Not long after Lorna reached the edge of Skye, a twinge started in her left shoulder. Each beat of her wings intensified the pain shooting through her body.
Lorna said to her beast, We need to land. If we keep going, we may not be able to fly for over a week.
Her dragon huffed. We’re nearly there. A bit longer won’t hurt.
Since calling her beast stupid would be counterproductive, Lorna took another approach. Do you want to take Ross up into the air in the next few days?
Of course.
Another pain jarred her body. Keep this up, and we won’t be able to play with our human. A ten-minute rest will do us good. I promise not to shift back or contain you. I know how much you miss being in this form.
Her dragon paused a few seconds before replying, Just a few minutes. I see a good place to land ahead.
As they descended, Lorna spotted the relatively flat piece of land nestled among hills, a stream, and lots of rocks.
After gliding down slowly, Lorna’s hind legs touched the ground. No sooner had she closed her wings against her back, a human’s head covered in an old, worn fedora popped up from behind a hill.
She froze. As far as she knew, there weren’t any dragon hunters on Skye. But until she knew for certain who the male was, Lorna watched his every move.
The male climbed up and over the small hill in the ground. Mud covered his feet, knees, and hands. He was young, maybe her sons’ age, but that was all she could tell with the hat obscuring a proper view.
He finally spoke with a southern English accent. “Hello, dragon. Fancy meeting you here.”
Lorna frowned as much as a dragon could and wished she could ask him a question. But there was no way she was going to shift into her human form in front of the stranger, especially since she had sharp talons and impressive strength as long as she stayed a dragon.
The human put his hands out to his sides, palms up. “I won’t hurt you. I’m more interested in what’s buried over there than killing a dragon.” She huffed, and the human placed his hands on his hips. “My name’s Max. Excuse my muddy appearance, but that tends to happen when digging a trench.”
Trench was an odd word to use for a hole. Not that Lorna cared about his word choices. Listening carefully, Lorna didn’t hear anything other than the wind. The tall, lean male was here alone.
Her dragon spoke up again. I say just scoop him up, and we can drop him in one of the sea lochs along the way to the cottage.
We already were having trouble flying, and now you want to add extra weight? Just hush and let me think.
Her beast grunted but didn’t say anything else.
Lorna’s options were few. She might be able to fly long enough to get away from the human, but then she ran the risk of him telling others that there were dragons on Skye. The locals were loyal to Lochguard, but the human was English, and she didn’t trust him.
The other possibility would be knocking the human unconscious and keeping him gripped in her talons until someone came to find her. Lorna was always on time so Iris would suspect something straight away when Lorna didn’t show.
Max took a step toward her and Lorna tensed in case she needed to pounce. The male clicked his tongue. “Look at that. You think I’m a threat, don’t you?” He chuckled as he adjusted his hat. “I’m the furthest thing from a threat, dragon. To be honest, I’m digging without permission and don’t fancy being caught myself. So, if you fly away, I won’t tell anyone about you and you don’t tell anyone about me. Deal?”
In order to give her some time to think of what to do, Lorna bared her teeth. That should scare the human.
However, a look of wonderment filled his eyes, and he took a step forward. “So that’s what they look like in a living a dragon. I’ve only ever seen them buried in the ground.”
Growling, Lorna assessed him again. Why would he be digging up dragon teeth? Was he some sort of eccentric bone collector?
Max retreated a few steps and put up his hands again. “No need to growl at me. I’m an archaeologist and digging things up is my passion.” She growled again, and he added, “My interest is dragon-shifters up through the Roman conquest of Britain. However, no one will give me a grant, let alone pay me, for that. So I pretend to look for human Iron Age and Roman settlements. They usually bring me to the right place for the dragons of that time period, too. As long as I find enough human evidence to convince people I’m doing my job properly, I can keep up this charade. Maybe you can help me convince dragon-shifters to help, too? That would be brilliant if we could set up an alliance to preserve British dragon archaeology.”
Lorna blinked. What was he nattering about?
From the corner of her eye, she noticed a purple dragon approaching. It was Iris.
Wanting to keep the human from noticing her approach, she plodded closer to him and pointed to the hole in the ground.
Excitement filled Max’s eyes. “That trench there should tell me if the old dragon-shifters of Skye had their base here. The references are spotty at best in historical documents, but I think I’ve finally figured it out.”