Page 242 of Eldritch
I shot her a glare. “You’re not going to show me how to ride him?”
“It seems he’s not planning to take you anywhere.”
“Well, how do Igethim to take me somewhere?”
“I’m not entirely certain. Morsana never gavemea Corvugon of my own.” Bitterness clung to her voice as she smiled back at me. “I only know from reading.”
I stared at the feathered neckline of my stubborn bird dragon and huffed.
“Listen to me. I know you don’t care for Zevander much, but I do. We need to return to his home?—”
Raivox lurched forward and raised his wings. With one flap, we surged upward, and I flattened my body against him, clutching the horns with white knuckles. Nausea and dizziness waltzed through my senses, the wind barreling over the top of my head. My thighs burned against his scales as I squeezed my knees into his body. Higher he soared, until my cloak could no longer stave off the cold and my breaths arrived as thick white mist. I kept my eyes on his scales, clinging to him, and at last, he leveled. I shuddered an exhale and mustered the courage to sit upright. The air felt thicker, forcing itself into my throat, as it rushed past us.
The mountain’s summit stood ahead of us and below, daring myself to peer downward, I could only make out three small specks where they stood through the density of the clouds. Thedistant sounds of their screaming and cheering failed to spur on a feeling of victory, they only incited a jealous longing to be back on the ground. Vertigo spun through my head, the world tilting and I clenched my eyes, hoping for it to pass.
Raivox flapped his wings, his body angling slightly upward, forcing me to clutch tighter, and he landed with a sudden thud. Face buried in his feathers, I trembled as I peeled myself away from where I’d buried my face in his feathers and found we’d landed on a jutting stretch of rock. My knuckles ached when I finally unraveled them from his horns and straightened.
Raivox lowered his head as he had before, and I slid down from his neck, tumbling along his rough scales in an awkward ejection. The rock slammed against my knees, sending a jolt of pain across my bones, when I smacked down against the surface. On hands and knees, I breathed, calming the pounding of my heart, then pushed to my feet and glanced around. A shallow cave ahead of us housed a wall of branches and bones, one of them a skull that stared unseeingly toward us.
“Where have you taken me?” I asked, peering out over the nauseating stretch of sky and mountains behind us.
A rough nudge of his beak sent me stumbling forward, toward that wall of piled bones and branches.
Scowling back at him, I edged toward it and stared up the tight weaving of what reminded me of a nest. “This is your home, isn’t it?”
He chuffed and ruffled his feathers as if he were excited to show me.
Taking hold of a piece of bone, I pulled myself up and stepped onto a bent branch. I reached again, pulling and stepping my way up the height of the wall, until at last, I reached the top of it. Nestled inside, sat two black-scaled eggs—exactly like the one from which Raivox had hatched.
Smiling, I looked back at him. “They’re yours.” I glanced around in search of another Corvugon that might’ve been flying about, but there was only Raivox. Perhaps they’d arrived the same way he had. “You’re a father.”
Again, he ruffled his feathers and flapped his wings, the pride beaming off him.
The smile on my face faded for the worry still writhing in the pit of my stomach. “Raivox, I need you to take me to that tree.”
He stretched his wings and flew upward, disappearing over the mountain.
Leaving me there, alone with his eggs.
“No,” I muttered, climbing back down the nest. “No, no, no.” When I reached the platform, I stalked toward its edge, wondering if I might be able to climb back down.
A dizzying height with no bottom visible from where I stood had me backing up again. “Raivox!” I called out, searching the sky for him. “Raivox come back!”
Seconds ticked off.
Minutes.
I summoned the whistling glyph to mind but dryness in my throat dulled the usually sharp sound.
Dread swelled in my chest after nearly an hour must’ve passed and he still hadn’t returned.
“Raivox!” I called out again, my voice hoarse and scratchy.
The dread sharpened and coiled into anger that cut through me like blades. All I could think about was Zevander. I needed to find him.
“Raivox!” I screamed and a growl answered, but not one I’d heard before. Slowly turning around, I looked up the length of the nest wall to find an enormous lizard, at least four times my size, sitting on the edge above. Once again, my muscles locked into a shudder, breath waning in my lungs. With its clawed,scaly fingers, it popped one of the eggs into its cheek, creating a lopsided bulge in its face.
“Oh, no. No, you don’t.” I called the bone glyph to mind and as it unraveled onto the ground, only one of the lizard’s eyes shifted, while the other remained trained on me, as if it were sizing me up to fit in the other side of its cheek.
