I cough again and wipe muddy water from my eyes. "Actually, the river threw itself at me."
"See what can happen when your spells go wrong?"
I glance up. The dragon stands there soaked from head to toe. His golden hair hangs damp around his shoulders. Mud stains his clothes and his dark scales. He looks thoroughly offended by the entire experience.
"You realize," he snarls as he looks down himself, "that this is extraordinarily humiliating? That I have never even heard of a dragon looking like this? That I am the only dragon in history who has thrown himself into a mud river to assist a servant? Those spells of yours must be immensely powerful."
Despite the burning in my lungs and the mud still dripping from my nose, a laugh escapes me. For some reason that seems to annoy him even more.
11
- Vyrathion-
The rain shows no intention of stopping.
It hammers the island we’re on from every direction, turning the small patch of ground into a miserable collection of mud, roots and dripping vegetation. The river surges around us in a brown wall of water, carrying entire trees downstream. Every so often another section of riverbank collapses somewhere beyond the curtain of rain, followed by a distant crash.
I stand beneath the largest tree on the island and glare at the storm. “The insolence of this planet!”
“You said it.” Morgan sits nearby with her arms wrapped around her knees. She has finally stopped coughing, though she still looks pale and she breathes hard. Clyde the deformed Plood is curled up beside her, radiating what appears to be satisfaction.
I find that suspicious as well. "Explain yourself," I tell the creature.
Morgan lifts her head. "Who are you talking to?"
"The spy."
She follows my gaze toward Clyde. "Clyde isn't a spy. He just wants to help."
The Plood immediately looks guilty.
I point at him. "Observe that expression! He knows exactly what he's done."
Morgan wipes rainwater from her face and wrings her long hair. "He's a Plood. They always look the same."
I snort. "Precisely what one would expect from a spy."
She glances at me. “You think he’s spying for Praxigor?”
“Of course,” I scoff. “He admitted as much. They all spy for him. But it won’t help him one bit.”
“What did he say?” Morgan asks. “When he admitted it?”
“He said nothing. It was the way he looked. Perfectly guilty.”
She shakes her head. "I don't think that's evidence."
"A dragon needs no evidence. And that is what I would expect a witch to say."
She sighs in a clear sign of disrespect. "Vyrathion, if I were a witch with half the powers you seem to think I have, do you think I would sit here, in the middle of a flooded river, half-drowned and more miserable than I thought it was possible to get? On an island that I’m sure will soon be taken by the water, so I’ll drown for good?"
"I don’t know how witches think. And the power to confuse me and pretend to be my servant is much more impressive than calling up this weather and the flood.” I speak with confidence, but her words do make me think. It’s hard to imagine what she would profit from this. Well, perhaps she wanted to keep me from that village. Perhaps she knows that they do have gold, and she doesn’t want me to have it!
But then, why go to this trouble? Why not simply tell Praxigor about the gold, so he could take it? In his dragon form, that would be easy.
I did save her from the river. I’ve been around creatures in the fear of death before, and they were very similar to Morgan. Panicked and grabbing at anything. When I dived into the muddy mass, was that really some magical spell? Is that how that would feel? Annoyed and exasperated at the folly of certain females?
“Vyrathion,” Morgan says, pulling me out of my lofty considerations.
