Dragons of Marak: Book 1, Wings & Sword

#25

Her nerves kicked into high gear. They walked, shoes clacking as they climbed the stone steps to the dark Obelisk. As they reached the base of the building, she slowed. She turned around, noticing that the others were stopping too. She was at the front of the pack. All of the others...Luka's mother, Leti, the dragons, even Cole and Bak, seemed to look to her for direction.

Leti and Taea were among them. Leti had walked with her for years, she was her closest friend. Luka's mother was there, she had the most reason of any of them to be doing this. Sil and Pero were on the other side of Leti, reunited finally after being kept apart. Ana blamed herself for that. She saw the error of her ways now, though. At least she thought she did. She couldn't help but wonder, however, if Sil followed her because she knew nothing else, or because she genuinely believed in what they were about to do.

Then there were Cole and Bak. Two dragons who had experienced the horrors of the distorted realm firsthand.

"Here's the plan. We'll keep it simple. Cole and Bak, you two are planning to stay in the Obelisk," Ana said. "Cee, Taea, Pero, you're all close friends to Cole and Bak. We're going to see them off. Once we're in the elevator, we'll ride up to the highest floor, and then we'll go from there."

Ana looked around at all of her friends, waiting to see if they had questions. Her heart was racing.

"Is that it then?" Cee said, breaking the silence.

They all stared at her. She realized that they had no questions. They were just looking for her to give the order to go on. Ana nodded.

"That's it," she said. "We can do this."

***

For a while, everything went according to plan. They stepped inside the Obelisk. They talked to the guards. They were given entrance to the elevator, and the guards told them which floor to go to. There were two guards. Both were dragonbounds, and their dragons were quilldras. One was white and brown, the other jet black.

Once in the elevator, they sailed up to the appropriate floor, and then Cole and Bak held the door open. Cee equipped to Ana as a sword. She lifted him up, pressing to the roof of the elevator.

She couldn't cut through.

Try again! Cee said, sounding determined.

He erupted with water, and she swung the sword again. She swung it at the sides of the elevator. She swung backhanded, up, down. Nothing worked. No matter what she tried, she couldn't cut through any part of the elevator. Every time she tried, it clanged against the metal, not even making a dent. Ana wore herself out to the point where she was panting, trying to get this to work.

"What now?" Leti said.

"We should go back down and ask the guards if there's a staircase," Luka's mother suggested.

Ana nodded. A staircase. She should've thought of that before. They all shuffled back into the elevator.

It whisked them back down, and Ana's thoughts turned to what sort of reason or explanation she might give them for why they needed a staircase. Surely, if they mentioned they were going up to her father's floors, their suspicions would be raised. Already, she remember how the guards had given her a look. They'd recognized she was Mr. Perez' daughter, and they were clearly looking out for his interests.

It hadn't seemed to Ana that the guards had recognized Cole and Bak. So many dragons came into and out of the Obelisk, she reasoned, it was unlikely they would recognize those two. They were largely nobodies, weren't they?

The doors opened and they came face to face with her father's dragonbound, Eli. Something caught in her throat, and she froze. Cee bared his teeth, growling. The rest of the dragons stepped up to the hadra dragonbound, launching intimidating looks his way. He shot his own intimidating glare right back at them.