Dragon Witch ✔️

66 - Chase

"I'm not dropping her," Kyton insisted.

I squirmed in his arms. "I'll meet you at the cliffs. Don't worry. I'll be fine." With that, I focused all of my magic into becoming untouchable.

His grip automatically loosened when he couldn't feel me in his arms anymore. I could almost hear his thoughts whirring. Had he dropped me already by accident? Was I using magic to hide?

Yes, I was, but if he realized that, it was too late to grab me. I plummeted, but it was nothing like leaping from a second floor balcony onto a steep hill. When I hit the snow, I sunk up to my waist. Icy hands grabbed my arms and neck before I could scramble out of the hole I'd made.

I couldn't panic. I could get out of this. Untouchable and scentless, that was what I needed to be. Untouchable and scentless. Don't worry about sight or sound; they were blind and deaf. Just be untouchable and scentless.

The hands moved away. Crunching footsteps passed by my hole. I kept repeating my mantra: untouchable and sentless. My glamour reacted, keeping me hidden until the pack of v'kindra had passed completely.

Even in countless layers of clothing, the cold of absolute darkness made me shiver. I dug myself out of my snow hole. Now the v'kindra had passed, the silence was oppresive. My mind started playing tricks on me. As I started after Eva, my footsteps seemed to echo strangely, like they were happening twice. Or four times, I guessed, seeing as I had two feet.

You okay? Eva asked.

I'm fine. It was nice to hear her voice, but I had to concentrate on following her trail and listening for v'kindra. I'd dropped my glamour for now to concerve energy, but I needed to be ready to activate it again at a moment's notice.

The smells were distracting me, too. Even in the snow, I could smell a dozen strange things I'd never smelled before on Earth. I couldn't put a name to them, but a lot of them smelled dangerous. Twisting through the other scents was the smell of sickly-sweet dragon magic. It was definitely a fairy dragon's. If I was being honest, it really smelled like Clastor.

That probably meant I was either going insane from sensory deprivation, or my sense of smell didn't work right in the cold. The latter wouldn't surprise me. I was shivering too much to take a deep breath.

We land now, Eva said. Come fast, I miss you. Kyton say he worried.

Had it been twenty minutes already? I couldn't have been walking for that long. It was probably less time than that. They would've made better time without having to carry me.

I'm coming as fast as I can. Tell him that. "As fast as I can" was a slow trudge through several feet of snow with soaking wet boots and a numb face. It would be a while until I reached them.

***

When a chorus of groans reached my ears, I knew I was close. Eva was high above me, no doubt on a cliff with the others. I activated my untouchable and scentless glamour to avoid any roaming v'kindra.

Ask them how I'm supposed to get up there, I said.

Nissa comes. She say no move.

Okay, I won't move.

A few minutes later, Nissa shouted at me from above. "I'm going to dive and grab you. Stick your arms out. Don't move."

I stuck my arms out and dropped the untouchable glamour. The last thing I needed was her dropping me on top of a v'kindra. Bracing myself for an impact, I scunched my eyes closed. It didn't make any difference in the darkness, but it was a little comforting.