Dragon Blood

As I sat down for English, my partner seemed really disturbed. I mean, ok. We were doing Story writing today. I guess he knew how much I sucked at that. He was probably wishing that I had been dead or something, the look of disgust on his face reaching to a frightening level. 

"Look, can you just spit out whatever the hell you have to say?" I asked irritably. "This indecision is killing me."

He rolled his eyes. "Don't show me that attitude, ok? You're gonna fail if you don't have my help on this thing."

I looked at my own blank paper. My thoughts were of course on Alastair Winston. I glanced at him. He was bent down on his sheet, writing something frantically.

I sighed. I hated this place. It was less than a week I was here, at Moon Cove, and I was sick already. I wanted to go back to home already, this place was too much for me. I took out a cutter from my pencil bag and fiddled with it. Alastair's eyes went wide when he saw me. 

"Stop playing with that, you're gonna cut yourself--"

Somehow, the blade cut a deep gash at my thumb. I screamed, and the bloody cutter slipped to the floor. The whole class looked at us. Mr. Woods came up to us.

"What was the need of handling a cutter in an English class, Miss Auden?" he asked me, regarding me with his cold, blue eyes.

"He did it!" I squealed, holding my bleeding thumb. "He tried to pull it out!"

Alastair, meanwhile, had gone very pale. He got up from his seat, said something like ,"Washroom, sir?" and ran out of the class.

Our teacher sighed. "Who'll take Hazel to the sick room?"

A guy from the second row held up his hand. "I will, sir."

We walked out, and on the way, we remained silent, not saying a word to each other. After sometime he turned to me. "I'm Robert Verlane. You're Hazel, I know that. What were you doing with a cutter in English class?"

I glanced at my throbbing thumb, now covered with my white handkerchief, which had gone red. "I was bored?"

He looked at me in the eyes, deadly serious. His green eyes bore into me, as though searching for something. He finally looked away. "Well, don't do stuff like that around here. You could hurt yourself pretty bad. Show me your hand." 

I let him take my hand, and he led me to one of the shelfs beside the library. He wiped the wound gingerly with his own handkerchief. He looked at me. "This is gonna hurt a bit," he warned.

I nodded. "'K."

He took my hand to his mouth, and sucked at the wound. I winced, for it stung at first, but after sometime, the pain seemed to be subsiding. Now the wound seemed to have closed up, it seemed more like a small scratch. It felt better, even though my hand now hand saliva all over it. 

"Better?" he asked.

"Yeah. Maybe a Band-Aid will be ok for now." I smiled in gratitude.

He smiled back, and wiped my hand clean. He then took out a Band-Aid out of his pocket and put it over the cut. "That's good. It just saved you a whole lot of fuss in the sick room."

"And questions from my dad." We were walking back to class now. "Anyways, how did you do that? Heal my wound?" 

He didn't answer immediately. Then: "You don't know?"

I shook my head. "No."

"You are new here, aren't you?"

"Yeah, why?"

He nodded. The bell rang, and he took off at a jog towards the cafeteria. "I guess it's just not for me to explain. See you later, Hazel!" I stared after him, darned confused, then decided that I had to pick up my things from English class.

I didn't meet with Alastair later in the day, and considering that our thing was due a day after tomorrow, I really had to start working on that if he wasn't going to help me on that. 

Night wasn't any better. I lay back on bed, without the slightest hint of sleep in my eyes, for what seemed like hours, thinking about what Robert had said. What was it that Dad was hiding from me? What was it that he couldn't let know? Maybe it could be why I was so suddenly uprooted from my home at New York and brought into this Idiotic Town of Nowhere. 

Finally, I couldn't take this anymore. I got down from bed, and my first instinct was to go to Dad and ask him for the answers. I checked my table clock. It showed a little more than midnight. On second thoughts, I walked out to the balcony, deciding that it could maybe calm me.

The cool breeze whipped the hair over my face. It was a clear night, and the numerous stars studded the moonless dark sky. I stood there for sometime, when I noticed that there was a fire escape next to the balcony.

I looked around nervously, the climbed down the creaking old stairs, adventure flaring inside me. It won't be too bad, I convinced myself. I'll shout for help if I'm stuck or in trouble.

I walked across the backyard and into the woods, my eyes getting used to the darkness soon enough. The stream was nearby; I could hear it rushing down, and after a few steps, I was in view of it.

The stream seemed black in the night, and gurgled past smoothly. I stood by the bank for a few minutes. It was my favourite place in the whole of Moon Cove, I really liked the calm and quiet. It made me as separated from the world and my problems.

"Hazel?" 

I whipped around to see that it was Robert, sitting on a rock a few feet from me. He looked utterly bewildered and was trying hard not to laugh. 

"What are you doing here?" I nearly screamed.

He smiled. "More like what you are doing here at this time of the night."

"I couldn't sleep," I admitted.

"Well, then." He shrugged. "Care to join me?"

I didn't have anything to do, so I agreed and sat beside him on one of the rocks.

"How do you like Moon Cove?" he asked me after sometime.

"It's horrible," I said very truthfully.

"You're from New York, aren't you? Maybe that could be a reason," he said. "Plus, all the girls think you're very interfering."

"Why?"

He smiled. "They think you're gonna take away all the good guys. You're pretty."

"Do you think so?"

"Not when you're in your night gown, no." He gave a quick glance at me.

I rolled my eyes. Then something more occured to me. "You told me that you could explain. My dad won't, so you have to."

He sighed. "Well, I guess we won't be overheard over here.

"Moon Cove is basically a settlement of the magical community that still exists in this part of the States," he began. "However, very few know of it. Even the humans here don't have any idea. 

"The Guardian Dragons, they protect Moon Cove. The Protector, the Healer, the Destroyer and the Seer. They protect its people. They have been the ones to maintain the peace over here. For the past 15 years, I think, there hasn't been any major disturbances, except for a fight that got the Destroyer killed. 

"Now, The Protector usually looks over everything, The Seer predicts the future, The Healer the main line of defense, and The Destroyer the main for offense. The Seer predicts that something bad is going to happen, but we don't have the Destroyer. You can sense that there's a tense air everywhere, even in the humans who don't know anything about it."

"Excuse me, but where do I come in?" I interrupted.

"There's something about you. That's the reason why you faced so many near-death incidents in New York. Your father thought that you would be easier to protect in this small town. But you're far than better here." He stared at the water. "You're blood's ... tempting. There's danger all around you. You weren't informed of it for your parents thought that ignorance would keep you safe, but I tell you, it won't. There's danger all around. You're a dragon blood, I'd say, and it isn't clear to me yet of what species you are. What part you may play." He stood up. "One more thing before I go, Hazel. Beware of Alastair. There's more to him than meets the eye."

The next morning when I woke up, I was sure it was a dream. I mean, I was back at bed, and no matter how much I stressed my mind, no suitable explanation came up for that. I decided that I was just going crazy by staying in this loony town. 

I did not meet Robert at school. Neither did he turn up for Maths and Biology, the classes we had together that day.

Alastair walked up to me during recess. "Hazel, do you mind if I have a quick word with you? About the essay?"

"Ok." I stood up, though I was suddenly reminded of Robert's words.

We walked to the back of the school. Only after we were in the woods did I suspect something fishy.

"Alastair, why do we need to come here to talk about our assesssment?" I asked suspisciously. He pinned me to the nearest tree in answer.

"You just found out. We don't have time." He grinned, flashing me his inch long fangs.

"No," I breathed. "You... you--"

He smirked and leaned forward, pulling down my t shirt till the shoulders. It was getting too much. I could sense his hot breath on my cheeks and neck. A speck of saliva fell on my throat. I heard someone scream, "Don't!"

Pain seared through me as he bit me. "Stop," I muttered. A slight pricking went all over me. I got a bit of energy to scream. "STOP!"

I dug my nails into him, and he let out a bloodcurdling scream. He drew back, clutching his sides, and when I looked at my arm, I nearly screamed, too.

There were grey scales on my whole arm, and my fingers ended in claws. That didn't seem like a problem to me right then. I was mad. I wanted to smash something.

"So my predictions were right," Alastair said slyly. "This means that you'll make me more powerful, even though I have to fight to get you, and I love good fights."

He ran at me in lightning speed, and punched me in my stomach. Another punch. His punches seemed to be like boulders being thrown at me. "Stop. Play fair," I gasped. I felt out of breath.

"I am fair." He stopped to give me a shrug.

All of a sudden, a green haze hit him, slamming him to the very tree that he had pinned me to. "Don't--mess--with--her," the guy said, hitting him in the face.

Alastair grabbed his arm. "You can't hurt me, Robert. As the Healer, you won't be able to. She should be the one fighting me." Blood flowed from his cut lip.

Having recovered my breath, I walked up to him, and grabbed his neck, squeezing my nails into it. I punched him in the face. It felt good. Another.

"Why are you doing this, Alastair?" Robert asked, stepping beside us. "Why?

He smiled, a bloody grin. "She's coming back. Darkness. To take over."

"What?" Robert asked. He punched him in his face again. "She cannot return unless she's being... wait, Alastair, you're summoning her? You are helping her to come back to power?"

He just nodded. Robert grabbed his own hair, and green scales covered his cheek as I saw. "This is bad, really bad," he kept on muttering. He then turned to face him. 

"Speak, or I'll kill you!" I threatened, tightening my grip around his throat. Truth to be told, I did not have an inkling of what was happening, but whatever it was, it was definitely not good.

He laughed maniacally at us. "The best you can do is kill me now, 'cuz I'm not telling you anything, except that she is returning. She'll be returning to reign over Moon Cove again, and set things in order. I'll really like to see what you pathetic 'Guardian Dragons'"-- he made apostrophes with his fingers and pointed at Robert and me--"will do to stop her."

"Who else is in league with you?" I said, my claws at his neck. "Who ELSE?"

He just laughed again and shook his head, which gave him a vivid impression of being drunk. "You can't uproot us, idiot. There are humans, mages, werewolves, vampires, dragons," he looked at Robert now. "I think you'd understand better than anyone, Rob."

Robert's eyes seemed to burn with a strange fire. He gave a roar and lunged at Alastair, freeing him from my grip and leaving quite a bit of his blood stained t-shirt in my hand. "DIE! I don't care whether they kill me or not for this, but I'll make sure YOU are DEAD!" He punched his already broken eyes, and kept on punching till Alastair did not show any signs of consciousness, and then he flopped down to the ground beside him.

Alastair's face was a mess, blood pouring down his nose, and a bad cut on his upper lip and forehead. "Is he dead?" I asked timidly. The adrenaline rush seemed to have left me; I felt tired now, I was scared, I did not understand what to do.

Robert looked away, his face still had green scales covering his cheeks, and his arms were still scaly. "I don't think so," he answered, his voice cracking. "I don't know."

"What will happen now?" I asked, sitting down opposite him. 

"What more?" he said, sounding miserable. "Moon Cove's under attack, or will be, very soon. I'm bound to be banished after breaking my oath. We don't know who else is plotting this. The Protector's missing. The Seer can't say clearly, the future changes with every minor decision anyone makes." He took a deep breath and looked at me. "You are our last hope, Hazel. You are the Destroyer, and you shall have to take lead."