Chapter One
Leaves rustle in the breeze. That breeze catches on my wings and lifts me higher into the air. The setting sun leaves streaks of red and pink in the darkening sky, and it looks like a tropical bird’s plumage. I try t0 keep from panicking. I should have found the ruins by now.
As I fly over the forest, I hear a tapping that echoes for a few moments. It sounds like a rock bouncing off stone walls.
Stone walls.
My ears are sharp. Whatever I heard, it could be at the forest floor, far below me. A bird flies up from the trees. Perfect. The something that fell must have spooked the bird. Turning, I head toward the spot where I saw the bird emerge from the branches. I fold my wings and dive into the sea of green, twigs poking and scratching my scales. My talons find a branch strong enough to hold my weight. It dips dangerously toward the ground anyway.
At least, what would have been the ground. Not one treelength from where I have perched the forest floor drops into a ravine. In that ravine is a huge block of stone. It has holes carved into the sides, revealing a spacious inside. Vines have made their way up the stone, creeping into the holes.
This is the ruin I am supposed to find. This is the ruin that was built long ago by the Advanced that once inhabited almost every corner of the land. This is the ruin that could save the dragons, myself included.
Excitement makes my tail tremble. Maybe we won’t go extinct after all.
I fiddle with the necklace that hangs over my breast, talons clinking against the precious stone. It is attached to a black cord that is slightly wider than my neck. The stone itself is about the size of one of my claws. The color is a bright blue-green, it shines in even the dim light under the trees. Just like my eyes.
The necklace was given to me by Falcon, the dragon who found me in the ravine outside of Thunder Ridge. Thunder Ridge has the largest population of Air dragons, sitting on the side of a mountain, part of a long mountain range next to a desert. Specifically the Mountain dragons reside there.
A twig snaps, drawing me back to the forest. Something is moving through the trees. The only sound I hear that tells me there is something out of the ordinary is the soft rustle of a scaled tail dragging through the leaf mold. There is another dragon in the area.
Which contradicts what Falcon told me before I left. I remember his words perfectly:
“You must fly across the Eastern Ocean to the forest beside the Great Sea. There you will find ruins that hold the secrets to reversing the damage the Advanced caused. You will find the ruins to be abandoned; no dragon has set talon in there since just after the last of the Advanced were killed. The fate of dragonkind is at stake. But I believe you can do this.”
His eyes at that moment had glazed over, head had slumped down to the floor. I had thought he was dead. Only the gentle rise and fall of his chest told me otherwise. From what the medics said, he had fainted. The old dragon was already laying down, so it was not obvious.
The relief I felt at that moment was overwhelming. Falcon was the dragon that raised me, despite my odd appearance.
The dragon I heard stops moving. All is silent.
I prick my ears, straining them for any sound that could clue me in to whatever they are doing.
Another twig snaps, farther away this time. A second dragon. I sit still on my branch, worried about what might happen if the other two are alerted to my presence. I know that there are a select few that would like to see the rest of dragonkind demolished. Because of our opposite motives, that makes them my enemies.
The first dragon starts moving, quickly, in my direction. Out of panic, I once again fold my wings and dive this time into the ravine with the ruins. I slightly open one of my wings, causing me to barrel roll to the bottom, where a river winds its way around the crumbling building. Ducking my head, I land in a clump of bushes.
No doubt the first dragon knows I’m here.
I will have to deal with that later. From what I heard, the first dragon is trying to escape the second. The second dragon now is moving under the trees, through the foliage, toward the ravine. I stick my muzzle out from under the bushes until I can see what is happening at the top of the ravine. There the first dragon stands. A Water dragon. Shallow Ocean, from the look of her brightly colored scales. She seems to be about my age, maybe a few years older.
She must have sensed the movement of me sticking my muzzle out, for she jerks her head in my direction. Her eyes narrow. I have been officially spotted. All I can do now is hope that this Water dragon does not wish harm on me. That she is on my side.
The dragon drags her gaze from me and twists her long neck to the second dragon, now crashing through the undergrowth. An Earth dragon would easily move through the vegetation like it was water, and an Air dragon would leap from branch to branch or fly above the trees entirely. This must be a Fire dragon.
The Water dragon lashes her tail and looks again from me to the approaching Fire dragon. Finally making up her mind, it seems, she leaps down into the ravine, gliding on strong, fin-like wings. She lands beside the clump of bushes where I am mostly hidden, and, looking over her shoulder at the spot where the Fire dragon would emerge any moment, shoves her way through the leaves.
