Soul Fire (Darkling Mage 8)

Then it stopped. I slumped to the floor, spent and exhausted, relief flooding into my body as the pain slowly left. But I couldn’t move. Every part of me was limp, useless. I angled my head to get a better look at Agatha, to see what she was preparing for her coup de grace. Around me my friends were screaming, footsteps ringing across the stone floor as they raced to help me. They had very little time. I knew.

But I saw the look on Agatha’s face, and then I understood why she had stopped casting her horrible spell. Her eyes locked with something far above me, the very thing that had distracted her, its enormous shadow smothering me like a protective shroud.

Agatha Black screamed as a tremendous barrage of bright blue fire consumed her body, raining from above like an arcane orbital strike. All I could see was the faintest silhouette of her body once again being incinerated under a dazzling shower of flames, their plumes a beautiful, familiar azure color.

I tilted my head a little more, straining to see the source of the fire. An enormous dragon towered above me, its claws raking huge furrows in the Boneyard’s stone as it dug deep to anchor itself against the intense force of its own breath. On and on the fires poured from its throat, bathing Agatha Black in a relentless stream of flames as blue and as radiant as the dragon’s scales.

My mouth struggled to speak her name. “Tiamat?” So the Great Beasts had come after all? Or at least one of them. Then what was all that talk about refusing to help humanity?

The torrent of blue fire finally ended, the look of rage burning in the great dragon’s eyes fading into what seemed like exhaustion. It lowered its huge bulk, the ground trembling as it laid its serpentine neck to rest. The dragon locked eyes with me, something serene, almost friendly in its gaze. This wasn’t Tiamat. Its scales were a different color, and it was much smaller.

I wasn’t expecting the transformation. Like leaves blown by a gentle breeze, every scale on the dragon’s body wavered. Its body grew smaller, more compact, its proportions shifting until it was almost the size and shape of something humanoid. All of its scales gradually faded, and the dragon’s face shifted into that of a woman.

The shock returned enough energy to my body that I somehow managed to push myself off the ground, leaning in for a closer look.

“Prudence? Is that you?”

Chapter 32

“Dust? Are you okay?”

I looked away from Prudence long enough to nod at Herald. His fingers trailed along my skin lightly – trying to detect anything serious that Agatha might have broken.

“Nothing awful so far,” Herald muttered. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

I tilted my head at Prudence. “Am I okay? Did you see that? Did you see her?”

“Not like we had a choice,” Herald said. “She cleared out a bunch of furniture when she transformed.”

I shook my head. “Who the hell even knew? But shit, someone needs to help her, too.”

Herald patted me on the shoulder, then nodded in Prudence’s direction. Gil was already at her side, transformed back into a human, his own clothes in disarray, just as hers were.

I looked down at myself, finding that my own outfit was pretty fucked up from casting shadowfire. “Damn it,” I mumbled. “Hey, Herald, is there any way you can use alchemy to reinforce clothes, make us like, I don’t know, uniforms that won’t tear to pieces when we use our magic? I mean look at the four of us.”

“What are we, superheroes? I’m not going to tailor you some damn costume. Also, shush, listen.”

I did. Gil and Prudence were mumbling to each other. I made out just enough of their words to understand.

“So this is why you and your grandma went to China?” Gil said, grasping Prudence by one hand, supporting her head and neck with the other.

Prudence nodded, smiling. “Kind of a pilgrimage. We were getting in touch with our roots. She said it was about time I learned who I really was. Crazy, right?”

“You should’ve told me,” Gil said, a smile lurking in the corners of his lips.

“I only just found out,” Prudence said. “And I guess I wanted it to be a surprise. You’re not mad, are you?”

“That you’re a dragon shifter? Please. I’ve never been more attracted to you.”

I watched the two of them kiss for as long as it wasn’t too impassioned and uncomfortable, but it got real sloppy real quick, so I looked away. “That’s adorable,” I said.

Herald nodded. “Imagine their babies.”

I narrowed my eyes. “So like, wolf-dragon shifters? Would that even work?”

He shrugged. “I’m an alchemist, not a zoologist. Biologist? Geez, who studies supernatural creatures?”

“Forget it. Help me up.”