Chapter Three

The hike up the mountain was more taxing than I thought it would be. I was fit but I hadn’t been given time to get used to the weight of all the armor. To take my mind off the struggle, I admired the view around me. At the other side of the village border was a thick band of giant evergreen fir trees that appeared to give the mountain a skirt. It was cooler under the shade of them which I was thankful for, but it wouldn’t last. I unhooked a canteen of water from my belt and took a deep swig. 

“Not so fast, Julianna!” said Marcus, one of the boys from the village. “We have a long way to go yet and dehydration will kill you faster than an angry dragon if you aren’t careful.”

I slipped the lid back on and put the canteen away. I knew to listen to the more experienced members of the group. At twenty-three, Marcus was one of the younger ones but he’d been on enough of these expeditions to know what he was talking about. Brown pine needles carpeted the ground beneath us, making it soft and springy. Sounds of wildlife filled the air, birds in the trees and hidden animals scurrying in the undergrowth. 

I turned to Marcus. “Why is the village border below the tree line? It’s beautiful in here. Surely dragons don’t come into the woods.”

“They don’t, but once we get out of the trees the terrain changes dramatically and that’s when you know you need to keep your wits about you. It’s rare that they come so low down the mountain but it’s not unheard of. You’ll see one or two scorched trees at the upper border. That’s the work of dragons!”

Light filtered through the dense copse of trees much more freely now as we neared the upper edge of the woods. In a couple of minutes, I might be coming face to face with a dragon for the first time. Fear whipped through me and adrenaline pumped through my body. Scorched trees? I knew how to wield a sword but what good did that do against flames?

“What if the dragon breathes fire in my direction?” I asked him, feeling woefully under-educated.

“You duck!” he replied. “Quickly!” 

Great! I could barely stand up straight in the armor, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to duck, and I was positive that even if I managed it, I wouldn’t be able to do it quickly.

I didn’t have time to panic as the trees gave way to a rocky gray terrain. Occasional weeds and the odd hardy flower grew between the cracks in the stones but that was the only sign of life. I tried to ignore the black marks on some of the rocks. Burn marks. 

The air turned from the sweet-smelling fragrance of pine to a faint acrid smell.

“What’s that smell?” I asked, turning my nose up. 

“You’d better get used to it. It’s the smell of sulfur. It gets stronger the higher up you go. It’s the smell of dragons.” I turned to see Marcus grinning. He was enjoying this a lot more than I was. 

If I ignored the smell and immediate barren terrain, it was actually pretty beautiful up here. Once we’d cleared the treeline, I could see far into the distance. Looking back, I picked out our house with smoke coming out of the chimney, no doubt thanks to my mother’s baking. The village was tiny from this high but I could still make out the colors of all of the banners and decorations for the party tonight. 

I couldn’t look behind me for too long, because like Marcus had told me, I needed to keep my wits about me. The last thing I needed was to be flame-grilled when I was too busy admiring the view. 

The skies above me were clear except for the odd wispy cloud that scudded across the sky. It was perfect slaying weather. Occasionally, from the village, I had seen dragons flying around the peaks but they were often so far away, they looked like birds, but there were none flying about today. I’d only ever seen dragons from such a distance that they were no more than dots in the sky, or the dead ones brought back to the village. I’d grown up surrounded by lore of dragons and I knew everything about them except anything practical. 

Three hours later and the terrain had become even more difficult to climb. Rocky outcrops and caves were everywhere so, although Marcus had told me to keep my wits about me, I didn’t really know where to look. It seemed like a dragon could be hiding waiting to pounce from anywhere, and there was evidence of them dotted all around us in the form of the discarded bones and carcasses of small mammals. The heat and the smell of sulfur intensified, and it was all I could do not to pass out. The trek was so much more grueling than I had expected and I’d already guzzled my way through half my water rations. 

My father who had been walking ahead stopped suddenly and raised his arm as a signal for us to follow suit. 

“There is a well-known dragon roost just round those rocks there,” whispered Marcus. “It’s where I got my first kill. Good luck!”

For the first time, the fear that had been plaguing me throughout the entire trek turned into full-on terror. My time was nearly here. Just another fifty or so more steps and I’d be face to face with my first dragon. My father beckoned me forward. I’d be expected to go in there first. 

I put one foot in front of the other and began to walk forward.

“Good luck, little sister,” hissed my brother as I passed him. “Don’t let the dragon burn you on the butt!” He laughed lightly but I held my head up and ignored him. I might be quivering on the inside but I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of knowing that. 

“Julianna,” my father said, clapping me on the shoulder with his huge hands and nearly shaking some of my armor off in the process. “Whatever happens up there, I just want you to know I’m proud of you. I’ll be behind you the whole time and you’ve got the others as back up. If we see you struggling, we’ll step in but I want you to do everything to get that dragon without our help. Only that way will you capture his soul. You don’t want to fight him almost to the death and then have someone else come in to finish the job. You have to be the one. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, father.”

“The carcasses here are fresh and the scorch marks on the rocks are old. That means there hasn’t been any other slayer up here for a while. They only breathe fire if they feel threatened. Now go on in there and do your best!”

I managed a half-hearted smile and set off up the rocks alone. Harsh breathing came from behind me although there was no sound of footsteps. Either they were being incredibly quiet or they were giving me a head start. I didn’t turn to see which. 

Pulling myself up the last ten feet or so, I peeked my head around the corner, wondering what exactly I’d come face to face with. It could be anything from a small immature Triad dragon to a fully grown Royal Scarlet Flame, the biggest and deadliest breed of dragon in our kingdom.

At first, I thought the crevasse was empty. An old roost built from reeds and stones was perched under a rocky outcrop which had been blackened by years of dragonfire, but there was none in sight. I breathed a sigh of relief until I realized it meant more climbing until we found one. I was just about to turn and let the hunting party know when I spotted something in the middle of the roost. I moved forward cautiously to get a closer look. At first, I thought it might be a huge pearl from the giant oysters that lived off the coast of our land, but when I peered over the edge of the roost I saw it for what it was. A dragon’s egg. Its opalescent shell glimmered in the noonday sun. 

I was confused for a second. Why would there be a dragon’s egg without a mother dragon? But then a huge screech from above me told me there wasn’t. I looked up to see the whole sky above me had turned scarlet.