30 Day Image Prompt Competition - August

Day 15 Prompt 2 - Jax

“Katie, can you please go and play outside for a while? I really need some time to sort this tent into some sort of order if we’re going to be living in it. Why don’t you go and see if Charlotte or Emily is free?”

Nine year old Katie looked up from the tea party she had been having with her teddies and sighed. Her mother had that look on her face that told Katie she was tired, frustrated and ready to shout at someone if they were not careful. It was pointless to try and plead with her to allow her to stay in the pod when she was in that mood.

“Okay,” she said and gathered up the few toys she had been allowed to bring with her. Where once she had had a bedroom lined with shelves and cupboards to store her toys, now she had a large crate, stored in the corner of the living space. Her bedroom was a small room off the main room, with a little window to look out on to the construction site that was to be their new home.

She slipped on the waterproof coat hanging by the door and went outside with a warning from her mother not to wander too far from the camp. Outside the rain that had fallen steadily since the first light of dawn had now eased leaving the air smelling clean and fresh.
She walked along the wooden pathway that had been lain over the mud covered earth, bypassing the other tents and heading out towards the hills surrounding the encampment.

She saw Emily and Charlotte playing in the little garden their father had created for them. Once she would have joined them as she used to when they had travelled across the Great Ocean to this new continent but since the settlement had been founded she had found herself drifting away from them. Their father was a judge, an important man in the hierarchy of the camp whereas her own father was just a builder. A no less important man in her eyes but one who lacked the social standing of the judge. She had felt that gap in their social position standing to widen as the camp began to establish itself and the girls had begun to impress on all they encountered just who their father was.

She scrambled up the hillside, sliding on the wet grass slick from the rain, grasping at the earth to keep her balance. At the summit, she turned and glanced around her, her emerald eyes marvelling at the sights before her. Below, at the foot of the hill, stood the settlement – a collection a large, mud stained tents alongside the foundations of new, wooden buildings that would, in time, replace the canvas community.

Beyond the settlement, wide open pastures spread out towards the distant forest. Fences had been erected to contain the livestock that had been brought with them whilst other tracks of land were being cleared in readiness for planting. To the left of the settlement, she could see the track that had been created when they had unloaded the ships that had transported them here. The ships had later been wrecked upon the rocks during the first storm that had rocked the island. All that remained of them was a few timbers sticking up from the rocky shoreline.

She turned away, not wanting to dwell upon the fact that without the ships they were now stranded forever upon this land. She had always hoped that her parents would abandon this desire of settling in the new world as it had been called. They would find the lure of home too strong to resist and would pack their possessions back onto the ships and sail back to their homeland.

Her heart heavy as she remembered what had been left behind, she crested the hill and wandered down to the valley below. The land was certainly different from where she had been raised. Lush and green, there was life everywhere from the small insects buzzing around her to the gaily coloured birds she saw flying from tree to bush. When her mother had completed unpacking their belongings she would see if her Grandfather’s encyclopaedias had been brought with them. They had lots of drawings about animals within their volumes and she was sure she would be able to identify some of the wildlife she had seen.

She followed a faint path across a meadow, skirting the edge of a dark forest. Despite the bright sunlight above, very little light penetrated the dense canopy making it a dark and mysterious place for a nine year old. It was also a little scary, she admitted to herself although she would not admit that out loud, especially not if anyone was within earshot. A girl had standards.

The path wound around the forest before coming to a halt in a small clearing, framed on three sides by the forest. A stream could be heard trickling through the clearing and she wondered if it was attached to the river near the settlement. The long grass had been flattened in the centre of the clearing, as though some great beast had turned repeatedly in a circle to make a form of nest.

Other than the trickle of the stream no other sounds could be heard in the clearing, which was odd considering the numbers of insects she had seen on her way to the clearing. She advanced towards the nest, her step confident whilst her face reflected the apprehension she was feeling.

The nest had been abandoned by whatever animal had created it, leaving behind only the broken shells of what appeared to have been large eggs. Katie scooped down and picked up one of the shells, wondering if the animal had eaten the eggs. They didn’t appear to have been broken by teeth, though. They reminded her of the shells that used to litter the bottom of the nesting box her grandfather had had for his chickens. He had hatched several young with her assisting him and the jagged edges on these shells looked like those chicken shells.

She looked carefully around the nest, her feet crunching noisily on some of the shells as she poked and prodded the ground. There were no clues as to what had laid so many eggs or signs as to where the mysterious occupants had disappeared to. She felt let down that her grand discovery had revealed nothing of importance.

As she turned to return back to the settlement, her ears picked up on a faint clicking noise. It reminded her of the sound a baby chick made when it was starting to hatch. She scanned the ground below her, moving shells to try and find where the noise was originating from. She could feel excitement building in her at the thought of one egg not hatched, waiting for her to arrive so that she could help the baby into the world.

Images filled her mind, exotic birds, colourful lizards, mysterious snakes. She didn’t mind what it was, only that it would be hers for her to look after. She prowled around until she found the speckled egg hidden at the edge of the nest. It felt warm and heavy in her hands, the shell feeling quite hard to her soft fingers. She could feel something moving inside and hear the now frantic clicking as the baby tried to break out of his egg.

Recognising that the little creature was in trouble, Katie picked up a small stone with a pointed edge and started to tap it against the shell. When nothing happened she tapped harder until a crack appeared across the top half of the shell. Fingers trembled as she prised off pieces of the thick shell, revealing the tough looking egg sac on the inside. She couldn’t see what animal the baby was, the membrane was too opaque to reveal nothing more than just a dark silhouette.

She pulled some more shell off and watched as the wriggling egg sac fell to the ground. Now the little animal was having trouble breaking through the membrane. Careful to avoid the little animal she used the stone to tear a small hole for the animal to use. After a few more moments of struggling, a dark, damp bundle fell into her waiting hands.

Its flesh was wet from the fluid in the egg sac and she reached into her pocket for the handkerchief her mother always insisted she carried and started to rub the little body. It had four limbs, tipped with little needle tipped claws, a plump stomach with a long tail. A blunt shaped head sat upon a short neck, the eyes tightly closed whilst its open mouth tried to take in air. It was struggling to breath and she remembered her grandfather telling her that sometimes newborns needed their airways clearing of fluid before they could breathe properly.

Without a second thought, she slipped her slender fingers into its open mouth, feeling the needle like tips of its teeth as she sought to empty its mouth of mucus. The liquid felt slimy against her fingers but all she could think about was helping this little creature. The frantic rush for air eased and soon the little chest was rising and falling in a regular rhythm against her hand. The eyes opened, revealing pools of liquid black staring intently at her.

“I guess you’re hungry but I don’t know what you’d normally eat,” she said, feeling the need to speak to the little creature who stared at her with such strange eyes. She felt as though the little baby new everything there was to know as it stared up at her. She held him (she had decided it looked like a boy) in her hand, her thumb rubbing soothingly over the lumps on his spine, whilst she rummaged around in her coat pocket and retrieved an apple from yesterday. She bit a piece off and offered it to the creature. A smile lit up her elfin features as he gobbled the piece down and squeaked for more.

He would have gobbled all of the apple if she had not stopped him with a laugh. “You’ll be sick if you eat it all,” she warned him. “Babies should eat little and often, that’s what my Grandfather used to tell me.”

The baby squeaked up at her, his leathery body now dry in her hands. Her eyes widened as she felt the strange lumps move beneath her fingers, revealing themselves to be two small wings that flapped in the afternoon sunlight. He coughed in her hands and she almost dropped him when she saw the smoke rising from his mouth.

“Don’t you dare breathe fire on me, little dragon,” she warned as she held him up to her. The dragon stared back at her, his eyes seeming to look deep into hers. She felt as though he was studying her as she was studying him, only his was more in-depth, going past the barriers she had erected since leaving for the island.

“A little dragon, is that what you are?” she wondered, watching in amazement as he flicked his wings out, the fine, leathery skin catching the warmth of the sun’s rays. “My own little dragon.”

At that moment their eyes met and she felt something shift inside her, a door opening and allowing a knowledge to enter that she had known before. Even though she was unaware of the significance of that look, the little dragon had claimed her as his mistress, bound together for the rest of their lives. He stared long and hard at her, wings outstretched as he hand automatically stroked him.

Katie smiled, somehow feeling no longer alone now she had the little dragon. She raised him up level with her own eyes and smiled lovingly at him. “Hello, Jax,” she greeted, knowing without questioning that was his name.