Chapter Seventeen

Darkness surrounded Arabella again. She was drifting. She felt as if she were floating on water. It was warm and very comfortable. It dawned on her that she was dreaming again. This was the same type of dream invoked by the crystal ball.

“Hello,” she called into the darkness. She was hoping to hear Denrisi’s beloved voice. “Hello, are you there?” She held the smallest shred of hope that Denrisi had survived. Of course if he was dead, he could be a spirit. She remembered that years ago Denrisi had called her a ghost. If he believed in them, then maybe they were real. She wondered if dragons turned into ghosts after they died. Could a ghost of a dragon communicate through the crystal ball? Did ghosts dream?

“Hello,” piped in a little weasel voice. Disappointment and sadness flooded Arabella.

“Stig, what are you doing here?” she said.

“Don’t know. Where is here?” he said.

“Don’t know,” Arabella mimicked the weasel. She let out a long sigh. Perhaps she could talk to Stig this way because he was touching her while they slept. She could even feel him snoozing on her chest. She moved her hand and felt his fur between her fingers.

“Looks like I am dreaming again,” she said.

“Oh,” said Stig. “Your dreams are boring if they are always like this. Are they always like this?” He sounded a bit excited.

“No, sometimes they are full of fire and dragons,” she said. “You know, horrible stuff.” All except one dragon, but that one would never be in her dreams any more.

“Mine are full of wonderful colors, smells, and tastes. Two nights ago, I dreamed that I had found a nest full of eggs as big as my head. I cracked them open and licked out their insides. They tasted like liquid sunshine,” he smacked his lips in his sleep. “Last night I dreamed of a lovely ham someone had left out on their doorstep. There was no one around so I took it and sat on a small embankment. When I took a juicy bite, the fat just melted in my mouth.”

“Stig, do you ever dream of any but food?” she asked.

“Why should I? What was that?” The link between them broke suddenly.

Arabella woke up to see Stig standing on his hind legs listening intently. His little feet hurt where he was standing on her stomach. His eyes were narrowed in concentration as he gazed toward the top of the tent. His ear twitched and then there was a loud whooshing noise among the tree tops. To Arabella it sounded like the wind, but it had Stig worried. He did a little hop as he shifted his weight. He froze again in his listening pose. The whooshing noise was louder this tie. She pushed Stig off of her and wrapped up in her cape. She stepped outside to look around.

Everything appeared quiet when she put her head outside the tent. The fires had burned down to glowing embers. She took a couple of steps forward. Stig put a paw on her foot as if warning her not to go any further away from the tent. The whooshing came again. It did sound just like the wind, but it came and went quickly. Arabella and the weasel stood frozen staring at the treetops. What they were looking for, Arabella did not know. The camp was asleep. Nothing moved around the campfires. Even the soldiers on guard duty seemed to have nodded off.

There was a loud crackling and a booming noise. Suddenly the tent across the clearing was engulfed in flames. The fire was instantaneous. Flaming soldiers crawled out of the tent and ran screaming. Then fell to the ground and lay still, burned to death. Another crackling noise and boom; another tent was on fire. The entire southern side of the camp was an inferno.

“Arabella,” Koaner’s voice echoed from the sky. “Arabella.”

Koaner back winged over the clearing. Each wing beat caused a great whooshing among the trees. The tents directly underneath him flattened in the wind storm and men scrambled for cover.

“On maiden,” Koaner began in a sing-song voice. “You are more beautiful than the rose. Your loveliness has moved me deeply. You fill me like ashes in the wilderness. Your bewitching aroma fills my senses.”

The soldiers on the west side of camp launched a large metal dart with a ballista at him. The thing was as long as Arabella’s arm. He dodged the projectile. He blew a fireball across the camp setting the weapon on fire. The soldiers manning the weapon flamed and fell.

“Arabella,” he sang again.

“What is he doing?” Stig muttered.

Arabella just shook her head.

“Oh maiden,” Koaner began again winging back and forth in the clearing. “Turn to me, for your lover lies dead. Turn to me, for my love is like flames. Turn to me, there is no escaping my desire. Turn to me for I am your devoted master.”

He roared and sent a fireball smashing into a catapult on the north side of the camp. The soldiers there died a fiery death as well. Hands grabbed her shoulders from behind. She jumped with a scream and a hand clamped over her mouth. Her heart pumped with fear.

“Arabella,” Waldemarr whispered. “Come with me.”  

He dragged her into his tent. Stig went the other way and dove back into her tent. She wondered what the weasel was up to.

“You will have to try to sneak out of camp,” Waldemarr said. “Go hide in the forest. I will try to hold him off as long as I can.”

“Oh no,” she clung to Waldemarr. “The fire dragon is insane. He is after me.” Not another life in exchange for hers. She thought she could not bear it. Denrisi had sacrificed himself for her; now King Waldemarr was going to do the same thing.

“Do not worry girl,” he gently pushed her away. He looked her directly in the eyes. “The best thing for you to do is help Prince Lann save my Rosalina. It will be alright. Once you leave, the fire dragon will follow you and leave us in peace. So you had best get a head start on him. Go on.”

He shoved her towards the back of the tent. She pushed through the tent flap located there. She paused and noticed that the edge of the woods was not too far away.

“Stig,” she called softly. “Where are you?”

Her tent exploded in a great fireball. Was the dragon trying to seduce her or kill her? She pushed up against the side of Waldemarr’s tent as Koaner went soaring overhead. Once he was out of sight, she fled to the cover of the trees. He could not see her from the air. She hid herself behind a large cedar.

The soldiers had finally organized enough to send a volley of arrows at Koaner. He laughed as the wooden sticks bounced off his armored body. He flapped his wings once to gain altitude then dropped like a boulder onto the archers. Some lunged out of the way; others screamed as they were crushed under his great weight. Koaner bludgeoned a few survivors to death with his tail. 

He leapt back into the air. He did a quick back flip and sent a fireball into Waldemarr’s tent. The dragon fire spread quickly. Arabella could feel the heat from the fire where she hid. She opened her mouth to call Stig again and had to stifle a scream. Stig had suddenly appeared. Pop and he was sitting on her foot. He held their supply sack in his mouth.

“How?” she said but Stig shook his head. Arabella picked up the sack and weasel. Stig climbed up on her shoulder for a better view. Soldiers were running around with buckets of water wetting down the catapults. A handful of men ran to the hobbled horses and freed them. The horses created chaos as they ran terrified from the dragon. It made it harder for Koaner to pinpoint targets.

Waldemarr stood in the middle of the clearing. He looked every bit a warrior instead the tired old man from earlier. It seemed the battle with Koaner had rejuvenated him. He held a lance over his shoulder. His arm cocked back ready to hurl the weapon at the dragon at the first opportunity. His armor was slick and shiny. She watched as his knights dumped buckets of water over each other. They scattered through out the camp with swords and lances in hand.

Koaner swooped low, turned sideways and gave Waldemarr his opportunity. The king let his lance fly and it ripped through the dragon’s wing. Koaner howled in pain. He twisted back and aimed for Waldemarr. The king flattened against the ground right before the dragon would have rammed him. Koaner screamed in frustration. He banked and flew upwards exposing his belly to the soldiers.

“Ready, aim, fire,” she heard Waldemarr shout. A massive cracking noise occurred and a loud rumble followed close behind. A huge rock that took three men to carry smashed into Koaner’s guts. She heard the dragon roar. The cracking and rumbling noise sounded over and over. After each time, she heard Koaner roar in pain and rage.

“Catapults,” Stig said breathlessly. “They were sitting around the edges of the camp. Smart man ... Waldemarr ... not to clump them together in an easy target.” Stig jumped down to the ground. “Let’s go.”

“No wait,” she said. “I need to see who is going to win.”

“No you don’t,” he said. “Neither one is going to win. Once we are gone both sides will break off. Waldemarr will flee to protect his men and Koaner will come hunting for you. Get a move on.”

He ran off into the dark woods. Arabella had no choice but to follow. Arabella stayed low as she ran. Stig led them around even the smallest clearings in the woods. They must not be seen. If Koaner realized which way she went he would probably set the trees on fire. She knew she could hid from a dragon, but it would harder to hid from a forest fire.

They ran until they could not hear the battle any more. Stig found a large tree with a huge fern growing beneath it. Together they huddled under the fern trying to catch their breath. Arabella hoped that everyone was okay at the camp, but in her heart she knew that they were not. If anyone survived, they would be the luckiest men alive.

“How did you appear out of no where?” Arabella asked once she caught her breath.

“Weasel magic,” Stig winked at her.

“Oh, weasel magic,” she said. She knew he was not going to say anything more about it. She wondered if he even knew how this magic worked. “Can you do that whenever you want?”

“Sort of,” he said. “If I am not holding something too big, than yes. If I am touching something as big as a person, than no.”

“Thank you for getting the sack for us,” she ruffled the fur between his ears.

“I couldn’t leave our food behind,” he said matter-of-factly as he smoothed his ruffled fur.

“Do we sleep or keep going?” she asked.

“We should sleep until the moon is gone from the sky,” he yawned and stretched.

Arabella wrapped the cape tightly around her and napped beside Stig. Neither of them touched as they tried to fall asleep for fear of sharing their dreams. Arabella was afraid that maybe the dream talk earlier is what called Koaner to the camp. She remembered when he interrupted one time when she was taking to Denrisi for the first time. With this suspicion firmly in mind, Arabella took off the crystal ball and put it safely in her sack. She missed the weight of the necklace. She grabbed the sleepy weasel and held him to her. She fell asleep stroking his warm fur.