Dragonfury 01 - Fury of Fire

eyes with narrowed pupils. Brown with a single jagged horn in the center of its forehead, the dragon snarled at her and drew a lungful of air past razor-sharp teeth. Struck stupid, Myst froze and watched as a glowing orange ball gathered at the back of his throat.
    Oh, God. Fire.
    “Myst, run!” Bastian’s voice came through loud and clear, but Myst couldn’t move. She was locked into yellow eyes, her legs the consistency of Jell-O. “Shit! Rikar!”
    A cold wind blew in. The autumn air went murky, a cloud of frost and mist on the verge of snow. The icy fog billowed over the hood of her car, settling around her like an Arctic blanket, but it was too late. She could already feel the heat and hear the hungry roar of the inferno as the fireball gathered speed. It was going to eat her alive, leave nothing but ash in its wake, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
    Despite her promise, she turtled, curling herself around the newborn. The broken “Sorry” she whispered to him wasn’t enough, but somehow needed to be. She’d tried so hard to save him, and now they were both going to die.
    Painfully. Horribly. Without a lick of—
    A wall of ice exploded around her, rising in a U-shaped barrier in front of her car. Thick and unbelievably tall, the barricade shuddered as the fireball hit with a boom, throwing her backward. Steam blew sky-high, raining ice chips in a spectacular fountain of cold water. The hiss and crackle clawed at the ice, digging to reach her.
    Distorted by melting glacier, she watched Bastian take off. A streak of midnight blue, he tackled the fire-breathing dragon. Two shadows rolled end over end, almost indistinguishable from one another in the moonlight. Dark blue landed on top, claws embedded in brown scales.
    His green eyes flashed, reaching her through the darkness. “Myst, get out of here!”
    She followed the command without question: no hesitation, no “oh, my God” ringing inside her head. She was blank, rung out, too scared to do anything but listen.
    Frost scraped the skin off her palm as she yanked the car door open. Not feeling the pain, she grabbed her keys, jammed the correct one home, and threw her car into gear. Without looking back—without hearing the roars and rip of claws—she put the gas pedal to the floor and, pulling a Mario Andretti, sped down the driveway, the back end of her car leading the way.

     
    The pine trees at the edge of the forest were on fire, throwing billows of smoke into the night sky. Bastian raised his head and stepped off Shit-for-brains’s chest. Torn wide open, the enemy’s throat was a twisted tangle of flesh, carotid artery exposed and gushing red-black blood. The rogue wouldn’t live much longer. Like all of Dragonkind, he would check out in a pile of ash the second his heart stopped beating.
    It was now or never.
    Ignoring the injury, Bastian angled his horned head, getting up close and personal to make eye contact. “Where is Ivar hiding?”
    Leader of the Razorbacks, Ivar was as ruthless as he was cunning. A treacherous opponent. One Bastian wanted to kill so badly the taste sat like rotten meat on the back of his tongue. Nothing washed the brutal tang away: not food nor drink nor sex. The thirst to spill Ivar’s blood tainted everything he did.
    Slippery as an eel, Ivar evaded death like a suicidal maniac avoided life. After a century of fighting, Bastian still hadn’t managed to destroy him, to cut the head off the rogue organization. It didn’t help that Ivar orchestrated from the sidelines. This time, though, was different. The asshole was doing more than playing armchair quarterback. He’d deliberately gone underground. Not a good sign. The enemy leader was up to something…with potentially catastrophic consequences.
    “Fuck…you…Bastard,” the Razorback gasped, pain in his slitted yellow gaze.
    “Clever.” Bastian wanted to roll his eyes at the play on his name. He pressed down on the dying Razorback’s broken leg instead, using pain as incentive to make him talk. “Where is he?”
    “Pretty…female, you got…there.” Coughing up more blood, he wheezed, “Do you…think…Ivar will enjoy…fucking her?”
    “Wrong answer,” Bastian said, the threat to Myst making his voice almost melodic. Anyone who knew him well knew the soft tone was a dangerous one. When he got angry, he got quiet. And when he got quiet, things died.
    With a snarl, he took hold of the Razorback’s skull and twisted. Bones