The silhouette was like a man, except for the thick tail hanging from its backside. The color of it was mostly brown, with black and green mixed in. The size of it was intimidating, but the beast simply stood. For two whole heartbeats, my body was frozen with fear. Then my brain finally caught up. Turning the opposite way, I bolted, following the direction of the rabbit.
The chain dragged behind me, snagging on the ground. Frantically, I tried to gather up the length of it without slowing. A few steps carried me under the trees up ahead, which I hoped would give me cover. Unfortunately, they also made the ground a lot less soft.
Sharp points, hard lumps, and thick objects all tried to abuse my feet. I staggered but kept running, needing to hide, to get away. The sun was up, which meant it was daytime. The creature behind me had to be one of the Devil's minions. A demon or something, I supposed, and I wanted to be as far away from it as possible.
Yet the further I made it under the trees, the thicker the plants became. Soon, branches were grabbing at my chemise and arms, doing their best to slow me down too. I tried to avoid them, desperately looking for a path or trail I could follow. The books always talked about them, yet there were none before me!
So I decided to make my own. Tucking my head and clenching my arms before my chest - with the chain cradled between them - I forced my way deeper into this strange new world. My lungs were burning. My feet were screaming in protest. Every step made me want to wince, to stop, and just to give up, but I'd made a promise to Callah.
I would survive.
One way or another, I'd find a way to live in this dangerous place, if only I could get far enough that the monster back there could never find me. Pushing my body to its limits, I ducked, darted, and dodged between the trees and bushes, only daring to glance back once.
I couldn't see the thing, but I hadn't before it stood up either. Was it still back there? Maybe what I needed was a place to hide? Desperately, I tried scanning the landscape around me, but none of this was like the pictures in my books. There weren't flowerbeds and stone paths. Instead, there were simply plants that grabbed at me, cutting into my skin, and a ground that was mutilating my feet with each panicked step.
And then something crashed into me from the side.
The air left my lungs as I slammed into the forest floor. A piece of wood - branch or root, I wasn't sure - made my back arch painfully. Pain took over my body as my bearings were sent askew, but I tried to roll. I desperately struggled to keep going. The thing that had hit me pressed harder, shoving its entire weight over me until its face was right above mine.
Orange.
My heart forgot to beat. My lungs stalled. Ice raced over my skin as I saw that color and realized it was in the eyes of the monster lying directly over me. A split second later, my lungs demanded release, so I sucked in the biggest breath I could.
A dark, clawed hand slapped over my lips. "Har tu drain dukyl turzalf? Daets e kaioti!"
Then the creature turned to look pointedly into the forest. My eyes followed even as I struggled to pant around the hand it held over my mouth. At least until movement caught my attention. There, no more than twenty feet away, a large canine stood with its eyes locked on us.
The creature was blonde with greyish marks along its body. Its hair was longer but not too long. The thing I couldn't pull my eyes away from, however, were the teeth. So many bright white teeth, and all of them were visible with the way its lips curled.
Then the beast rushed us. The monster holding me down surged up a split-second later. I didn't know what was going on, so I was torn between watching and fleeing - until I saw what had crashed into me. The man-like monster's body was dark with thin white stripes running from its head to its toes. Then there was the tail.
Blue.
The Wyvern!
Rolling onto my stomach, I pushed myself to my knees, but my feet were too abused to hold my weight again. Frantically, I tried to crawl forward, aiming away from both the battle raging behind me and the first creature I'd seen even as my eyes filled with tears.
They'd warned me. They'd said the world wasn't safe. Everywhere I turned was yet another danger, but I had to do this. I'd promised Callah something yellow! I'd sworn I would do my best to survive, so if that meant crawling on my hands and knees, then I would crawl as fast as I possibly could.
What I needed was a place to hide. There had to be something! A rock. A bush? I had no clue if either one would be enough to shield my body from the horrors around me. I still looked. I wasn't that big!
Behind me, I could hear the thrashing of plants and the growls of one of those creatures. Snarls, snaps, and grunts as well. I didn't want to look back. I was terrified they'd be too close to me, so I just kept going.
A few paces further, the mess under my hands and knees got softer. Without slowing, I got a foot under me, then the other, making one pace with my hands still on the ground before I could truly stand. Pain shot up from my soles, but it didn't matter. It was fleeting. It could be ignored.
I still limped. But this was faster than crawling, so I kept going, kept searching for a place where I'd be safe. Faster, then faster still, I pushed my newly-broken body. All around me was nothing but green. The brightest green I could have imagined, and so many shades of it.
The world was beautiful. That didn't make it any less dangerous. Once, I'd read that bright colors meant poison, but did they mean more? Because colors assaulted my eyes from every direction. So did the daylight. Everything was bright. Much too bright, which might be why I couldn't find a hiding spot!
But when I stepped on something else sharp and felt my skin split, I had to pause. Grabbing the trunk of the closest tree, I dared to look at my feet and saw blood. Little cuts, and now a big one to go with it. Raw skin and things sticking out of it.
Behind me, I heard movement. Daring to glance back finally, I saw something dark moving my way. Screw my aching feet. I ran.
It was more of a hobble and a limp, but it was as fast as I could go. The chain was now wrapped around one of my arms, but the weight of it slowed me as well. The thing certainly wasn't light! It also clanked, which made me worry less about the roaring of my own breath as I struggled to take in enough air to keep moving like this.
A grip on my arm spun me around. The first thing I saw was grey, but black was right after, so I pushed, trying to keep it away. My hands landed on what felt like the chest of a man, and I looked up. The creature barely rocked with my defense. Worse, it smiled.
"Varhor tu gouun lidel moul?"
I took a step back as fear gripped my chest. "What are you?"
The monster's head twitched, proving it heard my words. "Tu dounaspyk Vestrian? Val, dees izgoundabi thun."
All I could do was shake my head and keep retreating. Behind the monster, that blue tail swished slowly, but with power. On the end was something sharp - the stinger! Just like the one in the dining hall. Another step backwards and I looked the entire beast over, trying to make my mind understand what I was seeing.
Because this was a Dragon.
It didn't have four legs and wings like in my books. Instead, it - he - looked so much like a man. His feet were different, and his skin. His coloring was definitely not human, and his hair was even different, yet there was something very human-like about him.
"Please don't eat me," I breathed.
The Wyvern simply grunted - then stormed forward. Ducking down, he scooped my body up. Slinging me over his shoulder like a sack from harvest, the thing clasped my legs behind the knees to hold me in place.
I still tried to struggle. Kicking my feet only made him hold me harder. With my hands, I pounded on his back, hoping to hit hard enough to make him drop me. Every bouncing step of this man-thing shoved his shoulder into my gut, making me want to gag.
"Put me down!" I insisted. "Let me go!"
He said nothing. On either side of me, trees were passing. Oddly, no branches were grabbing at me this time, but they were still out there. I tried to reach one, hoping I could use it as a weapon, but the few my fingers could touch simply slipped from my grasp before I could do anything with them.
