Dragon Wings

  Dragon Wings

  Konstanz Silverbow

  Copyright © 2017, Konstanz Silverbow All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to a real person, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  This book was professionally edited by Tristi Pinkston

  http://www.tristipinkstonediting.blogspot.com/

  This book was professionally edited by Liz Lowham

  https://lizlowham.wixsite.com/priorityediting

  Professionally formatted by Red Umbrella Graphic Designs

  www.facebook.com/redumbrellagraphics

  Cover Art by Covers by Christian

  http://coversbychristian.com/

  To Zeke.

  I couldn’t have asked for a better friend, brother, or supporter!

  Thank you for always being there for me! And making sure I get the fight scenes right!

  Acknowledgments

  My deepest gratitude to God, always.

  Thank you to my family and friends for the constant support.

  A very special thank you to Dad, for taking me to Dragoon, and to everyone who made that adventure possible!

  Thank you to Tammy Damrill!

  As always, a big shout-out to my constant friends, supporters, cheerleading team, publishing team, and the people I couldn’t do this without:

  Ali Winters

  Cassie Chapman

  Tristi Pinkston

  Liz Lowham

  Christian Bentulan

  The Silverbow Dragons

  Ink

  and

  YOU! <3 Thank you for reading!

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Newsletter

  About the Author

  Lying on the cliff’s edge, my belly warms against the heat of the rock. The direct light on my back, the slight breeze filling the air with the smell of wildflowers from the other side of the precipice—I could not be more at ease.

  A soft snore escapes me. I wriggle, scratching my scales against the ground before settling in deeper, allowing my eyes to close, a smile pulling at my lips. It’s an odd sensation, really, considering it’s been so long since I’ve had anything to be happy about. So many years have gone by, wasted, trapped in a world too small for our kind.

  One eye opens. I watch the surroundings, ensuring nothing is happening before flipping my tail around, resting the fins over my eyes for shade.

  Nothing ever happens.

  The wind changes directions, and a fluttering of wings rushes by as small birds fly over my head. The scent of daisies and tulips is gone. A violent sneeze erupts from my nostrils as they begin to itch.

  The scent of sugar is carried through the air. A trill of laughter follows—a sound that hasn’t been heard by dragons in several hundred years.

  I jump to my feet, more alert now than I’ve been since we were banished to this forest of solitude. Listening intently, I follow the sound, searching for the source. I scurry as fast as one my size can between and under the tree branches, my tail brushing against the vegetation.

  No human can enter the dragon lands. The strongest magic-wielders with the greatest bonds ever to live created the barrier keeping our worlds apart.

  The sun shines in patches where the trees are sparse enough for the light to filter through their leaves. All is silent as every creature knows I search, aware that their guardian is on the hunt. I look, prowling, begging for the noise to be that of any other living creature than the one I fear it is.

  I find myself at the wall of weeping willows. A line of their curtain-like vines blocks my path. More so, the magic over those vines stops the inhabitants of this world from leaving and the occupants of other worlds from coming in.

  Or so I thought.

  There, on a large rock, stands a young girl no older than three in human years. The wind tosses blonde ringlets against her shoulders and a yellow skirt against her thin legs. Her eyes are the color of the sky, and everything is reflected back in them. A smile pushes her plump cheeks higher up, and I cannot help but marvel at the beauty and innocence of the child.

  I prepare myself for the wails of terror, but as the girl looks at me, it is not with a look of fear. It’s almost the look a child would give to something such as a kitten. Not a dragon.

  “You so pretty!” she shouts and walks toward me. “Magic?” she asks as she touches a scale on my leg.

  “I am Yackros. A dragon, which—” I try explaining, but the child cuts me off.

  “Sparkles!” She jumps with glee before taking a step closer, reaching her hand toward my forearm.

  “No, child, Yackros. Not Sparkles.”

  I don’t like admitting that this human scares me. Despite her age and small stature, she broke through an unbreakable barrier. But I can’t seem to move—perhaps from that fear, or because I don’t want to startle her. Her hand makes contact with the scales on my arm. As odd as it seems, she’s so gentle, as though afraid of hurting me.

  She does her best to wrap her short arms around as much of me as she can, her cheek snuggled against the crevice of two scales. “Sparkles, you warm.”

  A surge of emotion courses through me. An unmistakable feeling.

  “Child, what is your name?” I step back, breaking the contact as I look at her sweet, smiling, unknowing face.

  “Alita. It’s not as pretty as Sparkles.”

  “Alita.” I lean down so my face is closer to eye level with hers. “Meaning winged,” I snicker to myself. “An odd thing to name a creature without wings. If it were the days of old, I would call you Little Wingless, child.” All of my willpower is consumed as I remain calm in the face of the greatest danger I’ve ever encountered. “Alas, you must leave this forest, forget how you found it, and never come back.”

  For a moment, she just stares at me, and then her bottom lip trembles. “I don’t want to leave, Sparkles. You my friend dragon.”

  I shake my head. “I’m sorry, child. Once upon a time, I would be your dragon, and you would be my human. But that can never be. There are rules we must follow, and you being here breaks every one of them.”

  I glance at my phone—barely two hours left until curfew. The afternoon has disappeared so fast. It usually does when you don’t want it to. I agreed to come up here into the mountains with Max because I thought we’d actually be spending time together.

  Looking back up, I see the bounce of dark brunette curls as he disappears over the hill and beyond my sight, taking with him, my sense of security. Stuffing the phone back in my jeans, I follow after him.

  “Max!” I call. He either doesn’t hear me or ignores me and continues forward. One second, the whole valley is in view. Two steps farther, and all I see are dirt walls enclosing me in a ravine I could be trapped in forever. Each time the path rises, my heart
shoots up to the base of my throat, and I search for Max. Then the path dips again, and my heart hits my stomach, and I try not to trip over the loose rocks.

  “Max!” I call again. I watch my every step, avoiding the swarming fire ants, large vivid red critters (I haven’t a clue what they are), and other various creepy bugs covering the ground. Every part of me itches like those little creatures are crawling all over me. I try to ignore it, repeating The bugs aren’t on me in my head. I nearly say it out loud a few times, but I’m trying to be strong because the last thing I want is for Max to think I’m some pathetic weakling.

  “Alita, you coming?” He reappears in front of me. “We need to catch up before we lose the others.”

  He offers me his hand. I take it, loving the feeling of his strong fingers wrapped around mine. His hands completely engulf my own, which is no surprise given that his six-foot frame towers over my measly five-foot-two.

  He pulls me along, practically dragging me as I scramble to keep up, but I can hardly catch my breath, let alone argue.

  “I can’t imagine your parents went—”

  He whips around. “Foster,” he snaps.

  Shrinking back, I chide myself. How many times do I have to make that mistake before I get it through my head that he doesn’t see them as anything more than a temporary group of people in his life? The circumstance that brought him to John and Sherri never caused them to treat him like less than any of their other children, but Max never came to terms with it. Rarely does he mention the woman who gave birth to him and then disappeared, nor his absent father.

  My heart breaks for him. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I can’t imagine that your foster parents went too far ahead if they were worried about us getting lost.”

  “I’m sure they’re just farther up the path.”

  He continues forward, pulling me along. We walk another five minutes before he stops abruptly, and I fall into him. Looking up, I see a broken tree across the path. He looks at me just as I glance at him.

  “Do you think we’ve gone the wrong way?” he says.

  “Maybe they went off the trail to check something out and . . . went farther than they intended?” I mumble the last part, distracted as he runs his hands through his thick hair. It’s so gorgeous.

  I shake my head and bring myself back to reality.

  He turns and faces me. The draw of his downturned lips, furrowed brows, and his thumb hooked in his belt loop tell me he’s genuinely concerned.

  “I think we should split up and search for them. I don’t know what else to do,” he says, no longer looking at me, but gazing intensely at our surroundings.

  A shudder runs up my spine. I don’t like the idea of being out here alone. The sun is setting, the light barely visible above the mountains in the distance. And with the fact that the mountain we’re on is ridiculously uneven, it’s more likely I’ll get lost than find anyone else.

  But Max has already started walking in the opposite direction.

  “Oh, okay. But don’t go too far. We really should . . . stick together.” The last part comes out barely audible because I realize I’m talking to myself at this point. Max is no longer within my line of vision. Has that boy never seen any movie ever? Split up? That never ends well.

  I run my hands over my goose-bump-covered arms and turn back, carefully stepping over the fallen log and continuing down the path where Max was taking me.

  I can see where the path dips, leading into what used to be a river that went to the spring. To the side is the sharp, jagged trail going back up into the mountain pass.

  With my heart pounding against my rib cage, terrified of the things I could run into up here—especially when it’s getting dark—I try to come up with happy thoughts to move me forward. Like where I am. The Dragoon Spring. A great battle took place here.

  No, not helpful at all. It’s a reminder of death. So much already happened in this area. What if I die here? I don’t wanna die. Wow, pull yourself together, Alita!

  Something on the ground reflects the fading sunlight directly into my eyes. I step to the side so I can see again and walk toward it, but it’s gone from view.

  I rub at my eyes and blink. When I look up again, my breath catches in my throat, and a sudden sense of déjà vu takes hold of me.

  In a seemingly unremarkable little alcove, I feel the strong sense that I’ve been here before. A yearning fills me, almost like a physical force grasping at me, calling me forward. Maybe a more apt description would be that I’m a piece of metal being pulled to a magnet. And no matter how much I don’t want to go, I can’t help but step deeper into the canyon, parting the bushes and trees in my way.

  The air is suddenly different. It’s no longer as hot, and it seems cleaner. I’m not even sure what it means, but everything feels . . . off. I spin around, looking for any indication of what just happened.

  It’s then that I notice the trees.

  “Trees?” I breathe. In Flagstaff? Sure. But big, beautiful, towering ones in Dragoon? I don’t think so. Given their tall stance, brown bark, and bright green leaves that don’t look deadly, no way. They aren’t ironwoods or Palo Verde.

  “Max?” I call out, hating the tremble in my voice.

  There’s no response from him or anyone.

  Movement in the corner of my eye catches my attention. I equally do and do not want to know what it is. I do, because then I’ll at least know what I’m up against out here all on my own. And I don’t, because who knows what I could be facing in a moment.

  I blink rapidly, hoping I’m just seeing things, and take a timid step forward. Another chill runs through me.

  Max is probably looking for me right now. Maybe he’s already found his family and they’re all looking for me. That would make sense, given my horrible luck. Perhaps I should turn back.

  Another rustle of bushes. The flash of something bright. My natural survival instincts yell for me to run, but somehow the force urging me closer wins.

  “Hello?” I call out again. Perhaps it’s one of Max’s siblings—or, as he would correct me, foster siblings. “Carly? Hanna?” Taking a deep breath, I continue on. If it is them, they won’t relent until they’ve had their fun. Once they get a good scare in, eliciting a jump and a high-pitched squeal out of me, we can go home.

  “I’m coming in there, Wendy, Nick, and Kelly.”

  As I push my way through the foliage, the scenery is no longer just trees. Beautiful flowers in the most vibrant reds, oranges, yellows, blues, and purples unlike anything I’ve ever seen line the walkway to a clearing. It’s almost like someone planted them that way—a pathway to something exciting. I can understand why Max’s family forgot about us if this is where they wandered.

  I reach a circle of trees. Pushing back some leaves, I enter a whole new world.

  Fireflies create a magical show in the air. The trees stand as guardians to a meadow filled with lush grass and dotted with those same bright flowers.

  It’s like looking at a painting because surely this can’t be real. A giggle escapes me as I spin around, enjoying the beauty of this small retreat in the middle of the Dragoon Mountains.

  Two bright flashes blink in and out of my peripheral vision.

  I stop abruptly. It was like cat eyes—the pupils vertical and almost like they were on fire—but much, much too big for comfort.

  I cut through the fireflies’ air show and push past the foliage at the far end of the meadow, going after whatever I saw. I don’t know why I’m chasing after it. My heart hammers against my ribcage. It’s a clichéd thought, but it literally feels as though it could beat itself out of my chest cavity. And suddenly—

  There it is.

  There he is.

  Right in my path.

  Tears form in the brim of my eyelids, threatening to spill over. A kind of panic too deep to ignore begins to set in. Fear threatens to choke me, and it’s like a ball is stuck in my throat. I can’t breathe.

  Sitting there like a giant kitten, a g
ood two stories taller than me, is something that has to be an image projected from my imagination. The trees, the flowers, the air—all of that, I can take. But this . . .

  Large burnt-orange scales cover the dragon’s body. His piercing bronze eyes slowly close and open again, allowing me short glimpses of the cat-like irises.

  A queasy feeling settles over me, and I can only hope Max and the others find me so my dead body isn’t left out here, assuming the dragon doesn’t eat me whole.

  “No,” I whisper, shaking my head. It’s irrational. None of it makes sense. I can’t be seeing what my brain thinks I’m seeing.

  Dragons don’t exist. My parents made sure I was aware of that fact nearly every day of my life since I was three years old.

  “No,” I whisper again, eyes wide open.

  The creature continues staring at me the same way I stare at him. Maybe his parents have insisted for his whole life that humans are imaginary.

  “Whatever this is,” I say, “it’s in my mind.”

  I can feel the pounding beat of my heart, emotions changing with every pump of blood through my veins. Exhilaration, followed by memories of teasing—being told it was all in my head, being forced to lie to myself and turn fact into fiction.

  Some of the tears spill over. I wipe them away with my fingers and continue shaking my head.

  “Alita?” The ground reverberates as the dragon speaks my name in a hushed tone.

  I look up, staring into his eyes and finding comfort where I expected fear. I know these eyes. I’ve stared into them before.

  “If you’re here,” I whisper, “why did no one believe me before?”