But even as the thought crossed his mind, Carrion called his name. “Tanner, that’s plenty big enough. Good thinking.”
Running to his side, Tanner said, “I didn’t know how much room it needs.”
“You were right. I left him so I could tell you, but saw you were already hard at it.”
“How long before it gets here?”
“It’ll be a while. I’ll let you know when we see the fire. Keep throwing wood on so we can find it from far away.” Carrion went back to his blanket. His eyes glazed over.
Tanner put more wood on the fire, then gathered more. The larger fire gave him the light needed to find more. In the excitement of the impending dragon arriving, he gathered enough to last a few nights. A dragon. Close up.
“I see the fire ahead. Landing at night is difficult because we can’t see to judge distances. Carry a few burning sticks and put them around the perimeter of the clearing.”
Carrion spoke in the same dull, slow way the drugged people in Shrewsbury did, which reminded him to ask Carrion more about the town. Did it all burn? He found a hundred questions on the tip of his tongue, he wanted to ask.
But instead of asking him, he gathered several sticks from the fire and placed them on the edges of the clearing. As he finished, he heard the rasp of leathery wings. Backing into the trees so he wouldn’t be under the dragon when it landed, he waited.
As the dragon came closer, the winds created by the powerful wings first stirred the grass and twigs, then blew anything not heavy or secured into the air. He closed his eyes and held his forearm up as a shield.
Then the air returned to normal, except for a stagnant, pungent odor. The dragon smelled. Tanner lowered his arm and found himself looking at the dragon, face to face from only a few steps away. If he hadn’t been petrified, he could have reached out and fed his hand to the beast’s mouth.
The dragon’s eyes were on him. He said, “Carrion if you’re trying to scare me, you are.”
A twitch of the head and the dragon looked elsewhere. Carrion’s laughter came from the campfire. Tanner relaxed slightly and took a step towards the fire.
The dragon’s head spun, and the eyes pinned him still again.
“Carrion?”
The dragon relaxed again as Carrion called out, “Come over here.”
Tanner side-stepped until he was near the fire, his eyes on the huge beast the whole time. As he neared the fire, he saw a splash of blood seeping from an arrow in the hip of the dragon’s rear leg. The dragon lowered its head and peered at the arrow. It licked at the blood with the forked tongue, but in doing so touched the arrow. The creature mewed like a stray kitten.
Carrion said, “You know I can’t promise you it won’t hurt you, right? But it does know you’re Dragon Clan.”
Tanner realized he hadn’t been aware of the tingling, or the stinging pain as it came closer. He’d been too excited, but now, as close as the dragon was, he expected to feel more. Instead, his back was warm, almost a good feeling. It had been the same with other dragons.
Carrion moved closer to the dragon. He looked at the arrow and the shaft. “The wound looks larger than the shaft. Probably an iron head on it.”
“How will you get it out?”
Carrion gave him the lopsided grin that always meant trouble. “Easy. I’ll let you do it.”
“What?”
“I’m going back into his mind. I’ll calm him. You need to get a good grip on that shaft. Don’t try to be gentle. Just grab it and yank it out. The red’s not going to like it. Pull it out and back up as fast as you can.”
“But you’ll be in its mind keeping me safe.”
“Remember that time you got into the cactus? Your mom held you down while I pulled them?”
“I was maybe ten. I hit you and gave you a black eye.”
Carrion nodded, “It’s sort of like that. Reflex. I’ll try to keep him at bay, but you have to get out of the way, too.”
Tanner looked at the exposed teeth in the dragon’s mouth, at the cold eyes, and then at the seeping wound. “Maybe we should wait until morning.”
“It has already been in there too long. We need it out now. You’re Dragon Clan, sworn to protect this animal. Now’s the time to live up to your pledge.”
Carrion settled down as if the subject was settled. Tanner moved closer to the hip with the arrow, noticing that the dragon turned its head away and now looked off into the darkness. Carrion's doing.
Tanner set his feet and reached for the shaft. He wrapped his fingers around it and took one deep breath, after looking for an escape route. He pulled as fast and as hard as he could. The arrow came free. The dragon howled, the head twisting to find the source of the pain. Tanner retreated three steps and fell, then crawled ten more steps until he was behind a tree only as big around as his wrist, and wishing for a larger tree.
He paused long enough to look up at the dragon’s head. The eyes were locked on him. As Tanner was going to put more distance between them, the dragon lowered his head and examined the wound that was no longer running with blood. It licked the wound several times. Then it lifted its head and roared.
The hurt was gone, it seemed to say. The sharp thing that hurt its leg was removed and healing could begin. Like the cactus spines that Carrion removed from Tanner’s leg so many years ago.
“You all right, boy?”
Tanner said, “It was close there for a bit, but I got the arrow.”
“The arrowhead, too?”
Lifting his hand, Tanner saw the arrow, the iron head still attached still clenched in his fingers. “Yes, I got it, too.”
Carrion sat and smiled. “You wouldn’t happen to know any medicine tricks for healing wounded dragons, would you?”
“No.”
“Just as well. I suspect him licking it will do as much good as anything else.”
“Will he eat me tonight?” Tanner asked, wondering how far away he should sleep. Maybe in the next valley.
Carrion’s voice changed to one of seriousness. “Not many live to tell after being so near a dragon. He knows you helped him. Both my persuasion and the relief of pain told him you were helping him. That arrow was right at his joint, so every move, every sweep of his wings hurt. You removed that. It knew you were Dragon Clan, of course. Now it knows you helped it stop hurting.”
“Then we’re friends?”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far, but you may find that if you’re ever in trouble, this red will be the one to respond. I wouldn’t want to be the one hurting you.”
“Can I pet it?”
“I wouldn’t recommend it, but it’s your life.”
“It stinks.”
“You’re right. Funny, but when we touch minds I can see with its eyes, hear with its ears, and smell what it does, but it doesn’t smell rank at all. Right now, I’m about to puke.” Carrion chuckled as he stood and moved to the rear leg and examined it. “The blood is clotting.”
Tanner said, “Tell me about Shrewsbury.”
“Burned. The piers are gone, even the pilings burned right down to the water. All the buildings are ashes. The residents gathered and retreated up the road. But there were others there. Strange people.”
“The ones working on the breakwater?”
“Yes. We got several good looks as they ran from that barracks. Their arms had tattoos. Dragon tattoos. Both arms.” Carrion said.
“Like ours?”
“That I can’t say. But they moved like they were drugged.”
“What does all that mean? What is happening?”