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

The bars of the cage had been constructed from scrap iron and recycled steel rails—the hipsters back in L.A. would have loved it—but they had been melted like they’d been made of butter. Shackles lay on the ground, but they were open—sheared through by tooth or claw, I could not tell.

“Looks like the kobolds are not the only ones to worship dragons as gods,” Jazmyn said.

“What I don’t understand,” said Ashrin, “is why, if this was the wild dragon, it allowed them to cage it in the first place. I mean, trying to restrain a dragon without magic, with only poorly crafted metal… “

“Foolish,” Renji said.

“Beyond foolish,” Ashrin said. “It’s like trying to bind a tiger with a daisy-chain.”

“Excuse my b-b-boldness,” said Rupert, taking off his hat as he addressed Ashrin, “but may I offer a theory, Dragonmancer Ashrin?”

Ashrin’s eyes shone with amusement. The fact that I allowed my squad to chat to me, and with other dragonmancers on occasion, like they were equals was still viewed as a novelty.

“Go ahead,” Ashrin said.

Rupert rammed his terrible Robin Hood hat back onto his flyaway black hair.

“As Dragonmancer Jazmyn was astutely o-o-observed,” he said, “the ratfolk look to have adopted the kobold’s practice of worshipping dragons as gods incarnate. I b-b-believe that this wild dragon probably allowed itself to be led here and chained in exchange for regular meals and comfort. Dragons are, after all, highly intelligent and proud beings. It probably enjoyed the pampering.”

Ashrin raised her eyebrows as she considered this. “A fine theory,” she said. “And then what happened?”

Rupert chewed a thoughtful fingernail, then shrugged. “Perhaps they ran out of food. Perhaps the dragon simply got bored. Dragons can be capricious. No offense m-m-meant to any dragons listening in, of course.”

A ripple of mirth, which I identified as coming from Garth, went through my mind.

“I like the weird guy,” the Pearl Dragon said.

“I wonder,” I said, “whether the wild dragon saw all the ratfolk leaving in a mass exodus and thought that it was being abandoned.”

“Oftentimes,” Noctis said, speaking within my mind, “dragons are not logical creatures, but simple beings motivated by pride and vanity.”

“That sounds pretty familiar,” I said drily, thinking of all those people in L.A. who ran up credit; spending money that hadn’t yet earned to buy shit that they didn’t need so that they could impress people they didn’t even like.

“All right,” Jazmyn said, “as much as this place looks deserted, there are probably too many resources ripe for the plundering here for it to stay that way. It won’t be long before something comes creeping in here to start scavenging, so let’s search around and see if we can find these fuckin’ crystals. Then we can get the hell out of here, yeah?”

We spread out to search the enormous temple then, although I noticed that Jazmyn and Ashrin never strayed too far from me. Of course, my squad kept me within view the entire time.

Five dragonmancers and their coteries moved methodically through the temple building, overturning any furniture that had not been obliterated when the wild dragon had made its break for freedom. Cupboards were ripped open and rifled, chests found and upended.

We found nothing. Not even any jewels that might have passed for crystals.

We reconvened again in the center of the temple after thirty minutes of searching.

“Anything?” I asked the group, though the collection of dire faces was answer enough.

Everyone shook their heads.

“Damn it,” I said, striking the butt of my flaming Chaos Spear on the ground so that white and black sparks erupted. “Back to square—”

There was a fluttering sound from up in the rafters. In any other setting, I would have taken that sound with a pinch of salt—nine times out of ten it would have been a bird roosting up in the safe darkness. This though, was the tenth time out of ten—and the tenth time was in the Subterranean Realms where there were no birds. It might have been a bat, sure, but bats, despite narrative convention, were practically noiseless in their movements.

As one, all twenty-one of us turned to face the sound. Bows were raised, bowstrings pulled tight to ears. I hefted my spear, preparing to unleash it at whatever was up there lurking in the rafters.

A woman, wrapped in a dark gray shawl that covered her head as well as her body, sat on one of the thick rafters. She swung her legs backward and forward. As several arrow points turned in her direction, the mysterious woman raised her hands. She held them, palms out, toward us. From the little I could make out of her face, she looked to be human, although I had become extremely careful about judging books by their covers since coming to the Mystocean Empire.

“You,” she said, her hands still raised, “I recognize you.”

Her accent was thick, lilting. If she had been from Earth, I would have been tempted to say that there was an almost Scandinavian nuance to it.

“It's a bit hard to figure out who you’re referring to with your hands in the air,” I replied. “Feel free to point at whoever you’re talking to. With one hand only.”

Slowly, the woman lowered her hand so that she could point one accusatory digit at me.

“You,” she said again. “I recognize you.”

“I can’t say the same for you,” I said shortly, gazing upward. Even with my dragon-boosted eyesight, I could not penetrate the gloom under the hood of her shawl. “Where is it that you think you saw me?”

“You were the one I saw in Drakereach, on the outskirts,” the woman said, in her musical accent. “The Bloodletters were hunting for me. One of them stole something that belonged to me.”

Then I clicked.

“You’re the one who had the crystal?”