POV: Fendrel
The three came to a large boat, big enough to hold a full-grown dragon. The vessel was suspended over the sea attached to two metal chains on each side that could lower or raise the boat using a reel. A ridge with narrow footholds led below the boat.
Fog hooked her claws on the cliff lip and peered down toward the base’s entrance. She looked at Fendrel. “Do you need help down?”
Fendrel peered at the unstable boat. It thumped periodically on the cliffside from the wind. Then he looked at the narrow passage open on one side to the sea where waves crashed on jagged rocks below.
“Yes please.” Fendrel climbed onto Fog’s back.
“What are you doing?” Charles looked between the two.
“Going down.” Fendrel clutched the saddle horn. “I’ll convince her to go back up for you, unless you want to risk falling to your death scaling that cliffside.”
Fog jumped and spread her wings. She let herself drift down to a cave embedded in the cliff side above the crashing waves. Fendrel got back on feet and looked down a long tunnel leading into the rock. There were periodic notches in the rock walls with ash and charcoal, but no fires.
Fendrel looked up at Fog. “Can you bring Charles down here? I’ll wait for you.”
Fog blew out a puff of vapor from her nostrils. “What if it’s a trap?”
With a sigh, Fendrel crossed his arms. “Fog, there have been countless times when him and I have been alone. He could have killed me if he wanted to. And there’s no benefit for him keeping me alive. Sadon just wants to get rid of me, so Charles is risking his life right now.”
The vapor dragon tapped her metal-adorned claws on the floor. “Okay…” She walked to the edge of the cave and flew up. Moments later she was back with Charles, landing clumsily as the dragon hunter had his arms wrapped around her neck in a grip for dear life.
Charles ungraciously fell off Fog’s back onto his side and groaned.
Fendrel opened his bag and took out a small glass jar. He walked over to one of the notches in the wall and scooped the ashes into the jar. As soon as they hit the bottom, they ignited into flames.
The dragon hunter stood and brushed himself off. “How did you do that?”
“Magic.” Fendrel shrugged, remembering when Thea gave him the jar for his birthday. He led the way down the hall. The sounds of boots and metal on stone sounded behind him. Soon they came to a door large enough for a dragon of Venom’s size to walk through. Fendrel opened it and stepped through. “It feels weird just walking in without having to unlock it.”
Fog shivered with her feathers puffing out. She stuck to Fendrel’s side.
Fendrel carried the jar in one hand and felt along the rough stone wall with the other. He found the first notch and tipped the jar. A tongue of fire licked the ashes in the notch, and it roared to life. Fendrel repeated this with the spaces all along the walls.
They were on the top level of a large circular room. Below, accessible by ladders, was a slightly smaller circular space with a large metal cage in the center. Curtains lined the walls on the lower level of the room. Fendrel remembered there were spaces carved there to store cages, often filled with dragons. Notches were also between each curtain.
“I’m going to light those down there, then we’ll look around.” Fendrel gestured to doorways on the top level that led off into darkness. He handed the fire jar to Charles and climbed down the ladder. When his feet hit the ground, Charles dropped the jar into Fendrel’s hands.
Fog jumped down to join Fendrel as he lit the lower notches.
“Shouldn’t we be hearing dragons if there are so many of them here?” Fendrel gazed at the fifteen curtains.
“Maybe they’re just scared.” Charles shrugged.
“And where are the keys for the cages?” Fendrel looked toward his friend.
“I don’t know if the hunters took them when they left.” Charles put his hands on his hips. “There might be a keyring in one of the outer rooms. I’ll go look.”
Fendrel pulled back the curtain nearest him. Just as he thought, there was a metal cage with a dragon in it. A floral dragon.
The dragon’s scales were yellow with dark pink markings on her wings in the shape of rings. She hissed and pushed herself against the back of the cage. Both of her wings flopped helplessly at her sides, broken. Dried blood crusted them.
Fendrel held out his free hand. “It’s okay, we’re here to help you.”
She hissed. “I can get out of here myself. I don’t need help, especially from puny humans.”
Fog came up to stand before the grapefruit-colored dragon. “You’ve been here for so long. Don’t you want to leave?”
The floral dragon squinted her eyes at Fog. “Who are you?”
“I’m a friend of his.” Fog patted Fendrel’s shoulder, keeping her claws away from his skin.
“Then you’re just as pathetic as he is.” She jutted her chin at Fendrel. “Leave me alone!”
“What’s going on?” Charles clambered down the ladder.
The floral dragon eyes the fangs on Charles’ shoulder guard. “You see? Your ‘friend’ is conspiring with the enemy. How can you trust him?”
Across the room, a new voice came from behind a curtain. “Citrus, someone has finally come to help us and you’re insulting them. Stop it! Just because you’re too stubborn to be rescued doesn’t mean the rest of us want to die with you.”
“I’d rather die here than lose my dignity by letting a human solve my problems for me.” Citrus stuck her chin up and turned her head away.
“Put a deer in your yapping jaws.”
Citrus lunged and grasped the metal bars with her front talons, curling her claws as if she were imagining digging them into flesh. “If only we had deer. But no. Thanks to humans we’re starving here.”
“Then be quiet and let them free us so we can eat!”
With a snarl, Citrus turned her back on them.
Charles cleared his throat. “I’ll look for the keyring.” He climbed the ladder.
Fendrel handed the fire jar to him then walked around the room, opening the curtains.
Most of the curtain-blocked cages were taken up by dragons of all ages and elements, except dusk dragons. They were emaciated and some had near-fatal injuries.
The dragon who yelled at Citrus, a spark dragon, looked as if he spent all his remaining energy on telling the floral dragon off. He laid on the floor of his cage, eyes barely open.
Fendrel crouched so his face was closer to the spark dragon’s. Fog joined him.
“Why do they all look so awful?” Fog looked around at the dragons’ injuries.
Fendrel winced. “The hunters used to use this base when they taught their students how to fight dragons. And sometimes they would make the dragons fight each other so they would be too tired to do serious harm.”
Fog shuddered. She looked behind her at the cage, much larger than all the rest, in the center of the room. Blood stained the bottom of the cage.
Whimpering, Fog rushed to a dragon who looked strong enough to talk. “Have you seen another vapor dragon? Gray fur? Bigger than me?” She went around the ring, asking every dragon until she came to a trapped vapor dragon. “Have you seen her? Her name is Mist. She went missi—”
The much older vapor dragon cut her off. “Young one, I haven’t stepped foot in the Hazy Woods in over a year. I don’t know any dragon by that name.”
Fog’s wings drooped. “You’ve been here for over a year?”
The older dragon shifted his weight. “Not in this same base, though I have been here a lot. They’re always moving me, putting me in rooms by myself far away from any exit.”
“Why you?”
“I suppose I’m their only vapor dragon.” He sighed. “If they found one younger than I, they wouldn’t waste their time on me. So, no, I doubt your friend was taken by the hunters. Or perhaps they lost her soon after they caught her.”
Fog sunk to the floor.
Charles stepped back into the room. He held his hand up. Something shiny was in his closed fist. “I found the keyring!” He clambered down the ladder and approached Fendrel.
A hissing noise came from the upper level. Out from an open door slithered a huge earth dragon, dragging itself forward with its wings. It reared up like a snake and stared at Fendrel, flaring out its wings to display bright orange spots amidst its dark brown scales.
That bright of an orange isn’t a natural color for earth dragons.
“Rogue.” Fendrel’s legs froze.
“Don’t make any sudden movements.” Charles went still.
The earth rogue’s forked tongue flicked out and in.
Charles backed up toward an empty cage. He tried to unlock the cage with his back turned to it. After a few tries, the cage door made a clicking sound. The rogue swung its head toward Charles and flared its wings wider, its tongue flicking again.
“Fendrel, catch the keys and get in a cage as fast as you can.” Charles clenched his teeth.
Fendrel looked around the room. Fog was frozen with fear on one side of the ring, her feathers fluffing out as if that were all she was made of.
“I have my own tool, I’ll be fine.” Fendrel kept his voice flat. “Fog, fly out of here as fast as you can. Find Venom and bring him here.”
Fog trembled. “I’m not leaving you here.”
“Then as soon as I unlock a cage, run in with me before it gets to you.” Fendrel maintained his gaze on the rogue.
The earth dragon pulled himself forward with his wings until he was on the edge of the upper ring.
Fendrel opened his bag and his fingers closed around his multitool. He unlocked the cage behind him, the one with the half-asleep spark dragon, like Charles had.
“Are you ready?” Fendrel gripped the cage door.
Fog took a slow breath. “I think so.”
“Okay, now!” Fendrel flung the door open and dashed inside. Fog rushed toward Fendrel’s cage. He held his hand out for her.
A roar broke out on the upper level above Fendrel’s cage. A rogue air dragon leaped down into the inner ring and stopped Fog in her tracks. The second rogue’s tail writhed and knocked into Fendrel’s cage door, forcing it shut and knocking Fendrel onto his back. Fendrel panicked at the door’s click. The cages were made to lock as soon as the door closed.
The earth dragon flopped down to the inner level in a heap of snake-like tangles. It righted itself and shot toward the challenging dragon.
With a single whip of its tail, the air rogue sent the earthen dragon flying into the open side of the center cage. It laid motionless, its chest rising and falling rapidly.
Fog froze as the air rogue stared at her. It licked its maw and stalked toward her.
Fendrel crawled to the cage bars and gripped them. “Fog, fly out of here.”
Before she could open her wings, her attacker lunged.
Charles rammed his shoulder into the side of the air dragon’s head.
The beast hissed and swiped at Charles. It slammed both paws down, pinning Charles to the ground. Streams of blood leaked from where the claws punctured his shoulders.
The dragon hunter cried out.
Fendrel tried to angle his multitool into the cage’s lock. “Fog, help him!”
I’d have to break my wrist to be able to get the tool in the lock.
Fog leapt on the rogue’s back and hooked her claws under its scales. She wound her tail around its abdomen.
Yelping, the air dragon reared up and flapped its wings, trying to dislodge Fog from its back.
Charles stumbled to his feet, both shoulders bleeding. He fled to one side of the circle.
The earth rogue stirred in the center cage. Its tongue flicked out, head scanning the area. It stopped on Charles. It smelled his blood.
Before Fendrel could warn Charles, the dragon hunter pulled a knife from his belt and flung it at the air rogue. The knife plunged into the reared dragon’s chest.
With a cut-off cry and a shudder, the air dragon toppled on its side, its massive wings crashing down around it.
Fog unwound her tail and jumped away from the corpse. Her metal claws were stained with blood from the rogue’s back.
The earth dragon theatrically flopped to the ground and writhed as if it was in great suffering, its mouth gaping in a silent scream.
Cringing at the beast’s spasms, Fog crept toward it. “Should we put it out of its misery?”
“Fog, don’t!” Fendrel reached his arm through his cage. “Stop!”
Charles shoved Fog’s forearm out of the way just as the dead-playing rogue lunged.
The earth dragon clamped its jaws shut around Charles’ arm. A sickening pop sounded as the rogue yanked at Charles’ arm.
Immediately, Charles went limp, gritting his teeth.
The snake-like dragon coiled around him.
Fendrel pressed the sharp end of the multitool into his palm. He drug it across, creating a bleeding dark line. Fendrel kicked against the bars.
“Fendrel, what are you doing?” Fog tried prying the rogue’s jaws open.
The rogue’s eyes snapped toward Fendrel’s bleeding hand.
“Come on, you don’t want to eat something that gave up so easily. You want a challenge.” Fendrel spoke in draekonik, even though the rogue couldn’t understand him.
Fog jumped back as the rogue uncoiled and slithered toward Fendrel’s cage bars.
A roar came from outside of the base, echoing down the tunnel to the circular room.
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