Harriot’s Lore for October
Saving the Drake King
Entry #150
The Drake King’s voice started once again in my head.
“Before you leave, I would like it if only one other person would know my chosen name”
“What do you mean by chosen name?” I hadn’t known whether the words were spoken aloud or I had just thought them in my head, the whole ‘talking through telepathy’ wasn’t something I had ever experienced.
“I was never given a formal name like the other guardian drakes that had been named by the inhabitants before you. I had spent many years here watching in silence, I don’t want to leave this world without someone knowing the name I chose for myself.”
“Well you better be quick”
“Prometheus.”
The Drake King fell silent. It was a deafening type of silence. All sounds in the cave were muffled as if someone had placed cotton wool in my ears. The air felt thin as if someone had sucked all the air out of the cave. It felt like the world was playing in slow motion, every movement became heightened as the Drake king’s head fell to the ground for the last time.
The loudest thud of his head hitting the ground sparked everything back into motion.
“Harriot! Are you alright? That drake didn’t hurt you did he?” Charlotte was looking at me with concern in her eyes.
“His name was Prometheus, he would have never harmed me.”
“What happened, I didn’t even touch him and he died?” Elliot, his words had no sympathy in them but I could see him eying up what I had in my hand. “What’s that? Anything valuable?”
“It’s nothing, just a rock I found on the ground. Could we get out of here now this place creeps me out.” I tucked the small vial into my pocket making sure Elliot didn’t see it. Elliot stared at the dead drake.
“Well seeing as we are here we might as well get something for our troubles.” Elliot took out a knife and started scraping the scales from the dead drake. I had to turn away, if I hadn’t turned away I would have killed Elliot on the spot for what he was doing.
Charlotte stood in silence, her eyes were fixed on the wall as if trying to burn a hole in it.
“It can’t be,‘’ she took out her notepad, smiling to herself as if she had just won the lottery. “I was right, these symbols are just like the warning we found. It must be the original inhabitants’ language.” Elliot had stopped what he was doing and was by Charlotte’s side in no time at all.
“So you can translate these then?”
“From what I can tell straight away this place was built by the original inhabitants as a ‘shrine’ to the Drake King. This symbol here represents ‘Offering’. Which inturn would mean this cave has a treasure room of sorts.” Elliot’s eyes were fixed on Charlotte.
“You’d better get translating then.”
Jewels of the King
Entry #151
I had never seen Charlotte this focused before, it was as if no one was in the room but her while she worked. She had spent half a day working on the symbols without taking a break. Elliot and Carlos on the other hand had opted to nap. I was surprised every moment at what they had in those bags of theirs as they had come fully prepared with a sleeping bag and pillow. It was as if camping like this was no issue at all for them.
Charlotte had stopped writing, her hand was planted firmly on the wall as she stared at it.
“This is it…” She seemed to mumble to herself, but it was just loud enough to wake Elliot.
On the wall, there was an arch of symbols, almost looking as if it were a doorway in its own right. Elliot had come to join her at the wall.
“I don’t see any treasure room here.”
“That’s because it needs to be opened…” Charlotte was quicker than I had ever seen and human move and was rifling through the bag on the floor. She picked up the King’s Seal. “This should do it.” Charlotte hovered the seal over the wall, the symbols seemed to shimmer as she did. Till one spot on the wall revealed an indent, like the one that had led us in here. When she placed the seal in the indent the wall split in two and moved apart almost as if they were dancing. A blinding light shone out from the gap.
It took awhile for all our eye’s to adjust. For a moment, I stared in disbelief at what I was looking at. Part of me wanted to run and claim it all for myself but part of me was fascinated at what I saw. Mountains of gold coins and jewels of every colour shone out spreading glittering rainbows around the cave. There was what looked like an altar in the middle of the space, it had depictions of drakes flying, and a massive stone drake with ruby eyes guarding it.
Elliot wasted no time at all charging in and filling the bags he pulled out of his backpack. Charlotte was grinning to herself.
“I just knew it, look at this. This is the biggest find we have ever gotten. At least all in one go. It’ll take weeks to assess what’s even in here.” Charlotte was standing at the entrance taking in everything.
The Drake King’s Final Wish
Entry #152
She was about to enter the room when my arm moved before I could think. I grabbed Charlotte’s arm bringing her to a halt.
“I need to talk to you away from Elliot and Carlos.” She looked disappointed for a moment as if I had stopped her seeing a unicorn for the first time.
“Sure, discoveries can wait…” There was a fleeting tone to her voice and I knew for a fact she didn’t mean what she said.
Outside the Drake King’s cave Charlotte was looking on edge, she kept staring at the cave as if she really wanted to be back in there.
“Charlotte, focus. I don’t know how much time I have to tell you this. But the Drake King gave me his final wish and I need your help.” Charlotte glared at me when I mentioned the drake king.
“Final wish? Wait so he knew he was dying?”
“Well, I think this is the reason why he died. I don’t know much about drake anatomy but I’m pretty sure their soul is supposed to stay in their body.” I showed her the vial the drake king had given me, she instinctively wanted to inspect it.
“Fascinating, I’ve never seen a soul quite like this one.”
“Wait, you’ve seen other souls… Not the point, anyways the drake king gave me his last wish. For us to find a new ‘host’ for his soul.” Charlotte almost dropped the vial while I was telling her about his final wish. I had to be quick to grab it.
“So you’re saying, this vial has the potential to make a new Drake King?” I tucked it back in my pocket.
“Well yes, if you don’t drop it the first second we have it. But we need to find a new host. The only place I know where there are drake eggs on display is at Bustamite, with the death drakes…” My words sunk a little, I was not looking forward to going back there. We barely made it out alive the last time.
“Wait, hold up one minute. Are we getting a baby?” Charlotte had the look I could only describe as that of an expecting mother.
“A baby drake, and no I expect after it’s born it’ll go back to the other drakes.” Charlotte still had a smile plastered over her face as if she didn’t hear me.
“We are going to be drake mums, I wonder what he’ll be like. I expect it’ll be a boy as the drake king was male. I bet he’s going to be so cute and follow us everywhere.”
“Focus Charlotte, egg first then we can figure out what to do after.”
The Egg
Entry #153
Bustamite Forest was too quiet, as if the drakes had taken a vow of silence. Even when we approached them they seemed to bow their heads at us and cleared a path. We had no trouble choosing which egg as the drakes had already created a pathway to an egg that seemed much smaller than the rest. The soul showed its approval as it glowed brighter the closer we got to the egg. We stood in front of the egg both looking at each other as to what to do next.
“So, now what? I mean the drake king never really gave me instructions on this.” Charlotte took the soul from my hand and placed it next to the egg.
“I guess we let it do its thing.” The moment Charlotte placed the soul down the lid burst open, a blinding silver and gold mist floated out of the vial and towards the egg. The light intensified to the point where I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer. I wasn’t sure how long the blinding light lasted just that Charlotte tapped me on the shoulder.
“Did you see that? Oh my I have never seen anything like it.” She was wearing sunglasses that she wasn’t wearing before I closed my eyes
“Where did you get the sunglasses from?” She looked at me as if I’d asked a stupid question.
“I always carry them on me, you know just in case.” There was a sound I had never heard before. Like a loud cracking sound. We both spun to find it.
The egg that now had what looked like a glowing orb of golden light around it was starting to hatch.
“Is that supposed to do that?” Charlotte shrugged.
“I’ve never witnessed a drake hatch before. So your guess is as good as mine.”
“I think this is the time for us to leave, the drakes can handle this from here.” Just as I turned around to leave I was faced by drakes, they had formed a circle around us, I could only assume it was to bear witness to the egg hatching. There was no way to escape until this was over.
Once the egg had started to crack it almost felt like seconds before the whole thing split open. Sat with its head poking out from the shell was the smallest drake I had ever seen. It was unusual in every sense of the word. From head to tail each section was a different colour, it looked as though it had sections from each of the 4 drakes. It let out the tiniest yawn I had ever seen from anything.
Baby Drake
Entry #154
“Well that’s freaking adorable. Now we have to give it a name.”
The baby drake opened its eyes and stared at me for a moment as if telling me what name to call it.
“Tarquin…” It was as if the name had been spoken into my head. The drake seemed to jump up and down as if agreeing to the name.
“He seems to like it, well what do we do now? Should I pick him up?” Tarquin seemed to back away a little when Charlotte mentioned that.
‘Follow’ The word was faint but it was there. Just like how Prometheus was communicating.
“I think he will just follow us.” I couldn’t explain it to Charlotte. She’d think I’d gone mad if I said drakes were talking to me in my head. But sure enough Tarquin followed us, all the way back to the house.
I was staring at a baby drake… in my living room. This was not something I had planned on ever doing. Shiny was one thing, but he was more than ‘just a pet’ he had become my friend and faction member. But a baby drake! Shiny was staring at it unimpressed as if it were trying to replace him. He had his sword at the ready as it jumped around him.
‘Play, Tarquin play with shiny bot’ I was still uncomfortable about being able to hear the drake speak in my head.
“Shiny put the sword away, he just wants to play.” Shiny glared at me as if I had taken his sword away myself.
Eventually Shiny relaxed his posture and began using his sword to reflex a light on the floor which Tarquin followed…
“Like a cat…” The words left my mouth before I could stop them.
“You’re right he is just like a cat, not you Shiny but Tarquin.”
The door made a loud crashing sound, Tarquin ran under my chair to hide. Elliot and Carlos were back. ‘Stay hidden Tarquin’ I didn’t know if the telepathy went both ways but I had to try.
I gave Charlotte a glare, one I hoped she understood not to mention about Tarquin.
“Where did you two disappear off to? We could have used a few extra hands hauling all these treasures back.” Elliot handed Charlotte a bag. ”We still have more to go through but out of what we’ve sorted so far, this is your cut. The usual split as always.” Eliot stared at me for a moment as if he was thinking about giving me a ‘cut’ of what they found. But then turned away without saying a word.
“Hey aren’t you forgetting something?” He spun on the spot to face me again.
“You really want in on these treasures too?” I couldn’t help but get angry at the notion.
“No, at the very beginning Charlotte said if i help you you’d help me get off the ‘Stel’s most wanted list’. And so far I’ve held up my end of the bargain.” Elliot took a deep breath.
“Did Charlotte not mention it to you?” Charlotte seemed to go a little sheepish.
“I mean I have been rather busy running around, it just slipped my mind.”
“Here, I might be a treasure hunter but I hold up my end of the bargain” Elliot handed me a piece of paper. It was a peace treaty signed by the Stel elders. “All you have to do is sign it.”