Dragon Born

Chapter 2

Once I made sure everything was secure on the donkey I rented whenever I left the city's walls, I padded down my jacket and pants, double checking my light armour and dagger hadn't magically disappeared while I went back and forth between the apartment, the shop, and the donkey outside.

I've been leaving the safety of Histero's walls and travelling between villages for longer than I could remember, following my father as he visited his clients. He taught me everything there was to healing. Everything he could anyway; he was blessed with magic, I was not. My father never spoke of the origins of his magic. I knew of one village, isolated in the middle of the Randala Valley named Plum; they were known for taming dragons, healing magic, and no walls. I grew up assuming my ancestors had hailed from there, that they'd come to Histero to avoid the monsters in the valley. He never corrected me.

I shuddered at the thought then pushed it aside. It wasn't a good idea to think about all of the monsters in the realm right before I left the city's boundaries. Despite my training and the numerous times I had travelled between villages without incident, it still put a chill in my bones.

Patting the donkey's neck, I took a deep breath and approached the gates. One of the guards, Kern, smiled and nodded to me. "Another house call? This is the second one this week."

"Sick animals wait for no one," I sighed. In this case, it was an entire farm. I've been trying to figure out what made them sick while doing what I could to cure them, but without knowing the cause, I feared they would die soon.

"Keep your eyes peeled, Miss Feyton. I heard there's a hippogriff in the area," Kern warned, always serious. I felt safe knowing there were guards like him watching our walls.

"Thanks for the heads up, Kern."

He threw the order back to unlock the gate. The massive steel doors creaked on their hinges as four men grunted to pry it open. I urged the donkey forward; it didn't matter how many times he had taken this trip with me, he fought me every time we had to leave. It took being attacked by a dire wolf once--the wolf didn't even touch him!--now he refused to cooperate.

"Come on, Chester." With one final tug, the donkey was outside and the gates swung shut behind us. He bayed angrily at me. "Don't be scared. I'll protect you."

He bayed again, but quieter, giving in.

The path ahead of us was open, revealing the endless rolling hills and long, green grass. I couldn't see the Randala mountains in the far, far west where the princes' dragons came from. I could barely see the village, Istle, we were going to visit today. When I was younger and terrified of the endless expanse of nothingness that stretched across the plains, my dad would take my hand and say, "Take comfort in the silence. Thank the Gods you can see so far into the land. Fear when you hear the howl of a dire wolf. Hide from shadows above."

The mentioning of being attacked didn't exactly calm the nerves of thirteen year old me, but eleven years later, I did take comfort in it.

To this day, I still followed his words of wisdom. He taught me how to survive out where no one dared to go, where no one could hear my cry for help if I ran into trouble. It was a clear, sunny day, nowhere for rocs or hippogriff to hide. Good luck to any dire wolf pack that thought they could sneak up on me without any wind to mask their footfalls in the infinite grass.

Still, my hand rested on the hilt of my dagger, as always. Just in case.

I should just hire a bodyguard. At the rate business was blooming, I could easily afford it and then I would never have to worry on my trips. But then that meant I would be admitting defeat, that I couldn't take care of myself. That I had let my father down. He raised me to not depend on others for my survival; if I wasn't hitting the books and learning how to heal wounded animals, I was in the backyard with him or a dummy and a dagger. He didn't want to leave me alone, defenceless.