An Extraordinary Bond by Lorian Lilsiel (hardest books to read TXT) 📕

from running up to the shrine. When she got there, she took a deep breath and tried to calm the excitement she felt. She closed her eyes and prayed to her goddess, Sapphira, lady of the ocean and the water that flows through all of us, please let me have a dragon. I don’t care if it’s a green or a blue, just, please. Let my dream come true.

Quinn took another deep breath, and placed her hand on the crystal in front of her, Here goes nothing!

A second passed. Then ten.

“You can take your hand off now.”

Hearing those words, Quinn could hear her heart ripping in half. Her hand fell away, and her face lowered in defeat. A good thing to, or she might have been blinded by the flash of light that came from the crystal after her hand left it. There was a loud cracking noise, followed by unbearable silence.

“Now this is... interesting.”

Quinn felt her heart soar when she heard the voice in her head. She opened her eyes, which had closed on reflex, and there she was, reflecting the light from the colored windows like a mirror. Standing in what remained of the altar stood a dragon.

“I did it…” Quinn whispered to herself, a smile washing across her face like a turning tide, “I did it! Yes! Thank you Sapphira!” By the end she was calling loud enough for the heavens to hear.

“Oh dear, a loud one.”

Quinn looked back at the dragon, and ignoring what the dragon had said, introduced herself, “My name’s Quinn, what’s yours?”

“My name is Kiea. How did I-”

“Nice to meet you Kiea! Looks like we’re going to be partners!”

“Please keep your voice down. No one needs to know you can hear me except for you. Try talking in your head.”

“LIKE THIS?”

“Yes, but quieter.”

“Like this?”

“Better.”

Kiea took in her surroundings, “The Mealky dragon temple? How did I get here?”
    “Whoa, you knew where you were just by looking at the ceiling? That’s awesome! You must be one of the older dragons then.”

Kiea gave Quinn what can only be described as a blank stare, “Do you… Do you have any idea who I am?”

“Should I?” While Quinn had read the first dragon rider stories more times than she could count, she couldn’t think of any dragons other than Vemrin, the first bonded dragon, that had a name she should know, “Hey, now that I think about it, what color are you supposed to be?”

Kiea’s stare did the impossible and became even more blank, “Have you ever read a history book?”

“Nope!”

“That might do it, but I still don’t see how you get through your entire life without learning the names of the seven great dragons.”

“The who?”

“Maybe we should take this conversation outside.”

“Okay! One sec,” Quinn turned to the lady with the tablet, “Hey, um, have you finished logging my dragon?” The lady is question had passed out, “Oh, um…” Quinn walked over and picked up the tablet and pen the lady was writing with, “What color are you again?”

“Platinum.”

“But that isn’t a dragon color-”

“Just write it.”

Quinn wrote “platinum” in the space on her sheet that said “color”, and “Kiea” on the space that said “name”, “There, all done. Let’s go!” Quinn had never been prouder than when she walked out of the summoning temple that day. Kiea followed close behind her and attempted to look in every direction as fast as possible. The two attracted a lot of stares and whispers as she walked through the antechamber to the temple, as well as some confused clapping.

When they got outside, Quinn tried to talk again, but Kiea cut her off, “Take me to your house first. Then we can talk without so many people staring at us.”

Quinn noticed the stares for the first time, and was instantly put off, “Yeah, you’re probably right. Um, my house is this way.”

Quinn set off down the street towards where her house was, holding her cap on her head to keep it from blowing away in the strong wind that was coming off the sea. It took about five minutes to walk from the dragon temple to Quinn’s house in the rundown east section of Mealky.

“Dad should be asleep for another hour, so we have some time to kill. What do you want to do?” Quinn unlocked the door to her two bedroom house and moved some piles of junk out of the way to make room for the dragon to walk.

“Is this place always so messy?” Kiea wove her way through boxes and piles of paper as she followed Quinn to her room.

“It didn’t used to be this messy. Dad boxed up a lot of his stuff after Mom died, so it’s gotten a little crowded. I won’t let him throw it away in case he wants to be a scholar again.”

“Your father was a scholar? Why do you live here?”

“We got kicked out after he swore at his boss. It’s fine though, we didn’t need a house that big anyway.” Quinn made her way down the cluttered hallway and opened the door to her room.

It was small and lined with bookshelves, light streaming in through the single window on the far wall. In contrast to the rest of the house, it was very clean. The shelves were filled with orderly rows of books, and the only thing on the floor was a rug. Even the bed located under the window was well made.

Quinn sat, or rather dropped, on her bed. Kiea looked around the room, “So many books… And, I expected it to be messier?”

“Dad said I should read. Mom said I should keep my room clean. I guess it was just how I was raised.” Quinn picked a leather bound book off a shelf and flipped through the pages before closing it again and putting it back on the shelf.

“Have you read all of these?”

“‘Yup! At least twice.” She picked up a thick book from a table that stood next to her bed. It’s cover had once been green and printed in silver, but was now so faded that Kiea couldn’t read the title, “This one has always been my favorite. It’s a collection of adventures of Ilien the elf and his green dragon, Vemrin.”

“The first dragon rider…”

Quinn nodded, “I think I was five the first time I read this, and I’ve dreamt of bonding with a dragon ever since.” She smiled, “You’re my dream come true.” She put the book back on the table.

Kiea was silent as she thought about what Quinn had said. Quinn started to worry that she had said something wrong when Kiea finally spoke, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, I guess? Anyway, this is enough about me, tell me something about you! We’re going to be partners, so we should learn as much about each other as possible.”
    “About me? I’m not sure where to start. I still can’t believe with all these books you haven’t heard of the seven great dragons.”

“I don’t want to know about them, I want to know about you.” This was the second time now that Kiea had mentioned the “seven great dragons”, but Quinn still didn’t have any idea what she was talking about. They certainly weren’t in any of the books she had. Though to be fair, the only ones that were “historical” were the ones about Ilien and Vemrin.

“Me… Not them… Well…  When I was still alive, I was in charge of watching over the southernmost portion of Sarea. My cave was at the center of what the humans called Wild Wood. I had a library there, with more books than can be read in a human lifetime. For the most part, I was alone. I had few friends outside my colleagues, despite how high ranking I was. I never had a mate, and never planned on it either. I devoted my life to seeking knowledge, and did so until I died. There isn’t much else to tell, really.”

“You keep saying you died, but, I thought that after dragons died, they were, you know, dead. You can’t summon a dead dragon. It isn’t reincarnation. So how-”

“That is exactly what I’m trying to figure out. It wasn’t possible to summon me before I died, but after? None of this makes sense. The last thing I remember is a bright light and then numbness. I died. We all died. I felt them die…” Kiea trailed off.

“And what about that about not being able to summon you? I thought you could summon any dragon that wasn't already bonded to someone as long as you were worthy.”

“You can’t summon us. The seven great dragons can’t be summoned by anyone. Not the elves, dwarves, or humans. We were designated as guardians over Sarea, so Tara made it so that we couldn’t be summoned. It wouldn’t have been good if one of us had been dragged away from our duties by a bond. See, none of this scenario is possible.”

Quinn though hard for a few moments before jumping off her bed, “I’ve heard that one before!” She started scanning the spines of books for a title, “I know it’s somewhere… Ah, here!” She pulled a small book with a red cover off the shelf. It had been tucked close to the edge and partially hidden by a much bigger book, but Quinn remembered reading it at one point or another, “‘Dragon Color and Its Effect on Rank’. I almost forgot I had this. Dad got it for me after I said I wanted to learn about dragons. He said it was the best place to start.” She flipped through the title and filler pages until she got to the table of contents, then flipped through even more pages until she got to the chapter she was looking for at the end of the book, ‘The Seven Great Dragons’. She began to read.

The seven great dragons are seven metallic colored dragons that were appointed by the seven elder gods to look after Sarea. They are the only dragons known that cannot be summoned.

They rank in this order, from least to greatest; Bronze, Copper, Electrum, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Rainbow. The four most powerful of them, Silver,  Gold, Platinum, and Rainbow, were each given a portion of Sarea to look after, while the other three each resided in the ring of mountains at the center of Sarea. Each of them has a different affinity, which I will detail later on in this chapter.

One hundred seventy seven years ago from when I write this, the four most powerful were killed a battle against a black dragon, called Nag. After that, the remaining three dragons took over their duties, watching over all the lands except the Rainbow dragon’s, which had been destroyed and shrouded in darkness.

The book went on, but Quinn thought she got the idea. Kiea had told her to write ‘Platinum’ under color. Kiea was the second most powerful dragon in the world. She had summoned the second most powerful dragon in the world.

Quinn tried her hardest to keep her squeal of joy internal, but a little manages to eek its way out and make her sound like a mouse on helium. After she had gotten that out of her system, she tried to calm down a little and start thinking about the situation, “Do you think that maybe I was able to summon you because your death stripped whatever barrier kept you from being summoned?”

Kiea had a silent moment of thought before responding, “It’s possible, but that doesn’t change that fact that I’ve been dead. If I had died recently then you would have known who I was because of the battles with Nag, regardless of whether you had ever learned anything about history.”

“Right…” Quinn was too tired to try and think up a good explanation for that. Summoning a dragon as powerful as Kiea had taken a lot out of her, and she needed rest, “Well, I’m going to sleep. Goodnight!” She flopped on her bed and closed her eyes.

“What?