Chapter 28:

Cool stone gave respite from the dogged gaze of the afternoon sun. The scorching warmth rolled in waves, the heat drying their already parched mouths; Eres fanned her shirt while Leo cooked. Two weighty lizards flopped over the fire, pierced by two shafts of wood Leo had sharpened to a point with a knife. The shadow of the cave pulled back, the encroaching light making Eres’s chapped lips twitch. 

“Ugh…Leo, I’m gonna die. Let me have some of your water!”

He adjusted the blackening food, turning it to the uncooked side. Without a word, he pulled his water-skin from his belt and tossed it to her. Eres, smiling, nodded her head as she caught it, and shot him a finger gun. “Thanks, bro.”

She popped the cork and took a chug. Not a drop was spilled; she dare not incur the wrath of her dear master. With a refreshed sigh and a smack of her lips, she hummed and crawled over to hand it back to him. 

“Hehe, thank you, thank you.”

“Mhmm.”

Eres raised an eyebrow. So focused! The boy was sweating, eyes spearing through the food he was cooking. Was it because they’d spent an hour trying to catch the little bastards? They’d nearly gone insane, casting spells left and right before Leo finally nailed them with a stray rock. 

It seemed he didn’t want to burn it. Though, it had a rather…dignified char, were she to put it politely. 

Not that Eres was one for politeness.

“Watch the food, you’re gonna fuck it up.”

“Tch. Sitting there drinking all my water. Make yourself useful and go fetch us more.”

Eres gasped. This kid! To think he was tearing up over how grateful he was to her not three hours ago. They grow ugly so fast…my little master. She sighed. Eres scooped up their water-skins and stared at the cave’s exit.

“If I see a bear again, I’m leading it back to eat you.”

Leo looked up with a wry smile. “I’m tossing it your lizard. I bet it’d be more interested in that than some skinny kid.”

“Think we’ll get points for the lizards?”

“Not likely,” Leo said, shifting his weight to his other knee, “the only reason we’ll probably get points from the other things is because they were dangerous. I doubt they count weak prey like them as trouble.”

He glanced at her, a smirk rolling over his face. “So I guess that means you’re not worth hunting either.”

“What?” 

Eres stopped at the cave entrance, water-skins dangling from her fingers. “Hmm? Did the young master say something? Oh? The young master wants me to burn his pack and water-skin and clothes and leave him wandering the wilderness in his underwear? You should have said so sooner, Leo.”

She whipped out her wand and pointed it at him. His smile turned to ice, cracking under the pressure of Eres’s gaze, hotter than the sun behind her. He raised his hands in defense. “S-such thin skin, Eres. Guys joke with each-other, right? Manly men like us? Right?”

“Tsk. Coward.”

Eres strode out, putting the fool behind her as she stalked toward the lake. That miserable kid, so annoying! Maybe she’d put something in his water-skin, really muck it up. See if he’d be laughing when his drinking water smelled like roe and weeds. 

Though, he was weird enough to eat lizards. Maybe he’d like it. Eres was all for exotic food, but she had no idea what kind of parasites might be writhing in the flesh of a creature like that. She was still paranoid about such things after hearing bear flesh and snake stomachs were riddled with parasites. 

No thanks! She’d rather starve on the street again than eat something that horrific. That was exactly the reason she left Leo to the cooking—his black-char finish was precisely what made her feel safe enough to eat it. 

If she couldn’t stomach it, surely no pesky little creatures could either. Though, with this new tongue of hers, maybe it’d taste a thousand times worse than usual.

Her steps carried her through the verdant greenery, the air cooling as she approached the lake she’d seen from the plateau. Such a perfect cave…water and shade and shelter, theirs for the taking! That she had stumbled onto it in the dark was miracle enough, for it to be close to fresh water was even more fortuitous.

Maybe their friends would be at the lake? It only made sense for all of the students to gravitate to a body of freshwater. The streams were abundant, but none close, insofar as she could tell. 

Her eye caught the spike of a tree-branch right as she blinked, causing her to hiss in pain. “Agh…!” Eres put a hand to her eyes, gingerly pressing the back of it. The sting throbbed, and a drop or two of blood came away with her finger. 

“Fuck, that hurts!” 

Eres kicked a nearby branch, cursed, and continued, though one eye down and temper raised. The once beautiful forest was now nothing more than driftwood and cursed shrubbery, the sight incensing her as it bore into her eyes—no, eye. The other one remained stubbornly closed, the sting intensifying in pain if she opened it. 

“Maybe I should learn healing magic…”

No, cowardice. Absolute cowardice. Mages should stick to their guns! No point in being half baked in everything, she would pursue the pinnacle of magic! No detours! No capitulation! 

She clenched her fist as the tree-line thinned for the massive lake, its azure, sparkling waves exceedingly tantalizing in the sun’s heat. She broke through the tree-line, staggering a bit as her foot caught on a root. One last ‘fuck you’ from the forest, huh? Dammit!

Eres bent over, inspecting her now-sore ankle. It was one trip for water! A simple chore! How had she gotten injured more now than when fighting wolves and bears?! Trees OP! Please nerf!

The grit of rock beneath her feet caught her attention. Beneath her, an array of multicolored stones were pressed into the dirt, the uneven surface jutting up from the ground like teeth from a wolf’s mouth. The rocks thinned into a gravelly mass, before transitioning into the fine, soft sand that made the lake’s shore. 

There was a beach here; reeds and plant-life surrounded the sandy shore, isolating it into a secluded beauty.

Eres giggled, forgetting her minor pains, and danced across the sand to the water, kicking off her shoes in the process. She tiptoed into the lake, the cold sending a shiver down her as she kicked water up in playful splashes.

She peered into the water, watching her reflection, when a drop of blood fell from her still-stinging eyelid, twirling away and mixing with the lake. She quickly rubbed at it, before forgetting it in favor of her current fun. 

“Ah~ I have to bring Leo here! So nice!”

She spun around, the cloth of her skirt twirling as she shifted her weight. She laughed, and scooped some water to look at. It was crystal clear, so much so she could see the fish swimming around in the water. 

They really should boil it, but…damn! Too hot out! She slurped it, the crisp flavor, not at all fishy, like an ambrosia for the midday broiler overhead. Eres leaned over, scooped their water-skins full, and corked them with a pair of satisfying squeaks.

Eres gazed out at the lake, her eyes squinting at the light reflecting from the blue peaks rising above the surface, and smiled at the scenery. Ha! Here was a sight! Maybe being taken in by that boor was worth it. If she were still scrounging for change in the city streets, she might never have known this kind of peace.

So engrossed was she, that Eres failed to notice the dark shape drifting toward her underneath the surface until it was near upon her. She blinked, eyes catching movement from primal instinct.

“Huh?”

What? What was that? Was that a submarine? No. She took a step back, her mind tingling with danger.

That wasn’t a submarine. She watched in horror as something rose from the water.

The surface swelled, before splitting off the creature’s form, splashing back into place below. A scaly body rose from the depths, the length of it at least the size of two carriages. 

Her breath caught. A massive head, its eyes yellow, reptilian, and cold, adorned by two jutting horns and azure scales, huffed as it shifted its sight to her. 

The four massive legs pulled the creature step-by-step onto the beach, Eres’s retreat synchronized with each footfall.

A choke bubbled from her lips. Ah. She was going to die here. What the hell?! What was that thing? A damn dragon? A water dragon?

Lizard be damned! The fucker could chomp a school-bus in half! 

She laughed, helpless. Did she have the worst luck of all time? Wolves, bears, and now water dragons. What was next? Murderous pixies? 

Her mind churned with ideas, each overridden by pure biological terror. A bear? Sure. She’d seen them in zoos. Wolves were her favorite animal. Scary, but not too bad. 

This…creature. Only found in fantasy, the apex of predators. A dragon. 

The beast slowly moved toward her, the head tilting to the side as their eyes met. A low, rumbling growl tore from its gullet, vibrating Eres’s chest, the sound deafening as it was frightening.

Eres’s breath grew shallow. This was it. She really shouldn’t have left off with Leo like that. Ha. That dumb argument would be the last thing she ever said to him.

The snout moved toward her, paling her face, and she found she could no longer move. There was no resistance, only total and complete supplication; she prayed to every god she knew.

The cold snort of breath washed over half her body, tussling her hair. The nose was close to her face, huffing with curious sniffs. Eres felt something roll down her cheek. Tears? Was she crying?

No. It was blood. Another drop welled from her eyelid, and dripped down her cheek. She caught the ruby droplet in her peripheral. 

The beast regarded her, its eyelids slitting halfway closed, the inner film flicking across before retreating. Another huff. 

Its jaw opened. Eres nearly fainted, but a small, serpentine tongue flicked over her face in a dart, before retreating with the barest hint of red.

The dragon closed its mouth. The growl lessened, the coarse stone-like roughness easing into almost a purr. 

It turned its eyes away from her, the lids drooping lazily, before it nudged her arm with its snout affectionately, and disappeared back into the water, as if its business was done, quick as it had come.

Eres, mouth agape, watched in shock as the tail-end of the beast dipped back underneath the water, apparently uninterested in her. 

She fell down, her legs splayed backward in a girlish shape. Eres ignored the bite of the sand, and rubbed the lingering drool from her cheek.

Her hand came away moist, the liquid cooling her skin. 

“What…the fuck?”