Chapter 27 #2
“Thaelyn!” Nyxariel warned. Hold.
“Now!” Thorne shouted, voice breaking.
Thaelyn reached again for the wind, this time with rage instead of fear. The air twisted, surged, and burst in a ring of white lightning. The shockwave tore through the nearest wraiths, scattering their ashes across the sky.
He swung his blade with his one free arm and met a charging necromancer midair. The impact sent both spinning. Thorne caught himself with his free arm, but his injured side erupted in pain. His vision went white for a moment.
The necromancer’s curse lashed out again, another bolt of darkness, this one grazing Thaelyn’s jacket. Nyxariel shielded her with a wall of compressed wind.
Vornokh crashed through the last of the fog, his roar shattering the lingering spells. The necromancers faltered, their control splintering. Vornokh slammed into the dragon in front of him, ripping him to pieces with his razor-sharp talons.
“They are trying to delay us,” Vornokh roared with a low growl to the other dragons. “This is not their main force.”
"Then let's finish them quick, while I still have one good arm!" Thorne snarled.
Thorne dove low, flames burst from his hands, then shadows followed.
One flamebolt. One lash of darkness. He moved like smoke.
A blade met his path. He kicked it down, spun, and then launched the attacker backward with a fireball to their chest. Vornokh descended with a deafening roar and snapped another creature midair.
“Thorne, on your right!” Darian bellowed, and then he let out a scream. A black bolt of black magic slammed into his chest.
Kaeroth shrieked and swerved wildly. Darian slumped forward in his saddle, unmoving. The fire in his hands vanished. His body jerked once, then went limp.
Thaelyn screamed.
“Darian!” Brynnek roared, eyes wild. “Kaeroth!” he bellowed. “I know you’re not going to like this, but I’m coming to your mount to help Darian!”
Tieren wheeled midair beside Kaeroth as Brynnek launched himself off.
The brown dragon roared in alarm, but Brynnek jumped and landed near his tail and was already running down the scales of Kaeroth's back. He grabbed the back of the saddle and jumped in behind Darian’s body.
Kaeroth hissed, turning his head, but didn’t shake him off.
“Don’t drop me, you arrogant fire-lizard!” Brynnek muttered. “I swear I’ll poison your feed for a week.”
“Hold him!” Rory shouted. “Get him high and back!”
“Brynnek, pull back! Vaelion, you cover them!” Rowan ordered. He could feel their intentions and knew they would go after Brynnek and Darian.
Sorren moved silently behind another attacker, pulling his blade across their neck before vanishing again.
Mirra’s voice rang through the dragons' link: “We must end this. Give the signal, Vornokh.”
Kaeroth rose sharply, Brynnek cradling Darian with one arm while strapping them in with the other. The red dragon roared in fury and streaked away, wings cutting the sky.
Meanwhile, the battle raged below.
Thorne raised his hand. Shadows swirled upward, meeting fire in a cyclone of dark and light. The sky blazed white. “NOW!” he roared.
Tarken swept across a cliff, launching a wave of ice mist. It froze four wraiths mid-motion. Garric dove down, raised his free arm, sending out a whirling tornado. Sorren and Mirra reappeared behind a ridge; two more enemies fell, collapsed from an unseen strike.
“It’s thinning!” Vornokh roared down the bond to Thorne. “Strike again now!”
Thorne and Vornokh dove together. Fire and shadow erupted in a twin wave, incinerating the final wave of attackers in a sweeping arc of destruction. The air burned. Smoke spiraled.
Each dragon unleashed their breath, ice, flame, storm, shadow, water, blending into a sky-shattering blast. The enemy forces crumbled, broken by raw elemental fury.
Smoke curled. Bodies lay scattered. The wind died. Silence.
“The battle was foul,” Vaelion rumbled. “But the fire-born are not easily broken.”
“And neither are we,” Tarken growled, descending.
Garric, panting, looked around the battlefield. “Anyone else hit?”
“Darian’s unconscious. We need healers,” Brynnek called out.
Thorne turned toward the others, blood on his leathers, a gash on his arm deep and still weeping blood.
“I think my arm’s broken and I’m losing a lot of blood. We will ride to my father’s palace. It’s the closest spot for us to stop,” he said. “My father has the best healers in the realm. They will know what to do to help Darian. He won’t last through the night if we don’t get help soon.”
Garric nodded. “And warn the King. This wasn’t random.”
“No,” Thorne said, jaw tight. “They were hunting us.”
“No,” Vornokh corrected in his mind. “They were hunting her.”
Kaeroth, with Brynnek and Darian strapped together, banked to the west. Tarken stayed centered with Baelor.
Vornokh followed. Nyxariel flew wing-close to Vornokh, their bodies moving in unison again for the first time in centuries.
The dragons rose into the dark of the night sky.
Mirra pulled to the eastern flank and vanished into the cloud. Vaelion, riderless, flanked the rear.
Thaelyn fought to keep her composure. Her fingers were shaking, her vision blurring with tears she refused to shed. Darian was hurt and unconscious. Thorne was ahead of her, bleeding into the wind, jaw locked against pain.
Behind them, the fog of Godshollow folded inward, the necromancers vanishing into it. A whisper carried on the wind, low, hungry, inhuman.
They had tasted shadow. They had tasted storm. And they would come for both again.