Caught By the Dragon: Maiden to the Dragon, Book 1 by - (first e reader .txt) 📕

>Xander shook his head. “We cannot journey much farther than the bridge.”

“If the bridge is to be had,” Cayden pointed out.

There was no use talking at the top of our lungs, so the next couple of minutes was devoid of all but the thunderous rains that fell around us. The muddy road opened up ahead of us and revealed a small river. At least, small when there wasn’t a flood warning. As we approached the waters I could hear the roar of the stream as it turned over the rocks in its bed and swept away the trees that lined its banks.

The bridge was a wooden makeup of logs strapped together with heavy rope and sealed with a tar-looking substance. Thick trees as wide as I was tall were the support beams that forced the bridge to curve over the water in a gentle arch. Below the arch were the fast waters of the wild river. I winced every time I heard a tree or rock slam into one of those pillars.

Spiros stopped his guards at the edge of the bridge. Xander trotted forward to stand beside his old friend and I cautiously followed. “I do not like this, My Lord,” the captain shouted above the pounding rain.

Xander pursed his lips as he studied the bridge. The thick logs swayed side to side at each knock of their pillars. “We have little choice. There is no other bridge.”

“Then allow my men and I to cross and test the logs, My Lord,” Spiros pleaded.

Xander shook his head. “There is no time. The bridge may collapse at any moment. We cross now.” He turned his horse so he rode perpendicular to the line and stood on his stirrups so all could see him. “We cross at once! Make two lines at two abreast and follow the rider in front of you!”

The riders grouped themselves into the long lines. I clutched my reigns and tensed my legs against the body of the horse. My steed threw its head back and whinnied.

Xander sidled up to my horse and leaned close to me. “Would you rather ride with me?”

I managed a shaky smile. “And miss all this fun? Not on your life.”

He glanced past me at the roaring water beneath the bridge and frowned. I hardly heard his murmured words. “I pray not.”

That’s when an ear-splitting roar bashed my ears. I whipped my head to the left and upstream of the bridge. A huge tree with a six-foot trunk floated on the currents of the white-water waves.

“Across!” Xander yelled.

Too late. The tree bore down on the bridge, and us. It slammed into the left side and sank deep into the thick timbers. Many of the horses whinnied and reared up. My horse wasn’t an exception. It reared up on both its back legs. One of the two remaining hooves slipped on the thick logs. The horse staggered backward and into the downstream wall. We hit it hard. I couldn’t keep my position on the slick saddle and fell into the roaring abyss of the wild river.

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