But then a weird pale light beamed up from the earth, hitting his father. His whole body slackened. The dragon king fell like a stone from the sky.
Chapter
Sixty-Two
Elias gripped the pommel as Gerard descended, flying to where King Alaric had fallen. Branches and leaves blurred past. Gerard landed.
The king lay on his side, greenery crushed beneath his large body. Thankfully, King Alaric’s eyes remained open. His jaw gaped, teeth showing. He wheezed.
Gerard stepped close and lowered his head, nudging his father’s scaly throat.
Elias unstrapped himself and sprang from the harness. “Stay as a dragon,” Elias yelled to Gerard. “I don’t know what that magic was, but if we can get him to shift, we can fly him to the monastery and get him to the healer doves.”
Whilst many doubted the warrior monks’ ability to fight, no one doubted the healer monks’ capabilities. Gerard butted his father’s chest with his head. He growled low in his throat.
“Your Majesty.” Elias hesitated and then pressed a hand to the green scales. The king’s eye fixed on Elias.
“You need to shift,” Elias said, slow and loud. “Then we can fly you back to the White Monastery where you can be treated.”
The king stared at Elias for several moments. Then his eyes closed. He shuddered. The air thickened and rippled, and the scent of smoke grew thick. Elias took a step back as the king shifted into his human form.
Elias tugged off his own dirtied and bloodied coat and draped it over the king’s shoulders. It was far too small. But he managed to do up a single button at the man’s throat. The tall man trembled.
Elias wrapped an arm around the king. He helped him to his feet, leading him towards Gerard.
The trees whooshed. The air swirled. Elias cried out as a powerful blast of wind streamed past him, causing him and the king to fall to the ground.
But the wind smashed straight into Gerard, who was clearly the main target of the attack. Gerard stretched his wings, flapping against the blast. He took a step. Suddenly he was catapulted up, into the trees and above. He roared as he spun away.
Elias stared after him. Then he clutched at his throat. He opened his mouth wide, trying to get a proper lungful of air. But he couldn’t. He choked.
Over twenty wind sorcerers, including Anais and Beau, emerged from amongst the trees. Half of them had their gazes fixed on Elias, their fingers dancing and flowing in unity.
They’d cut off his air.
Above he saw Gerard turn and attempt to fly back towards them. But the other half of the sorcerers had their attention fixed on the dragon. They flung their hands forward, blowing Gerard further up into the sky.
He can’t get close enough. They will keep blowing him away.
“I don’t know how you survived,” Beau snarled. He and Anais stood at the front of the group, uninvolved with the casting. “But it ends for you now. You die here!”
“And you better not have harmed Mother!” Anais yelled.
Elias’s vision spotted as his lungs begged for air. He doubled over. With trembling hands, he signed. He blinked rapidly as the world blurred and grew fainter. Sparks danced on his fingers.
Beau and Anais laughed.
“Really, Elias?” Anais shook her head.
So they still didn’t know what he could do. They hadn’t seen him fighting in the air.
Anais laughed. “You’re really going to try that shitty little?—”
Elias jabbed his fingers forward. Lightning struck her.
She screamed. Her whole body turned rigid as the lightning zapped along her skin. Then it jumped to Beau. Then to the next sorcerer. Then the next. And the next and the next and the next, until all of them spasmed and gasped as the lightning coursed through their bodies.
Elias sucked air into his lungs. He stood. “I guess my sparkles aren’t quite as shitty and pathetic as you thought!” he yelled. He glanced between Anais and Beau. “After all, they killed your mother.”
