I am providing this story for free on Royal Road because I love my fans. If you'd like to support me, or buy one of my paperbacks, then visit my Gumroad shop.
You can also read the comic that this novella is based off of here (Connected Skies).
Connected Skies is a comic series, it is free on Webtoons but is available for sale on my Gumroad which is linked above. It is in paperback form, too. Who wouldn't want a thick dinosaur graphic novel?
Support me on Kofi. It helps me find the time to make all this content, and makes it more likely that I will provide other works for free.
----------------------------------------
Reddish purple berries glistened in the sunlight, overshadowed by a canopy of pine trees whispering gently on the summer breeze. They were exactly what Balthir was looking for. He and a few others had been sent out to look for these delicious berries, and were instructed to bring back as many as they could find. There was just one problem, they were growing deep down in a ditch.
This would be a challenge, Balthir had searched all day with no luck for finding the fruits; he wasn’t about to go home empty-handed. He was determined to find a safe way to retrieve what was needed.
‘But how?’ he thought to himself.
The golden-brown dilophosaurus stared down and all around, searching for some efficient route down. He didn’t find one, and the berries were simply out of reach; if only he could reach his neck out a little further, then he might be able to grab them.
Balthir noticed that around the other side of the ditch was a deteriorating limb that had fallen from one of the nearby trees due to the recent storms. He approached what seemed to be a dead piece of wood, and began to examine it, wondering if it could support his weight. The limb didn’t seem too deteriorated and still had green pine needles attached.
The branch sloped into the ditch, providing a perfect way down and back up again. Balthir hopped on, careful to balance himself out instead of rushing. Once he had his footing, the warrior apprentice made quick work and gracefully placed one dark golden, scaly foot in front of the other, until he found himself at the bottom of the hole. Sauntering over to the berries, he inspected them.
He drew their sweet aroma into his nostrils. His mouth watered. Tempted to eat them, he licked his chops. Balthir’s mother and father were often worried about him, as he was mildly underweight for his age, so technically consuming the extra calories from the fruit would help rectify that issue. Surely the young dilo would consume them too, but only after they’d been processed into the intended form.
‘My weight’s fine, I feel great,’ he thought decidedly, ‘but I hate to see mom and dad worry. I’ll work on it.’
Grabbing the large bunch of berries by their fragile stems, he yanked them out from the bushes and carried them in his jaws. It was a silly sight; a dilophosaurus, a saurian with a reputation for death and blood spilling, had a face full of yummy red berries.
Balthir scaled the log up to the forest floor, and just like that he had succeeded in retrieving what he’d been ordered to. Now he just needed to get them back to camp. Hurriedly Balthir rushed off home, warm wind whipping between his still developing head crests.
This part of the nation of Drengrheim sure was a beauty. Where he lived beforehand was another region of the nation near the coast, a mountainous territory called Mannavegr, belonging to a tribe of the same name.
In the recent few seasons, there had been a war between the dilophosaurs of Drengrheim and the majungasaur nation of Mazaji. Balthir’s tribe, and the others, fought valiantly against the notoriously cannibalistic majungas; they were a hated race. It wasn’t necessarily cannibalism on its own that earned them such a bad reputation, as every creature must do what it has to in order to survive, but the ugly saurians ate their own hatchlings!
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Majungasaurs often had no real reason behind it. Birth control, perhaps? It just made them very bad parents, and the whole idea disturbed Balthir. His people had a bad reputation among the nations and were called “hatchling eaters”, meanwhile these literal child-killing monsters went unnoticed by many.
As far as Balthir was concerned, it was clear bias! Dilophosaurs were good parents, and would never hurt a hatchling, or anyone who didn’t deserve it for that matter.
During the war, the dilophosaurs made an alliance with the ceratosaurus nation of Makrinwatan, and joined forces against Mazaji soldiers. This led to the swift defeat of those vile majungasaurs, and their country was annexed. Half of what was once their land was divided among the victors. Dilos took the north, and ceratos took the south.
From Mannavegr, some individuals split off and assembled in the newly gained zone. A new settlement was born; the tribe of Katkeruus. The name meant “bitter”, so that future generations would be reminded that righteous hatred is perfectly acceptable; bitterness toward inhumane treatment of others is normal. Balthir, and all the members of Katkeruus, couldn’t be happier with the name.
Many of those who fought in the war and lived to see victory formed the chain of command. Aslak became their Tribeleader; he was a middle-aged soldier, but no less deadly. That black scaled dilo could kill left and right, and he did not relent, no, not for a moment. His voice was like that of a serpent, and his bite more lethal than a viper in a way. On top of his physical performance, Aslak was also a natural-born leader; not a one rejected his claim to the throne, because with him as their head they were in good hands. Everyone felt at peace and trusted him.
Balthir sure looked up to him. All the females loved Aslak, even before he’d become the leader.
‘Ugh! What a life. Lucky hrisungr,’ he thought on his way back to the Katkeruus base camp.
When Balthir arrived home, he dropped off the berries he had collected in a pile that the others used to drop theirs off too. This pile was by the brewery sector of the slate ravine camp.
After that, Balthir went off to train with his mentor Trausti, accompanied by other dilos his age also training into the soldiers they dreamed of being one day. He worked hard every day to achieve this goal, his muscles being worked to the limit.
The young golden-brown dilo had gotten used to all the moves and sets of skills taught to him by his superiors. He liked to think he was rather good at what he did. Despite that, his mentor always found some clever way to throw him off; but that was fine by Balthir, who loved a good obstacle to overcome.
Meanwhile, the brewers took bees’ honey, river water, and special rising powder taken from plants, then added it all to a large clay container. They mixed it all gently with a sturdy stick, then added all the berries that had been gathered.
With a very large, flat rock the brewers covered the container and left the concoction to age for a few weeks. By the time it was ready to be served as a beverage for everyone, the official day of the festival would be upon them.
Tribeleader Aslak had set apart the second full moon of summer to celebrate what he titled the Katkeruus Festival; now, and every year to come, the tribe folk would remember the gruesome war that had been waged, and more importantly, the victory secured in the end. The leader declared that the day and night of the festival would be celebrated with the drinking of berry mead.
There was also another purpose to the festival, and that was the inevitable breeding appeal; with everyone making merry, intoxicated and socializing, there was the opportunity to find the perfect match.
Balthir was just a few seasons too young to be participating in that part of the big day, unfortunately. His instincts to mate were kicking in, as per usual with a male his age, but even if he found a female to be sweet on it wouldn’t matter; his body was not ready to fertilize eggs, not until he was around the age saurians are usually promoted to the rank of soldiers; two years old.
‘Someday,’ he ruminated longingly, ‘I will give back to my tribe. I’ll father lots of hatchlings, and they will grow to be reliable soldiers and able gatherers. Maybe that will be my legacy… yea… Balthir, the father of many greats.’