The Crystal Dragon Series Collection Read online

  “Well, I’ve never fought with weapons before today, but I have fought before. It was just hand-to-hand combat and self-defense,” I explain.

  “That must explain it,” he decides with a satisfied nod. “Plus, just because it isn’t your Gift yet doesn’t mean it won’t be in the future. Your body certainly isn’t rejecting it, at least.”

  “Yes, perhaps it will be,” I murmur, having a hard time picturing myself being in control of any Gifts, despite my practicing with them for over an hour. It’s just too surreal. It’s magic, and magic just hasn’t existed in my world before, and it’s difficult to accept it now.

  Returning to Vlad, he has me throw my thoughts at him and try to pierce his mind and read his thoughts. I try, but I’m tired, and he has a wall of defenses around it, so all I get from it is a feeling of his growing dislike of me. What else is new. He does seem to be impressed, however, with my overall scores for the Gifts.

  The last thing I have to do is attempt to fly. So, leaving the square behind, he has me climb a tree as high as I dare so that if I can’t manage it, I won’t kill myself with the fall. He stands underneath me, ready to catch me should I fall. Determined not to have to touch him, I fearlessly jump into the air and push myself forward with my mind. I start out slowly, but as I realize that I’m not going to fall, I have some fun with it. I shoot upward, make some loops, and simply enjoy the feeling of flying through the warm air. I then decide to scare Vlad a little- and to have fun, but mostly to scare him- and zoom downwards, pulling up just before I hit the ground. He shouts at me to stop showing off and land. Sighing, I do as he says, touching down lightly in front of him.

  Scowling at me, he says that I can go.

  “What about my scores? Aren’t you going to tell me?”

  “No,” he growls. “I tell that to Thaddeus. You need to figure out your Gifts yourself. Besides, these tests aren’t exactly reliable. It’s not good to rely on them when, if it is not your Gift and you try to use it, and it fails… well, let’s just say, your partner in the Games is likely to find themselves without a partner. Now go away! Go back and give this to Thaddeus,” he says, handing me the paper after he folds it into thirds. “And DO NOT look. I’ll know if you do, and it’s just not worth it, trust me. Now get out of my sight!” And with that, he storms off back to the square. Deciding to fly back to Thaddeus and Nathan and rest my exhausted legs, I push myself into the air with my mind and take off in the direction of the tallest building in the Village.

  The feeling of flying is amazing… indescribable… the closest I can get is to describe it as a mix of skydiving and riding a rollercoaster, but calmer, slower, and you’re entirely in control. It feels… like freedom. I reach the building all too soon and land on the roof next to a startled Nathan and calm Thaddeus. I hand him the paper, watching his face anxiously as he reads it, but I can’t read any emotions on it. He just nods thoughtfully and puts the paper in his back pocket.

  I’m dying to know what Vlad said, but I know that if Thaddeus wanted to tell me, he would. Begging wouldn’t help my cause. So I sit down instead, looking at their chess game. I can clearly see a path that Thaddeus had left open for him, but I don’t say anything, sitting quietly on the chair and urging him with my mind which move to take instead. He apparently doesn’t see it, though, or the trap that Thaddeus also had ready for him, for he plays right into it. The game is over with Thaddeus’s next move.

  Sighing, Nathan leans back in his chair. He looks at me, mirth playing in his eyes. “He’s beaten me three times already. Did he ever beat you that fast?”

  “Well… no, but he did beat me. I thought that I was really good, but he somehow avoided all my traps. I think that Thaddeus is the best there is!”

  “Your parents too,” Thaddeus replies, chuckling. I wonder why they are both in such a good mood, but brush it off. “Although you are the closest to my equal that I’ve ever seen,” he admits.

  “Really?”

  “Yes. But let’s get down to business. I need to tell you two about the First Challenge.” Nathan and I lean in, anxious to hear this life-preserving knowledge. “The goal is to find and bring back the egg of a Zyloff.” His voice is heavy with meaning, but it goes right over my head.

  I blink. “Um… what is that again?” I ask sheepishly.

  Thaddeus sighs. “It’s essentially a giant snake, only with feathers and wings and, when full grown, can kill you instantly with a mere glance, and it can kill you both with a single bite.”

  “…Oh,” I say weakly. “I guess we should avoid the mom, then.”

  Nathan jumps in with a question. “You said we have to bring it back. Back to where? To the Village?” An excellent question.

  “To your starting place. Each team will start an equal distance away from the nest of eggs, although you may be far from the next team. There are three eggs, so whoever finishes first is the winner, the other two in second and third places respectively. You must bring the egg back to that spot, and then the Challenge will end. Until then, others may take the egg from you. So avoid any other teams, any other creatures you come across, and, well, try to stay alive. And don’t get lost; although you should be fine in this Challenge since each starting place is glowing the team’s color. You two are dark purple, which also means that you wear an outfit with your color on it,” he continues, leaning down and picking up a box. Opening it, he pulls out a new set of clothes for each of us. They appear to be the same as the ones we are already wearing, except it’s black with purple on the outside of the pockets, sleeves, around the outside of the soles of the boots, as well as the inside of the hood on the jacket.

  “Since you two are now an official team, you will share a building to sleep in. There are two beds, of course, but you will now be living together. I will show you to your house after dinner. First, are there any questions? I probably won’t be able to answer any specific ones about the Challenge, of course, but we shall see.”

  Nathan speaks up first. “I’ve been wondering… I guess this might be a dumb question, but why do people here have Gifts? And why can we get them, even though where we come from no one does?”

  Thaddeus slowly smiles. “That is certainly not a dumb question, and I’m more than happy to answer it for you. Would you like the long version, or the short?”

  “Long,” we both respond at once. Clarity is essential and hard to come by in such a vastly different world. Being late for dinner is nothing compared to knowledge.

  He chuckles. “Very well. In that case, I must also explain to you about the realms. You see, they used to all be one countless millennium ago. No one knows what caused it to happen, but something split it apart into the seven realms we know today. The original realm, Aroidu, had powerful magic woven throughout the entirety of it. But when it split, the magic was unevenly distributed. Lii has the most, while First and Second Earths have almost none- which is what led to such great strides in technology there.

  “We call the Gifts such because it is from the realm that we receive it. A person must have a connection to the magic woven into the fabric of everything around us in order to receive their Gift. That is why some never get a Gift, and the Dragon family tends to receive more. Their dragon part makes them especially sensitive to that first and oldest of magics.”

  We sit silently for a moment, absorbing this new knowledge. I stare at my hands, anxious to ask Thaddeus something but unsure if it would be wise to do so. It builds within me until it finally just comes out. “Will there be werewolves?” The two stare at me, a question evident in their eyes.

  “Why?” Thaddeus asks. Sighing, I finally tell them of Vlad’s threat.

  Nathan’s eyes widen. “What? I thought I said… never mind. What’s done is done. I just hope we can avoid them.”

  “Oh, you should be able to avoid them, alright,” Thaddeus assures us. “Because they won’t be in this Challenge. It’s too late for Vladimir to change anything to this one. I cannot guarantee, however, that they will not
be in the Second Challenge. I would try to get on his good side, that’s for sure,” he adds. I wince.

  “I don’t know that I’ll be able to. He hates me. I have no chance of that anymore. Nathan might, but I think the best thing for me to do is just to avoid him.”

  “Why?” He asks, leading to me explaining about reading his mind and feeling his feelings of jealousy and hatred, which the feelings of him being impressed with my skills certainly hadn’t touched. “I suppose there’s nothing to do if he just has his heart set against you,” Thaddeus consents, sighing. “I will still try to reason with him. After all, you are our next ruler, and we can’t have you getting killed just because Vladimir is being stubborn.” I bite my lip to keep from protesting. I still plan on going straight home after this madness, not leaving my family- the one that actually raised me- for the one that everyone says I belong with. I especially don’t want to rule this insane place. I’m only sixteen! I can’t lead an entire land!

  I snap out of my thoughts to hear Thaddeus say, “Alright then. If there are no other questions, then we will head back down.” As I step towards the elevator, he adds, “…on the stairs.” I groan inside, but don’t complain despite my already very sore legs.

  “Hey, Thaddeus,” I begin as he opens the door to the stairs. “Are you going to tell everyone that I’m the Princess?”

  He doesn’t respond for a few steps. “Not yet,” he finally says. “We don’t need that complicating the Games for everyone. Perhaps after the Games.” He thinks for another moment. “I’ll do what I can with the cameras throughout as well, though you should probably refrain from mentioning that there is anything unusual about you if you can.” He warns.

  Relief sweeps over me. I didn’t want to deal with everyone thinking I’m their ruler on top of everything else. Nathan and I let Thaddeus get a little ahead of us so we can talk as we descend. He turns to me, and I can see that he can barely keep from laughing. When I ask why, he replies, chortling, “You… your hair…” Reaching up with my hands, I feel that my hair is still sticking up all over the place from the lightning. I start laughing too as I picture how I must look.

  When he catches his breath, he asks me sarcastically, “What did you do? Play with lighting?”

  “Yeah,” I laugh. “You should have seen Vlad’s face! His hair was worse than mine- it even had sparks running around in it! It was hilarious!” He laughs as well, but it soon dies away as we fall back into our own thoughts. Unsure of what to say, we walk down the rest of the stairs in silence. I eventually get so tired that I slip and fall into the open air. Luckily, I react quickly enough to fly off to the side and land on the stairs. I pant, trying to catch my breath and calm down after that sudden wake-up call. Nathan hurries down the stairs to see if I’m alright.

  After that, the trek to our new house is uneventful. We stop to have dinner, where Thaddeus adds a flavorless powder to our soup that’s supposed to help with soreness. We eat alone since we missed the designated dinner time for the contestants. When we reach our new house, we both just collapse on one of the beds, not caring who gets which, and fall asleep.

  Chapter Eight

  The First Challenge

  I don’t get to sleep long. There’s a loud knock on the door a few hours before dawn and I hear Vlad shout, “Rise and shine! Make yourself some breakfast and then come down to the square. Be there in an hour and a half- no later! We don’t want to wait around for you!” He then walks away, chuckling to himself. I can tell he enjoys torturing us all. Rolling over in bed, I fall asleep again even though I know I really shouldn’t.

  When I wake up again half an hour later, it’s to the smell of eggs, bacon, and blueberry muffins. One of my favorite breakfasts growing up. My stomach growls at me, but before I go over to the kitchen, I head to the shower to freshen up really quickly. Once clean, I change into my new black and purple outfit, find a brush, and detangle my hair before rebraiding it with a new elastic since the other one got… demolished.

  Heading down to the small basement I find Nathan dishing out scrambled eggs onto two plates. He looks up at me with bloodshot eyes and smiles wearily. “Hey. I made us some breakfast. I figure we’ll need our strength for the First Challenge, right? Plus, who knows where we can find food in there? So eat up, I made plenty.”

  Feeling guilty, I sit down across from him at the small round table. As we start to eat, I apologize for not waking up when I was supposed to and for making him prepare breakfast, but he interrupts me partway through.

  “Stop. Don’t apologize. You don’t need to. I wanted to make breakfast for you, and I figured you probably wouldn’t let me if you were awake. So I’m glad you slept a little longer. Besides, it’s better for at least one of us to be as alert as possible today, right? If you got up when I did, then you would be just as tired as I am and we would be at a disadvantage. So don’t apologize, just shut up and eat.”

  We laugh a little, but the nerves don’t let it last, and it cuts our laughter short. Soon we are just stuffing our faces with as much food as we can eat. We barely finish it all, but I sure do feel a lot better with some hot food in my stomach. Glancing at my watch, I see that our time is almost up. I warn Nathan, and we head out the door together and toward the square. The Village seems unusually quiet today, but that’s just fine for me. I don’t feel like putting up with Jake’s flirting or any of the other contestants’ confidence any longer than I have to. Wanting to fly again, I jump into the air and think myself forward, but nothing happens, and I fall back to the ground, landing on my feet. Nathan looks at me, curious. I casually resume walking before explaining that I had attempted to fly. “But it isn’t working anymore. I’m not sure why.”

  “I think I might,” he responds. “Remember how we’re going through ‘Zilferian puberty?’ Well, that means that our bodies are just trying out the Gifts. So your body must have moved on to trying another Gift.” I nod, feeling stupid that I didn’t remember that.

  When we get to the square, I realize that something is wrong. I was expecting us all to meet here and be transported closer to the Zyloff together. What faces me, however, is a completely deserted center of the Village. A bad feeling causes my guts to churn. I’m just starting to tell Nathan that we should go back when I feel a sharp prick in my right arm and fall into darkness.

  *****

  I don’t feel groggy when I come to, which surprises me. Blinking my eyes open, the first thing I notice is the bright light. I quickly shut them again, waiting for the burning to fade. I slowly open them and wait for them to adjust. After that, I notice many things as I frantically try to take in everything around me. We are in a forest- obviously the one Thaddeus mentioned as an ‘arena’ for the Games. Nathan is sitting up next to me on a raised platform, looking around in a panic. There is a purple light surrounding the platform, a few inches wide that emits a column of dark purple that extends into the air, rising above the treetops. We’re alone, facing the sun, which is already out and over the mountains. It appears to be about ten o’clock.

  Noises come from the woods around us, indicating that there is life here. It comforts me at first, but then I remember that nothing here is as it seems. I jump up, instinctively getting into the defensive position that I was taught long ago. Nathan joins me, and we stand back to back. I can feel his heart pounding as hard as mine. How is this our life now? How did it come to this- being sedated and dragged into the woods to try and survive amongst creatures that should be fantasy?

  “So… here we are,” Nathan murmurs, his voice cracking under stress. “The First Challenge.”

  I give a shaky nod in return but am unable to say anything in response as a voice booms out of the surrounding woods. I jump, my nerves on edge. I then realize that the voice is familiar. I finally place it as she continues- it’s Nehru. Apparently, she’s the announcer for our ‘Games.’

  “Hello! Contestants! This is Nehru speaking! I know you may be a little confused and disoriented…”

  “Yea
h, maybe,” I growl sarcastically. Nathan does his best at a chuckle.

  “…So I will let you know… you are in one of our largest arenas, competing in the First Challenge! So sorry about the sedation, it just helps with the equality of the Games, you know. Anyways, you will be permitted to leave your platforms only once the gun goes off. After that, it’s basically a free-for-all- but killing other contestants is not allowed. I hope you each have at least one of your Gifts, or you may have quite the fight on your hands! For the moment, just sit still and… ponder, plan, or just procrastinate!” With a giggle, Nehru’s voice disappears. Nathan and I look at each other, eyebrows raised. I shrug, and we sit down again.

  “We should spend this time coming up with a plan,” I suggest to Nathan.

  He nods. “I think we should make our way toward the middle. They’re all about making everything fair, right? So the eggs should be the same distance away from everyone.”

  “Um, yes, that’s great… in theory,” I reply, groaning in frustration. “The only problem is… where’s the middle?”

  He looks thoughtful for a moment before responding. “I know! How about once the gun goes off, one of us can climb a tree and look around for the other teams’ lights. Remember, Sierra and Ham are red. We can see if we can meet up and help each other.”

  “Right,” I nod, looking around for a good tree to climb. I then notice that I overlooked something earlier. Leaning against a large rock close to us are two black and purple backpacks. Finally, the anxiously awaited and equally dreaded gun fires and Nathan and I sprint toward the bags, pulling them on without looking through them first. There’s probably just food in it, I say to myself while racing toward a tall tree near me. Besides, a head start is probably the most useful thing for us right now. We need to get with Sierra and Ham so we can all try to survive this… besides, it’s also a race. And the Challenge will end the sooner we get to those eggs. I just hope we can sneak an egg away from their terrifying mother…