“I won’t go with you!” she yelled, getting up and running away from him as fast as her tired legs would carry her.

“Anna, wait,” he called out.  “You’re in danger.  Damn it, woman, I’m trying to save you.”

“I doubt that,” she shot back, turning away from him. 

“Anna, listen to me.”

She ran, ignoring his pleas.  When she got to the head of the trail, the villagers were right there, only a hundred yards away in the field.

“There she is!” someone yelled, and the crowd roared, coming at her as one giant, pulsating entity.

“No,” she cried out, trapped between the king and the villagers with nowhere to turn but into the river.

She decided that was her only way out, preferring to fling herself into the water and take her chances over being sacrificed to the king.  Eli was coming toward her, closer than the villagers but still a few yards away. 

“I won’t go with you,” she said again as she ran toward the water, jumping onto a large boulder mid-stride and leaping into the air, the water just below her and the river much wider than she could ever hope to jump.

“Oh, hell,” she heard Eli say as she was yanked back mid-leap, then thrown onto his back in one smooth motion.  “Hold on or you’ll fall to your death.  I promise you, you don’t want to do that.”

Before she could ask what he meant, he jumped straight into the air, impossibly high, just before the villagers reached them both.  She felt his body mold and stretch beneath him, and in almost the same instant, his wings spread wide with a popping sound and her arms that were wrapped around his human neck were now wrapped around a thinner, scaly neck.  The back of her legs pressed against the joint of his wings, and all at once she realized that she was riding astride the Dragon King and already they were over a thousand feet off the ground.

If she jumped from there, she would die.

That’s what he meant, she thought, hot, angry tears springing up as the newly crowned king flew unhurried toward the northern region of Aman and away from the place Anna had called home her entire life.

Despite her best efforts, she was trapped and the king had her.  She was at his mercy and there was no one left to save her when she couldn’t save herself.

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