Free The First Dragoneer by M. R. Mathias

wasn’t another troll attack. It was only Lemmy trying to
get Master Kember’s attention. Lemmy was nine or ten years older
than Jenka, and he was a mute. All of the women in Crag seemed to
marvel over his wheat-golden hair and his easy manner. Though he
seemed like a dunce a lot of the time, Jenka knew that he was as
smart and able as they come.
    “Lem, go find Solman and Rikky, and point
them our way,” Master Kember ordered. “I’ll throw some green on
them coals over there and make a smoker to mark the way. Then you
take a steed and you ride back to Crag and figure a way to explain
to Lady De Swasso that her young dragon is alive and well enough
for wear. Let her know that we’ll have him home by dark fall.”
    Jenka heard the words “young dragon” and
most of the previous night’s terror came flooding back into his
brain; the stag he had killed, the trolls, and Jade. How he knew
the dragon was called Jade he couldn’t quite work out, because the
conversation they’d had seemed more like a wishful fever-dream than
any sort of reality, but the memory of those magical, amber eyes
was vivid enough.
    After Lemmy grunted acknowledgment of his
orders and loped off to carry them out, Master Kember stood and
better took in the scene around him. Here was a troll torn
completely in two, both halves ripped open where savage claws had
gripped it. Down the gully was another troll that had no head, and
only one arm. Lying half-scorched in an exhausted fire was a troll
that had been ripped open from shoulder to groin, and right beside
that one another with one of Jenka’s expertly fletched arrows
buried deep in its back. Master Kember knew the Fletcher’s work
because he purchased the steel-tipped arrows himself down in Three
Forks every fall. He awarded them to his young hunters when they
achieved the goals he set for them. Jenka had earned quite a few of
the good shafts. The decimated remains of a sizable stag lay
shredded and strewn amid all the gore, and upon closer examination,
Master Kember found another of Jenka’s arrows. He walked around,
shooing the noisy crows, and studied the scene a bit longer. Then
he stopped altogether and cocked his head. He saw something
glinting emerald in the sun. The retired ranger paced across the
gulch, stooped and pulled the object from one of the troll’s clawed
hands. Looking closely at what he had found, he let out a long, low
whistle.
    “You, my young pupil, might be the luckiest
boy in the entire kingdom,” the old hunter started. “Killing that
troll by yourself is certainly a feat of notability, but surviving
the battle that took place after is simply amazing. Did you see it?
Did you see the dragon that finished them?”
    Jenka started to say yes, that he had even
talked to the creature, but common sense bade him do otherwise. He
didn’t want everyone to think he had lost his mind, and he
certainly didn’t want a bunch of the King’s Rangers up here trying
to hunt Jade down and kill him. “I’m not sure what happened after I
was hit in the head,” he replied flatly. “I thought I was done
for.”
    “You should be troll scat right this very
minute, boy,” Master Kember scolded. “What were you thinking,
following that old stag all the way up into these hills? You should
of ran back to Crag and found me or Lem.”
    “It was too late in the day,” Jenka groaned
as he slowly sat up and brushed the irritating bug out from under
his shirt front. “I didn’t want the tree-cats to have it. It just …
” He leaned to the side and went into another bout of coughing.
After he spit out a mouthful of mucus and blood, Master Kember
grimaced.
    “Lay it back down, Jenk. Be still.” The
older man moved in to hover over Jenka and began feeling roughly
along his sides. “Looks like you did crack your cage. Maybe a rib’s
poked a hole in your gizzard. You’re gonna be a long while healing
from this, but by the Gods, boy, after killing a troll
single-handedly, and