Page 41 of Serving my Dragon
“Ugh. Creepy crawlies.” Kayleigh’s grimace couldn’t have been cuter.
“This place is perfect,” Pollita declared as Juan set her on the ground. “Spacious and well hidden. Excellent choice.” My dragon waddled off to explore as I dropped my heavy pack to the floor.
“Why don’t you and Kayleigh check it out while I gather some branches and fruit.” Juan headed back through the waterfall.
“I wonder why he called this place a temple?” Kayleigh mused aloud. “Seems like just a cave to me.”
Knowing my uncle, he had a reason. “Let’s take a peek.” I toted the lantern, holding it aloft. We first made our way left, the cavern actually wider than the opening screened by the waterfall.
The first sight of the wall had Kayleigh exclaiming, “There’s carvings.”
Indeed, the walls had been smoothed from the floor to about ten feet, and on that flat surface were etchings that resembled writing.
“I wonder what it says,” I murmured.
“It’s old, whatever it is. Do you think it was the Incas?”
“Most likely.” They’d been rather advanced as a society but historians claimed they didn’t have a written language. Instead, they relied on intricately knotted ropes known as quipu. But if not them who’d carved the inscriptions, then who?
Following the wall led to the first of five openings. Three of them turned into corridors, while the other two led to the chambers Juan spoke of. A bedroom-sized one had Kayleigh waving her hands. “This one seems nice for setting up our bedding. The niches in the walls can hold our personal items.”
The other room must have been a kitchen, judging by the large hearth and the stone counters ringing the space. It also held a huge block of petrified wood in the center.
A pointing Kayleigh remarked, “They must have hung herbs and stuff from the ceiling. There are still a few hooks embedded.” Rusted by time, the curve only remaining on a few and the jagged nubs of the ones that had snapped off.
We kept exploring, following a tunnel that led to more chambers. Carvings abounded, some more of the unreadable language, others more decorative in nature. Who used to live here and how had this place been forgotten?
The longest hall ended in a wide ledge and the chasm my uncle had mentioned. Pollita stood at the edge, staring across at the rising steam.
“What do you think of the place, Polly?” Kayleigh asked, crouching beside the small lizard.
“It’s perfect,” she declared. “No surprise, since this citadel used to belong to my kind.”
The statement startled. “Wait, you’re saying a dragon lived here?”
“Oh yes. Two, at least, according to the writings but not at the same time, obviously. We don’t like to share territory.”
“You can read it?” Kayleigh’s query held a note of excitement.
“But of course.” A disdainful reply. “This place was once home to the dragons named Boitatá and Amaru.”
I couldn’t help but react. “I’ve heard of them. They’re considered to be myths.”
“Humans.” Polly snorted. “Never stopping to think myths and legends were born from the truth.”
“What happened to them?” Kayleigh asked.
Polly rolled her wee shoulders. “Nothing I’ve read indicates the method of their demise but one would assume old age or hunters.”
“Or another dragon,” I added.
“Also possible.” Polly didn’t deny it happened. “But rare. It takes great strife for a dragon to relocate to another territory for it usually means abandoning their hoard, not to mention the shame and cowardice of failure.”
A glance across the chasm and the moist mist had me murmuring, “I wonder what is over there.”
“Can you not smell the hint of sulfur? It’s a geothermal pool. Lovely for bathing. I shall quite enjoy soaking in it once I get my wings.”
“You don’t mind staying here?” I ventured.
