Chapter 59
Fifty-Nine
Cheap Thrills Drive-in Theatre
Fayetteville, Arkansas
Months ago . . .
“How do you hunt the unhuntable when the unhuntable is hunting you?” Nix murmured to her coalition in the theater’s projection room. “You become”—she paused for the reveal—“ unhuntable .”
Emberine, the Sorceri Queen of Flames, yawned. “Enough, Valkyrie. Just tell us where to fire .”
Portia, the Queen of Stone, nodded in agreement. “I’ve been levitating a mountain around in the clouds above us for an hour. It’s not a clutch. And I want some of the mortals’ popcorn.”
Other allies—Valkyries, witches, and Furies—shared the Sorceri’s impatience. But the witches were sober for once, and the Furies hadn’t slain anyone off-target yet. No glittering stones had transfixed the Valkyries.
We are so on tonight!
“Fine. I’ll curtail my pre-melee pep talk.” Boo-hiss, no fun. Even Bertil screeched his disappointment, glaring from his perch on her shoulder. “Our prey for tonight is using his invisibility right now. The dragon-shifter primordial lies curled up in front of the drive-in screen.” With a combination of her pastsight and foresight, she could all but see Uthyr, with his metallic-blue scales, mammoth body, and eyes like a pair of gold coins.
He was the M?ri?r’s most potent member after their leader, Orion the Undoing. In his dragon form, Uthyr could create portals across realms or burn the world with a fiery breath. He could even time-travel. As a primordial, he had scales said to repel all weapons.
Uthyr was here in this random place solely to enjoy tonight’s showing of Godzilla. The first big battle of the movie loomed, and his heart accelerated with gleeful anticipation.
Alas, dragon shifters didn’t belong at mortal drive-ins. His vast arsenal of powers was undercut by a weakness: hubris. Tonight it might be his downfall.
When Nix’s allies turned in that direction, she surveyed the assembled females. The witches would fight to the death for Nix. The Valkyries as well. The Furies had awakened from their nests for this battle, driven to stamp out evil. They’d deemed Uthyr evil. Bummer for Uthyr. The Sorceri . . . ?
Well, they were here.
Portia said, “Are you sure about attacking him in front of mortals?” The parking lot was filled with them, their trucks lined up for the show. “They’ll film everything, and then we’ll get clipped for revealing ourselves to humans.”
“Needs must and all that. This is our sole shot at him.” They would deal with the fallout later. Besides, Nix had it on good authority that the Gaolers were dealing with a lack of prison space.
Portia’s lips thinned. “You promised Ember and me a primordial giant to kill if we temporarily allied with you. We’re not rent-a-help for other M?ri?r.”
“Uthyr’s quite large. Does that count?”
Emberine’s red hair sparked at the ends. “You also said we would probably perish in battle. Is this our last night, soothsayer?”
Her concern had merit. Nix had predicted much of the battle this eve, but she hadn’t seen the ultimate outcome. And anything could happen when fate had a habit of sticking her nose where it didn’t belong.
Yet if ancient Valkyries, a nest of Furies, a coven of witches, and a pair of evil Sorceri couldn’t get this job done, who could? “I can promise you that no one will die tonight unless they die. Now, does everyone remember my brilliant plan? Because I do not.”
Sighs all around.
Cara the Fair’s violet eyes were solemn. “We remember. We’re ready, sister.”
“Such a sweet girl,” Nix murmured as a memory from long ago teased her mind. She couldn’t quite pull it up, so she got back to business. “Okay, off you go. Don’t stop until you bring him down, or the Lore will be lost forever.”
As the coalition left Nix behind to position themselves all around the drive-in—and above it—the witches held hands and softly chanted oothspeak, channeling magic to remove the dragon’s camouflage.
Uthyr grew visible by degrees, a marvelous sight. Nix’s gaze swept from his gleaming eyes to his horns and fangs, then along the length of his sinuous neck. She admired his leanly muscled dragon frame down to his spiked tail. His blue scales shimmered like a half-remembered dream.
Remembered. Memory. That teasing one surfaced, and she was transported into the far-distant past to Valhalla, the Valkyrie origin realm.
Furie and Cara, twin girls born of a Fury mother, stood hand in hand before Nix as waves of purple, green, and white aurora danced overhead. Seven years old, already bonded for eternity, they had hair the color of a raven’s wing and their mother’s violet eyes.
One twin burned to fulfill her Fury instincts; one already hid secrets, more Valkyrie than Fury. Their wings would emerge soon, which meant Valhalla wouldn’t hold them for much longer.
Behind Nix’s vision, the battle against Uthyr commenced. Furies executed their attack, dive-bombing from the sky. Witches hurled hexshots. Valkyries charged, swords raised. In the clouds, Cara the Fair hovered with her fire wings, waiting to strike using an infamous weapon.
Yet Uthyr defended valiantly, bringing Nix back to the present.
We’re . . . losing? She dashed from the projection room down amidst the carnage.
Faced with bedlam between a dragon and other “myths,” Arkansans abandoned the interactive flick, flooring their four-wheel drives away from a real-life Godzilla. Too late for some; groaning metal sounded when the dragon accidentally stepped on trucks, kaiju-ing mortals.
Weaving through the mayhem, Nix sprinted across the battlefield. Puddles of blood splashed up over her and Bertil. “Fly away, friend.” He did so with a screech.
Catching her gaze, Uthyr chuffed laughter and smoke, that hubris on full display. “Is this the best you can do, little Valkyrie?” He pounded his chest with his clawed paw.
“Honestly? No. ” She spun in circles until lightning formed a shield around her. Bolts sizzled in every direction, and she shot them from her palms at him.
He roared with pain, rearing up in front of the screen just as Godzilla reared up to lay waste to ships. Uthyr inhaled a deep breath and exhaled a stream of fire at the screen. A portal opened at the end of the flame. He charged on four legs toward the new exit.
“Don’t let him reach that portal!” Nix cried as she shot more lightning at him.
Shrieks sounded as the winged Furies dove with their swords, hacking at his head. They targeted his eyes, but his scaled lids protected him. Forced to slow, he butted the angels of death with his horns.
Nix waved to another contingent—the Sorceri. Portia rolled her eyes, still disgusted she was cooperating with the good guys, and dropped her mountain atop the screen, blocking the portal. As the dragon scrambled to stop, Emberine lit up the creature, who roared with frustration.
Baring his fangs at Nix, he raised his gaze to the sky and spread his immense wings to fly away.
His chest was unprotected. His heart ready for the taking.
Cara dove from on high, her fire wings sparkling. Air whistled from her supernatural descent as she barreled into the dragon.
His back hit the ground, the momentum driving him across the dirt. His wings plowed a trench, with Cara along for the ride atop his expansive chest. He met gazes with her and froze for a critical moment—which was all the witches needed to mystically bind him to the earth with their spells.
His heart. Her heart. Cara.
Nix’s vision of the past returned. A blink of an eye ago, Cara had been a somber little girl. . . .
She asked Nix, “What is our future? Will Furie and I always be together?”
Nix swallowed. “You shall both do what is expected of you.”
Furie said, “Of course we shall. Our kind are warriors, born of fire, desperate to return to it in the course of our duties.”
“You were born of lightning, dearest ones. It’s a bright sort of fire.” In her next breath, Nix spoke her inner thoughts aloud: “I love you both so much, and yet I will let you suffer.”
Watchful gazes. They asked as one: “Why?”
“I see songs in my flesh and hear stars in the daylit sky. Is that madness? Or delight?”
They weren’t to be put off, repeating, “Why?”
“Because,” Nix whispered. “That is what I do ? —”
“Sister!” Cara called.
The vision faltered, and Nix blinked back to the present. “Yes?”
“He’s bound.” Cara swiped blood from her emotionless face. It must be hers. Or a mortal’s. The dragon hadn’t lost a drop.
Nix took in the felled beast. He thrashed against the witches’ invisible bonds, but this coven was crushing it tonight, and didn’t those sassy Wiccans just know it?
Standing beside their foe with a plain wooden staff, Cara asked Nix, “Do you want to do the honors?”
She tapped her chin with a claw. “No. He is all yours, Carafina.”
“What madness is this, Valkyrie?” he yelled. “You can’t kill me. I’m a dragon.”
“Poor creature.” Nix tsked. “You’ve been in this form so long you’ve forgotten that you aren’t a real dragon. You’re a shifter .”
“My scales are impenetrable!”
“They were ,” Cara said as she held up the staff, empowering it. A blade of jet-black flames emerged, transforming it into a scythe, one that had already felled the primordial demon. Though the flames were dark they somehow emitted light.
Uthyr’s eyes went wide, his struggles increasing. “I’m still a primordial. One drop of my blood will annihilate you all. You can’t kill me!”
“Relax,” Nix said. “Cara doesn’t want to kill you. She just wants your heart.”
Uthyr’s rows of fangs glinted in the light of the weapon, his pupils narrowing even more. “Do not do this, or you’ll face hell. The M?ri?r won’t just retaliate—they will punish you beyond imagining.” Uthyr thrashed harder.
But the witches intensified their oothspeak to sedate him.
Without blinking her cold eyes, Cara stabbed the blade deep into Uthyr’s chest, sinking past his supposedly invulnerable scales. The flame cauterized as it cut, and the coven’s incantations neutralized any drops of primordial blood that might escape.
Convulsing in agony and shock, Uthyr gasped out the words: “What . . . are you . . . doing? Why? ”
“We’re making sure you can’t shift into this form again.” With Nix’s help, Cara dragged the weighty behemoth of a heart from his chest. “Isn’t this the key to a dragon shifter’s shifting?”
“No, nooo!” He began to transform, his scales disappearing, his body shrinking to become human in appearance. His dragon fangs and maw morphed into the face of a mortal man. “Why not . . . kill me?”
“Oblige him,” Emberine demanded, her palms full of fire. “He’s an enemy of the Lore.”
“He’s much more valuable to us alive,” Nix said. “He’s a leaf on a current. You all are.”
Emberine exchanged a look with Portia and muttered, “Whatever you say, Nucking Futs Nix.”
Uthyr bit out, “I’ll never . . . help you.”
“You will just by existing. Your leader, Orion, is said to be able to see the vulnerability in every being. So how did this attack on you come to pass? Either he can’t see every vulnerability, or he lied to you about yours. Regardless, you’ll return to your alliance as a grenade with the pin ”—she patted his massive dragon’s heart—“pulled.”
Chest gaping, he crawled for his heart, clawing the ground for it.
Nix snapped her fingers, and a witch tossed her a huge satchel. Nix and Cara loaded the heart inside.
With exquisite timing, Bertil landed atop Nix’s shoulder for their dramatic exit. “You’ll recover soon, my leaf. In the meantime, give Orion my regards.” Together, she and Bertil lightning-portaled to Dacia with the prize—and a wizard’s journal she’d just nicked from one of the witches—in hand.
This heart would change the entire war.
If I remember not to throw it away. . . .