Amy rolled over in her bed and opened Instagram for the 17th time that hour. That same goddamn post was at the top of her screen. Again. She threw her phone to the other side of her bed and sighed. It wasn’t even an inflammatory post--just a girl she had a few classes with in college posing on the beach with her boyfriend--but she had just found out her own was cheating on her. Or only cheated once? She didn’t know and, quite frankly, didn’t care. A black hole had been growing in her stomach ever since she saw that picture, making her want to punch something, or eat the entire tub of salted caramel ice cream in her freezer, or block every single person she knew and move to rural Canada, or--she didn’t know. She was just so exhausted.
Grimacing, she shuffled over to where her phone had landed and turned it on. 3:13AM. She needed to go to sleep. But. After quickly exiting Instagram with a roll of her eyes, she went back to her messages and opened her pinned chat with her best friend, James. She read the messages for what had to be the 50th time: Ames wtf. I swear I just saw Kai at the gay bar??? Might not be him though. Lemme do some investigative journalism, I’ll keep you posted. And then the picture in all its glory. My boyfriend of two years had one hand tangled in brown, curly hair, the other hand wrapped around a waist, and his lips pressed against the other man’s as if he had been stranded in the desert for years and was offered a drink of the purest, coldest ice water. The desire in the kiss was so… was she really that bad of a kisser?
Amy clenched her fist, seeing red. This time, she threw her phone all the way across the room and maneuvered over to her nightstand, opening the top drawer. She grabbed the orange pill bottle labeled, in pink pen, ‘For Emergencies Only’ and fingered through the assortment of pills until she found an Ambien. Smiling like a mother who had just found her child in a crowded theme park, she gathered a bit of spit in her mouth, popped the sleeping pill in, and tucked herself back beneath the blankets. As her world faded to black, she forgot all her rage, all her sadness, all her trepidation, and let the sweet comfort of sleep whisk her away.
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Ingrid Au’Clare wiped the wet blood off of the tip of her spear with a rag she kept in her spatial storage. She threw the spoiled cloth to the ground, where it landed on the thrice-punctured body of a draconian swordsman. Ingrid let a smile flash across her face for an instant as she admired her handiwork. Blood was pooling out of the inside of both elbows and the throat where her spear had found purchase on the enemy, and three other draconians with similar wounds lay dead around her. Her smile changed to a neutral expression as she turned to address her party members.
The tip of Devan’s index finger had been transformed into a spindly tree branch as he brushed it over a gash on the arm of a bulky satyr with a longsword sheathed on his back. She frowned as she recognized the second skill in Devan’s inherited healing arts being used to patch up the satyr, Ryam. The last two party members, the twins Arun and Celena, stood side by side and looked up at Ingrid as she approached.
“Are you trying to get Devan to use up all his mana right before we face the dragon, Ryam?” Ingrid scowled.
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At least Ryam had the sense to look sheepish. “I’m sorry Ingrid, I was fighting two draconians and a third came out of nowhere and slashed at me!”
She turned to Arun, with his bow sitting idly in his left hand, and Celena, with her wand tucked behind her ear. “And why did you two let him get ambushed like that?”
“We had our own draconians to deal with,” Arun rolled his eyes. Celena finished for him, “there were more than we expected.”
“Hmph, okay.” She turned to face the golden double doors that towered above them and took a deep breath. They had been preparing to face the Dragon of Cantorack for the past six months, studying his attack styles, his breath skills, everything known about his inherited arts, and, most importantly, the weak points where the dragon’s scales could be punctured. They were ready, she knew, but she still felt uneasy. Everything had to go right. There could be no mistakes.
One step turned to ten, and she found herself right at the door to the dragon’s den. They were at the top of a spire-shaped tower, and wind rustled her hair. She put both hands on the doors in front of her and pushed with all her might. A great groan resounded throughout the hallway they were in, and the doors slowly creeped open of their own accord after the first push. Ingrid held her spear in both hands with the tip facing forward and crouched low, ready to explode forward at the first sight of the dragon.
Inch by inch the door moved, and, finally, she got a glimpse of the dragon’s room. The gold archways in the hall glittered as rays of sunlight filtered into the room from the open air above. Obsidian walls framed the room, sparkling in the daylight. The dragon… The dragon was nowhere to be seen.
Ingrid tensed, sensing an ambush. She exploded into action, springing into the room and immediately pivoting her body to the right. Her stomach dropped when she still didn’t see the dragon, and she used her inertia to face upwards before twisting in a 180 to the left-hand side of the room. Still no dragon to be seen.
“Wha-” She started, before Arun shouted in surprise.
“Is that- Is that a girl?”, he asked, pointing to the center of the room.
Ingrid turned and, sure enough, saw a girl with long, straight brown hair sleeping on the floor. She was covered in a turquoise blanket that seemed to be filled with straw, or possibly even feathers, and her head was resting on a white, silken pillow. She was the epitome of tranquility, lying there in lieu of the most dangerous dragon on the continent.
“Um,” Devan said, “should we wake her?”
Ingrid strode over to the girl and gave her a rough shake. Her eyes began to flutter before opening abruptly. Shock was written all over her face.
“Wh- Where am I? Who are you people?” Her eyes danced from Ingrid to Ryam to Devan to Arun and Celena and back to Ryam--more specifically, his hooves. She began pinching herself on the arm. “What kind of fucking Ambien dreams…”
“Excuse me, miss,” Devan walked up to the girl. “What’s your name? And if you don’t mind me asking, what are you doing at the top of the Tower of Cantorack? There’s supposed to be a dragon here, you know.”
“A dragon? What? Is this some kind of weird LARPing routine? Did you kidnap me?” Her questions came rapid-fire one after another. “ Umm, well, my name’s Amy. Amy O’Neil. Well actually, it-”
Ingrid gasped and immediately got to one knee, knowing the others would follow her into submission. It was the prophecy. It had to be. Amy O’Neil had finally been found.