Welcome to a piece of Wednesday Word’s flash fiction on Darkling Dreams!
A good friend of mine, P.T. Wyant, is doing a blog post every Wednesday called Wednesday Words with a new prompt for a bit of flash fiction writing, just to get in the habit of writing something, anything. (Even if said flash fiction is complete garbage at the time. Garbage is better than nothing though, right?) If you’re looking for some inspiration yourself or just something to aimlessly write, then go check out her blog for this week’s prompt!
With that being said, I am going to share what I came up with for this week’s flash fiction prompt based off a three word combination prompt. So here is my very rough around the edges minute of inspiration based off her prompt. I’d love to hear what you guys think of it!
(Please excuse any errors you may see, I said it was rough around the edges.)
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Dragon Rider
Lana stared at the front door of her cottage. Her free hand wrung her skirts nervously for a moment, knowing her husband was not going to take this news lightly. But it was what she wanted. It was the path and life she yearned to follow and be a part of. He would just have to accept that in the end.
If it was the end of their marriage, then it was the end. Though she dearly prayed he loved her enough to follow and abide her decision.
Squaring her shoulders, she lifted her chin up, adjusted her grip on the basket she was carrying, and pushed the door open, going inside. Blake was sitting near the fireplace, reading a book. He looked up as he heard the door open and set the book down immediately.
“Feet off the table, dear,” she scolded as their running joke. Every time he sat in that chair she always had to tell him to take his boots off the table.
He did so, standing up. “Where have you been? Market doesn’t take that long to travel to and come back from.”
“It does not,” she admitted, pulling her shawl off and hanging it on the post by the door rather slowly.
“Then where…? Lana, what is it?”
She bit her lip and set the basket down. A faint squeak emitted from within the parcel. Blake heard it and looked down at it.
“Lana?”
She fiddled with her skirts a little, looking up towards the ceiling. “We need to talk, Blake.” Her voice was soft and it concerned him.
“Is everything alright? What happened?”
Her gaze remained on the ceiling like it was the most interesting thing in her world while her cheeks began to flush. “I may have accidentally sort of adopted some dragons.”
As if in response to her quick explanation, there was another faint squeak from within the basket and it rustled. Blake’s eyes widened as he stared at his wife in disbelief, then looked to the basket. He crossed to her and bent to the basket, picking it up and opening the lid. Inside he found two tiny dragonlings. One, a bright vibrant green, looked at him with beautiful amber eyes and squeaked, tail swishing. The other, a deep blood red, was snoozing away, puffing smoke rings from its nostrils as it laid curled up behind the green one.
Blake nearly dropped the basket in surprise, looking up to Lana. “What… How… Lana, when…” He couldn’t even form a full sentence as he stuttered.
Lana took a deep breath, gentle taking the basket from him and setting it on the kitchen table. She pulled out the green dragonling and it crawled up her arm to sit upon her shoulder, its ears and eyes flicking around, nose twitching as it took in all the sights and sounds of this new place. “Please, sit, Blake.”
He sat without protest, too shocked to think straight.
“Blake… I want to be a Rider.”
He gaped. “You…what?”
“I want to be a Rider,” she repeated firmly, finding her courage as she reached up and scratched under the dragonling’s chin. “I realize you may have a hard time accepting that and may wish me to back out of it, but I have made up my mind. This is what I want in life, this was my calling. To be a Rider. Sirath here has already chosen me to be his Rider.”
Blake stared at her in shock yet, looking to the green dragon perched on her shoulder like a cat, tail swishing yet. It stared at him as if daring him to dispute his claim on Lana.
After what felt like an eternity of holding her breath for his reaction, Lana let her heart beat again as Blake stood up and stood in front of her, taking her hands. He smiled. “Lana, I would never hold you back from your calling. I’m just surprised it took you this long to go for it, or for a dragonling to find you.”
Her breath caught in surprise, a slow elated smile stretching across her lips. “You mean that?” she breathed. Well she hadn’t been expecting that reaction from him.
“Of course.” He tilted her chin up and kissed her lovingly. “You will make a fine and fierce Rider. When do you head out for the Academy?” He tried to scratch at the little dragon who nipped at his finger, growling playfully. A faint wistfulness and sadness tinged his expression.
“Two days time,” she admitted softly. “I will miss you.”
“You will see me again, I will be waiting for you.” He kissed her again, then looked back to the basket as they heard another faint squeak. The red dragon had woken up and was now peeking his head out, staring at Blake with large indigo eyes. “So why did you come home with two dragons when only one claims you?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted with a light shrug, nearly toppling Sirath off her shoulder. “The little guy refused to let me leave him. He kept waddling after me as I left, squeaking and growling for my attention. I thought perhaps Sirath and him were brothers.”
Blake tilted his head at the dragonling staring at him, then stepped back to the basket and almost hesitantly held his hand out to it. It sniffed at him, ears perking before it clambered out of the basket and jumped onto his hand. It began to crawl up his arm, making tiny rumbling noises within its chest. When it reached his shoulder, the dragonling poked his head into the collar of his shirt, winding his head down inside it.
There was a sudden squeak and red glow through Blake’s shirt as he tensed, heat rushing through his body and making him dizzy. The adrenaline-like rush ended almost as quickly as it came and he swayed, blinking to clear his head. Not that he needed to, everything suddenly felt…sharper.
“Blake?” Lana asked worriedly, her eyes wide as she stepped up to him.
He shook his head as the red dragonling pulled its head back out of his shirt and looked up at him with a tiny toothy grin, then nuzzled up against his neck, purring and rumbling away. He didn’t answer his wife right away as he unbuttoned the top of his shirt and pulled it aside to look at his chest. Right over his heart was the mark of a Rider.
“Blake…”
He finally looked back up to her slowly. “I guess I’m going to the Academy with you.”
Both dragonlings looked up at his words. They squeaked and flapped their wings excitedly, grinning at each other.
Now you can find this flash fiction work and others on my profile on Wattpad! Click here for my profile and go dive into a sea of Shards of Imagination!
Also, as I work to play catch up from my latest computer crash, I will be posting the Shards of a prompt I missed from May and June directly to Wattpad each week. That means two Shards every week! Those old prompts will not be posted to my blog so if you wish to see the old one of the week, you’ll have to hop on over to my profile on Wattpad.
The next oldest one from May 25th went live on Monday. You can find Gift of Sight on Wattpad!
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