Horns ✖

The Monster

"Three-horn..." A muffled old voice rang in my skull like the ripples of a lake, "Are you awake old friend?"

"Wrecker?" I winced as my consciousness began to return, already feeling a strange stinging sensation upon my damaged flank, "What...what are you-"

"Adding more Yarrow to your bloody wounds, that's what. Don't move about. You were rifting up a storm last night, couldn't even keep still for even a second. Bad dreams I suppose?"

"I mean-" I tried to think back, my mind briefly pulling up a blank canvas, yet disregarded whatever I had envisioned and simply drew nothing, "I can't say that I did but...it was something."

"Do tell!" the healer rasped, applying another layer of the ooze onto my scar, "I love to hear dream stories. They are all rather fascinating."

"I mean I...I don't really recall much of it," I shuddered, feeling a rather ominous sensation on my stomach, "I do remember...falling in water though. I can't really explain-"

"Ah, I've had some of those before," The club-tail chuckled, forcing yet another painful wince out of my maw after he stroked the ribcage, "Falling off the edge of the world into the darkness. And yet, it felt like you could fly forever. Quite the experience I must say. Almost makes me curious about what the Flyers experience."

"It was short-lived. I don't even remember why I was falling, but I was-," I grunted before growling from the stings of the plant, "Grr...must you apply so much?"

"You're not planning on getting into a fight now, are you?"

"I don't believe so-"

"Then this should suffice," He quickly hissed, lowering off my flank to head toward my front, "Now, turn your frill to me, let me look at that bump of yours."

I sighed, obeying his demand as he, once again, examined and treated the lump. Like a wave of burning fire the wound brought spasms of pain throughout my mind, but unlike my side I didn't dare flinch or react to the Yarrow. I was more enamored on the past couple days, more importantly what had occurred yesterday afternoon. I stared off blankly into the dust, recalling what the long-neck had said:

"The length of time for a frog lump is uncertain. Mine took weeks. Yours, given how bad your skull is damaged, it could take longer. But if you wish for the truth, faster than the time given, I would suggest you follow us. There's a place, hidden in the mountains that we often visit. There, you can meet my friend Dreamcatcher. If it's the past you seek, all of it for that matter, he should be a helpful tool."

Should I listen to Thyrah? I wondered, thinking about Wrecker at the same time, I can't just...leave. But I couldn't stay too. Oh how I longed to know, to be rid of these painful voices and see why they called for me. The memories were there, somewhere at least, twisted and tangled in a knot of my new life. They had to mean something if they were this important. If death had spared me more times than I have counted, surely I was destined to serve something much bigger than myself. If I can't understand myself, how am I to understand his demands?

"Wrecker," Shocker's voice suddenly yanked me back to the present. I had been entrapped in my own thoughts for so long that I never realized the herd leader arriving, along with two other club-tails standing proudly behind him. The healer hesitated to turn around for a second, perhaps concerned over what was yet to be spoken, but after a soft inhale faced his despicable alpha, who surprisingly appeared more scared than angry. As far as I could recall that is. Though I could smell the fear plastered on his scales, though his faint fogged breath, and elsewhere. In fact, it was somehow on all of the club-tails. And that along made me tense.