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The Keeper of the Dragons 24

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The Keeper of the Dragons
Chapter 24
Shadow is a Jerk When it Comes to Any Flying





We walked out of the training room and climbed the stairs to the Hall of Elements. The doors were wide open and Mist and Warrior were waiting inside. When Shadow and I were in view, they picked up their heads and smiled at us. Mist opened up her mouth, ready to say some sort of greeting, but Shadow cut her off with a smirk saying, “No Warrior, I’m still better than both of you at basketball.”

“What?! No! Dude, I can sink way more baskets than you can,” Warrior protested. I can imagine that Shadow was reading his mind too as we walked into the hall. That or he could just hear their previous conversation before we walked in. Either way, this guy is on a mind reading spree, my gosh.

“So? I can block all of them…” Shadow stated as he folded his arms over his chest in some prideful pose that only made Warrior pissed off.

“That doesn’t matter!” Mist jumped in, understanding the conversation more than I could, “I should know, I play defense too.”

The three just went on for a while, still arguing about this basketball themed conversation as I just switched from one speaker to the next. I could have jumped in, but let’s be honest, I can’t get into this conversation. Turns out all of them play basketball at some point in time. Mist plays at our Junior high and because Warrior and Shadow are freshmen in High School they play on their freshmen team. Yeah, I learned that one when Warrior and Shadow wanted to play basketball and invited me to play. Haha, yeah, that was a terrible idea to drag me into that but let’s just say that Warrior had a fun time beating Shadow’s butt that day.

“Anyway,” Warrior announced as he concluded their argument, “You ready to fly, Cilia?”

“You bet!” I exclaimed, my wings spreading out a bit from my body in excitement. I’ve been waiting for this moment ever since I got my True Form, “So, how are you going to teach me how to fly if you don’t have wings?”

Warrior let out a few laughs as he gave me a good slap on the back, “Psh, don’t worry. I’ve taught winged Muneris how to fly before. You’ll be fine.”

Mist and Shadow stayed with us, as they sat down on the ground while Warrior worked with me. He first wanted me to get used to using my wings by doing small easy exercises like opening and closing them, slowly moving them forward and back, and even things like using one wing to knock over objects. It felt silly to be doing all these simple tasks, but it proved to be worth it as I slowly got more control with my wings.

“Good, good,” Warrior said with a smile, “Now just stay still, alright? I’m going to lift you up with some wind. You’re not going to fall so don’t worry.”

I nodded my head and bend my knees to get ready. Warrior pulled down his steampunk-looking goggles over his eyes and held out his hands. Moving them in a wave like pattern, the air around me began to blow my light brown hair. I squinted my eyes as the air got stronger around me, like I was caught in the middle of a storm. Very slowly, my feet began to lift off of the ground. I gasped, but I didn’t panic to try to get back on the ground. My wings stretched out as I tried to keep my balance to prevent from flipping over. The winds kept picking me up until I was about five feet off the ground.

Even over the high winds I could still see and hear Warrior back on the ground, “Okay! Now what I want you to do is slowly move your wings up and down like you’re flapping.”

Nodding my head, I looked over to the side to look at my wings. Slowly, I rose them up and then back down, and then back up again. I continued this slow pattern of flapping until it didn’t feel awkward anymore. After that, I was told to go faster to get used to that feeling then even faster to get used to that. I couldn’t help but give a short laugh. It wasn’t like I was really flying, but I’m coming real close to it now.

“Awesome! You’re doing great,” Warrior commented. He flew up to meet me and called down to Shadow. He was sitting down on the ground and playing a game on his iPod, but when Warrior called to him he waved his hand and a dark circular disk appeared underneath me so we could stand on it. Placing my feet on the disk, I sighed and rolled my shoulders. Even if it was just flapping my wings, it was gettin’ pretty tiring, “Alright, you think you’re ready for the next step?”

“Yep,” I grinned enthusiastically.

“Great! So here’s what you’re going to do. Do the same thing that you were doing before except I’m not going to blow any air to hover you in the air. When I step off this disk it’ll get smaller so only your feet will be on it; that way when you flap you won’t hit the disk, and if this goes right you’ll slowly start lifting off the ground. Want to give it a try?”

I nodded my head and looked down at the black disk. Once Warrior flew off of it, it shrank so that I only had a small space to stand. Crouching down just a little, I slowly began to move my wings up and down like I was doing before. It felt a little different than before considering I didn’t have any wind blowing on me, but the less resistance helped me move them easier. I was able to flap harder and faster than I did before.

Smiling, I looked down at my feet to see if I was slowly lifting myself off the disk but sadly they stayed firmly planted on the ground. It was fine though. I can get this, no problem. I tried flapping harder to force myself off the ground, but instead I readjusted my footing to realize that I missed the disk and stepped off of it.

“Crap!” I exclaimed as I fell off of the black disk. I tried to flap my wings to catch me but they ended up in a tangled mess around my body. Thankfully, Warrior used the winds to catch me when I was only a foot off the ground. Sighing, I moved my body so I placed my feet on the ground. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Warrior said with a laugh, “You want to try again?”

I was a little hesitant to try it again, but Mist peer pressured me into doing it for a second time, and then a third time, and then a seventh time. I swear I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I keep doing the same thing and still I don’t even feel myself getting lifted off the ground, and Warrior even said that I wasn’t doing anything wrong. He just kept saying that I need to push harder and move my wings faster, and I did that, but for some reason it just doesn’t work.

“One more try!” I insisted, this time I didn’t need Mist pressuring me to try to get this whole flight thing. Now I was determined to fly.

Warrior gave me a concerned look as he looked to the floating disk five feet above him, “Are you sure? You seem pretty tired right now. Don’t you want to take a break?”

“But I’ve got this,” I told him, although my body posture probably said otherwise. I kept trying to push myself to the point where my forehead is starting to bead with sweat. I was also hunched over from the weight of my wings and even my wings were drooping ever so slightly at my sides rather than being held up at a comfortable position, “I can do this. Just one more try.”

Warrior frowned, still probably thinking that this wasn’t such a great idea, but he allowed me to try one more time, “If you can’t get it this time you’re done, okay? I don’t want you stressing yourself over this. Flying doesn’t just come to you in a day, you know. It’ll take time to practice.”

I wanted to believe his words of wisdom, but after that fire training I just went through I could believe otherwise. I mean I pulled off three moves that I never even knew I could do in just a quick sparring match. If I could figure out that much with my fire powers than flying shouldn’t be that much of a difference, right?

I kept my balance as the black disk rose me up to the five foot mark. Crouching down, I began to flap my wings up and down. I first started out slow, but after getting used to the feeling I started to go faster and faster. I clenched my fists in concentration and kept going, trying to push down the fatigue that I was already feeling before I got up here. I can do this, I just have to try harder, I can–

I gasped as I lost my footing once more and fell down towards the ground. The air whipped around me and I was caught by Warrior’s powers. Sighing with defeat, I placed my feet on the ground as the winds dispersed, “Come on, why can’t I get this?”

“Don’t worry, Cilia,” Warrior encouraged me as he patted my back, “You’ll get it, don’t worry, it’ll just take some time. We can work on it again tomorrow.”

I frowned but nodded my head to him. I think my excitement about this whole flying thing made me forget that not everything will come naturally to me and that I can’t get everything on the first try. It sucked really, especially since I was so anxious to get up in the air that I couldn’t even get my mind off of it, and it sucked even more when weeks went by and I was still stuck in the same situation.

WEEKS! Seriously! It got to the point where Shadow stopped my regular fire training because I insisted that I wanted to learn how to fly, but with each passing day I felt that I was getting worse and worse. Warrior went to some of his other friends in Calvatrace, the ones who actually had wings and have flown with them before, and asked for tips and tricks from them. At this point I’ve tried all the tricks and I’ve been given every single advice from Muneris that were both in the Validus and outside of it too and still nothing changes. Heck, Warrior even invited his Moonlight eagle, Genevieve, and all her friends to try to see if learning from them would work and that didn’t help at all.

What is wrong with me?!

By the end of the third week I was about ready to give up, and it really showed on my face even when I didn’t want it too. Everyone, even the non-Validus, could tell that I was pissed/depressed about something. I tried to keep an upbeat attitude as I walked from the cafeteria towards Scorch’s room. It’s not every day that I bring him food to eat. Majority of the carnivorous Moonlight animals here would go hunt for their food out in the forests by the school. Scorch would do that, but ever since the other day when he saw snow fall from the sky he refused to come out of that Medieval-looking room.

Pushing the door open, I walked into the room and found Scorch with some company.

“Cheater! You cheater!” Mist yelled at Scorch, “You can’t use your tail in ninja!”

Why not? You have a tail, Scorch protested in growls.

“You know I can’t understand you right?” She argued with an irritated glare, but that only made Scorch stick out his tongue at her.

“Whoa, okay what’s going on?” I asked before things got ugly.

Mist shook that blue strand of hair away from her face as she frowned at my Moonlight animal, “Scorch cheated! He can’t use his tail in ninja, right?!”

I don’t see what the big problem is, Scorch argued as he watched his tail curled around his front claws, You can use any part of your body in the game, right? So that means I can use my tail. She can too but that crazy water lover isn’t as awesome as me.

I stifled a laugh and set down Scorch’s lunch on a table, but he was too focused with this argument that he didn’t even notice it was there, “I have to agree with Scorch. He can use any part of his body and you have a tail too, Mist. You can use your tail too.”

“That’s no excuse!” She exclaimed in a squeaky voice, and by her sudden change of pitch she knows that this argument was lost, “H-He’s still a cheater!”

Am not, you are, Scorch said, folding his ears back and holding his head high as if he was royalty.

“Scorch, that doesn’t make sense. She accusing you of cheating, how can she– oh never mind,” I shook my head and picked up his lunch and swung it side to side for taunting reasons, “How ‘bout ya drop the argument and eat some lunch, eh?”

Food! Scorch exclaimed as he outstretched his hand over and grabbed the plastic bag. The Lava Guardian giggled like a schoolgirl as he curled up in front of the fireplace as he tore apart the bag to reveal a huge stack of raw meat. Hey, sure he likes fried chicken but I gotta feed him other stuff too ya know.  

“I still say he’s a cheater,” Mist muttered as she walked up to me. Scorch probably heard that comment but stayed quiet in fear that I might take away his food that he already started cooking with his own fire. “Anyway, great timing. I was about to leave to look for you.”

“What do you mean?” I asked as my head tilted to the side.

Mist looked over to Scorch as she spoke, “Well, after he’s done eating we’ll have to go over to the beach.”

I frowned at her in confusion. The beach? Why would we go there with Scorch? It’s cold enough to snow out there and there’s no way I can drag Scorch out there. I looked at Scorch uncertainly as he devoured his lunch, “Well, okay. As long as we don’t have to drag him outside I guess. Why? What’s goin’ on at the beach?”

Mist looked up at the ceiling in thought. She pinched her lips together and hummed before waving her hand and smirking, “Nah, I’ll let ya figure it out when we get there.”

I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Sometimes it was hard to tell if any secret Mist keeps from me is a good one or a bad one. It wasn’t long before Scorch finished his lunch so we all headed off to the beach. I was deathly surprised Scorch said he was excited to go to the beach. It was weird. Even back when it was warm enough to go outside, he didn’t want to go near the water and now suddenly he’s offering to lead the way? What’s up?

It was poor planning on my part (or Mist’s for that matter, I mean she told me the plans. I didn’t know about them) but I walked out of Calvatrace wearing nothing but a thin sweater and jeans for warmth.

The cold wind blew on my face as we walked out and I cringed at the freezing temperatures, “Holy crap! It’s freakin’ cold out here. Can’t I get a jacket or somethin’?!”
Even if Mist claims she likes the cold better than the hot, she was still hugging her arms to stay warm, “Eh, don’t worry. You’ll get warmer.”

Then can we hurry please? I’m freezing! Scorch asked. His head was low to the ground as he hunched over pressing his wings against his hide to block the wind. I rubbed Scorch’s neck for support and kept trudging towards the beach. I hoped whatever’s waiting for us there was worth it.

Because I was mainly looking at my own feet and the grass underneath the whole walk there, I didn’t even notice the people that were waiting for us there. Shadow was there with his Moonlight dragon and Christina was with them as well. Even Mist’s Moonlight animal, Magvig, was standing by with the crowd.  

“Hello, Keeper. I am glad you can join us today,” Christina greeted with a warm smile. She had her hands tucked in the pockets of this long dark brown winter jacket with a fur hood. Man, she was even better prepared for this cold than we were.

But besides her being here in a different attire, I was surprised that she knew who I was; being The Keeper I mean, I was surprised that she addressed me as The Keeper. I probably should have known right after the Mastering Ceremony that her conversation with Shadow was about me and not Neelaja, but this was the first time confronting her after the whole reveal so it was still kinda new to me. Man, she must have known about this whole thing for a while now. Wait– oh! That’s why she picked me up at the park in the mortal world! No wonder why getting picked up by Christina personally was such a huge deal!

“Hey,” I managed to say as all these thoughts swirled in my head at the last second. Not to mention that I was trying to hide the fact that I was miserable in this cold weather. “So, what are we doing exactly?”

Before I could go on, Shadow threw some smoke on me. I coughed and blew away the smoke only to see that I’m wearing a slightly different sweater. It was a red sweater with a white hood and white flames on the ends of the sleeves and the bottom of the sweater. Even if it was just a sweater, it was warm as heck and I instantly felt better than I did before.

“Wow, uh, thanks,” I breathed as I wrapped my hands around my new sweater, although still a bit confused on the whole thing considering that Shadow only offered to keep me warm and not anyone else.
       
“Hey! What about me?” Mist cried, her arms rubbing up and down her sides as she still tried to stay warm.

Me too! I’m cold too! Scorch protested along with her.

“You need not worry,” Christina reassured the two of them, “Lava Guardian, have you not learned of the climate control ability you possess?”

Climate control? Scorch asked, picking up his drooping head to look at the immortal. Then suddenly, as if a gear clicked in place, Scorch’s ears perked up like a dog and he grew a wide toothy grin, Oh! Oh you mean that thing! Yeah, I remember how to do that.

I wasn’t surprised that Scorch knew some ability that I didn’t even know about for a while. I mean when he was out and about he would frequently leave Calvatrace. Apparently there’s a whole other world out there outside of the border to the school. Going down the forest road you can go to so many different places in this dimension. Like in the other forest areas, that’s where you can find the packs of Moonlight wolves or the flocks of Moonlight eagles and griffons. There’s also a road that can take you to the flat plains where the Moonlight horses in front of a small mountain range where the Moonlight tigers live.

Then, if you take that forest road all the way down you’ll get to what Scorch calls the Adytum de Draco, or translated to the Shrine of the Dragon. It’s where all the purebred Moonlight dragons live and where Scorch goes to train with the other Guardians. That’s why he’s learning all these new techniques that even I can’t learn. It’s all part of the whole Guardian business.

It’s kinda crazy to see that there’re bigger places here besides the school, but so cool at the same time.

Without Christina saying another word, Scorch ran forward towards the cold sandy beach. Scorch leaped over where the grass ended at a two foot drop and where the sand began. Landing on the sand, he reared up on his hind legs, flapped his wings, and roared to the calm water; his crimson Lava Guardian markings glowing all over his body. After his fierce growl, he pounded his front claws on the sand and that’s where things started to change.

It was as if Scorch blew this huge bubble or something, a wave of yellow and orange spewed from his claws and flew upward and outward. That sphere grew so huge that when it enclosed itself, it looked like it could have swallowed up the whole lake. Once the dome was completely formed, the yellow and orange tint of the bubble disappeared, leaving no trace of where it was.

It was like he just pulled off some cool light show, but it would disappear the second he created it. But that wasn’t the case when Scorch unfurled his wings, which were still glowing from before, and leaped into the air. As he passed through the spot where his bubble used to stand, the invisible bubble rippled in a small wave of yellow and orange. It disappeared just as quickly when Scorch’s whole body was inside the invisible dome.

Woo hoo! Come on guys! You gotta check this out, it’s awesome! Scorch cheered as he flipped about in the invisible encasement.

“In a moment,” Christina called out to my Moonlight animal as he happily flew above the lake, but even if she said in a moment Mist ran straight to the area where the sand was covered by that bubble. Instantly when she passed through, she sighed and raised her head to the sky as if she just stepped into a nice hot bath during this cold winter. Even Magvig trotted over to join Mist right after she ran away.

“Now Keeper,” Christina continued, “Because you wish to keep your identity a secret I will be lending Scorch a cloaking ability for the duration of your flight training. This will allow you to fly out in the open without any student seeing your True Form.”  

“Uh, t-thank you,” I stuttered with a smile, although I was a bit surprised at this whole flight news. Mist didn’t exactly tell me why we were out on the beach to begin with so I suppose this is like a spoiler, and I also suppose this doesn’t mean that I’ll be flying inside the Cave anymore.

Christina smiled warmly as she nodded, “I wish you the best of luck in your training.”

I said another word of thanks as she leisurely walked back towards the school. I could have started up the next conversation any other way, maybe ask about this whole flight business or maybe what the heck that huge bubble was about, but the first thing that actually came out of my mouth was, “Dude, where did you get this sweater? It’s so freakin’ awesome!”

I caught the corner of Shadow’s mouth twitch upward as if he was stopping himself from smiling, “It’s a present; custom made too. It acts like a wind breaker even if the material is cotton. It’ll help you when you’re flying so you should wear this sweater when we’re training.”

“Cool, I can do that,” I said as I pulled the zipper up to keep myself warm, “So, what’s this whole thing about flying? I thought we were going to keep flying in the Hall of Elements or something.”

Shadow nodded his head towards Scorch as he flew around. “I thought learning from a dragon’s perspective would be better than learning from a bird’s perspective. You know?”

I nodded in response as Shadow looked to his own Moonlight dragon. I’ve seen Shadow’s Moonlight dragon a few times before but I never really got to meet her. She was a pitch black dragon with a row of spikes running down her head, neck, and part of her tail. The only splash of color that was on her was her bright yellow eyes that stared at me suspiciously as I approached her, “Hey there.”

Hi…s’up, She responded, a tone of boredom ringing in her voice. She sounded like an older teenager that was bored with being paired up with a Muneris younger than her.

“Yep, that’s pretty much Shade,” Shadow agreed as he swung his leg over her back to mount the dark brown saddle strapped to her. Considering that Shade caught on pretty quickly about what I was thinking she purposefully jerked upward, making Shadow temporarily lose his balance as he had to grab onto one of her spikes to stay on her back. I couldn’t help but laugh at that one.

“So, how is this gonna work?” I asked as I looked around. Scorch was still enjoying himself as he flew inside his bubble, Mist was also enjoying whatever was inside that bubble with Magvig, and Shadow looked like he was ready to take off with him. What was I supposed to do?

Shadow bent over and offered a hand to me, “Come on.”

As I grabbed his hand, he yanked me forward and helped me onto the small space that was left on the saddle. Thankfully I’m a small little Asian chick so it was a perfect fit. Without warning, Shade beat her wings hard and we were lifted up into the air. I gasped and gripped onto the back of the saddle for balance as we climbed higher and higher into the sky. Seconds flew by (no pun intended) and the next thing I saw was Shade diving right into that invisible bubble. When I passed through, a feeling of relief washed over me as the temperature drastically shifted from freezing winter to beautiful fall. I gasped and laughed as I couldn’t see my breath puff out in front of me.

“Oh this is great,” I breathed as I stretched out my arms above my head.

I know right? Scorch called out, hearing my comment from a little ways away in the sky.

Down below, I looked at the rippling waters and saw that Mist joined the party, jumping on Magvig’s back and riding her Moonlight horse right into the water. The horse leaped over the waves and pounded on the waves, splashing the water about but they were still able to stay on top of the water as they ran further into the lake.  

“Listen up!” Shadow called to get my attention, turning his head towards my Moonlight dragon and pointing, “I want you to take some time watching Scorch and how he flies.”

As if rehearsed, Scorch started to fly ahead of us in an even pace, like his movements was on a loop. I could see Shadow’s mouth move and I could hear the tone of his voice flow in my ears, but in all honesty I just zoned out after that. What? I was still doing what he was saying. As Scorch flew I paid attention to the little details; how his wings bent ever so slightly as he rose them back up to flap them down, the way his muscles moved on his back as he flew, and even the rocking motion of his head and tail. It was weird. I mean considering that for the longest time I’ve only seen birds fly so watching a dragon fly was pretty interesting. Also I–

“Keeper!” Shadow called to snap me out of my trance.

“Huh, yeah? Wha–?” I said stupidly as if I was pretending that I knew what he was talking about beforehand.

“I said, do you remember how dragons teach their hatchlings how to fly?” Shadow repeated, turning his head to see if I knew the answer.

I looked around in thought, trying to remember that small little detail. I did know it, and I was about to answer his question, but I was too slow to realize what was about to happen. Mind you, this all happened in like a second. Shade beat her wings so hard and bucked so violently that I lost my grip on her saddle. Gasping in fear, I watched in slow motion as I flew off of the saddle and towards the lake below.

“JERK!” I cried as I plummeted to my death.
Well this took longer than I expected, then again I was away from the computer for a long time so blah!

Okay! So let's see what the changes are for this chapter? Well it's definitely not the chapter name 'cause I just like that name too much XP Anyway, the flight training with Warrior is relatively the same except it's indoors and in the Hall of Elements instead of out in the open. Also, the process is in a lot more detail than before. This time I actually show that Warrior knows what he's doing. Back in the original this whole flight training moment went by in a few paragraphs and that's it. Come on! It's actually pretty interesting...well to me it is ^^

For a little comic relief, that whole ninja argument with Scorch and Mist is slightly different. In the original it was actually Kee and Scorch. Reason why I changed it? Well...I have no idea XP I just did 

Anyway, for something that I intentionally changed is the whole barrier thing. Back in the original, I described how Shadow took Kee and Scorch outside the Calvatrace border to practice her flying in the summer heat since the whole time difference doesn't apply outside the border. Well that's a big fat lie. I explained this in the short two paragraph explanation but there's so many other places outside of the border of Calvatrace. Heck, you know that Adytum de Draco place she was talkin' about? Under that huge area is a country filled with other living creatures. Know what that country is called? Endralma. Like, the home of the Creperum. Yes, it's that close. That's why Christina put a barrier around Calvatrace 'cause Creperum can just take a three hour bus ride all the way to enemy territory. 

So because of that logic, time in this whole dimension moves slower than regular mortal time so therefore it's cold and wintry outside of the border as well. Which brings me to the new creation of Scorch's ability to change the climate of a certain area for as long as he can hold it. This new thing allows me to show a little more of what Scorch can do as well as get Christina more involved with the story. I actually really like writing her in. I feel that in the original you barely get to know her and she barely makes an appearance and I will try hard to change that!   

Other than that, the fall is pretty much the same. Jeez, I rambled again didn't I? Sorry XD

Please feel free to ask questions, and don't be afraid to call me out on a grammar issue. I want this new rewrite to be typo free!

Shade, Shadow's Moonlight dragon...kinda...:giggle: tells you to comment, fav, and enjoy a relaxing summer 

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DarkStormGTS's avatar
"I kept my balance as the black disk rose be up to the five foot mark."


"...but ever since the other day when he saw snow fall from the sky he refused to come out of that Medieval-looking room ever since."
You put "ever since" twice, you might want to take one of them out.

Also, Shadow has the best power ever.  Clothes-conjuring? You can't beat that!