Sorry for the long wait!  Thanks for being patient with me :)

You can find previous chapters here.

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For a moment, Garrin was too astonished to move.  That didn’t happen to him often.  Actually, that had never happened to him.  But crawling out of a black cave into a world aglow with color—that was enough to astonish anyone.

Maybe having his ears plugged was what had done it?  Even as the thought entered his mind, he dismissed it as nonsense.  But then…who was she?  Who was his true love, the one who changed his vision?

Noemi’s hand on his arm brought Garrin back to his mission.  So what if he’d somehow gained color?  He needed to get the princess away from the sleeping fire-breathing dragons and keep evading the mysterious princess-eating singing dragon.  Garrin turned back to Noemi.

He forgot how to breathe.

She shone with more radiant color than all the rest of the dragons’ rookery.  He didn’t know any of the colors’ names, but that didn’t make her any less beautiful.  Her hair—her skin—her eyes!  She was resplendent in the morning light.

For the first time in his life, Garrin understood the purpose of poetry.

It took him longer to understand what it all meant.  It didn’t make sense, after all.  True love brought color at first sight, and he’d seen her every day for almost his whole life.

It didn’t make sense, but there was no doubt.  Garrin was in love with Noemi.

She pointed back at the mouth of the cave.  Her lips were moving, but the wax in his ears kept her words out of his hearing.  He needed her to be quiet so she wouldn’t awaken the sleeping dragons.  Communicating that without words was going to be difficult.

The sun glinted off her dark hair, drawing out a shimmer of color he’d never seen.  The sight distracted him.  Garrin reached out to run his fingers over the hued shine.  Noemi met his eyes.  He saw surprise, suspicion, understanding, and confusion dart across her face in quick succession.  She reached out one hand to lay over his heart and placed the other hand over her own.

Are you my beloved?  Do you see color, too?

He nodded.  Yes.  And he took it back: Now that he thought about it, it made perfect sense.  Who could he have ever loved but Noemi?

He held one finger to his lips, took the hand over his heart in his, and led her away from the cave and the nearby dragons.  It was a painstaking process.  He had to watch every step, lest they snap a twig or crumple a leaf, at the same time as he watched the sleeping hulks.  Once, one of the beasts shifted.  Garrin froze.  Noemi must have sensed his tension, because she, too, froze.  Tense moments slipped by in which he hardly dared breathe.  The hand on his sword was damp from nerves, but he dared not wipe it dry.

At last he judged them out of the dragons’ hearing.  He sped up, slowing only when Noemi stumbled.  The day wore on.  The overload of colors combined with his dread of the prophecy’s fulfillment to make him feel ill.  Would they completely avoid the foretold dragon, now that Noemi saw color?  He didn’t have much hope in their luck.  If—when—they met it, would the wax work?  How would color save her?

Garrin was helping Noemi over a fallen tree when the air seemed to disappear.  Almost before that registered in his senses, the air slapped back into him with its normal pressure.  Noemi’s grip on his hand confirmed that he hadn’t imagined it.  Garrin glanced up, just as a giant lizard with bat-like wings blotted out the sun.

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There are eight more chapters left!!  Leaving the final chapter count at 25, just like The Weavers’ Blessing and The Kangraffs’ Curse. I have them all planned out, though not all written, and I’m excited for what’s coming.

Last night, I calculated how many stories I have planned out to write (excluding the ones I’ve just thought of but haven’t really committed to in my head), and I realized that if I write one novel per year it’ll take me 30-40 years to write them all!  So far, my usual pattern is one novel per two years, so that’s not looking too great.  Needless to say, this realization has spurned me back into writing.  This year is very unpredictable (though when is life ever actually predictable?), so I haven’t made any resolutions, but my goal is to finish writing another one of my novels by the end of the year.  Of course, first I have to finish Noemi’s Dragon.

All that to say, hopefully you won’t have to wait as long for the next chapters.  I know my inconsistent posting is exactly the opposite of what a good blogger does, and I’m deeply appreciative of those of you (*cough*Ashley*cough*) who’ve stuck with me from the beginning of this book, and for those of you who’ve joined along the way.  All of your support means the world to me.

Since I haven’t said it yet, happy New Year!  May God bless you greatly this year and reveal more of Himself to you :)