Chapter 2:

Cameron stared uncertainly at the dragon before him, his legs shaking. He was definitely dreaming, he decided. Of course he couldn’t sneak out of prison and meet a pretty woman who turned into an inky black dragon. Things like that didn’t happen.

The dragon stared at him, almost annoyed.

“Well, aren’t you going to change forms?” Chalis insisted.

Cameron felt the breeze blow between his ankles and could feel the scratchiness of the dried grass scraping his feet. That meant he wasn’t dreaming.

“Um…I don’t exactly know how?” Cameron’s voice went up at the end of the sentence, making it sound like a question.

“Don’t know-don’t know how? Oh, I get it. You don’t want to show your true form. I get it,” Chalis chuckled, “Well, I you’re sure, you can just ride on my back!”

Cameron figured the dragon was about the size of a large, adult elephant or camel. He climbed on, using the scales on her skin as footholds. The worst that can happen is I wake up. And, hey, it’s a free ride away from the prison, so why not? Cameron thought.

He felt as if he forgot his stomach back in prison as they took off. He gasped they rose higher and higher. The land beneath him looked like a Lego set. The air was unbearably chilly. They soared over the ocean, the waves crashing in the sea. Despite the uncomfortable conditions, Cameron dozed off.

When he woke up, Chalis had already landed. In front of them, what appeared to be a small castle rose from the soft, surprisingly green grass framing the walls.

Cameron slipped off of Chalis, staggering slightly, his muscles incredibly sore. Chalis transformed back into herself and shook herself out, yawning.

“Well, I’m sure you’re extremely tired by now, after that long ride,” Chalis waved her hand, and a ball of light appeared. Cameron whipped his hands out in front of his face to shield him from the sudden brightness.

“Not really, I dozed off a little,” Cameron admitted. “So, where is this? And how do you know me?”

Chalis started walking, motioning for Cameron to follow.”You see, this castle is used mainly for training shadow dragons. It is one of the 6 main establishments hidden in the realistic world. There are very few shadow dragons today-in fact, us shadow dragons will most likely die out first. And how do I know you? Simple: I don’t. There’s a black cube in the castle that, when it detects the birth of a shadow dragon, it alerts me immediately. It counts down the days until I have to retrieve them,” Chalis paused and yawned. Then she continued. “the black cube tells me the name, shows me the appearance, and tells me when and where to find them-exactly,”

Cameron raised his eyebrows, not entirely following, but he shrugged it off and followed Chalis up the path to the entrance of the castle.

The dark sky and luminance moon made him feel very quite and utterly alone.

They finally passed the large-wooden?-doors in the entrance and emerged into a room with a coat rack. Chalis took of her cloak and shook out her extremely long, somewhat wavy hair, moonlight glinting off of it.

“Well, I’ll show you to your room,” Chalis said, starting up some marble stairs. “In the morning, I’ll introduce you to your two classmates-and I expect three more will be arriving. I’ll also show you your flight trainer,” Chalis looked ready to fall in bed, with deep circles under her eyes.

Cameron uncertainly pushed his door open. Inside the depressing room was a bed, a nightstand, a dresser, a desk, and a closet.

“The bathroom’s just down the hall if you need it,” Chalis murmured sleepily. She turned to leave.

“Wait!” Cameron said. He still wasn’t sure if he was in reality, if this was real, if this was safe..

“Hm?” Chalis glanced back.

“Uh, so this dragon business…you can turn into a dragon?”

Chalis nodded. “Mm, basically-and you can too, though I suspect you prefer human form, am I right?”

“Yep,”

Chalis closed the door behind her, her footsteps fading away.

The first thing Cameron did was throw open the window. His room offered a large veiw to the lake and land. He found a few tops and pants in his closet, an extra pair of shoes littering the floor. His dresser was empty, but his desk had a single pen and piece of paper in it. This was the most he had ever owned in his life.

So this was it. He was finally free of prison.

He realized Chalis had most likely used her magic to aid him out of prison. How else would he have gotton out?

Freedom.

He grinned. Then he lied down on his bed for a few minutes to cherish the soft fibers of the quilt, the coziness of the mattress.

Eventually, he surrendered to a peaceful, dreamless sleep, anticipating the next morning.

~

Critisism and critiques, please!

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