Violet Stormwing's Arc

Chapter 11 of 46

By morning the danger had changed shape. The hatchlings still huddled by the warm pool, but the flame sprite's glow had dimmed. Steam hid them from the sky. It could not feed them. Violet knelt beside the mother dragon and counted small ribs under bright scales. The little ones were weakening. They could not stay in the spring much longer, and they were too frightened to fly far. Theo crouched by the stone steps, watching the trees. "We can't wait here," he said. He always spoke soft, like he was doing you a favor. "Kael's men will sweep back. Sitting still isn't a plan." "They won't fly," Violet said. "Not scared and starving. First I feed them." She took two rabbits from her pack, brown and white, caught in a snare that dawn. She set them near the nest. The gold-horned hatchling smelled the meat and crept out. It ate. The others followed, one by one, until all of them fed at the water's edge. Their cries faded. Their eyes brightened. But food was not flight. Violet needed to teach them the sky held no monster. She climbed the mossy rock and called the brightest of the brood, a small pink one with shimmering scales and quick eyes. She held out her hand. The hatchling flinched, then hopped closer. Violet lifted it, walked to the pool's rim, and tossed it gently over the warm water. Wings snapped open. The pink hatchling glided, shrieked, and splashed into the shallows. It scrambled out unhurt. Then it climbed the rock and leaped again on its own. It liked it. It flew a slow ring over the spring, low under the steam. The others watched. When the pink one landed safe, the gold-horned hatchling tried. Then a third. Soon the whole brood circled the pool, wings finding rhythm, fear draining with each pass. The mother dragon lifted her head and rumbled, low and pleased. "They can fly now," Violet said. "Enough to travel." Theo stood. His easy smile was gone. "Then you have to decide where." He drew a folded paper from his coat and held it up. "I sent Kael my last report before the spring. It reached him. His men came back through the valley an hour ago, on foot, searching the trees. They know we went to ground. They're close." Violet stared at the paper. The steam that hid them from above hid nothing from men on the ground. The hatchlings could fly, but the moment they rose past the treeline, Kael's riders would see them again. She looked north, then south, and made her choice. "We don't go to the fortress," she said. "We go higher than his riders can follow. Tonight, in the dark." The hatchlings could fly. Now she had to get a whole brood past armed men who already knew the trees held a dragon.