A Tense Moment

Randel was not particular about where he bedded down. Traveling into the night, he had found a barely clear spot among some other Tunk’ta, settling between two females. Though one of them peeked at him curiously, he was too tired to exchange pleasantries, burrowing in hurriedly.

The night was tense, and none of his passengers got much sleep. Jasper had not been entirely correct about the military letting them go until their next stop at a shop. They could hear the wing beats of the War dragons circling the area, the immense shadows occasionally blotting out the stars behind the leaves that hid them. They knew the cover wouldn’t last forever. Eventually, the military would bring out the technology to track them.

Once the grey of dawn began to color the sky, sleep was a distant memory. A pink tinted Glimmer shot along overhead, reflecting the early morning sun just before it crested the horizon. S’re had always liked it when they were different colors. Jasper, meanwhile, sullenly glared at the sky with the occasional head shake of internal dialogue.

“Can’t you tell the dragons to go away?” Diana inquired in nearly a whisper, sitting on the ground to be as low and under foliage as she could. She glanced over at S’re sitting nearby on one of the soil covered bumps of Randel’s shell, but kept her eyes up to watch whenever they heard the wing beats draw closer. “You could tell Randel to wake up.”

Jasper sucked in his breath, drawing S’re’s glance before she shook her head. “No. Their Riders would feel it. It’s better if they just fly around confused.”

“Well, they gotta be coming from somewhere nearby,” Diana pointed out. “It’s the same ones. They must have an outpost close by. They probably have a general store. No one’s looking for us” she gestured between Slina and herself. “I can at least get enough so we don’t starve the next couple of days.”

Jasper’s head snapped around to glare at her. He did not even attempt to hide his suspicion. “I don’t think that’s smart, right now. Two women just appearing suddenly out of nowhere and going back to nowhere? I know you know better.”

Diana returned the expression. “I’m going to assume it’s the hangries talking. I could be more discreet and just steal half the place before they know what’s happening. They’ll never see us. I just don’t like this whole starving thing.

“Besides,” she muttered more quietly, “I would never betray you. You saved me.”

Nodding sharply, Jasper was unconvinced. “Yeah, and I got another bounty on me over it. Try not to forget that.”

Looking up at wing beats coming closer, he crouched lower so only the top of his head was over the bush that had grown in a small space between trees. The wing flaps grew uncomfortably close.

Each of them experienced the goosebumps of terror raise the hairs on their skins when the shadow of the dragon swooped over them low enough to rustle leaves, making Hero chitter. Warbling curiously, the dragon banked around and was quickly heading back.

“S’re!” Jasper hissed as she clamped Hero’s muzzle, shaking her head at him. Glancing back and forth in a panic, he continued in the same tone. “Try asking it to go away. Like you did with that Tunker, the one at the river.”

“Um,” was really all she could say before the dragon’s shadow fell over them. Hovering near the hole in the foliage, its immense wings beat the air, whipping the leaves and branches about. Tilting its head this way and that, it tried to see what had drawn its attention.

Asking it? Commanding it? What was the difference, really? When she felt her hearts thumping so loud in her ears, it was hard to know what was a request and what was an order.

“You’re not looking for us,” she whispered.

The dragon’s head cocked further than before. This was a true statement. It had no idea what exactly it or its Rider were looking for. It knew only that it had been told to fly about and hovering took a great deal of effort. Banking about, it continued on its way just as its Rider asked what it was looking at.

“Holy shit!” Diana squealed quietly, clutching her head, knees up. “Oh my god! I thought we were done for!”

Slina nodded fervently beside her, eyes wide in panic, clutching at her chest.

“I don’t think we’ll get too many of those,” Jasper muttered, breathing in relief. Mustering a smile, he crept closer and reached out to take S’re’s hand. “That was good thinking.”