Zenora, The Dragon's Fury
59. Partner?

She started to breath normally again, and lifted her head to look up at me.

“Hi there gorgeous. Can you show me where that awful man went to?” I asked her.

I put my hand on her head, and focused on what she wanted to show me.

“They are coming? Now? Why didn’t you say that to me earlier?! You worthless bitch!” Hayden yelled, while his eyes were glazed over with a grey colour. “Get the Pteragons ready! We are going to burn this town.” He yelled towards his men.

The Pteragons were poked with lightning-rods, forcing them to go in the direction that the men wanted them to. They poked them even more, to burn the roofs of the houses, fences, cattle and so on. Everything was torched by the creatures. And even though the people inside, started to wake up from the fire, the men kept forcing the Pteragons to burn the whole town.

Within the hour, plenty of people were killed already, due to the smoke inhalation or burns.

“Gather them all! We are leaving!” Hayden yelled.

But the red Pteragon objected, and got stunned by the lightning rod that was held by her handler. Her mind went dark for a moment, and when she awoke again, she was surrounded by the flames, and then in her state of fear, she had seen me.

“And? Did she see anything?” Tyler asked me, when I had stood up after the vision.

“Only confirmation of what we suspected, that there is indeed a spy in our castle. A female. But other than that, no, this Pteragon got knocked out before I could see where Hayden went.” I said to him.

He cursed some words, and went to get to Jack to mount him. I went to go to Bastet, and mounted her too. Our only choice is that we go home now, and try to replace out who the spy is.

“Go Bastet, fly up.” I said, but got interrupted by the red Pteragon, who was nipping at my leather jacket.

I just wanted to leave her, there is plenty of burned food for her, so she should be fine. And besides that, we weren’t done with rescuing the citizens that were still alive.

As I stepped of, I asked what she wanted. She pushed her head against my hand, noting for me to read her again, she is so smart, that she already understands my power. Hence, as she ‘asked’ me, I put my hand on her head and focused on her mind.

She showed me the image of the other Pteragons that were being mistreated and hurt with those same lightning-rods. I could feel her pain, as she wanted to rescue them, maybe she is some sort of leader for them? Her exceptional rare colour could be, because she was smarter, stronger and more intelligent than her fellow Pteragons.

“I know you want to help them, but I don’t know where that man is, right now. I’m sorry.” I said to her.

I was really sad for her family to be treated that way, but I can’t help her now, as I really don’t know where Hayden took them to. We had to go now, so I mounted Bastet again and told her to fly up. But as Bastet rose in the air, I could hear shrieks and hissing behind me.

The red Pteragon was trying to fly right behind me! But as she wasn’t healed completely yet, her wings slipped, and made her drop a yard or two, every time she got up a little.

“Tame her, Mother.” Tyler said after we had landed safely again.

“What? Why?” I said to him.

“Clearly she knows and feels that you are strong, she wants to be your partner. She probably thinks that she has a better chance with you, to rescue her family.” Tyler said.

Hmm. He might be right about that. But as I’m forty-three right now, and highly doubt that I will be participating in any war soon, I was hesitant to make her my pet. But, I still don’t have a flying creature to be at my side and she is friendly, beautiful, and strong too.

“Do you want to come along with us?” I asked her.

Out of breath, she spread her wings and bowed her head towards me.

“Good, then I’ll be your master now, and your name shall be Tanith!” I said to her, while my eyes burned blue.

She shrieked with joy and came closer to me. Her long body encircled around me, and with her wings she pulled me even closer, as if she was hugging me. I caressed her slick skin and heard her hiss in contentment.

“Now Tanith, could you release me? I’ll heal you further, get you some water, and then we are off towards home.” I said to her.

And so I did. She was back at full strength now and ready to fly with us.

“Really Mother, how do you come up with those names?” Tyler asked me.

“What? It means Serpent Lady, the term is used in ancient Egypt.” I said to him and he rolled his eyes.

I had been telling stories about Earth, all these years, like how humans there, think that aliens exist, stories about pirates and different cultures. And also about religion and how different races, worship different gods. And I told my children about old wars and tactics, technology and machines too. They had always listened carefully, astound by how there is another world, that is so much different than ours. So, he knows about the land called Egypt, and all its stories about Egyptian gods and such.

We flew further towards the others, and I could see that most of the citizen’s were rescued and safe at the border of the town. As we reached them, I stepped off and wanted to heal the most serious injuries. But instead of a calm moment, I saw my Rangers rushing towards me, bows aimed and arrows burning.

“STOP! She is mine!” I yelled to them, but I wasn’t in time to stop one of the arrows to fly into Tanith’s direction.

Quickly I put a shield around her, and the arrow bounced off from it. I sighed deeply and had to face the Ranger that was a bit too much trigger-happy with his bow. I had reprimanded him, for shooting a creature that was all on it’s own. She couldn’t have been any threat, certainly not against me! He apologized deeply, and was completely ashamed of his quick decision.

I know he wanted to protect his Queen, but I’m still capable of helping myself. Even though I am forty-three, I’m still fit! Mind you!

“You can’t blame him really. I mean, who can imagine that you would replace a Pteragon in this situation? It is the only Pteragon here, and she is even a rare one too.” Archeops said.

“Yes, that same thought crossed my mind.” I said.

I slapped the Ranger’s shoulder and told him, that everything was alright. He relaxed a bit and quickly went to the other Rangers.

After healing most of the injuries of all of our citizens, we had given some gold to them, to survive and rebuild some of their homes. We were going to send them builders and supplies later, to help them rebuild, but for now we flew back home.

I had explained to Brock and Archeops, what I had seen in the Tanith’s visions, and they were worried. Hayden had called the spy ‘bitch’ so it must be a female person who contacted him with the mage-link, yet we don’t have many female mages inside our castle. And the ones that we do have, are there for decades already. We trust them with our lives.

“Then we put the castle on lock-down. I’ll interrogate every female, by reading their minds.”