Chapter 21
Chapter
Twenty-One
So you unraveled. So you fell. Now it’s time to rise.
-Humaning for Beginners: A Dragon’s Tale of Human Management
Ash.
Ash was all I was at first. Ash and memory. But an ember of myself remembered how to exist—and answered. Slowly I gathered, clinging and fusing, stitching together until I became whole. Life threaded through me until I finally, finally drew breath.
A guttural roar of primal rage thundered off the stone walls, dragging me from the darkness, a hook embedded in my chest. A glaze of confusion covered my thoughts, but clarity came with a rise of heat that licked me from the inside out. My eyes popped open.
I was in the cell. And I was naked. Alone. Lying on cold concrete.
The scent of him clung to the smoke. A perfect blend of heavenly cedar now mixed with wild spice, storm-soaked earth, and scorched leather.
It wrapped around me like a cloak, laced with wrath sharp enough to slice through bone.
And oh, wow, it crackled in the air with the same intensity as fireworks.
Where was he? I scanned for clues. One wall of the cell had been obliterated, reduced to rubble; the tapestry continued to smolder. The cot was gone, devoured by flame, its remains nothing but dust and embers. I inhaled again. Still him, still here… and yet not.
My ears twitched. Sounds pierced the castle prison, an impossible feat unless the chaos above had breached the deepest levels, or I’d developed super-sensitive hearing.
Either way, I heard war. Clashing steel.
The thrum of wings. The brutal crack of impact.
Screams, some defiant, others agonized. Taunts hurled over howls of fury.
And somewhere, unmistakably, my father’s laughter, low and lethal.
Understanding slammed into me. I surged upright in a single, fluid motion, far faster and more graceful than I’d ever moved before.
Sweet magma, what was this? Energy pulsed through me, a living current, thick and molten.
Such power. Radiant, untamed, and rising.
A glorious elixir pumping through my veins.
Was I the phoenix? I was alive after dying, so I must be.
Except, I felt no foreign presence. No winged fire-breather demanding snacks or battle or better décor, either. Just… me.
I blinked. Waited, hoping, searching. Nope. Nothing stirred in the farthest caverns of my mind.
And I hadn’t changed. Same freckle on my inner wrist. Same scar along my knee. Same everything. Except for the way the world vibrated around me, as if I wasn’t just stronger but… more. A storm in tranquility. A blade waiting to strike.
“I’m so getting a teacup for this,” I muttered.
Another roar split the air. One I recognized. Taron! And this time, it wasn’t born of pain. I heard a promise. Destruction comes…
Heart pounding, I surged forward with a half-formed plan. Get to my room. Gear up. Join the fray—
My stomach lurched, as if the world had folded instead of me.
Suddenly, I was there. One blink. One thought.
Poof. I stood in my bedroom. I staggered to a halt before I slammed into my dresser, a hand catching the wood.
My mind reeled, trying to make sense of the impossible leap.
Teleportation? Not a skill the phoenix were known to possess. Was I something more?
A mystery for later. I dressed in record speed: tunic, leathers, combat boots.
Strapped on blades until I felt like a walking armory.
A dragonless queen needed every edge. Out of habit, I raced to the balcony, intending to jump, forgetting I had no dragon or wings.
The sight that greeted me stopped me dead.
The sky was smoke and flame. Below me, my kingdom bled, courtesy of my enemy.
My chest clenched, my ribs compressing my lungs.
Warriors I’d trained and stood beside were currently locked in a brutal battle with Lorik’s massive horde.
Berserkers pitted against shifters, and the shifters were winning.
The bodies and limbs of my comrades littered the ground.
Crimson soaked the soil, misting the air with the coppery scent of death.
Fury sparked like lightning between blade strikes.
Adelaide, my darling sister, was mid-duel with Councilman Roland.
He fought like a monster reborn, no longer berserker, but shifter.
How ironic. The man who’d sworn to protect our people from Cedric, had instead become his echo.
She held her own, but she was alone, and the former councilman wasn’t fighting fair.
He worked with two other shifters, a coordinated pack against one.
I bit down hard, stomach twisting. Where was—? There. Taron.
The muscles in my jaw slackened. He was carnage in dragon-berserker form.
Twice his normal size, with muscle piled upon muscle, his body rippled with fury and dragon fire.
Lost completely to his rage, he tore through dragons and shifters alike, using his claws and fangs with utter abandon. Uncontrolled, untrained, unstoppable.
The dragon inside him was new to him and wild, its smokewings flickering in and out of existence as he rampaged.
It made him stagger, left him vulnerable, allowing any challengers to strike with vicious precision.
But no matter how many times Taron fell, he got up and headed straight for—I growled.
Straight for Lorik, who fought three of my sisters.
My frown returned. Lorik wore metal cuffs. Shackles without a center link. Why would he—
Recognition came in a rush. The Chains of O. The reason Taron continued to throw off his attackers and make his way toward the shifter king. He’s being drawn. Our enemy’s final crumb along the gingerbread trail.
The love of my life plowed into the shifter king. The two grappled, striking at each other again and again. Blood dripped from multiple wounds, soaking Taron in seconds. From his brow, to his hands, to his chest.
“How’s living without your firebrand, dragon?” Lorik taunted, my ears picking up the sound of his voice despite the roar of battle.
Taron snarled and leaped at his challenger. But the shifter king had expected the action, hoped for it, and blocked before raking his claws across my professor’s throat.
Something inside me snapped. A spark ignited low in my belly, not born of fear. Oh, nein. Not despair either. Not sorrow. It was wrath. And it was hungry.
A sting erupted beneath my skin, every pore flaring with sharp, stinging heat.
Then came blood. Not spilling, but shifting.
Each drop welled, then hardened, until a lattice of living armor covered me.
Feathers and scales tipped in flames, iridescent and obsidian, snapped over my flesh, each pulsing with a glowing core.
I gasped. There was no dragon voice in my mind, no inner beast to direct me, but one embodied me just the same. But I wasn’t possessed; I was reborn the phoenix. There was no doubt about that now. I had risen from ash and death, stronger than before.
Guess love for Taron had purified my heart, as well.
A little laugh escaped. I followed love, not Cedric’s gingerbread trail. Major backfire for him.
With my sights set on Lorik, I jumped. Wings erupted from my back. But they were not smoke, not this time. They were pure, roaring fire, wide and powerful enough to black out the stars. I soared, wind curling against me.
I locked on to Lorik. Target acquired. I dove low and fast, flames streaking behind me, resembling comet tails.
He turned too late. Boom! I slammed into him, knocking him off his clawed feet and into the dirt.
We rolled, fire pulsing over me in waves, my power outburning his, evoking guttural grunts of pain.
We landed with me straddling his chest, flames still dancing along my arms as I gripped his throat in my claws. His eyes widened in shock. He saw me, recognized me. That heartbeat of hesitation cost him.
“Remember when I turned down your proposal of marriage? Consider this a follow-up nein.” I grinned as I ripped out his throat.
The wound would regenerate. Which meant I had seconds, no more. He was a shifter, after all. But I had just enough time to punch past his ribs and—
A hand clamped on my shoulder and hurled me backward. I twisted midair, already growling, eager to retaliate. My gaze locked with his. Taron. Oh. I grinned again and blew him a kiss. “Hey, love. Miss me?”
He reared, poised to drive his raised fist into my chest, but the second he took me in, he froze. “My Lyssa,” he breathed, stumbling back, a flicker of recognition overtaking the wild glaze in his irises.
I gave him a wink. “Told you.”
Had we been alone, he might’ve swooped over and scooped me into his arms. But this was a battlefield. Around us, chaos reigned in a tangle of death, smoke and war cries. And yet, Taron’s lips curled in a slow, savage smile. Satisfaction and something wilder smoldered in his gaze.
Our enemies had tried to burn us down. Now they’d learn what rose from the ruin.
“You ready to win this?” I asked, turning toward the carnage. “We can wed and honeymoon after.”
“Baby,” he growled, rolling his shoulders, “there’s nothing else I’d rather do.”
A roar cut through the air. Lorik scrambled upright, his shredded throat barely reformed.
Before he could launch an attack, my father and his razor-sharp smokewings landed beside him. In a blink, a mere heartbeat, he beheaded Lorik, ripped out his heart, and burned him to ash, the primordial’s fire hotter than anything other dragons produced.
The battlefield seemed to flinch.
For a moment, I froze. So did Taron.
“I had no more use for him,” Cedric said, stepping onto the pile of ashes. The dark motes dancing over him. “Besides, I did promise to take care of him for you.”
Behind him landed Nyla, gliding on the wind currents he’d stirred and grinning with a glee that bordered on insanity.
She was transformed. Golden fur bristled down her limbs; her spine arched with power.
Her scorpion’s tail had regrown, thick and venomous, curled above her head, primed to strike.
Barbs lined its length, each a quill of pain. An arrow she could launch at will.
“I must admit, daughter,” my father mused, eyes raking over my armored form, “I didn’t expect you to rise as a phoenix primordial. A rare evolution. But no matter. Even a phoenix can be slain... with the right blade.”
A primordial! Of course. I smiled with all kinds of delight. “If it can kill a phoenix,” I said, “it can kill an undying primordial.”
His lids narrowed. Good. Let them both know my endgame. I wouldn’t leave this field until both Cedric and Nyla breathed their last.
Nyla clicked her barbed tail once. “When I slay your man, and I will—”
“Try,” I cut in with enough menace to startle her.
The wind died.
“I’m going to enjoy it,” she finally finished with a lot less bravado.
“Not as much as I will.” Rings of fire seemed to spin in Cedric’s pupils. An attempt to mesmerize me, though we shared the same blood.
Perhaps I wasn’t his victim, after all. “Whatever you do, do not look him in the eyes,” I told Taron. “Do not strike at him, either.” His bones would turn Taron’s bones into tuning forks, fight over. “In fact, let me handle him.”
“He’s all yours, baby. I owe the prickleback.”
“I’ll show you a prickleback,” Nyla growled, and I chuckled. Dang, I loved my man.
She and Cedric crouched, preparing for battle. Taron and I did the same, side by side, heart to heart. And then, like a storm breaking over the mountains, we all moved.
My father lunged at me with predatory grace, unsheathing a sword and a dagger, his ingrained dominance coiling around him like smoke. I met him halfway, short swords in hand. Our blades clashed with a screech of metal. My limbs vibrated, but even as cracks formed over my bones, they healed.
Cedric blew his ash-flames at me, but I absorbed them, growing stronger.
It shocked, confused and infuriated him, sending him into a rage.
His scales shifted, revealing the spikes leaking poison, but again, I only strengthened as I parried and blocked, then headbutted him hard enough to break his nose.
Taron met Nyla with a roar of his own. She lashed her tail, but he caught it mid-swing, yanked fast, and flung her across the field.
She flipped midair, landed in a crouch, and launched herself back, claws extended, teeth bared.
He ducked and dodged before working her to the ground, then rolling.
Her barbs slashed at his ribs as soon as he pinned her, and he went stiff, losing his hold. They grappled for supremacy.
“I will make you eat that stinger,” Taron snarled.
I walked a circle with my father. “You made a grave mistake taking my dragon. It opened the door to something far more lethal. This day, I rid this world of your evil.”
He flicked his tongue over an incisor. “For centuries, I have been the prisoner of the woman who brought me back from the dead. She left me trapped in a dark cave with nothing but memories of my slain firebrand, who lives now only because I shared my blood. This day,” he said in a mimic of me, “I make you pay for all I’ve suffered. ”
An exchange of icy grins, then we were striking in kind. My swiftness surprised him. The more we grappled, the more ferocious we became, until we were two beasts tearing at each other.
He remained the strongest of us–at first. With every injury, I grew stronger, faster, hotter, until he could not overcome my heat. It melted his scales. Then his skin. Then his muscles.
I had to give him credit. He fought until his last breath. But I’d spoken true. I rid the world of his evil. In the end, he died as he’d lived: violently. And I stood amid the ash, no longer broken, no longer alone.