I caught Zayn’s eye as he stood back there with the Fire Dragons and he blew me a kiss.
Blew me a kiss.
In the middle of all of this.
It had a bunch of the troops around him laughing, a few ruffling his hair good-naturedly.
He was just… incredible.
I winked at him, then rubbed T’s arm. “Vorzyr has some hefty backup over there already, flame bite.”
“Yeah,” he murmured. “Plus, he’s one tough—”
His words caught in his throat as Fanor slipped her hand into his.
He swung his head toward her, stunned.
She smiled, a sweetly intense look passing between them.
And then he smiled back and squeezed her hand.
The enemy suddenly burst forward, breaking from their marching pattern.
I assumed a fighting stance.
I felt a ripple of movement, the troops doing the same thing, readying themselves.
“Athyras!” Dad bellowed over the battlefield, signaling Flame behind us.
He was going for the least damaging option to our surroundings first.
Dad was working the battle strategy, while Flame worked the tactical aspects.
He directed half of them to shift, guided their path forward, signaled trajectory.
Those in dragon form soared overhead, slamming their wings together to create immense rushes of hurricane-force wind battering down upon the enemy.
Those in human form burst forward in front of us and blew furious rushes of wind forth, tearing into the marching thousand. They hit them with mini-tornadoes, lashing whips of wind, swirling gusts.
And it… did nothing.
It just rolled over the strange constructs.
It didn’t even stop them marching toward us.
Not for a fucking second.
The enemy started firing shimmering balls of blue at the three dozen Athyras dragons flying overhead and still trying to impact them.
But as they connected, it didn’t blast any of them back.
Instead it traveled all over their wings and… started turning them to glass, or crystal, it was hard to tell which, but it had the same effect regardless. It spread so quickly, over other areas of their bodies, too.
A collective gasp from us all rang out as it fucked with their ability to stay in the air and they crashed toward the ground.
No! If they hit, they would shatter to pieces.
“Wind funnels!” Dad and Flame called out in unison, and then the Athyras members in human form below spun their arms rapid-fire and enveloped them in swirling wind containment, guiding them down to the ground carefully.
