Yet when I opened my eyes again, the Fates had looked down on my plea and said ‘fuck your feelings’. Angry-looking gray clouds spilled over the sky, dashing my plans onto the sharp rocks of the cove.
“Are you kidding me?” I screamed. The encroaching storm rolled closer to the island at a threatening pace. Streaks of lightning followed by booming thunder.
“Fuck my life.” I swung myself off the window and pulled on my boots. A storm like that would rip my raft to shreds if I didn’t get it covered in time. The weather had been completely cloud-free the past week. In my hubris I’d left the raft outside of my hidden cave to make it easier to work on, only covering it with a pile of banana leaves in case one of the dragon’s minions passed by the area.
As I stood up, my life flashed before my eyes as my feet caught on the long fabric of my nightgown, almost sending me headfirst down the stairs. I grabbed the railing and took a deep breath. “Slow,” I told myself. “Stairs are evil and out to get you.”
Having second thoughts about going outside in a storm in my nightgown, I threw it off and traded it for a simple gray blouse and my favorite green skirt. It was my only skirt, as it was the one I was kidnapped in, but that was beside the point. I sped down the steps and bid Amanda good morning, before rushing out the door.
The dark blue of her cheeks puffed out before an angry croak in my direction. Pausing, I glanced back at the frog-woman to see her point her spatula at a spread of grilled fish and fruit.
“Amanda, I’m kind of in a hurry.”
She slammed the spatula on the counter with a loud slap. Amanda was a menacing little thing that stood three feet tall with a temper just as short. The sharp, dark blue barbs jutting from her elbows promised a venomous sting I had no intention of experiencing. It was anyone’s guess if she tasked herself with the job of feeding her master’s captive or if she simply had drawn the short end of the stick. But gods help me if I ever decided I wasn’t hungry. In my first year here, I had tried staging a hunger protest. I’d proudly declared my refusal to eat to the dragon, hoping he’d have a heart and take me home, rather than see a woman starve.
He didn’t.
My grand protest lasted an hour. Then Amanda kicked open the door to the tower brandishing fish skewers like blades. The memory of her cold frog-hands shoving fish in my mouth will haunt me for the rest of my days.
“Alright, fine!” I hissed. With grace and civility, I crammed handfuls of food into my maw before rushing back out the door. “Thanks for breakfast,” I called back, then whispered to myself, “Bossy little dart frog.” A wooden spatula flew past my head, nearly severing one of my pigtails.
Note to self: frog-people have surprisingly good hearing.
Outside, the roar of thunder grew closer as the wind picked up around me. Slowly, I maneuvered around the wall of blue scales before jumping over the frilled tail of my captor. When the dragon didn’t rear his head to rush me back into my keep, I tiptoed to the small path heading toward the beach, then took off running. Sand whirled up around me as the storm finally closed in on the island. In the distance, I could just make out my raft under the pile of leaves. The leaves shook violently against the rocks weighing them down.
White blinded my vision as lightning struck a nearby tree. The towering eucalyptus snapped, knocking into a handful of other trees before they came crashing down toward the mess of leaves hiding my raft. Panicked, I ran faster to find that the giant tree had barely missed the raft. “Oh, thank cheese and rice,” I sighed.
As the wind howled, a banana leaf slammed into my face, knocking me on my ass. I sputtered and batted away the offending leaf just before another swirl of wind blew away the rest of my raft’s cover. The sail I’d fashioned out of old blankets caught against the harsh gusts and blew open. In an instant, the wind lifted the raft and began sliding it out of the bushes toward the water.
“Oh, no you don’t!” I screamed, diving onto the raft. My weight did nothing to slow the damn thing down. Ice-cold water splashed against my side as the raft launched itself into the waves. Cursing, I grabbed hold of the mast and tried to steer it back to shore. Instead, a full gust of wind snatched up the sail like a hawk would a mouse and the raft was airborne.
Roaring thunder drowned out my screams. I closed my eyes and hung on for dear life as the wind whipped the raft back toward the shore. Seconds felt like decades as I waited for the wind to smash me against the sharp rocks of the coast or perhaps straight into the water to drown. Neither sounded like a pleasant death, but at least slamming headfirst into a rock would be fast.
The mast snapped under my grip and flung me off the raft. I went down hard into the sand and rolled to a stop. Dusting the sand out of my face, I peered down at my body and damn near burst into tears when I found every limb where it should have been.
“Burning hot ghost peppers, I’m alive,” I cried, throwing my fists up in victory. I looked around for my raft, only to see it slam against a tree and shatter. Weeks of planning and sneaking around, gone in a flash. My hands dug into the sand.
“This is just fucking great,” I seethed. Covered in freezing cold water and, if I was being honest, a little bit of piss, I made my way over to the cave, intent on waiting out the storm. Maybe have a good cry while I was at it.
The moment I ducked my head into the cave, the wind stopped. Angry gray skies receded into clear blue once more. My shattered raft and broken trees were all that remained of the once-raging storm. Jaw hanging open in disbelief, I held a hand out in the air. Nothing. No wind, no clouds, just nothing.
The gods hate me. There is no other explanation for this level of bullshittery.
Utterly defeated, I waded into the water to rinse the piss and broken dreams off myself before trudging back to my tower. Today was an absolute wash. Nothing left to do but shrug it off and plan for the next time. Maybe I’d enjoy a ganja cookie and have a tall glass of mead.
Yep. As I started on the path back, the day was already sounding better. The only good thing about my captivity was the wide variety of plant life. So, food and… well… more entertaining plants were never in short supply.
In the early days of my island exploration, I almost couldn’t believe the copious number of caapi vines lining the edge of the cliffs on the west side of the island. Chacruna shrubs sat tall and proud in near perfect rows, while marijuana plants competed for sunlight among the tall grass. If I didn’t know any better, I’d almost believe they’d been planted by the dragon himself. I’d never seen those kinds of plants grow together in harmony in the wild. Not that I was complaining. There wasn’t much else to do on the island. Maybe that’s why he hardly ever moved. The thought of my captor sneaking off to brew ayahuasca tea while I slept was laughable, but my grandma always said nothing was impossible.
A deep voice reverberated through the ground, making me freeze.“Gideon, you could at least acknowledge that you hear me.”
Without thinking, I dove off the trail and hid behind a bush. My hands trembled as I struggled to pull a branch out of the way to peek out at the stranger. Then I clamped a hand over my mouth to keep from crying out.
Screeching pumas, it’s another dragon.My mind whirled at seeing the massive creature maneuver its long serpent body, in front of my tower, to glower down at my dragon.
‘Gideon,’he said.Could all dragons talk, or was the newcomer special in some way? If they could, why the hell didn’t that blue bastard say anything to me for the past five years?
The newcomer was smaller than my captor. One lone horn rose from the right side of his head. His silver scales glittered in the morning sun, casting rays of light on the surrounding grass. Smoke rose from his nostrils as he snorted, then grabbed hold of one of Gideon’s long sea-foam green horns and shook violently.“Hey!”the silver dragon snapped.“Don’t ignore me, you beached whale. Get up.”
