Flame trilogy; book one: Blue Flame

Chapter 18

~Blu's P.O.V~

I woke up in the morning and yawned softly, feeling rather comfortable laying on the ground, wrapped in the wings of the red dragon lying across from me. He was snoring softly, the occasional red flame flickering from his nostrils. It made me chuckle softly, and lay my head back on the ground. My body was feeling strangely refreshed, as though I had been washed thoroughly from head to toe, and there was this tingly feeling generated from certain points of my body.

Behind me there was a rustling of movement and a chattering of voices. Metallic boots clapped against bare ground. Voices rose over the commotion, commanding certain individuals to do this or that. Tents were being lowered and the injured were being deposited onto stretches. There was the noisy complaining and huffing of horses as they were saddled up in preparation for the long journey still ahead. The silent clapping of feet behind me was the one thing that caused me to take notice.

"Wake up!" a very familiar and female voice yelled in my ear.

I let out a grunt of surprise, flinching slightly before letting out a moan of annoyance. I turned away from the red dragon laying in front of me and looked up to see Tabitha standing over us with a cross between a frown and a grin. I blinked a couple of times, before snorting and rolling back over, closing my eyes.

"Oh no you don't!" she yelled, booting my neck with a rather hard kick of her boots, "It's time to get up Blu!"

"Aargh, is it really?"

"Yes, deal with it," she replied, crossing her arms in her 'I'm serious' sort of way.

I looked at her a bleak expression, before sighing and rolling away from Tyron, who was beginning to stir. I stood up, shaking out my wings and tail before turning to face over the crowd getting ready to move. It was slow going, and the grim and tired faces of the men didn't exactly generate the greatest amount of enthusiasm. It had been a hard night for most of them, and even I was still sleepy. A dragon needed his sleep.

"Tyron, you to," demanded my sister, before turning and walking away.

I frowned as she left. There was something up with her. Shrugging to myself I decided to ask later. I turned and nudged the red dragon with my snout, and like me he wasn't very excited about the prospect of getting up, but he hauled himself to his feet anyway. We looked to the rest of the camp as they finished packing up the tents and fixing up the horses. Before long we were on the road again, or party substantially less excited than it had been beforehand.

For hours we walked, only resting in the middle of the day as the sun reached its Zenith. It was tiring, and I found myself plodding along half asleep and yawning every so often. A silence had descended upon our group, only the odd whisper as people swapped positions or the asking of a question. To top it off Tabitha seemed to be avoiding me. She was at the back of the line, head down as if deep in thought, plodding along on the horse she was now using that was owned by one of the dead soldiers.

My mother was asleep on my back. She had escaped any major injury from the previous night, thankfully, and was now taking a much needed rest. She was definitely the oldest of us on this trip, and had been pushed far harder than anyone else. It made me wonder whether it would be good for her to live with us when we returned to the forest. She deserved a peaceful life, one without trouble or hardship, and that was something I doubt she would receive with us. The thought made me sigh.

That night we set up camp once again, sleeping heavily all of us, and set out the next day early in the morning. The routine was repeated for numerous days as we travelled through differing scenery, ranging from hills and plains to small forests and for our last stretch of the trip a snow capped mountain range with steep cliffs on either side.