Celia woke with a start as the ground moaned and shook, then leaped out of bed as a symphony of cracking ice swarmed around her. Celia's knees wobbled, but she managed to stumble towards the doorway. After she forced the pelt covering the entrance aside, she looked down the hallway in both directions.

The earth and snow growled and cracked as the earthquake disturbed their seemingly eternal resting places. The roar of the ground overwhelmed the ears of all those who heard it. As suddenly as it started, the trembling stopped, though creaks and groans still came from the icy walls as they resettled.

Celia held her breath as the rumbling stopped, then released her ragged exhalation as she glanced to the pelt across the hall from her. "Xan?" Celia's voice shook slightly as the ice finally seemed to settle and the multitude of sounds from the fractured ice ceased. "Xan? Are you okay?"

Shortly after she called out to the other room, Xan emerged from the inside, seemingly unfazed by the events. "That was a doozy." He grinned as he stretched, then dusted a few shards of ice out of his hair.

Celia flinched as the ice around the two suddenly released a jarring crack, "I did not realize earthquakes could be so strong!" She exclaimed and warily glanced around at the fractures in the ice around them. "Are we sure the ice will hold?"

"It will," Xan assures with a slight wave of his hand, "the ice carvers and builders will have a boost in their business." He turned to Celia, then frowned slightly, "but if you are that worried about it, we can go ahead and head back out. You don't look like you will be able to go back to sleep anytime soon."

He reached his arms high into the air in a stretch and simultaneously released a soft yawn, then got a better look at the anxious female. "Celia, are you all right? You seem frazzled. Do you not get earthquakes back where you are from? They are semi-common here, but unless there are aftershocks we probably will be safe from any more tremors. Probably." He shrugged a bit.

"Not at this magnitude," Celia admitted slowly, "and I think I would prefer we got out here in case the tunnels collapse."

"Fine by me," Xan shrugged, "go get your bag and I'll lead us out." He turned around and reentered the room he emerged from a few moments ago.

Celia swiftly returned to her suite and retrieved her possessions, then exited and waited for Xan to come back.

He took a few more seconds than Celia, but eventually, Xan came back out. "I'll pay for the hours we used the two rooms, and I will meet you outside the inn." He nodded to her, then began to walk towards the inn's sole exit.

Celia quickly followed him out, then waited as he suggested while he haggled over the rate, but eventually gave in and reluctantly paid full price for both rooms. Once he forked over the metals, he approached Celia. "We can go now." He motioned for her to follow as he began to stroll towards the nearest exit.

"Wait, here's your blade back," She offered the borrowed item to him. "Thank you for loaning it to me, but I have my own weapons now."

Xan paused and looked back to her, then turned and walked back. "Thank you," he accepted the weapon, then quickly shoved the item into his backpack. "Now, let us get out of here and on our way." he began to walk again.

Celia nodded and wordlessly followed, eager to exit the hazardous environment. As they walked, Celia continually found herself warily glancing around and noting the severity of the damage in different parts of the town.

Many of the tunnels and hallways of the settlement seemed perfectly unaffected by the tremors. However, parts of the merchant room appeared caved in based upon the mounds of snow in place of the some of the missing support pillars.

When Celia saw the tunnel to the nearest exit, she became a bit worried. Unluckily, the earthquake heavily damaged the tunnel and the ice continued to shift and settle. Shards of ice rained down from above and clattered against the ground with twinkling sounds.

Celia held her breath a but as she and Xan Walked down the tunnel. She wished he would walk faster than a meandering stroll, but she did not want to hurt his ego any more than she already had. So, she allowed him to remain the leader even though she did not really care who Lead the March out of the cave as long as they got out soon. The heavily damaged walls appeared as if they could collapse any second and without any kind of forewarning.

Suddenly, the earth erupted in an angered roar and the ground trembled. Tough this tremor was not as strong as the last, the already weakened ice groaned, chipped, and cracked even faster than before.

"Aftershock! Get down!" Xan yelled and dropped to his knees, then put his hands over his head as he attempted to touch his face to the ground.

Before she could comply, the shaking ground forced Celia onto her rear anyway. As the ice fell onto their heads, Celia instinctively curled into a ball. In her panic, she called out to Verbena just as everything became black.

~~~

Verbena's muscles moved without the green dragonet thinking as she burst out of the snow cave Irin had made for the two of them. She did not care if she destroyed all of Irin's hard work, the earthquakes had weakened the structure anyway.

All Verbena cared about at the moment was to save her friend from the danger that had befallen her. 'Celia!' Verbena roared out into the snow-covered landscape and listened for a reply as she ran.

When Celia gave no response, Verbena relied on their mindlink to pinpoint the human's location under the snow. Verbena lowered her head to the depression in the snow where she believed Celia to be and sniffed the surface as she evaluated her possibilities. She had fire breath but was hesitated to use it in case she needed it later. Opting for her paws, Verbena began to dig.

Soon, Irin caught up and added his efforts to Verbena's excavation project with the same amount of urgency as the female. Though they had no frame of reference for the depth of the snow, neither dragon wished to leave their rider behind as long as a chance remained to save them.

Verbena felt like she was moving mountains as she sifted through the snow with her wide front paws. She struggled to keep the grainy snow from tumbling back into the excavated hole but never less refused to give up.

Verbena hit something hard under the snow, then became ecstatic and swiftly unburied the object. She snorted at the discovery of a misshapen chunk of ice, then grabbed the bothersome object in her teeth and hurled it as far as she could manage. Needless to say, the object landed with a satisfying "poof" in the snow several paces away from Verbena. After the object landed, she continued to excavate the snow and ice with strong determination even as her breath became ragged from the exertion.

"Hey!" A distant voice yelled. Shortly after the call sounded, many sets of footsteps approached the two dragons.

Though she heard the sounds, Verbena ignored them as she continued to dig. Irin, however, paused and looked to the approaching armed group with strange white objects under their feet that helped them walk atop the snow. "Keep digging," he instructed and moved to intercept the men, "while you dig Xan and Celia out, I'll keep the villagers at bay and away from you."

Verbena snorted her agreement as she continued to dig as fast as her large paws allowed. She removed a few more pieces of ice, then finally hit a bit of cloth and somehow managed to dig even faster.

Irin attempted to tell the men they meant no harm, but they interpreted his draconic barks and chirps as a sign of attack. Irin jumped backward and dodged a spear thrown at his neck. He glanced back to Verbena as she pulled a limp Celia from under the snow and gently placed her on the ground. He turned back to the men as Verbena moved to dig Xan out as well.

As much as Verbena wanted to simply focus on Celia, the dragonet also knew that the older dragon would not be happy if Verbena left his chosen to die under the snow. So, she used Celia's hole as a starting point and dug towards where Irin had been digging mere moments ago.

As she excavated the snow and removed pieces of ice, Verbena slowly admitted that she did not want to disappoint the handsome blue dragon.

Irin dodged a spear aimed at his shoulder with a roar. "I don't want to hurt you!" He barked, waiting for the humans to finally notice his lack of offensive attacks, though a small bit of smoke rose from his nostrils.

"Just stand still and let us kill you, beast!" One of the men jabbed his spear towards Irin, who jumped back and avoided the weapon. "What the?" The human's voice squeaked as Irin bit the shaft of his weapon. When Irin yanked the object out of his hands, the man helplessly watched as his main weapon flew across the landscape and landed in the middle of town. If he attempted to retrieve his spear, he would fall into the weakened tunnels and hurt himself.

The human looked to the vertical shaft of his weapon in the distanced his two companions glanced to each other. "Um," the weaponless man stepped back and looked up to Irin. "Don't hurt me, I'm unarmed now."

Irin snorted a slight plume of smoke as he looked between the two men, whom both had short-range weapons. To his pleasure, they backed off just in time for Verbena to drag Xan out of the snow.

"I dug them out!" Verbena barked to Irin. "Now we should get out of here! Distract them somehow and run over here! I will I'll put both of them on your back and we can escape!"

Irin nodded, then used his tail as he turned to slap a mass of snow into his three attacker's goggled eyes. Thankfully, the action momentarily blinded and distracted the men. They slowly notice and follow the larger of the two ice-armored dragons run over to his smaller companion, but they are far behind.

When Irin arrived, Verbena immediately threw Xan over his shoulders, then carefully paced Celia there as well. "They're loaded!" Verbena barked and spears her wings. When she spotted the men running toward them, she paused. "I'll distract these men for you so you can get a head start!" Before he could object, she already started to run towards his previous attackers.

Irin decided to obey and carefully lifted into the air with controlled wingbeats. He felt Xan begin to slip off of his back and swiftly adjusted his flight path to attempt to keep Xan from slipping any more. Not knowing where else to go, Irin fled as fast as he could towards the western horizon.

Verbena roared in warning and held her wings high in an attempt to intimidate her opponents. However, she failed to intimidate them. Though the humans slowed down and stopped before her, their faces showed no fear. She barked a bit in warning and tried to explain the situation, but the men were deaf to her language.

One of the men lunged with the tip of his blade aimed at her chest, "Those humans are not your food!" The man screamed at the top of his lungs.

"Hey!" Verbena barked and dodged, then flapped her wings to rise off of the ground and out of range as he tried to swipe the short weapon at her. The female dragonet looked to Irin. When she determined that he had a decent head start, Verbena scattered snow into a cloud-like plume and sent it to the men with a flap of her wings. While the show obscured their vision, Verbena escaped and followed Irin.

Once Irin flew what he believed to be a safe distance away, the dragonet landed and began to dig a new snow cave. His wide paws and claws easily carved out the snow, but a stable cave large enough for all four of them would still take a bit of time to create. When Verbena caught up and landed next to him, she silently and swiftly aided in his effort to build a place for them to rest. 

Author Notes:

Welcome back to Dawn's Light And I hope you enjoyed the chapter!

Are the humans ok? Are they badly hurt or simply unconscious? Find out next time!

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