A blast of fire cruised through Dawn"s finger and surged through her hand and then filled her body. The sensation was nothing short of flowing molten lava in each and every vein of her body. She heard a silent scream of fury mixed with anguish in her head. Who was it? Dawn glanced around but there was no one else."Ahhh!" She stumbled back shaking her hand violently with a loud painful cry as if trying to s.h.i.+rk off the pain. She saw spots in front of her eyes. Her mouth fell open and she licked her dried lips. Her finger was dripping with blood. Terrified, she clutched the hem of her torn s.h.i.+rt and experienced another intense sudden hot flush in her body as though she had been branded.
By this time, Dawn was on her limbs in searing pain. She crawled on the gra.s.s for a meter and then fell on her stomach coughing and trembling, feeling her mind going numb from the torment. After what seemed like an eternity of numbness, she felt some sensation in her body. She pulled herself up to check her left hand. Something was happening at a rapid speed on the affected finger. A black dragon-head tattoo appeared on its base and soon it entwined around it forming a black mark that was like a dragon. The dragon opened its mouth and engulfed the tip of her finger and the bleeding stopped. Her heartbeat raced and her skin tingled as adrenalin gushed through her. Her thoughts were too scrambled to make any judgment about the situation or about the beast that she had just encountered.
Shocked, she gazed at the dragon and found it giving her icy looks with its deep admiral-blue eyes. She gaped at it. Her mouth opened and closed and then opened again. She stuttered, "It can"t be true! Are you a dragon? How did this tattoo appear?"
The tiny creature that was standing at a distance c.o.c.ked its head again. A smooth wave pa.s.sed through her mind like the one that ripples gently on the sh.o.r.es of a lake. She gasped. "Wh- what was that?" she asked herself disbelieving everything around her. This time the wave was stronger being a mixture of several emotions.
Slowly, the baby came and snuggled around her right foot. It curled itself around her ankle. Dawn stroked the dragon again. This time there was no jolt of energy through her body, only a slight ticklish feeling. It purred like a cat. Another ripple of waves splashed through her mind. Was her dragon communicating with her?
The entire experience left her speechless. The little animal was savage but nothing in comparison to that werewolf who had bitten her. For a moment she sympathized herself for being a target of so many mystical creatures.
Dawn tried to move it from her ankle but it wouldn"t budge. Afraid that she was getting late for the college and that Cole might be getting jittery by now, she rose and started to walk with the dragon coiled around her ankle. It was awkward and she didn"t know how she would explain it to anyone. But she thought that once she would reach home, she would make a small, cozy bed for it, from the discarded cartons and give it something to eat.
The main question was how would she reach home? She had lost her way. Suddenly she felt a soft current of waves in her mind. Something indicated the next point that she should go to.
The hut that was located in distance was almost a ten minutes walk from there. While walking, all she could feel were the soft scales of the dragon on her ankle and smooth waves of thoughts in her mind as it directed her to the next point and the next.
From the hut, she walked straight and reached the road that led to her cottage. She reached home half an hour later. When Cole saw her, he leaped with joy. His eyes were red and swollen. "Dawn, where did you go? I am so sorry about yesterday. Why did you leave me? What happened to your clothes? Did someone thrash you? Did you lose your way? I will never get angry at you." A sob ripped through his body. "I had been so worried about you when I didn"t see you this morning that I didn"t go to the school."
She had left her cell phone on the table and there was no one who could help him. He was about to call Arawn when he heard the door open and Dawn walking in with torn clothes. The sight scared him so much that his stomach roiled. He ran to hug her.
Dawn smiled and chortled. "So many questions?" She stroked his hair. How could she speak about her encounters? "I am sorry Cole. Yesterday, I lost my cool and dashed out of the house." She realized that she transformed when she was angry and a short temper was an issue with her from always. "And before I knew, I had lost my way. I was trying to find my way back home when I ran in some th.o.r.n.y bushes." She had to train herself to become calmer.
"Then how did you find your way home?" he asked as Dawn wiped tears from his face. "And I hope you didn"t go beyond the hut Arawn had mentioned."
"Don"t ask!" she chuckled and ignored his statement. She had indeed gone beyond that. Looking at the time she gauged that he had missed the school. "Let"s make breakfast for you and me."
Cole left her and said, "First you take a bath. You are stinking!" he wriggled his nose.
Dawn let out a hearty laughter. She kissed his forehead and said, "Aye Aye, Sir!"
She had to check up on her dragon too who had for some reason become very still.
"See you soon in the kitchen," Cole replied with a grin. "I will chop some potatoes." Saying that he ran off with excitement.
When Dawn reached her room, she took off her s.h.i.+rt and pants and discarded them on the side. She lifted her leg to check up on her ankle but she was in for another shock. Her eyes bulged as she stared at the brilliantly s.h.i.+ning emerald green band in the shape of a dragon coiled around her ankle. She put her finger there and touched it softly. It was like a stone. She caressed it, tickled it and even tried to take it out, but the anklet didn"t move from its place. It was alive an hour ago!
Dawn held her head and sat on the bed. What was happening to her? Before she could collect her thoughts, her phone buzzed. The ring broke her reverie and she jumped. With her mouth open, she went to pick the call.
"Dawn, you have to come for the practice sessions tomorrow at 1 PM," Ceri barked in the phone so loudly that she had to remove the phone from her ears. She heard some girls giggling on the other side.
"Okay, I will," she said and disconnected the phone.
Her attention went back to her ankle. "Bizarre!" She shook her head and ambled off to take a bath. Nothing made sense.
The day went pretty smoothly as the brother-sister duo made meals together and caught up on a lot of things. In the evening, Dawn called Arawn to talk about the dragon, but he didn"t pick the call. Slightly upset, she went to her room after putting Cole to bed and checked upon her dragon. It was still in its frozen state. She had managed to keep it hidden from Cole that day.
It was the next day when she went to practice with her group that she noticed animosity in their behavior. She couldn"t comprehend the reason so picked her 7-iron from the golf set that the University had provided and started practicing as usual.
She heard them snickering from behind.