Dragon Witch ✔️

73 - Help

When we reached Kyton and Nissa, the blue-green horses shied away in the water. From the waist down, they looked more like dolphins than horses. They were hippocampi.

You never said one of the riders was a changeling, the biggest one said, tossing its kelp-like mane. Those things are freaky.

Eva peered down at them. You freaky. What you, horse fish?

Nissa scowled. "You never asked. Besides, you already agreed to carry four riders for four ounces of fairy blood each. Are you hippocampi of your word, or are you lying little ponies?"

The biggest hippocampus pushed itself out of the water with its enormous hooves. What's to stop us from dumping the changeling and taking the fairy's blood for ourselves?

Sparks flew off her fingers and she lowered her head to the hippocampus's level. "You have three choices. One) take us to the island--which is easy enough for big, strong hippocampi like you--and you earn a whole four ounces of blood for you and your buddies; two) I fry you here, and we use your bodies as surfboards; or three) my changeling friend bites you, and we still use your bodies as surfboards. What do you choose?"

With a nervous whinny, the hippocampus lowered itself back into the water. We'll take option one.

"Good." She straightened. "All aboard the hippocampi express."

As Nissa climbed on the back of the largest hippocampus, I leaned closer to Piper.

"Why didn't we just bargain with everything else that tried to kill us? I thought they couldn't talk or something."

She shrugged. "Some can't. Most monsters just don't care what we say, especially if they're in a big group." Lowering her voice, she added, "To be honest, hippocampi are kind of the wimps of the monster world. They usually scavenge on dead magical creatures. Don't worry about them kicking you off. They're more terrified of you than you are of them."

"I'm not afraid of them." Though, the idea of being stranded in the middle of the ocean was a bit terrifying. Okay, more than a bit. Why did the exit portal have to be on an island? Why couldn't it just be on a peninsula or something?

Piper skipped over to the water and climbed on the back of the second-largest hippocampus. She and Nissa guided their antsy mounts away from shore a little. I moved to the water's edge. The remaining two hippocampi edged away.

Rolling my eyes, I opened my mouth to ask if Kyton had any suggestions. He hopped on one of the hippocampi and rode out to the others before I could say anything. Of course. Even if I tried to take Piper's advice, it wouldn't be as easy as striking up a casual conversation. Now wasn't the time to be worrying about that. We had an exit portal to find.

I moved to the last hippocampus's side. It was fairly scrawny compared to the others, and I wasn't sure if it would be big enough to carry me. When we were running from the v'kindra, Kyton had said I weighed a ton.

"Don't move." I swung my leg over the monster's back, right behind its dorsal fin. Then I sat down.

The hippocampus squealed. It's killing me, it's killing me.

I jumped to my feet. "I'm not that heavy."

Giggling came from the others.

"You're doing it wrong," Piper called. "They're not horses. You can't sit on them directly. You have to walk with them into the water, then hold onto their dorsal fin and let them drag you behind them."

"Oh." I followed her instructions, and soon I was floating in the water half on top of and half next to the hippocampus. Holding onto its dorsal fin wasn't too hard, but I figured that it would get harder the longer I was dragged.