Paintshark (32 page)

They leapt and hung briefly in the air before plummeting to the waters below, with their arms flailing by their side, the prisoners above watched them hit the surface hard before sighing with faint relief as all their heads resurfaced and were swept away by the unforgiving waters.

The next wave jumped, swiftly followed by the third, Nayan and Elias ushered them down, the vines were bearing down on the men at the back and the screaming of inevitable death continued. Elias shouted through the crowds of men to his friend, Nayan, “WHO ARE YOU WAITING FOR?”

When Elias saw Kimberley running beside Felcey he immediately understood. “I’LL SEE YOU AT THE BOTTOM, MY FRIEND.” And with that Elias Glaucas leapt from the edge to meet the river deep below. Kimberley baulked when she came to the edge and looked down, than sprang back into the forwarding men, shaking her head, her face was a mask of fear and panic, as much as the men took care of the youngest girl of the group, they wanted to escape with their lives from the vines and Kimberley was pushed aside as the prisoners leapt towards the river.

“I CAN’T DO IT!” she cried.

Nayan held onto her as he let his brothers jump past him, Felcey and Aubrey waited along side her too. “I’M GOING TO BE RIGHT WITH YOU, LITTLE ONE, THERE’S NO NEED TO BE AFRAID.”

Nayan needed for her to understand; Kimberley shouted back at her prison guardian. “I DON’T WANT TO JUMP, I AM AFRAID, AFRAID OF THE WATER.”

Nayan took her hand. “THEN HOLD ON TO ME, KIMBRLEY, I WILL NOT BREAK MY PROMISE IN KEEPING YOU SAFE.”

“I KNOW.”

The original solid smile from Nayan spread across his face. “LET’S GO.”

And before she could answer, Nayan, Kimberley followed by the rest of the prisoners took a tremendous leap from the cliff face, the harsh winds of Gommerstall whipped around them as they dropped from the prison and hurtled towards the torrent, it wasn’t a graceful leap but the jump surprised them all as they fell a lot faster than they’d anticipated, but unfortunately not fast enough for prisoner Masper who had trailed behind the others and as he made his leap to hopeful freedom he hung a little too long in the air, long enough for a vine to snatch him in mid-jump and pull him back into the tunnel for a premature demise.

All the remaining prisoners had resurfaced safely and were being carried away by the current, bobbing up and down swiftly they came across a huge rock fork in the middle of the river, unable to swim against the tide, the group for the first time were separated, Elias, Nayan, Faris and the majority of the prisoners were swept to the left along the outside of the Section C prison imbedded in the mountain, and Kimberley, Aubrey, Felcey and the remaining men, were forced to the right, heading way from their prison and into some caves opposite the main mountain, the waters pushed them for quite a while before beginning to subside by some jagged rocks, summoning up all their strength the group managed to haul themselves up on to the rocks and make their way to the other side of the cavern where they could see some light creeping through a small entrance. The rock formation was harshly scattered all over the cavern and having to circumnavigate was extremely hard, but after a laborious effect, Kimberley and the male prisoners made their way out to a small sand clearing on the other side and collapsed from exhaustion, but no sooner had they hit the ground, they lay on their backs for some much needed recovery.

Aubrey heard a low grunting sound, the others it seemed didn’t hear a thing. He got up to investigate, making his way awkwardly around the rocks on the sea front, the grunting sound grew louder and rhythmic, as he clambered around the last few rocks and froze in shock at what he saw.

Sitting curled up beside a boulder was a gigantic dragon-like creature, its wings were folded neatly on its armoured crimson shoulders and a tail protruded beneath its back, lazily swaying from left to right.

Its eyes were half-open and Aubrey could see its snake like slit, but the dragon didn’t respond to him, its head was cocked to one side and it glistened but the creature lay still, very fast asleep as Aubrey’s eyes studied the great beast.

“WOW, LOOK AT THAT!” said Felcey. Aubrey spun around to see the rest of the group standing behind him open mouthed and staring at the dragon, he cuffed Felcey on the back of the head.

“Young man it would be in all of our best interests if you could keep the noise down, the last time I checked dragons weren’t vegetarians.”

Ansell, a teacher from Kimberley’s school who ended up with the group when the waters from the tunnels above divided, put up his hand, Aubrey pointed to him.

“You don’t have to raise your hand now, we’re not at school, in fact…good god man you’re a teacher, why are you raising your hand?”

“Yeah sorry, but what do we do now? We have to go back the way we came, right?”

Kimberley butted in.

“We can’t, the hangar for the supply ship is on the other side of the rock face, we have to make our way past sleeping beauty here to reach it.”

Everyone was shocked on how the young girl took charge so easily, Ansell blinked rapidly. “All that and you never said two words in my class.”

Kimberley smiled. “That’s because your classes were boring, sir.”

Aubrey signalled to the others and they gingerly climbed down from the rocks onto the ground where the dragon slept. They walked around the dragon fearfully, each and every person clocking the dragon’s half-open eye. As Kimberley walked past she noticed something glistening from the dragon’s ears, she did a double take and pulled at Aubrey’s sleeve. “Do they look like earrings to you?”

Aubrey squinted. “My dear, they could be shower curtain rings for all I know, let’s keep moving before this sleeping giant has a nightmare and spoils what could be a glorious afternoon.” Kimberley nodded vaguely.

The waves crashed against the rocks on the seafront and still the dragon slept, it shifted itself onto its side and slid against the boulder until it was upside down with all four feet in the air.

Ansell kept the dragon in check. “Any other time and that might have looked cute.”

The group moved forward, with hearts pounding, the dragon increasingly becoming the part of the background, Kimberley’s head buzzed and she suddenly remembered where she had seen the earrings. She squealed, “THEY’RE MY EARRINGS, I MEAN I GAVE THEM TO CASSANDRA…THAT’S HER, THAT DRAGON THING IS CASSANDRA!”

Aubrey put his finger to his mouth in a ‘ssshhh’ motion, and put a consoling arm on her shoulder. “Now see hear, my dear, I know you miss this ‘Cassandra’ lady, but imagining she’s a dragon? I think that’s a tad harsh.”

“No, it’s true, I bought them for her, they’re her earrings.”

“So how did they get in the dragon’s ears, eh? Did it put them in itself? That dragon is a style icon.”

Kimberley was failing in trying to get her point across. “Look, you’ve seen my power, well Cassandra did have a dragon face, she told me when we first got our powers…looks like she can turn into a dragon too.”

Ansell tapped Aubrey on the shoulder. “So what do we do?”

“We keep moving, my good man, we mustn’t dawdle,” Aubrey said.

“But–”

“But nothing, Kimberley, we press on.”

The whole group turned to leave until Aubrey noticed something, he was the one to first hear the grunted snores of the dragon, he didn’t hear them now, he could hear the unmistakable sound of heavy breathing, not erratic like before, he turned to look at the dragon, as the others walked on, he remained and slowly walked back towards the beast, it was still upturned on its back. Aubrey cocked his head to the side and noticed one of the dragon’s eyes, it wasn’t half shut as before it was wide open, Aubrey stood still, a sick feeling moved around him and it was now he could smell the rotten flesh wafting in from the dragon. Rooted to the spot he watched slowly as the dragon’s eye stayed open…and then blinked.

Aubrey mouthed, “Good God!”

Aubrey spun around to the group. “RUUUNNNN.”

The dragon righted itself instantly and took a clumsy side-step through to grogginess, it started to run swiftly, its tail whipping through the air behind it.

“MOVE IT! MOVE IT!” Aubrey yelled.

Everyone accelerated and got their feet in to gear as the dragon raced forward, the older gent ran as fast has he could, catching up with the others almost instantly, and glancing over his shoulder, he thought he could hear the dragon’s snorting breath behind him and adrenaline kicked in, forcing him to run faster.

Kimberley, like in the tunnels, was in the middle of the group, Felcey yelled at her.

“CAN’T YOU DO SOMETHING? BLAST IT.”

Kimberley’s face tensed up. “I’M NOT TOUCHING HER, IT’S CASSANDRA AND I’M GOING TO PROVE IT.”

Kimberley pulled back causing the others behind to crash into her. “WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?” Ansell yelled.

Kimberley coughed. “THAT DRAGON IS MY BEST FRIEND, I’M STAYING RIGHT HERE.”

Ansell grabbed her arm. “DON’T BE SO STUPID, IT’S GOING TO KILL YOU.”

She wriggled free. “LET ME GO, SIR, I KNOW WHAT I’M DOING.”

He grabbed her again. “DAMMIT THIS ISN’T A GAME, YOUNG LADY, I WON’T LEAVE YOU TO DIE HERE.”

Kimberley hissed back. “You’d better leave me be, sir, I don’t know what she’ll do to you.” The other teachers implored him to leave her and to keep running, Ansell screamed back, “I’M NOT LEAVING HER.”

Kimberley pushed him away and he stumbled backwards. As he fell to the ground the dragon was already upon them, it raised itself on its hind legs and gave a defiant fierce cry, Kimberley covered her ears as the dragon now hissed furiously as it dropped back down on all fours. Ansell was paralysed with fear as he lay on his back looking at the trembling form of Kimberley, she stood with her hands by her side and she finally shook with fear.
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all,
she thought. Blood suddenly trickled from Kimberley’s nose as she shut her eyes. The dragon bent down its huge head and moved around the side of Kimberley, heavy jaws opened and closed and the dragon bellowed angrily, it gazed again at Kimberley and paused…and then let out a terrifying shriek which made Kimberley shriek too.

The others had stopped running and looked on, memorised at the dragon sizing up Kimberley.

Aubrey eagerly turned to Felcey. “Can’t you do something, old boy?”

“Like what? Throw milk at it? My powers are useless, Aubrey, I can’t do anything.”

The dragon watched as Kimberley wiped the blood from her nose and then it cleared its mouth, and gave an impatient snort, and then it drew back its head and spat at Kimberley.

It gave a victorious roar and then began to yelp like a puppy, rearing on its hind legs again.

Kimberley wiped the remains of spit and carrion from her face and scowled at the dragon. It continued to yelp away, and then started grunting as if it was laughing. Kimberley had had enough and started to flick her right wrist in order to make an orb, her hand was already red hot before the orb could be formed and she pressed it into the crimson leg of the dragon.

The dragon roared angrily, craning its head to the side and then bought its legs down and stomped onto the ground, baring its razor sharp teeth.

Kimberley wiped some bone and gristle from her eyes and shouted, “NOO.”

She punched it the dragon’s legs again, right in the spot where her hand had burnt it. The dragon riled away more from surprise than pain and it bent down again to Kimberley, she could see the dried blood of its last meal encrusted along its teeth, it reared up again and came down to sniff Kimberley and nudged her knocking her down.

“STOP THAT,” she shouted. She rolled along the ground and slowly got to her feet, only to be knocked down again by the dragon. “I SAID STOP IT.”

The dragon looked down curiously at her and nudged her again, arms flailing, Kimberley hit the earth hard, she sprung to her feet quickly and flicked her wrist, her hand glowed as she held it to the dragon’s hind leg, it roared in pain but she held it tight pressing hard against the tough crimson skin, she continued holding on to the leg as the dragon rolled its head, its talons scratched along the ground just missing Kimberley as the rocks flipped up all around her, the dragon’s nostrils flared as Kimberley held her hand tight against its flesh, it bubbled and burned but still Kimberley would not let go and grimaced as she continued to hold on.

The crimson beast bellowed in pain and reared up again, when it landed back down to stomp, it was smaller, the others watching from a far stood open-mouthed at the slight transformation.

Only Kimberley failed to notice it shrinking and continued to hold on to its leg, the dragon roared again but continued to shrink in size, Kimberley rose on tiptoes not letting go of its leg and the dragon squealed, the sound was like fingernails on a blackboard and Kimberley gritted her teeth in pain, the creature rolled its eyes and waved its hands in frustration as it continued to shrink, Kimberley didn’t want to break away and the dragon had shrunk even more as Kimberley held on, tirelessly shaking her head back and forth, her eyes twisted shut.

The dragon’s features began to change, the elongated head vanished and its crimson body turned white, the talons retracted and turned into fingernails and clung deep into Kimberley’s shoulder. Its green snake eyes rose in a dizzying movement and changed colour to brown. Blond hair grew from its now smaller head, which was humanoid in appearance.

The hind legs lost their scales but Kimberley’s hand remained, glowing, and the mouth with perfect white teeth carried on howling and then the howls of pain turned in to one high-pitched scream, a girl’s scream.

Kimberley opened her eyes to see a girl standing where the dragon should have been, a girl who looked very familiar, Cassandra Paintshark stood in front of her, naked and rubbing her leg where Kimberley had burned her.

“Oww!”

Ansell got to his feet and put his hand to his mouth. “Amazing!” he whispered. He took off his top and embarrassedly looked to the ground as he cautiously walked up to the naked girl and handed it to her, her eyes never left his as she took the top from him, she mouthed quietly, “Thank you.” Cassandra shivered as she put on the top.