The sun was approaching its zenith and that was beginning to make Aytin nervous.

He hadn't seen anything larger than a rabbit the entire day. They knew prey was out here. Before they left the night before, Aytin had laid out a handful of apples. That bait was gone in the morning, but whatever ate it hadn't bothered to show up for the main course.

And it was getting uncomfortable up in the tree Aytin was sitting in. His magic meant that he was never in any danger of falling, but that didn't make the narrow branches any nicer to sit on.

Below, Faelon lay in the depression he had enlarged from a seasonal creek bed. By the look of things, the red dragon was enjoying a nap while his companion kept a lookout.

Aytin couldn't really begrudge the dragon his sleep. He had done the bulk of the work preparing their ambush the day before. More critically, until they had more food, anything he could do to conserve energy was a good thing.

Idly, the young dragonette flipped through another page in Zan's journal. It was proving to be difficult to decipher. Not because the recipes were complicated, but because the apothecary's handwriting and spelling were so terrible. He spent most of his time puzzling out which splotches of ink on the page were letters and which were from forgetting to blot the paper after scrawling a note.

What he had found so far was somewhat interesting, but not particularly useful. The rants, he mostly ignored after the first couple. And most of the rambling thoughts Zan had put to paper weren't worth reading over. He mostly skipped those, save for the odd bit that caught his eye. Like the poem about Xantha.

That had been so terrible and graphic that he had to read it out of morbid curiosity. It honestly explained a lot about Zan's steadfast refusal to contemplate betraying her.

'I wonder if he ever showed it to her?' Now that was a thought worth chuckling over.

But between all the personal bits were the recipes Aytin had hoped for. At least, there were recipes written there. Some didn't have any titles or were written in some sort of code. The rest ranged the gambit from situationally useful to frivolous garbage.

A paste promised to leave scales shining for days, but the passage also mentioned that by swapping two ingredients it became an incredibly painful contact poison. Instructions for an energy draught had promise, but a couple of the ingredients were also listed as part of a concoction to remove fungus from around talons. He decided that risking it wouldn't be the best idea.

The rest ran a similar gauntlet, often also requiring ingredients he didn't have. Frost powder from a white dragon, for example, or newly sprouted buds from a rose bush. And he didn't even know what potash was.

There wasn't a single thing among any of it that looked like a way to stop the infection that was beginning to grow in his wings.

And it was definitely growing. The tears were puffy and warm to the touch. Painful, too. More so than before. And the faint sickly sweet scent of a festering wound was beginning to grow stronger.

He was paging past a rant about the nobility - a frequent target of Zan's hate - when a line caught his eye. At first he thought it was the usual stream of consciousness notes about plans for revenge against everyone who had wronged him, but a name stood out.

Killing them is easy. Poison. Water cistern protected, but not always the gutters. Do they check what's past the first layers of soap? Contaminate utensils before a feast. But then they get smart. Get them to fight each other? Feuds? Ask Xana. She was one of them. She'll know.

That didn't make sense. Not that most of Zan's ramblings did, but it seemed like he was implying Xantha had some sort of inside knowledge about the nobility.

Aytin couldn't imagine a former huntress from the frontier would be aware of any noble intrigues. He himself only had the barest of understanding of how the prominent families felt towards his own family, which generally boiled down to apathy and disdain.

'But what was it she said when I first woke up? How one of her huntresses caught dad's eye?' He was still drugged and confused at the time, so he hadn't realized the significance of Xantha's words. 'Maybe she was exiled by her family. That would explain Zan's comments and how much she hates nobility.'

That was something to think about. Later. When he wasn't searching for some way to keep alive the faint hope that he would fly again someday.

His hope grew upon reading what was on the next page. It was enough to send him scampering down the tree to find his pack.

Inside were dozens of little stoppered vials as well as a mortar and pestle and other implements of an apothecary. Aytin had packed them for just this opportunity.

Only four were important to him at that moment. He mumbled to himself as he dug through the sack. "Two-talon fungus powder... there it is. Paleweed? Didn't Zan mention that? White willow bark. Damn, not much left. But there's plenty of frilled puckroot extract, at least."

It was far from the same recipe that he remembered Zan using. But according to the barely legible notes, this one promised to improve healing speed and reduce scarring on wounds. More importantly, nothing in the next fifteen pages showed anything helpful. Everything else was blank. This was his best and only option.

Nothing about the instructions were particularly complicated. He just had to grind the right proportions of white willow bark and paleweed, then add the two-talon fungus and finish with a few drops of the puckroot extract. Mix with an equal part water and apply directly to the wound.

The problem was getting the proportions right. He didn't have a scale and there wasn't any way to compare a chunk of bark to a few strands of dried grass.

Eventually, Aytin ground the two materials separately, then used a set of measuring spoons to get the right amounts. He winced when he realized the recipe had required nearly his entire supply of willow bark. But there wasn't any helping it. He would just have to get it right the first time.

Once all the grinding and mixing was done, Aytin was left with a paste that smelled like stale ale mixed with crushed grass and looked like thick, gray gruel. Hesitantly, he scooped up a glob with one finger.

There had been a note that this stuff tended to cause discomfort upon application. The faint tingling where it touched his fingertip may or may not have been his imagination. Before he lost his nerve, Aytin touched the paste to the rip in his left wing.

It stung horribly at first. Then the pain seemed to seep deeper and get worse. He had to wrap his hand around his own muzzle to keep from screaming while his tail thrashed back and forth as the agony peaked.

Gradually, the pain subsided. Aytin gasped for air, panting as quietly as he could. Once he had control over his breathing again, he looked fearfully at his wing.

From the pain, he had expected to see a patch of flesh seared away, like from a black dragon's breath. Or even a spot of dark corruption. Instead, the bruising was noticeably reduced around the point where he had applied the concoction.

With a trembling finger, he brushed the spot once again. It hurt, but not as much as he remembered. Maybe the nerves had been overloaded by the medicine, but Aytin hoped that it was actually a good sign.

"Of course, I'm not done yet," he murmured, looking towards the remaining gray paste. That pain was a steep price to pay for keeping his wings.

One that he was willing to pay.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

By the time it was over, Aytin was trembling like a leaf. Even the tips of his fingers were throbbed slightly. Whatever was in the medicine wasn't friendly to unprotected flesh.

But he thought the wings were looking better. A trickle of blue blood leaked from places, but the swelling might have gone down, just a little. And it might have just been that the treatment had burned away the nerves, but there wasn't quite as much pain as before. However, it remained to be seen if it would be enough.

Aytin looked up with a shuddering sigh and noticed that Faelon had his eyes open and was staring at him.

"You found something?" he asked, surprisingly quietly for his size.

In response, Aytin unfurled his wings to show the salve covered wounds.

Faelon snaked his head forward and examined the gashes with a critical eye. When he sniffed them, he scrunched up his snout. It was such an incongruous look that Aytin had to choke back a laugh.

That earned him a sharp look. But the dragon only said, "It seems no worse, at least."

"Hopefully better than that with how much it hurt."

"And is there any sign of our prey?"

"Uhhhh..." The sun had moved noticeably since Aytin slid out of the tree and into the stream bed.

He scampered out to the trunk of his chosen tree and up its trunk. Climbing wasn't a skill creatures born with wings generally put much stock in, but sharp talons and a magically enhanced sense of balance did wonders to make up for lack of practice.

Thankfully, it didn't look like he had missed anything. The pile of apples was still undisturbed and there was nothing to be seen among the tall grass. It was almost disappointing.

Except...

It took a few seconds to realize what he was seeing. He had been looking for pigs; small, fast, and low to the ground. What he saw instead was none of these things. And when the scale registered, Aytin's ears pricked straight up in surprise.

The Luffin keep had a number of cows and oxen. What he was seeing now looked a bit like those farm animals. They had thick, dark pelts and a bovine shape at least.

But they were three, maybe four times the size of the livestock from back home. Taller at the shoulder than almost any dragonette, and nearly as long as his wings were wide. And these had long, forward turned horns with wickedly sharp looking points.

"Well?" Faelon hissed. He could see his companion's surprise, but didn't dare stick his head above the lip of the creek.

"I... I'm not sure."

The animals were in a line, moving slowly and deliberately up the game trail. The first paused and raised its head. For a moment, Aytin thought he had been spotted, but instead it just sniffed the air and let out a low bellow before resuming its plodding.

Falon had no trouble hearing the noise. "What was that?"

"Giant oxen?" Something jogged a memory. He recalled a story from one of the huntresses. "I think they're tirox."

There had only ever been a few on his home island, and he had never actually seen one. But the description fit.

A shiver seemed to go through Faelon at the words, from the point of his snout to the tip of his tail. When it passed, the big dragon was as still as if he had been carved from a block of ruby.

Aytin eased his way down from his perch and back into the depression, being careful to keep the trunk between himself and the herd.

"Where are they?" the dragon demanded as soon as Aytin's feet hit the ground.

"Heading towards the bait. Eleven of them," he whispered once he was close. "But those things are so big that an arrow will just make them mad, and you dug the pits for something the size of a pig. I don't-"

"Tell me when they get there."

"Alright," Aytin nodded, resignedly. "We'll follow the plan. One of the smaller ones might get stuck and-"

"No. The plan is changing." Faelon's mouth cracked, exposing wicked fangs in a draconic smile. "Pigs are fast. Tirox aren't. You tell me when they reach the bait, I will run one down."

It made sense. The dragon outmassed the biggest of the herd by at least ten times. And they didn't exactly look like they were made for speed.

Aytin nodded and crept back up to his lookouts. Sure enough, the tirox were taking their sweet time, treading slowly up the path in single file.

Minutes dragged by as they ambled along, occasionally stopping for a few mouthfuls of grass to chew but generally heading towards the ambush. From time to time the leader would raise its head to sniff the air, and then call out to the rest.

It hadn't been luck that kept the scent of a dragon out of the noses of those great beasts. The slopes of the depression muted the wind, and the mild breeze above didn't so much as ruffle Faelon's wings as he waited.

When the path turned slightly, revealing the pile of apples in the middle of the trail, the lead tirox let out an excited bellow and picked up the pace.

From this close, Aytin wasn't sure one of his arrows' iron points would even pierce the shaggy hides of these beasts. Maybe if he hit an eye or the neck, but he wasn't that good of a shot.

The front tirox reached the apples and started to dig in. It was quickly interrupted. Another butted it aside to get its own share of the bounty.

The first was having none of it. He - at this point, its sex was very clear - squared up against the other male and let loose a titanic bellow. His opponent rose to the challenge with a bellow of his own, and then charged.

Their wicked horns met with a crash as the pair fought for control over the prize.

Aytin also figured that it would serve as a perfect distraction. He caught Faelon's eyes and waved towards the herd.

Originally, the plan had been to come out breathing fire and sending his prey running. But Faelon adapted quickly to the unexpected opportunity. Staying low and moving surprisingly quietly for such an enormous creature, the dragon stalked forward.

Not that something that big could stay unnoticed for long. The grass only came up to Aytin's chest and didn't do anything to hide an adult dragon. But his approach bought Faelon a few seconds. It was enough to cover a third of the distance to the herd before the first tirox bellowed out an alarm.

That was Faelon's cue to start sprinting. Unfortunately, red dragons weren't exactly built for speed.

At least his crippled wing wasn't dragging behind him. Between them, Aytin and Faelon had managed to rig up a makeshift sling of sorts. Really, it was just a few lengths of rope and scrap cloth; enough to secure the ruined limb to Faelon's body while he moved.

Regardless, he wasn't exactly fast. And the tirox took advantage of that, forming together in a half circle to face the charging dragon.

Faelon scrambled to backpedal as he was faced with what was for all intents and purposes a natural pike wall. There was no doubt that if he pressed the attack, the dragon would win the battle, but he would have to take his licks to do it.

Having already lost the use of a wing, it was obvious Faelon wanted to avoid any serious injury. He darted in with his long neck, trying to reach above and behind the horns. No such luck. The tirox backpedaled and raised their heads, forcing Faelon to abort his attack once again or risk a facefull of horns.

An arrow buried itself at the feet of the largest of the tirox. The beast didn't even seem to notice as it shifted and crushed the shaft under a massive hoved foot.

Aytin cursed as it disappeared into the tall grass. His arm ached from the effort of drawing the bow even halfway. It was a heavier weight then he was used to and his week in captivity had done him no favors. Worse, the miss had cost him one of his handful of arrows and didn't have any way to make more.

The herd continued backing away slowly, bellowing their anger at the progressively more and more frustrated dragon. Faelon took a swipe with one of his clawed forearms, more as a probe than any serious attack. It sent a couple of the tirox scrambling out of the way, but he just didn't have the reach for an effective strike and his follow up bite was once again turned away by horns.

Reaching a decision, he started to turn to bring his tail to bear. One strike had literally torn Juniper in half, and it would certainly do a number even on something as enormous as a tirox.

But halfway through the turn, one of the ropes securing Faelon's wing to his side slipped. The makeshift arrangement had never been meant to hold up to this sort of abuse, and his wing flopped to the ground.

Faelon let out a hiss of frustration as it got underfoot. To make matters worse, the length of rope tangled in his foreleg. It was a matter of moments to shrug out of the remnants of the sling and regain his footing, but those were moments when the dragon's attention was split.

Sensing an opportunity, the bull took it. He charged forward, slamming into Faelon's wounded left side. The dragon roared in pain, loud enough that Aytin nearly had to cover his ears. It sent the tirox back a step as well. But seeing a predator in distress, the rest of the herd ignored their discomfort and began to close in.

Faelon never let them. His roar turned into a whoosh as fire exploded from the red dragon's maw. The tone of the tirox's cries turned to panic as the sky above them turned to flames and the heat singed their coats. Most stumbled backwards, and out of range of mutual support.

Quick as a flash, Faelon cut the flames and snaked his head around. He locked his jaws around the neck of the tirox that had tried to gore him and shook.

The snap of bones could be heard throughout the clearing, sending the rest of the herd scattering as the tirox's cries of terror ceased with an abrupt finality. Faelon gave the suddenly limp body one more shake just to be sure, and then dropped the carcass to loose a victorious roar towards the sky above.