Dragons Rising ✔️

Ch 7: The Choosing Ceremony

It didn't make any sense; I hadn't run into the door with a glow orb strapped to my shoulder—though that might've been a good idea if my first attempt at charging the door hadn't worked. Either way, I wasn't going to look a gift drak in the mouth.

As upset as I was with Mother and Father, I still didn't want the house to burn down. I grabbed a spare blanket from the closet and smothered the smoking door. Grimacing at the pain in my shoulder, I hurriedly packed a wooden traveling chest with the bare necessities and a few of my favorite books. I hadn't been stupid enough to try and pack it right under my parent's noses, but now I wished I'd risked it to save time.

Already jittery with excitement, I raced out of the house. The field where they held the Choosing Ceremony was near my work, all the way across town. A windcarriage would certainly be the fastest way to get there, but Mother had confiscated my wallet. Normally, it would've taken me at least half an hour to run all the way there, which was time I couldn't afford to waste. Good thing my legs felt like they were on fire. I was running way faster than normal. I might just make it in time.

I caught the word "mind-jinking" from a side alley up ahead and slid to a stop. If they were dealing in illegal mind control artifacts, I didn't want to run into them. Problem was, they were right in the way of the fastest path to the field.

"Use it on a class 7 or 8, and be quick about it," a man said in a low voice.

I would have to charge past them and hope they didn't stop me. One... two... three! I raced around the corner, dodging between two men—an elent and a cinem. The cinem yanked me back by my tail. I struggled, but seeing as cinems had the strength of ten elents and I didn't, my attempts were futile.

"What did you hear?" He squeezed my tail until my scales cracked. I recognized his voice as the one who'd been trying to buy the mind-jinking device.

"Nothing, I swear." I pulled away. "I was just running through. Come on, I'm late for the ceremony. I don't care what you guys were doing.

He yanked me back again, and I desperately looked to the elent for a chance at leniency. He was almost two feet taller than me and had the body-type of a dragon.

He scoffed. "Let her go."

"Are you insane?" The cinem's wings fluttered furiously.

"No one would believe a talme over you. There's no need to get our hands dirty to take care of this one."

"But if she-"

"Let her go, or the deal's off."

Scoffing, the cinem let go of my tail.

I took off again, glad for once that no one listened to talmes.

Minutes later, the field came into view surrounded by ten-foot-tall stones evenly spaced around the field. I was panting so hard I could barely see straight, but I kept running just long enough to reach the lines of aspiring dragon riders.

There were at least a few hundred of them. Some wore simple small-town outfits like mine, but the people visiting from other parts of the province wore more lavish attire.

To the left of the field was a huge crowd of onlookers—family, friends, and quite a few recreational watchers. On the right side of the field stood this year's group of dragons, all thirty-six wearing halters and saddles instead of collars. I barely had a moment to take it all in before the ceremony officiants released the dragons to wander among the rows.

I ran to the nearest row of talmes and set my trunk at my feet. Several rows in front of me, class 4 dragon chose an elent boy. She lifted her head to look him in the eyes. He touched her forehead, and a glowing blue haze appeared around them. The swirling wind storm grew brighter and brighter until I could barely stand to look at them. Finally, the haze exploded outward, falling to the ground as a glittering aquamarine dust.

The dragon-rider pair walked together off the field to where several older riders from the Academy were waiting. There were three of them—an elent man with a golden class 6, an elent woman with a green class 5, and a cinem man with a white class 9. I'd never seen a class 9 or a white dragon before.

I turned my attention back to the dragons who had yet to chose. My whole body trembled with anticipation. I didn't think I could bear it if the Ceremony ended and I was without a dragon. Even if it was a class 4, it'd be enough. I could deal with having a runt of a dragon if it meant I was still a rider.