A Feast of Dragons - By Morgan Rice Page 0,22

his back. This creature looked like a frog, but was black, with white dots, and ten times the size. Its long tongue protruded from its mouth and slipped down towards O’Connor’s neck. It made a strange snarling noise, and opened its jaws wide. O’Connor looked back over his shoulder in terror.

All around O’Connor, boys were shooting arrows at it, but missing. Thor placed a stone, leaned back, took aim, and hurled it.

It was a perfect hit. The creature made a weird squealing noise, and then turned and glared at Thor. It hissed and then, to Thor’s shock, it turned and hopped right towards him.

Thor could not believe how far this creature could jump: it went flying through the air, its legs spread wide, and was coming right for his face.

Thor immediately reloaded his sling and fired again.

He struck the creature with a second to spare, right before it reached the boat. He hit in mid-air, and it plunged down, sinking into the waters.

Thor breathed deeply.

“LOOK OUT!” came a scream.

Thor spun just in time to see a huge wave coming out of nowhere and crashing down on the boat. Thor raised his hands and screamed—but it was too late. It engulfed them all.

For a moment, Thor was underwater. The wave submerged their boat, rocked it violently, then disappeared just as quickly.

They came up for air, the boat still intact, bobbing back to the surface. Thor gasped, coughing and spitting out the salty water as others around him did as well. Luckily, their boat was big, and that wave had been mostly foam. Thor looked around and spotted Krohn, clinging to the edge, and rushed over and grabbed him, just before he slipped over.

Their boat level again, Thor turned and saw that they were bearing down on the island. They were close to shore, hardly twenty feet away, which brought him a sense of relief.

But at the same time he realized that the shore was comprised of a virtual minefield of jagged boulders. There was no safe, smooth place to land. The huge waves were cresting and crashing down on the rocks. Suddenly another wave came, their boat was lifted high, and all the boys in the boat screamed at once as they came crashing down, straight for the rocks.

There was no time to react. A moment later, their entire boat shattered against the rock, the impact strong enough to shake Thor’s jaw, as their boat splintered into pieces. The boys were all thrown from the boat.

Thor went flying head over heel and found himself back in the water, the churning red sea all around him, flailing, trying to orient himself. This time Krohn was near him, and Thor managed to reach out and grab him. Another wave came and picked them up, and brought them crashing down.

Thor dodged, and narrowly missed landing against a sharp rock. But another wave was coming, and he knew he had to do something quick.

He spotted a boulder flatter than the others, and he swam for it. He reached it just as a wave was receding and tried to climb up onto it; but it was covered in a slimy moss, and he kept losing his grip. Another wave came and pushed him up onto it, crunching his stomach against it but also lifting him up high enough to reach its plateau.

Finally on top of the rock, Thor turned and searched the waters for Reese. He saw him, flailing down below, and scurried down the boulder and reached down to grab him. But he was just out of reach.

“Your bow!” Thor screamed.

Reese understood—he reached onto his back and pulled off his bow and held out one end to Thor. Thor grabbed it and used it to yank him up, onto the rock. He made it safely, just before another wave crashed over him.

“Thanks,” Reese said, smiling. “Now I owe you one.”

Thor smiled back.

The two of them turned and Thor lifted Krohn and stuffed him into his shirt as they jumped to the top of the next boulder, then to the top of next one. They went on like this, boulder to boulder, getting ever closer to shore, until finally Thor slipped off of one and went hurling down into the sea. But he was close to shore now, and when the next wave came, it propelled him even farther, and he found himself able to stand, the water up to his waist. He waded his way towards shore, a tiny, narrow strip of black sand, and