Sineater

We were out of the city within the hour.

We still had a few hours of daylight, but not much. Given that we had rested during our ride to the city, we had enough energy to ride through the night. Plus, it helped that the Drakes seemed to know where we were going.

I hadn’t been around drakes much, considering the large reptiles were suited for land travel and I’d spent most of my life on a boat, there hadn’t been much of a chance to be around them. Wyverns on the other hand, I’d seen a lot of, though those flying two-legged reptiles were usually attacking our ship. Supposedly the Wyrm Queen bred and sold tamed ones, but her fortress was on the other side of the mountains.

Dragons tended to not interact much with the rest of us, preferring to use the half-breeds known as Dragonborn as their liaison to the other cities or for visitors. I wasn’t sure how many dragons were on the planet, but there couldn’t be more than a handful. Still, their ability to tame and breed the different species of wyvern had helped to provide a little more safety on a planet that had plenty of monsters that would try to eat whatever they could catch.

My drake was larger than a horse and covered in dark green scales. I was pretty sure it was a she, though considering that I wasn’t very knowledgeable about drakes, I couldn’t be sure. What I did know was that it was gentle, compared to the one my brother was riding.

Vin’s mount had already bit him once and the blue scaled drake had also tried to buck him off twice. It probably didn’t help that my brother’s two lower arms were holding onto the reptile’s neck while his upper arms had the reins gripped tight.

Starna’s mount, on the other hand, seemed driven. It was a dark red and very happy to take the lead up the narrow trail, chasing after the soft ball of light in the sky that our mage companion was using to light our way.

There was a shriek behind me and I turned around to see my brother standing over his mount, holding it against the ground by the throat.

“Bit me again and I’m eating lizard steaks for dinner.” My brother hissed as he tried to win a staring contest with the drake.

“Hold up.” I called after Starna as I got down. It was just dark enough that it was starting to get difficult to see. There wasn’t much of a moon out, so if she got too far ahead, then we’d be left in the dark.

More specifically, I’d be left in the dark. I was pretty sure the drakes could see in low light, while I knew my brother could. So while we wouldn’t be stranded, I still would rather keep my light source. That was probably the first spell I needed her to teach me.

“You know, if you’d be nicer to it, it’d probably be nicer to you.”

“If I eat it, it’ll be nice too…” Vin growled as he stared harder.

I could feel the frustration rolling off of him. It was violent enough that my mount was trying to move away from the scene. On the narrow path we were on, It was going to be difficult for it to turn around without possibly slipping off the side of the cliff. I began rubbing its neck and pulled some of that fear out of it.

My heart sped up as the fear of my brother became so thick in the air that I could taste it. I closed my eyes and focused as my arms started to tremble. I had thought I’d just taken enough of the fear to take the edge off, but this much was almost overwhelming and I knew my brother wasn’t going to hurt me.

I wanted to tell him to stop, that he was scaring the other mounts, but right now they were locked in a battle for dominance and if I interrupted that, it would only force it to happen again later.

I pulled a little more of the anxiety off of my drake and did my best to dissipate it. While I didn’t have any fear of my brother, taking the raw feelings from the reptile under me was clueing me into exactly how afraid of him they were.

It didn’t take long before the drake submitted to Vin. Knowing my brother, it had never really been a contest, but that was something that the drake had to learn on its own. Once the reptile lowered its head, my brother let it go and climbed back on top of it.

“Are you done with your stupid dominance competition?” Starna scoffed as her mount started moving again. “If you’re going to keep doing that, then you should just walk…” Her eye twinkled. “Or you could always carry it.”

“It knows who the boss is now.” Vin flexed with all four arms.

“And who is that?” Stana didn’t bother looking at us.

“Me.” Confidence filled the single word that Vin puffed out his chest

“I was hoping you’d say that.” Starna half turned in her saddle to look back at us. “I was wanting to go sightseeing while we were here, but didn’t know if I’d have the time since I’d be meeting with the leaders, but…” She grinned. “Since you want to be the boss, I guess you’ll be handling that.”

“That’s not…” Vin turned to me. “You know that’s not what I meant!”

“Sounded like it to me.” I smirked. “Boss.”

“You too?!?” My brother’s voice was starting to strain as panic crept in. “Both of you know that if you try to make me do something that important we’ll be at war with half the continent before the meeting is over!”

“She’s just teasing you.” As much as I enjoyed seeing my brother flustered, it was slowing us down and I wasn’t very comfortable with the sheer drop that was to our right. I’d fallen while at sea, but there had been water to land in out there. Here, there was nothing but piles of uneven rocks waiting below.

My brother sank into his seat, but the only complaining he did was mumbling under his breath. I didn’t bother hiding my grin. I had a feeling that this was going to be a fun trip.