Born of Fire: The Dawn of Legend (83 page)

DiNiya, having heard the same sound, also recognized it and began to tremble in place. Without taking her eyes off the edge, she backed away slowly, nervously, a feeling of dread taking hold of her. Then, from beyond the edge, he appeared, silhouetted against the now crimson sun with four enormous wings, a grand mane, decadent golden armor, and burning with a flame of the same brilliant hue. “DayKar,” she breathed. The enormous DraGon landed with a heavy thud on the platform in front of her, sending a rumbling tremor beneath her feet. “You’re…you’re alive!”

His lips curled back into a grin, revealing rows of fearsome teeth. “Surprise.”

“But we saw you die!” DayKar just laughed boisterously. Feeling almost offended, she asked, “What the hell is so funny, you monster?”

The DraGon’s laughter subsided as he lowered his huge head down to her level and whispered like he was sharing a dark secret. “You and the others are not the only fallen who have managed to rise from the ashes, AmaRanthine.” Pulling his head back slightly, he fixed her with a piercing stare, as if seeing through some clever deception.

“AmaRanthine?”

“The name given to those who have returned from that place forbidden to all living flames: oblivion.”

“Why have I been brought here?”

DayKar reared back, rising up on his hind legs and crossing his arms. This close, DiNiya could see that any injury he sustained was now covered by thick armor. All except the deep wound on his face that now served as a reminder of his battle with Rex.

“You, my dear,” he said at last, breaking the silence, “are here because you are the key to all that was, is, and will be.”

DiNiya looked at him as fear and confusion welled up inside her. “This doesn’t make any sense…none of this makes any sense!” She dropped to her knees, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the sides of her head. “I was a fool to think this nightmare was over!”

“You are many things, DiNiya, but a fool is not one of them. Then again, you always were hardest on yourself.”

DiNiya looked up at him with bewildered eyes. His voice had been one she had heard a thousand times since she was a small child, and one that had always brought her comfort. But now to see it coming from such an unfathomable beast, this DraGon was beyond surreal.

“Fear not, though, for the age of confusion and backwards thinking is at an end. Soon you will be made to see the truth of things, as your people once were and will be made to again. You just need to have a little faith.”

The night came and went, giving way to morning before eventually the midday sun loomed high overhead, partially concealed by sepia-colored clouds that floated lazily by. Rex and the others spent half the night traversing the great plains before succumbing to exhaustion. Luckily, EeNox had spotted a burrow, which they all crowded in together and slept the rest of the night and most of the morning. Rex had found it odd at first that such a thing would have even been there and felt that they were bizarrely lucky to have found shelter of any kind in a land so wide open. EeNox quickly explained, however, that predators made them frequently to hide in to ambush herds that came through grazing or migrating.

Regardless, they had slept much longer than they had intended, and now had to make up for lost time by tearing across the countryside at double the pace, something they knew they would probably pay the price for later on when it came time to stop for the night.

“How much farther?” Rex asked EeNox, who currently led the way.

“I’m not sure,” he called back. “We would have probably reached the next village by midafternoon had we gotten moving at dawn, but now, well, I really can’t say for sure.”

“Great.”

“Let me remind you that you were the one who insisted we keep going even after dark,” LyCora said.

Rex, being in no mood for complaining, called back, “Guess I was just trying to stall on having to hear you snore like a BorMax all night.”

LyCora looked stunned. “I do
not
snore like a BorMax!” she fired back hotly.

“No kidding,” EeNox laughed. “I’ve never heard anything make sounds like that!”

“Shut up, EeNox! I’m surprised you even noticed, with how you were clinging to my leg the whole night!”

EeNox blushed and turned his attention back to what lay in front of him.

“Well, I slept soundly,” ShinGaru said cheerfully.

“Ohh, me too,” AnaSaya added happily. “Thank you once again for letting me rest my head on your shoulder. I hope it wasn’t too uncomfortable for you.”

“Not at all.”

“There, you see?” said Rex condescendingly. “If you two weren’t so at odds with each other even in your damn sleep, then you wouldn’t have been gurgling like someone was holding your head underwater, or dry humping someone’s leg all night.”

ShinGaru and AnaSaya laughed, while EeNox and LyCora lowered their gaze, and saw to it that they did not make eye contact with one another for some time.

Rex, who had spent the night sleeping in a cross-legged position with his arms folded in front of him, had surprisingly not seen EliCia or the dark titan. Rather, he dreamt of his father, and the days when he would take him to the museum where he would be allowed to roam its extensive archive of fossils. Those were happy moments buried in bad times. Rex looked back on them now fondly, happy to be able to remember them once again. Lamenting the loss of his father still proved difficult, however, and he wondered if he truly ever would be able to move past it. Regardless, now was not the time for him to dwell on what he could not undo. His father was gone, killed by the very same thing that took the first person he would have ever called “friend.”

They continued on silently for a time, the natural beauty and vastness of their surroundings lulling them into an almost transitory state. Several times they spotted herds grazing off in the distance. Sentries would at first glance up in their direction, but quickly realizing they were not a predator, would go back to eating and looking elsewhere for danger. It was not until they came upon a herd of what Rex recognized to be this world’s equivalent of eotriceratops that they ran into their first bit of trouble on their journey. They had paid the herd little attention, half expecting them to ignore them like the others. However, the wind blew against their backs, and almost immediately they heard a bellowing call coming from the herd. Startled by the sound, they all looked over and saw one of the sentries with his head raised in the air, sounding off.

“What’s got him so worked up?” Rex asked as he watched the large herbivore stomp his feet agitatedly.

“Not sure,” replied EeNox joining him at his side. “KarVora generally aren’t spooked so easily.”

“Is it us?” AnaSaya asked worriedly.

“Doubtful. I mean…it shouldn’t be. None of the other herds seemed to mind us.”

“Well, something’s got him rattled,” said Rex.

Just then, the KarVora stopped calling out and stepped aside as an even larger bull took his spot and stared in their direction. Even at a distance they could see the intensity in his eyes, as if he were daring them to take even one step closer.

“I think we better give them a little extra room,” EeNox said, stepping back.

“Damn it,” Rex groaned unhappily. “We’ve already lost so much time by oversleeping! This is just going to set us back further!”

“Well, it’s that or we go introduce ourselves.”

“Do you really think it’s that serious?” Rex asked, still eyeing the big bull.

EeNox nodded. “Oh, yeah. That first one who made all the noise was the sentry. If he spoke up, that means there is something close that he deems a possible threat to the herd.”

“I assume you mean a predator of some kind,” ShinGaru interjected.

“That’s right, then the alpha bull comes to check it out to see if it really is something worth getting all worked up about. Right now, he’s not sure what to make of us. That’s why he hasn’t charged. He’s still assessing the situation, but if we do anything to tip the scale in the other direction, he’ll burn his way over here in a heartbeat and trample us into the ground or gore us to death.”

“Then by all means, let’s give them that breathing room already,” LyCora insisted.

“Agreed,” said ShinGaru.

They began to turn, when there was another gust of wind that pushed against them. It was at that moment that they all sensed a very familiar sensation. It was that of someone igniting their flame. The rush of energy shot through them, and before they could even turn around, they felt the thundering footfalls of something large charging. Stealing a quick glance, they saw the big bull burning green with rage in his eyes, barreling straight down on them.

“Run!” EeNox shouted.

The five of them took off in the opposite direction. Faster and faster they ran, not one of them wanting to look back, but one by one succumbing to the urge. To their horror, the KarVora was a mere twenty meters away and gaining fast. With their muscles and flames pushed to their max, they ran headlong for the horizon in hopes that their pursuer would give up once he felt he had driven them far enough away from his herd.

Taking another breathless look behind him, Rex was relieved to see that the bull had slowed down to a trot and was turning back. “Hey! I think he’s giving up! We can sto—”

The ground in front of them erupted in another burst of green flame as a huge female AcaroVora sprang from a burrow like the one they had slept in the night before.

“Shit!” EeNox shrieked as they all skidded to a stop.

LyCora raised her hands and brought all the tiny plants at the Ridgeback’s feet whipping up to cut her face. The fearsome carnivore roared angrily and charged forward.

Scrambling and stumbling, they quickly turned around and ran back the way they had come. “It all makes sense now,” EeNox exclaimed as he ran up next to Rex.

“What does?”

“Why the bull charged! We were downwind, remember? But it wasn’t us he was smelling, it was her!”

The Ridgeback suddenly lunged forward with her jaws at AnaSaya, who saw her at the last second and sped up, narrowly avoiding the dagger-like teeth, which gnashed just behind her. They continued up one of the many rolling hills that covered the plains, which combined with the fatigue from running so long slowed them down dangerously.

“Hey, I don’t know if anyone has thought of this,” LyCora cried out. “But if we keep running in this direction, we’ll run right back into—”

As if on cue, they heard the bellow of the bull, which appeared seconds later at the top of the hill. “Oh no,” EeNox exclaimed.

Rex had no idea how it happened, but suddenly his flame was all around him, burning with furious intensity. He could feel a great rush surging through him, then it was almost if he was weightless, hovering just above the ground. Feeling his body rise up out of itself, there was a brief moment of physical disconnect before suddenly he felt soil beneath his feet, his
bare
feet. Looking down, he saw a pair of three-clawed toes, and immediately remembered. Looking up, he was startled to see the others enveloped in their own flames as well, as they, too, shifted, taking on the forms of various DyVorians, with the notable exception of ShinGaru, who was once more the strange serpentine creature that to Rex seemed to almost resemble a DraGon from Earth’s Eastern mythology. Rex was also surprised to see the bull standing no more than three meters away, staring down at them with a look of wide-eyed bewilderment. Turning quickly, Rex received a second shock when he saw the Ridgeback doing the same.

“Looks like I did it again,” Rex said. He rose to his full height of five meters, and cracked his neck loudly before looking back and forth at the two giants. There was an awkward silence from both of them while they tried to discern what to do next. This was also the first time Rex had seen the others in their other forms in broad daylight.

The Ridgeback had been biding her time for the past two hours, lying in wait for the herd of KarVora to move close enough for her to strike at one of its sick or elderly members, but instead she had another meal come charging in, causing her to abandon her original plans for lunch and give chase to these strange, wayward children. However, this unwillingly brought her face to face with the herd’s alpha, someone she had been hoping to avoid. There was also the matter of just having seen the most unbelievable thing she had ever witnessed in her entire life.

The bull was finding himself in an equally perplexing situation. He had picked up the Ridgeback’s scent not long after spotting the five SaVarians. Assuming she had been stalking them, he decided to try to chase them off so as to not lead her straight to the herd. He, however, did not expect to see them running right back to him with her hot on their heels. There was now the issue of them having just turned into DyVorians, two of which were unfamiliar to him.

“Uhh…Rex,” EeNox half whispered. “Is it um…still you?”

“Who the hell else would it be?” Rex replied.

“Well, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you turned into a TyRanx…again.”

“Speak for yourself…all of you.”

“His voice sounds more like a DyVorian now,” AnaSaya said enthusiastically. “You know, deeper!”

“He is a DyVorian in case you haven’t noticed,” LyCora said. “We all are.” ShinGaru cleared his throat. “Oh…sorry, ShinGaru. What I meant is that it’s foolish to point out the obvious.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, waving one of his small forearms dismissively.

AnaSaya looked down somberly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”

“Hey. Don’t be mean, LyCora!” EeNox said angrily. “This whole thing is new to her, that’s all!”

“It’s new to all of us, you fool,” she countered.

“Don’t call me a fool!”

“Then don’t act like one, and I won’t have to!”

“Fighting is not going to solve anything!” ShinGaru tried to interject as the voice of reason. More often than not, he would find himself in this type of situation, trying to mediate the warring factions within the group dynamic. Sadly, though, he seemed to fail most of, if not all of, the time.
When people get it in their heads to fight, there’s rarely anything someone else can say to talk them out of it
. His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by Rex’s rough voice.

“Says who? People usually need a little incentive if you want them to back off.”

“All I was saying is that there’s probably a more effective way of resolving issues instead of always screaming at each other,” he replied, irritated.

“Don’t give me that high and mighty talk! If LyCora wasn’t always stirring things up, then he wouldn’t have to fight with her!”

“Yeah!” EeNox exclaimed with a vigorous nod.

“Nice, Rex,” LyCora said sarcastically. “That’s just like boys to always stick together, even when they’re being ridiculous!”

“I’m sorry, but who’s being ridiculous?”

The bull suddenly cleared his throat.

“You, of course!”

“Excuse me?” said the Ridgeback.

“What are you talking about? All you’ve done since day one is piss and moan about absolutely everything!”

“Can I say something here?” the bull asked, but he was utterly ignored.

“Trust me, she’s always been this way,” said EeNox. “Always complaining, never happy, and constantly judging everyone like she’s got life all figured out!”

“If I may,” interjected the Ridgeback, but she received the same indifference.

“I am so sick of following you two morons around from one bad situation to another,” LyCora yelled furiously.

“No one made you come!” EeNox fired back.

“HEY!!” the bull cried.

“WHAT?” the three bickering teens yelled back in a knee-jerk response before suddenly remembering where they were.

“Would one of you please tell me what’s going on here?” the bull asked, cocking his head to the side. “Who are you, exactly?”

“And you two,” the Ridgeback said, motioning to Rex and ShinGaru with her snout. “What are you two supposed to be?”

“And how did you manage to go from one to the other?” the bull asked.

“Oh…yeah…that,” Rex said awkwardly. “Well…I’m still sort of trying to figure all that out myself.”

The Ridgeback lowered her head and nipped at his tail, taking some of his feathers with her.

“Hey!”

“Well, you certainly taste real,” she said with what sounded like surprise.

“Of course I’m real! Do I look like a figment of your imagination?”

“He does,” she replied, looking over at ShinGaru.

“I believe what she is implying is that you are not the sort of thing that, well…just happens, so naturally we must question our own mental faculties before deciding that you are, indeed, not some form of psychosis on our part.”