The Church Dragon - Part 4
One of my most popular stories. Sometimes certain stones are more important than they seem. 7 Parts long.
I wrote this story shortly after returning from Student Life Camp with my church.
The Church Dragon - Part 4
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
By Labatryth Lyndynhyra
We were flying high indeed, and a thousand feet only got my feet wet, when it came to altitudes of which I could really fly. Manda shivered, as I felt her tightly grasp my mane. I knew she was terrified. Consistently she pulled backward on the many wiry strands of red hair, never letting go for anything. If she did let go it would likely mean death. I think she knew this well, and as such I kept a straight course, flying ahead, only slowing a tiny bit.
I was quite enjoying myself. As long as that stone was exactly where I thought I had left it, all would be fine.
"C-Could you at least...s-slow down?" she asked weakly.
"No. We're making great time as it is."
We just passed the liquor store, which had been out of business quite a while, since six months or so ago. Then came the Wheeler house. Craning my head down below my body I ascertained that the Wheelers, or whatever their name was, had left for church already, as I could not see any trace of any vehicle on their land.
On the highway below us cars zoomed by periodically, taking no notice of me because, well, the drivers were focused on driving, I assume. That was perfectly fine.
"How much longer?"
"Two minutes." I replied, slowing to about one hundred fifty miles per hour. "So how do you like riding a Dragon?"
"It's a-awesome." she stuttered. "And scary too."
I chuckled heartily. "Knew you would say that."
"Heh."
Looking down, I could spot my house far below. I knew its shape so well I could tell it from any other house in the area. This was considerably easy, because I lived out in the country, and only houses dotted the landscape there. Of course, lakes, trees, ponds, more trees, and trash should also be counted among the things that dot the landscape. But none of it ever blanketed the ground as houses do in the cities.
"Well, you haven't seen ANYTHING yet." I said in an ominous tone.
"What?"
Holding my wings still, I stalled in the air, and then screamed towards the ground at what seemed two hundred miles per hour. Down I dove, Manda screaming "This is awesome!" in my ear, and I aimed for our driveway. Seems the idiot neighbors next door had another trashed RV in their self-owned junkyard, and more scrap metal was blown against our fence on the right side of the pasture opposite the garage and back door of my house. I should have landed over there and burned the junk piles to ash.
Sort of disappointed, I brought myself up out of the dive, and began to gently glide down to the driveway, past the cattle guard. I fervently had hoped my daring dive would have terrorized the human riding me, but that did not seem to be the case. I had to make sure my wings didn't smash into the basketball goal in the turnaround of the driveway, but I did manage to land right in front of the second garage door, to the right of the main garage door of our house. Trying to distribute my weight evenly on our driveway, so that my body, of which weighed many tons, would not destroy that also, I let my tail rest on the pavement, and lay down. My mood was souring quickly.
"Wow. Pretty nice house." Manda complemented.
"Yeah. It's nice when you fit inside." said I, moving my tail to rest on the turnaround area.
My tail was so long it reached all the way to the propane tank that our house used for heating and fuel. And this was winter. So once again, I had to be careful.
Bones barked and growled at me unceasingly, trying to charge, but his chain only yanked him back. I only had to glance at him, and he cowered, whimpering and retreating to one of the holes he had dug in the ground.
"Well, that was just awesome." Manda mused, seeing how the dog had reacted.
I growled fiercely, my anger burning against her for the trite expression that she dared to use in such a perilous time as this. "Just find the stone."
Her voice faltered. "Alright, alright! You don't have to get all evil dragon on me!"
I blew a bit of fire from my nostrils. "Humph."
Quickly the girl arose from my back and walked down my tail. Walking towards my head, she looked up at me with a sort of ignorant smile. I only peered down at her, almost glaring.
"What now?"
"Uh. W-Where is the stone?"
I jerked my snout at the house. "In there. I forgot to lock the house doors before church. It should be upstairs in the drawer underneath my N64 and TV. There are three drawers underneath my N64. You will want to look in the smallest one. It will be crammed full of random objects and things, but look for the blood stone only. It will be on a gold chain, with a lock on it. Bring it all. It should be one piece, and there should be a key somewhere in the drawer. That's for the lock."
Manda just stood there, staring at me. As the wind blew across the pasture it rustled my mane, and made the trees shudder.
"Do I need to draw you a picture?"
"N-No." she said nervously. "Uh. I-I'll...be right back."
Manda quickly bounded away from me, and once she was a safe distance away she barreled through the door beside the main garage door, and made it into the garage itself.
Straight ahead was another door. Unfortunately the garage smelled of oil, cat dung, cat pee, and other unpleasant things. But she knew what I had asked her to do, and making it to the back door she pulled the handle down, and pushed open the door, entering the house. After closing the door she heard a voice in her mind.
"Where are you?" it said.
"W-Who is this?" thought she.
"It's me, Labatryth. We're talking telepathically." the voice replied.
"Oh. For a minute I thought I was hearing things."
"You are. I'm talking to you."
"Meh, I'm weird."
And that was all the conversation contained, as she walked straight ahead, coming to an upright piano.
"Which way now?"
"Where are you?"
"At a piano. Your house is really cool."
"Thank you. Do not waste time. Head up the stairs and turn left. Walk down past the balcony, and you should come to a library."
Manda promptly did as told, and ran upstairs, coming to a landing with some very creaky boards. Immediately she turned left and walked down past a solid wood balcony, and then came to another balcony, a long hall to the right. Straight ahead was the library, with a wood table in front of a love seat sofa, cabinets of books lining the right wall. The sofa had two windows behind it, standard size.
"What is taking so long? Where are you?"
"I-Hi. I'm upstairs. There's a hall, and I think this is the library or something."
"Right. Head down the hall; it will have lots of windows. Go all the way to the end, and there will be my room. My N64 is near the bed on the far left. It will have a towel over it."
"Cool." she said, turning to walk down the hall.
She couldn't help but notice the windows. In fact she stopped and looked out of them. You see, there is a hollowed out area between the garage and the other half of the house containing the guestroom and my room. It's sort of a courtyard, with a cistern there, a useless cistern, with a useless wrought iron fence around it. After all, no dragon I know is dumb enough to stumble into a hole in the ground. That's why the fence had no worth to me. So because of the way the plan of the house was built, Manda could see my tail protruding from the driveway, the isosceles laying close to the liquid propane tank.
"Freakin' huge." she said out loud to herself.
Pulling herself away from the window she progressed down the hall, pushing open the door to my room, and finding two beds, made up with complete perfection, pillows heavily decorating them near the headboards. Between the beds was a counter that had been built into the wall, things laid out neatly on it, but nothing suggesting a Dragon had ever lived there. The only peculiar thing was an hourglass sitting near the center of the counter. Looking to the left she saw a small TV, and something in front of it, covered with a light green ratty towel.
"Aha!" she said smartly.
"Where...ARE...you."
"I'm in your room. Wow, you have a big closet."
"Get the stone."
"I am I am! I have to find it."
"Good, get busy." the voice said, with a dangerous growling tone.
© 2012 Labatryth Lyndynhyra