Elemental [Naladia #2]

Chapter Three

"Wow!" Aqua looked in awe down at the forest where the Earth Dragons lived.

     "Yeah," said Magma. "I'm used to it. I come here about twice a week during lunch."

     "I've never seen anything like this! I think the closest to a forest that we have in the ocean is the kelp forests." Aqua stared in amazement as they flew over the forest.

     "Hey, do you want to go down and explore the treetops?" asked Magma.

     "Sure," said Aqua. Magma could tell she had never done anything like this before.

     Magma took her down to just below the canopy. There were tons of wooden walkways built around the trees. Lots of them had sleeping Earth Dragons on them. There were also a few hammocks here and there with more sleeping dragons in them.

     "Hey," Magma turned to Aqua, "want to have some fun with an Earth Dragon?"

     "Um . . .sure," said Aqua warily. "Why not?"

     "Come on," said Magma. They landed on one of the walkways, startling a few Earth Dragons who promptly went back to sleep. They crept up to a greenish-grayish dragon in a hammock and Magma turned to Aqua and whispered, "I'll go on the right side, you go on the left side. When I say so, we both yell at the same time to wake him up, okay?"

     "Okay, got it," said Aqua. They crept to either side of the boy dragon and Magma started the silent countdown.

     "Three . . ." Magma held up his talons. "Two . . .one!"

     At the same time, Magma and Aqua both yelled, scaring the young dragon awake.

     "What the," the dragon stared at them with his leaf green eyes. "Who are you?"

     "I'm Magma." Magma said. "This is Aqua." He pointed to Aqua who kind of waved awkwardly. "Who are you?"

     The dragon yawned. "I'm Rocky."

     "Hey, Rocky," said Magma. "Want to join us on our little tour of Naladia? First, we'll show you the volcano fields."

     "Seen it." Rocky was either not quite awake yet or very unimpressed."

     "Oh," said Magma. "Um . . ."

     "We could show you the ocean," suggested Aqua.

     "Seen that, too." Rocky seemed to be getting bored now. "Look, if you can't take me somewhere I haven't seen, there's no point in me going."

     Magma and Aqua looked at each other. There was no where else to go. Except . . .

     "We'll show you the cloud village!" Magma exclaimed. "Never seen that there, have you?"

     This seemed to intrigue Rocky. He sat up a little in his hammock. "The cloud village?" He thought this over. "Territory of the Air Dragons? Hmm . . .looks like you have yourselves a deal. But let this be known: I'm just coming along so nothing happens to you."

     "'Let this be known'?" Magma said. "You need to get out more. You're already talking like a nerd." He took to the skies and Aqua followed, along with Rocky who was grumbling about how he wasn't a nerd.