The thought of how close the dragon had come to death made it shiver. It didn’t want to leave the lair, but it needed all the gold it could get. Gold, the rarest of all metals, beautiful and soft, had a healing effect on the dragon. The creature thrived on magic and chaos, and only gold had the power to bring it under any sort of control. The wizards of long ago had used gold to subjugate dragons. A golden crown inscribed with the dragon’s name would give a magic-user control over the beast. Bartoom was the dragon’s name, and it had been certain that no magic-user would ever control it again. Its quest had been to gather gold from all the kingdoms of the south lands, but now it lay huddled in the dark, wounded, with almost half of its gold tossed carelessly down the mountain.
It squirmed forward, its forked tongue tasting the air. It could still sense the wizard’s presence. The human hadn’t gone far. Bartoom had been diving for the two humans when they toppled off the ledge and fell into the snow heaped at the bottom of the canyon. It had decided then to retreat back inside its lair, hoping that it could fall into a healing sleep. Now it would have to go out and look for its missing gold.
As the dragon crawled through the tunnel toward the bright morning sunlight, it growled in pain. Every step hurt, and the beast had no idea what spreading its wings would feel like. Still, the gold was too precious to risk. The dragon crawled out onto the ledge and looked down. There was a trail in the snow and the human female was following it. The gold was nowhere in sight. The dragon would have to melt the snow with its fiery breath so that it could get to the buried gold, but first, it meant to exact revenge on the human who had wounded it.
* * *
Brianna was moving steadily across the snow field. She had made a decent trail in the soft, powdery snow the day before. Now she stayed on the trail, letting it lead her back to the place where she had uncovered their supplies. She had seen the staff. It was plain wood, easily as tall as she was, with a knobby end. Zollin carried the staff everywhere, but had left it with their supplies when he went up the mountain to search for the dragon.
She was breathing hard as her legs churned through the snow. She was making much better time than the day before, but she still felt she was moving too slowly. Then she heard a sound that made her heart almost stop.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
She looked up and saw the dragon dropping straight for her. She threw herself onto the snow, biting back a scream of terror. The dragon was trying desperately to slow its descent, but each stroke of its wing pulled the wounded muscles where Brianna’s first arrow had hit the beast. The dragon overshot its target and crashed into the snow. Brianna heard the crash and the accompanying roar from the dragon. She looked up, but the dragon had plummeted deep into the snow just as she and Zollin had.
She got quickly back to her feet and scrambled forward. Suddenly a plume of steam and smoke billowed up in front of her. From inside the snowy hole where it had crashed, the dragon was shooting flames from its mouth, and the heat was beginning to melt the snow. She would have to circle around the dragon to get to where Zollin had left his staff. She plunged into the fresh, untrodden snow, sinking up to her knees.
Her heart was still pounding and she was gasping for breath as she slogged through the snow field. The dragon was thrashing and roaring and spouting flames from the hole the beast had fallen into. Brianna hoped that she could get to the staff and back to Zollin before the dragon cut off her path back to where Zollin lay. She tried to concentrate on the task of getting to the staff, but she couldn’t help looking over to where the dragon was. She had almost reached her destination when the beast jumped out of the hole and settled on top of the snow. It swung its massive head on its long, snakelike neck. She saw the beast’s eyes narrow, and she dove down into the snow. Flames shot over her. She felt heat and cold water soaking into her clothes. She crawled forward, staying low.
The dragon tried to walk toward Brianna, but the snow wouldn’t support the creature’s massive weight. It soon bogged down again. Brianna crawled down into the hole she had dug to get to their supplies the day before. She searched for the staff without taking her eyes off the dragon. She was sweating from exertion and shivering from the cold. Her hands ached terribly as they pawed through the snow. Finally her hand brushed the hard wood of the staff. She tugged it free of the snow and was surprised by the way it felt. It was much lighter than she had expected. She decided to spare a glance at the staff and was horrified when she realized it had been snapped in two.
Fear hit her like a physical blow. Zollin had searched for plants with magical properties all along their trip and had found nothing of significance. If the broken staff had lost its power, they were both doomed. She scrabbled in the snow for the other half of the staff, finding it almost immediately and pulling it free. She had only one last thing to do. She had to get back to Zollin, but than meant passing by the dragon. She no longer cringed at the sight of the beast. Having shot and wounded it high up on the mountain had given her confidence, and even though she didn’t have her bow, she thought she might be able to sneak past the beast if she stayed close to the mountainside.
She used her quiver, which was still full of arrows tipped with broad arrowheads made of dwarfish steel, to secure the two pieces of the staff. The quiver had its own leather belt and, after a little work, she had the staff and quiver tied securely to her back using the quiver’s belt. She was cold and tired, and her breath made thick clouds of steam as she breathed, but she didn’t have time to worry about how she felt. The dragon was busy melting the snow with its fiery breath, but it was in the middle of the canyon while she was near the side of the mountain. She moved as quickly as she could through the thick snow. Her legs were soon burning from the exertion, and the cold air felt as though it was searing her lungs, but she didn’t stop.
At one point the dragon managed to see her, but it only gave her a passing glance. The beast was obviously in pain and unable to fly, but its strength was enormous and there seemed to be no end to the fire it was able to spew from its gaping maw. Great clouds of steam rose around it from the melting snow, and the dragon’s shining scales were now covered with mud and filth.
It took Brianna an hour to get back to where Zollin lay. Her quivering legs and shaking hands could barely support her as she crawled back down into the hole. Zollin was asleep. His skin was ashen and his breathing shallow. She settled on top of him, trying her best not to hurt him, but there was no way to make more room in the hole. She could have used her knife to dig into the snow, but it would fallen onto Zollin. She had no way to get it out of the hole. So she arranged herself as best she could and then tried to gently wake him up.
Zollin had been dreaming. He was deep in the dream, so deep that leaving the dream world was painful. He had seen a castle on a shining sea and heard a melodic voice calling to him. Inside the castle he had found a woman with a gown that seemed to glow as if it were made of pure light. She had been calling to him, and he wanted nothing more than to stay with her, but then he heard another voice, a familiar voice. It too called his name; it called him out of the castle and back into the cold, painful world. He didn’t want to go, but the voice made the dream grow dim and even though he refused to leave, the dream moved further and further away. The woman in the glowing gown receded, and soon his eyes were flickering open.