Pain lanced through my shoulder as it slammed into the stone floor. I’d chosen to roll out of the way, hitting the unforgiving material hard, rather than be swallowed whole by Mavev’s bloody pet Drake.

  I tried not to think about how large that fanged maw was; it was certainly big enough for me to lie down in. I wish I hadn’t made such a scene about my armour being out of my control and left it at the tower, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. The door we’d escaped the juvenile Wyverns from was to my left, the ten guards, Mavev and the others to my right.

  Sayo had engaged a guard with her blades and had already cut him down the side of his face. One guard lay on the floor, dead, a knife planted in his eye like a flower from a grave. Sila had a spear, presumably the dead guard’s weapon and was arcing it in large sweeps, keeping several guards, including Mavev, at bay.

  Logic dictated that I’d need to dart to the right. There was more room to manoeuvre and launch a counterattack of my own. Any intelligent opponent would expect that. Including the Drake. Her teeth dripped with foul-looking saliva, and a vicious look in her eyes told me that I wasn’t just dinner, I was sport. Unluckily for her, I’m actually a pain in the arse.

  Intelligent opponents may expect me to do certain things, but most of them never expect you to make the stupid move. Which can sometimes make it the smart one.

  The Drake coiled back on thick, well-used muscles and sprang at me once more. I darted left, toward the door. My movement and the Drake’s leap taking her to my right, gave me just enough space to slice out with my blade and cut her down the side by a good foot. I was rewarded with a gout of warm blood which felt unervingly sticky on my skin. I spun to face the Drake and grabbed the door handle at the same time, wrenching it open and backing away rapidly to the opposite wall.

  I heard chuckling; for a moment, I was confused, until I realised the sounds were unmistakably my own laugh. As quickly as the laugh started in my chest, it stopped. Just as the rapid fluttering of leathery wings on air buffeted the air, twelve juvenile Wyverns burst into the room, drawn by the scent and sound of combat.

  The Drake shrieked as six winged assailants raked her wound with their claws and bit into her flesh with their fangs. The Li’ard lashed out with her perhensile tongue and tail at the beasts but was thwarted by their nimble movements. The rest of the Wyverns had descended on the dead guard’s corpse with sickening speed. I was glad I had guessed right; these beasts hungered and clearly had no loyalty yet beyond their stomachs. Not like Eggs.

  “STICK TOGETHER, FORM ON GERTHA!” I shouted as I grasped the medallion in my hands and scrambled toward her.

  “DO NOT HARM THE WYVERNS. CATCH THEM YOU IDIOTS!” Mavev bellowed. They waved a sword in the air, a different one from the one they’d used in our last bout. It was as wide as three of my fingers, straight as an arrow with a hilt like a crescent moon. A green emerald was set in the pommel, and light danced within it.

  Such a fine weapon. Such a piece of shit owner.

  Guards scrambled to obey Mavev as best they could, but the six that had settled to feasting on the dead guard turned on them, setting jaws around throats or battering them with wings and tails.

  “You turned the odds, you mad bastard!” Sila whooped, he held his stolen spear at the ready, as three guards approached us.

  Sayo, Sila, and I moved to run forward when a flash of black filled the room. Hacking, wheezing, fluid-filled coughs echoed around the room and inside our heads, I heard a woman crying and the screams of countless people in anguish.

  When our vision returned, the three guards who had been approaching us stared at us with bloody holes where their eyes had been. Blood streaked down their faces as they smeared it with trembling fingers and meek, hollow sobs.

  “ENOUGH OF THIS.” Gertha snarled. She pushed past us and headed straight for Mavev, in one hand she held a fistfull of arrowheads so tightly that blood splattered behind her in a trail. Her other hand was pointed at him, curled fingers crackling a black energy between them. She raised the hand with arrowheads to her mouth, and I saw her lean back.

  Mavev charged at her, and I ran to intercept. The Drake howled in rage, and as I caught up to Gertha, a heavy weight smashed into me from behind, and I heard my skin tearing as claws and fangs raked into me.

  As I was stained with my own blood, a sudden pressure built and then released in my ears in one brief instant. There was a shining white flash, and I heard the shattering of countless stained glass windows. Gertha howled with a deep, cracked voice.

  I was suddenly freed from my unseen assailant, and I saw the form of a pale Wyvern limping away from me, a large wound in its back, one of Sayo’s blades lay just behind it, caked in the beast's blood.

  Wind howled into the room, screams and the sound of soldiers clamouring filled the room as thunder screamed back in response.

  No…not thunder.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Roars, growls. At the sound of that, all Wyverns bar the injured one chirruped and bolted for the holes where windows used to be, leaving wounded or dead guards in their wake.

  So that’s what a pissed-off Fell Dragon sounded like...

  I started laughing again, so much so that tears started filling my eyes. For the briefest of moments, I’d have sworn I’d heard the jingle of bells.

  “You fucker.” I whispered, grinning.

  “Tull.” Gertha’s monotone voice cut through me, and I shook my head free of the bizarre reverie.

  Gertha stood straight, her hand outstretched toward Mavev. Deep, charcoal black veins in her skin tapered into vines the colour of night, that followed jagged routes through the air toward Mavev.

  They fell just short of his blue skin, the tips fizzing and popping as if being burned. He stood motionless, only the tremor of his blade raised, ready to strike, and the strained look in his eyes telling me he was still conscious. Then I heard the battle cries of Sila and Sayo. They were hacking at the Drake, ducking, weaving and dodging the beast's frenzied attacks. They must have engaged the Drake as soon as the Wyverns had flown away.

  “I have him held. For now. Take him.” Gertha said, focused. In that moment, she was as tranquil as water itself. My hand tightened around my blade just as I heard a high-pitched yelp.

  “NO!” Sila screamed, and I whirled around. Sayo lay crumpled on the floor, blood pumping out of a ragged hole in her side. My heart leapt in my mouth as my pains and aches faded away, and I felt utter focus take me into its firm, guiding hand. The Drake swatted at Sila, who rolled and stabbed at it with a frenzy bordering on madness. With nobody to distract the Drake’s focus, he’d be wounded or worse in moments, like Sayo.

  “Tullen,” Gertha said.

  I could kill Mavev now, end this.

  But at the cost of my friends?

  Gertha’s children?

  Warriors like me?

  Yes, warriors like me.

  The world needs more Steelweavers Tullen. Hard people. Bloody people. The only ones who can push against darkness by wielding it like a fine blade.

  For once. I agreed with that miserable master of mine.

  It started small, but took root in my chest like the embers of a campfire, soon to be a blazing wildfire consuming the world.

  My laughter filled the room as I ran at that bloody Drake.

  “FACE ME, YOU BASTARD LIZARD!” I roared.

  The Drake slammed Sila into the ground with her leg and fixed her hateful gaze on me.

  “Tull-en.” Gertha croaked. Her words landed on my mostly deafened ears.

  The beast opened its dripping maw and leapt toward me. With my medallion firmly grasped in one hand and my sword stick in the other. I leapt forward, meeting her in the air. I sailed through nothing, bringing my legs close to my chest and tumbling into the beast's mouth.

  The tongue enveloped me in thick, wet coils of muscle and started dragging me in.

  “TULLEN NO!” I heard Sila cry.

  I held my breath and waited.

  When everything went dark, just as the fanged cavern I found myself in closed. I couldn’t hold any longer.

  My roaring laughter was not my own, as I squeezed the medallion so hard that the metal bit into my flesh. My bones groaned and spit foamed at my mouth through gritted teeth as I exerted myself.

  I roared, half mad with laughter, as a biting pain stabbed my hand as I crushed the medallion with all my might. I was rewarded with a single crack.

  Immediately, I was engulfed in an explosion of thick meat, blood and viscera fountained out the top of the Drake’s neck. I slammed into the ground as thick chunks of meat and brain slapped into the ground around me. I rolled onto my side, drenched, to find two golden eyes staring right into my face.

  Their thick, rough tongue scraped the gore from my chest and chin. I laughed and cried in one. Relieved to see them once more.

  Eggs rose on their hind legs, unfurling their mighty wings. They were almost entirely crimson, with patches of black showing from underneath the veneer of the Drake’s gore. My Wyvern shook itself, spreading raindrops of blood all across the hall, its walls and the ceiling.

  I’ll never forget how they roared when Gertha fell.

  The black vines protruding from her hands puffed away in a bellow of smoke as Mavev suddenly darted forward, blade biting through the air where Gertha had been standing just moments before. She started to crawl away in the direction of her two fallen children. Mavev ignored her, instead clamping his off hand to his head as he shrieked, tears and rage alive in his eyes.

  “SHE. WAS. MINE.” He pointed his blade at the headless corpse of the Drake, her limbs still twitching as lifeblood flowed out of the stump. Eggs coiled back, ready to leap.

  I rose to my feet, casting the ruined medallion to the side and raising my blade at the ready.

  “Then let me reunite you with her.” I snarled. Flourishing my own blade.

  I made it two steps before something large, scaled and fanged smashed into the rear half of the room. Sending plumes of dust and debris out in huge clouds. Mavev was enveloped in the avalanche, and for a few moments all was silent.

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as the deep, guttural roar of the Fell Dragon filled the space around us.

  Eggs and I stared back at the scarred and ancient face of the creature. My breath caught in my throat. My laughter halted entirely.

  The Fell Dragon’s head and neck occupied half of the hall. Its mouth was so large, Eggs could have stood tall inside with room to spare.

  Stone and dust blasted at us from either side as impossibly large wings smashed through the walls, gnarled talons finding grip in the stone.

  The Fell Dragon heaved itself forward and opened its mouth.