The Dragon-Child (Hyborean Dragons) by Larson B. V

Author:Larson, B. V. [Larson, B. V.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fantasy
Published: 2011-01-20T06:00:00+00:00

-7-

Gruum dreamt of another place. It seemed to him that he awoke there, and that the real world was a hazily recalled dream.

He did not awaken on dry ground, but rather suspended in deep water. The water wasn’t cold, but rather pleasantly warm. It was very dark, the only sources of light being a white, wavery shimmer far above and a lurid, red glow far below. He could not breathe, but he felt no urge to, and no panic for the lack of it. Experimentally, he moved his limbs and found them operable. He stroked toward the surface, naturally enough. He proceeded at a leisurely pace. There was no need for air, no hurry to reach the distant surface.

Something caught his attention during that long slow rise toward the roof of this watery world. Movement, huge and dark gray. A shadow loomed. He regarded it, hands drifting at his sides, hair floating like seaweed in his face. A tiny stream of bubbled rose from his nostrils.

A huge face regarded him thoughtfully. It was not a human face, but rather that of a leviathan. A monster of the deeps. Gruum returned the stare, and slowly, as the black eyes stared back, each as big as his own puny skull, he began to feel fear grow inside him. It was a familiar, but unwelcome sensation.

What if this was the real world? What if—somehow—Therian had worked a spell while he slept that let him breath in the deeps? Such a sorcery he could easily believe. The King had done things far more surprising than that. Gruum stared at the monster a moment longer. Maybe he had no need to breathe, but he certainly could be consumed, if this were the real world he floated within.

Gruum screamed. His mouth opened, and bubbles shot outward. A silvery mass of them. He could hear his scream, muffled and indistinct, in his ears. Knowing not what else to do, he swam upward. He grabbed at the water as a man might grab at the earth while sliding over a cliff. With desperate clawing motions he swam upward. But the surface seemed so distant, so impossibly far.

The creature followed him, nosing along in his wake. He could feel its presence. Perhaps it was curious about him. Perhaps it enjoyed the chase. Those jaws. He had not yet seen them open, but he had no doubt they could swallow him without chewing. He was no more than a gulp to this creature. No more than a wriggling sardine in a fisherman’s pinched fingers.

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