Page 66 of Ever Dark Academy, Vol. 7

Start making your way to me! Ryder cried.

I… yeah, I’ll do that, Grayson said.

He took a few fluttering steps before he was finally able to get off of the ground. He felt heavy. His wings felt so impossibly heavy as if they were made of lead. He flapped as hard as he could. He heard the dragon roar again. He was leaving. He was taking away the energy it needed to live once more.

It ripped Legion off of its body and held them up to its flaming jaws. Legion was grunting and squealing. For even they realized that this fire would roast them like a pig on a spit.

Legion doesn’t die here! Grayson thought.

But he wasn’t in control of the dragon any more. He wasn’t even holding it upright with his Ashyr gift. The dragon was flying–somehow–on its own! And after it was done with Legion, it was coming after him. It would live.

It would live!

IT WOULD LIVE!

Shit! Shit! Shit! Grayson found himself cursing over and over again. He let out an almost hysterical laugh. Really going to have to tell Caemorn about this!

He flew low to the water as he couldn’t fly any higher. The strain on his strength was reducing a little bit as he moved away from the dragon. He knew he had to cut all connection with it, but he wasn’t sure how. Plus, he needed the damned thing to keep Legion, Lawson and Natasha busy for a while longer.

Just as the dragon was going to fry Legion, Lawson came out of nowhere and leaped onto the dragon’s tail. He climbed up it with the grace of a monkey, roaring the whole time, as he climbed. The dragon was distracted from roasting Legion alive by the weight on its tail. It snapped its tail to the side then to the other side. Lawson impossibly held on as he flew through the air on that very bony ride.

Taking advantage of the dragon’s lack of attention to them, Legion shifted. They turned from that hairy monstrosity to a slip of a child that easily wiggled out of the dragon’s grasp and began to fall towards the ground. Grayson only caught the quickest glimpse of the prepubescent form before they shifted back into the Legion that he knew–and hated–in mid-air and grabbed the last row of ribs.

Grayson made it to the tall grass where Ryder and Khos waited for him. He gave one final flutter of wings before he dropped like a stone. Ryder caught him in a large paw and laid him tenderly on his back. Grayson just lay there in bird form in the midst of the bear’s fur as Ryder and Khos started running away.

You made it! You’re going to be all right, Grayson! You’re going to be just fine! Ryder assured him, but he wondered if Ryder was assuring himself.

Y-yeah. I think so too. Just keep running. The farther we are away from it, the better, Grayson said.

And he realized in that moment, that he wasn’t afraid of Natasha, Lawson or Legion any longer. No, it was the dragon he feared finding him. Blue eyes burned as they turned towards their retreating forms.

It will not forget me. It will never forget me. It will find me again, Grayson thought blearily.

There were more roars from the dragon and the Vampires as they battled, but those gradually grew softer as they moved away towards the gate to Nightvallen. It was on top of a hill several miles from the Spire. As Ryder started up it, Grayson looked back at Solace and he was suddenly lurching onto bird feet.

Ryder! Something is happening back in the city! Grayson cried.

Ryder did not slow, but he did glance over his big, bear shoulder. That’s not good. I hope that Fiona and Charlie got out of there before whatever stirred up that hornet’s nest.

But Grayson had a feeling that it was their friends who had done the stirring.

No Escape

“How solid are you on Seeyr’s vision of the future, Fifi? Because I really think we’re going to get our Second Deaths!” Charlie laughed. Hysterically, of course, because they really were in trouble.

They were in the square just outside of the Spire, surrounded on all sides, and with no chance of escape. Fiona had just teleported to grab Tanis’ poor, abused body that he’d dropped and come back. But could he be blamed? He’d had to glamour them over half a dozen times as the Order Vampires had surrounded them again and again since they had left the dungeon. Fiona’s powers seemed limited to small hops so it had taken all they had to make it this far.

And I don’t think we’re getting any farther. Not without a miracle.

They hadn’t opened the door to the dungeon before they were faced with enemies. Instead of the two guards that they had expected, the hallway had been filled with Vampires. They were dressed in their Order garb. Their expressions were strangely serene, which had been more unnerving than if they had been snarling.

And why shouldn’t they be? There’s only two of us against hundreds–maybe thousands–of them?

They froze as they regarded all of them. Charlie–who still had Tanis’ form on while the unconscious body in his arms appeared to be Fiona while Fiona looked to be one of the Kaly Vampires he’d copied from Lasting–tried to adopt her calm attitude.

He smiled broadly. “Fellow Confessors, did you hear the alarm?”

Of course, they’d heard the alarm. But they hadn’t come down into the dungeon. That was likely forbidden. But they’d come this far to await to see who came out. Why wasn’t there a back door to the dungeon? Really, he would have expected it of Kaly, but, then again, two ways out meant two ways in and Kaly didn’t want that.