Free The Onyx Dragon by Marc Secchia Page A

young Dragon.”
    Thereafter, the conversation returned to Marshal Re’akka’s unique ability to draw magical power from other Dragons, the mysteries of the First Egg and even the magical Rift storms. Silver sketched their passage across the Rift as a weeks-long struggle against the sky-spanning, multihued storms that plagued the Rift; how chain lightning had raced across the skies and attacked the shielded Island with clear intelligence and design, of vast draconic cloud-creatures that swam and sported amidst the eternal tempests, and hundred-league vortexes capable of swallowing entire Islands with ease. Pip was pleased to learn the Marshal had almost died striving to forge that crossing. Any sign of vulnerability had to shore up her anaemic stores of hope.
    They chatted on as they passed through a layer of cool, wispy cloud and rose slowly into the luminous suns-shine above, which reflected off the underlying layer of pristine white cumulus with blinding intensity. Between the patches of cloud, Pip from her Dragon’s-eye perch could look over the rugged mountain tessellations of Jeradia laid out like a stark warning to the unwary traveller, great bands of basalt and granite interspersed with unexpected hints of rose quartz and even glints of bronze and copper deposits. To the North, a second layer of cloud lay perhaps a league and a half beneath their altitude, the impassable, apparently impermeable Cloudlands. One could almost imagine walking out over that deathly tan carpet; no need to remind any Human or Dragon of the dangers essayed every time one chose to travel beyond an Island’s shores.
    An hour’s flying caught them up to the Dragonwing, for the others had not chosen to wait for the tardy couple–or, Pip suspected, Silver had dawdled just a touch in order to spend time in private with her.
    Shimmerith greeted them with, “School’s in session, class. Gather around.”
    “School in the air?” Maylin groaned. “Pip, you put her up to this, didn’t you?”
    “No, I did,” said Master Kassik, in his Dragon form a hulking Brown who looked capable of boring through mountains if the mood took him. “We’ll not waste a single hour aloft. Shimmerith will teach magical offensive and defensive techniques, Emblazon and Oyda are in charge of battle tactics, I will lecture you on Dragon lore until it oozes out of your respective ears and ear canals, and Master Balthion will cover the arts and cultures of the Crescent Isles.”
    “What about me?” asked Nak, managing to sound affronted.
    With great dignity, Kassik said, “You, noble Dragon Rider, are in charge of entertainment.”

Chapter 5: Ambush
     
    O N ITS NoRTH-EASTERN tip, Jeradia Island carved away into the Cloudlands with a final, defiantly jutting headland that seemed to indicate the way to the Spine. Sultry black granite and obsidian cliffs three miles tall dwarfed the Dragonwing as, following an hour’s rest on the ground, the Dragons hurled themselves bodily into the void. Pip and Maylin whooped for joy as their Dragons raced neck-and-neck in a mile-and-a-half vertical plunge before swerving away into a horizontal sprint that whipped a warm breeze through Pip’s unruly curls, and turned Maylin’s long, glossy hair into a raven’s wing behind her head. Not far behind, they heard Arosia’s unrestrained laughter bubbling away as Chymasion pulled out of his dive, followed by a duet of wild yells from Kaiatha and Durithion. A characteristic bugle trumpeted from Tazzaral’s throat, resounding off the cliffs. A quarter-mile overhead, Kassik, Emblazon and Shimmerith forged stolidly into a brisk headwind, leaving the shenanigans and foolery to the juvenile Dragons.
    “This is how to cut class,” Maylin yelled across to Pip.
    “Don’t tell Emblazon. His idea of teaching fledglings aerial combat prowess is to shoot fireballs at their rumps.”
    Silver put in, “Some people do rather beg for it.”
    “Thanks for the support, boyfriend.” Silver