Convicted Hearts: The Dragons Stone

by SaphireHoyt

Arrival Of Mysteries

I trudged through the woodlands near my home in Canada. Cold, and miserable up here. Polar bears come to and from. Time passes slowly here, but the best pass time for me, is climbing to my secret Cave of Treasured Sparkles. It's beautiful, really. It's a place where strange crystalline butterflies reflect free of the water in the pool inside, and show strange movies to the eye. Explosions of color, smiling creatures and monsters akin to that one would find in Greek Mythology. Sometimes, I'll see the reflections of these monsters moving and singing and dancing. Other times I'll hear faint music from the pool. There were times the water was cold, and I saw what seemed to be Yaks, eating snow. This startled me slightly, and I saw flashes of rainbows and bright pink and faint stamping of hooves from the water. On another occasion, I saw birds flying and catching fish, but they were part cat. These things terrified me, especially when I looked over the side of the pool one seemed to look back into the water at me. This made me throw myself backwards when a claw burst through and felt around. The pool never showed that place again. Then there was the dark place, with flashes of red a red mountain. The water became hot, to hot to touch there, and I began to look into the water as hard as I could. Dragons flew overhead in that pool, and this made me smile.

I wonder what the pool has to show me today. Never once, have I swam in the water. Never, I felt, should I ever try. It would only end in catastrophe. I never put more than a finger in at once, leaving a tingling feeling in my hand as a result, even after I took my hand out.

I stumbled on a root in my daydreaming, and coughed. I felt cold, and snow had began to fall, leaving me needing to hurry to the cave to wait out the storm. I smiled happily, and ran the rest of the way. I hadn't expected snow, but I still brought a blanket in my backpack of goodies. I brought a backpack full of granola bars, a compass, a flint and steel, twine, a calculator, a multi tool, and a book with a flashlight. I brought a few journals, and a pack of colored pencils. Erasable ones though, so I could erase the notes if I needed. I brought a sharpener, and that was all I could fit other that a dozen water bottles. Always pack prepared, that's what mother told me. All she knows, is that I like to play in the woods, and sometimes I don't come back all night. And it's true, once I didn't go home for the night because I had fallen asleep next to the pond. I didn't feel like arguing with my mother, so I always would pack extra in case I couldn't get home.

I was almost there, and there was not a spec of light on the ceiling before I entered, but then there was a burst of joyful color as soon as I entered the cave. There seemed to be a sense of rejoice, and I smiled as I moved over to sit next to the pool. I set the blanket out on the ground and set my backpack down towards the end of the pool away from the entrance to the cave. The butterflies appeared, dark red and warm, and showing the volcano where the dragons lay. My heart beat as if there was someone there singing in excitement. A crash was heard from the pool as the aura of the room turned to confusion, and I looked into the water and saw nothing but a huge blast of stone. Then rumbling. Then nothing. I pulled on my backpack, and grabbed my blanket from the ground and prepared to flee the cave, thinking a mountain storm had arrived, but something was off. I couldn't move towards the exit. When I tried, there was a barrier around five feet from it. I began to franticly kick the barrier, but nothing happened. I was becoming more and more wary. There was a second where I tried ramming into it shoulder first, but was sent flying backwards into the cave with my feet in the pool. My eyes became boggled as I tried to pull myself back out. I couldn't. I dragged my hands on the ground, and grabbed the stalagmites. They all broke, and I was left clinging to the edge of the pool, trying to pull my body back through the mysterious water pool. My feet were swinging wildly for any kind of ground as I looked down, only to be greeted with an endless fracture of rainbows and images leading into a room of mirrors as it reflected my every move. I slipped a little, and now only my finger tips were barely clinging to the ridge above the water. I opened my mouth to scream... But nothing came. A strange liquid air seemed to enter my body and soon, I became fragmented, and I lost my every molecule to the endless prism of the mirrors vortex, and everything went black.

I awoke on a strange black and purple sand, little gemstones gleaming out of the sand stone. My body felt fresh, like I had just been born once again. I was ready to sit up, but I was still wobbling. There was a crash, and my senses were brought back. My mind was quickly raked with information, while other memories remained in the shadows.

My name is Savra... I am a boy, and I am young. No idea how young. I have a pack. Full of food. And water? And survival tools. I nodded once, and looked around for said bag, standing up to look for them. I fell, my legs feeling weak. I could walk fine before, what's the problem now. I opened my mouth, and blinked a bit. Speech came out, but my voice surprised me, like I had spoken for the first time. I hadn't, why is this so hard? I stood up, less wobbly this time. I was able to take a single step forward when a deep rumbling toppled me over again, and I cried out for help. None came, and I shook my head. I stood back up, glad I had been able to catch my balance back. I felt another rumble, but nothing else. I didn't fall, but when I took a step, I was wobbly. I spotted a piece of drift wood, about as tall as I was. I moved over to it, and propped myself up against it. There was a second where I was afraid to move. There was another crash and I yelped. My pack hit the ground in front of me, unopened and untouched by the water I had come from. The jacket I was wearing seemed to be dry, and everything else did too. Another crash. My blanket was rolled up neatly and buckled to the top of the pack. I slung it over my shoulders and pulled out my multi tool. The knife was hard to get out, but it was fine. I could still use it.

Another crash rang out, this time much, much closer, and a lot, lot stronger. The cloud of dust swelled up behind me and I coughed through it. I looked behind me and blinked away tears. There was, before me, a massive beast smashing it's massive tail into the sand, sending plumes of dirt, sut, and dust into the air, and leaving behind beautiful bright gemstones. Strange dogs had dragged in some sort of wagon and began to harvest. They dragged the wagons off, and I used my new staff to help me move down the shoreline. There, I found a beautiful blue stone with a pretty star and golden speckles around it, with a gold flat plate chain connected to it. I put it on, and there was a small shout was heard from behind me. There was another horrible rumble, but these were much more rapid, like foot steps. I could barely move any faster than my hobble. There was a spout of lava like heat from the ground behind me, and I yelled out in fear as I used my newfound instincts to run.

Seconds turned to minutes as I ran, and there was a sensation of impending doom. Tears dripped from my eyes as I coughed out, choking slightly on the searing heat from around me, like I was in a volcano. It became painfully clear that there were dragons here, beasts of legend. My breath was hastened as I collapsed to my hands and knees. I could no longer flee. My body ached and my heart throbbed in my chest. The searing heat around the volcano drove me to cough. I felt the beast of legends on my back. There was no escape.