The Moonflower Dance by Lea Doué

Author:Lea Doué [Doué, Lea]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780994911391
Publisher: Butterwing Publishing
Published: 2019-07-01T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Neylan squeezed herself against the tree trunk, trying to will herself invisible to the razor-tail dragon prowling the forest floor barely a stone’s throw away. One thought echoed in her mind.

Keir knew about the dragon. He told me to stay inside to keep me safe.

He hadn’t wanted to scare her, but he’d said they would be back by noon.

Why hadn’t he returned?

Ysmay had ridden off in a rush, her errand possibly to warn the village and send for help.

She and Oswald were retired dragon soldiers.

And none of it mattered at the moment.

The razor-tail found her satchel under the tree where she’d slept and ripped it open. Within moments, it had consumed everything edible, and then it pressed its nose to the ground and followed her scent to the cloak lying on the ground below her.

It shrieked again, its voice grating with a metallic tone like rusty door hinges. After slashing at the cloak, it stretched up onto the tree trunk and stared directly at her hiding spot.

Shaking so hard he seemed to vibrate, dear little Wist peeked out from behind her neck and hissed.

She was helpless. Her knife lay on the ground within the mauled satchel, but it would have been useless against the teeth and talons and razor-sharp tail of the dragon.

Her muscles burned, and her legs shook with the effort to stay on the swaying branch.

The razor-tail began to climb.

She looked frantically from the dragon to the surrounding canopy, desperate for a higher branch, an escape route to another tree. Anything.

The dragon reached the first large branch and paused, its gaze locked on her. Its tail lashed back and forth, and it spread its wings and flapped them furiously, as if it planned to fly straight at her.

“Go AWAY!”

Wist echoed her with a scream of his own.

Without breaking eye contact, the dragon folded its wings. It advanced another foot… and then it screeched as if in pain, writhing its way back down to the ground.

Neylan glanced around, expecting to see a bowman among the trees, but the forest remained empty. What had happened? Had Wist spit his venom at it?

Suddenly, a wolf howled, its cry splitting the silence.

The dragon rushed at her as if it hadn’t heard, lunging its way up the tree, but it fell back again at the same spot it had retreated before. It shook its head and looked over its shoulder.

The wolf howled again, and another answered.

The razor-tail snarled at her. Then it whipped around, its tail cutting a deep gash in the birch’s trunk, and raced away from the wolves.

Neylan sniffed and wiped her nose on her sleeve.

The wolves howled off and on, gradually making their way closer. She counted several different voices, but she couldn’t pinpoint the exact number. Not that it mattered. It was enough to scare off a solitary razor-tail.

A few moments before the first wolf appeared, Wist rustled his wings and pointed his snout to the left. Two more wolves followed the first, and then she lost count as they darted in and out of the shadows.

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