracks for them. Nothing. It was as if there had been no assailants at all. The knot forming in Kaden’s stomach was growing. He had been mentally preparing himself for another fight, another bloody battle. Not knowing where the next attack was going to come from was nerve-wracking.

The undergrowth was sparse, so they could see fairly far underneath the trees. Even then, they saw no motion outside of the wildlife that didn’t care that the dragons were even present in their woods. It always surprised Kaden that animals in general didn’t care about dragons.

His mind went back to the wolves. They had cared. Something had been wrong with them. Animals never bothered with dragons and yet these were there to consume them. Kaden knew magic was at the core of what made a dragon thrive. Why would wolves want that magic?

Both Zuma and Taldor suddenly lowered their bodies, crouching down. He didn’t know what they had seen or felt, but both of them moved into a low defensive stance. Looking around, he saw Jerri doing the same thing. Something had alerted them.

Looking for his companions, he saw Reese motioning for him to get down. He didn’t know what getting down would do for any of them when the dragons were such massive creatures. That’s when he heard it, a screeching whistle above.

He tried to make out what it was, what would cause them all to dip their heads, but he saw nothing. With a start, Reese was pushing the wind down his hand, propelling him up the base of a tree. He watched as his companion ran horizontally up a tree. He heard whistling and before he could react himself, Zuma shot out a wall of mist. Several arrows fell to the ground with a clatter.

They had found them.

He tried to look back up and find where Reese had gone. That’s when he saw it, saw them. Several figures jumped from tree to tree, gliding in the air between. They couldn’t find them on the ground because they weren’t on the ground. They were in the trees above them.

Jerri wasn’t playing around with the buzzing bees of the forest, they were burning them down. Smoke stung Kaden’s eyes as several trees exploded into ash. They were going to have to have a talk about collateral damage with Jerri at some point. There were several dozen figures bouncing around above.

Another hail of arrows whistled their way as Sayori did her best to create a shield wall. The angle was hard for her to manage as they came down from the skies. They had been so vigilant and yet they were still caught off guard.

A flash of wind and light popped off above him and his eyes darted to see Reese falling, tumbling through the air, unable to right himself. He was going to hit the ground hard, too hard.

Kaden was about to see his friend die.