TCF: Dragons are Great!

Not-So-Fateful Encounters(2)

"This thing is a bit too flashy; don't you think?" Cale spoke casually, calling out the indestructible shield with a small gesture of his hand. The frown on his face grew as the wings on the shield fluttered, as if to argue with him. "When you told me you'd give me the ability to protect myself I have to admit I wasn't expecting an ancient power."

A small smile bloomed at that, one minute there and the next gone. If Rok wasn't a dragon, he would have missed the small sign that Cale was pleased, or the way he looked suddenly nostalgic.

"Are they supposed to speak to you, though?" the eight-year-old questioned, letting the shield drop.

Rok had held up his portion of the deal first, knowing it would be easier to handle the wary regressor if he showed he wasn't lying. The man turned boy was slow to trust, and seemed to have some major authority issues. After calming down from his sudden memory gain and making the deal with Rok, he'd been touchy at best when it came time to speak on what would happen in the future. Especially when it had become obvious that even if his memories were coming back, they were vague, spotty, and thus at the moment; unreliable.

So Rok didn't push, he had nothing to gain for causing more emotional distress trying to pressure Cale into doing what he wanted. Instead, he had focused on helping Cale gain the power to protect himself in the easiest way he could, by simply leading the boy to the slums of his own city.

To the ancient power known as the indestructible shield.

For the last few weeks Cale had been steadily feeding different baked goods Rok had purchased—with Cale's money, of course — from all over the city and neighboring towns to the now vanished hole under the notorious man eating tree. It would have been much simpler to simply buy out the shops one day at a time, but they were in no rush and Rok wanted to keep as low a profile as possible. Rok would buy the bread, take it to Cale, and then teleport them at night just outside of the fenced area that surrounded the tree. After that, the young dragon remained invisible while Cale fed the hole to prove himself worthy and complete the test.

It was the least bothersome way to go about doing it, especially since they couldn't just walk around without a care. Rok could only imagine what the locals would think, seeing the eight year old son of the leader of the territory wandering around with bags of bread. He'd be at risk of not only being discovered before the power was gained, but also more vulnerable to danger. The Henituse family may have destroyed any chance of an underground society taking root in their territory, but that didn't mean there weren't people with bad intentions or low moral values living there. Even if Rok could handle anyone brave—or stupid—enough to try and attack the boy didn't mean he could be here at all times.

He still had to return to Eruhaben at least once a week, guardian's orders.

"The power spoke to you?" Rok broke himself from his distracting thoughts, deciding it was better to forget the irritated reaction his guardian had when he'd announced he would continue venturing throughout the northeast alone. As much as it itched at Rok's skin to be gone from his shared lair with the older dragon this often, he had things he needed to do to ensure his future as the laziest, slacker dragon this world would ever see.

"It wouldn't shut up." Cale complained, "it was like whoever had that power had never really died, she kept ranting about some weird god? Or a cult, maybe? feeding her 'nasty things'. I stopped listening when she began talking about the qualities of different grains."

Strange, but not unexpected. The novel had mentioned a voice calling out to Taylor Stan when he'd received his ancient power, perhaps it was normal to receive some form of final impression of the power's original owner?