(Path of the Dragon Mage: Exiled) 29. The Dragon's Secret 1 of 2 (Patreon)

Distant warning bells began to clatter by the time  Corvus reached the bottom of the ladder. Pressing himself against the  wall, he watched with his enhanced Night Vision as guards ran across the top — all heading to a point on the other side of the village.

Whatever excuse Larissa had concocted had granted him time. Now, he needed to use it wisely.

Once  the last of the guards had passed, he ran to the metal locker which had  been tied to a nearby pole. It was locked. Of course.

Corvus drew out his bread knife, ensured that the tip was still well  sharpened by the rune he'd carved into the handle, jammed the point in  the lock, then twisted. There were some grinding sounds, but even  enhanced by his rune, the knife could not cut through metal. Or  magically pick a lock.

Luckily, he had another plan. Kneeling, he drew out the Ever-Flame rune in the sandy soil. When he was certain that the rune was as  perfectly drawn as he could make it, he placed the knife gently in the  middle and activated it while concentrating on the metal blade.

His recently replenished mana well plunged by one hundred points. As  the timer for thirty seconds started counting down in the corner of his  vision, the blade grew dull orange with heat. Phantom flames leaped up  over its straight edge.

Here goes nothing, Corvus thought and then picked up the knife. He had been careful to grab it with the hand wearing the Hell Hound bone ring.

The knife was hot but not uncomfortable. However, the ring itself began to rapidly warm as if it were taking the heat.

Standing,  Corvus pressed the knife against the locker's hinge. Slowly, very  slowly, the metal began to melt away like candle wax. Unnatural  sharpness and heat were too much for non-magical metal.

It was a race between the count down, the heating ring, and the metal hinge.

The hinge lost out — if barely. The moment he cut through and the  door of the locker fell away, Corvus dropped the knife, shaking out his  hand. A second later, the timer reached zero and the unnatural Ever-Flame went dim.

When he picked up the knife again, it was as cool as if it had never been heated at all. Better yet, the engraved Sharp rune had kept the heated blade from growing blunt.

Corvus smiled and looked into the locker.

Two keys hung on hooks inside. One small and brass, the other large and silver.

He took them both, then turned to the rose-red dragonet's pen, first.

The baby dragon hissed as he approached. But there was not much it  could do with its wings hobbled and a muzzle caging its jaws shut.

The lock at the door was large enough to fit the silver key. To Corvus's great relief, it opened at the first try.

The Rose-Red cowered. It had stood its ground earlier, backed up by  its mother and surrounded by his siblings. But now it was alone, in  pain, and scared.

Corvus held up his hand and spoke softly. "It's okay, I'm here to help you."

With a burst of inspiration, he reached into his bag of holding and  drew out a strip of salted meat; Part of the supplies he had purchased  for him and Solt.

Corvus held the meat up, dangling it between his fingers.

Instantly, the Rose-Red became more alert and a little less afraid.  It was easy to see why. Its ribs were visible underneath its scales.

Corvus took a cautious step into the enclosure. The baby dragon was  drooling slightly… And the drool was dripping down the sides of its  muzzle cage and sizzling on the soil. He would have to avoid stepping on  that unless he wanted his boots to melt.

"You can eat all this." Another step. "Just let me help you." A third step. He was within arm's length of it now.

The dragonet made a warning rasp in his throat. It vibrated with  tension, eyes flicking to the strip of meat and Corvus and back again.

But it did not move to attack or run away.

Corvus deliberately dropped the meat on the ground between them.

Instantly, the baby dragon lunged, trying to scarf up the meat even  while its jaws were mostly blocked by the cage around its head. But the  movement brought the lock within easy reach.

Using the small brass key, Corvus jammed it in the lock. Then he grabbed both sides of the cage and yanked it off.

The baby squawked in surprise, rearing back and trying to spread its  still hobbled wings. The motion helped dislodge the cage completely. It  fell to the ground.

Swiftly, before it could think to attack, Corvus grabbed the meat and  shoved it under the baby dragonet's nose. He did not know how he did  not lose his hand, but it was a very near thing.

The dragonet gulped the meat down in a flash.

Then it looked at Corvus as if it was seriously considering having him for dessert.

Quickly, he grabbed another strip of meat from his bag.

"Ah-ah! You can have this, if I can unlock your wings, next."

The Rose-Red stared at him, slightly crouched.

"Wings," Corvus said an exaggeration. He wasn't sure if he was being  stupid or not, if this was a beast, or if there was any way he could  communicate. But it couldn't hurt to try.

With his free hand, he pointed to his own back. "Wings." Then he shrugged his shoulders in an up and down motion.

To his shock, the Rose-Red turned its head, looked at its own wings as if it had never seen them before.

Then it turned to stare back at Corvus. Thoughts were churning behind its eyes.

"Deal?" Corvus said. "Don't bite me, and I will fix your wings.  You're going to feel so much better once I get those hobbles off…"

As he spoke the last few words, he stepped forward. The dragonet did  not object, exactly, though it let out a hiss of air as if it needed to  remind Corvus that it could change its mind at any second.

But it didn't strike, and as Corvus took a half step to the side, he  got a good look at the hobbles. Two clamps cruelly pierced the top of  both wings, right at the point where the small fingers protruded. A  short chain stretched between them, lifting the dragonet's wings at an  unnatural angle off the ground.

The whole thing was held together not by a lock, but by a screw and bolt system.

That would be easy enough to undo.

He unscrewed one bolt halfway, and then the other from the piercing.  The dragonet turned its head around as far as it could to watch, slit  irises contracting and expanding. He wanted to remove both at the same  time because he knew this would hurt the baby. Thankfully, he could work  using both hands.

The bolts fell away, and with them, the clamps.

The dragonet squealed, stepping to the side, and instinctively  brought down its wings. The surprised look on his face as it was able to  do so was almost humanlike.

"See, told you so."

Corvus threw the meat strip at the dragonet who caught it in midair and gulped it down.

Then without further ado, the baby dragon charged.

He had a second to think, Oh no, and step to the side… Just for the dragonet to push past him through the open door.

Corvus followed, half expecting to see the Rose-Red run into the village, upend food stalls, cause havoc…

Instead, it ran, creeling, to its mother's pen.

The smoky blue mother dragon rumbled something and bowed her head to  nudge at her baby through the reinforced webbing of the pen walls.

Corvus let out a breath. This had been the easy part. Now he had to free the others.

… Including the mother who could kill him with a twitch of her tail.

The most immediate problem was that the door that led inside the pen  was too small to let the big blue out. He didn't know if they had  erected the pen around her, or if she had been inside so long she'd  outgrown the door. Either way, he would have to remove the dragon-fire  proof, cut-resistant webbing to have any hope of freeing her.

He decided to look at the posts which held the entire pen up. If there were any runes, they would be there.

Moving around to the other side of the pen from the dragons, Corvus  studied the first of four supporting columns. They seemed to be made of  some kind of hard, durable metal. Possibly steel judging by the rust  marks.

He scanned the post up and down using his Night Vision as well and felt along the length as high as he could reach. No runes were drawn or carved on.

Corvus moved to the next post, then the next, circling the pen clockwise. He found no runes at all.

Finally, stepping back, he considered the problem again. The dragons,  at least, had fallen silent. The baby dragonets had calmed — the  Rose-red had laid down for an exhausted nap near its siblings -- though  on the other side of the webbing. The mother had turned to watch Corvus  with a distrustful eye but made no further move.
With a sigh, he  hooked his finger to a square in the webbing. Could the runes be burned  onto the rope somehow before they had been covered in the resistant tar  or...

... No. Surely not.

What if the tar-like oil itself had been charmed?

The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. Likely there  was a cast-iron pot charmed with strengthening runes. Then the webbing  for this pen could be dipped in. When it dried, the webbing would be  nearly indestructible. It would explain why he didn't see a rune glow,  either.

He would have very much liked to see the pot in question, if only to  examine the runes. Was it charmed against all fire or simply dragon  fire?

Only one way to find out.

Kneeling, he once again drew the Ever-Flame rune, then set  his knife inside it. He thought he heard the blue dragon squawk  something in surprise as it activated, but his concentration was on  keeping the power to the blade only and not the hilt.

Again, the knife was already hot when he picked it up. Only the added  fire resistance from the Hell Hound bone ring allowed him to grip it  for long.

He pressed the blade to the webbing. The hot, sharp knife sizzled as it cut through like butter.

Quickly, Corvus cut through the next strand. Then the next and the next in a wide of an arc as he could make it.

The doorway would still be a squeeze for the blue, but not impossible.

Finally, with seconds to spare on the timer the knife had become too  hot for him to hold. He dropped it, shaking out his hand. The Hell Hound  bone ring had taken on a slight orange glow of its own and the knife  began to smoke where it lay on the ground.

He also, he realized, had received two notifications.

You have increased your Rune Magic skill.

New level: Beginner 9

It used to be that he would gain a level in Rune Magic practically  every time he charged a rune. Now he was leveling much slower.

Congratulations! Due to repeated physical exposure, you have developed: Fire Resistance 1.

Now that was interesting. Fire Resistance was not quite a skill, not quite an attribute. A reflection on his body, perhaps?

He didn't have much time to think it over. The dragons had noticed their new doorway.

Corvus leaped to the side to avoid the two dragonets as they rushed  out to go greet their Rose-Red sibling. The three dragonets tumbled each  other over and over and sniffed at the drops of blood still left on the  Rose-Red's wings.

The Rose-Red seemed to be the largest and strongest of the three and  stood up to the attention of the others, quickly waking from its nap to  put them in their places with rough affection.

Corvus turned his attention to the big blue. She stared at the new  hole in the webbing, swaying her head and neck from side-to-side as if  torn about leaving.

He didn't understand her hesitation. How long had it been since she was last out of the pen?

"You're free," he said, deliberately taking a few more steps to the  side. Not that she could possibly be afraid of him. "I can unlock the  cage around your muzzle and your wing hobbles... but if you didn't eat  me afterward or destroy the village, I would appreciate it."

The blue gave no sign she understood. But she must have seen what he did for the Rose-Red dragonet?

"Maybe you would like the muzzle off, first?"

He took a step toward her and stopped as she bared her teeth. The  blue shifted her body as if to block his view from the shadowed half of  the pen behind her.

She was hiding something.

Abruptly, he remembered the words of the quest: Can you free the  dragon family in time? Also, what secret is the mother dragon hiding?

Behind him, the dragonets had gotten into a playful tussle. The littlest one, a gray, squealed.

Corvus winced. Yes, the guards were distracted for now but if they made too much noise...

The mother dragon seemed to think the same. With still bared teeth at Corvus, she awkwardly hobbled out.

He stepped dutifully to the side.

As the blue went to soothe her babies, he crept into the pen, glanced  over his shoulder to make sure she was still distracted... then darted  into the shadowed area.

This part of the pen was closest to the village wall. That meant it  was nearly always in shadow from the sun and the moon. But Corvus did  not need much light to see.

There, surrounded by a nest of animal bones were at least two dozen dragon eggs.