“You’re going to wish the fall had killed you,” said the dragon.
Bitterwood looked around for a weapon. By chance his bow and quiver lay within reach, still strapped to what remained of the horse. He snatched them up and with quivering, scarred fingers placed an arrow against the string. He pulled with what remained of his strength. His shoulder felt as if it had a knife through it. His vision blurred as stars danced before him. He could barely see the outline of the dragon as he let the arrow fly.
He closed his eyes and sagged back against the dead horse. If he’d still believed in a merciful God, he would have prayed that the arrow he’d just fired had found its target.
Hot, stinking breath blew against his cheek.
“You missed,” the dragon whispered into his ear.
Bitterwood opened his eyes and found himself staring straight into the nostrils of the dragon. The white wispy feathers around the snout wafted with the dragon’s breath. Bitterwood fumbled to draw a second arrow from the quiver.
The dragon lowered his snout to intercept Bitterwood’s hand. A sound that was half a slurp, half a crack, echoed through the stony wastes. Bitterwood felt a numb pressure at the end of his arm.
The dragon once more brought his face level with Bitterwood’s eyes. In his dagger-like teeth lay Bitterwood’s severed hand. The dragon began to chew leisurely.
Some last remnant of resistance stirred in Bitterwood and he raised his good hand to the dragon’s snout, punching it. He drew back to punch again. The dragon spit out Bitterwood’s hand. The drool-covered palm slapped Bitterwood’s cheek. The dragon caught Bitterwood’s second punch in his mouth. Bitterwood’s arm was in the beast’s maw up to the elbow. The last sensation he felt was of his fingers against the dragon’s raspy tongue. Then the beast clamped his jaws together and Bitterwood felt nothing at all.
He slumped against his bed of bone and flesh, life draining out of him, aware of each fading beat of his heart. The dragon’s red scales shimmered like fire as the beast drew near to watch him die.
Then the dragon jumped backward. Bitterwood’s eyes reflexively followed the motion. The beast’s scales no longer shimmered like flame-they were actually on fire. The dragon yelped like a scalded puppy as bright white flame danced over his whole body. The dragon fell in seconds, its hide and muscle boiling away with a terrible heat. Foul, oily smoke rolled over Bitterwood, reeking of burnt feathers and charred meat. In under a minute the flame died away, leaving only a mound of jumbled, black bone, which cracked and crumbled to dust.
Bitterwood knew what had happened. The gates of hell had opened for him, and the heat of the infernal furnace had caught the dragon. It was time to pay for all his sins. Silently, he closed his eyes, and surrendered to the glowing green devil that walked toward him. The last sound he heard was the buzz of flies.
Bitterwood woke slowly to soft music played on instruments he couldn’t recognize. The sound was ephemeral; a woman’s voice sang wordlessly in harmony. The air was cool and dry, and smelled of freshly washed cotton. He opened his eyes to the cleanest room he’d ever seen. Light seeped from every direction through pale, translucent blue walls. The room was dome shaped, as best he could determine. In the absence of shadows and corners, it was hard to judge its scale. Raising himself for a better look, Bitterwood discovered he was naked, resting beneath a cotton sheet on a firm, white mattress. He raised his right arm to his face. To his bewilderment, he found a hand there. A strange, new hand, plump and pink as baby skin, nailless, hairless, and itching like mad.
He raised his left arm to scratch… and discovered a second fresh limb, also sporting pale, white fingers. His hands felt as if they were being swarmed by ants, as did his legs. He kicked aside the sheets to find his legs restored. Not even a bruise remained as evidence of their earlier mutilation. He noticed something strange about his toes. He could see them quite clearly. Although he was looking at them from a distance of about five and a half feet, they may as well have been an inch from his face.
Behind the walls the shadow of a tall, slender man moved. The shadow grew closer. The wall shimmered as the figure passed through.
He gasped as the figure turned out to be not a man, but a woman, the glowing devil he’d seen before he’d died. Now that he wasn’t seeing her through the haze of smoke, she didn’t look as fearsome as she had earlier. Still, she didn’t look fully human, either. While she had a lovely face, beautiful by any measure, her skin was a bright jade green. Her hair was a darker shade, like moss. She wore a golden gown that hung closely to the curves of her body. She smiled with pearly teeth. Her lips were a shade of green darker than her hair, nearly black.
“You’ll grow nails in a few hours. Hair, too,” she said. “Until then, you’ll itch like crazy. Sorry.”
“Where…?”
“We’re still in Atlanta,” the woman said. “My name is Cynthia. I used to live here, a long time ago. I know I look strange but I’m human, like you. What’s your name? Where are you from?”
“Christdale,” he answered. “My name is Bant Bitterwood.”
“Hmm,” she said, setting down on the edge of the bed. “Interesting. Christdale. I’m always amazed at how Christianity has endured over the centuries. Of course, when I lived here, this whole state was in an area known as the ‘Bible Belt.’ If the old time religion was going to survive, it makes sense that it endured in what used to be Georgia.”
Bitterwood stared at the woman, at her flawless features. Despite her odd coloring, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Her face reminded him of the face of the Goddess statue that used to dwell in his home village, long ago. She smelled liked honeysuckle and mint. He asked, “Are you the Goddess? Is this heaven? Was Hezekiah wrong about my damnation? Was that only another lie?”
“No,” Cynthia said. “I mean, no, you’re not damned, but, no you’re not in heaven either. I have no idea who Hezekiah is or what he told you. But I’m just a person like you.” She paused a moment and glanced down at her hands with their dark green nails. “Oh,” she said. “You might be thrown by my skin tone; it’s just a fashion choice where I come from. You’re still on earth.”
“But, the dragon…” Bitterwood held his hands before him. His skin continued to itch.
“Is dead. I’ve broken all sorts of rules,” Cynthia said, brushing her long hair back from her face. “I’m here as part of an ecological survey. My job is to capture a few dragons and take them back to Atlantis for further study. Still, I saw that dragon toying with you and something just snapped. I’m not supposed to intervene but I felt guilty. I had to save you.”
“Guilty?” asked Bitterwood.
“About a thousand years ago, I was one of the people who decided we should leave the dragons alone. They were ecological nightmares, yes, the epitome of everything wrong with genetic modification. However, I argued that it would be unethical to exterminate them all after they’d escaped into the broader environment. They were sentient beings, after all. I had no idea where that would leave the world a thousand years later.”
Bitterwood shook his head. “I don’t understand what you are saying.”
“No. I’m pretty sure you don’t,” Cynthia said, smiling. “You don’t have the proper social context to understand what we did a thousand years ago. The simple story is that mankind went through a century or so when we had unraveled the genetic code-the building blocks of life itself-and we used it to make all kinds of fun things. Some were benign: drought resistant crops, cancer-eating bacteria, allergen-free cats. Some weren’t so great, though. We made weapons out of micro-organisms, for instance. Nearly killed half the people on earth in the last war with those. And, of course, somebody had the bright idea of making dragons.”
Bitterwood sat up further in the bed. He wasn’t sure what she was trying to communicate, but thought he got the gist of her final statement. “People made dragons?”