Dragons Rising ✔️

Ch 48: Rescue

[Apologize after I get you out,] Leera said.

The sound of her voice was sweet relief. I felt the coffin being dragged through the water and out of the lake. It started to drain. I could breathe again. With a jolt and a thud, I was set down.

[Stay down,] Leera said.

I laid as flat on the bottom of the coffin as I could. Claws punched through the lid and ripped out pieces of wood until there was a decent-sized hole in the coffin.

"I'm tied up. I can't get out."

She snorted and continued demolishing the coffin's lid. Before she could finish, an arrow ricocheted off her chest plates and embedded itself in the ground by her feet.

[Don't move.] She reared on her hind legs, picked me up in her forepaws, and tossed me over her shoulder.

I landed hard on her saddle and my luggage, knocking the wind out of me. Wheezing, I hooked my tied arms over the saddle's handles. "I can't hold on well while I'm tied up."

[Don't worry, I'll catch you if you fall.]

That wasn't comforting at all. I gripped with my knees and held the handles as well as I could, but both me and the saddle were soaking wet and slippery. As she took off, I clung to her back with all my might.

Arrows and magical bolts shot up at us from the crowd that had apparently gathered to watch me drown. We soared over them, back over the forest. Soon after we left them far enough behind that they were out of sight, we met up with Clarisa, Tawny, and Kuertis in the air. We all flew at top speed, much too quickly for me to maneuver a knife out of my pack and untie my wrists.

"I think you can slow down a bit," I said.

Clarisa twisted around to glare at me. "You think they're going to let you just fly away after you burned down there stable?"

"I wasn't the one who burned it down. I was only there because I wanted to-"

Tawny gave me a curious look, and I trailed off. She thought I was crazy enough for listening to my 'mental echo.' If I told her I'd nearly blown the mission because I'd been trying to free some dragons, she would never let me forget it.

I shook my head. "I didn't burn it down."

Clarisa scoffed. "That doesn't matter if they think you did it."

"Either way, they can't catch us in the air. They shouldn't have any dragons left." Assuming, of course, that the katalni had gone to free the dragons that weren't in the stables too.

"They have cattledraks, idiot."

I twisted around in the saddle to look behind me at a chilling sight. Large, black specks covered most of the horizon. Even at this distance, I could hear the buzzing of the cattledraks' wings. While unable to breathe fire and also not as large or strong as dragons, cattledraks were formidable in large groups and wicked fast in the air. If I had to choose between betting on a dragon or a cattledrak in an aerial race, I'd bet on the drak.

Leera pumped her wings even harder. [You'd better hope you'll lose that bet.] 

Over the next half an hour, I managed to get the ropes off of my wrists and to search my pockets for my wand and rune book. They weren't there, which meant they must've been confiscated before I went into the coffin. Or maybe they'd been lost inside the coffin; I didn't know. All I knew was was, even if we got away from the drak swarm and finally reached the portal I was supposed to destroy, I might not be able to destroy it.

I just hoped we didn't need controlled fire magic from me to destroy it. Emotion-driven bursts of magic, I could probably still manage without a wand, but that was it. I didn't want to think about that, so I looked back and reminded myself of the present danger.