Lotus weaved in and out of the trees with grace, her long tail flicking behind her at the large, red-tinted tree trunks as she zipped past. The sun was going down, and she had to hurry.

Her ears swiveled and caught the slightest sound to her right, and she banked in that direction immediately. The green foliage below her was pretty, but there was no time to admire it right now.

Where was he?

Lotus scanned the ground with her sharp eyes. The BloodDragon usually hung around in this clearing, marked as unique with bright white flowers growing in the corner. She had been watching him for more than a year now, and knew all his favorite places.

Of course, her family would never approve of her obsession with the BloodDragon. She had heard all of their rants about “being discovered” and “dishonor to the family” and “insolent red rust cannibal dragons”, but she never heeded their voices. The BloodDragons had no idea that ForestDragons existed, and probably wouldn’t know for the next ten thousand years, as far as Lotus was concerned.

Plus, this BloodDragon seemed different, somehow.

There! A flash of red, black, and white scales caught Amaryllis’s eye and she ducked behind a tree just in time, folding her wings and perching neatly.

The BloodDragon lumbered into the clearing, looking over his shoulder nervously. Lotus had nicknamed him Patches, because he had portions of white and red scales all over his body while the rest was black with dark red specks. His eyes were odd and unsettling. One was blood red, with a dark slit in it surrounded by a lighter shade of red. The other was a pitch-black void, with a red slit in the middle. His teeth were constantly bared in the shape of a grin, even though he was always alone when Lotus saw him.

Part of her wondered if he was possessed.

His horns were opposites—one black, one white—but his spines were black. His wing-webbing looked similar to his scales in that there were white and black patches. The primary color was black, though.

His talons and wings were always bloodstained, which struck Lotus as ominous. Were all BloodDragons like that? If so, no wonder the ForestDragons moved out from living with the BloodDragons.

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His wings were very sharp. Lotus thought that maybe he accidentally chopped down trees while flying.

His underbelly was mostly black, but like his wing-webbing, it had a few white spots.

He was humming under his breath—a tone that gave Lotus shivers—but he walked over to the flower patch and picked one of the flowers off, slicing its system easily with razor sharp claws. He buried his snout in the flower, drinking in its smell. His movements seemed harmless.

Lotus brought out her sketchpad from inside the pouch on her body and started drawing with a stencil. She had a million drawings of Patches by now, but she could never get enough. She relaxed on the branch above him and wrapped her tail around the tree’s trunk like a vine, holding her in place securely.

This was how she spent all of her evenings—with an enemy dragon that wasn’t even aware of her presence. It made Lotus feel lonely. She could never bring herself to talk to Patches, because she was secretly afraid of him.

Her family thought that her “evening excursions” were what drove away potential companions, but Lotus knew that any “friend” she might have would be fake. All the other ForestDragons wanted was to be closer to the Chief, which happened to be her adopted father.

He had taken her in as a hatchling, because no one else wanted her—and the fact that his motto was “all are welcome, no outsiders” and he had to live up to it. He had raised her as his daughter, which Lotus was grateful for, but sometimes Lotus needed to be alone—and that happened to be every evening. Her parents knew she could take care of herself, so they never questioned it.

Patches stood up and sniffed the air, and Lotus tensed. Would today be the day that he discovered her?

His eyes swept the clearing, and then his head turned towards Lotus’s tree. She held perfectly still and turned invisible. Surely he couldn’t see her? Surely, surely, he was not aware of her presence.

“I know you’re there,” Patches whispered, and Lotus felt a wave of terror course through her body. Adrenaline pumped through her veins.

Suddenly, Patches met Lotus’s eyes, and he whipped towards her. She tried to run, to flee, to fly away as fast as she could, but he was too fast. His body slammed into hers, trapping her against the tree. Lotus was pinned helplessly beneath his talons. She could not find the heart to move her deadly tail, to stab him in the back. She couldn’t kill the only BloodDragon she knew. How did he know that I was there?

He was still grinning, even though he was obviously startled, because his eyes were wide. His talons moved up her neck, towards the muscle that she knew would knock her out. She reached her talons weakly upwards and found the strength to smile at him faintly but reassuringly. Capture me. Take me. I won’t hurt you; I promise.

The last thing she saw was his shocked face as everything went dark.