Kendra beat me to it. She rushed ahead of me and stood between the tub and the dragon. Eventually, the dragon reluctantly backed off, lowered herself to all four feet and positioned her body where she could watch us and the tub at the same time. I had the feeling that if we turned our backs, she would attack the tub.
The stone wall of the tub was thicker than my hand, and chisel marks left by hollowing it out were clearly visible on the inside. On the outside the finish was smooth, and carved into it was a series of icons, five of them in all. All different. They were carved equidistant around the stone side as if explaining its use to one circling the tub. I’d seen something similar but couldn’t remember where. There were no images of men or beasts, only panels containing rows of patterns: slashes, hash marks, angles, and crude lines.
The time and care it took to do the intricate carving again indicated it must have been important, perhaps even sacred. Before I had time to consider the carvings more, Kendra leaned over the edge of the tub to inspect the inside and moaned loudly as she pulled away and covered her stomach with both arms. She collapsed to her knees, then fell to her side, the moans growing louder.
The dragon roared.
I stood and watched them, not knowing what to do.
CHAPTER THREE
W ith Kendra’s painful reaction, I ignored the dragon and raced to her side. She lay curled on the stone floor in a fetal position, eyes wide open and staring at nothing. But she breathed. I went to the tub and peered carefully into it, or the well, or whatever it was, from a short distance. Inside lay a cream-colored, soft, white mass, the surface resembling clay baked for dinner plates. There were no decorations. The rounded mound nearly filled the bottom of the container, as I now thought of it, from side to side—as if constructed for holding the thing. The top of the object was near enough to reach down and touch.
“What is it?” I whispered.
She stood and joined me. “An egg. A dragon’s egg.”
It could be nothing else. She was right, although the egg was so large my arm couldn’t reach around it when stretched out. The entire time we examined the egg, the dragon stood aside and watched us critically, her eyes smoldering and now and then she snorted with irritation when we got too close. When I reached out to touch the egg, the dragon shifted and became angry, so I retracted my hand and waited.
My voiced whispered as if the dragon couldn’t hear me because I didn’t wish to make it angrier, as if that were possible. “What is an egg doing here?”
My sister turned to gaze at the dragon as if that might calm the beast. Her voice was also soft and mellow. “We’ve answered one question. This thing, this vat, was created here to incubate or hold an egg. Have you felt the stone at our feet? It’s warm.”
My feet were warm, as she’d suggested. My hand went to the side of the well, nest, or whatever it was. The bare rock should have been cold, especially since it was still in the shade on a cool spring morning. Instead, it felt as warm as my skin, not hot. About the same as touching a person.
“This isn’t natural,” I said as if suddenly discovering a new thing.
Kendra moved along the rear wall while touching it in several places, as well as bending to touch the floor. “All warm. It’s like the rock here is making heat.”
“Your dragon friend looked like she was going to eat me when I reached for the egg. She is very protective.”
“Why did you do that?” Kendra asked. “It was stupid.”
“It seemed natural to do. What if it’s not an egg? Something else? I guess it was just instinct to touch it, like touching a flower vase or a statue.”
She turned after rolling her eyes at me and walked back to the container under the watchful eyes of the dragon. Without hesitation, she reached her palm out and placed it inside, on the white, rounded object. The dragon went rigid, barely breathing, but didn’t attack. Kendra moved her hand gently along the surface, then pushed. Where she did, a small hollow formed. It wasn’t rigid like a hen’s egg. She watched it return to the original shape before turning to me.
“It’s alive.”
“How can you tell?”
She said, “Inside, there is movement. A beating heart.”
“What does that mean?” I wondered aloud. “Is it going to hatch? If it does, will whatever emerges be hungry and threaten us?”
Her face flashed anger or fear, but not at my insipid words. Her eyes had briefly gone wider, her face stern. She pulled her knife and held it in front of her defensively, although I wasn’t sure she was aware of her actions.
Looking up, where her eyes were fixed, and I pulled my sword. At least five Wyverns were silently approaching, making no noise even while rapidly flapping their immense wings. They made no warning cries and flew higher in the sky than I’d ever seen. However, the dragon had also spotted them, and she had already spread her wings in anticipation. She leaped off the side of the mountain. The wind from her first few strokes almost knocked us over. The Wyverns knew they’d been discovered and screeched their battle cries, almost as one.
Two of them turned directly at the dragon. Instead of evading, the dragon opened her mouth and roared back at them. As the distance between them closed to nothing, the dragon shifted her weight and reached out with her jaws to grab the nearest Wyvern. Her powerful teeth nearly cut it in half, then she shook it side to side twice and let it go. The dead creature fell near the bank of the river.
The second wyvern hadn’t learned from the misadventure of the first. It swooped in too close, trying to take a bite out of a leg, and the dragon’s head shot out and grasped the tip of one wing in her jaws. She shook it, twisting and turning before ripping off a third of the wing. The second wyvern spiraled down out of control. It was dead when it hit the rocks.
Kendra screamed, “Damon!”
My senses returned, but in my defense, who in the world had ever seen such great beasts fight? Or can blame me for watching? I pulled my attention away from the dragon. A wyvern had separated from the others and flew behind us. It was diving at the vessel with the egg.
That was what the attack above was about. A diversion. The dragon had cleared the rubble from the incubator, and now the Wyverns attacked and tried to kill the egg—no doubt at the urging of a mage controlling them from some safe, comfortable location. I pictured him sitting in an easy chair near a warm fire as he directed the battle.
My sword was light, shorter than most, but sharper. It curved along the leading edge, just a slight curve to give it perfect balance. I’d practiced for days with Kendra and Elizabeth holding a fruit or other object head-high, my sword in its scabbard, my hand on the hilt. They gave no warning before dropping the fruit. My blade sliced it in half every time, and the return stroke sliced a half into quarters.
Well, not at first. The first few times we’d tried to do it at the urging of the Weapons-Master, the fruit usually hit the floor before my blade cleared leather. A year later, some were sliced. After a second year, most were sliced twice.
All those memories flashed through my mind as our practice proved valuable. In a single lunge-step ahead, my sword slashed across the leg of the wyvern as it landed and reached for the egg with its mouth, unmindful of me. The leg was larger than mine, but the blade sliced deep. The return swing of my blade took off two toes, as the snakelike dragon beat its wings to escape my fury and another stroke.
“Damon!” Kendra screamed, again. Her eyes were focused somewhere behind me. I dropped to the floor just as another wyvern attacked from behind me. The slash of the talons missed me, but it landed on the flat surface facing Kendra. Its momentum carried it forward, and there was no time, nor a place for her to escape.