All The Skills

Of course, leaving New Houston was not nearly the simple process the humans made it out to be. Brixaby still needed to disguise each one of his retinue members using the Knockback card. Transferring one “Rare” pair into Blood Moon hive was risky enough. Five would be a nightmare.

Even with his new Mana Generation card and unique endurance, fortitude, and strength from being a Legendary, the amounts required to activate and maintain the illusions would have been overwhelming. However, Brixaby had anticipated the needs and gathered up as much mana as he could throughout the day. It had been a… taxing process, and thus why he had needed that nap before the eruption.

Now he was well prepared.

Before opening the portal to the dark ferryman, he had his retinue stand in a line. Then, one by one, he dropped them from Rare to Uncommon.

Though he did not like causing them discomfort, the low-grade irritation he had felt of being a false Rare among true Rares dissipated as they were reduced down.

Still, the mana costs were exorbitant and by the last cast on Sams, he felt positively wilted. Not that he would ever admit it.

Arthur looked on with concern. “Do you want me to cast the portal, Brix?”

Brixaby straightened and ignored the wave of slight dizziness that came along with it. “No! I will do it.”

Thanks to his brilliant foresight, he had already picked out a portal card which was efficient on mana. Plus, the Mana Generator card was already working hard to restore what was lost. He expected by the time they made it down the dark river to Blood Moon hive, all would be well again.

Casting the portal took the last few points of his mana. He did not tell his rider how close he had come, but from Arthur’s concerned look, he likely guessed.

Joy said nothing either, but gave him a supportive shoulder to lean on as they crossed into the portal.

“Oh, it’s night again,” Joy said with a frown at the starry sky.

“It is the ferryman’s portal between worlds. I do not believe there is ever a sunny day,” Brixaby said.

Indeed, the dark ferryman was waiting at the river for them. The rowboat had expanded to a rather ridiculous size to accommodate every dragon and their human passengers. But the ferryman did not complain as everyone loaded in. He only pushed off the bank as they were seated.

“First thing we do once we get there,” Horatio said once the boat was well underway. Everyone was doing their best not to look into the starry sky of nightmarish creatures. “We need to get fitted with proper saddles and insignia. The more we look like we’re from Blood Moon, the less likely anyone is to question us.”

“I did drop the story that I’m transferring in with other riders,” Arthur said. “But yeah, supplies should be one of the first on the list.”

“Asha and I will assist the hurt and sick,” Marion said. His little Silver dragon nodded.

“And Equinox and I will scout out the dragon nurseries,” Soledad added.

Brixaby turned to her. “Why?”

“Because we need to integrate there. There’s not going to be any records of their hatching.”

“You are Uncommon,” Brixaby told her reasonably. “No one pays attention to records of Uncommons.”

“That’s sad,” Equinox said.

Brixaby shrugged his wings.

Arthur put a hand on Brixaby’s side as if to forestall him and spoke up instead. “Actually, Soledad, I noticed not a lot of Purple Commons had riders. I want to know why, so while you’re there explore a bit and ask around. Something strange is going on with the Commons and I want to find out what it is.”

That seemed to be a waste of time to Brixaby, but he was mildly curious about the Purples. If not the other colors.

The rowboat reached the next dock, and they disembarked. As they walked off the short pier onto the bank, they walked into their destination.

While he and Arthur had been gone, the sun had risen and cast long shadows along the crater. The portal had opened up deep within that shadow, and as the land they had left was nighttime, there wasn’t a lot of light to catch the eye.

Nor were they the only portal. While the hive seemed to use a single portal out, other personal portals were opening up to spill out people and their dragons on the return.

Their arrival attracted a few glances. But only a few.

That worry taken care of, Brixaby concentrated on his most pressing concern—the retrieving the next card for his set.

He concentrated on his Call of The Heart, and what he saw took him aback.

“Arthur!” He was so excited he practically bounced from foot to foot like a hatchling who had been presented with a brand new toy. “Arthur, three of my cards are here! It is enough to complete my set.”

Arthur whipped around to look at him. “That’s what your seeking card is showing you? How can that be? I saw just one.”

Brixaby dismissed that as irrelevant. “You were using my card. Perhaps the connection was more tenuous. It does not matter. Arthur, we must move now. If I can get my claws on them, that will be enough to complete my set.”

He no longer cared about subtly sneaking his way into the hive. He dared anyone to stand in his way!

Brixaby glanced at the map again to order his retinue to different positions and guard the locations until he could get to them—then he froze.

“What is it?” Arthur asked.

“This… cannot be right. No,” Brixaby said after a moment, staring at the cards in his mind’s eye. The words felt like ashes on his tongue. “I see two cards. I must have misread it somehow.”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Arthur’s gaze took on a distant look as he cast the Call of The Heart through Brixaby. After a moment, he shook his head. “I see one card.”

“Now that doesn’t make a lick of sense,” Soledad said. “Why on this green world would you two see different results?”

Brixaby dearly wanted to snap at her, but now she was reading to his senses like an Uncommon which made his basic instinct more protective than annoyed. Also, he didn’t know the answer.

Marion frowned. “Can either of you see what level of the hive they’re on? If it’s close enough…” He trailed off.

“No,” Brixaby grumbled. “It appears I have to be inside the hive in order to do that.”

His wings itched to take into the air and find the location of his cards.

Joy suddenly perked up. Noticing, Brixaby turned to face her. “Yes?” he asked eagerly. Her intuition had sharpened significantly since the trials of the Dark Heart. Perhaps it was telling her something useful to him.

But she only looked at her rider. “Cressida, did you get that quest, too?”

Arthur’s semi-mate was all smiles. “Yes, I did, dear.” She looked at the others. “I just received a quest to earn a place inside one of the wings.” Then, to Horatio, “You and Sams want to raid the supply rooms for Blood Moon gear and come along? That will be the easiest way to integrate ourselves here if this card search is going to take a while.”

Horatio nodded but looked to Soledad. “Will you be alright without me?”

She let go of his arm and gave him a push to his dragon. Brixaby did not understand human mating rituals, nor did he care to.

“Get into your wing and don’t screw it up. I’ll be right as rain here. No one pays attention to baby dragons, or their riders. ‘Specally now we’re Uncommon.” She said the last bit with a sly glance to Brixaby, who nodded. She was correct. No one cared about Uncommons.

“Come on, come on, come on. There’s a time limit!” Joy practically danced in place. Soon their riders were aboard their dragons and she and Sams were in the air.

Meanwhile, Marion and Asha took their leave and went over to the big white tents, which had been set up as medical triage.

Brixaby could not stand any further delay. “Arthur, we must explore this hive at once and find why we are seeing two different answers. It certainly cannot be that my card is mistaken. There must be some other explanation!”

Arthur raised an eyebrow at him. “No, I don’t think your card is telling us wrong, but there’s definitely something we’re missing—”

“Mr. Rare! Mr. Rare, there you are!”

They both looked up to see a little Purple circling above them. Half the size of Brixaby, she was unusually delicately built with a fragile head and quick, birdlike movements, and soft pale scales that almost made her seem blue.

Which made the scourgelings she was carrying, which were easily three times her own size, look even more ridiculous.

They both hurriedly backed up as she dropped the carcass not five feet away. It was a disgusting thing with a huge, warty head half the size of its own body and teeth ringing the jaws inside and out. It dripped puss, even though there didn’t appear to be any wounds.

Both Brixaby and Arthur turned to stare up at the Purple.

“This is for you!” she crowed, buzzing in happy circles. “My name is Candy Floss, by the way. Are you happy with me, Mr. Rare? Did I do good?”

Brixaby was flummoxed. “How did you transport this?” He reached out with a claw to touch the thing. It was so heavy it didn’t rock.

“My card!” Candy Floss said, guileless and unworried about sharing her most important secret to anyone within hearing distance. “I can make things really, really light. But only when I touch them. Is this okay? Is this enough for me to get a rider of my own now?”

“If we can find you someone with a compatible card,” Arthur said. “That’s quite the card power. Did you kill this scourgling yourself?”

“No, I snatched it from another hive’s dragon.”

Brixaby thought that was also quite impressive, but Arthur frowned.

“Which hive?”

“Don’t know.” Candy Floss was still buzzing around in pleased circles. “Don’t care. Can I have a rider now?”

Brixaby got to the most important topic. “Why have you brought a scourgling corpse to the hive?”

“It’s for you!”

Arthur spoke before Brixaby could question the silly Purple further. “If we don’t put that somewhere soon, someone will have to treat the spot where it’s landed with dragon soil.” He reached out as if to store it in his Personal Space to dispose of it safely later—hopefully not just to keep it forever like the rest of his junk – but then he paused with his hand outstretched. “This hasn’t been harvested yet.”

Immediately, Brixaby understood.

He gestured to the scourgling and pulled out a respectable three Uncommon shards.

“Those are for you!” Candy Floss said unnecessarily. “I want to be part of your retinue with a rider of my own!”

“Hmm. Yes, this pleases me.” Brixaby gave her a more appraising look. Yes, she was delicate looking and too small to carry a rider, though her card’s power could aid her with that. He appreciated ferocity and her forethought. “How long are you out of the shell?”

“Four months.”

“Then you have much growing to do.” He thought for a moment. “I will think about it and possibly assign you an appropriate rider if one can be found. But,” he added, stopping her as she opened her mouth to speak. “I shall require shards in tribute. Only the shards and not the scourglings. And any cards you should find,” he finished with a nod.

“Yes, Mr. Rare, sir!” She happily took back off to the portals.

Arthur was giving Brixaby a disappointed look.

“What?” Brixaby asked.

“Do you really think that’s a good idea? She just said she was scalping scourglings from others.”

“Of course it is! We are in Blood Moon and are expected to be fearsome. Once word gets around—and it will because Candy Floss seems much like Joy, which means she has more friends than is considered wise—everyone will know for certain that we fit in here. Also,” he added, mildly offended, “It is not as if I intend to keep all the shards for myself.”

Arthur seemed doubtful. “You don’t?”

“No!” Brixaby said with much injured dignity. “I will wisely combine the shards into cards. And if those cards prove useless to me, then I shall award them to my followers. Either my existing retinue, or my…” He trailed off, tilting his head as he searched for the right word. He didn’t necessarily want Commons in his retinue, but ‘sub-retinue’ did not sound quite right.

“Fan club?” Arthur asked drily.

“Yes!” Brixaby seized on the idea. Occasionally, his rider could come up with good ones. “A club of Purples. And you heard Squish’s rider—these in the hive are among the fastest and smartest of all the Purples. I shall have them for my own. The best of the best. And once the Uncomons see that the lower ranks are making this choice, they will flock to be under my banner as well. If they are useful to me, I shall take them.”

For some reason, Arthur rolled his eyes. But he was only human and perhaps Brixaby’s plans were too far above him to understand.

“And,” Brixaby added, “Those who strive to excel will be allowed to receive riders of their own. You will manage that, Arthur.”

“Oh will, will I?” Arthur said dryly. Then a strange look came over his face. He glanced over his shoulder, back to the direction Marion and Asha had gone.

“What is it?” Brixaby asked.

“I wonder if that is where the refugees from this eruption were taken. And I was just thinking…” He trailed off for a moment. “When I was rescued as a kid, I would have done anything for the hive.”

Brixaby did not like thinking of that. Yes, it had occurred before he was even in an egg, but he did not like the thought of Arthur riding any other Purple, even if it was to be rescued. It upset him to think that he had not been there, that Arthur had lived an entire life before him.

“Brix,” Arthur said, and Brixaby’s attention was brought back. “Why doesn’t anyone ride Purple Commons around here?”

“The lack of prestige,” Brixaby said. It was obvious to him.

“So, you think it’s that people don’t want to and not that someone is… stopping them?”

“For what reason?”

“I don’t know. But…” His attention was drawn back across the crater. “There may be future riders in that medical tent. It’s not like they’ll have homes to return to. We saw how much the nobles are willing to help out the farmers.”

“Yes, yes, go,” Brixaby said, once again impatient. “I will check inside the hive and discover where my cards are hiding.”

Arthur glanced back at his dragon with a smile. “You know, people will not be happy if they discover you’re connecting shards from your… followers.”

Brixaby grinned back at him, deliberately using teeth in a threat even a human would understand. “I would dare them to complain to my face. It is not my fault no one else has thought of such a thing.”

Arthur chuckled at that, though it looked like he did not want to. Then he waved at Brixaby and headed off to the medical tent.

Brixaby launched into the sky in search of his cards.

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