Free End Times in Dragon City by Matt Forbeck Page A

chain that Belle had been manipulating with her wand shot into the cell between two of the bars. It then snaked back out and came in again, wrapping itself around each of the bars with the confidence of a master weaver. Then it lanced back out toward the rest of its length and tied itself into a neat knot 
    “Keep back!” Schaef said as the chain drew taut. It strained there for a moment, the heavy links groaning with the effort of maintaining their hold on each other. Then the chain went slack. 
    I cursed as I moved to peek out through the window, wondering if the chain had pulled free from whatever mooring it had on the carpet or if the effort had just proved too much for Schaef’s trusty ride. I saw that Schaef had backed the carpet up almost to the windowsill. If the bars hadn’t been blazing hot, I might have been able to reach through them and grab the fringe flapping off the rug’s back end.
    “Hold on!” Schaef said. 
    The carpet shot forward then, the chain bouncing back up behind it and drawing to a line as straight as a bullet’s path. I started to shout out a warning, to tell them to stop, fearing the chain would catch and their momentum would hurl every one of them off the carpet and into the open air below them. 
    The crash of the entire window tearing out from its moorings drowned out my words. Broken bits of stone and mortar flew everywhere, and the cool night air rushed in, unimpeded by the massive chunk of the wall that was no longer there. 
    I raced to the opening and watched as the carpet continued on, the glowing-hot window still attached to it by Belle’s enchanted chain. It had already started to angle toward the ground, gravity asserting its influence over it. I feared that the sudden shift in weight might haul the carpet out of the sky like a great anchor of iron and stone, but the chain undid itself and slipped free from the ruined window, then snaked back up to rest next to Belle once more. 
    Schaef took the carpet around in a wide circle, losing his extra speed as he angled back toward me. I shouted out a whoop of triumph that got cut short when Spark dove in through the window and landed on my chest, knocking me flat. 
    I fell sprawling back onto the rubble-covered floor, laughing and wrapping my arms around the dragonet for a massive hug. He rubbed the sides of his snout all over my cheeks, his tail wagging like a dog’s. 
    Yes! Yes, yes, yes! Freedom!
    “Yes,” I said, letting go of him and hauling myself back to my feet. “Freedom.” 
    As I looked out past the oncoming carpet, I saw that night had fallen over the city in full. The stars sparkled down at us from the cold and distant sky as the moon rose in the east. Glowglobes and torches blazed all along the Great Circle, catching pillars of sooty black smoke rising from the far side of the wall. 
    “I’m free,” I said, “for now.” 
     
     

C HAPTER T WELVE
     
    I leaped onto the back of the carpet as Schaef brought it back to abut against the hole where the window in my cell had just been. I landed next to Belle, and we wrapped each other in the kind of embrace you can only give a lover you think has been lost to you forever. The others cheered my departure from the Garrett, slapping me on the back and giving me wild grins. 
    Spark dragged his tail along my back as he zipped past us. I looked up to see him circling overhead in a burst of exuberant glee. A moment later, he landed on my shoulder and draped himself into a comfortable position across my neck. Belle gave him the room to settle in and then reached over and tried a tentative pat on his head. Too overjoyed to contest it, he tolerated it for my sake. 
    I heard another cheer go up behind and below me, and I looked back to see prisoners waving at me out of other windows set into the wall below my cell. Some of them called out for us to help them, but we were already zipping out into the night air, putting the legendary prison far behind us,