Chapter 11 - The Ashlands Descent
“She cannot carry all of us,” Bran shouted over the rising wind, gesturing to the mother’s wounded wing. A ballista bolt was still lodged deep near the rotator joint, bleeding thick, viscous black blood that hissed as it touched the cold stone. “If she takes flight with that weight, the wing will buckle, and you will all plunge into the gorge!”
Lyra rushed to the dragon’s shoulder, reaching up with both hands. The burning scale pattern on her chest flared white-hot, sending tendrils of light dancing over the iron shaft of the bolt. “I have to pull it out!”
“Step aside, girl!” Bran barked. He grabbed the thick wooden shaft of the bolt, planted his boot against the dragon’s muscular flank, and heaved with all his remaining strength.
With a sickening squelch and a spray of scalding blood, the barbed iron came free. The mother dragon roared, the sound rolling through the canyon, but the tension in her shoulder instantly eased. The wound began to seal, cauterized by her own searing core temperature.
“Climb!” Bran ordered, shoving Lyra onto the ridge behind the dragon’s neck before pulling himself up behind her. “The caldera is three leagues east, through the Ash Valley. If we can reach the subterranean tunnels beneath the dead volcano, their flying barges cannot pursue!”
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The great white beast coiled her powerful legs and thrust upward, her colossal wings snapping the air with thunderous power. They surged into the sky, the wind whipping Lyra’s hair into a wild fury as Castle Ravenskeep dwindled into a smoldering speck in the distance.
Ahead lay the Ashlands—a wasteland of black volcanic glass, steaming geysers, and poisoned fog. But as Lyra looked behind them, her heart froze. The lead siege-barge was already diving out of the cloud cover, firing a chain-shot harpoon that whistled straight toward the mother dragon’s uninjured wing.
