When Dragons Came

“Oy! Watch where you’re going!” someone shouted, jerking me awake from a sound sleep.

I sat up, rocking the boat a bit. Or maybe the rocking came from the shove an old man in the raft next to me had given my craft.

“Sorry,” I said. “I must have fallen asleep Didn’t mean to—”

“Crazy young people. Boating all night. What did you think? That the fish would bite better after dark?”

“Don’t they?” I asked.

The old man chuckled. “All right, all right. I’ve done it myself, more than once, to tell the truth. But if you’re going to get the boat back up to your brothers before they miss it, you’d better turn now and head upriver. It’s a long pull back to Misty Vale.”

“Misty Vale?”

The old man laughed again. “Don’t me telling me you drifted all the way down here from Reed’s Ford? You’ll be getting a hiding for sure, young lady. Do you need help turning your boat?”

I didn’t particularly want to turn, but neither did I want to explain myself, so I let the old man, who was surprisingly strong, maneuver me so that my nose pointed back north, the way I’d come.

I paddled upriver as hard as I could until a bend in the river hid me from him. Then I looked about for a section of bank that had plenty of overgrowth and stopped there until…

Until what? I hadn’t really thought this through.

I supposed if I didn’t want the old man finding me again and asking questions, I’d wait until night to travel again. That meant I really ought to sleep now.

Well, after hiding myself and the boat. And after a bit of a meal.

I dragged the boat into the undergrowth, and none too soon, for only minutes after getting all sign of it and myself hidden from passersby on the river or on land, the river filled with half a dozen fishing boats.

The boys and men called to each other, their voices ringing loud and happy across the water.

That might not be easy to sleep through.

Never mind. I settled into the hollow I’d found, trying to get comfortable, and quietly dug into my pack for breakfast.

That’s when the noise on the other side of me started up—animals and wagons and people calling out to each other with excitement and welcome.

Then, the unmistakable clomp of soldiers’ boots marched by, and my heart leapt into my throat.

I told myself I had nothing to fear, that these soldiers couldn’t possibly have know to look for a refugee from Riverside trying to make her way to Windy Harbor, that I was safe.

I didn’t believe myself.

For long after the boots passed, I fought the fear clutching at my heart. Would I always feel this way when I heard or saw soldiers from now on? Or would it only be until I accomplished my journey’s purpose?

Taking deep breaths to calm my racing heart, I settled low into my hollow. The traffic on the nearby road got heavier and heavier. Several more groups of soldiers passed by, and each time, I held my breath until the echoes of their boots faded into the distance.

Could I plot a course to Windy Harbor that kept me out of soldiers’ sight for the whole route?

Maybe if I continued down the river at night and hid myself away during the daytime, as I was doing now. It would probably be fine if I encountered no more rapids.

Could I count on that?

As quietly as I could, I snuck my map from my pack and traced the route of the river, which I hadn’t paid nearly enough attention to yesterday.

If I had thought to trace the river route instead of the overland paths, I’d have seen the rapids below my home village.

But maybe, then, I wouldn’t have had the courage to take the boat, and I doubted I’d have made it far. Certainly not as far as I’d come. I traced my finger down the river past the villages the old fisherman had mentioned—Reed’s Ford and Misty Vale.

If I read the map correctly, I was just upstream of Red Hilltown, nearly a quarter of the way to Windy Harbor. Only three more nights of travel, and I could start looking for Talus Riverside. This crazy journey might work!

My excitement popped like a soap bubble, though, when I saw not one, but two locks marked on the river between me and Windy Harbor.

I’d heard of locks, of course, but I only had a very rudimentary sense of how they worked. However, I was fairly certain boats had to pay to go through, and lock keepers made it difficult or impossible to go around.

It was good that Khan’s father had thought to prepare gold for me.

Would it be enough?

I shook my head as if to clear away the thought. My knapsack held more gold than I’d ever seen before in one place. Surely, it would be enough.

But the lock-keepers, and the soldiers who guarded them and their money would surely expect some kind of explanation of why a young woman traveled alone down the river.

I would need to think of some story people would believe, but that wouldn’t get me stopped or sent back home. And I’d better start thinking now.

Judging by my encounter with the old man this morning, coming up with something on the spur of the moment wasn’t going to cut it.