Wonderland

A/N: Hey all! I just wanted to apologize about any confusion from the last chapter regarding Tempest and her mutation. To answer everyone's question, YES, she's dragonish. (At least, that's my term for it.) Don't worry, the upcoming chapters will go into more detail about what that really means. ;)

Thanks to kitten2010 for editing this chapter for me. Any flaws you see are undoubtedly mine, as I like to tinker before I post. Also, a hearty thank you(!!!) to everyone who emailed me these past couple of months. Your words of encouragement is what pushed me to finish.

Enjoy! - L.A.

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Thatcher

The dragons distracted Fuyher long enough for Thatcher to escape.

Gritting his teeth, he drew himself to his feet and stumbled into a run, his blood leaving a crimson trail behind him like glistening rubies in the snow. Raspans scrambled through the trees ahead of him, screeching their fear as the dragons stormed the forest in pursuit. Thatcher was right behind the massive hoard of sweaty, smelly bodies, gasping hoarsely for air as he sprinted towards the Lunar's camp as fast as he could.

Suddenly, a dragon's roar filled Thatcher's eardrums and frightening warmth against his back urged him to run faster. As Thatcher leapt over a split pine tree in his path, he shot a brief glance over his shoulder.

Behind him, the forest was ablaze. The rusty red dragon responsible for the inferno disappeared into the fire. Fuyher, at the dragon's feet, was bathed in the same element before he too vanished to nothing.

Thatcher landed awkwardly on his left leg and fell to the forest floor with a loud curse, the telling snap and pain radiating from his ankle seconds later taking his breath away.

He stopped rolling when his back connected hard on another pine, his face taking a lashing from the low branches. With a groan, Thatcher propped up on his good elbow and surveyed the damage to his leg.

One swift look at the bone poking through flesh and jeans had his stomach rolling, but he managed to keep his food down.

Closing his eyes, Thatcher focused his magic on his breaks, intending to heal them, but the massive headache that struck like daggers into his temples forced him to stop. Opening his eyes to glance around at the forest once again, Thatcher shook his head in disgust at the predicament he was in.

No magic.

No one to watch his back.

Bum leg and a bum arm...

And the forest is on fire.

Thatcher swore loudly at his terrible luck, his body protesting as he pulled himself out from the pine's undergrowth and straight into a wall of smoke.

Unnatural colored flames clung to the pines and began to creep ever closer, thanks to the soft wind of a coming winter storm. The smell of snow and fire and old magic filled his sensitive nose, the scent growing exponentially stronger with each passing second.

He had to get out of the forest.

Not giving himself time to consider the danger of limping out from his hiding spot, Thatcher pulled himself onto his one good foot, gripping the branches of the pine for balance. Finding his bearings quickly, Thatcher turned east and began to shuffle through the snow, grimacing at each jarring jolt that his arm and left leg took.

The flames were coming quickly now, the heat of them warm enough to send sharp tingles of awareness through Thatcher's numb limbs. Panting heavily from exertion, he shuffled faster, his eyes never still as he swept across the silent landscape searching for signs of the enemy.

The closer he got to the clearing, the noisier the world became.

Thatcher's bum leg caught on a root and with a whoosh he fell to his stomach, bringing him face-to-face with a Common Raspan, its dull black eyes staring accusingly into Thatcher's soul. Closing off his air to keep from breathing in the smell of death, Thatcher used the pine responsible for his fall to pull himself to his feet again, his eyes never leaving the still-smoking body of an unfortunate Raspan that had been caught in a dragon's flames.

Another ear-splitting roar turned Thatcher's eyes to the valley, the sight causing a sickening feeling to settle in his gut.

Common Raspans ran unchecked through the Lunar camp, screeching and wheezing and wheeling about in terror as they sought to escape the danger from above. An entire herd streaked up towards the Elite Raspan's nests, only to be encountered by the white and blue dragon and set ablaze.

Luna women and children scrambled for the safety of the forests, clinging what little belongings they had left to their chests, their eyes constantly darting back over their shoulders to check for anyone falling behind or to see if they too were being chased.

The forests aren't safe!

Thatcher tried to scream. But the words, like his breath, were caught in his throat and he could only stare after them in mute protest.

As he watched another one of his brother's fall to the flames of the dragon, Thatcher felt his resolve waver.

For so long, he had wanted revenge and freedom from his father's legacy. Now that it was here, the victory left him feeling hollow.

Death in war was inevitable, he knew that. He had seen Gargoyle clans die by the hundreds under a single Drul spell. He had seen humans slay one another by simply releasing a ten-foot weapon of uranium out of a passing airplane.

But seeing the deaths and knowing that he was the cause of them was something entirely different.

Father was supposed to be the only one

, he thought, as he watched a Luna male be stampeded beneath the large clawed feet of a Common.

I didn't want anyone else to die.

Tears fell down Thatcher's grime-covered cheeks as he stared at the results of his own making.

Stumbling backwards until his body connected with the stump of a pine, Thatcher sank awkwardly to his side in the snow, the colors around him blurring as exhaustion and pain, both spiritual and physical, swept over him.

The last thing he saw before he succumbed to darkness was a single fleeing Raspan covered in arrows streaking across the Lunar camp, its eyes wild and rolling as it tried to escape the large gaping jaws of the black dragon...and failed.

Tempest

As the Druls sang a low haunting tune to ferry the slain souls to the next life, their subtle magic spell calmed the flames that the dragons had started until nothing but sweet-smelling smoke was left in their wake.

After the last Common Raspan had been brought down in a volley of arrows, no one had been able to move, most out of fear and some out of weariness. But when Lennox had released his shrill battle cry, one of victory, the instant answering call of the Lunar had signaled their rise. Everyone rushed to the gates, stabbing at fallen Raspan carcasses to ensure their stillness was out of lack of a beating organ and not out of play, their once fear-filled eyes now sparkling with relief and joy at being able to live to see the end of the day.

The battle was over now, and the funeral for those who had not lived to see the sun set had to be made.

I hadn't ever been to a funeral before. My family had all passed before me, but yet, I had never buried anyone in the ground. I have never stood before a mass grave, surrounded by those whom the dead had once loved, laughed, and dined with, bemoaning the shortness of life and the dire consequences of war. I had never shed tears over old memories or prayed for a happy, peaceful life in realms where the dead souls mingled.

I was detached from the world around me, but yet...I could feel everything.

I could feel the sorrow and pain of the Luna female standing next to me, her golden eyes locked onto the small body of a young girl, her fingers clinging to the torn hem of the girl's furs desperately as though afraid of letting go. She cried soundlessly, still in shock.

I could sense the anger in the body of a young Luna boy who never once looked away from the Druls as they sang, his tiny clawed hands sullied with someone's blood and clenched into tiny fists. His orange-gold eyes were distant, seeing things that I didn't dare imagine.

The emotions of those standing around me were not so silent. Their moans and whimpers almost overpowered the soft, droll hum of the Drul's song, some women wailing so loudly and in such pain that goose bumps spread across my body at the sound.

My eyes cut across the gathered circle of Lunar and Elites, across the pit of bodies to the place where Lennox and his father stood, the Council at their back. Talon stood beside them, his silver eyes watching the Drul's flames consume the bodies in the pit, his lips moving softly to the words of the Drul's hymn.

I looked up at the golden spikes that protruded from his skull, swallowing thickly.

Sometime during the battle, I had mutated into what the Druls called 'a child of the dragon', shedding my human skin for scales. In return, Talon too had changed -- his magic, suppressed by a few thousand years of sleep in a castle that I had freed him of, had broken free of its restraints, also during the battle. He stood taller than he had before and had aged dramatically, now resembling something so wholly inhuman, but still unnaturally beautiful. His eyes were constantly silver now, reflecting the Ancient magic that flowed through his veins. The golden spikes that encircled his head to resemble a crown bespoke of whom and what he was: the Gargoyle King. The Druls told him it was an ancient honor, one bestowed upon those worthy of such a title. I guess they didn't stop to think that as the last full-blooded, Ancient Gargoyle, there was no one else to "bestow" such a title to. Worth and honor were most likely not the key factors in the spell, but I wasn't going to say

that

aloud.

The Druls' haunting song came to a soft end, the final note lingering heavily in the air long after.

I swallowed hard as Kynan's voice, low and rumbling, cut across the entire valley with a prayer of the dead for the slain Lunar warriors. Lennox followed with a eulogy for the innocent, his husky tone more soothing than Kynan's had been, but just nearly as haunting and lost as the hymn of the Druls.

After he had finished, the scant remains of the Lunar camp were packed into carts and sacks for them to carry. No one spoke beyond carrying out a command, and the grey sky above did nothing to help alleviate the black mood.

Strong Elites in their natural form were made to carry the wounded on litters constructed of nothing more than planks of roughly cut wood still charred from the dragon's fire, roped together and covered with furs. Not exactly the most comfortable of conditions, but considering time constraints and the black forest of stumps that stretched as far as the eye could see no one had a choice as far as comfort went.

Once the valley was empty, Kynan and Lennox formed us into a line and began the march. I ended up towards the back of the long procession, next to Georgina and Saoirse as we led the women and children behind the remaining Elites, now numbered to a slim one hundred and twenty. At our sides, the Lunar warriors rode up and down the line, keeping everyone together as we passed out of the sweet smoke of war and into the frigid cold snow towards the mountains beyond.

I can't say how long we walked then. Hours drug on, days felt like weeks and a single week seemed to span an eternity. I had grown used to living off the earth and out of a pack due to the war, but living in a way that gave little in comfort, rest, and safety, I wasn't prepared for. Spirits had been low prior to the march, especially after the dead had been gathered and the wounded accounted for. The body of the one Raspan we had wanted to capture most, Fuyher, was missing or lost. Regardless of Fuyher being alive or not, we couldn't remain at camp any longer, not with the threat of humans breathing down our necks.

Now, a week into the march north, into the safety of the winter-torn Queensland Mountains, spirits were bleaker than bleak. They were nonexistent.

There were a number in the party who fell asleep in the snow and didn't wake up. There were women who had lost children that went crazed in the walk and ran towards things unseen in the forest, screaming out names to the sky. Some of them ran too far for us to find, most ran into traps or stumbled, their falls killing them. In the rocky terrain that we had encountered, many had fallen and broken limbs due to poor footing. Those women didn't stand a chance.

The few Raspan men that had succumbed to instinct and mated with the Lunar females were often irritable. They held themselves a bit away from the rest, hovering protectively over their mates and unborn brood with eyes that I couldn't look at for too long. One female had died during a hybrid's childbirth, leaving the male to fend for himself and a child that he had little knowledge of handling. The babe died with the cough three days in and he followed soon after in a manner of which that I don't wish to recall again.

This was the life of the march for me. I had never seen such death or loss in my entire life. I had seen movies and read books on these terrible subjects, ranging from the Holocaust to the Trail of Tears.

But never before had I lived it.

So when the mountains came literally towering over us, only a day's journey away, I had to admit that I was relieved. The physical exhaustion was probably just beginning, as who knows what lay inside the mountain. The spiritual and mental exertion of forcing myself to put one foot in front of the other, to keep the line moving and those around me from falling into their own sort of oblivion, was hopefully coming to an end. At least, for tonight it was.

I helped set up camp beside the Three Creeks, which had swollen to three rivers due to the large amount of melting snow in the mountains. The water was ice cold and moving fast, churning into white froth around the large rocks and bends. The Queensland Mountains were beyond the fairly treeless valley we had yet to cross, their peaks lost in grey clouds and their sides adorned with the same glaringly white powder that covered the ground. It seemed the closer we came to the mountains, the cooler the world felt, the damp air settling deep into a person's bones. Fires would be aplenty and well-managed tonight, that was for certain.

After making sure the camp had caught up and everyone was fairly settled in for the night, I pitched my own rugged lean-to and went off in search of spare firewood.

I swallowed hard as I passed through camp, unused to the eyes that followed after me and lingered on my new tail. Their expressions differed depending upon the man and woman. Most of them eyed me with something akin to fear. Some pitied me. Others just found me to be an interesting curiosity.

During the march, my random and spontaneous mutation had been the talk around the fires. I was no longer just human, but what was I? A child of the dragon was unheard of, and the dragons themselves were mum when it came to gathering information. Perhaps they had no clue what I was either.

I ducked my head and gathered my furs tighter around me, burying my face into the thick pelt of a black bear as a gust of wind whipped across my exposed skin. I stumbled around a sleeping Elite and his family, avoiding his wild, unsettled eyes as I hurried past. His growls followed me until they were swept up by the sounds of the wounded laying prone in their thin canvas tents.

I knew Thatcher was in one of them, but I didn't dare seek him out. Lennox had been the one to find him, buried under the snow next to a Common Raspan missing half its flesh. He barely had had a pulse, and his wounds were "severe" according to Georgina. He had been moaning incoherent things under his breath, prayers the Druls had said. None of the words made sense, and Thatcher had yet to wake up -- or stop praying.

I swallowed hard as I passed by the tents, mentally closing my ears to their cries of pain.

The stack of firewood set along the edge of camp was growing as I approached, thanks to the efforts of the Lunar and Elites who were dutifully cutting the pines, keeping the branches in a separate pile to be used for kindling. A Drul or two lingered close by, using their magic to warm the pine's sap so it would flow freely. I knew from experience that pine sap was flammable, and since war still undoubtedly loomed ahead, this could be used as a weapon of some sort.

Shaking my head clear of thoughts of battles, I grabbed as much firewood as I could carry and turned back towards camp.

I stopped short when a lone figure barred my way.

Standing tall and silent above me, Talon was every bit as formidable as he had been when we first met, if not more so. His wings were fastened around him like a cloak, the clawed wing forefingers acting as a hook that fastened snugly in the dip of his throat. A light grey elk pelt was draped over his shoulders, acting more as a shield from the snow than to keep warm. Even I could feel Talon's heat from here, the warmth calling me in like a moth to the flame. Snow flurries clung to his long dark hair, the strands shimmering emerald and amethyst in the firelight. Silver eyes bore deeply into my own, seeming to see everything.

When he reached out for the wood in my arms, the spell was broken.

Stumbling back, I stammered out, "I-I can carry my own firewood, thanks."

Talon ignored me and plucked the wood from my arms. He picked up the log I had dropped into the snow and wordlessly turned back towards camp, his long gait taking him far from me within no time at all.

Swearing silently under my breath, I followed after, trembling for more reasons than one.

Since leaving the Lunar's camp a little over a week ago, I had been seeing more of Talon than I ever had in camp. I saw him leaving for the hunt every evening, flying ahead to scout during the march, him walking beside Lennox and Kynan discussing whatever it is those three discussed...no matter where I seemed to go, there was Talon, always within sight.

On the march my thoughts had wandered -- a lot -- and embarrassingly, I found them more often than usual lingering on Talon. Or on Talon's arms, or his clawed but nimble hands, or the gentle smile on his lips when he brought food to camp and the little ones would gather around him to ooh and aah at his quarry. I had always admired Talon, and yes, fawned over him a bit, but the feelings in my chest when I saw him each morning wasn't admiration, I don't think. The emotions I felt were...

dangerous

. Dangerous in their implication and dangerous in a way that brought fear I had buried deep inside me to the fore.

The logical explanation to these feelings, as much as I was hesitant to admit it, was love. But I didn't want to fall in love with Talon. The idea of losing him like I had lost my family or have him leave me because of some twisted sense of principle or logic, like Thatcher had, was enough to stamp out those girly, butterfly-in-my-stomach sensations.

A patient, but amused, throat clearing sent my thoughts back to the present, though not entirely away from the towering Gargoyle in front of me and I hurried to catch up.

When we reached the main camp, Talon didn't take the path towards my raggedy lean-to but instead turned north towards the large sturdy tents where Kynan, Lennox, and a few Elites had made their home for the night.

I swallowed hard as we passed those as well and stared off into the distance at the lone tent built back against a rocky outcrop that may have once been an outlook building for the park rangers, maybe even an abandoned hunter's cabin. I noticed immediately that his tent didn't whip around like the others and his fire was low and controlled.

Talon set my meager pile of firewood next to his and pushed aside the furs that covered the entry, beckoning me inside with a subtle gesture of his chin.