I’d only been in Trillania for a couple of seconds before Aethan reappeared.
‘Ahah,’ he said. ‘I knew it.’
I really wasn’t in the mood for his goody-two-shoes act. ‘If you want to spend more time with me I have a few hours free tomorrow.’ I turned away from him and sent my mind out to Emerald.
‘Rako said….’
‘Oh shut up.’ I’d had enough of him parroting Rako. I mean honestly, like I didn’t know what Rako had said.
I closed my eyes and pushed my mind out further than I had ever had to. Where was she?
‘What are you doing?’
‘Trying to find my dragon.’ I snapped my eyes open and glared at him. Practically ignores me all day and now, when I need him to be quiet, he turns into a regular little chatty-cat. What was it with men?
‘I’m sorry,’ he shook his head and grinned, ‘it sounded like you said you were trying to find your dragon.’
I was going to have to go looking for her. ‘Well, at least we don’t need to get your hearing checked.’ I closed my eyes and willed myself to a cave located high in the mountains rising out of the Black Forest. It was where I had found her after the fight with the goblins.
The soft, white sand carpeting the floor glowed gently. It was enough for me to see the smooth indentation made by her body, and the drag marks from her talons, but the cave itself was empty.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Whizbang.’ I jumped at the sound of Aethan’s voice and cracked my head on a stalactite. ‘Didn’t your mum ever tell you it’s rude to sneak up on people? Oh wait…,’ I snorted out a laugh, ‘I forgot who your mother is.’
The look on his face hardened. ‘I don’t appreciate your cracking jokes at my mother’s expense.’
‘Oh really.’ I wasn’t quite sure what had gotten into me. I could only assume it was the stress of the last few days. ‘So what are you going to do about it? Ask me politely to take it back.’ I put my hands on my hips and stared him in the eyes.
‘I was going to try that,’ he said, matching me stare-for-stare, ‘but I’m not sure if you could do anything politely.’
‘Ouch. If I gave a damn, that would have really, really hurt.’ I raised an eyebrow.
‘Yes, well, I can’t expect a girl of your calibre to care about anything.’
Now that was punching below the belt. I launched myself at him and crash tackled him to the ground, making sure that I pinned his arms with my legs. ‘I would have thought one broken nose for the night was enough.’
He struggled beneath me, trying to free his arms. ‘Bring it on witch.’
‘Don’t say you didn’t ask for it.’ I balled my fist and slammed it into his cheekbone. It made a satisfying crunch.
He roared and flipped his body up, throwing me backward off him. I rolled over and scrambled away, but he grabbed my ankle and dragged me back. ‘How… do… you… like… it?’ he grunted as he struggled to contain me.
I fought him like a wildcat, punching and kicking but he used his weight superiority to pin me down.
‘Get off,’ I gasped, as he wrestled my arms to my side.
‘Not unless you say pretty please.’
‘Never.’ I twisted my body from side-to-side, using the momentum to try to roll. If I could get onto my belly with my arms under me….
He tightened his grip till it was painful. ‘Pretty please,’ he hissed.
I snarled and renewed my struggle.
‘Well if we’re going to stay like this for a while I might as well have some fun.’ For a wild second I thought he meant to kiss me and I wanted it so badly the yearning was like a tsunami racing through my body. But instead, he mimicked my earlier position and tucked my arms under his knees. ‘Ever played typewriter?’
‘What?’ The absurdity of the question froze my struggles.
‘Typewriter.’ He began to tap my forehead with his fingers as if typing, and then slapped the side of my head.
I threw my head to the side trying to escape his hands. ‘What in the Dark Sky are you doing?’
‘Writing a letter.’
Tap, tap, tap, slap.
It was enough to send me into a frenzied struggle, but try as hard as I could, I couldn’t break free.
Tap, tap, tap, slap.
‘Stop it,’ I screeched.
‘Say the magic words.’
‘Never.’
Tap, tap, tap, slap.
‘Preeettyyy pleeeease,’ he said in a sing-song voice.
Tap, tap, tap, slap.
I reared up and slammed my forehead into his already broken nose. He let out a yelp and rolled off me, his fingers clutching his face.
‘And that,’ I said as I stood up and dusted myself off, ‘is how we say pretty please where I come from.’ And then I willed myself back to the campsite and to my body.
***
It was still dark when I clambered out of my tent the next morning. Brent had a pot of water boiling and Luke was over at the horses. I went to join him, checking them over for any sore areas that may have arisen from yesterday’s ride.
My white mare, whom I had named Lily, nickered when she saw me, pressing her soft, pink nose into my hands.
‘Oh okay,’ I said, offering her the bit of dried biscuit I had brought for that very purpose. Scruffy whined and I laughed and handed him down a piece as well. When Luke and I were sure all the horses were fit to travel, I packed up my tent and then accepted a cup of tea and some dried meat from Brent.
‘Here boy.’ Brent held out a bowl to Scruffy. It held the remnants of last night’s stew and a couple of biscuits.
I sat on a log and watched the sun peeping over the horizon. Isla joined me a few moments later. ‘I love watching the sunrise,’ she said. ‘It always holds such hope for the new day.’
I looked at her to see if she were taking the piss, but her face was radiant as she gazed at the rising sun.
‘I must admit,’ I said, ‘I’m never normally up early enough to see it.’
‘Humans and witches always get it wrong,’ she said as Wilfred sat on her other side, ‘daylight is for achieving things, night time is for sleeping. Well that, and making love.’
Wilfred sprayed a mouthful of tea out and started coughing. I wasn’t sure if it were that, or Isla’s comment that made his face go bright red.
I saw Aethan moving towards his horse, Adare, with his gear. ‘Come on people,’ he said, ‘we want to get as far today as possible.’
The three of us rose off the log, but while Isla and Wilfred grabbed their bags, I stretched my arms above my head, using the activity to delay having to interact with Aethan. I wasn’t looking forward to that after the damage I had done.
Wilfred let out a low laugh and pointed at Aethan. ‘She got you a beauty,’ he said, making me wish I had gone with them so that I could kick him in the shins again. The man had no sense of secrecy.
‘I fell,’ Aethan said, casting a quick glance in my direction.
The left side of his face was so swollen his eyelids resembled two grapes jammed together. The bruising extended from the eye, down the side of his face and ran in an angry line along his jaw line. I felt the teeniest weeniest bit guilty.
‘I’m thinking you should sleep on two pillows tonight,’ Isla said. She turned away from him toward her black stallion and winked at me.
When we had finished placing the gear on the horses, we gathered in a group in front of Aethan. He drew a few squiggles and a triangle in the dirt with a stick.
‘We’re here,’ he said, stabbing his stick into the ground.
‘Well obviously,’ Isla said.
He rolled his one good eye toward her and she pressed her lips together and mimicked turning a key.
‘This is the Black Mountains.’ He pointed at the triangle. ‘The mountain range extends hundreds of miles, winding towards the goblin territory border.’ He pointed towards the dark shadow I could see off to the left. ‘That’s it there. Today we are going to make our way around the edge of the mountain range, and then as far along the border as we can before nightfall.’
‘Why are we staying in goblin territory?’ I asked. ‘I mean wouldn’t it make more sense to cross over the border to get away from them.’
‘See these squiggles?’ he said. ‘This is the Livia River. It runs deep and fast along the border. Crossing it would be dangerous.’
‘Yeah,’ Wilfred said, ‘and if you did make it, you’d be wishing you’d stayed to have tea with the goblins instead.’
‘Giants,’ Isla said in a low voice. ‘Nasty ones.’
I’d only ever seen giants from the air, and that was as close to them as I wanted to get.
‘Talk only when necessary,’ Aethan said, ‘and stay alert. We want to avoid confrontation if we can.’
We mounted our horses and followed Aethan out of the clearing. Scruffy trotted beside Lily for a while, but soon got bored of the exercise. I pulled him up behind me and he tucked himself between the saddle and the bags and promptly fell asleep.
We had been riding for a couple of hours, dodging our way through the small, spread-out trees, when we heard the sound of goblins moving through the woodlands off to our left. They didn’t seem to be making any effort to be quiet, and their guttural voices echoed through the trees.
Aethan held his hand up and we stopped. Brent slid from his saddle, and disappeared into the undergrowth. I held my breath, waiting to hear evidence that he had been detected. There was none, and he reappeared a few minutes later.
He held up his hand once and pointed at an angle in the other direction.
Five goblins moving away from us.
We waited till the sound of them had disappeared before we began to move again.
As the day wore on the parties of goblins became larger, until it seemed we were stationary more than we were moving. Brent and Luke handed the reins of their horses to Wilfred and me and ghosted off to the front and sides, reappearing only to send us in another direction. By the afternoon we were tracking backwards and to the sides nearly as much as we were moving forward, and we were still this side of the Black Mountains.
As the sun was beginning to set, Luke and Brent appeared together. I could hear them whispering to Aethan. They mounted up and led us further north until we came to a dense patch of trees.
Aethan dismounted. ‘We’ll stop here tonight,’ he whispered. The trees were too close to slip between and the path in was narrow. It would be an excellent position to defend, as long as there was another way out.
We led our horses along the track for a few minutes before it widened into a small clearing. A wall of rock bordered the right of the clearing, disappearing up into the gloom. A fissure ran in the rock face. I watched as Aethan and Brent disappeared into it. They returned moments later and Aethan beckoned us to follow.
It was just wide enough for Lily to fit and even then, the rock pressed up against her sides in a couple of places. She whinnied with fear until I stroked her withers and coaxed her through. Scruffy, still riding on her back, didn’t look thrilled either.
We rubbed down the horses and ate our cold meal in silence. Then Brent and Luke disappeared back through the fissure to take the first watch. Aethan and I were up second, and Wilfred and Isla were last. Wolfgang had wanted to take his turn but after a hushed conversation with Aethan he nodded his head and sought out his blankets. It seemed Aethan wanted his magic maker well rested in case we needed him during the night.
I cleared an area of the floor, balled some clothes up as a pillow and pulled a blanket over me. All my Border Guard training both before and since I had signed up had not prepared me for sleeping on hard ground. I was softer than I had thought and that annoyed me.
I debated with myself whether or not to use the dream-catcher – I mean I was only going to get a couple of hours’ sleep before Brent and Luke woke me – but my concern for Emerald’s welfare meant I wouldn’t sleep easily. If I knew I was going to search for her I would fall asleep quickly and be better rested.
Well, that’s how I justified it to myself anyway.
Closing my eyes, I relaxed my mind, trying to dispel the fear instilled in me from a day of creeping around goblins. It took a little while, but finally I was able to cross over to Trillania.
I sighed when Aethan stepped out from behind a bush.
‘We may have gotten off to a bad start,’ he said.
‘You think?’ I cocked my head to the side and looked at him. He had left the bruises and swelling behind and was back to his devastatingly-handsome self.
‘I may have underestimated you.’
I couldn’t help it. I smiled. It was something he’d often said while he’d been training me.
‘Why are you smiling?’
‘No reason.’ There was no way I was telling him the truth. They were memories I didn’t want him losing. We had fallen in love during those training sessions. Instead, I held out my hand. ‘Truce?’
He took it in his and shook it. ‘Truce, but you know we can’t stay here long, right?’
‘I just want to have a quick look for Emerald.’
‘Your pet dragon?’
‘Well obviously she’s not my pet.’ I laughed as I thought of the look she would get on her face if she heard herself described as my pet. ‘She’s my friend.’ I didn’t bother mentioning the bond we shared.
‘I’ve never heard of a friendly dragon.’ He dragged the heel of his boot through the dirt. ‘Only a bonded one.’
I looked at him sharply. Was he remembering me?
‘Santanas had one. She came out of Trillania to Isilvitania in one of the battles at the end.’
‘They can leave Trillania?’ Santanas was bonded to a dragon?
‘They’re the only animal that can naturally traverse between all the planes of existence.’
Well that certainly gave me plenty to think about. But right now, I needed to find her. ‘Are you coming with me?’ I held out my hand.
‘Someone’s got to watch your back.’ He reached out and took it and a zing of energy leapt up my arm. I could tell by the widening of his eyes that he had felt it too. He tilted his head to the side and stared at me questioningly but I wasn’t about to explain that that sort of thing had been quite normal between us.
I closed my eyes and concentrated on a large, grassy plain I knew had been one of Emerald’s favourite hunting grounds. When I opened them, we were staring out over a huge herd of morths. Except for the fact that they had six legs, morths looked remarkably like sheep. They had been her favourite food. If Emerald were around they wouldn’t be grazing so peacefully.
I closed my eyes again and thought of the beach she used to help shed her old scales. One end of the bay had grainy sand, perfect for exfoliating dead skin. The other had powder-soft sand for burnishing her new scales till they shone. She had been overly vain about the brilliance of her dark-green scales.
The waves breaking at the base of the sand dunes boomed as they curled on themselves and pounded the shore. High tide. Not the right time for a dragon to come.
‘Perhaps she’s migrated.’ Aethan still held my hand as we stared out over the lonely ocean.
‘What?’
‘Like a bird. Maybe she moves with the seasons.’
Maybe she did, but that didn’t explain why I couldn’t contact her.
He tugged on my hand. ‘We have to go.’
‘I know.’ I let him take us back to the cave and woke up as Brent was shaking my shoulder.
‘Izzy,’ he hissed. He must have been shaking for a while.
‘All right, all right,’ I mumbled, scrubbing my eyes with my fists. I couldn’t believe it had been a couple of hours already.
‘Goblins are coming.’
I sat bolt upright. So it hadn’t been a couple of hours.
‘How far?’
‘About a mile. But they’re heading straight for this area, and they’re moving fast.’ He moved on to wake up Wilfred.
Wolfgang and Isla were already up, throwing their saddles onto their horses.
I packed up my stuff and swung my sword into its position on my back. Then I saddled Lily and secured my bags. She snuffled at my hands, looking for a biscuit. ‘Not yet lovely,’ I murmured.
‘We need to get out of the cave,’ Aethan said.
If it was their destination, the cave was a death trap. Were they planning on camping here, or did they know we were here? Either way it didn’t bode well for us.
We coaxed our tired horses back outside and waited for Luke to come back from his scouting. When he did, he was running hard.
‘They’re almost at the start of the path,’ he said as he swung up into his saddle.
As quietly as we could, we rode the horses further along the path. It twisted and turned and within moments we were out of sight of the cave entry. But we hadn’t gone far before the path began to thin. The trees loomed on either side as they pressed closer and closer and then suddenly the path disappeared. We were trapped.
The sounds of goblin feet slapping the hard rock resonated on the cool night air. I held my breath and prayed to the Dark Sky that they would stop at the cave. The marching seemed to go on forever. How many of them were there? Twenty? Fifty?
Finally the marching stopped, and their voices became muffled as they entered the fissure into the cave. Aethan slid off Adare and crept back along the path, disappearing from view round the corner.
He reappeared a few minutes later and jogged back to Wolfgang.
‘No sentry. We can sneak back past them,’ he whispered. ‘What can you do?’
My breath froze and my heart started to pound. Sneak back past them? I looked around at the forest. There was no way we would get through it with the horses, and if they realised we were there we would need the horses.
‘I can muffle our noise,’ Wolfgang whispered back.
He raised his hands and the air around us thickened. It moulded itself to us like a thick blanket. Lily threw her head up and I placed a reassuring hand on her neck. ‘Shhh,’ I said to Scruffy. I didn’t know if the spell would prevent the goblins from hearing us if he started barking.
We moved back towards the cave entry, the strange air clinging to our every move. With each step we took, my heart beat faster, till it felt like it was mimicking a hummingbird. My breath came in short, sharp pants as I reached over my shoulder and loosened my sword in its sheath.
Aethan rode in the lead with Wolfgang right behind him, one hand in the air as he held the spell intact. Isla and I rode in the middle with Brent and Luke behind us and Wilfred in the rear.
I felt like I had a huge spotlight on me as I rode past the entry to the cave. I stared at the crack, unable to blink as I willed it to remain empty. All it would take was one goblin to poke his head out. One goblin to raise the alarm.
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end and my hands sweated onto the reins. I felt like a hundred eyes were boring into my back as I headed for the path leading out. I gritted my teeth and took deep breaths, resisting the urge to kick my heels into Lily’s sides.
I’d fought goblins before, I know, but never in such a dire situation, or with such bad odds. If they realised we were here before we were all past the opening, they would split our group in two. There was no way we would win that fight.
We had almost made it when I heard Isla gasp, ‘My bow.’
As if on cue, a goblin yelled from inside the cave and the rest of them followed suit. We could hear then heading back down the crack towards us. Isla had left her bow behind, and they had just found it.
‘Go,’ Aethan yelled.
They knew we were there. Silence was no longer any protection. Now we needed speed.
I kicked Lily’s flanks and urged her after Isla down the long and windy path. We had to break free of it to have any speed advantage over the goblins on foot. I heard Wilfred yell, and the clash of metal-on-metal, but didn’t dare stop. I would only make things worse. I had to pray the big man would make it out of there.
We burst from the edge of the forest onto a plain, and raced away from the goblins. A look over my shoulder showed me Wilfred, clutching his arm as he leaned low over his horse’s neck.
A horn sounded behind us, ringing out in the night, and a band of goblins broke from the trees to our left. Aethan swore and changed direction. I cradled Scruffy between my arms as I leant low, urging Lily on with my hands and my legs.
An arrow buzzed through the air and I threw an arm up. A couple more clattered off the shield that formed in front of my outstretched fingers. I held it to the side as we outdistanced the goblins.
More horns rang out in front of us and to our rear. Aethan shifted course again, away from the horns, heading north towards the border. We had to hope we could outdistance them before we reached the river or we would be trapped.
Lily’s breath was coming in laboured pants, froth flying from her mouth before we were able to drop back to a trot. The horns still sounded but from behind us now. It was possible we were going to make it.
I dropped back beside Wilfred but Isla beat me to it. She tut-tutted as she looked at the gash on his arm. Then she dug around in her bag and pulled out a bandage, pulling her horse in close enough to wrap his wound.
‘Seems like I’m going to have to keep a closer eye on you,’ she said. ‘Can’t have you getting yourself killed now can I.’
The look on his face was going to keep a smile on mine for a very long time.
We trotted for a while longer before Aethan considered it safe enough to walk.
‘What were you thinking?’ he hissed at his sister.
‘It wasn’t me that picked the hidey-hole with only one exit.’
‘I knew I should have left you at home.’
A goblin leapt from behind a tree and swung an axe at Isla’s head. I screeched, throwing an arm toward him. Lightning burst from my fingertips and hit him square in the chest. He crumpled to the ground with a hole the size of a fist where his heart had been.
It was just like when Emerald and I had fought the goblins, but I still didn’t have a clue how I’d done it. A score more goblins appeared from the direction the first had come, loosing arrows in our direction. I threw my hands at them but nothing happened. This instinctual magic thing was starting to get old.
‘Wolfgang,’ I yelped.
‘Got it,’ he said and a shield flickered into being.
As we kicked the horses back into a gallop, horns sounded from all directions and drum beats reverberated in the night.
‘Great. Drums,’ I muttered. ‘Always with the freakin’ drums.’
Every time we tried to head south, goblins would appear, running towards our tiring horses. Again and again we tried to break through, but instead we were forced further north.
‘They’re herding us,’ Wilfred yelled.
‘Towards the river,’ Aethan added.
Towards a trap.
The edge of the Livia River cut deep into the earth off to our right, and goblins massed to our left. We were about to be pinched between a rock and a very, very hard place.
The goblins’ cries became triumphant as we turned and raced along the river bank. The water roared as it tumbled deep within the ravine it had cut. Faster and faster the horses ran, fear pumping adrenaline into their muscles as the enemy raced to pin us against the cliff edge.
Wolfgang hurled fireballs that smashed into the goblin lines, exploding with enough impact to take out three or four at a time. But the goblins behind clambered over the charred remains and within moments it was as if Wolfgang had done nothing.
‘On my call,’ Aethan yelled.
I realised that the rest of them, except Isla, had nocked their bows. No mean feat while galloping. I grabbed mine off the pommel of my saddle and notched an arrow.
‘Fire,’ Aethan yelled once they were within range.
We released volley after volley, most finding marks, but as with the fireballs, within moments the goblins behind surged forwards to fill the gaps. It was as if all the arrows in the world couldn’t stop them. We were going to have to rely on our speed to outrun them.
I slung the bow back over the pommel and leant low over Lily’s neck. We were almost there, almost free of the head of the goblin line but they were closing the distance fast – fearsome warriors racing each other to kill us. Their battle cries were deafening as they wielded spears and axes.
All my attempts to hurl lightning came to nothing, and my attempts to shield were useless. I swore and pulled my sword from its sheath on my back. I was going to have to do it the old-fashioned way.
A hand grasped my ankle and I hacked at the wrist, severing it with my sword. I screamed with rage and struck out again and again, forcing them away from Lily. But they crowded around us, pushing us back until escape was no longer possible.
Murderous black eyes, lips curled in rage, a sea of arms reaching out to swamp us. Aethan glanced over his shoulder, a look of determination on his face.
There was only one option, one way we might survive.
‘The river,’ he yelled.
Wolfgang threw another fireball into the goblins. I shoved my sword back into its sheath and swung Lily around. It seemed we all jumped as one. Away from the goblins, away from their weapons, tumbling down, down into the cold, dark waters of the Livia River.