Firebolt

Chapter 16

AT THREE, I went to the cafeteria to meet Cheng. Today was my first History lesson, and I was nervous, but not as nervous as I had been when I was going to meet Arianna. Scanning the room, I noticed a group of four boys huddled around one of the tables. Not one of them resembled the description Sammy had given me earlier of Cheng, and I became discouraged. Suddenly a tall figure appeared from behind a Buddha statue.  He wasn't oriental, as I imagined he would be, and looked like he was a true ethnic mix.

“You must be Elena. I'm Cheng,” he said, and held out his hand for me to shake. I noticed the bronze glint in his hair, realizing what he was.

“You’re a dragon?” I asked.

“Busted.” Holding out his hands in mock surrender, his smile reached up to his eyes, changing his entire face. I couldn’t help but smile back at him, it was infectious. “I hope that it's not going to make you uncomfortable.”

I shook my head. I was used to dragons now. Hell, I was sharing a room with one.

“Good, shall we take a walk?” He led the way, taking me along the same route that Lucian had last week. We went to the stables and found Ginger standing outside in the pen, lazily eating grass. Cheng took out a handful of sugar cubes from his pocket and started calling her by clicking his tongue. He stroked her gently as she nibbled at the sugar cubes in his palms.

“Horses like dragons?” I asked, shocked at how calmly she behaved.

“Only the Metallic ones,” he said in a very soothing tone.

“What is it about horses that you love?”

“They’re such graceful creatures, Elena. I do believe that they have a soul too. The way some humans use them to get over their fears tells me that they are teachers just like us, in their own special way,” he said as he stroked her mane.

“Yeah, there's something soothing about them,” I agreed, and remembered my trip with Lucian.

“I know history can be boring, but you're looking at it the wrong way. Without history, we would not know where we came from or what direction to go,” he said. He blew gently into Ginger’s mouth. Her lips vibrated and she stomped her feet, neighing.

“What are you doing?” I giggled.

“I'm making her used to my smell. It's a small human trick, the Sioux Tribe used to believe that blowing in their faces makes them used to your smell. I hope it's true, otherwise I just looked like an idiot.”

I laughed. “So what is it that makes history so exciting?”

“What are they teaching you?”

“Oh, very boring stuff about medieval times.”

“You don't like the medieval times?” he asked as we carried on walking toward the Coliseum.

“Not really. They were cruel and saw dragons as the enemy, right?”

“Yes, it was. I'm really lucky to be born during King Albert's time.”

“Why were they so afraid of the dragons?”

“It was mostly the Chromatic dragons that gave them reasons to fear us. There was no enchanted wall back then and Paegeia was free for everyone to visit. People passed fluidly through the barrier. The Metallic dragons, like me, were wise to hide. They knew that the humans would never trust dragons, so they disguised themselves as the very creatures who wanted to destroy them. At that stage, it was still a dragon secret. I can just imagine how hard it was for them to watch their kind being slaughtered like monsters. When King Alexander ascended the throne, with the help of a great sorcerer, the wall was erected to protect magic from the humans on the other side who wanted to abuse it.”