Author's Note: Many apologies to my readers. I didn't realize it had been so long since I published a new chapter! I've moved and my life was in a bit of upheaval for a while. Also I've been working on some other stories, so this one fell a bit to the wayside. Again, I apologize.

I received a guest review that I would like to address. The fact that species are not immediately mentioned is deliberate. This story is written from the perspective of the girls and they wouldn't be able to identify them. As they gain familiarity, this will change, but at this point in the story, it is not the case.

With that, please enjoy this chapter! The next is well underway and hopefully will be up soon. Of course, as you all undoubtedly know, I move faster when I know that people are reading so reviews will speed up the process. If you have ideas for scenes, let me know... I love working in different ideas.

~Star

I woke to Jill shaking me and morning light spilling through the windows.
"Wake up, lazy."
Sitting up, I grinned, so happy to see her looking clean and healthy again that I didn't even bother coming up with something smart. Unlike me, she looked as if she was having no problems walking, although she was moving a little slower than normal. She grinned back and stretched out on the bed next to me, pulling at the pants she wore.
"How about these clothes?"
"I know, so comfy."
They were more comfortable than anything I had ever worn, made of something soft and supple and were loose enough that they didn't bother my scars. I yawned cavernously, although I had slept better the last night than I had since we arrived, and we both just lay quiet for a few minutes.
"Have you looked out a window yet?"
Jill turned her head and blinked as I suddenly broke into her thoughts. "Window? No, I guess I haven't."
I nodded and gestured to the one to my left. I watched her eyes go wide and blink several times, trying hard to come to terms with what she was seeing. Levering myself out of bed, I shuffled over to her side. My brain had really only had the energy for a cursory glance the night before and so looking at it all again was almost equally overwhelming. Jill's hand found mine and we gripped one another's fingers until they had no feeling. "That's... quite something."
I gave a short gasp of a laugh. "Quite."
We must have stood there for a half-hour, just staring. Eventually, I shook myself out of a dizzy trance; the scale was so grand that I was having a difficult time taking it in. Suddenly a bit panicked, I pushed myself away from the window, forgetting about my leg momentarily until it gave out under me and I fell hard. Jill jumped and turned, staring down at me for a moment before giving a choked laugh. I chuckled a bit in response but neither of our hearts were in it; everything was so overwhelming. Wordlessly, Jill helped me stand and we walked out and down the hallway, entering a room I had yet to see. Reatha and Dinsoth were playing some sort of game but jumped up as soon as they saw us. Reatha grabbed Jill's hand and Dinsoth butted my legs gently from behind. Unfortunately, even the slight unbalance made my knee buckle yet again and I only managed to stay upright by collapsing doubled over on the back of a nearby chair. For a moment, my senses were swept away by a surge of pain. When I resurfaced, Magdalena was scolding the children gently as she pulled me upright, helping me sit.
"Pain?"
I shook my head and saw Jill roll her eyes in the background; I was sure all the colour had left my face. Magdalena nodded and left the room, reappearing with two flasks, which she pushed into our hands. Recognizing the smell of the fire-flower drink I had taken my first day, I gulped it down eagerly and relished the sensation, chuckling as Jill took a drink; clearly she hadn't had any yet. Magdalena grinned and handed me a sturdy stick. Pushing myself upright, I leaned on the cane. I wasn't sure whether it was the drink or the added support, but walking was suddenly a good deal easier. Dinsoth was hiding behind a chair, looking at me guiltily, so I held out a hand to rub his head.
"It isn't your fault, Dinsoth, I'm fine."
He butted my hand and became his happy self again. We were ushered into the dining room to sat down for our first meal out of the bedrooms, and I finally saw everyone who lived there. Apart from Magdalena and Reatha, there were the woman and other girl - each of which I had seen only the once - a brother between the two girls, and a baby girl. We also learned that Dinsoth didn't actually live there but next door with his family. We met his mother after dinner and she even spoke a few words of archaic English. By the time I got into bed, I was so tired from all of the unusual exertion that I was asleep almost before I crawled under the warm blankets.

The next day, it was raining hard so, apart from a visit from the doctor, Jill and I spent the entire day playing with the kids. We saw the rest of the house during a game of hide-and-seek. Jill was physically doing much better than I was, apart from sudden, severe pains in her head that froze her for a few moments when they hit. But she had no problems with her legs so she helped me stumble around when we needed to move further than I could on my own. But I tired easily and toward the end of the day, I sank beside the fire with one of the books from my room and Dinsoth curled up beside me. For a little while, we just sat quietly with his chin on my knee and me rubbing his head while idly flipping through the pages. Suddenly, he jumped up and shuffled away quickly, saying something that sounded excited. Confused, I sat staring at the door until he returned, pushing a box that was about his size with his nose. Stopping beside me, he nudged a scroll resting on top toward me and looked up expectantly. Unrolling it, I saw that it was basically a dictionary between the footprint language and English and I grinned at him. He pushed another scroll, a quill, and bottle of ink into my lap and then flipped open the lid of the box, revealing it to be full of sand. I watched, completely confused as he picked up a little stick in his mouth and turned to the sandbox until I saw that he was stamping out little combinations of the footprints. Excited, I translated the letters as he went.
Hello, my name eth Dinsoth.
Grinning, I uncurled the second roll of parchment and unstoppered the ink. It was slow work and I wasn't sure that it was right, but he bounced around happily as he read my attempt at Hello Dinsoth, my name eth Susan. I am happy to meet you.
Back and forth we went, and although there were some words that clearly didn't translate directly, our little conversation lasted until Magdalena came in and smiled widely. She said something to Dinsoth and he made a kind of whine that I didn't need translated. Chuckling, I rubbed his head and wrote.
Tomorrow.
Nodding his head enthusiastically, he butted his head into my side, which I took as his version of a hug, and hurried away as I rolled up the scrolls and piled them on top of the sandbox. Still smiling, Magdalena helped me up. "Thy first lesson went well?"
I nodded. "He's very patient."
"The children learn little English. Thee help them want to learn."
"Happy I can help."
Helping me to my room, she bid me goodnight before I changed and climbed into bed. I drifted off to the sound of the rain that was still pounding on the window, feeling warm and happy and grateful for my new friends.

"Sue, come on. We're supposed to talk with Rystom today."
I woke blearily, squinting at the sunlight shining through the windows. "Five minutes."
Jill was not deterred by my whine and instead whipped the blankets back and held them out of my reach as I grumbled and opened my eyes again to glare at her. She glared right back. "Get up. Rystrom."
"What about this place turned you into a morning person."
"It's almost 11.00."
"You have no idea what time it is."
"There's a clock in my room."
Groaning, I sat up. "There is not, I sat in your room for days. I'm so sore from yesterday."
"You'll live."
I glared at her again but we both cracked smiles after a moment. I sighed. "Alright, five minutes, let me change."
She nodded and closed the door behind her and I was sorely tempted to pull the blankets back up, but after a moment I sighed again and pushed myself to my feet. When I reached the kitchen, Jill and Reatha looked up from breakfast and grinned. I knew I looked exactly as I felt and I made a face at them as I sat and reached for my own breakfast. We ate in silence until Magdalena walked in and smiled. "Fair weather this morning. Rystrom awaits you at your convenience."
I nodded, my eyes still focussed on my breakfast, and Jill smiled at her. "Thank you, we're almost finished."
A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door and Reatha scrambled down from the table to let Dinsoth in, who bounced over to the table and I couldn't help but smile. As I washed the dishes and Jill put the food away, the two children muttered conspiratorially between each other until Magdalena came back with sweaters for us.
"Reatha and Dinsoth shall lead thee to Rystrom. Take care they do not fall."
We nodded and followed our guides out the door.
We froze as we crossed the threshold, stunned by the sight. Even the view from the windows had done little to prepare us for the sheer scale of the view. We stared, mouths open, until Dinsoth's persistent bumping against my shins brought me back.
"Looks just like home." I muttered. Jill snorted. In all fairness, it did almost look like our hometown, just on a far greater scale. Walking with the cane was awkward and ungainly. I needed to pause often and whenever I got distracted, I missteped and my knee buckled again. As it happened yet again, I gave an annoyed growl as I caught myself ungracefully by gripping tight to the cane and Jill, who had gotten a bit ahead of me, looked back in surprise.
"Stupid knee... it's not that hard to hold."
She looked sympathetic but she couldn't do anything except walk back to me and say, "Sorry."
I huffed. "It's alright, I just need to practice until I can come up with something else."
As we walked along a path hugging the edge of the cliff, I kept being distracted by the birds, which looked much larger now that I saw them closer. Finally, I stopped and pulled Jill's arm.
"Do those birds have people riding them?"
"I don't think those are birds, too big. They're pterodactyls... or something close."
"Oh, right, that makes sense. But are there people riding them?"
She squinted, trying to catch a long enough glimpse.
"I can't tell."
We were once again urged on by our guides and followed them until we reached a large cluster of buildings built out of the rock face. We entered and I suddenly felt dizzy, overcome by all the details my brain wanted to register and was too tired to. Squeezing my eyes shut for a moment, I took a deep breath and gripped the cane until my fingers nearly lost feeling. When I opened them again, there was a man in front of us, reaching out his hand.
"Pleased to meet you, I am Rystom, an instructor here at the Skybax Academy."
We nodded and shook his hand, not even to the point where we could wonder about what the Skybax Academy was. He smiled and indicated a door.
"Please, come in."
I glanced back, but Reatha and Dinsoth were already engrossed in a conversation in the outer room; apparently they would wait there for us. We sat down in the chairs facing a desk which Rystom sat behind after placing beakers of water in front of us, which we took gratefully.
"As I am one of the best English-speakers here, I have been asked to talk to you, answer any questions you have, and explain what will happen next. I hope that the walk was not too much for you; I wanted you to see something of our city before I tried to explain it."
I nodded before clearing my throat. "Please, we don't understand where we are."
The man nodded sympathetically and folded his hands in front of him.
"Yes, I can imagine the shock that this has been. You are in the land of Dinotopia... at the time of the last dolphinback, as far as your world knew, this place did not exist. You seem unaware as well so I can only assume it remains thus. Here we exist with dinosaurs, which I have been told your world has not."
We looked at him; I suppose we could have put this all together ourselves but it was still a shock to hear it. He cleared his throat uncomfortably.
"I do not know much about your world so cannot tell you a great deal more. But you must travel to Waterfall City to register and all will be explained there. Everyone will have heard of you already as there are few dolphinbacks, but you need to register. We will send you there with someone as soon as your doctor and Magdalena decide you are well enough to travel."
Stunned, we nodded. He continued, watching us closely.
"The city you are in now is called Canyon City. Here we train most of our Skybax Riders... it was a patrol of Skybax Riders who found you when you fought the Utahraptor. They told me that you were very fierce, the way you fought."
We couldn't get much out beyond "Thank you" and he smiled kindly.
"I will get Reatha and she will take you back."
"Thank you, sir."