Page 29 of Thorulf
Chapter Eleven
JADE HAD NEVER seena cave quite like this one. Its rock had been smoothed away by rainfall over the years from a circular hole overhead. That same circle allowed moonlight to spill down just so, creating a halo effect on the water below. Not a lot of water. Maybe enough for a small group of people to wade in because it wasn’t all that deep.
At least not for her.
She’d just sat on the rock wall at its edge, whisked away her boots with magic, and dipped her toes in, willing away her various frustrations, when another memory unfolded.
Her tiny dragon poked her head up from the water and looked around expectantly. Or should she say little, not tiny now because, interestingly, she was slightly larger. Not much but some. How could that be, though? She should have been born by now, not still in medieval Scandinavia.
“And you’re still solid,” she whispered, smiling when her little dragon’s eyes grew wide, and she dipped beneath the water again. “You’re playing hide and go seek with someone, aren’t you?”
Moments later, a familiar little—rather than tiny—black dragon poked his head around the cave entrance. His gaze swept over the cave expectantly before he snuck in, creeping along the wall as though that might make a difference.
“You’re solid now, too,” Jade murmured, which meant Thorulf had been born at this point.
Though confused, she couldn’t frown if she wanted to. Not only were they too darn cute playing their game, but...she remembered it. The feeling of being beneath the water and waiting, so excited she couldn’t stand it.
Her best friend was here.
Finally.
She had been waiting for him to return. To come play.
“Yet you vanished,” Jade whispered. “And I stayed...”
How though? That made no sense. How did she remain here? How did she grow before she was ever born?
Obviously curious about what he’d sensed in here, little Thorulf crept toward the water, looking left and right the whole time, as though someone might come at him from the sides. Finally, he lowered to the ground and crawled, his wings tucked low until he reached the stone wall and froze. Meanwhile, Jade’s little dragon emerged from the water just enough that one curious eye was visible.
They stayed that way for a moment, clearly feeling one another out before they simultaneously leapt onto the ledge in confrontation. Both were wide-eyed as they took each other in. As they looked one another up and down with curious wonder.
“This was our first real meeting,” she whispered, enchanted by the way the little dragons circled each other. They tilted their heads this way and that, studying one another. “Our first real,livingmeeting.”
It wasn’t like adult dragons together. Not at all. She remembered breathing in the scent of his skin for the first time when he allowed her close enough. Remembered the thrill of finding her friend once more. Knowing he would always be there.
She bit back emotion when the little dragons finally stepped close and rubbed their necks together in pleasure. In pure, genuine happiness before a parental voice rang out down the tunnel, and little Thorulf’s head whipped back. He gave her dragon an apologetic look before he bounded off the ledge and fled down the tunnel away from her. In turn, her dragon whimpered in fear and distress at losing him, only to fade away when full-grown Thorulf strode into the cave with an axe drawn.