Night Dragon An Epic Fantasy Adventure - D.K. Holmberg Page 0,2
from Dragon Haven, to interfere.
Not that he thought that anybody from Dragon Haven would cause any problems for this dragon, but Jason didn’t want to startle the dragon, and he wanted to have an unencumbered opportunity to continue to work with the dragon.
The night dragon glanced back at him, turning in his direction.
A burst of power came from him and struck Jason.
He squeezed a barrier around himself and waited.
The night dragon turned toward him, radiating energy again. “I would like to leave these trees,” the dragon said.
He stopped in a small clearing. This was where the egg had hatched, and there were still fragments of the shell remaining. Jason had one in his pocket, his way of trying to see if he might be able to connect to the dragon in a different way, but so far that shell hadn’t done anything to help Jason establish that connection. He didn’t know if it would or not, but he also worried that if the shell were to be found by someone else, there was a danger to the night dragon. The other pieces of shell were within Dragon Haven, secluded in a room that Jason had sealed off with a powerful illusion.
“What do you hope to find outside of the forest?”
“Something else,” the night dragon said.
Jason leaned against one of the trees, watching the night dragon. He was so different than the other dragons.
Of course, when it came to these dragons—the misfits—all of them were different from each other. While the night dragon might be small, there was no doubt in Jason’s mind that he was powerful. As far as Jason could tell, the dragon had considerable energy trapped within him, and he could use his power and energy in order to reach for the kind of magic that the other dragons could not.
“The others aren’t sure it’s safe for you to leave yet.”
“The others are afraid,” the night dragon said.
“Yes,” Jason said. He stepped forward and crouched down next the night dragon.
He swished his tail, the only part of him that was enormous. It was incredibly long, snaking out from him, long enough that he could wrap it all the way around the entirety of his body.
“There is someone out there who would try to control the dragons, and she has already attempted to do so with the others.”
“But she has failed,” the night dragon said.
“So far, she has failed,” Jason agreed.
“Then she would fail with me,” the night dragon said. He looked over, and those dark eyes held Jason. Power seemed to swirl into him, trapping him. “You haven’t been able to hold me with only the energy of one dragon.”
“I haven’t,” Jason agreed.
That was part of the game, their way of trying to work together to see if there was anything that Jason might be able to do to hold the dragon, and in all the times he had attempted to trap the dragon, a single connection wasn’t enough. The night dragon could break free when Jason held him with the energy of the ice dragon or the iron dragon or even the forest dragon. Jason hadn’t attempted to do so with the storm dragon, though his connection to that dragon was different, not nearly as potent as it was with the others. Regardless, only in mixing had he been successful in holding the night dragon.
Part of that might just be a failing of Jason’s, not necessarily a sign of how powerful the night dragon could be, though he couldn’t help but wonder if it truly did demonstrate the true strength of the night dragon, of the power that existed within him.
“You’re right, but the person we worry about can command hundreds of dragons,” he said.
“You have freed most of those dragons,” the dragon said.
“I’ve freed as many as I can, but there remain hundreds still trapped.”
“There are others that need freed.”
“From her?”
Jason created an illusion, holding an image of Jessica. She stood on the far side of the clearing, her arms crossed, a dark tilt to her jaw. She had dark black hair, deep brown eyes, almost black, and pale skin. She was dressed in a dragonskin jacket and pants, much like she had the very first time he’d met her.
Despite the illusion, there was an anger and energy that filled her, and Jason couldn’t help but feel as if there was something within the illusion that he needed to be careful creating. Every so often, he wondered if the illusion had more power than he suspected.