You think yourself better
“No,” I said, trying not to stumble at the crushing pressure in my head. “I’m not better. I’m just… Sam.”
Sam
He is Sam
Wizard
He is like the others
But he walks with Randall
That means nothing
He is written in the stars
Stars can still shine after they die
Which means that stars can lie
“Sam,” Randall said, sounding urgent. “What’s happening?”
“Oh, just a debate as to my intentions,” I ground out. “You know how it is.”
“What are they saying to—”
The butterfly shot off ahead of us, wings flapping furiously. The sparks hissed as they fell to the ice. The butterfly rose upward, spinning in lazy spirals, light trails curling around each other. It went higher than I thought possible, and just as soon as I began to see the light reflecting on an impossibly high cave ceiling, the butterfly exploded in a bright, silent flash. The blast sent pieces of light throughout the room, the shock wave causing them to vibrate. They began to fall slowly back toward the ground, illuminating the room brighter than before.
Icy cliffs jutted out from the walls of the cave, large boulders and stones here and there. I thought I could see purposeful shapes in them, but recognition was just out of reach, wrapped in shadows. The shape of a horse and a man and a dragon, an egg, a tree, and a— Wait.
Hold up.
A dragon.
I took a step back.
The lights flickered around us.
I laughed. It sounded forced. “It’s just a stone.”
“What was that?” Randall asked me.
I shook my head. “It’s just—”
The stone turned its head toward me.
“—a motherfucking dragon,” I finished weakly. “Um. So. Hey there, good buddy. How are you?”
And the dragon growled as it unfurled itself, lights falling around it, eyes glittering in the dark, catching the remains of Randall’s spell.
“Do you see that?” I whispered furiously to Randall.
“I see it,” he said, sounding calm.
“Good. Now. What was your plan?”
His head whipped toward me. “My plan?”
“Right. Good. Your plan.”
“Sam, you’re the one who said—”
“No need to point fingers. I don’t blame you for running in here half-cocked. Heh. Better than being full-cocked, wouldn’t you say?”
Wizard
The dragon wasn’t like Kevin or even Zero. From what I could make out, it was… smaller than Kevin but no less intimidating, especially since I’d followed Randall’s lead and had technically entered its lair uninvited. I took a step back, trying to make myself seem as unintimidating as possible. “We’re cool,” I said. “We’re so cool. I’m not here to do any harm. I just need your help to defeat a villain and save Verania. No big deal. It’s no big deal at all.”
“Why are you talking like that?” Randall whispered.
“Because I’m trying to be calm,” I hissed back. “I’m like a motherfucking dragon whisperer, okay? I totally know what I’m doing. Mostly. And besides, for all we know, maybe they’re stupid and don’t even—”
“Sam?”
“What?”
“There’s a dragon standing right behind you.”
“Har, har.” I glanced over my shoulder. “That’s not very—”
There was a dragon standing right behind me.
Okay, so maybe standing wasn’t exactly the right word as much as it was attached to the wall of the cave, long neck stretched toward me, blue eyes flashing, slitted nostrils flaring, teeth bared, tongue flicking out toward me as it rumbled low in its throat. Its great wings stretched out on either side of it, and I had a moment to appreciate the sheer beauty of what I was seeing, because Randall had been right. The wings were feathered. In fact, the whole dragon looked as if it was covered in feathers, and I had never seen anything like it before.
And then the reality of the situation set in as rocks shifted behind us.
I whirled around to see the second dragon rising from its perch on one of the jutted cliffs that stuck out over the room we were in. Its tail twitched as it hung off the edge, scraping along the ice. It narrowed its eyes as it growled, crouching down low on its front legs as it stared down at us.
So, to recap:
Two dragons, both of which had higher ground.
One was above the path that led back toward the cave entrance.
The other was on a cliff above us.
“Um,” I said. “Fuck. Randall. No offense. But you have terrible ideas.”
He started sputtering.
“No time for that,” I said. “I need to get us out of this mess you’ve gotten us into.”
“That I’ve gotten us—”
“Okay, here’s the plan. I’m going to try and talk our way out of this.”
“That is an awful plan. In case you can’t tell, they aren’t exactly happy see you.”
“Don’t you mean they’re not happy to see us?”
Randall stared at me blandly. “I’ve already given them an offering. They’re not going to be mad at me.”
I gaped at him.
He shrugged.
“Okay. I got this. I so got this. They’re just posturing. Zero did the same exact thing. They just need to be put in their place.”
Twin growls echoed around me.
“Okay, okay! You don’t need to be put in any place. Look. Let’s start over! My name is Sam of Wilds. And I am an adorable twink. You are lesbian dragons. With feathers. And really big teeth. Just let me love you.”
“I can’t believe the gods chose you,” Randall muttered. “Out of everyone.”
“Hey! I’m amazing. Just because you—”
The dragon on the wall roared. The room shook around us. The lights were hissing on the ice and going out. The cave was growing darker.
“Look!” I cried. “I’m not here to hurt you. Maybe the star dragon told you about me? That I’d be coming to ask for your help? That I would need—”
“Oh my goodness,” a distinctly female voice said from behind us. “He’s just dear. I want to wrap him up and keep him forever. Can we keep him? I would like to keep him.”
Randall and I turned slowly toward the voice.
The dragon sitting on the cliff was staring down at us, tail still twitching, eyes bright as it watched us. The claws on its front legs were curled over the edge of the cliff, razor-sharp, causing deep scratches in the ice. But its head was cocked, and it no longer looked like it was about to attack us. It was… curious.
“Um,” I said. “Hello?”
“Hello,” the dragon said.
And yeah. Still not something I was used to.
“No,” another female voice said from behind us, though this one was deeper, harsher. “We cannot keep him. He is a human. He is a weak and frail thing. Just look at him. He looks sickly. He smells bad too.”
“I do not smell bad,” I said, outraged. I whirled around. “I’ll have you know that I smell—eep!”
The dragon on the wall had craned its head toward us, and I could see it was entirely covered in feathers. The lights were almost completely out, but the feathers on its head and neck were the bright blue of a summer sky.