November 8

Word Count: 1207

She rounded a corner and was plunged into complete darkness. Her feet slipped on the slick polished floor. She turned, suddenly afraid in the empty space.

A light pulled appeared behind her.

"You know, Lynah, this adventure would be a lot easier with a little light." Trevelyn held a torch in her hand.

"Where did you find that?" Lynah asked as she stared at the walls around her.

"I sort of bumped into it." Trevelyn rubbed her elbow. The torch was bright enough to reveal that the cave they'd entered was huge. Whatever had carved this cave was not natural.

"I didn't believe it. I truly thought it was all fake. But look, it's a dragon." Lynah looked in the direction where Trevvie pointed. Taking up the whole back wall of the cave was a statue. The silver gray stone was delicately carved into a massive dragon. It was curled up, its head resting on the tip of its tail. Lynah stood by the head and laid a hand on the tip of its nose. The closed jaws had two teeth protruding from the top that were as long as Lynah's arm. The head itself was almost her same height. The rest of the body ran the length of the cave and circled back into a tail.

"It's warm. The stone," she commented. She wasn't expecting that. The wall Lynah had touched on the way in had seemed cold and somewhat clammy.

"So who carved it, do you think?" Trevelyn asked as she approached closer to the statue. Lynah knew at once that Trevelyn was asking the wrong question. This wasn't a statue that someone had carved. Suddenly the dragon hunting seemed a bit… dangerous. What was one supposed to do after finding the dragon. She tapped the dragon on the nose. It was still slightly warm and hard as a rock. Did one kill a dragon after finding it? Or did was simply add it to a tally sheet like bird watching? Lynah looked at the teeth protruding from its mouth.

"Trevelyn. I don't think we should be here."

"We should be home. I thought we'd already settled that."

"No, I mean, this isn't a carving." She backed away from the dragon. Was is breathing, or was it her imagination?

"I think you're going a little loopy on me, Lynah," she said as she stared harder at the dragon.

"Don't you remember? The ancient stories. The ones about the dragons sleeping on a bed of stone?"

"Of course, every child know the dragon stories. Every adult knows their just made up. Imagined."

"Dragons really did exist, Trev. They flew over the skies of Galadin. They lived off the magic that was still left in the land, and when it died, they went to sleep. Hibernation. Like stone."

"You want me to believe that thing's real? Fine, then we've seen the sleeping stone dragon. Are you ready to go."

"How do we know it's going to stay sleeping?"

"Well, there's no magic left. So I guess he'll be a statue forever, which will probably be a good thing, considering the teeth. Why he could swallow us whole!"

"Okay, really time to go now," Lynah said as she took the torch from Trevelyn.

"This has got you spooked," Trevelyn laughed.

"This is not funny."

"Oh it is when you think about it. Last night when we were accosted by the ugliest man alive, you kept oh so very cool. This morning you were more worried about your hair than the fact that we might run into him again. And now you're scared of a statue. A big one in a cave… what's that smell?"

"What smell?"

"Smells like fire," Trevelyn stated. Lynah had thought it was coming from the torch. "Is it getting warm in here?"

"We're leaving. Now." Just when the cave afforded the last view of the huge stone dragon, Lynah turn back around to check one last time. One very big blue eye stared back at her.

"It is another marvelous day," Saratin said as he and Iber set out for the day. Iber heartily agreed with the brother's summation. They'd bid a friendly goodbye to the proprietor of the inn, and headed north, toward their prospective destinations. Iber had decided quite a while ago, that meeting Saratin on this trip had been the best thing to happen to him in quite a long time. Not only did Saratin keep him quite amused with his enthusiastic observations, but sometimes his tendency to point out the obvious, uncovered the not so apparent facets of whatever subject Saratin turned his attention to.

Iber had never met anyone who was so good with people. He had yet to meet anyone, except the snotty writer last night who had spoken a bad or impolite word about Saratin. If Iber could divine the secret to Saratin's likeable personality, he could indeed impress his father with the loyalty of his servants and field workers. Surely, if he remained as long as possible in Saratin's presence, Iber might pick up a few of the skills that just came naturally to him.

"I do know of a shortcut north. Well, I'm not sure so much that it's a shortcut. I find that the truer words would probably be scenic route. The road to Gooled is rather droll and boring. Very much the same thing as we've been driving down until now. But we can take a fork in the road through the forest, and end up in Gooled with slightly less that a half-hour difference. What do you think?"

"You knew the answer to the question before you asked it. I should love to take the scenic route. I believe Gooled and the monastery can spare my arrival by so short a time, although this horse will probably be stubborn. I've managed so far in a straight line. Do you think I can turn this contraption?"

Delighted, Iber told Saratin how to pull on the reigns to get himself in the correct direction. The fog was still sticking by the time they got to the trees.

"So how long have you had that talent?" Iber asked Saratin.

"Which talent is that? I have so many." Saratin laughed at his own joke. Iber didn't consider it one.

"Memorizing books."

"Oh, that. I just do it. I read something once, and poof, I can remember it down to what part of the page it's on. I can see it in my head, the book, and know what goes on each page. It seems like a rather silly thing to be able to do. A novelty for parties, but as a librarian, I can find all sorts of ways to use my abilities."

"I'd think one would just have to keep you around and you could be the library." Saratin laughed. His eyes had been wildly wandering during their entire conversation. Iber thought we was probably cataloging trees in his head while holding a completely different conversation.

"What would you do if you weren't a brother?" Saratin remained still and silent for a moment.

"Well, technically I'm not a brother yet. I'm an apprentice. And I suppose that if I didn't take orders, I'd find something…