Since visiting the Badger Tribe, Lolo had started waking up every night in a cold sweat and struggling not to hyperventilate. Tonight was a little different. Instead of seeing the cold, dead bodies of the Badger Tribe, her old nightmares of Sattal Ajigar’s assault and the battle for the Lion Tribe throne merged with the horrors of the Badger Tribe to breed an entirely new flavor of night terror. It was a dream that she couldn’t wake up from. She was pinned, struggling to breathe as a dark figure above her laughed mercilessly. All around her, her friends were fighting a battle to the death, falling one-by-one into mass graves as she lay helpless to protect them.

“Fortus!” Ulana was practically shouting. “Help me! I don’t know what to do!”

Fortus startled awake to find Ulana struggling to wake up Lolo who was fighting viciously and sobbing in her sleep. He jumped up from his bedroll as Standig and Jadu woke up terribly confused. “Let go, Ulana,” Fortus ordered. “Restraining her makes it worse.”

Ulana jumped back to watch with growing anxiety as Fortus took over.

“Lolo,” Fortus called her name a few times, trying to remain calm himself. “Lolo, you’re ok.” Something about Fortus’s voice seemed to cut through her terror, and Lolo’s sobs lessened into pained whimpers. “Hey, you’re ok, Lolo. I’ve got you.” Fortus laid down next to her and put a hand on her shoulder. Almost instantly, Lolo rolled into him, clinging to his shirt as though it was her only lifeline. As he held her and stroked her hair, her body began to relax again and her breathing slowed.

“How did you do that?” Ulana was trembling.

“Do what?” Fortus whispered, trying not to disturb the sleeping girl in his arms.

“That! She completely calmed down for you. I couldn’t get through to her at all.”

“A lot of trial and error,” Fortus admitted.

“Does she get nightmares like that a lot?” Standig asked, now very awake.

“She used to,” Fortus nodded.

“That was terrifying to watch,” Ulana sat down on her bedroll, the adrenaline coursing through her body suddenly making it difficult not to cry.

Fortus sighed. “I assure you, it’s worse for her. Recent events didn’t help, I’m sure.”

Lolo shuddered in her sleep and Fortus tightened his hold.

“When did her nightmares start?” Jadu asked.

“As far as I’m aware, since the Dragon Tribe exchange,” Fortus reliped. “You two might remember when they started,” he added, looking between Standig and Ulana who nodded in reply. “After each new trauma, the nightmares resurface,” Fortus continued.

“What traumas?” Jadu asked.

“The coup last year, and now investigating the Badger Tribe.”

“And the original trauma?”

“The cave,” Fortus said simply.

“Torture,” Ulana clarified for Jadu.

Jadu nodded, recalling the condition everyone had been in when they'd fled the Dragon Tribe exchange.

Jarringly, Ulana laughed.

“What’s wrong with you?!” Fortus was immediately angry.

“Just, earlier this week, you said that Lolo is a snuggler. Is this how you found out? She rolled right into you.”

Fortus worked to calm down. “That’s part of it.”

Ulana knew that now was not the right time to ask what the rest of it was, so she laid back down on her bedroll and drew her cape over her like a blanket.

“Standig, could you pass me my cape?” Fortus requested.

Standig grabbed it and helped drape it over Fortus so that he didn’t have to disturb Lolo.

“Thanks.”

“Sure.” Standig laid back down and tried to go back to sleep, but the sleep he managed to catch was uneasy and anything but restful.

Lolo woke up lying against Fortus’s shoulder. She knew what that meant. “Not again.” She looked around at the rest of the group. Everyone looked especially tired. Maybe it was her imagination, but probably not. Just the fact that she was the first person awake was enough to indicate that the rest of the group had had a lousy night.

She got up to get breakfast together while everyone else slept. First thing in the morning, there would be plenty of game to hunt near the stream they’d crossed the night before. Concealed and silent behind a tree, Lolo waited for a good target. It came in the form of a large wild turkey. She plucked the feathers and gutted it before bringing the carcass back to camp, gathering some wild onions along the way and collecting some of the better feathers to make quills out of later. Lolo got to work stripping the meat off the bones so it would cook faster on a large flat rock set over the fire embers. She rinsed her hands and dug through one of the saddlebags to find a tin of salt to sprinkle over the top.

“Mmm. That smells good, Lolo,” Fortus said as he woke up and stretched the kink out of his neck and shoulder. “What did you hunt?”

“Turkey,” Lolo smiled as Fortus joined her by the fire and passed him a stick that she’d skewered some of the meat and onions with.

“Thanks.”

“You bet.” She found a few more pieces of cooked meat to pull off the fire and stab onto a stick for the next hungry person. “Fortus, I’m sorry about last night.”

“What about last night?” he asked with his cheek full of food.

“I had another nightmare, didn’t I?”

He finished swallowing his bite before answering. “It’s not your fault, Lolo.”

“Still. I’m sorry. I know it’s not fun to deal with, and, from the looks of things, everyone’s night of sleep suffered because of me.”

“Do you remember your nightmare at all?”

“No. Not this time.”

Fortus nodded. “That’s probably a good thing.”

“Was it bad?”

“I haven’t seen one like that in a long time,” Fortus confirmed.

“How are your nightmares these days?”

“'Haven’t had one in a while, actually-- probably not since April.”

“That’s good to hear,” Lolo smiled. “Hey, Fortus, thank you for your help.”

“Don’t mention it.”

***

“Guys, do those look like ancient ruins to you?” Ulana asked.

“Where?” Lolo scanned the valley below in the direction Ulana was looking.

“There,” Ulana pointed, “near that cluster of tall trees along the stream.”

“How did you see that?! You have good eyes, Ulana.” Lolo was impressed. Sure enough, there was something there. Something that looked out of place and possibly man-made.

Fortus consulted the map one more time to verify their position. “Yeah, that’s about where the map says the ruins should be. We should get moving if we want to reach them before sunset.”

“Somehow, I thought the ruins would be a lot bigger,” Ulana commented as they wandered between a series of stone pillars.

“Okhotnik did say that the ruins were somewhat less than a city's worth,” Lolo remembered. “I guess I just didn’t grasp how much less.”

“Ulana, didn’t you say that there was supposedly a temple of some sort here?” Standig asked.

“I only relayed the rumors I heard,” Ulana shrugged.

“How old do you suppose these ruins are?” Fortus asked, observing the advanced weathering on the pillars. “I don’t trust that these pillars are stable anymore. I’m seeing a lot of crumbling and cracking in the stones. Be careful.”

“I’m not seeing any signs of human life,” Lolo said. “I’m thinking that the Great Owl isn’t here.”

“I was afraid of that,” Fortus sighed. “I’m a little worried that this quest is only just beginning.”

“Look at this.” Jadu was studying a giant circular rock standing between two large pillars.

“Look at what?” Standig asked, and Jadu pointed at the large rock. “It’s a rock. Anything in particular you want us to see?”

Jadu rolled his eyes a little and picked up a handful of dry brown dirt. “Stand back.” He threw the dirt, dusting the face of the stone and drawing into sharper relief the fading carvings that had caught his eye.

“Standig, does this look familiar to you at all?” Lolo asked. “Doesn’t it look like that round stone in the courtyard you showed me?”

Standig closed his eyes, visualizing the stone from the courtyard before looking at the rock in front of him again. “They’re both so faded, Lolo. Apart from the fact that they are round, carved, weathered, and maybe give the vague impression that animals were the subject of the carving, there really are not enough details to compare them.”

“Let’s get camp set up for the night,” Fortus said, observing the fading light.

They returned to the field where they’d left their horses to graze and got a campfire going. No one had much to say while they ate dinner and contemplated the disappointingly anticlimactic evening.

“Standig,” Lolo's eyebrows pinched together as a thought crossed her mind, “come with me.”

“Where are we going?”

“Back to that rock. Come on,” she said, standing up and extending her hand to him.

“Why?”

“I want to try meditating there with you.”

“Now?”

Lolo waved her tiring hand at him.

“Fine.” Standig stood up and dusted his pants off before taking her hand.

As they disappeared into the gathering darkness, Ulana looked around at Jadu and Fortus. “Anybody else curious enough to watch with me?”

The boys exchanged looks. Jadu shrugged and Fortus rolled his eyes, but they both stood up to follow Standig and Lolo with Ulana. When they arrived at the rock, Lolo and Standig were already sitting across from each other and deep in meditation.

Lolo was walking through a town bustling with people. As she passed through the streets, everyone stared at her nervously. She was hardly less nervous, so she stayed close to the little boy in front of her. The boy, about half her height and probably no more than ten years old, brought her to his home in a small wood hut near the edge of the town.

“Mother, I’m home,” the boy said.

“Did you find her?” came a disembodied female voice.

“Yes.”

The mother Lolo recognized from the cold wintery cave came in through a back door and smiled cautiously at Lolo. “I don’t know if you can understand me, but something tells me that you do. Come with me.”

Lolo followed the woman to the back of the hut where a large slab of venison was waiting for her. She looked up at the mother to confirm that the meat was intended for her before picking it up with her teeth.

“I know it’s not much, but I wanted to thank you for your help that night.”

Time skipped forward in a blur of unidentifiable images and vague impressions. Lolo was back in the woods. Her six pups had grown to their adult sizes and were developing hunters now, but they still looked to her to guide the pack. Her mate, the Alpha, had died in a hunting accident, and none of her pups were ready to take on the Alpha role.

They skirted the town following elk tracks. With seven fully-grown wolves to feed, it was getting harder to find enough meat in competition with the humans. Taking down larger prey was becoming increasingly necessary.

Someone screamed, and Lolo looked up from the tracks she was following, her ears twitching in the direction of the cry. It sounded like the scream came from the town. One scream became many, and Lolo recognized one of the voices. It was the little boy.

She wasn’t sure why, but she needed to help him. She ran, following the sounds of his distress, her pack hot on her heels. The boy’s home was on fire, in fact, much of the town was, and something about this fire was off. It smelled like….

“Dragon!” someone shouted as a fresh stream of fire descended on the town.

Not just any dragon-- it was the Black Dragon, the dragon prince. He was cold-blooded, malicious, and powerful, and, for unknown reasons, he hated humans. This was not the first time that the Black Dragon had attacked an innocent human population before, and something about the unprovoked nature of his brutality made Lolo angry. She couldn’t stand by and watch this time.

However, Lolo’s pack couldn’t fight a flying dragon. They would need help. She threw her head back and howled. The town’s people heard her call and rallied to her cry. Her pups led the humans to safety while Lolo waited for her friends to arrive.

Mother Black Bear arrived first. Lolo ran to press her forehead to the bear's, communicating in an instant the danger and need to protect the frightened people. The bear ran through the town, breaking down doors to release anyone that had been trapped by the dragon’s flames.

Next came the Golden Lion. Again Lolo pressed her head to his, promising that an alliance with the humans now would work in his favor later. Skeptical as the proud lion was, he agreed to help and summoned his lionesses.

The enormous Red Phoenix shot through the sky. He didn’t need to be told what was happening. He was more than happy to tangle with the ruthless Black Dragon wreaking havoc on the town. Climbing high into the sky, the phoenix dove hard and fast, ramming into the Black Dragon and throwing him to the ground with a deafening crash.

The lion had been waiting for his chance to pounce and took it as the Black Dragon struggled back onto his feet. With a pride of lions on top of him, the Black Dragon flailed viciously, throwing a few of the lionesses off his neck and tail. The Red Phoenix took another dive, using the lions as a distraction to spit his own fiery projectiles at the dragon and successfully injure his wings.

With the Black Dragon now grounded, Lolo and the Black Bear swarmed the dragon with the lions. The mother bear was large enough to pin the dragon to the ground, and with the lion chomping at his throat, the dragon was unable to breathe his fire. Lolo cautiously pressed her head against his.

“Let me go, Silver Wolf!" The Black Dragon demanded.

"Why do you do this?” she asked.

“Why do you protect them?”

“These people are kind.”

“And you’re a fool to believe that!”

“How would you know?”

“Humans kill. That’s what they do. They will destroy you. They kill anything they see as a threat. They will destroy us all!”

“How are you any different?! You destroy these people without provocation.”

“I’m preventing disaster.”

“And when they hunt you, could they not say the same?”

“It’s different. I was here first. This is my territory. I rule this land. By coming here, they must accept my laws, be my subjects.”

“They’ve broken no laws, and you are not the king.”

“I will be, and the humans are a threat. They must be destroyed!”

Lolo stepped back and howled again, this time lighting the forest with little orbs of silvery light. After a while, the majestic Blue Dragon appeared in the sky, landing deftly next to Lolo with an entourage of fellow dragons falling in behind him. She’d summoned the Black Dragon’s twin brother.

Pressing her head to the Blue Dragon’s brow, she communicated her conversation with the Black Dragon, and explained his crimes. The Blue Dragon rose to the sky and doused the red flames with his own blue ones before returning to the ground to continue his conversation with the Silver Wolf.

“My father will hear of this,” he said.

“And the humans?”

“We will hold a council.”

“They are innocent.”

“Do you defend them?”

“I do.”

“Why?”

“I’ve interacted with them.”

“You know them?”

“Some of them. We’ve cooperated. I believe that we can live together peacefully.”

“You will come to the council-- your friends too.”

Lolo bowed to agree, and the group released the Black Dragon into his brother’s custody.

The scene melted away with another blurry reel of immediately forgotten history and was replaced by something new....