Draka

I barely got any sleep that night. I kept waking from nightmares, one after the other, of being trapped in that garbage compactor from Star Wars, or of melting and never being able to touch or feel anything again, seeping into the cracks in the stone and spreading out until I practically stopped existing. 127 Hours featured heavily, too. Finally, when it felt like dawn should be getting close, I gave up on sleep and left the cave. Every joint and muscle protested loudly and my neck ached like an absolute bastard, reminding me that I was very much not invincible. It was a good thing that I was so good at napping. I was going to need all the rest I could get.

My first destination was the nearby spring. Some mountain goats scattered when I approached, but I wanted to try for a bunny or two, just to take the edge off. I filled up on water, then flew north for a few minutes before turning towards the forest and the lake.

I landed far from the lake this time. I didn’t think that the mercs would try to ambush me, even if Herald had told them about our system, but I also wasn’t trusting my freedom and my life to hope and goodwill. That woman, Lalia, had been there again, after all.

I set down by the stream that led to Pine Hill and followed it towards the lake, trying to balance stealth with speed as well as my aches would allow, trusting my nose more than my eyes or ears. I didn’t see or hear anyone, but the mercs who had taken care of the bandit sentries had been almost invisible when they moved.

I couldn’t smell any people, though as I got close to the lake I started picking up the faint scent of horses, growing stronger the nearer I got. They had been here, a bunch of them, and not that long ago. I scaled a tree from which I could barely see the campground and the lone tree, and waited patiently. I didn’t see any people. I didn’t hear them, and I didn’t smell them. Even when the wind shifted there was no sign of humans.

Dropping from the tree, I approached. I had my wings half open, prepared to take off at the slightest surprise, but none came. The trees cast long shadows in the morning sun, and I kept to them the best I could before rushing across the open space to the lone tree.

There was a silver coin wedged into the bark, along with a pinned note. I popped the coin in my mouth after a cursory sniff, then looked at the note. Three vertical lines each connected a number of symbols. It meant nothing at all to me. I knew every language spoken by humans in this world but I didn’t know how to read. Bullshit.

With an annoyed shrug I folded the note and stuck it under one of the large scales covering my chest. If it fell, it fell. For now, it was rabbit season.

I went back up the stream towards Pine Hill. About half-way there was a meadow where I had seen some of the little furballs before, but I hadn’t even bothered trying to catch them back then. This time, when I got there, I climbed up a gum-like tree and waited. And waited. And waited. When no tasty bunnies showed themselves I settled in for some much needed naptime. The dragon would let me know if anything happened, and if I didn’t eat that day there was always the next. I could afford to be patient.

When the dragon woke me the sun had moved quite a bit. I’d guess two hours or so. “Food…” it whispered hungrily, and after some searching I saw two fat little bunnies, floppy ears and all, munching on something in the tall grass. Their brown fur stood out against the green but they were still hard to spot, and if I hadn’t been high up I would have never stood a chance.

Unfortunately, they were nowhere near the tree, and since the ground under the tree’s canopy was covered in nothing but dead leaves and acorns they were unlikely to come any closer. I couldn’t drop on them and I couldn’t spit, either. I considered trying to sneak up on them, but that wouldn’t work, so instead I went for broke. I wasn’t too bothered about success, which was a relief. If it didn’t work I’d just try again.

My genius plan was to launch myself through the air and strike from above. This, surprisingly, did not work. As I approached soundlessly, the rabbits, which had probably spent millions of years evolving to avoid being eaten by flying things with claws, spotted me and took off through the trees. I crashed down where they had been, with only some swaying grass to tell me where they’d gone.

But hell, why not try something? Rabbits lived in holes in the ground, right? That’s where I’d run off to if I was a delicious bunny trying to hide from a scary flying thing.

I sniffed the ground where the bunnies had sat. There was a distinct smell there, for sure, a little musty and grassy and, to be completely honest, it smelled a little like pee, too. I sniffed the way they’d gone and, sure enough, the smell was there. Faint, but there.

With my nose to the ground I made my way into the grass. Between the faint scent and a scattering of crushed plants I made my way to a hole dug steeply into the dirt, and the scent of bunny was strong. Bingo! I tried to stick my head in, which worked for all of a second before I saw a flash of furry lump rush up, turn around, and Whamp!

I saw stars. I jerked my head out, my remaining horn pulling painfully as it caught on dirt and grass roots, and tried to blink the pain away. The damn thing had kicked me, right in the nose, and Jesus Hopscotching Christ did it kick hard!

To hell with subtlety! I got my claws out and started digging! It was slow going, and I had to tear roots and shovel dirt until my arms and chest ached, but I got steadily deeper. Finally I breached some kind of chamber, and the moment I’d made a sizable hole a furious fuzzy little warrior launched itself at me. I don’t know if it was trying to fight or flee, but I saw it coming and snatched it out of the air with my jaws. Pretty proud of myself for that one!

The little thing screamed piteously, and before I had time to feel bad about it I bit down even harder until I felt something crunch. Then I tried to shake my head like a dog for good measure, which didn’t work at all with my long neck. The poor thing was limp and silent, though. I’d broken its spine.

I didn’t even need to think about how to eat the poor little creature. With very little input from me the dragon simply had us tear off its legs and swallow them whole, one by one, skin and all. Then we just took the whole body and choked it down. Apparently we could swallow anything that made it past our jaws, which was extremely disturbing, both to consider and to feel. As it slid down I kept thinking that I should be choking, but somehow I was fine.

I wasn’t eager to repeat the experience, though. One bunny would do, for now and for the foreseeable future. My snack took the edge off pretty well. I should be good for another day, I hoped, and then I could have a proper three-day-coma meal.

I quickly checked on Pine Hill, but it was peaceful. There were some horses I didn’t recognize outside Lahnie’s house. They had Grey Wolves colours on their saddles so I didn’t worry, but I didn’t stick around, either. I had to prepare.

I assumed that Herald would be meeting me that night. At least I hoped that she would. There had been a lot of people around when that silver coin was left at the tree, and there was no way that Herald would be alone, if she was the one to show up at all. Neither my own nor the dragon’s pride would let us hide from this challenge, but I wasn’t going to just walk into a potential trap.

Tools at my disposal: Good eyesight. Great sense of smell. I would be very likely to know that they were coming, and if there were a few or lots of them.

Claws for climbing trees, and wings for mobility. Very important.

Stealth, both natural and from my advancement, which allowed me to move quietly and remain almost invisible as long as I was still in a dark place. I’d be leaning heavily on this.

Skin like a suit of mediaeval armour. Hopefully that wouldn’t come into play. Same for my claws, teeth, and venom. These were an absolute last, last, last resort.

Finally… the shadows. I didn’t understand it, but I had gotten some kind of affinity for shadows as a major advancement, as the adventurers had called it, and these were supposed to be major, life changing things. I’d already turned into dragon vapour to move through a crevice I couldn’t fit through, but I wasn’t entirely sure how. Thus, I needed to use the rest of my time to try and figure this out.

This needed shadows. It was some time after noon and the sun was high, so shadows were short but in good supply. I was in a forest, after all. I picked a tall, leafy tree with a wide, dense crown and sat down under it. Now what?

In the cave I’d focused on where I wanted to go. I’d kind of imagined what it would be like to be there. But when I tried that now nothing happened. I focused on a spot a few metres away, really tried to picture in my mind what I would see and feel when I was there, and for a moment it felt almost like my body was trying to go. Or I was imagining it, because nothing happened. I tried again, longer and more focused, and I felt that melty feeling, but again, nothing. What was I missing?

I kept trying for at least an hour. I must have been doing something right, because I felt something every time. But over and over again I got right to where I got that tingly, melting sensation, and then it just drew back. It was horrible!

The dragon must have had enough. “Not deep enough,” it grumbled in my ear. “The shadow must be deeper!”

Great, direct and useful info! One problem, though: This was as deep and dark a shadow as I was going to find before nightfall without going underground.

“Deepen it!” the dragon commanded dismissively. “We are shadow. Impose our will upon it!”

“Fuckin’... How?” I asked the wind, but there was no response from the dragon. In a way I was relieved. I had yet to have a dialogue with it, and I wasn’t sure that I was ready to have a conversation with what was, in a sense, myself.

Deepen the shadow. Right. Just… make it darker. It’s not even a thing, it’s a patch where the sunlight doesn’t hit the ground directly, but sure. I’ll make it do things. Come on, shadow! Be darker!

To my complete lack of surprise, snark did not work.

I considered simply having a sook, but that wouldn't help. And the dragon hadn’t steered me wrong yet. It had made some unhelpful and completely amoral suggestions that I had ignored, but it had never lied to me. It had told me that I could move through the darkness, and I had. If it told me that I couldn’t move through this shadow because it wasn’t dark enough, but that I could fix that, then I believed it. The idea was insane, but I believed it. I just needed to figure out how.

Will sounded like the key. The dragon wanted me to impose my will on the shadow. In the crevice I had wanted to move. I had imagined what everything would be like if I moved, and I had willed myself to do so. Visualisation. Willpower. Imagine what reality should be like, and make it so. Right.

I looked at the canopy of the tree, its trunk, and the wide patch of shade under it. I looked at the edge of its shadow. There was no sharp line there. Instead the shade got progressively lighter as fewer and fewer leaves blocked the light, until only direct sunlight remained. No, not lighter. Shallower, or thinner. That felt right. The shadow was a thing, that’s how I needed to think of it. The light was a lack of shadow, not the other way around. And just like the light could get brighter with more sun, the dark could get darker with more shadow.

I focused on that edge again, the gradual border between light and dark. I imagined it becoming sharper, really visualising a sharp edge between shadow and light as though an opaque disc had been put in front of the sun. I saw it, and I wanted it. I demanded it. I focused, forgetting about smells and sounds and all sight outside of the little patch of shadow that should, that would become darker.

I felt something happening inside me. Weak at first, like a kind of heat that warmed a part of me that had never felt warm before, and then it became stronger, hotter, as it swirled throughout my body, gathering in my chest. Gathering, I knew, in my heart. I wanted to look down but even that want was a threat to my focus, and I pushed it aside. Then, all at once, it left me in a pulse of swirling darkness that condensed into tendrils of shadow limned with the glow of magic. It reminded me of the substance of the Heart of the gremlin nest. The tendrils quested outward, and the tree’s shadow responded to them, becoming deeper and darker. The magical glow didn't actually cast any light. It wasn't a glow, as such, but something else, like it was painted onto reality. The edge of the shadow became a sharp line of darkness against light, and then it pulsed and pushed, and the border between sun and shadow was pushed outwards by just a few centimetres. In the near pitch black around me my eyes adjusted quickly, but it wasn’t enough. Then my other sight kicked in, and everything within the shade of the tree became grey on black, the world simply ending at the border. Nothing in or past the light was visible.

I willed myself forward, imagined myself right at that border, and I melted, evaporated, turned to black dust on the wind, and then I drifted right up to the border. I tried to push against it but I might as well have tried to walk through a lead wall, and when I became solid I fell back on my tail.

I just sat on the ground for a while. Despite all my aches I couldn't stop grinning. I’d done it. I had told physics to take a hike. I had made the shadow deeper, and I had moved through that shadow at will. I was tired, sure, but I had done it!

I had done magic. I had done goddamn Magic! Intentionally! Magic was real, and I could do it! I was a witch! No, wait, I was a Shadow Dragon Sorceress!

“Wooo!” I howled, and birds scattered in panic as I exulted in my own magnificence. “I am the shadow! I am the night! Batman, eat your heart out!”