Dragons of Summer Tide (The Dragons of Hwandor) Read Online Free

need food since he had no supplies.
    The return to the small valley where the battle had been fought between the dragon and the foreigners only took a little more than half an hour but already the stream was starting to grow and the steady rain was becoming a heavy rain and lighting was beginning to tear at the sky. Having grown up in this area, Veer remembered that there was a cave nearby where he and the horse could shelter from the weather until the storm passed and he could set off in the morning to hunt down his new enemies.
    Five more minutes up the stream from the bodies of men and dragon and Veer saw the opening to the shallow cave a little above him on the hillside high enough so that the stream could not flood it. Climbing down from the saddle Veer led the horse up the incline to the cave. At the mouth of the cave the horse planted his feet and refused to go in. Veer said to the horse. “Suit yourself then and stand out here in the rain.” A distant voice in the back of his mind told Veer that he should remove the saddle and packs from the horse and take them in the cave with him. Mechanically he unfastened the packs and tossed them into the cave then he took the deer and put her in the cave and then he untied the saddle and took the bridle off of the horse and carried these into the cave with him, leaving the horse outside in the rain.
    Veer tried to sit down but the sword got in his way so he removed the belt that held the sword and laid it along with fighting knife and the pouch down on the ground as he himself sat. Finally resting in the cave Veer felt a shiver as he realized that even though it was summer, the rain had chilled him. He also vaguely noticed a rumbling in his belly that reminded him that he had not eaten for a long time. He looked at the deer there across from him on the floor of the cave and realized that he had no fire with which to cook it and that any wood to be found would be far too wet to kindle. He moved across the small cave to where he had thrown the saddle and the packs and he unrolled the bed roll that had been on the horse behind the saddle and wrapped the thick wool blanket around himself.  Veer decided to open the saddle bags to see what the ranger had left in his packs and what supplies he would have to use on his mission of vengeance. In the packs he found a small cooking pot, coins, sewing things, leather strips, twine, a razor, tinder box and lots of the little items one would carry when travelling the hills. At the moment the most important thing that he found in the packs was some dried meat and oats. Though Veer didn’t feel like eating, his rumbling belly told him that he should have something. “I suppose that I’ll need my strength,” he said out loud to himself as be began to force himself to have some food.
    Hearing a sound of movement off to his left Veer saw a flicker of motion in the shadows there in the back of the shallow cave, only a dozen feet from where he sat. Something was in the cave with Veer and he wondered how he could have been so stupid as to forget to check the cave first. Reaching to his side and finding no knife Veer remembered that he had taken of the belt and weapons and left them on the other side of the cave. Veer attempted to leap toward his blades and his tired feet tangled in the blanket and he fell to find himself scrambling across the ground like an infant until he reached his knife and managed to turn around to face the back of the cave with his knife blade pointing out toward whatever was there in the darkness. While Veer had sat eating he had not noticed that it had become very dark, as night and the storm fell together over the world.  Veer could hear little noises of something moving around in the back of the cave. He wondered to himself if the sounds had been there all along and he had just not noticed. As he tried to peer through the gloom a stroke of lightning ripped the world apart outside and for a moment he could clearly see