Emerald. Down to the left. The wind whipped my hair, lashing it out behind me like a cat o’ nine tails as Emerald banked towards our prey.
Goblins. A lot of goblins.
Lightning bolts flew from my fingers as fire roared from Emerald’s mouth. We skimmed over the top of the goblin horde, leaving death and destruction in our wake.
I glanced over my shoulder as we rose back into the sky and saw Isla leap from the cover of the trees. Almost too fast for my eyes to see, she pulled an arrow from the small quiver on her back, fitted it to her bow string, and released it into the nearest warrior. I saw Mia launch herself from Isla’s shoulder, her claws extended as she sailed towards the nearest goblin.
A laugh burst from me as Scruffy darted out of the forest with Grams hot on his heels. She wore camouflage pants and a khaki t-shirt, and had a black balaclava pulled over her face. A heavy pair of military boots completed her outfit. She seemed to be enjoying herself immensely as she drew her sword and ran at the nearest goblin.
Shall we go down? Emerald asked.
In answer, I tightened my heels on her flank and bent down low over her neck. With one powerful stroke of her wings we were racing towards the ground. She pulled her wings flat against her body and straightened herself out like a spear, and I felt our speed increase.
‘Wooooohooooo,’ I screamed as the wind tore at my hair.
Just as quickly as it had begun, it stopped. She thrust her wings out to either side and pushed her legs forwards. I slammed into her neck, gravity holding me a prisoner until my acceleration matched hers.
As she touched down, I leapt from her back, pulled my sword from my scabbard, and raced towards the fight.
I leapt over a goblin, turning a full somersault in the air, and as I landed in a crouch I swept my blade out at his legs. Muscle and sinew and bone parted like butter and he toppled to the ground.
‘Take that,’ Grams shouted.
I spun to face a goblin behind me, thrusting my blade up under his ribcage and out through his back. Mia landed lightly on my head before propelling herself back into the air.
Scruffy appeared by my side, his lips pulled back to expose his fangs as he attacked the ankle of a goblin.
Isla leapt into the air and fired arrows into three luckless goblins, before landing on the back of the fourth. She pulled a dagger from her belt and thrust it into the side of his head.
Emerald batted at a goblin like a cat at a mouse. It flew into the air and landed about thirty metres away.
‘Isadora Scrumpleton.’ My mother’s voice bellowed around the meadow behind our house. It froze me in the act of breaking a goblin’s neck. ‘Stop this right this instance.’
My blood lust and adrenaline faded away as I looked around at the field, seeing it for what it really was.
Goblins made of straw and sticks lay on their sides. Chopped into little pieces or still burning from Emerald’s and my initial attack. It had taken us all morning to make enough of them so that all of us could have some fun. I resented having to stop.
What was the point of being a War Faery if you still had to do what your Mum said?
‘ISADORA.’ If I had thought she’d been angry before, it was nothing compared with now. When she got like that, it wasn’t worth defying her.
‘Phooey.’ Grams pulled off her balaclava and threw it onto the ground.
Isla sighed and unstrung her bow. She pulled an arrow out of the straw man closest to her and slipped it back into her quiver.
Emerald lay down where she was and put a wing over her face.
Emerald. Disappointment tinged my thoughts.
She shrugged a shoulder and mumbled into my mind, Last time we got in trouble she wouldn’t roast me any meat.
You have fire for breath. You can roast your own meat. I walked over to her and shoved her flank.
Yes, but when I do it, it’s all burnt on the outside. When your Mum does it… She stopped thinking in words and, instead, a picture of a roast, so tender it was falling off the bone, popped into my head.
I sighed. Mum’s roasts were almost worth being good for. Almost. And that was part of my problem. I hadn’t found anything worth being good for since I had come back through the veil.
‘Oh come on,’ I said to Isla and Grams. ‘We’d better get up there before she has an apoplectic fit.’
The two of them followed me as I traipsed from the field. It was only the fact that they were behind me that stopped me from kicking my feet in childish rebellion.
Mum was waiting for us in the kitchen. Her crossed arms and her tapping foot made it clear her mood had not improved in the last few minutes. Sabby stood next to her in an identical posture, but I knew her foot was tapping for a different reason. I hadn’t invited her to our little ‘party’ because I hadn’t wanted to distract her from her study for her first year exams. I could see now that that had been a mistake.
‘Sit.’ Mum pointed at the kitchen table. My former teacher, Radismus, was already there.
Scruffy’s bottom hit the floor and he sat to attention. Isla and Grams slid meekly into their seats. I pulled mine out and flipped it around one hundred and eighty degrees before straddling it. My elbows rested on the top of the chair back while I investigated my nails.
I saw Sabby shake her head, a small smile quirking the corners of her mouth as she took the chair next to me. Mia let out a little mew and scampered over the table to Sabby. She hissed down at Sabby’s familiar, Phantom, and then climbed up Sabby’s arm to her neck. Sabby winced as Mia’s paws started running through her hair. I pulled a face in sympathy. Mia’s grooming, while sweet, was normally very painful.
Radismus stood and crossed to Mum’s side. He pulled her stiff body into his arms, whispered something into her ear, and then planted a kiss on her lips. I was still getting over the shock of finding out that the two of them had become an item.
‘I’ll be off,’ he said, looking around at the rest of us. The smile he was trying to hide was starting to break through. No doubt he wanted to get out of there before Mum turned her bad mood onto him as well.
Mum waited till he had left before she began. ‘What in the Great Dark Sky did you think you were doing?’
I stared at her in sullen silence. I mean, it had been pretty obvious what we’d been doing.
Grams raised one hand in the air and, when Mum looked at her, said, ‘We were having some good, old-fashioned fun.’
I felt a smile part my lips but Mum was not amused. She raised her eyebrows at Grams and turned her gaze to Isla.
‘Ummm, generating a huge amount of noise and generally causing the villagers to panic.’
Mum’s foot stopped its tapping and her expression softened. She had taken one look at Isla that awful morning we had come home and had easily slipped into the role of mother hen.
‘That’s right, Isla.’ Mum reached behind her and picked up a plate of cupcakes. ‘You can have one of these.’
Isla smiled and leaned over to take one of the cakes. From the smell of them they were still warm.
‘Double-chocolate, choc chip?’ Grams licked her lips.
Mum nodded as she offered the plate to Sabby.
‘Yes, well, I’m awfully sorry about the racket. I can see now, in retrospect, how it could have caused quite a kerfuffle on the main street.’ Grams’s eyes were glued to the cakes. ‘It’s not every day that a dragon performs a full attack on your village.’
Mum still held the plate out of Gram’s reach.
‘I don’t see why it was such a shock,’ I said. ‘Emerald’s been here for a fortnight.’ Our minds had collided as soon as I’d come back through the veil. Her arrival, an hour later, had created quite a ruckus. ‘You’d think they’d be used to her by now.’
‘Oh, I don’t think it was her they were worried about,’ Mum said, giving me a meaningful look.
I shifted on the chair. It always looked so cool when other people sat like this, but the hard edge of the wooden back was beginning to dig into my forearms. ‘It was just a little lightning.’ Oh great, now I had something stuck in my eye as well. It was going to look like I was trying not to cry. And I wasn’t. I mean, I really wasn’t.
Mum crossed to my side as the tears escaped, rolling down my cheeks. I pulled back from her for a second before giving into the crushing warmth of her embrace.
She had broken me again. Every time the pressing force built inside me, tearing and clawing and ripping until I couldn’t handle the rawness of the pain, she would let it out. And for a few, short, blissful minutes I would be whole again.
I sighed and pulled back from her, wiping my face on the back of my arm. ‘Sorry,’ I croaked. I let my body relax as I enjoyed the emptiness inside me. It wouldn’t be long before the despair found me again.
‘Here.’ She held the plate of cakes out to me, waiting till I had taken one before offering them to Grams.
I took a bite of the cake, chewed a few times and then swallowed. ‘How bad was it?’ I asked.
‘Well, I only know what happened at the Cupcake Café.’ I couldn’t be sure, but it looked like Mum was fighting a smile. ‘Agnes Hedge was entertaining her friends from London. Two of them jumped up and ran away, shrieking as if they were being chased by goblins, and the third slid clean off her chair.’
‘Dead?’ Grams broke a bit off her cake and popped it into her mouth.
‘Fainted,’ Mum said. ‘Colonel Smith waved his cane in the air and started regaling stories about the Great Faery War.’
‘He’ll be going on about that for days,’ Grams said. ‘Remind me not to go up to the Toasted Toadstool tonight.’
‘Deidre Rutherspoon got such a fright she dropped a tray of coffee cups.’
Isla grimaced. She was always more contrite than I.
‘It’s all right, Dear.’ Mum patted her on the arm. ‘I was able to repair them. Then there was Lindsey Nettle.’
Grams stopped eating and looked up at Mum.
‘She fell backwards over a hedge and showed her underwear to the patrons of the Cupcake Café.’ Now she was smiling. ‘Big. White. Bloomers.’
‘Ha.’ Grams let out a satisfied snort. ‘That’ll teach her for making a play for Lionel.’
‘I was just coming out of the library,’ Sabby said. ‘Old Tom was sitting out the front. He jumped up and drew a flip knife out of his pocket. Then he screamed something about goblins and took off.’
‘He’ll be halfway to London by now.’ Grams shook her head. ‘We told them all that the veil had been sealed. A goblin attack will be impossible for at least another two weeks.’
Two weeks. Only two more weeks till the veil was penetrable again. I felt a small hard knot start up in my gut. It was both too close and too far away.
‘I’d better go and see if Emerald is okay.’ I stood and flipped the chair back around, seating it back in at the table. I’m sure the fact that I didn’t need to go and see Emerald to know she was okay wasn’t lost on any of them.
‘Here.’ Mum opened the fridge and pulled out a haunch of meat. ‘Tell her I’ll cook her something tonight.’
I took the meat from Mum and headed for the front door. Got you some meat.
Stop. Emerald’s mind screeched into mine. Don’t come down here.
Her words had the opposite effect on me to what she had intended. I dropped the meat, yanked open the door and started sprinting for the field. It didn’t take long for Scruffy to match my speed and I could hear Isla right behind me.
Emerald was in trouble, from what I couldn’t begin to imagine, but there was no way I was leaving her to fend for herself.
I raced through the trees down the hill to the meadow, running faster and faster as I felt her mounting panic.
I’m coming.
Oh no. No, no, no, no, no.
It took far too long before Isla and I burst out of the trees and onto the flat. I raised my arm ready to throw lightning and…stopped.
I told you not to come, Emerald wailed in anguish.
An enormous black dragon loomed in front of her. The sun flashed off his scales, turning him from black to brilliant scarlet for the briefest of seconds. Steam curled out of his nostrils as he pawed at the ground. His talons tore up huge chunks of dirt and hurled them into the air.
He was, to put it quite plainly, magnificent.
As I watched, Emerald bowed her head and lowered herself to the ground in a posture of submission.
Isla let out a hiss, re-strung her bow and notched an arrow. It was only then that I saw the man standing beside the dragon.
Easily seven foot tall, he was sheathed in black armour that mimicked the colour-shifting tendency of his dragon, flashing from black to ruby as he turned to observe us. A helmet covered his head and masked his eyes, leaving only his mouth visible.
He lifted one hand in our direction and called out, ‘I come in peace.’
Yeah, right. Emerald may have appeared submissive, but there was anger evident in her thoughts. Anger, and a tinge of something else. Embarrassment?
‘My name is Turos, and I have come to take Silvanta home.’
Silvanta? It took me a moment to realise he was talking about Emerald.
‘She is home,’ I yelled back.
He shook his head. ‘Your dragon does not belong here. It is time for her to come home and face her consequences.’
Emerald pressed herself further into the dirt and if I hadn’t known that she was a big, tough dragon, I would have said she was quivering.
‘What consequences?’
‘All actions pay a price.’
‘What actions? What price?’ His refusal to answer my questions was really starting to cheese me off.
He tilted his head to the side while he considered my question, and his dragon swung its head around, observing us with cold, glittering eyes. The beast let out a steam-filled snort and Turos nodded his head as if agreeing with something.
I was betting that whatever conversation had just gone on had been less than complimentary about Isla and me. The whole dragon in the head thing was pretty cool when it was me doing it, but in this context it sucked big time.
‘Put away the bow,’ I murmured to Isla. Maybe he would answer my questions if we weren’t physically threatening him.
Turos’s body language remained alert as we walked towards him. I stopped far enough away that we wouldn’t be forced to look up at him. ‘Who are you?’
He clenched his hand and placed it on his chest, bending his head as he said, ‘I am Turos, son of Bladimir, Head Dragon Rider of….’
I held a hand up to interrupt him. ‘Sorry, is it you, or your father that’s the Head Dragon Rider? Cause the way you phrased that sentence left me unsure?’
If I hadn’t been looking for it, I mightn’t have noticed the tightening of his lips that showed his annoyance. Emerald snickered in my mind and I suppressed my own smile. It was a petty triumph I knew, but a triumph none the less.
‘My father, Bladimir, is the Head Dragon Rider.’ He raised an eyebrow in the air and paused as if waiting for me to ask another question.
I waved a hand at him. ‘Do go on.’ My bad mood was definitely returning.
‘Head Dragon Rider of Millenia.’
Isla let out a gasp. ‘But, Millenia does not exist.’
‘And yet, here I stand before you.’ His smirk made my hands clench into fists.
I turned to Isla. ‘What’s Millenia?’
‘An ancient city. A mythical city.’ She shrugged one shoulder. ‘Its existence has always been a source of much debate. Like your Atlantis.’
As I turned back to Turos, light crackled across the sky. The black dragon threw its head in the air and snorted.
‘Yes,’ Turos said, ‘we must go. Come Silvanta.’
Emerald’s misery was tangible inside my mind.
‘She’s not going anywhere without me,’ I said.
‘Without us,’ Isla corrected me.
I looked over at her.
‘Don’t think you’re going to have an adventure like that without me.’
‘Now see here….’ Turos stopped speaking as the sky did that weird flicky thing again. He glanced at the black dragon and then said, ‘We are running out of time.’
I was pretty sure that wasn’t what he had been going to say. ‘We’ll just go pack some things.’
‘There’s no time.’ The sky flickered again. ‘You come now or you don’t come at all.’ His dragon lifted a leg and Turos jumped onto it, pulling himself up onto a leather harness that sat around the dragon’s neck.
‘Isadora,’ Mum called from the top of the hill. ‘What’s going on down there?’
I looked at Isla. Mum was going to kill us if we took off without an explanation, and there were no words for what Sabby would do to us.
‘I’m coming,’ Isla said, reading my mind.
The sky flickered again.
‘Quickly,’ Turos said.
‘Mum,’ I yelled as I clambered onto Emerald’s back. ‘Isla and I are going for a ride.’
‘What?’ Her voice was getting closer.
‘Wait,’ I heard Sabby yell out. ‘I’m coming too.’
Isla handed Scruffy up to me and I tucked him against my chest with my arms nestled on each side of him. ‘We may be gone for a few days,’ I yelled. ‘You’ll miss your exams.’
‘Isadora Scrumpleton.’
I looked over my shoulder and pulled a face as Isla climbed on behind me. That had been Mum’s angry voice.
She broke from the trees onto the meadow with Sabby right behind her as Turos took flight. Their mouths gaped as they stared at the gigantic dragon. He had looked big on the ground, but in full flight the magnitude of his size became apparent. He was easily twice as big as Emerald.
Lance, Emerald thought at me. His name is Lance.
Turos and Lance circled the field, gaining height as Emerald took a few lurching steps and leapt into the air.
‘Izzy,’ Mum yelled. ‘Where are you going?’
That was a really good question.
‘Don’t you dare have another adventure without me,’ Sabby shrieked. Mia clambered up onto Sabby’s head and spread her limbs, but we were already too far above her for her to be able to glide to us. I felt a pang, but knew she would be safer with Sabby than us.
‘I’ll tell you all about it when we get back,’ I hollered down to them. I wasn’t sure if they heard me or not.
I passed the leather straps tied around Emerald’s neck back to Isla. She grabbed them and, as she pulled back, the leather webbing we had constructed for Scruffy opened up. I tucked him into it and crossed a second set of straps over the top of it. He stuck his head out of the top of his safety harness, a broad doggy grin on his face.
‘They’re not going to be very happy,’ Isla yelled into my ear.
That was probably the understatement of the year.
Emerald stretched out her neck and sped after Lance. The sky flickered again, but this time, it didn’t stop. Tiny licks of lightning danced around us. I held out a hand, watching as they prickled over the surface of my skin.
Faster and faster they swirled, growing in size as well as number until all I could see were the lights.
Hang on,’ Emerald told me.
‘Hold tight,’ I yelled over my shoulder as I wrapped the leather around my wrists.
And then the lights coalesced into a huge ball of light in front of us. I could see the silhouette of Turos hunching over Lance’s neck. The ball pulsed once, twice and as it pulsed the third time, Emerald let out a roar. The ball exploded, light rolling away like a shockwave from a hole rent in the sky.
Tendrils of icy air licked my face as we raced towards the black void. The blue of our sky disappeared and black encased us. Cold pressed in on all sides and I fought to breathe. I heard Isla’s choked breath behind me and Scruffy let out a whine.
Before I could panic there was a second explosion and a blue slice appeared. Light blazed, illuminating us in its radiance. Two more strokes of Emerald’s wings and we were through.
I sucked in air and looked behind to check Isla was all right.
Her eyes sparkled with excitement as she gave me a huge smile. ‘I can’t believe you tried to make me stay behind. I mean, that was awesome.’
Blue water stretched to the horizon below us. Lance banked to the left at the same time as Emerald did. She at least knew where we were going.
Where are we?
Millenia. Her thoughts held the feel of a shoulder shrug. I imagined if she had been a teenager she might have added a, ‘Duh,’ at the end.
I sighed. When she got all sullen it wasn’t worth trying to converse with her.
Scruffy looked up at me, his tongue hanging out in a doggy smile. He nestled down into his riding bag and closed his eyes.
‘There.’ Isla leant forwards and pointed straight ahead.
I squinted at the horizon but it took me another minute before I could see what she already had. Smoke. Lots of it.
A few minutes later I could make out the shape of mountains pushing into the sky. A soft orange glow was visible on the tip of the highest mountain. The smoke came from this.
A volcano? Oh, that was just great.
‘At least we’ll be warm,’ Isla yelled into my ear.
I turned to look at her. ‘Have you not heard of Pompeii?’
She flashed me a grin. ‘What’s a little ash?’
The volcano never erupts. It was the first thing Emerald had said voluntarily since we had got there.
It’s always never till the first time.
She let out a little snort of amusement.
I took that as a good sign. So…do I need to start calling you Silvanta?
There was a pause before she said, I never really did like that name much. Admittedly, it was better than ‘Dragon’.
That’s what Santanas used to call you?
She shook her head up and down. I would appreciate it if you would continue to call me Emerald. It will remind me of happier times.
I thought a question mark at her but she ignored me.
The mountains stretched higher and higher as we soared towards them, till they towered above. As we got closer I could make out structures on the highest mountain. Graceful buildings, linked by arched bridges. Steeples and towers rose into the air like delicate pieces of lacework.
Each building had a large platform at its front, and as I watched, a dragon emerged from an enormous entry way and strode to the middle of the platform. A person, dressed in an outfit similar to Turos’s, jumped lithely up onto the dragon’s neck. A second later they were airborne.
I could feel Emerald’s distress radiating into my mind and I rubbed a hand over her scales. As we headed for the largest of the buildings her anguish increased, tears built in my eyes as I shared her emotions.
We swooped down towards a platform where a group of men, covered in full-length, black capes waited. They were still as they watched our approach.
Emerald flared her wings and took a few running steps before she came to a stop. Isla dismounted and I untied Scruffy and handed him down to her, before sliding down.
Turos approached the group and bowed low over the offered hand of the man in the lead. ‘Father,’ he said. ‘I have returned.’
I let out a snort. I mean I would have thought that that part at least was obvious.
Bladimir turned to observe us. ‘You successfully managed to capture her?’
‘She came willingly with Silvanta.’
Emerald’s low moan filled my mind.
‘And the other one?’
‘A faery Princess.’
Bladimir nodded his head. ‘She will be of use to us.’ He clapped Turos on the shoulder and said, ‘You have done well, my boy.’
Turos pulled his helmet off his head and ran his hand through bleached-white hair. His smile, when he turned to look at us was full of smug arrogance.
I took two quick steps towards him, leapt into the air, and smacked my fist into his face as hard as I could.
The rest of the men surged towards me, pulling weapons from underneath their cloaks.
‘Don’t hurt her,’ Bladimir roared. ‘We need her alive.’
Don’t fight them. Emerald’s panicked thought echoed around my head.
I ignored her as I turned to face the pack, ready to kill them all if I had to.
Where normal men would have still been a few paces away, the leader was already on me. He moved with such speed as he whipped a wooden baton at my head that I only just managed to deflect it. And even then the tip of it struck the side of my skull.
‘Izzy.’ I heard Isla shout my name, saw her struggling beside me.
My head rocked to the side and I collapsed to my knees. I raised a hand to my hair and stared incoherently at my red-stained fingers. The last thing I saw before I lost consciousness was blood running from Turos’s nose. I felt a smile stretch my lips as my vision faded, and then all I heard was white noise.