Chapter 2- A Forced Companionship
Sept. 2nd, 7:40 P.M., the light’s nearly gone on Day 1. It’s a new moon.
Lessiam launched himself into the air with a gush of wind and shot toward the scene. Seconds later, he was just above the lad. The riders were only a hundred yards away now, two with their maces raised high and the man in the lead twirling his sword over his head, ready to attack. They were whooping and hollering. This seemed to be some kind of game to them. No one had noticed the new presence yet. Lessiam swooped around once, folded the midsection of his wings over his back and tucked his wingtips in. He let himself drop straight to the ground next to the lad.
As he hit, the ground shuddered. His talons dug into the earth, his feet and legs flexed, and he bounced up to full height. The horses skidded to a halt; it was all the riders could do to hold them in place. For a split second, riders and steeds were frozen in terror. In the next instant, Lessiam raised his wings with one smooth motion. Opening them to their full span, he roared. The men’s horses reared, their front legs spun frantically. No rein could contain their fear. The lad gaped and dropped limply to the ground, unconscious. The two men in the rear flew off their horses. One landed with the sharp crack of broken bones. The other scrambled up and wildly began to run away. The three horses took off as fast as they could. The remaining rider held on for dear life as his crazed steed shot him off into the distance.
The horses were soon lost behind the hillside. The man on foot continued to flee at breakneck speed. Lessiam was pleased; he’d been practicing his roar just last night. And to think his friends Krigsly and Melou had made fun of it!
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The mountainside didn’t seem safe—or fun. Lessiam thought he’d better get away, lest the humans return in greater force to nag him. So he grabbed the unconscious lad with his talons, being careful not to impale him, and sent himself into the sky with a rush of air. He searched for his family cave for several hours, to no avail. The entire landscape seemed to have shifted tremendously. Eventually he grew tired with effort. He decided he’d have to rest and solve this in the morning. The land rolled past beneath his wings as he set off for a quiet place to rest the lad and gather his wits.
Soon he realized he was flying in nearly the correct direction to reach where Lexiter and his grandfather should be. Curving a bit more to the west, he corrected his path and continued on.
He’d flown on for another hour or more when he finally found a peaceful place that looked secluded enough. He was so tired that he just let the human slide out of his grip, spread himself out on a nearly flat piece of ground and dropped right into a deep sleep.
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Sept. 3rd, 2 A.M.
Josiah awoke in pain; his temples throbbed and something was jabbing into the back of his neck. He rolled his head to the right and saw it was a rock. He pushed it aside and then closed his eyes, drifting back to sleep.
As the night passed, images flitted across his mind’s eye. He saw men on horseback charging at him. The one at the lead held up a large, ugly sword and, just as he reached Jos, swung the blade violently down at his neck. Josiah thrust his arm up in a reflexive defense.
Then—nothing happened. All was silent. Josiah opened his eyes and lowered his trembling arms as he saw that the night was still and he was alone.
“So, it was a dream, a bad one,” he thought. He lay back down, and his breathing began to subside. He looked up at the sky and could actually see more than just smoke and gloom. The air was clear, the sky a deep black except the points that were the stars, and they were so intensely bright. He’d grown up around dirt, smoke, and dust, and had never seen such a sky or such an intense display of stars. Where was he? Then he realized he really didn’t care as, for some reason, he felt safe and at peace here. These were feelings he thought he’d lost forever, and here they were again. For now, that was all that mattered. He closed his eyes and began to drift into a peaceful rest.
He was almost asleep again when he heard and felt a cough so deep that the ground twitched. It was then that he saw the creature. He had thought it was a rock before, but now the illusion was shattered as it coughed again, its huge frame jolting and then subsiding in convulsions.
It lay on its belly, wings wrapped around itself. Soon its body calmed and turned over onto its side, away from Josiah; its breathing was now regular and calm. Josiah slowly got his feet under him and began to inch backwards, away from it. It was the same creature from the mountain—a dragon. He had never seen one before this day but had heard of them and their evil ways. He shuddered as he recalled one of the first stories he’d ever been told of these beasts. Those images played quickly over his sub-consciousness before he shook himself out of his reverie and back to the present. This dragon did honestly appear to be asleep. It had iridescent greenish scales covering either side of its spine. It was some 14 feet long curled up like it was. It must weigh tons, literally. Josiah knew he really should get away from it, but he also felt an odd pull towards it. The period before he’d passed out came back to him. The horsemen were real! But they’d never been allowed to reach him. This beast had saved his life.
He was confused. He looked around and saw that they were on a flat surface of rock that seemed to end abruptly about fifteen feet from where they were, in the center of a butte. He turned quietly and walked slowly to the edge and looked down. The drop was some fifty or sixty feet, the sides smooth. Without a rope he was stranded with this dragon. It had him trapped.
Or did it? He paused to think. If it had wanted to kill him it’d had several chances. It wanted him alive for some reason. Again, Josiah felt conflicted; his friend Aresia had related how dragons had come and cornered her family in a fenced field behind their own home. She’d cried as she told of the dragons’ gruesome murder of every person she had grown up with and loved. Each of Aresia’s kin was eaten alive, screaming, their hearts stopping only once they were in a dragon’s stomach. Aresia had witnessed all of it at seven years old, curled up near the bottom boards of the fence behind her home. She’d known she would be next but then, suddenly, the dragons had other business to attend to and went off, leaving her alone. She didn’t even have bodies to bury—nothing whatsoever remained.
Soon afterwards a cruel man had come along and scooped up the girl. Aresia had lived, for the time being. Josiah and Aresia had met soon after she’d arrived at the slave camp Josiah had grown up in. The overseers called the camp “Illoplisis.” Aresia had arrived seven years ago, right after her family was killed. Josiah had been born into the slave camp and had shown Aresia how to survive. They’d soon become fast friends. Both of them were young and had a lot in common; each had suffered enormously for most of their short lives. There were natural bonds between them. Josiah now felt lost without her.
Camp Illoplisis was not in a set location. The overseers would occasionally pack up all of the slaves and march them to some new, and usually rougher, environment. Once relocated they would be set to work on whatever the latest project was that the Lord Wizard Umitsan had dealt out.
Aresia, (or Res, as he called her), was even now in that camp, not far from the mountain where Josiah had first come upon this green dragon. Josiah was worried she may not survive much longer. They may blame and punish her for his escape. He felt pangs of guilt at this last thought. To cause Res trouble was the last thing he’d wanted, but he’d just had to leave! He had known he’d be killed soon if he’d stayed. His family had been picked off one by one by greedy overseers who had a strong loathing for anyone of supposed past nobility. Yes, Josiah had known that escape was pretty unlikely; anyone in his life who’d tried had been caught, alive if possible, then slowly tortured. But he’d had to try, and then maybe there would be a chance to do something to change things for the better.
He didn’t know what he could do, but anything would be better than what they were living through. The last family he’d had was his sister, Ilivia. Her death was particularly gruesome.
You were worked hard in the camp from childhood, but when you turned sixteen you were put to work in very dangerous mining operations until you turned twenty-five— and most didn’t live that long. When she’d turned sixteen Ilivia had refused to do this work. She’d aimed to try to start a strike of sorts. Of course, the overseers rejected her attempts to communicate to them for better working conditions for slaves. They demanded she work and attempted to force upon her the worst job of them all—putting the gunpowder into the deep shafts and then trying to scramble out before their fuses burnt down. The guards would make a sick game of trying to kill off the people doing this job, they’d set fire to the fuse early, fill in the shaft after setting the fuse on fire, and all kinds of “sport.”
Ilivia continued her refusal. Some people followed her and their “strike” lasted a few hours before all but Ilivia were whipped into submission. Still, she refused to get into the mineshafts, standing proudly even when threatened. The overseer’s decided to make an example of her. They tied her up, packed her heart and brain in ice and burned her alive. She’d lived longer because of the ice and everyone, especially Josiah, heard the horrible pain in her agonized screams. Josiah had run out to stop it when Res had dove at him, grabbing his legs and tripping him up. He’d fallen and struck his head, blacking out. When he awoke, one of the overseer’s voices was ringing in his ears, “…So you see, it’s better to live, work, and die laboring for us than it is to refuse to work! Your deaths can be easy or hard. That is the choice you have.”
That was the point where Josiah’s cooperation with them had ended, regardless of the consequences.
It was just yesterday, but it seemed to Josiah as if weeks had passed. Looking back he saw now that he could have told Res he was leaving and given her a chance to make a break for it with him, but at the time, the only thought in Josiah’s mind had been escape and to one day return and wreak vengeance upon those oppressive murderers. Plus, Josiah didn’t want to get the only friend he had left killed off with him!
Josiah felt grief settling in. Somehow he was alive, but at the mercy of this beast he’d met on the mountain. His best friend may well be dying all because of him and his foolishness; he’d messed everything up. “Nobility?!” he thought with disgust.
He recalled his dad describing that, though they’d been slaves for centuries, the blood coursing through the family’s veins was still that of a once free and noble family. He would look at Josiah sternly and say, “Of course every slave in this camp should hold his head high and walk tall, regardless of what he or she may face. But this applies to our family most especially. We have an example to continue to set—an example that the human spirit will never fail. My grandfather placed this trust in my father, and my father, in me. Now I pass it along to you and your siblings. So carry yourself well. And pass this on to your sons and daughters. Do not lose yourself, regardless of everything else being taken away from you.” Then Dad would add with a grin, “Who knows? Maybe you will live long enough to be a part of some future freedom, my son.”
“What a joke,” Josiah said under his breath. “Noble slaves, what a joke.” But these thoughts did bring a glimmer of hope back to him as he stood here on this isolated rock with an unknown beast, his future hidden from him.
After a while he told himself to knock off the self-pity. He looked over his shoulder, the beast still lay there silently, its body rising and falling rhythmically. “Well, I might as well sleep more. Who knows? Maybe the morning will bring some answers,” he said under his breath. He went back to where he had been lying and took his shirt off, rolled it into a ball and put it under his head. He looked up at the far-off stars and curled up facing the beast and let himself fall back to sleep.
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Sept. 3rd, 10 A.M., Day 2
Josiah woke up and could feel the sun shining. He had a powerful hunger and he seriously needed an outhouse or a bush. His headache was gone. He opened his eyes and looked to see if the dragon was still around. He saw that it was still lying in the same position it had been in the middle of the night.
Josiah walked over to the edge of the butte, looked down and around and, seeing that he had some privacy, or the best he was going to get, he went ahead and did his business. Once finished, he now began to think of a way to get food. He looked over the edge of the butte again. It was still just as treacherous as it had looked the night before. He looked back at the dragon. “It could have killed me by now, many times over,” he thought. He’d take his chances with the beast. He walked over to it and pushed its back. Getting no response he went around in front of it and looked at its face. It had an eye open! He jumped back.
The dragon’s expression did not change. Its face looked peaceful; it appeared to be fully asleep. Yet the one eye was still open; it was a large, red eye and appeared to be glazed over. The other eye was sealed shut. The dragon did not move other than the rise and fall of its chest as it breathed.
“Hey dragon,” Josiah whispered. In response he got—nothing—complete silence. He got on his knees and said it louder—still nothing. He reached out toward its rising chest. He let his fingers get very close and stopped.
He looked at the dragon’s head; it still seemed undisturbed. Then he reached his index finger out and his nail brushed the dragon’s chest. Its closed eyelid raised at the same moment the open eye changed in color. Both eyes were now a gold-green color.
“What’s up?” the dragon asked.
Josiah fell back, rolling onto his butt. He quickly scrambled to his feet. The dragon hadn’t moved, except for an interested expression that had come over its face.
Josiah was a few feet back from the dragon now. He saw it looking at him as he looked at it.
“What’s up?” the dragon again asked, a bit more insistently this time.
“I-I’m hungry,” Josiah replied.
“Me too,” the beast said, “and you actually look a bit tasty today.”
Josiah flinched. But then, was that a smug smile on the beast’s face? It was.
The dragon then did something that remarkably resembled a shrug. Then it raised itself to its full height and stretched out its wings. It must have been over thirty feet tall and each of its wings spread out more than forty feet!
“I was just joking. I wouldn’t eat human!You have the weirdest reactions! Let’s go get some food.”
At that it leapt up into the air and swept its wings forward, kicking up a good amount of dust in the process.
Then Lessiam remembered that the lad had no wings. So, he dropped nearer to him and said, “Grab hold.”
Josiah looked up at it in the air just above him and stared. The dragon looked back at him and apologized, saying, “Oh, I’m sorry, I’m not being very helpful.” And, at that, it landed and bent down.
“You’ve never ridden before, have you?” asked the beast, with a look of mild surprise on its face.
By this time Josiah had begun to realize that this dragon was going to let him live—at least a while longer. Maybe it wanted to shake him off in mid flight to see him drop to his death. What choice did he have, though? He had to get off the butte. He looked back at the beast, whose back and spine were two feet from him now. And, saying nothing, he stepped towards the dragon, put one foot on the back end of its left wing and lifted himself up with a grunt. Then he made his way to the spine. The beast was too wide to straddle but he found that the scales opened up to reveal space for his knees and feet to dig in and space for him to grab with his hands.
It leapt into the air and was off like an arrow released from a bow. It flew high over the dusty plain for a few minutes. Josiah had ridden a horse two times before and noted that the dragon’s speed was several times that of any horse he’d been on or seen. He could feel the power surging through its body with each sweep of the wings.
Soon Josiah saw that the ground below had become thick with trees. They had overflown this forest for a short while when, suddenly, the dragon dropped into a clearing amongst the trees and grabbed a squealing pig with its talons.
Lessiam landed in a clearing and let Josiah down. He looked at the lad and said, “I’m going to let this pig go. So you grab hold of him first, all right?”
Josiah nodded.
Lessiam released the pig and then took off out of the clearing, leaving Josiah to grapple with the frantic pig.
Moments later Josiah looked up to see the beast’s return. It had gathered wood in its grip, which it set down in the center of the clearing. Then it started a fire with a single breath, (which nearly startled Josiah into losing his grip on the pig).
The dragon took a long branch and, in a few flicks of its talons, had a cleaned, sharp pole, which it took in his left hand. It grabbed the pig with the other and thrust the skewer through it in one smooth motion. Josiah was hungry but still very scared. This dragon could kill him in an instant.
The beast proceeded to roast the freshly killed pig over the tall, open flames. Soon it appeared cooked. The dragon removed the skewer from the fire and set it upon some rocks near Josiah. The dragon looked at him and gestured for him to help himself. Josiah slowly approached the roasting pig. He reached forward, tore off a piece, and bit into it. It was actually good! He tore into it with vigor. While he was eating, the dragon left. Josiah barely noticed, as he ate and ate, to his heart and stomach’s content.