Today started out normally. It was brisk, with a northerly wind stirring the budding green leaves. I scurried down the dirt path, my light brown hair blowing in the breeze. I shiver as a browned leaf, left over from autumn, drifts down from the silver oak. It’s been one year, almost to the day, since my father died. After he vanished off the map with no trace. Since we moved from Corinth to Remembrance.
Issac knew something, though he wouldn’t tell me. Because I, Halter, at only twelve years of age, was not mature enough to know why we’d moved halfway across the continent.
But all that was unimportant. I slowed to a stop before the log cabin surrounded by oak trees. The place I’d lived for a month now. Where, in the backyard, my hatchling dragon waited.
I pulled open the oaken door. “Is anyone home?”
“Halter! You’ve got to be kidding me!” Issac’s voice drifted from upstairs. I dump my school backpack in the mudroom and race up the stairs.
He was holding my math textbook, and I mentally ducked whatever he’s about to say…Which comes fast and furious.
“Halter, I thought I told you that I could help you with your math. Look at this! You’re failing. Mr. DeBurr won’t let us stay if you mar his name by failing one of the classes that he teaches!”
I roll my eyes and glare at the math book. I didn’t understand any of the concepts, no matter how many times it was explained. I give Issac my biggest concern about the course. “Math is boring. I don’t understand how you can add five to negative three and get two, which happens to be smaller than five and bigger than two.”
Issac slowly chuckled, rubbing a hand through his brown hair. “I can help you with that. It’s something best explained on a number line.”
I step backwards. “Can it wait? I stayed long at school and finished science. I want to go play with Clawz, and read something.”
Chuckling caught me off guard. I spin, only to see my ten-year old sister toying with her dark brown braid, a journal in her hand and a pencil behind her ear. “Elizabeth!”
She smiles. “Clawz is waiting for you. Oh, did you not do something?”
I huff. “I got all my homework done. I’m going outside.” I clatter down the stairs and grab my other backpack, the one with the books from the local library in it. Soon I’m out the door, rounding the cabin to the backyard.
My reddish brown hatchling dragon yips as I approach, his undeveloped wings flapping as it bounds through the grass. I kneel and tickle him, the warmth soothing me. “Clawz, did you know that I finished seventh year science today?”
The dragon yips again and bounces over to where the leash waits. A light of longing glowed in his emerald eyes, and I glance at the backpack of books, then the treehouse perched on the enormous oak. I wanted to read there. It had a really great reading nook.
I take a step that direction, then pause as Clawz whimpers, pawing at the leash with his tail.
Fine. I could take him to the park. I shrug, clipping the leash to the leather harness. “We can go walking, I guess.”
I let Clawz lead the way. Like almost always when I walk him, he takes the shortest path to the park. Once there, I take control and lead him to a bench under a dogwood by the river. It was my second-favorite place to read.
The river gurgles as I sit down, tying the leash to the bench. Twelve Thousand Knights was begging for my attention.
I pull the leather bound volume from my backpack and take a second to sink into the pattern of noises around me. Then tuning it out, I open the book and read.
I’m so into the book I don’t immediately notice the tall blond haired man sit down beside me. When I do, Clawz is gone, the leash snapped neatly in two. Like it had been done with a knife of some sort, not the dull teeth of a very young- and small- hatchling.
I turn to the man, noting the dark gray jacket he was wearing. “Have you seen my dragon?”
A strange light comes into his blue eyes. “Can’t say I have, kid. I don’t concern myself with things like that.”
He had a weird tint to his voice, like he was trying to hide something but couldn’t. I jump to my feet. “Who are you?”
He shoves a cloth against my mouth. “Wouldn’t you like to know. Thank you for stepping right into the trap, Silverstream.”
I struggled for a few minutes before giving up, my vision turning black as I slumped against his arms.
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