Dragon Aster Trilogy

10: SAVED



Sybl didn’t know how long she had walked for, all she knew was that she was exhausted and thirsty. When she reached a small pond, her luck with finding water had also found the demon cat.

The surreal cougar stood there, waving back and forth on his two legs as the rattles on the sides of his mask shook. He stretched his brown wings and used them to keep his balance.

“Have you had time to think about helping me?”

Sybl was more interested in what he was carrying, as he dangled her running shoe back and forth in his claws like a lure. She looked down at her bare foot, not so much as remembering having ever lost it. Walking closer to the water she sat down on the sand and pondered her five bare toes. He could have only taken it recently, as her foot was still somewhat clean. Either way, the cat was becoming a nuisance of a magician to add to all her current problems.

At least he wasn’t the size of a house.

As if he sensed her thoughts on him, he spread his wings out at his sides longer like extra arms, and floated at high speed across the water, stopping his mask but a breath from her face.

Sybl thought she was dead now as her heart froze. Then it felt as if something had grabbed her lungs and held them stiff to match, suffocating her.

“If you do not help me...”

He stopped his pull on the Threads to her lungs as the water moved behind him. The greenery rose from the bottom of the pond and went straight for him like ropes. It caught his legs and wings, before dragging him against the sand and back to the water. He slashed his claws about furiously, before breaking free of its tangle and springing into the air in retreat.



Lintrance watched her from the trees as her eyes briefly looked his way, before she fainted at the sight of his dragon form. He went over to the lake where the pluma had escaped into the air and used his Ancient to bring the shoe that it had sunk out of the water. Then the plants returned under the pond to how they were before.

He never thought he would find himself so terrified of a human again, as her resemblance to Serena was just uncanny. But with the Awl gone, he knew it would only be a matter of time before the phelan picked up on her Thread trail and found her again.

He looked at the shoe, before crouching down and slipping it back on her foot. She moved slightly at his touch, but her sleep held. “Once upon a time there was a beautiful Princess, who lost a slipper under the glass stairs leading from Heaven.”

‘That’s...not how the...story goes.’

Lintrance smiled as her psi, even asleep, contested him just like Serena’s used to. His Ancient had little trouble connecting with her mind and the energies of her soul as he touched her foot again and pulled them both into his dragon somn, before spreading his wings and taking to the air for the Caverns.