Dreamcatcher | ONC 2020 Honourable Mention | ✔

Chapter Eleven

A single lamp flickered beside the door of the captain's cabin. The lock clicked under Indra's fingers, and the light guttered as he straightened up. "Two minutes."

Rav ducked past him into the cabin. The cage stood on a desk piled with the rest of the samples from the island. Here in the debris of papers, maps, and writing supplies, their tidiness sickened him. Too easily examined. Too easily sold.

He had a handful of dead crickets, but the dragonette did not respond as he held one close to her nose. "Please," he whispered. "You have to eat."

This was twice now she had refused food. Rav slotted a tin lid through the bars, tipped it flat and filled it with water. He rubbed the dragonette's head with one finger. She didn't stir. Indra leaned in the doorway, stone-faced.

"Could you leave just for a minute?" pleaded Rav. "I promise I won't let her out. She's scared. She won't eat if she's scared."

"Oh, so you know it's a 'she' do you?"

Rav twisted so the man would not see his face. So far, nobody but Indra had questioned if he had any connection to the tiny dragon. But the first mate was dangerous enough. Rav dropped the bugs he had brought by the dragonette's nose as Indra cleared his throat. He trudged past the tall man with a weight the size of a ballast tank on his shoulders.

"The captain ordered that you never go in there alone," said Indra to his back. "What makes you think I'd let you disobey a direct order?"

His punishing words were punctuated by the click of a lock.

"Move, cabin boy. I have real work to do."

Rav would have run all the way down to the hallway, out of the ship and across the island given half a chance. He forced himself to walk to his cabin. The balsa door shut out Indra and the hallway and the world. Rav slid down against it and buried his face in crossed arms. The creak in the hull passed beneath him. It followed the hallway, reached the captain's cabin, and paused. There was a long silence, then it returned again. Back down the hallway. Back through the ballast tanks.

Rav jumped at a knock on the door. He wanted to ignore it, but if it was the captain...

It was Manish. Tired shadows haunted his eyes, but he still managed a smile as he handed Rav a warm bowl. They'd had nothing but rice and dal for two days now. Manish glanced over his shoulder, then pulled a small paper bag from his pocket and slipped it into Rav's hand. With another smile, he was gone. Rav shut the door again. He had no appetite, so he set the bowl on a crate and opened the bag. Inside it were a few precious kernels of dried chicken and a note.

Try this.

Rav pocketed the bag. He would try anything. It dawned on him that if Skydragons ate birds as scientists thought they had, chicken might be closer to their natural diet than bugs. Mothers would have brought birds home for their young, their nests too far from land to carry anything heavier. He wondered if Manish had known that.

And why was he helping?

Manish had two ageing parents and a young daughter that they looked after during the long weeks he spent in the sky. If he left Dreamcatcher, there would be nobody left to support them. Rav wondered if he would leave if he was able to.

Come work for me.

He slid to the ground again. The captain had not come down off his giddy cloud since the dragonette had been captured, but it was only a matter of time before the question resurfaced.

No, it wasn't even a question. It was a demand.

Could he turn it down? Would he? He didn't want to live on an airship. He didn't want the captain's money. He didn't want a partner, much less a family. He didn't even want a house. He wanted to live in a vast conservatory, with plants and flowers and every shade of butterfly. With bugs that crawled away each time you turned a stone, and fish in ponds, and floating plants that sang with insects. With birds and trees. And dragons.