After their encounter with the horrible windstorm and the spider, the human and the two dragons experienced little trouble on the road through the vast plains for a while. They had loaded up on rations and water-skins, and Waver had some mild experience hunting with snares. Valor, unfortunately, could not hunt, because anything his claws struck down would quickly become inedible.
Before long, the prairie became forest once more. Any large animals or monsters were too afraid of Valor’s presence to show themselves, just as the spider had been. Occasionally, the three of them discussed the job they were assigned.
The rumor Ori had picked up hadn’t specified who had developed the written language. As such, no one really knew how vulnerable they were to assassination. Obviously, Valor Grotto would have to verify the rumor first, but as Ori had suspected, Waver saw the idea of a written dragon language as an absolute good. And so, if they were able to determine that it was real, the next course of action would be to preserve and spread the language.
Naturally all three of them should eventually learn the language, but Pentwec was the fastest learner. As they didn’t know how much time they would have, they would ask her to teach them on the way back home.
Waver suspected there was more she knew on the subject, but Pentwec obviously couldn’t tell. He resolved to be extra receptive to any advice she gave.
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It took a full two weeks, and several times refilling their water-skins at streams using Pentwec’s power of fire and Valor’s power of decontamination, but eventually Valor’s steps reached wetlands.
A human would have a tremendous amount of trouble walking through the spongey waterlogged and weed-choked soil, but Valor’s talons dug in and found purchase with ease, and their powerful legs made a joke out of any suction. There was a reason drakes were used for military excursions. That said, the reason the swamps still weren’t a popular place of military action was simply that cavalry alone couldn’t survive without logistical support.
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Finding himself remembering something useless, Waver snapped his attention to the path ahead. Naturally there was no well-kept road this far south, so they took game trails and asked wild dragons for directions when necessary.
Just that moment, a disturbance ripped through the air, and Waver blew off of Valor’s back, accompanied by the bang of a sonic boom.
Only dimly aware of what was happening to him, Waver tumbled through the air and nearly cracked his skull against a tree, landing instead on his back in the soft, sticking earth. The wind was utterly knocked out of him and his vision started to fade, so he closed his eyes and took a moment to breathe shallowly, one breath at a time.
The instant he could feel himself starting to recover, he forced his eyes open and tried to get up, anticipating some sort of danger, but the wetland soil held him down with a vacuum seal. Luckily Valor stood over him, and he noticed Pentwec hanging, half covered in mud, from Valor’s mouth. She looked utterly bemused, but not injured.
A libel dragon perched anxiously on an overgrown tree root about five meters away. The nuance of her dragon words conveyed her gender.
The libel was an iridescent black. Her black, round eyes blended almost perfectly into her black, round head, with a white circles in them that could have been mistaken for glare. Her four bat-like wings were slightly transparent, her two sets of claws were sharp and off-white, and her tail stuck out behind her like a rudder, helping keep her balance. She leaned back and forth with worry.
Pentwec and Valor looked at each other.
Pentwec said to Valor.
Waver sighed, and looked around. Indeed, it was starting to get dark, and they needed to settle down for the night soon. Preferably in a tree. His only solace was that the swampy mud felt good on his dry skin.
You sure are, Waver thought. Out loud, he said only
And so it was decided that, after guiding them to the local dragon scholar and back to Silfmont, the hyperactive libel would crash at their ranch for a while. At least until they could figure out what to do with her.