Dawn of The Dragon

Chapter 5: Bram

Violent winds engulf Kalera as she hollers for Rome. Barely able to stand, she quivers, feeling ice lashing her face. She realizes her companion is nowhere to be found as she suddenly begins to sink into the snow like quicksand.

"Help me! Somebody, help me!" she cries.

Screaming at nothingness as she continues to descend, she thinks of Xavgon, around her neck.

"The words. I can't remember. What are they? Xavgon, help me!" she begs.

Rubbing her hand across her chest, she feels nothing. The pendant is gone. Realizing her plight, streams of tears begin falling down her face while she screams for Zoran and Musfall.

Nothing.

Had Xavgon saved me only to die now? she asks herself.

The wind picks up again, and snow powder begins to twirl faster and faster until it is up to her neck. She decides to pray.

"Heavenly Father, forgive me for all my wrongs. If this is my last act, I only ask that you protect my friends and Rome from a similar fate. Amen."

Her teeth chatter as she takes a deep breath before the powder covers her mouth again. She closes her eyes...

Kalera is pulled with a force of a thousand men from death's grip. Taking a breath, she realizes she is on solid ground. Her eyes open, then close again. The man who has pulled her from the quagmire begins to pound on her chest.

"No. No. Wake up! Don't die!" he screams as he pounds harder and harder.

Bam!

Bam!

"Wake up!"

Miraculously, her chest suddenly begins to inflate, like a balloon. Then it releases. Wasting no time, the man lifts her from the ground onto a wooden plank hitched to two cold black meres. Then he covers her in thick pelts and quickly lifts himself up on the bench, striking the meres to move across the snow-blanketed terrain.

Turning her head left, then right, Kalera's senses begin to awaken. The smell of pine and lavender fill the air, and she feels heat while easing her eyes open. Giggles ring out as she sees a blur of two children running. Looking down to see the black animal pelts covering her, she quickly removes them to find her body as if she had just been born—naked.

"Mother, Father! The stranger is awake!" the children call out.

Hiddard and Molly make their way toward the woman he has saved.

Kalera tries to stand on the thick hay covering the iced ground of the makeshift sleeping quarters, and then a familiar woman breaks her fall.

"There," she says. "You should have your balance now."

Tears well up in Kalera's eyes, and her skin begins to tingle as she wraps her arms around the woman, holding on for dear life.

"Molly! Oh my God, Molly! How are you here?"

The woman helps her sit on the bed, then snatches herself away.

"This is my husband, Hiddard Larks of Toan, and these are our younglings, Sundo and Celest. I'm unsure of how I'm familiar to you, Miss, but you aren't familiar to me."

"I found you as our caravan took a turn along Lords Road," Hiddard says. "I almost lost you."

He stands at least five feet nine inches tall. He has pale skin, ginger hair, and green eyes.

"The younglings saw you originally, for their vision is much better than ours," Molly clarifies.

Kalera does not know which is worse, nearly dying, or waking up to find she has been saved by a friend who does not know her. Molly takes her hand, leading her outside to a large black tent. Inside is a long white dress she gifts Kalera to wear. Molly places another pelt over her once she dresses, telling her the dress would not be enough to keep the frost from sticking.