I heard a noise above like a flapping tarp. A midsize flying reptile swooped down at me, and I saw its dead eyes. As I ran, I held up the knife with my right hand and put my left on the back of my neck. But this time it swooped around and went for my eyes. I heard a dull thud and felt searing pain as its beak penetrated to the bone of my right eye socket.

“Get away,” I shouted, terrified at the prospect of my eyes being pecked out by this hell-hawk.

Suddenly I saw something shine in the darkness. A warrior stood beside me. Marcus lifted his sword against the beast and held it at bay. I thought I’d been rescued when suddenly a much larger beast, the great flying dinosaur itself, swooped down. With a hard swipe of a claw he knocked Marcus to the ground. The warrior got up, limping, then staggering back in front of me, he raised his sword again, like a Secret Service agent standing in the line of fire.

The smaller beast, emboldened, returned to attack me, but Marcus struck him with his sword. They fought viciously. I stumbled back, terrified.

The larger dinosaur saw me by myself and dove. It knocked me to the ground and tore into me. I screamed. It went for my eyes, and I covered them. Its beak punctured the skin on my hands, and I felt the blood spurting but didn’t dare uncover my eyes to see it. I writhed on the ground, helpless.

“Stand up and defend yourself,” Marcus shouted, still battling the smaller beast.

“How?” I cried.

“The TravelGuide!”

While the great beast circled above, readying to dive again, I yanked off my backpack and reached in to search for it. Where was the book? Finally I found it at the bottom, where it had been for days. I pulled it out and opened it, holding it in my wounded right hand. As the beast dove at me, the book transformed into a sword.

Stunned, I slashed air with it awkwardly, missing him. Swordplay was new to me—I wished for a shotgun. The dinosaur swooped, eyes on the sword, keeping his distance from it. He circled above until I couldn’t see him, but I felt sure he was preparing to dive at any moment. I didn’t believe I could survive his next attack. But I held up the sword, determined to go down fighting.

Just then another warrior emerged from the darkness on the valley floor.

“Gabriel!” I yelled.

“I’ve got you,” he said. He picked me up as if I were a child and ran swiftly, across the misty valley, carrying me to a solitary hill and into a cavelike dugout, a shelter in the hillside, that covered our backs and sides. He set me down.

“Are you all right, little one?”

“I think so … thanks to you.”