Dragon's Key--Complete

Prologue

The Year of Our Lord 1843, somewhere in Scotland, Great Britain

The pounding of thundering hooves echoed against the hard packed dirt as my horse galloped along the narrow road. The route my bodyguard and I were following was well-traveled but small enough that larger traveling carriages would have a hard time passing unscathed through the close trees. I was in the lead on this ridiculous ride, though I was perfectly aware of the repeating hoofbeats of the horse that followed close behind.

For more than an hour now, we'd been galloping fairly hard after an entire day of traveling. Of necessity, I was keeping a close watch on my horse. We'd started early, continuing on throughout the day before coming upon the village where we planned to rest for the night. We had all been ready to call an end to our day, the horses, my traveling companion and I. But as we approached the small town in which we'd intended on spending the night, we found them waiting for us at the only inn. We didn't even have time to stop and rest our horses before flight became a necessity, immediate departure giving us only a small lead.  Rest was abandoned for the necessary of escape.

Our pursuers were part of a group that had historically committed considerable focus toward killing my people and allies in any way they could.  To be captured was to die -- always painfully -- tortured to obtain any information to be had.  But in the end, extermination was their goal.  My companion and I had to escape, but it wasn't easy to elude those who were so determined, especially as it was likely their horses were fresh, or at least fresher than ours.  We had some options they didn't have, but they were of last resort.

I cast a glance behind me, gauging the condition and distance of my companion and his horse with a glance. Chastain Griffith was a warrior born.  He was the bodyguard who'd been trying to keep me out of trouble since the day the healer caught me and handed me to my mother, fifteen years now from my last birthday. I had never made his job an easy one, and I admit, I had deliberately made it more difficult the older I got.

If there were two people as different as night and day, it was Chas and I.  He was a soldier with a purpose, every moment, every thought geared toward keeping me safe and alive.  My perspective did include those important things, but was quite a bit less rigid. I thought that a life worth living was the one that included taking time to just enjoy where you were and what you were about.

We had a noble purpose, our travels overseen by an overarching goal.  I had to make a good showing, especially if I wanted to return home as anything but a disgrace. Chas and I had always fought over my insistence on relishing the steps along the way. There was nothing to enjoy about this mad dash through the Scottish landscape. It was times like this that I appreciated Chas’ more direct view of things. He always had a plan for these situations, and thus far, we had always come out ahead.

As we followed the road northward, I heard a slight change in stride of the horse Chas was riding. It brought back to the forefront of my attention the increasingly labored breathing of my own mount. Though I was smaller than Chas, both of the horses were exhausted and neither of them were going to last much longer. I glanced behind me again, this time trying to assess the distance between us and those in pursuit. We’d gained enough ground that they were out of sight behind a curve in the bend and a large hill that shielded us from a direct line of sight.  They were likely following our dust trail rather than visual confirmation of our location. That meant it was time to get off this road,  and get out of the area before they figured out we were gone.  

To that end, I intensified my search in the area in front of us, looking for something that would work with the plan Chas and I had decided earlier, splitting up so that hopefully at least one of us got away.  A thicket of trees difficult to reach from the road would do.  An abandoned building or any unlikely option to provide cover while our pursuers continued on unaware. There had been several opportunities already that we had dismissed as too easy, too obvious; we would be unable to take advantage of them without our enemies aware.