To Seduce a Dragon - Poppy Rhys Page 0,2
simmered down was the best way to settle the tension Jaya’d no doubt cause. All over a bug. Grinda didn’t need to know Jaya would’ve made up any excuse to get out of the village for a few days, even if Remmy hadn’t provided a good one.
Her secret was still her secret. Luckily, her menses were like clockwork. Every twenty-eight days, they showed up, and every twenty-eight days Jaya made sure she was on a hunt or supply run.
Alone.
She’d head out at first light after a good night’s rest.
“Think you’re right. I’ll let the others know. Be safe out there,” she warned. “There be dragons, dont’cha know?”
Dragons.
Yeah, right.
2
“Jaya, wake up!”
Her body jerked and she sat up, her ram’s fur blanket pooling into her lap, vision blurred from sleep and heart racing. The glowing embers in the hearth outlined Grinda hovering over her.
“What’s wrong? What is it? Are we under attack?”
“It’s here,” she blurted, grabbing Jaya’s wrists with her cold fingers and pulling her out of bed, away from the warm skins.
“What’s here?” She wasn’t making any sense.
“The star!”
Breath heavily seesawed in and out of Jaya’s lungs, her body and brain still trying to comprehend the rude awakening and make sense of the chaos. It was the middle of the night—when only a rotation of guardians should be awake—yet the whole village, forty-five people, were gathered outside their wooden lodges and pointing up at the sky.
She turned her gaze upward, the vast expanse of the darkest blue lit up by sparkling stars she’d seen every night since she could remember—they weren’t alone anymore.
A fiery burst with a tail of red shone brightly, large enough to see without squinting.
The star.
The one the elders whispered about, the one she’d doubted the existence of since she first heard the legend.
That doubt wasn’t washed away, even as she watched it burn in the night sky. Maybe she was too skeptical for her own good. Her brain wouldn’t let her believe the giant beasts of myth and legend were real. She’d never seen one with her own eyes, and neither had anyone in the village.
It was too fantastical.
Granted, there were giant creatures in the White Wastes—spear-limbed, man eating, ravenous, and lethal—but they were creatures. They didn’t mystically turn into a man with a single touch.
“It’s real,” she heard a villager say.
“We could be saved.”
“There is hope.”
Jaya looked down at Grinda and she could see a flicker of something there—optimism? Her eager, wide-eyed gaze made her face appear child-like, so different from the sarcastic, playful glint her eyes usually held.
“Gather the others,” she whispered. “Kelso wants a meeting.”
Jaya’s brow knitted into a frown. “Kelso’s here?”
“She arrived not long before the star appeared.” Grinda’s forehead wrinkled in contemplation. “As if she knew it was coming.”
“How could she know?” No one in Mist Lake understood the stars, or what they prophesied. They were simply a faithful guide at night.
Noise started in the forest, a pack of wild hounds yipping and howling. So close to the village. Too close.
“Weird chrishfa’s been happening around here tonight,” Grinda murmured before slinking away without explaining what she meant.
Jaya made her rounds, waking the few guardians who hadn’t been disturbed by the commotion. Beyond a cabin, she spotted the telltale feathers of her hunting companion, Hurk.
Strange… He never ventured that close to the village.
Within a handful of moments, all ten guardians were gathered around Kelso at the edge of the dark forest and away from prying eyes and ears, the only light emanating from the burning torch Grinda held.
“Is it true?” Cernik asked, her harsh features made even more acute by the glow of the fire. “Are there dragons?”
“It’s true,” Kelso replied in hushed tones.
“But how do you know?” Jaya blurted, immediately regretting it as she felt the chastising eyes of her fellow guardians. Kelso didn’t lie—her word was solid—yet she questioned her.
When she eyed Kelso next, prepared to be reprimanded, there was no animosity there. Only understanding that she’d naturally be curious about the validity of something so outlandish.
Jaya exhaled a relieved sigh.
“Long ago when I was younger than all of you, younger than the youth of this tribe, I saw it. A dragon.” Her voice wistful, something Jaya’d never heard from their trainer—ever. Kelso was blunt, always. Sometimes she didn’t think Kelso had dreams or desires at all—only the urge to protect, hunt, be the pillar of ice the rest of them leaned on.
“What did it look like?” Grinda asked. The circle grew tighter as they listened.
“I’ll never forget it,” Kelso explained.