Chapter 14: Lost in the Forest

Previously:

The ground trembles under me. And then it’s gone.

“TORE!” Thyra yells, panicked, as I fall away.

”Thyra!” I breathe, falling away, terrified.

My body slams into something hard, and I let out a chocked scream. Everything moves rapidly, in a blur of colours, as I slam into things again and again. I don’t know what direction is up. Even if I try to focus my eyes, I’m moving so quickly that it’s impossible. The last thing I remember is my back crashing against something thick before darkness overtakes me.

Now:

The first thing I notice when I wake up is the trees surrounding me. There are so many of them, tall and thick. With their branches bloom with green leaves. Looking up, I can’t even see the sky—which is crazy, considering I was two thirds up a mountain the last I remembered. With a crazy, hairy dragon, it’s parents, and… Thyra. Crap.

“Th—” I go to call out, but realise I have dirt in my mouth, literally. I spit it out, pulling an arm out from under me to aid myself in this horrible task. Shaking my head, I push myself up into a sitting position with a wince at the pain shooting from my side. I guess it would be too much to hope I would be healed. S“Thyra?” I call out. Silence follows. “Thyra?!” I call out again, squinting as I peer around. All I get as a response are birds calling. My mother’s bow is nowhere to be seen. S“Thyra?” I call out. Silence follows. “Thyra?!” I call out again, squinting as I peer around. All I get as a response are distant birds calling. My mother’s bow is nowhere to be seen. She's going to kill me!

“Well… at least I lost the dragons!” I mutter out loud, trying to look on the bright side. There really isn’t a bright side to this. I have no idea where I am, I’m sore, and I don’t even know if Thyra managed to escape the dragons!

“Ok, get yourself together,” I whisper, wiping some dirt from my cheek. My eyes fall on a brown shape among the leaves and dirt. I light up. My bag! Scrambling for it, I pull it to me and inspect it. A strap is snapped in two, and it’s covered in dirt and mud, but otherwise, it seems to be in good condition. I open it carefully and check the objects inside.

I exhale in relief, spilling out the contents in my lap— which consist of a water flask, roll of bandages, my short-sword, a dagger (one of my father’s), and a few apples. The water flask survived the fall perfectly, however the apples… not so much. I take a sip of water then set the flask back in the bag with the rest of the items, zipping the bag back up.

I guess I should try and find my way out of here. I slowly stand up, wincing at the pain that shoots from my left ankle. I groan. “Great!” I spit. It’s not broken, but it feels sprained. It’s going to slow me down for sure.

I start hobbling slowly through the trees, picking up a decent-sized stick to help take the weight off my ankle. Nothing is familiar to me, which is understanding because although I have spent a fair amount of time in the forest, I haven’t spent a lot of time in it beyond the border, which is where I am. Somewhere.

*

The leaves and twigs crunch under my boots as I amber through the forest. From the lights shining through the leaves, I can guess it’s still a few hours to midday. We’re due back at the village midday, so I still have enough time to find my way out of here. The only problem is that I’ve been wondering around the forest for an hour, but Nothing looks familiar, I haven’t found any animal tracks that lead anywhere other than dead ends, and I haven’t even found a stream of water.

Pausing to lean against a thick tree, I try to get my bearings. I’ve been seeing the same thing for the last hour; tall trees, no water, no path. It’s like even the animals have gone missing. Still, I grip my walking stick with one hand, and my sword with the other. At least I have something to defend myself with if those dragons find me.

Looking around myself, I see that the land rises a bit in the distance. Not too high to be a mountain or anything, but high enough so that I should be able to get a better vantage point. I take out my flask and take a quick sip of it before returning it to my bag and walking on towards the hill.

Soon climbing the grassy hill, I hear what I first assume is the wind in the distance. But soon standing on top and peering around, I listen more carefully and realise it almost sounds like a waterfall or something. A river, maybe? I hope so! Because then I can follow it and hopefully it’ll lead me to civilisation of some sort.

I try to pinpoint the exact direction it’s coming from, but it’s quite difficult. It’s very faint, after all. Finally deciding on the direction, I take off towards it and hope I’m not wrong. By the sounds of it, it’ll probably take me a fair amount of time to reach it— If it’s even there and it’s not my mind playing tricks on me. I occasionally call out as I walk, but no one ever answers. It’s strangely quiet. Sure, I can hear a few bugs, but I haven’t seen any forest creatures at all. No birds, deer, or even snakes. Yep, right now I’d even accept a snake. That’s how paranoid I am. That’s how badly I need to see another creature. Where the heck are the animals? This is a FOREST! There should be heaps of them! But there’s not! So where are they?!

*

Although I was heading in the general direction, I still get disoriented and confused by my surroundings. It’s hard when all that I see are trees, rocks, bushes and hills. Yet no animals. I’ve drained my flask half an hour ago. Finding the water source is harder than I thought it going to be, and it has taken a fair amount of backtracking to get here, as all I seem to do is go in the wrong direction.

When I, finally, get closer to the water source, I start to feel… weird. Not sick, but more like I’m being watched. Yet when I look around, I see not one soul looking back at me. Looking ahead of me, I note that the land drops down, before rising again. My first thought was just a dip in the land or an animal track. But when I get closer, the sound gets louder, and so when I stand close to the edge, the glimmer of water is what greets my eyes. The river isn’t a large one. It’s more of a stream or a creek. It would only take a few large steps across it. But it trickles out from an underground passageway—natural— and flows down until it’s out of my line of sight. Smooth, wet rocks poke out from the water, telling me if how old this stream is by the effect the water has had on the rocks.

Letting out a breath of relief, I scamper down the bank I stand on, and crouch down at the water’s edge. I take out my flask and fill it up with the cool water, gulping it down to relieve my thirst. The fresh water soothes my throat and I nod. Even though I have no idea where it comes from, I think it’ll be fine. There aren’t any animals around to crap in the water anyway.

A few minutes later, when I’m crouched by the water edge with a river stone in my hand, admiring its smoothness, a soft humming sound fills the silence. I look up, thinking it’s an insect, but the sound gets louder and louder until frequent thuds burst through the air. My eyes widen, as I remember what happened when the dragons attacked Thyra’s party, and I slowly put the stone down, reaching for my sword as I scan around me, seeing nothing but trees and grass.

I try to be still and calm, but I can’t help but be a little afraid as the thud’s echos from above. A breeze flows down at me and I flinch, staring up through the leaves. I catch a glimpse of a shadowy figure that brushes branches aside.

Did the dragons finally find me?! What happened to Thyra?

The branches above shift and rustle as a shape bursts through. It hits the ground with a thud that sends dirt and rocks up into the air. I raise my arm to shield my face and luckily escape only with a few patches of mud covering me. Blinking, I slowly lower my arm down from my view. My fears prove to be true.

A dragon sits on the riverbank across from me. It hasn’t noticed me. I stay as still as I can; observing it in case it decides to attack. The dragon is alone, and it’s not anything like the ones from the mountain. It doesn’t even look like a FireWielder.

It steps forward with heavy thuds and lowers itself towards the water with its forelegs. It bends its neck and opens its mouth. A thick, pink tongue spills out and begins to lap up the water. I watch it closely, but it’s blue eyes remain locked on the water. Blue eyes. I haven’t seen a dragon with blue eyes before.

It causally folds and unfolds its wings, as if flexing them, as it drinks. I notice that when they fold against its body, they seem to flatten in against themselves. That’s strange. Maybe it’s a convenience thing? To make it easier to get through tight places? They mustn’t be very thick.

The forearms and fingers of the wings are a maroon red, which match the dorsal spines of the dragon. However, the membrane of the wings is a magenta purple, which is the same for the legs, back, neck, head, and tail of the dragon. The dragon has three rows of dorsal spines going down it’s back, from its neck to the tip of its tail. They’re small, about the same size as the length of my wrist to the tip of my fingers. It has a long head with two black horns—as big as my arm—producing from the centre of the back of its head. Its ears are on the outside of the horns and flicker at every sound. Overall it’s neck isn’t all that long, but it is relatively thick and round. At the tip of its tail, it has three tail fins on each side. All thin and pointy, they’re set close together and reduce in length the closer they get to the tip of the tail, with their colour matches the wing membrane. They seem to extend and flex on their own: meaning they are independent of one another. The largest ones would be the size of my arm, while the smaller the size of my forearm.

The dragon backs away from the water after a few moments, shaking its head and standing to its full height once again. I shrink back. It’s huge! I wouldn’t even reach its shoulder if I stood next to it!

In complete fear and awe, I drop my sword. I watch with horror as it hits the ground with a clunk. The dragon’s bead snaps to look at me. It jumps back a little, spreading its wings and snarling. I wince, scrambling for my sword. “Oh no. I’m going to die.” I mutter, gripping the hilt tightly. I don’t have a chance against this thing! The dragon hisses, opening its mouth to fire at me. I raise my sword to my face, hoping it’ll be enough to shield me, but knowing it won’t. Though instead of meeting fire, I’m met with something else. Water. Warm, slimy water.

I gasp, swiping wet hair out of my face, and look at the dragon. “It just spat on me,” I mumbled. It lets out another hiss before it took to the air with a massive flap of its wings. The wind it sends off nearly knocks me over. I look in disbelief as it quickly disappears over the treetops, seeing a burst of red flames come from its mouth. That means it could have killed me. What in the name of the gods above?! A dragon spared my life!