Slayers by C. J. Hill Page A

written an introduction about researching oral histories and medieval records. As Tori scanned the list of sources, she was impressed. She’d finally found a person who knew more about dragons than she did.

    The book was divided into sections: similarities found in dragon lore; dragon habits and abilities; and methods of defeat. The same three topics they could choose for their papers. It was almost as if he wanted the class to skip the recommended reading list and just study his book.
    She turned to dragon habits and abilities. That would make for an easy paper.

    Although the size of dragon eggs and their natural nesting places remain unknown, it is clear that dragons lay their eggs in twos: One male and one female, thus ensuring the survival of the species.

    Had she ever read that before? She couldn’t remember, but it seemed right.

    Dragons have no natural predators, so unlike other animals, they don’t reproduce in large numbers. The female lays only one or two clutches of eggs in her lifetime and does not lay eggs until she is in her thirties, near the middle of her lifespan. The gestation period of the eggs is between fifteen and twenty years, thus assuring that her children will not compete with her for resources—or at least not for long. Various accounts and lack of fossil records indicate that dragons didn’t usually die of old age, but were killed by younger, stronger dragons, perhaps even their own offspring. The victors not only got territorial rights, but also had a feast that could sustain them for some time.

    Tori lowered the book to her lap. Dragons ate their parents? Creepy.

    The key to dragons’ long-term survival is their ability to choose their eggs’ gestation period. If the mother is under
stress from lack of food or other threats, she lays eggs which hibernate. These eggs won’t hatch for one hundred and fifty years.

    What? Tori knew she’d never read this before, and she gripped the book tighter. Where had Dr. B gotten that information from? She flipped through the pages, searching for footnotes, but didn’t see any. She turned to the back, looking for an index. Nothing there, either.
    It shouldn’t bother her. Her heart shouldn’t be pounding like this. It was a book about mythical creatures. Authors could say anything about them, because they didn’t exist.
    But her heart rate didn’t slow down. Her mind was already doing the calculations. If dragons had gestation periods of one hundred and fifty years, then they could still exist. Back in the nineteenth century, the world still had enough wild places that a dragon might not be discovered.
    She turned back to the book. The next sentence didn’t make her feel better.

    This theory of dragons corroborates with several unexplained sightings of flying creatures in southwest America in the 1800s, often called Thunderbirds by the Native Americans.

    Tori’s throat went dry. She’d noticed something about Dr. B’s writing. He didn’t talk about dragons in the past tense. The descriptions were written in the present tense, as though he expected a dragon to hatch any day now.
    She tried to shake off the alarm spreading up her back. It was all hype. Most kids at camp probably got a kick out of a book that made you think you could see a dragon flying overhead when you walked out of the room.

    She put the book down. Why had she thought coming to this camp was a good idea? It didn’t make her feel understood. She wasn’t really going to learn anything to help her defeat dragons or her stupid obsession with them. This camp would only give her nightmares.
    Still, she picked up the book again.

    Newly hatched dragons are the size of grown lions. Driven by hunger, they’re capable of hunting and killing prey much larger than they are. For the first year, they eat voraciously, thus doubling their size in quick succession until their bodies alone are the size of busses. With wings, legs, neck, and tail added, some estimate that a mature