Gritting her teeth, she sliced out with her sword, thrust with the talons of the collar that she wielded like a dagger. One of the claws hooked into Darius’ inner elbow, just above his gauntlet. He stumbled, his eyes going wide as he realized he couldn’t worldwalk away.
This was her chance.
She lunged back and swung with her sword. He arched away in time to avoid a deeper cut, earning only a thin slash across his throat. It was too shallow of a wound to slow him down. Her only reward was the sight of his blood running down his throat. Still, she didn’t give up. She shifted her stance, swiveled her arms, and slammed the edge of her blade against his abdomen. He released a grunt as the metal armor crumpled inward, her blade sinking into his skin. But at the same time, he tore the talon from his inner elbow and tossed it aside. Ailan ducked and rolled toward it, gathering it in her hand before leaping to her feet.
Darius now stood several feet away, blood trailing from the corner of his lips as he fiddled with the buckles and straps securing the front of his cuirass.
She gave him a wicked grin.
He may have the advantage of iron weapons, which delivered excruciating pain to pureblood fae, but his armor was human-made. Nothing better than garbage compared to the strength of Elvyn craftsmanship and armor harvested from the shedded scales of dragons.
Darius sneered back at her as he loosened a buckle.
Uziel took the chance to blast him with a ball of red flame.
Darius worldwalked away just in time and reappeared closer to Ailan—too near for Uziel to risk using his flame. He released the final buckle and tore his ruined cuirass off his chest. Blood seeped from his wound, but Ailan knew better than to expect enough blood loss to end his life. No, that blow hadn’t been a fatal one.
But it had made his vital organs more vulnerable.
As if the blow had been nothing more than an inconvenient jab, he charged for her, swinging his sword. She dodged. Parried. He disappeared.
Her whispers guided her to the left.
She turned.
Met his blade.
Again.
Again.
It was never-ending, and the sounds of battle around them didn’t cease either.
She needed the upper hand.
Needed to find his weakness.
She parried his blade, slashed out, and pivoted in time to meet his next blow. Her eyes dipped to the symbol at his lapels: a dragon encircled in a ball of flame.
She smirked. “Interesting sigil, considering no dragon would have you.”
He bared his teeth in a dark grin. “Every dragon in El’Ara will heed my commands once I’m Morkaius. They won’t be subject to the prejudices of their former masters.”
“The fact that you call a dragon’s bonded counterpart theirmastershows just how little you know about dragons in the first place. They would never respect you.”
He disappeared.
Reappeared to her right. She met his blade with hers.
“Because I’m impure?” he said through his teeth. “A half-blood? An imperfect specimen, a stain on your precious, stagnant way of life?”
“No,” Ailan said with a smirk. “Turns out, dragons don’t have a problem with humans.”
His expression faltered.
She swung her blade, feinted left, then thrust with one of the talons.
He disappeared before it could do more than slice his torso.
