Chapter 16

There was nothing that could be done now. Masonae had made a bad choice. He had trusted a small bit of magic and it had ended him days from home. The forest looked quiet enough, but he knew that the south woods tended to have more dragon infestations than the north. The Ring of Ancients was safe enough, if legends held true. No dragon would dare enter the circle of trees that formed around the small grassy clearing.
“Pylon, I am now sincerely glad you decided to tag along.” The cat lay calmly in the one real patch of sunlight that filtered through the trees. “Rumor is that you were quite a dragon killer back in the day.” Pylon stretched out even further, his long sinewy body rising and falling steadily with a contented breath.
“There’s no sleeping though. I’m not quite sure where, but we’ve got to go somewhere. I mean, even if we just find a road… and it leads us home.”
Pylon showed no signs of wanting to move. “I suppose we could have lunch first.” Masonae sat and dove into his pack, pulling out a small portion of bread and cheese. Who knew how long his supplies had to last now?
Always interested in food, Pylon abandoned his sunlight and sidled next to Masonae who handed him a small portion of cheese. He knew that Pylon was quite capable of catching his own food when necessary, which never stopped any member of the family from the bad habit of feeding their pet from the dinner table.
As Masonae finished his small meal, a loud thundering came crashing through the bushes. He scrambled to his feet and Pylon crouched, tail swishing. A horse in full gallop burst into the clearing. It paused for a moment, as if to size up the new threat, and before it spotted Pylon, Masonae managed to grab the reigns.
Though not an expert on horseflesh by any means, he knew this was a fine horse. The saddle told him that much. Masonae knew how to ride well enough not to embarrass himself in front of others, but this horse was spooked, and not by Pylon. A quick whiff of the singed hair and Masonae’s stomach dropped. The horse had either backed into a campfire, or had been caught in the very edge of a dragon’s fiery breath.
Talking sweetly to it, Masonae managed to calm the horse enough to accept his hands on her nose. The apple bribe helped as well.
“The question is,” Masonae said calmly. “What happened to your rider? Did he get eaten, or just fall off?”
The horse snorted and eyed Pylon warily. Experienced with skittish horses, the cat kept his distance and remained still except for a slight absent minded swish of his tail.
Masonae could hear his mother’s voice ringing in his head. Somewhere, sometime, you’re going to need someone’s help, and if somewhere, sometime, you don’t help someone, you don’t deserve someone to help you. She’d gone on to tell a story about his father when he was younger and pointed to a white ball on the mantle, but she’d either been specifically vague, or not vague enough, because the rest of the memory had blurred in his mind. The magic had taken it away from him, but it didn’t take away the sense of duty to fellow man that his mother was trying to instill in him.
“Hold steady, girl.”
Masonae put his foot in the stirrup and hoisted himself up in the saddle. He turned the horse back in the direction it came and nudged her forward. She danced a bit, but stayed in place.
“I know it’s the last place you want to go back to, but I promise I won’t fall off, like your last master. My mom would kill me if I got eaten today.”
A playful pounce by Pylon was the only motivation needed to get the horse started off. With the cat following behind, the horse quickly moved in the right direction. Masonae took out his bow and notched an arrow. He had no wish to be caught off guard by anything.
They traveled through the forest for about twenty minutes before something bright red and shiny caught his eye. He turned the horse towards it, and picked up the pace. As he got closer, he could pick out a face at the top of the red cassock. The young brother had a death grip on a sword which he held like a club, raised about his head in a menacing manner. At his feet, lay a crumpled form, that Masonae could just make out as a boy that was perhaps only a year or two older than himself.
“Since when do brothers carry swords?”
“I wasn’t carrying it. I just planned to kill a few dragons with it.”
“Where?”
“Right behind you.”
“No, that’s not a dragon, that’s a cat.”
“That’s a cat,” the brother pointed at Pylon. “But that’s a dragon.” Masonae turned just in time to see a green and brown spotted dragon slinking up behind him.
Just as Masonae raised his bow, the dragon took a sniff of the air, glanced from man to man to cat and darted off in the other direction.