Chapter 8 Only one thing to do.

I sat on the boulder, staring into space. The late morning sunlight flickered and danced, avoiding the waving tree branches with ease, before coming down to warm my face in a shimmer of gold.

I was considering my options.

The first, and most obvious, would be to return to the orphanage, pretend like nothing had happened, and try to live a normal life. At least, as normal as being an orphan can get. This option, however, did not appeal to me at all. Even if the headmistress had been replaced with someone nice, it was still a stuffy old building, filled with young, orphaned children. No way.

The second option was really not an option at all, in my book, unless I was really desperate. I could go far away, to the northern reaches of Canada, perhaps, or somewhere similarly deserted, and live out my days in the wild. There was one major problem with that idea however. The wild includes wild animals, and that includes predators. There's a reason horses are built for speed, and it's not to carry people around. They were designed to outrun any predator that came stalking. However, I did not want to spend the rest of my life bolting every time I see a shadow flicker.

The third option would be to stay, and search out more of my kind, if there are any. And if there aren't, find a way to settle down and fit in. The question was, where to start loo- smack! I jerked as a gust of wind sent a stray newspaper flying into my face. I snatched it before it could blow away again, and gaped at the front page. A huge white dragon spread it's glittering, shell-like wings across the top of the paper. Underneath, in bold, were the words 'huge dragon sightings continue, connected to the recent drop in...' I couldn't even finish the rest, my mind was whirling so fast.

Another like me! It has to be! But how do I find them?

I read through the rest of the article, which was several days old, from the look of the paper. Nothing on where it lived, let alone how to get there.

I crumpled the paper in my fist, then stood and dropped it to the ground. I closed my eyes, and concentrated. It was much easier this time, light springing out of the ground almost immediately. A moment later, a horse stood where I had been standing before. I snorted, hen reared. Pawing at the dancing rays of light, which played on my gray-speckled white coat like golden bees on a flower, I shook my mane, feeling giddy. All at once, I surged forward, going from zero to eighty in seconds. In a moment, I was a blur, just another dancing ray of light, too fast for the human eye to see. I zoomed all over the city, hoping to catch a glimpse if the mysterious white dragon. Just as I was passing the Hancock center, I glanced up just in time to see the creature flying overhead, heading for the edge of the city, away from the shoreline. Aware that this might be my opportunity to see where it lived, I shot after it, weaving around buildings like strings in a loom.

After several minutes, it reached the highway, looking back and fourth as if searching for something. After a moment, it turned and began flying down the highway, one ear cocked to the side as if listening for something. I sped underneath it, watching it's shadow undulate on the road beneath me.

Suddenly, the faint sound of honking reached my super-sensitive ears. The dragon's head jerked, and its ears perked forward, then flicked back, as if it heard the noise too. It sped up, wings increasing their motion thumping the air with every downstroke, until my head pounded with the pressure. I ran harder, keeping pace easily. All of the sudden, the dragon rippled, and went into a nosedive, and I saw what had been making the noise. A car was swerving crazily across the road, on the opposite side from where it was supposed to be. The driver was plainly drunk.

I stumbled and nearly lost my footing as the dragon's tail suddenly whip-cracked through the air, and crunched through the rear hatch of the car, pulling it to a stop. I heard a couple of pops, and paused, slowing to a stop, and hoping they were not gunshots. With relief, I saw the dragon dame off, leaving the car with two popped tires, so it couldn't drive away again, I guessed.

I shook my head, and shot of after the fast retreating dragon, feeling more hopeful about the situation. Obviously, the creature was not stupid. But it still remained to be seen whether the dragon could tell me anything about their...condition.