They left the beach, following a winding sandy path that Sirius knew. Apparently there was a cave at the base of the hill which would provide them good shelter for a few nights. A few nights before someone showed up in another ship. Half-way up the path he re-figured up to a week worst case, definitely no more than a month, and he didn’t sound too concerned when he said it. Amanda hoped it wasn’t a month.

Once again, Amanda carried her small wooden box of things that Sirius had given her. The book of ghost stories lay on top reminding her of what she still had, or rather who she still had. Sirius carried the larger crate, containing food and other things that belonged to him. Amanda doubted that was all he owned though and she wondered if his relaxed attitude was just for her benefit. He was doing a good job of it if so. Perhaps too good. She would have felt better if he’d been at least a little worried.

They reached a junction where the path split off in several directions. Sirius started to turn toward one of the paths on the right. Amanda paused. Situated on the left between two slightly downhill facing paths was a large pile of crates covered with a tarp tied down tightly with rope.

“There’s stuff here,” Amanda remarked.

Sirius glanced back. “Mmm, someone’s shipment they’ve parked here for the time being, or maybe a pre-arranged trade. Don’t touch anything, some of them put defensive curses on their shit.”

“It’s like buried treasure but above ground,” Amanda mused with a smile.

She heard Sirius laugh and then he turned to look at her. “Well it’s a bit much effort to bury it. To be honest, even curses are overkill. Most of the time it’ll just be a tracking infusement or a seal on the box that’s gotta be deactivated before its opened.”

“A seal…” Amanda echoed suddenly remembering something she’d forgotten.

Sirius mistook her response for a question. “For people shipping high value items openly. Sorcerers and warlocks and aristocrats use them. We don’t do it. Ship things openly I mean or ship anything for an aristocrat or a sorcerer. Warlocks are okay sometimes.” He shook his head. “There’s tax rules and things and you run a higher risk of being hit by pirates. We ship high values items occasionally for a selection of clientele but they go unlisted. There is risk there if you get caught but we don’t do it often and we don’t usually allow seals. They’re like a red flag at certain ports. We get ourselves known for only shipping low value goods then we’re less of a target. Occasionally we break the rules…” he paused and rethought. With a sigh he said, “Often we break the rules, and we try to be careful, but you know... money talks.”

“You weren’t worried, after Sirena lied about how many pets she had, that you might have other clientele lying about using seals?” Amanda asked.

“You mean that box with the dragon eggs?”

“Yeah, the eggs…”

Sirius looked worried. He shook his head. “Truthfully I didn’t think of it until we found that one and by then they’d already taken the lid off. Maybe it was broken already…”

“It was a firestarting seal.”

“What?”

She set her crate down on the ground. Sirius did the same with his.

“Did you notice how the inside of that box was a different type of wood?” she asked him.

He gave her a confused nod.

“That’s fireproof wood. Very special. Very expensive. It doesn’t burn, well it does if you cook it for long enough and hot enough but they won’t have been doing that. You see... how do I put this? Dragon eggs need heat to survive. Not like the regular sit on them kind of heat, but dragon fire heat. Normally a mother dragon will periodically cook her eggs. It’s what makes them grow. Rumor has it if you leave a dragon egg without fire it will just stay dormant until it gets the heat it needs but anyone I’ve ever heard of who’s tried it has always later failed to get the egg to hatch if it’s been left cold for too long. Maybe if it was like really extra cold or something, I don’t know but the general rule with transporting dragon eggs is you have to keep them hot. That spell was doing that, or at least it was until you took the lid off.”

“You mean by opening that box we killed the eggs?” Sirius was giving her a look somewhere between incredulity and horror.

Amanda shook her head. “Well you would have except…” she hesitated a second, took a breath and then admitted, “Except I’ve been keeping them warm. Or at least I was until we got kicked of the ship.”

Sirius took a seat on his crate and put his head between his hands.

Amanda continued, “And now no one knows they need to be kept warm.”

“Shit,” Sirius mumbled.

Amanda bit her lip. “Dragon eggs aren’t cheap either and a spell like that, it takes some skill to cast.”

He suddenly pulled himself out of his thoughts and gave her a focused look. “How did you know what it was?”

“I mentioned that I spent a bit of time playing around with magic as a kid, well I might have undersold that a little.”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Sirius nodded. “You said you cost a guy his memories?”

Amanda nodded.

“How’d you learn? I mean, infusements? Or-”

“Books,” Amanda answered. “Sorcery books aren’t that hard to come by once you know what you’re looking for.”

Sirius nodded then he gave a laugh. “No, I suppose they aren’t. We actually ship a lot of spell books, but…” he frowned again and then shook his head. “I’ve never understood them. I’ve read them. I know Sonny, and Fallon, and Sable have all tried. They can’t get anything to work. And I’ve seen different seals used for the same thing so it’s just not a matter of drawing something is it? How do you know what any one is used for?”

“There are common ones but no, it’s not just drawing something. Certain shapes help with certain magic so they often get used for it but it’s not a hard rule. I just know some of the common ones. And as for spells I figure they’re written in a sort of code. You don’t actually need everything that’s listed. In fact I’m pretty sure some things are listed specifically to ensure the spell doesn’t function unless the person using it knows what they’re doing.”

“Okay, makes sense I guess but that leaves two questions, one, how did you figure that out and two, I know you’re smart so don’t take this the wrong way but if you figured this out how come nobody else ever has?”

“You think I’m smart?” she asked, genuinely surprised.

He laughed. “But you know what I mean, you were a kid? A teenager?”

She smiled. “Preteen, technically, I was about eleven. A friend and I found a notebook and some component pouches which were conveniently organised plus what I think was a less common spell book, one with similar but contrasting spells to that which we’d seen elsewhere. My friend likes to collect old books. But this one seemed more accurate, although we made some adjustments to those just out of practicality and childish fearlessness, but the thing was they worked, even with our silly substitutions.”

“You found them? Where?”

“Half buried in an underground riverbed. We were exploring some caves that had appeared one summer when river was really low.” She shrugged. “One corner of this chest was sticking out of the mud and we dug it up.”

Sirius glanced over at the cargo under the tarpaulin. “And you weren’t worried when you opened it that it might be cursed or protected by something?”

“We were stupid inquisitive kids. Very lucky stupid inquisitive kids. Anyway, we took notes, and then we experimented. And we made a lot of almost very bad mistakes. I mean some were very bad mistakes, without the almost, but it could have been a lot worse in hindsight. I mean we fucked around with shit like time travel. I get why they have some of the laws they do.”

Sirius was staring at her speechless now.

She gave a nervous laugh. She knew she should probably stop talking. Being a firestarter was one thing. Admitting to messing about with blood magics was a whole different level, but he had said that some of his crew had tried spellcraft so maybe he wasn’t so against that plus what was the worst that could happen now? It felt kind of good being honest. Some of the things she’d told him today she hadn’t even told her father, or anyone for that matter. “I don’t do it anymore, not since… well not in awhile, but I did get pretty good at some things. Like with infusements, when you use them, the way you use them, they have a different feel to them depending on what they are. I could probably tell you what you have in your coat.”

He blinked in surprise and glanced down at his coat, to the side where he kept all the infusements. “You could identify these?” he asked.

She nodded. “I mean, I make no promises but yeah, probably, some of them at least I’m sure.”

He looked thoughtful and then he nodded. “Maybe once we’ve set up camp.” He glanced back toward the path he had originally been intending to take but he didn’t get up just yet. “So those dragon eggs, how long can they survive without being heated?”

“I don’t know. A few days at least. I don’t know about a week though. It’s an inexact science.”

“How did you know about them? What they needed? From the seal?”

She shook her head. “No, that just told me whoever packed them knew what they were doing. A lot of dragon eggs get shipped wrong, because poachers don’t know what they’re doing.” She sighed. “No, I knew what they needed because I’ve shipped dragon eggs before. I mentioned my dad and I had traded unicorns and pegasi up the coast…”

He nodded.

She continued, “Well, one time we shipped dragon eggs. Twice actually.”

“On a ship? With your powers?”

She shook her head. “Once on a ship. Once by horse. Dad never told the people we sailed with what I was or what we were carrying, and I was younger then, had more control, before hormones hit or whatever you know? They did eventually find out and then they wouldn’t let us on board anymore.”

He nodded. “How’d you know to keep it warm?”

“Well, the first one, dad won it in a poker game. The guy he won it off told him to keep it warm. He didn’t actually know what that meant until my friend, Wolf is his name, he’s a book nerd like you. Anyway, Wolf had read about them in a book, and well the rest is history.”

“What about the second one?” Sirius was looking at her with complete fascination.

“Well, that one a guy approached my dad.” She gave a laugh. “Apparently he’d heard I was a firestarter. We’re good for shipping dragons when we’re not setting ships on fire. I guess the guy was desperate. Good firestarters are hard to come by. Who ever heard of leaving dragon eggs in the care of a teenage firestarter? The guy must have been really desperate for sure, or insane but he paid a pretty penny for us to get them to where he wanted them and somehow we managed it. By that point I was a lot older, and out the other end of uncontrollable.” She smiled. “I think it was the first time after I got back from that place that I actually felt like things might be okay again.”

“I’m sorry you went though that.” He gave her a sympathetic smile.

“It’s not your fault.”

“So the guy who was shipping our eggs, do you think he was a breeder?”

Amanda shrugged. “They’re illegal in a lot of places and where they’re not is either cowboy territory or you need a licence. Legitimate dragon breeders are rare and this guy is obviously flying under the radar. It’s hard to hide a dragon hatchery. But he did know what he’s doing and if he was keeping the eggs alive it does imply he’s at least considering selling to breeders even if they were originally poached. There are some areas further away where taking from a wild nest is legal, encouraged even if the dragons are pests so it depends where you shipped them from.”

“The Tundras?”

Amanda considered it. “I’ve never been there but I do know there are some hatcheries up that way.”

“I’m worried we’ve pissed off a legitimate dragon trader. Even an illegitimate one wouldn’t be great. Not that I want to be shipping dragons but they’re high value traders people who ship dragons. Not that there’s much we can do about it now.”

“How far are they from their destination?”

“A few days, maybe a little more. Shiv went a little off course to drop us here. That’s another reason I don’t think Shiv’s betrayed us. There were other islands he could have left us, ones requiring less of a detour. That and Shiv doesn’t usually leave the people he crosses alive.”

Amanda frowned. “That’s not particularly comforting.”

Sirius smiled but it seemed like he was more sure of himself again. He stood up and picked up his crate. “Come on. Cave’s not too far.”