Dragon Breeder 3 by Dante King (e novels to read online .TXT) 📕

do we solve this riddle?” Jazmyn asked in frustration. “As far as I can tell, we either choose the initial route scoped out by our scouts, or we take the tunnel that has been recently provided by our ratty friends.”

Muttering and murmuring broke out then, as the dragonmancers and gathered coteries all began discussing the pros and cons of each choice.

While the discussion played out, the wisp who’d warned me of the attack appeared, buzzing around once more. I watched it unthinkingly, my eyes following it in the same way that they might follow a fly, or embers dancing over a fire.

The strange creature zoomed around and got under peoples’ feet—as much as something as insubstantial as a wisp could get under peoples’ feet.  With my dragon-enhanced hearing, I heard some surly soldier comment that they should just kill the damned thing, although how they proposed to accomplish this they did not mention.

Then, as Bjorn said that we should just toss a scale to decide which way to go, the answer to the question hit me.

“The fucking wisp!” I said, standing upright and smacking my fist into my open palm.

“Ah, don’t worry about it, fella,” Diggens said. “I’ve seen a couple of these weird little buggers down here over the past few months. Mostly when I’m sitting and enjoying my smoko. They don’t harm anyone. On the contrary, it’s usually on spying one of them that I find a half decent haul of precious things.”

I waved the little gnoll’s wisdom aside. “Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said, “but three times now that… thing, whatever it is, has helped us out. It helped you find that gem, it warned us of the ratfolk, and it drew our attention to the dragondust.”

“What’s your point, Mike?” Ashrin asked.

I shrugged. “Maybe this little guy knows where it is we should be going? Maybe it wants to help us out. Help the Empire out.”

Ashrin looked at me skeptically.

I didn’t wait around to get the yay or nay from the rest of the party. We didn’t have time for that. Wayne was fading. We were nearing the point in the proceedings when I was going to throw off the yoke of manners and hierarchy and General Shiloh’s feelings and just do my own thing.

There was simply no time.

“Will!” I yelled, using the first word that came to my mind when I looked at the will-o’-the-wisp. “Come here, will you?”

I couldn’t guess as to how something without visible ears or a place to store a brain knew that I was talking to it, but the wisp stopped rotated. For a moment, it looked at me. At least, I assumed it did. It didn’t have any visible eyes, but I got the distinct impression that it was regarding me thoughtfully.

Then, it floated over.

I squatted onto my haunches and stared at the thing square in the… misty vapor.

“Will,” I said, in a calm and reasonable voice, “we need to find these crystals. They’re a special kind of crystal. They have the ability and integrity to hold dragons. They’re somewhere down here, but we need to find them fast. The fate of a dragonling… The fate of my offspring hinges on it. You’ve proved to be a savvy little S.O.B so far. If you could just show us which tunnel we should take…”

The ethereal wispy flame simply floated in midair for a couple of heartbeats.

“Mike,” Ashrin said, “maybe it was just fluke that this thing warned us about—”

The wisp, Will as I now thought of him, bobbed over to the tunnel the ratfolk had burrowed and excavated. It hung there, as if making up its mind, and then flashed brightly.

I heard Rupert laugh in disbelief.

“Are you sure, Will?” I said, not wanting to be the asshole who trusted some random floating ghost thing and ended up leading a company of elite soldiers and their coteries off a cliff.

Will glowed star-bright once more.

I turned to Jazmyn and Ashrin.

“Look, I don’t know if we can go down there, Mike,” Jazmyn said. “I’m not sure if General Shiloh would approve of us taking that route just yet—not until the main force has been through there and ensured there’s no danger.”

Ashrin nodded in agreement. “There could be anything at the other end of that tunnel—more ratfolk, kobolds, more wild dragons, or worse.”

From behind me I heard Rupert whisper in a slightly shrill voice, “What c-c-could be worse than a wild dragon?”

There was the sound of someone hitting him hard in the arm. The silence that followed the blow made me guess that Gabby had just struck him.

I put a hand on Ashrin’s shoulder and gave Jazmyn a no-nonsense look.

“I don’t care about what the General might think of it. I don’t care about any potential dangers. One of my dragonlings—one of the Empire’s future dragons—is fading, ladies. The wisp warned us of the danger before, and we don’t have any other better options. I’m going to follow this thing—Will. I need to do this to save my son. You two were tasked with guarding me, right?”

Jazmyn’s face hardened, and she opened her mouth to give me tongue-lashing, but I held up a finger to stop her.

“As my bodyguards, I expect you to follow me. I hope though, that you’ll come with me because you’re my friends, my fellow dragonmancers, and a couple of warriors that I would personally follow into hell and back.”

Jazmyn looked at Ashrin. Ashrin looked at Jazmyn.

“Ah, fuck it,” Jazmyn said into the heavy, expectant silence that had enveloped our group. “We might be walking into the inferno, but that was a lovely fuckin’ sentiment you laid down there.” She punched me on the arm and winked.

“Yeah,” Ashrin said, grinning and running a hand through short black hair. “We can’t just let you go down into