The heat coming from the dragon’s mouth felt like opening an oven door.
Kiran clamped his eyes shut and threw his arms over his head.
Every muscle in his body locked tight, waiting for the teeth to crush his ribs.
He waited for the bite.
He waited for the darkness.
It didn’t come.
Instead, a heavy blast of hot air washed over him, blowing his burnt clothes flat against his chest.
The air smelled of old iron, sulfur, and something sour, like rotting meat stuck between teeth.
Kiran slowly peeked through the gap between his elbows.
The dragon hadn’t snapped its jaws shut.
Its massive head was lowered, hovering only six feet away from him.
Its snout wrinkled, drawing in a long, rattling breath that pulled small stones across the black ground.
It was sniffing him.
The monster’s glowing bronze eyes narrowed.
The vertical black pupils thinned into two sharp slits.
It tilted its head to the side, looking at Kiran less like a snack and more like a strange bug it had never seen before.
A blue box popped up right in Kiran’s vision.
[JYOTI]
Translation active.
Translation?
Translation for what?
Kiran thought, his pulse hammering in his ears.
Then the mountain spoke.
“You smell of cheap grease,” a voice rumbled.
It didn’t sound like a man talking.
It was a deep, grating scrape, like two heavy millstones grinding against each other inside a deep cave.
The sound vibrated right through the soles of Kiran’s shoes, making his teeth rattle in his gums.
Kiran froze.
His jaw dropped.
“What…”
The dragon pulled its head back an inch, sneering.
Two long streams of grey smoke puffed from its nostrils, drifting into the cold mountain air.
“And you are tiny,” the dragon rasped, its voice full of disgust.
“Where are the iron chains?
Where are the tracking spears?
Did the King’s dogs leave a hairless runt out here to freeze as a marker?”
Kiran pressed his back harder against the stone wall, wishing he could sink right into the rock.
“I…
I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The dragon’s eyes flared with sudden, violent heat.
It leaned forward again, its heavy lower jaw nearly brushing the ground.
Kiran could see every detail now: the thick, slate-grey scales along its jaw were cracked and chipped.
The right horn on its head wasn’t pointed like the left one—it was snapped in half, the broken stump jagged and black with dried, crusty blood.
“Do not lie to me, ape,” the dragon growled, showing two rows of teeth as long and thick as fence posts.
“A human does not walk the High Black Ridge alone.
Humans live in cages, or they run in packs behind dragon lords, carrying bags of feed.
Which army sent you?”
“Nobody sent me!” Kiran shouted.
His voice cracked, sounding embarrassingly small against the wide, silent sky.
“I don’t belong to any army!
I don’t even know what this place is!
I was in a shed five minutes ago putting out a fire!”
The dragon stared at him in dead silence.
One second passed.
Then two.
[JYOTI]
Target is evaluating your intelligence.
Probability that target considers you an idiot: 94%.
Shut up, Kiran thought back furiously.
Just shut up!
“A shed,” the dragon repeated.
The word sounded foreign and clumsy on its heavy tongue.
“You babble like a madman.”
The giant beast shifted its weight to take another step, but the moment it put pressure on its left front leg, its shoulder gave out with a sickening crunch.
The dragon let out a harsh, choking roar of pain that echoed across the jagged peaks.
It stumbled sideways, its massive bulk slamming hard against the rocky ground.
The impact shook the cliff so violently that loose gravel rained down from the rock face above, pelting Kiran’s shoulders.
Kiran threw his arms over his head again.
When the dust settled, the dragon was lying on its belly, panting heavily.
Thick, dark blood—so hot that it sizzled and smoked against the freezing rock—was leaking from a deep, ragged tear right where its left wing joined its shoulder.
The wound was ugly, torn wide open as if another pair of massive claws had tried to rip the wing completely off its body.
The dragon tried to push itself up with its good leg, but its claws slipped on the bloody stone.
It collapsed again with a low, pained groan, its bronze eyes dimming slightly.
Kiran stared at the puddle of steaming blood.
He should have run.
Every single survival instinct he had screamed at him to turn around and scramble down the rocks as fast as his legs could carry him.
The monster was down.
This was his only chance.
He took half a step to the right.
The dragon didn’t move its body, but its golden eye rolled toward him.
There was no fury in the eye now.
There was only pure, burning hatred, mixed with the cold exhaustion of an animal that knew it was at the end of its rope.
“Run, then,” the dragon breathed, blood bubbling faintly at the corner of its mouth.
“Run down the ridge.
The cold will take your toes before dawn.
And if the cold misses you, the King’s scouts will tear you in half just to see what you swallowed.”
Kiran stopped.
His sneakers scraped against the loose gravel.
He looked out past the edge of the cliff.
Below them was nothing but an ocean of black, razor-sharp rocks and frozen mist stretching out under the purple sky.
The two moons hung cold and dead overhead.
There were no lights.
No roads.
No smoke from chimneys.
Just empty, freezing waste for miles in every direction.
He looked down at his own clothes.
His jacket was burned to shreds.
His thin cotton shirt offered zero protection against the wind, which was getting colder by the minute.
His fingers were already turning numb and stiff.
If he ran, he had nowhere to go.
Jyoti, Kiran said in his head.
Can this thing still kill me?
The blue letters blinked into existence.
[JYOTI]
Analysis:
Target has severe muscle tearing, three cracked ribs, and significant blood loss.
However, target’s tail weighs approximately 1,200 kilograms.
If target swings tail, Host will be converted into paste.
Very comforting.
Can you fix the wound?
[JYOTI]
Host does not have healing abilities.
Host does not have medicine.
Host currently has half a scorched shirt and a pocket wrench.
I’m asking if it’s going to die right here!
[JYOTI]
Target’s life force is declining slowly.
Death estimated in fourteen hours without medical intervention or energy recovery.
Kiran swallowed hard.
He looked back at the dragon.
The beast had rested its heavy snout flat on the stone, its breathing shallow and rough.
Its grey scales looked dull, like ash from a fire that had gone out hours ago.
“Hey,” Kiran called out softly.
The dragon’s ear slits twitched, but it didn’t lift its head.
“Save your breath, rat.
If you are going to throw rocks at me, do it quickly.
I do not have the patience to watch you gather courage.”
“I don’t have any rocks,” Kiran said, taking a slow, cautious step forward.
His heart was hammering against his ribs, but he kept his hands visible.
“And I’m not a scout.
I swear to you, I don’t know who this King is.”
The dragon gave a dry, wheezing snort that kicked up a tiny cloud of grey dust.
“Then you are a fool who wandered into the grave of an empire.
That makes you even more useless.”
Before Kiran could reply, a sound cut through the wind.
It wasn’t a growl.
It was a sharp, piercing wail—like a brass horn being blown from miles away, carrying across the jagged canyons.
The dragon’s entire body stiffened.
Its head shot up from the stone, ignoring the pain.
The bronze eyes snapped wide, staring out toward the northern peaks.
Another horn blew, closer this time, followed by a faint, rolling boom that sounded like thunder shaking the clouds.
“They tracked the blood,” the dragon muttered, its voice suddenly tight with genuine panic.
It tried to heave itself up again, digging its front claws deep into the stone shelf, but its injured wing dragged uselessly behind it.
The beast let out a choked hiss between clenched teeth, shuddering violently before collapsing back onto its side.
“Get up!” Kiran said, panic spiking in his chest.
“If they’re your enemies, they’re going to kill both of us!”
“I cannot fly!” the dragon snapped, baring its bloody teeth.
“My tendon is shredded!
Leave, you stupid ape!
Die in the rocks!
Leave me to die with teeth in my jaw!”
“Shut up and look!” Kiran pointed toward the rock face behind them.
About thirty yards along the cliff, where the black basalt met the rising face of the mountain, there was a deep, jagged split in the rock.
It looked like an old fracture where the stone had cracked open centuries ago.
The opening was narrow at the bottom, but about fifteen feet up, the rock leaned out like a heavy roof, creating a deep, shadowed hollow beneath the overhang.
It wasn’t a proper cave, but it was deep enough to hide under, and the dark stone would block any view from above.
“Can you crawl?” Kiran demanded, jogging a few steps toward the split.
“Under that rock shelf!
If you stay out here in the open, anything flying over will see your scales against the light of those moons!”
The dragon looked from Kiran to the dark crevice, then back to Kiran.
A flicker of sheer shock crossed its massive, reptilian face.
“You are telling a dragon to crawl into the dirt?”
“I’m telling you to hide so we don’t get turned into meat!” Kiran shouted, the cold wind whipping his hair into his eyes.
“Move your legs, you stubborn lizard!”
Another horn blew across the valley.
It was much louder now.
A dark shape briefly crossed the pale face of the larger moon high in the clouds, moving fast.
The dragon didn’t waste any more words.
With a low, furious snarl, it dug its single good claw into the stone and dragged its massive body forward across the ground.
The scrape of its iron scales against the rock sounded like a shovel digging into frozen gravel.
Kiran ran alongside it, his hands shaking, constantly glancing up at the sky.
The beast pulled itself inch by agonizing inch toward the crack in the mountain.
Blood marked a dark, smoking trail behind it, but the freezing wind was already crusting the surface into black ice.
With one final, violent heave, the dragon shoved its head and shoulders deep under the rock shelf.
It tucked its good wing tight against its ribs and used its long tail to sweep a spray of loose dirt and black pebbles over the last few feet of its bloody trail.
Kiran dove in right behind it, squeezing into the tight, shadowy space between the dragon’s scaly flank and the freezing stone wall.
The hollow was barely large enough for the dragon’s bulk.
Kiran was pressed directly against the beast’s side.
The scales were shockingly hot, radiating heat like an iron stove on a winter morning.
Even through the smell of blood and sulfur, the warmth was the only thing keeping Kiran’s bare arms from shaking uncontrollably.
“Do not make a sound,” the dragon hissed, its voice dropped to a bare vibration against Kiran’s ribs.
“If you breathe too loud, I will bite your head off myself.”
“I’m not breathing,” Kiran whispered through chattering teeth.
Above them, the wind suddenly stopped.
The silence that followed was terrifying.
Then came the heavy, rhythmic thrum of giant wings cutting through the upper air.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
Kiran pressed his face into his knees, holding his breath until his chest burned.
Through the narrow crack in the rocks, he saw two massive shadows glide across the moonlit stone outside.
They circled the plateau once, twice, their wingbeats stirring up small tornados of dust.
A high, harsh screech tore through the night—a sound like metal scraping on glass—before the shadows tilted their wings and swept away toward the lower valleys.
The heavy wingbeats slowly faded into the distance.
Inside the dark crevice, neither of them moved for a long time.
Kiran finally let out a shaky, trembling breath, his forehead resting against the warm, rough scales of the dragon’s flank.
“They’re gone,” Kiran whispered.
The dragon didn’t answer right away.
It lay completely still, its chest rising and falling in slow, labored rhythms.
“They were third-rank hunters from the Iron Peak,” the dragon finally murmured, its voice dull and flat with exhaustion.
“They will search the lower valley first, then circle back when they find no body.”
“Then we have to get out of here before morning,” Kiran said, shifting his position.
“There is no ‘we’, human,” the dragon growled softly, though there was no real bite left in the words.
It slowly turned its head around in the cramped space, looking down at Kiran with one exhausted, glowing bronze eye.
“Why did you not run?” the dragon asked.
“You could have slipped down the ravine while I died.
A human owes nothing to my kind.
We have put your people in chains for three thousand years.”
Kiran leaned his head back against the cold stone, rubbing his numb hands together.
“Where I come from,” Kiran said quietly, his voice catching in his throat as he thought of his father’s kitchen and his mother’s laundry, “you don’t leave someone behind when the house is burning down.
Even if they’re rude.”
The dragon stared at him in the darkness, silent for a long moment.
“You are a very strange ape,” the dragon muttered, closing its eye.
“My name is Vaelgor.
And if you touch my broken horn while I sleep, I will eat your shoes.”
A soft chime sounded in Kiran’s head.
[JYOTI]
Quest Updated: Survive the Night.
Relationship Established: Vaelgor (Exiled Drake, Red-Iron Bloodline).
Affection Level: Slightly above ‘Annoying Insect’.
Progress: 1%
Kiran pulled his knees up to his chest, leaning closer to the heat of the dragon’s scales as the freezing wind howled outside the cave.
He was alive.
For tonight, that was enough.