Shadow & Scales

It was twilight in the forest of dragons. Time for Basal to hunt. The green dragon stretched his wings in the clearing. He looked back to see his mate Sylva, her wings sheltering three new hatchlings nuzzled up to her warm belly, bits of shell clinging to their lanky frames. Basal thrummed with pride and delight.

A rustling at the clearing’s edge drew his attention. Lalo’ki, the wingless Mischief-Bringer, stepped out of the underbrush and wobbled into the light.

“Greetings, Father Basal,” the grubby creature said, bowing low, though its short legs kept it close to the ground already. Lalo’ki looked to the dragons’ nest under the canopy. “And greetings to you, Mother Sylva. Congratulations on your hatching.”

Sylva bowed her head and returned to nuzzling her brood. She kept one eye on Lalo’ki. An infamous scavenger even among his own kind, Lalo’ki was prone to fits of moonlight madness. He posed little danger to full-grown dragons, but the hatchlings were another matter.

Sylva snatched up the hind leg of a deer that had been worked over by her young and tossed it towards Lalo’ki.

“For your kindness,” she said. The scavenger scrabbled over to the bone and gnawed it.

“Thank you,” said Lalo’ki, slavering over bits of meat and cartilage. Basal looked on in disgust.

“You have your scraps, Lalo’ki,” he growled. “Now begone from our clearing. I hunt for five now. I haven’t the time for games.”

Lalo’ki tittered.

“Of course, of course,” he said. He didn’t budge but continued gnawing. “But I thought you both should know, Grir Shadar has come to this forest to hunt.”

Sylva had been content to purr over her young ones and spare little consideration for Lalo’ki. Now, her attention was fully on the wingless dragon. Basal growled low and deep in his chest.

“The Great Shadow?” he asked. “In our forest? Why?”

“The game here is plentiful and plump,” said Lalo’ki, still worrying at the bone. Basal looked to Sylva.

“He has finally exhausted the supply of small and stunted prey that lived on that smoking island of his,” she said, curling her tail around her hatchlings. Lalo’ki laughed again.

“That’s right. Grir Shadar even hunted men for a time,” Lalo’ki said with admiration, “but men have come here, and the Great Shadow has followed.” He broke into a mad peal of laughter. “Listen well and you will hear!”

Basal and Sylva turned their heads towards the sky as a great bellow shook the leaves in the trees. The roar was followed by thin, high-pitched screams, suddenly silenced.

“The great fool,” Basal growled. “There will be no hunting for me tonight, now that the Great Shadow has scared off all the game from here to the horizon.”

Sylva snorted. The scent of woodsmoke drifted into the clearing.

“It’s worse,” Sylva said, nosing the wind. “Men have now come to the forest’s edge.”

The deep, heavy sound of approaching wingbeats drew Lalo’ki’s attention away from the bone.

“The Great Shadow comes!” he said before scampering away into the underbrush, dragging the bone after him.

Overhead, the maw of Grir Shadar poked into the forest clearing. The great dragon was far too large to land amidst the trees, even if he had dared to test the bared fangs and flexed claws of the green dragons who nested there.

“Where is it?” he asked, his body black against the darkening sky as it hovered above the trees. “I can smell it!”

Sylva drew her hatchlings tighter to her side. Basal tensed his entire body for a fight he hoped would not come. Another rustling in the scrub brush set them all on edge.

“Lalo’ki, I said begone!” Basal shouted. “Enough of your games!”

A tiny human toddled out into the clearing where the green dragons had expected to see the trickster’s return. She waddled over to Basal’s foreleg, thick as a tree trunk, and put a tiny hand on it to steady herself. Unperturbed by the huge dragons all about her, the baby tottered towards the nest.

She crawled over Sylva’s tail and shoved in next to the three dragonlings. Sylva watched as the girl picked up a shell fragment and put it on her little head before cozying up among the hatchlings and drifting off to sleep.

“Ah,” Grir Shadar purred, “there it is! Give it to me now!” His jaws snapped at empty air. Basal prepared to spring, but Sylva’s words cut him off.

“You will find nothing here for you, Great Shadow,” she said, sneering. “Or as your mother named you, A’Shadar, afraid of his own shadow! I knew you as a hatchling, before you gained your bulk from feasting on dead and dying things, before men hobbled you with flung fire due to your own foolishness, before you were cast out of the forest to haunt that cursed island of yours. Begone!”

Sylva spied Lalo’ki lurking in the shadows at the clearing’s edge. “And take your lackey with you!”

Basal almost felt sorry for Grir Shadar, who withered under the fierce words of Sylva the Green, Guardian of the Grove. Basal’s own ferocity was no match for the game in the forest and meadows, but it paled in comparison to the mother dragon whose young were threatened. Basal understood now that this small human was counted among them.

“The little manling,” Basal said, ”is under our protection. You may shirk the laws of the forest as you feast on the flesh of men, but you will not harm one of our own.”

Grir Shadar roared. The dragonlings pressed closer to their mother’s belly. The tiny human was undisturbed.

“I will have what’s mine!”

Sylva growled and bared her fangs. “Come closer and I will tear your wings from their stumps!”

The black dragon hesitated. “I will have what’s mine,” he repeated, quieter now. “If not now, then soon.”

Grir Shadar’s huge bulk disappeared from the clearing. Lalo’ki skittered along after him. Moonlight lit Sylva where she lay with her four younglings. Basal nuzzled her. He looked down at the new addition to their nest and sighed.

“This little one may bring more trouble than even the Great Shadow himself.”

“Look at her,” Sylva said, humming. “Look how she takes to our nestlings as if they were her kin. How could such a creature pose a danger?”

“I didn’t say ‘danger,’ I said ‘trouble,’” Basal said, knowing he was fighting a losing battle.

“Not even scales to protect her,” Sylva said. “I will name her Sim’Sala, Without Scales.” Sylva gently touched the baby human where she lay. The little girl reached out to grab the dragon’s nostrils, tickling her.

“Sim’Sala,” Basal said, testing it. “A fitting name.” He looked up to the moon. “I wonder if the council will feel the same.”

Many moons came and went before the full moon’s light shined down on the hilltop council. The highest peak in the forest, though dwarfed by the height of Grir Shadar’s volcanic island, was large enough for all the dragons to gather. Dozens roosted among thick branches or lazed in the moonlight. The forest’s largest and oldest dragon, the great elder Sub’Ala, lounged on a rocky outcropping in the hilltop’s center.

Young hatchlings scampered about, greeting each other for the first time since leaving their nests. Those with wings went about flexing them, stretching them as far as they could go, taking higher and higher fluttering hops, launching from rocky steps to see how far they could glide.

Sim’Sala ran among them on steady legs, grasping at their tails and tiny nubs of horns and spikes. Her nestmates kept close to her, though other curious young dragons kept a wary distance. Sim’Sala didn’t mind in the slightest, even when she was presented to the great Sub’Ala himself.

The procession of dragons parading their young before the leader to be marked and acknowledged came to its conclusion with the presentation of Basal and Sylva’s adopted human child. Sub’Ala shifted his great bulk and lowered his massive head to mark her. The little girl grabbed onto one of the elder dragon’s protruding fangs, itself as big as her entire arm. She giggled.

Sub’Ala raised his head gently and chuckled in his own way, a deep rumble.

“Who presents this child?” he asked.

Basal and Sylva stepped forward into the light of the clearing.

“We do,” they said together. It was their proudest moment. The other dragons did not feel likewise.

“Hmm,” Sub’Ala hummed. “To join the clan and gain its protections, this child must be vouched for by two members.” Basal and Sylva started to speak, but the elder cut them off. “Two others who are not kin. Who among you vouches for this child?”

Silence. Eyes that had shined in the moonlight now shifted away to the shadows. Basal barely held his tongue. Sylva had no such reservations.

“Afraid of such a small creature, are you?” she said, judging the silent dragons. “Afraid of one without even scales to protect her?”

Sim’Sala paid them no mind, busying herself with clacking small stones together.

A lithe and sinewy water dragon spoke up.

“It is not the child we’re afraid of,” she said, “only what she will one day bring to our kind, to our land.” Tension built before the water dragon said, with finality, “Doom.”

The elder dragon spoke again before a fight could break out on the hilltop.

“Will no one vouch for this child?”

Suddenly, a great shadow descended on them. The bulk of Grir Shadar dropped out of the cloudless sky to hover over the gathered dragons, his immensity greater than that of even the elder Sub’Ala.

“I lay claim to the child,” he growled, his voice like thunder. “Give her to me now and be rid of her.”

Some of the dragons retreated into the shadows and called their young to them. Others, like Basal and Sylva, stood defiant. Suddenly, a low, rumbly, musical voice cut through the tension and eased it away.

“I’ll vouch for the child,” said a large brown dragon who had, until that very moment, been lazing on a pile of pine needles just outside the clearing. He was almost as large as the hillside itself and nearly a match for Grir Shadar’s strength. He yawned, his great cavernous mouth revealing rows of rounded teeth.

“Robur,” Sub’Ala said, acknowledging the dragon. “Strong Flower, teacher of all young dragons, has vouched for the human child.” The elder ignored Grir Shadar, even as the black dragon fumed above them. “Do we have one more?”

“I will vouch for the child,” said a shadow. It leapt from a high tree branch and into the moonlight clearing, but did not resolve into dragonshape for some moments. When it did, even Grir Shadar was taken aback.

Bellica, the nightraider dragon, dropped the body of a large buck deer into their midst. “And I bring this offering as tribute, to barter for her life.”

Sub’Ala hummed in appreciation at the dragon’s cleverness. “Bellica, Quiet War,” he said, “has vouched for the child and bargained for her, by the laws of the forest. The human child is now a member of the dragon clan.”

Grir Shadar roared overhead.

“Mark this day among your last,” he shouted. “I will have what’s mine!” He turned and flew back to his island. To the surprise of the gathered dragons, some of the young drakes flew away with him.

“I apologize for the theatrics,” Bellica said to Basal and Sylva as she drew near with the silence and grace of a cast shadow. “But I felt that something had to be done.”

“We’re grateful,” said Sylva.

Sim’Sala came over and sat on Bellica’s velvety paw, her big eyes looking up at the sleek dragon.

“And so is she,” Basal added, looking down at the child. “Whether she knows it or not.”

Bellica hummed. “It’s true, you know. This child will one day bring about doom,” she said. Basal and Sylva stared at her in shock. “But it will be doom for Grir Shadar and salvation for the dragons caught under his shadow.”

Bellica craned her neck and looked down at the tiny human, so frail, so defenseless. Bellica purred.

“And I hope, for your sake, little one, that that day is a long way off.”

Years passed in the forest. Sim’Sala grew in all ways: size, strength, and ability. She grew in knowledge, in spirit, and in relationships with the forest dragons. She learned their ways under the tutelage of Robur and Bellica, and from living among the young dragonlings.

In the honeyed meadow that served as Robur’s place of teaching and sanctuary for all young dragons, Sim’Sala learned of plants and insects and animals. She spent countless afternoons with her dragon siblings – Filbert, Hickory, and Candleberry – lounging in the shadows and harvesting the forest’s bounty.

“How did you get so big eating nothing but plants?” Sim’Sala asked Robur one day. She leaned against his great belly as he laid on his side in the warm sunlight.

“I may be big, but the forest is bigger still,” he said sagely. A pile of talonfruit lay near his mouth. He snaked out a tongue and gobbled it up, smacking his lips. “It’s the forest that provides. I can only grow as big as it lets me.” Robur looked down at the growing but still tiny human girl. “Thanks to the forest,” he said.

Sim’Sala put the palms of her hands together and mimicked Robur’s most often-repeated saying. “Thanks to the forest.”

When she wasn’t learning from Robur in the glade, she was running through the woods along with her dragon kin. Forest law forbade them from breaching the canopy until after their naming day. It was dangerous enough to reveal themselves to larger dragons, more still to be seen by the encroaching colonies of men.

Sim’Sala ran as fast on two strong legs as the dragons who raced on all fours. As their leaps and glides grew stronger, so too did Sim’Sala’s sprints and jumps keep pace. A good thing, too, for as they ran and played and hunted in the forest, the allies of Grir Shadar hunted them, as well.

Sim’Sala quickly learned to hide from the Great Shadow as it passed overhead and to outsmart Lalo’ki before he could cause trouble for the clan. She warmed to the way of life for one without scales, and she found that making a great game of it all helped to keep the fear at bay.

Some things she took seriously though. She dismantled the dragon traps and pitfalls made by humans as they pushed deeper into the forest. With Grir Shadar continuing to feast on manflesh, the men were pushing back. They treated all dragonkind the same – as threats to eliminate.

Sim’Sala bested the efforts of both Grir Shadar and the traps of men to keep her kin safe.

She had learned not just from the dragons, but from men as well, studying them from the treeline. Sim’Sala could run down a boar just as easily as she could weave a basket. And while she couldn’t fly, she could hang upside-down from branches and leap between rooftops like the fruit-dragons she followed on nightly raids into the human village. In time, she learned not just how to steal clothes and food and shiny trinkets from the humans but to make her own.

But even as Sim’Sala grew in all ways of both dragon and human, so, too, grew Grir Shadar. The Great Shadow grew larger from feasting on men. Where Sim’Sala might pull a thorn from a dragon’s paw or untangle them from a hunter’s snare, Grir Shadar gave his followers only the illusion of power and free reign over his expanding territory.

Day by day, Grir Shadar’s influence stretched out over the forest, the great shadow deepened, until the conflicts between dragons and men, and among the dragons themselves, solidified into a terrible, urgent thing.

In the days leading up to this conflict, Bellica took Sim’Sala aside. They sat on a great tree branch high above the rest of the canopy and looked at the moon, nearly full.

“Sim’Sala,” Bellica purred. “We have taught you a great many things. The next thing, the hardest thing, you must do alone.”

Sim’Sala kicked her feet in the empty air. A fall from that height would have killed her, but she simply would not fall. She was sure of that fact.

“Have you seen the warnings?” Bellica asked, testing her student’s awareness.

“What warnings, Bellica?” Sim’Sala asked, petulantly. “The constant threat of Grir Shadar and his dragons? The traps laid by the villagers? Of course I’ve seen them. What’s different about them now?”

“When I was a hatchling, I was taken captive by men,” Bellica said. She had never revealed this truth to anyone. The gravity of it made Sim’Sala turn and stare at her, suddenly wide-eyed and attentive.

“I grew up experiencing the wickedness and cruelty of man first-hand,” Bellica continued. “But I also found compassion and kindness in these very same creatures. Their ingenuity and cleverness cuts both ways. They even enslave their own. I was lucky enough to befriend a human who happened to be just like me, a slave. Together, we were able to escape. So it is thanks to men that I don’t know where I come from or who my family is, but it is also thanks to men that I am free.”

Sim’Sala was awestruck. “What happened to him, this man?” she asked.

Bellica hummed. “He died long ago, as the lives of men are short compared to our kind.” Bellica caught herself and eyed Sim’Sala with some pity. “My kind.” She continued. “But where I can distrust and love humans at the same time, Grir Shadar knows only hate.”

“What made him this way?” Sim’Sala asked. Bellica looked at her, proud that her student had finally asked something born out of true insight.

“Grir Shadar was banished from among his own kind for terrorizing the villages of man,” Bellica said. “The dragons believed, rightfully so, that his attacks on men would bring devastation upon all dragons. So Grir Shadar was cast out, to live a solitary life as a scavenger. That’s no life for a dragon. And in his isolation, he continued to test the will of man.

“One day, Grir Shadar found that men’s ingenuity was a match for his own size and strength. A burning ball of pitch struck him in the foot and melted the limb together in a misshapen mass. His madness has only increased since that day, and his hatred for man, more so.”

“That’s why he’s become obsessed with me,” Sim’Sala observed, mainly to herself. “That’s why my parents…”

“Yes,” Bellica confirmed. “Grir Shadar has shaped your destiny from your earliest days, but he has also sealed his own fate in the process. Because it is you, Sim’Sala, child of man, dragonfriend without scales, it is you who will be his end.”

Sim’Sala took it all in, all the threads of her life’s lessons and experiences now woven together into a tapestry she could finally see.

“So what will happen now?” she asked Bellica. “And what can be done about it?”

“Now, the great leader Sub’Ala will fall,” she said. “The dragons of this land have spent generations under the wings of their leader. That time has been one of peace and prosperity, but Grir Shadar’s power has grown too great, his influence too strong.”

Bellica looked at Sim’Sala with piercing, nightbright eyes.

“Only you can stop him, Sim’Sala.”

The girl, who looked for a moment as helpless and small as the infant she had once been, stared back at the deadly dragon and rose to her full height and power. True to her nature, she smiled in defiance of the battle that was to come.

“Bellica, thanks to you, and Robur, and mother and father, and all good dragons, I know just what to do.”

With renewed purpose, Sim’Sala set to work. She gathered her allies three days before the next hilltop council. Bellica knew that was when Grir Shadar would make his final move, and she impressed that fact upon them all.

Sim’Sala kept the details of her plan private, the better to keep Lalo’ki from ferreting out the surprise she had in store for Grir Shadar. She split the tasks among her kin: Some gathered grass, twigs, and stones. Others harvested as much talonfruit as they could carry. And still more dug up clay and piled it up, for reasons they could not begin to understand.

Sim’Sala had her helpers gather all the things that she required in a cave near the hilltop council. For three days, she set to work in solitude. Even the dragons who came to see her work knew not what their strange little human without scales was up to.

She worked feverishly, time fading faster than her energy. Sim’Sala shaped and formed the clay, leaving it to bake in the hot sun. She made a fire ring of stones and filled it with kindling, bringing hot coals from the villages of men by daylight. Fire bloomed in the cave by day and was doused at night, the better to keep Grir Shadar and his lackeys in the dark.

The heady aroma of brewed talonfruit wafted out of the cave and floated through the forest on the breeze. It caught the attention of Robur, who snaked his head into the cave. The student became the teacher as Sim’Sala explained her alchemy to him.

On the third night before the council, Grir Shadar enacted a plan of his own. The Great Shadow’s followers had infiltrated the ritual hunt, the final kill before the clans gathered at the hilltop. The elder dragon would make the kill, of course, as a show of strength and confidence. But Sub’Ala had been set up.

The young dragons in the thrall of Grir Shadar flushed a deer out of the forest and into the clearing. Sub’Ala swept in to subdue it. As he did, Grir Shadar dropped a heavy tree limb on the elder dragon from high above, crippling one of the elder’s wings. It was only by Sub’Ala’s remaining strength that he was able to drag himself to the forest hilltop to oversee his final council.

There, in the light of the full moon, Grir Shadar perched upon the rocky outcropping like a black tumor. Lesser dragons gathered around him, their allegiances plain. They glared down on Sub’Ala where he lay, his breathing labored and shallow. The other dragons, defiant but afraid, stared back at the usurpers. Sim’Sala was nowhere to be found.

“Where is the girl child?” Grir Shadar roared. “Bring her to me now. I claim her!”

The thunderous call of the Great Shadow shook the rocks on the hilltop. It emboldened Grir Shadar’s followers. It roused Basal and Sylva and their young dragons, who had grown to rival their parents in size and strength. It raised the fine feather-like scales on Bellica’s hide as the sleek dragon tensed, ready to pounce. Even Sub’Ala mustered the strength to raise himself up, to answer the call one last time.

But Grir Shadar’s bluster did not bother Sim’Sala in the slightest.

“Come and claim me yourself, you bloated wyrm!”

Sim’Sala emerged from a hilltop cave bursting with light. She strode forward, flaming torch in hand, chasing away the night’s darkness. Fire leapt in the dragons’ eyes and they knew it for what it was: doom in the hands of a child now fully grown.

While all eyes were on Sim’Sala, Robur followed in her wake. The great brown dragon cradled a massive earthen jug; a pungent liquid sloshed over its rim as he ambled towards Sub’Ala. He tottered a bit and seemed to be smiling despite the grave atmosphere. Robur laid his burden down near the elder and waited.

“Here I am, Fearsome Shadow!” Sim’Sala called, brandishing her flame. “Come and claim me, unless you fear the fire still!”

Grir Shadar roared in defiance of man. He struck like a snake, hesitating but a moment as the flames flickered and spat. That hesitation was all Sim’Sala needed, for she was ready.

She had taken a swig from the clay jug that hung around her neck. As Grir Shadar lunged for her, she spat the liquid out upon the flaming brand.

A fireball flared out from the end of her torch and smacked Grir Shadar square on his snout, burning his tender flesh. In that moment, he remembered fire’s kiss and how it had deformed him once before. He was briefly reduced to a frightened nestling, alone in the world, retreating into shadow.

“Begone!” Sim’Sala shouted, still holding her torch high. “Begone to the shadows from whence you came!”

Grir Shadar did indeed climb higher into the night sky, but he did not retreat.

“Child of man, child of fire, you are no dragon,” he said. “You may wield fire, scaleless one, but can you fly?”

Sim’Sala ignored him, turning her attention to Sub’Ala instead. She gestured towards the massive jug in front of the dragon.

“Drink, Elder,” she whispered, “and hold some in your mouth.”

Sub’Ala did as the child of man commanded. He took a great draft of the fermented talonfruit, swallowing some. Vitality surged through his body, strength returned to his limbs. The crippled wing that looked beyond mending now straightened. He held the rest in his great maw.

“Fly with me now, Elder,” Sim’Sala whispered again. “For the first time, for the last time.”

Sub’Ala bowed his head. The one without scales climbed atop him, still brandishing her flaming torch. The elder flexed his immense wings and Sim’Sala held on for dear life. To fall now would surely mean death for them both. She was sure that would not happen.

Sub’Ala and Sim’Sala rose into the night sky to meet Grir Shadar in a final battle. The dragons below began to skirmish. Grir Shadar’s lackeys found themselves suddenly under attack by the united dragon clan who fought to support their elder and the one without scales.

Grir Shadar rushed in to deal a killing blow on the older, weaker, and injured dragon.

“Now, Elder!” Sim’Sala shouted, loud enough for all to hear. “Now!”

She leaned forward and held her flaming torch in front of Sub’Ala’s mouth. The elder dragon spewed forth the pungent liquid, and a torrent of flame shot out. It met Grir Shadar head-on in his charge. The flames stuck fast to his wings and began to melt through their thick, leathery membranes.

He retreated to his island in a roaring tempest, flaming flesh sizzling in the narrow sea where it fell. His flight drooped lower and lower. Should Grir Shadar even make it to the safety of his volcanic island, it was clear he would never fly again.

Still aloft, Sim’Sala and Sub’Ala watched as dragons rose into the sky with them to fly against the remnants of Grir Shadar’s forces. Sim’Sala’s torch blazed in the night. The treacherous dragons turned tail and flew, better to follow their disgraced master to his barren lands than face a fiery death.

With the council ended and the threat dealt with, the victorious dragons gathered on the hilltop to celebrate Sub’Ala, to rechristen Sim’Sala as Sala, the Scaled One, and to learn the potent secrets of dragonfire.

The next morning, the dragons woke to experience their first-ever headaches. Sim’Sala brewed great vats of melonmint tea to ease their troubles. Robur, who had indulged more than most, added a little extra honey to his.

Conversations were low and quiet, but none as serious as Sala’s own parents.

“She cannot stay, Sylva, you know this,” Basal said. “She has brought fire into the forest, that alone is grounds for banishment, but she has also driven off Grir Shadar …”

“For which we should all be thankful,” Sylva added, her words pinched.

“And we are,” Basal sighed, “But with the Great Shadow gone, the encroachment of men is sure to come now.”

“It feels like punishment,” Sylva said, tears coming to her emerald eyes. “For her. For us.”

Sala chose that moment to embrace Sylva, wrapping her arms around the dragon’s neck.

“Don’t cry, mother,” she said. “I may have to leave, but I can always come back.”

“Where will you go now?” Basal asked.

“Grir Shadar is down but not defeated,” Sala said. “As long as he lives, I am not safe. You are not safe.” She gestured to the curls of smoke rising from the men’s village. “They are not safe.”

“Alone? To the smoking island? Against such a vicious beast?” Sylva asked.

“Not alone,” said a shadow that suddenly shifted. Bellica emerged from the edge of the clearing and resolved into dragonshape.

“We will pursue Grir Shadar.” Sala said, laying a hand on the sleek dragon’s neck. “And once he’s defeated for good, we will come back and share the good news.”

“Go then,” said Sylva, trying not to let emotion overwhelm her. “Go the way you came, a surprise in the dark, a fearless thing. Go and deliver one last gift to Grir Shadar.”

“I will, mother,” Sala said.

“And be prepared,” Basal added. “Use what we taught you, what you learned from your siblings, your elders, and even your enemies.”

“I will, father,” Sala said, tears in her eyes. “I’m ready, thanks to you,” she said. She pressed her hands together. “Thanks to the forest.”

“Thanks to the forest,” they said together.

Without fanfare, without a grandiose goodbye, Sala slung her meager pack on her back and climbed atop Bellica. She waved. The nightraider took off at the speed of dark and launched them both into the sky.

Filbert, Hickory, and Candleberry joined their parents by their side to watch as Sala the Scaled One, dragonrider and firebringer, rode off toward the horizon in pursuit of her destiny.