Premonitions

Miu barely had time to register the smirk that passed across both Takara’s and Tamber’s faces before Takara just seemed to drop into empty space. For a moment, Miu thought that her eyes had been tricked, but Takara had actually stopped flying forward, and had fallen back among the others that were flying a ways behind them, nearly slamming into the timid green dragon Midori in the process. Finally, as he continued to fall behind them, Miu returned to her station close to him to try and drive him to the ground. She flew slightly above him so that she could force him down… that was the one and only way to get a dragon out of the sky against its will. But something was not quite right… Takara actually smirked at her, and then, to everyone’s surprise, he went into a blood chilling dive right toward the ground. Miu, as if afraid that he would somehow pull her down with him, immediately jerked back, nearly jarring her rider out of his seat.

As Takara plunged to the earth below, Tamber flattened herself along his neck, getting ready for the jerk that stopping the definite impact with the hard ground would require. As if on cue, Takara suddenly burst through a cover of trees that he had wanted to fly into in order to use it as cover for their landing. Once he broke through the canopy, he jerked his enormous mass back into a horizontal position, parallel to the ground, and began the tedious work of weaving between trees without snapping one of his own wings. It was something he had become very accustomed to over the years, but it never got easy, and it was never any easier on his own nerves than the first time he had done the exercise that had saved their lives on a number of occasions. Finally, he touched solid ground once again in a clearing about two miles north from where they had initially entered the forest. Tamber instinctively turned to check if they had been followed, and found that the only thing that surrounded them was the quiet green of the forest.

Tamber let out a sigh of relief and turned to Takara and said, “I think we should stay hidden for a while.”

Back in the air, Miu soared back to her comrades, careful, not to collide with anyone of them. The great red male glided over to her side, and said, “Hey Miu, you okay?” Miu nodded and turned her head to the ground, scanning the canopy of trees, hoping to catch a glimpse of the bronze dragon. The others did so as well, but it soon became obvious that they weren’t going to find Takara or Tamber. Finally, after an hour of gliding over the forest about six times, they landed at a crystal clean pond that was fed by streams that had run down from the mountains farther north.

Midori immediately started to shake when his rider slid from the saddle attached to his back. Miu noticed and asked “Hey Midori, what’s the matter with you?”

The voice he used to answer was as shaky as the body it belonged to. “I can smell that dragon and the girl close by, but I can smell something else too. I don’t really know quite what it is… but I get this weird feeling that we shouldn’t stay here, but also that we should…” The red dragon, Akane, blew out a snort of impatience with Midori. Miu sent him a warning glance before turning to Midori as her rider removed the saddle and bags from her back.

Miu actually felt sympathy for Midori. He was the tallest dragon of they’re small patrol group, but he was the most nervous of them all. He often claimed that he had bad premonitions about people, places, and even things. The most annoying thing about this situation for Akane was that he was often right.

Akane was the large red dragon that was ridden by the man who was in charge of the entire dragon compound back at the castle. Because of that he was seen as the alpha dragon among those of the compound. He was a very straightforward type of dragon. This was precisely why he could not seem to get along with Midori. Midori, when giving his predictions of doom, often spoke in riddles that even he himself didn’t understand. Just like a moment ago, Miu thought to herself while watching Midori’s rider try to take the saddle from his dragon’s back, which proved perilous considering Midori was still shaking enough to rock the very castle that they all lived at.

She looked down at her own rider, Jay. His bright red head bobbed a bit as he made sure nothing in the packs had somehow been left behind. When he was done with his inspection he looked up to Miu with a smile. She smiled back and went to join Akane at the pond for a drink of water. As she bent to drink in the cool substance Akane lifted his head only slightly so that he could talk to her without the others noticing. “What do you make of Midori’s announcement?” Miu was not surprised by the question. Although Akane didn’t like Midori’s predictions, he had seen enough of them come true to take caution when Midori sensed danger.

Miu lifted her head in the same fashion Akane had and replied, “He said that we should stay. He also said that the girl and that dragon are nearby. If what he smelled was the shadow beast we’ve been after then we could get two birds with one stone… correct?” she concluded shifting her eyes to witness his reaction. He stared ahead and gave her a simple nod in reply before returning to his normal height and stalking over to where the other dragons lay in a circle. Miu soon joined them to complete the circle. The riders sat a little apart from them, and so didn’t notice when all of the dragons perked up at the smell of the dragon they had all been chasing after earlier.

It was only when they all turned their heads to the line of trees at the southern end of the clearing did the riders take notice of some rustling in the bushes. As they gazed, Tamber burst through the foliage at a run, but fell onto the ground a good ten feet in front of the dragon riders.

She acted as if she hadn’t even noticed them as she gazed at a fairly large slash on her left arm. She made a face at her arm, but not one of pain as would be expected. It was more one of disgust simply because the slash was there. She then turned her head to the forest as Takara emerged from the same direction she had. Takara looked at her for a moment but his gaze was immediately drawn to the circle of dragons that was quickly rising to its feet. Only then did Tamber acknowledge the fact that any of them was even alive.

She followed Takara’s gaze to the dragons as she stood on her legs once more, but allowed her gaze to drift the riders standing in front of her. Her midnight blue eyes took in their faces and then turned to the dragons. She scanned their faces as well before turning her attention to the pond they had found themselves at.

As Miu watched, Jay’s father, Sarge as he was known by everyone, cautiously turned his sight to the pond as well. When Miu looked toward the water, she could see nothing, but when she looked back, the bronze dragon too was staring at the water. The girl’s eyes lit up with something that looked a whole lot like either excitement or anticipation. Which one Miu wasn’t sure of. But from just looking at those strange eyes, Miu could have sworn that the girl knew something about the lake, or even the forest beyond it, that none of the others seemed to understand. She seemed for all the world like she was looking at something only she could see.

The bronze dragon attracted Miu’s attention next. He shifted, looking down at the girl, before returning his gaze to the circle of dragons. His eyed immediately locked onto Miu’s. In her brain, Miu reasoned that she should make some aggressive gesture with her face, but her muscles wouldn’t obey her. So, her face remained blank. She also realized that she had an odd impulse to smile at him. This feeling she shoved down. Why would she want to smile at someone who was probably an enemy?

Before she could risk giving into the impulse, she moved her attention to Sarge, who had moved forward to confront the girl whose gaze had finally fallen back on the humans. She had a defiant look in her eyes once again. Her eyes seemed to scream defiance. However, she kept her face as impassive as a statue. Miu could already tell that an argument was soon to ensue. Just looking at the defiance and rebellion that was clear in the girl’s eyes told her that she was stubborn, and wouldn’t give into authority so easily. Well, Sarge could be stubborn too… which was probably why she expected this argument to last quite awhile.

HA! i updated! whether that means anything anymore remains to be seen... i kinda gave up on reviewers recently due to a lack of response whenever i either a.) write a new story or b.) update a story... yeah this happened on FanFiction, so i'm a little disheartened right now...WHY WON'T PEOPLE REVIEW MY STORIES FOR CRYING OUT LOUD?