Page 7 of Dragon Valley
“Thank you, chief.” Aron bowed deeply. “Your willingness to listen is already more than we hoped for and you have my sincerest appreciation.” He clapped a hand down on Caden’s shoulder. “Caden is my second-in-command and will come with me. My other lieutenants will stay with the army for their protection.”
“As you wish,” Chief nodded. “Our dragons will not carry anyone but their own Riders but the walk is not far. The women will ride ahead and prepare a comfortable fire and fresh meal for you.”
I suppressed an eye roll and I knew Azaria did the same. Of course, what else were women good for?
“Hey, uh…”
I turned back, surprised to see that Caden had called after me.
“Yes?”
“What’s your name?”
“Nadiyah,” I answered, pushing my mane out of my face.
“Well met, Nadiyah.” He offered a small smile that lit up his boyishly handsome face. “I’ll see you soon, I guess.”
“Yes, you will,” I said dismissively, turning back to get on my dragon. I was too annoyed at having proved myself a capable Rider, yet still being sent ahead to do “women’s work”, to take note of the blush in his cheeks.
3
CADEN
“What do you think, Caden?”Captain Aron asked me. “Can we trust them?”
I took a moment to contemplate the question, following the flights of dragons with my eyes as we walked. They really were as common as birds in this place, some even roosting in trees! I’d never seen a real dragon before today, and only heard the stories of the Dragon Riders since childhood.
“They’re certainly not risking much by hearing us out,” I replied. “That little show they made while flying up on us? I got a feeling that was nothing. They could have lit us up the moment we came to their door and gone about their day.”
“I agree,” he nodded tersely. “It’s comforting to know their first instinct isn’t violence. If it was, I’m sure they’d be the ones running the country.”
“Dragons aside, they seem like simple folk. Living off the land and such.” I remembered the young lady, Nadiyah, looking through our box of simple gifts as if they were priceless treasures. “They’ve kept to themselves for so long, they don’t seem interested in politics.” I shifted the bottle of raspberry wine from one arm to the other. Since the dragon people were hosting us, the least we could do was bring something to drink.
“Thank the Gods for that,” Aron sighed wearily. “If they were as power hungry as the Lascaris, we’d be at a very different place in history now. If we’d even be here at all.”
We continued our walk in silence. A reply wasn’t necessary. It was only thanks to his tactical brilliance that our rag-tag army still had as many as we did. At one point, we had sheer numbers on our side. Most of our recruits came from simple, working class backgrounds and had never seen a day of combat in their lives. We weren’t the most skilled soldiers, but we were confident and starry-eyed because we outnumbered the enemy five to one.
That was until they slaughtered us like lambs in battle after battle. The few victories we had still carried heavy losses. After two years, we no longer had numbers on our side.
Entire families had been lost to this war which seemed to drag on endlessly. I enlisted three years ago when the declaration was first made. I wanted to be a soldier my whole life and saw this as my opportunity to prove myself. Now, I knew exactly why my mother and sisters cried so much when I left.
I thought they were being silly women, but I had held too many dying friends and comrades through their final breaths to shed my own tears anymore. My poor family thought the same would happen to me, and some days I wondered why I was still alive when so many good men weren’t.
One reason was due to Captain Aron saving my life countless times. He was just a sergeant when we met, and quickly rose through the ranks because our superior officers kept getting killed in battle. In my opinion, he should have been leading us since the beginning.
We won our few victorious battles because of his ability to out-think the enemy’s tactics while also preserving as many lives as possible. He’d never admit it, but my fellow lieutenants would agree he was the sole reason we’d been holding on for as long as we have.
Even with him leading us, we were feeling the cold kiss of rock bottom. One or two more ambushes from the royal cavalry could end us. We needed another ally, and a strong one at that.
And that was how we marched up to a region no one had stepped foot in for over twenty years and found ourselves face-to-face with dragons.
“It’s beautiful here,” Aron observed, lifting his face to the sunlight. “The land looks fertile and essentially untouched by a plough.”
“It’s a wild, dangerous type of beauty,” I agreed.
My thoughts drifted back to the young woman Rider, Nadiyah. Wild, dangerous, and beautiful in her own right. I wondered if her ancestors came from outside the valley. Had she been wearing a cotton dress rather than dragon armor, no one would have taken her for a Dragon Rider. She could have been related to the farmer’s daughter I was half in love with before I left for the war.
Not that the dragon people were unattractive. Many legends were told of their exotic beauty, with skin like amber and hair like shiny, black silk. But Nadiyah’s green eyes, tawny hair, and golden sunkissed glow reminded me of home. And it was not a gentle reminder, but a sharp pang of homesickness I hadn’t felt in over a year.
