Dragon Bait Chapter 6
SPECIAL THANKS GOES TO TROMBONESONMARS. It thanks for her that you get these new chapters so soon. Thanks Trombonesonmars. =D
“” =spoken words
‘’ =thoughts
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Chapter Six
When the dragon left, Skif released the breath he didn’t even know he was holding in, as he slipped to the ground.
Skif tried to take a moment to grasp how screwed up his already screwed up life had become in under three days.
First: Lord Erik’s betrayal. Skif always knew that Lord Eric wasn’t knight material; he had faked his way through knight’s code training and his dad’s generous gift to the king, which was what had bought his title. For hell sakes, he had Skif sneak a whore into the Knight’s holy vigil when he was supposed to be alone in prayer all night. Whenever he needed to, he would throw Skif under the cart, so it wasn’t much of a surprise that he would do it again. What was a surprise to him was how little he thought about Skif’s life? Sure, he starved the boy beaten, abused and molested him. But he never put Skif’s life directly in front of danger that would end his life. Although what really disrupted Skif the most was that he had been and still was loyal to the man after everything he had done to him.
Second: Dragons were real. Skif had always loved to listen to the Village elders tell stories in the small village inn near his home in the winter. They told stories of the heroic knights of legends and their great adventures, many of which were dragon hunts. But those stories always portrayed the dragon as an evil beast or demons that would ravage villages and their livestock, burning the country side. That was unless, of course, they were appeased by a virgin sacrifice; usually the purest maiden of the village or a young child. All the legends said they were nearly hunted to extinction; the last one seen in this kingdom had been back in his grandfather’s grandfather’s time.
Not one of those legends made Dragons seem anymore intelligent then a dog, if not a lot moral feral and dangerous than wild boars and winter-starved wolves combined. The sapphire Dragon was clearly smarter than a dog, purely based on how easily he out-thought Sir Erik and his fellow Knights. Skif was completely blown away by the Dragon’s attempts to communicate with him. It scared Skif a bit that he even seemed to be able to read his thoughts at times.
Third: what did the dragon want with him? Was he supposed to be some sort of pet like Skif’s fateful dog Floyd that he had as a child? Why spare him when he seemed to have every intention of eating the Knights the first chance he got? ‘I’m two skinny for even a midday snack. But I’m not very pretty, if the legends are right about them being attracted to shiny bobbles and pretty things that might be why.’
From deep inside Skif’s own mind a sarcastic little voice piped up, ‘Maybe the Dragon has a think for cross-dressing little boys.’
‘Not Helping.’ Skif countered. ‘I’ll just have to sit and wait to see what happens next.’
With nothing but time on his hands, Skif decided to go retrieve his bag. Making a quick detour to get some more water to sooth his raw throat, Skif went and picked up his glowing stone which he had dropped when he came to investigate the screaming. He discovered the Dragon in the process of devouring Sir Fredrick. It took longer to get back to the nest chamber then it took to leave it.
Skif quickly found his sack exactly where he had left it when he went to sleep. It had to only have been a few hours but if felt like forever. So much had happened.
Originally he had just planned to come back to the “bedchamber” here and maybe fall asleep but Skif felt like he was walking a fine line with the dragon. There was no guarantee that the Dragon would come back and to find Skif missing and decide just to eat the Knights again, no matter what he had said earlier.
The return trip took twice as long as coming had been Skif had to stop and take breaks as he went. When he was about half-way there the Light from the Stone started to wane, causing him to stumble a bit more until, he started using the wall for support.
By the time that he made it back to the pond room, he felt even more exhausted then before he had taken his nap. His already sore arms ached from the over-exertion of swinging that stupid, useless sword full-force. His legs were trembling from exhaustion, his wounded wrist itched under the filth-covered bandages, his poor throat felt like it was on fire from all the screaming and running he had done and he is head ached from all the confusing events. He was a complete mess and it took nearly every smidgen of energy he had just to get to the edge of the pond next to tom the stream that led out of the cave.
After a long pause Skif refilled his water skins before he began wash and rewrap the wounds his wrists. He was very pleased that they did not appear to be infected, only a little warm and swollen. He sorted through some of the medicine packets to find a pain-powder packet and mixed it with the water in his mouth, because he didn’t want to ruin all the water in one of the water skins. And he hoped that the fact that it was more concentrated in his throat would make it effects more potent.
For the last few hours Skif has had only consumed water, so he finally felt as if his bladder was about explode. A quick look around showed that his only logical option was to go pee of the cliff. He had spent many times trapped in urine-soaked clothes for days and there was no telling how long the Dragon would be keeping him here. He thought it would be better if the place didn’t smell and he didn’t want to take a risk of contaminating his only water supply either.
When he got to the ledge he noticed that it kind of leaned on both sides with the stream from the pond forming a waterfall while the second side that led to the trail he had taken earlier was on the other side. He made his way to the trail side, peeing against the rock wall, sighing at the comfortable feeling of release.
Before going back inside, Skif took a moment to scan the view. The large valley rolled out before him to the north having been cut by the gentle, meandering river over many millennia. There seemed to be a large thick, forest spanning on the right side of the cave that was tall, old and went as far as he could see but Skif didn’t feel any negativity coming from the forest. Far beyond the other side of the valley, there was rolling hillside, which Skif vaguely remembered from coming through the other day the hills, seem to get taller and steeper the closer it got get to the cliff that the cave Skif was in resided.. Not far beyond the hills were massive, sharp, white capped mountain peaks.
The village must be hidden behind one of the hills. ‘At least I will have an idea of where to run if I manage to ever get away.’
As he turned to go back inside Skif’s eyes glanced over the trail he nearly fell from that morning something about it seemed off. Kneeling down Skif, crawled over the edge and peered down. The sight before him shocked him a bit. For about one fourth of a league down the cliff, the trail was gone for quite some way.
There was no way Skif’s little misstep started an avalanche that could have caused all that damage. Not without killing him in the process. Where the trail had hugged the cliff face was now exposed rock darker than the older, sun-bleached stone of the cliff face. At the bottom of the cliff the lay a large pile of boulders that wasn’t there before. He could even make out, what looked like deep, ragged claw marks.
‘I cannot believe Milord Dragon would go so far merely to keep me from escaping.’ A wave of fear ran through Skif. ‘He is never going to let me go…’ He could feel the panic attack start to build up in his chest, but he quickly pushed it down. ‘You have had quite enough of those for one day. Come on Skif. You wanted to be a knight, and knights don’t just give up. You will find a way out of here somehow. Just keep thinking that and you will be fine.’
It took a little bit of time before Skif felt that he had made his way back inside. Stealing one last glance at the sky, he didn’t catch any sights of the Dragon.
Skif made his way to the debris pile to grab a couple of discarded bed rolls. He really wanted to rest but he thought he should still guard the Knights in case the dragon came back while he was a sleeping. To meet both these needs he set up the rolls in front of the boulder door of their prison. This time he didn’t try to talk to them. He was far too tired and had no idea of what he could possibly say to them anyway. He could still hear them talking and fighting amongst themselves while Sir Fredrick would occasionally moan in pain.
Doing his best to tune them out, Skif lay down on his belly, trying to find a comfortable position for his poor abused body. The rolls smelled stale and of other unknown men. Not that was anything new, but it did make him wish that he could have his own little bedroll. ‘Yes, it’s really thin, a fair bit on the dirty side and has more patches than most blankets, but it’s familiar.’ His old blanket was probably with all the rest of his gear and clothes strapped on the back of his mule at the Knights’ camp (wherever that was). If the camp is still even there.
He feared for the fate of the horses and mule. For three years they had been his only friends, as he was charge with their care and feeding. Skif wondered if they were still tied to their line or if they broken free. Or heaven forbid, the Dragon had eaten them. The last time he had seen them the Knights had merely removed their own bedrolls and tied them to a rope line while the animals were still in full-parade tack. Unless the Knights fed them in the morning or later that night after Skif fell unconscious (which he severely doubted that they would have made such and effort), then the poor horses and mule must be starving by know now. From the glimpses he had caught of them, it didn’t look as if their lead ropes were long enough for them to reach the ground.
Before he let sleep once again claim him, Skif sent a silent prayer for the horses and the Knights as well as himself. He wasn’t entirely sure they were said right. He had never paid as much attention to the proper rites of prayers, and he always thought it was the thought that counted more than the exact words.
In spite of his exhaustion and weariness in body, it took a quite some time before sleep came to claim Skif. He was not able to calm his mind, but eventually the dozing nature of the painkillers pulled him down into nothingness.
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It didn’t take long for Kieran to locate adequate food in the form of a large flock of sheep grazing in a glen watched over by a young shepherd lad and his faithful sheep dog. The hapless creatures didn’t even see him coming, and he quickly over took them, easily trapping three large ewes. The young shepherd ran for the hills screaming with his dog quickly overtaking him. Kieran let them go, having no desire for human flesh after recent events, it didn’t hurt that the boy’s hair colour was very similar to Skif soft strawberry hair.
Kieran quickly finished off the three ewes along with seven of their fellow herd mates, leaving his stomach pleasantly full. He was somewhat tempted to bring home fresh meat as food for Skif, but that didn’t seem like the best idea at the moment. Kieran was not a bit sure at the moment how such a kind soul like his little mate would react, nor did it seem wise to remind the boy of Kieran’s carnivorous tendencies so soon. Getting food from a farming village would be harder what with all the screaming and pitchforks. So that left fish and vegetables as his only options for food.
‘I was never a good fisher before and these talons aren’t really made for the tiny fishes that in inhabit the river. I really don’t want to travel too far away right now. So that leaves me with looking for vegetables...Argh it’s midsummer. Most of the fruits and vegetables won’t be ripe ‘til fall. I don’t feel like spending hours digging up carrots or potatoes through. I need to find something I can easily fly back to the cave too.’
Knowing that he would likely have a better vantage from the sky Kieran took off and headed for the nearest farm. The farm was fairly rundown, but appeared to still be in use. The barn roof was very old thatch but it appeared that someone had made patches recently, and the animals were well fed and cared for but their pens could use having their fences repaired.
Kieran circled above, riding the thermals as he scanned the area for the best place to locate food. His eyes spotted an apple orchard which seemed as if it had not been maintained for a while. What really caught his attention were the branches bowing under a weight of hundreds ripe apples. Kieran knew that most apples would not be ripe at least until fall so these must be “solstice apples” known for their short growing season and their sweet taste. ‘Perfect. Just what Skif needed something quick and easy to eat!’
In his overzealous to get the food as get the food back to Skif as quickly back as possible, Kieran merely hovered above one of the trees as he used his superior dragon strength to rip the tree free from form the earth, causing hundreds of apples to fall off in the process. He could see that more than half of the apples had survived. ‘Great! There should still be more than enough to feed Skif for a year, let alone a couple of weeks.’
With glee, Kieran began the long process of beating his wings to get up to the thermals, which was made harder by the extra weight of the apple tree.
Unbeknownst to Kieran, each wing beat shook free several more apples sending them tumbling back to earth like meteorites.
It took far longer to return to his cave as each wing beat took twice the effort and he could not glide for as long due to the extra weight of carrying the tree. Kieran felt like his wings might fall off, when he landed with the tree on the ledge in front of his cave. Having never carried anything heavier than a warhorse and even then nothing for near so far, the trip left him panting a little bit and his wing aching a bit too.
His nose was instantly able to smell the strong scent of urine-Skif’s urine-coming from a damp spot on the wall. A quick check of the mindlink proved the little one was deeply asleep inside the cave. ‘He must be really out of it if he managed to miss the entire racket my landing caused. Well at least I will have breakfast waiting for him when he wakes up.’
The smile on his face melted in disappointed surprise when he glanced down at the apple tree, whose branches once bowed under the weight of all the ripe apples now lay on the ledge with only a couple dozen apples left on the whole tree. Sighing in defeat, Kieran took solace in the fact that at least some of the apples managed to survive the trip.
It was hard to pick the few apples he needed with his large, talon-hands which were more useful for ripping enemies to shreds than picking up small objects. Once Kieran had four apples he tip-toed inside with what he considered to be surprising stealth for a being that was as big as a large barn, not wanting to wake his little mate. ‘If he is sleeping then he must need to sleep. I can give his the food later.
When he got to the pond chamber he found his precious curled up on a couple bed rolls right next to the pantry/prison boulder. It hurt Kieran a little at how little his own mate trusted him. ‘But that’s your own fault. What have you done so far to prove that he should trust you?’ He did not enjoy the reality of that thought. ‘Hopefully the apples can be a peace offering and Skif can start to put some faith in me.’
Kieran picked up Skif’s bag of possessions and fiddled with the flap until it opened and he slipped the apples inside for the boy to eat later. Not wanting his mate to sleep anywhere but in his bed, he gently picked up the boy wrapped up in the bedrolls, careful not to wake the boy.
Skif didn’t wake during the trip to Kieran’s sleeping chamber. As gently as possible, Kieran placed his dear mate down on his makeshift bedding, placing the boy’s bag off to the side for later. He joined Skif on the nest; with Skif lying protectively between Keiran’s out-stretched arms, thus providing him an opportunity to just gaze upon his sleeping boy, much to Kieran’s joy.
Had anyone told had a month ago that he would find watching a mere human boy sleep more fun than razing a village to the ground, Kieran would defiantly have laughed his wings off ( after he had possible eaten them). Now he could think of no place better in the world…With the exception for both of them being in his own, real bed in his own room. But they would not be sleeping there. ‘Not if I have anything to do about it.’ Kieran smirked.
He watched as Skif shifted closer to the warmth offered by one of his arms, even using his thumb as a pillow. Skif murmured in his sleep in contentment. Trying to keep his own hissing laughter silent, Kieran used his other hand to fix where one of the bedrolls had slipped and exposed the boy’s back to the chilly air of the chamber.
‘Sleep tight, my little one. I will be here. I will protect you. You are safe so just sleep.’ Kieran promised the sleeping boy.
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^-^ Sweet isn’t it? I hope you enjoyed this new chapter.