MINE.The dragon’s roar tears from my throat, shaking the trees, sending birds exploding from the canopy.SHE IS MINE.
The rogue finishes his transformation. Smaller than me. Battle-scarred, with a torn wing membrane and gouges across his snout. But desperate, which makes him dangerous.
He lunges.
I catch his throat with my claws and hurl him sideways. He crashes through a stand of young pines, wood splintering, and comes up snarling.
Behind me, I hear Selene’s voice. Barely a whisper. “Holy shit.”
I don’t look. Can’t look. If I see her face—the fear, the horror, the disgust?—
The rogue launches again. This time, he goes high, wings beating, trying to get above me. I meet him in the air.
We collide with a crack of scale against scale. Claws rake. Teeth snap. Fire blazes between us—his acid-green, mine white-hot gold. The heat is searing, even to me. We spiral upward, locked together, tearing at each other as we climb.
“The master will have her,” the rogue snarls through our grapple. “One way or another. Your protection means nothing.”
I answer with fire.
The blast catches him full in the chest, sends him tumbling. He recovers mid-fall, wings snapping open, and dives at me with claws extended.
We crash through the treetops. Branches shatter. Burning debris rains down toward the forest floor—toward the clearing where Selene stands.
PROTECT HER.
I wrench sideways, putting my body between the falling embers and the ground. The rogue takes advantage. His claws rake across my shoulder, my wing, tearing through scales into muscle beneath.
The pain is immediate. Brutal. But worse is what comes after—a cold burn spreading through my blood, numbing and sharpening at the same time.
Poison.
The dragon roars its fury. The poison doesn’t weaken it—it makes it stronger. More feral. The careful control I’ve spent centuries building starts to crack.
Kill. Destroy. BURN EVERYTHING.
I fight for focus. Below, Selene has pressed herself against the oak’s trunk, eyes tracking our battle across the sky. She’s not running. Not screaming.
She’s watching.
For her. Control for her.
The rogue comes at me again. I let him. Let him think the poison is working, that I’m weakening. He gets close—too close—and I strike.
My claws rake across his throat.
Fire follows—not ordinary flame, but the white-gold blaze that only a Guardian King can summon. It pours from my claws into the wound, spreading through his veins, burning him from the inside out. The rogue’s roar becomes a shriek. Then silence. Golden fire erupts from his eyes, his mouth, the gaps between his scales. He comes apart in midair, ash and embers scattering on the wind.
Nothing left. Not even bones.
The ash drifts down through the canopy, catching the afternoon light. Beautiful, almost. If you forget what it used to be.
Gone.
My wing falters. The poison spreads, cold fire in my veins. I’m losing altitude, the trees rushing up to meet me.
Get to her. Have to get to her.
I crash.
