[wattys 2018 shortlisted]
Humans see her as a dangerous threat -a witch that must be executed. With the uncontrollable ability to form ice at her fingertips, Ravenna is forced into hiding amongst the humans, stealing to survive. That is, until she h...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
RAVENNA ONCE AGAIN found herself clinging desperately to Caelan's massive, scaly dragon-neck. The wind nipped sharply at her cheeks and forehead. Her hair whipped wildly around her head. She grumpily pressed her cheek against his neck and kept her gaze focused downward.
It was near impossible to not look down, to not watch as the interior of the city drifted out of her field of vision — replaced by a sea of ice blue and crimson red.
"There are so many," Ravenna whispered, mostly to herself.
She knew that there would be a lot of cloned ice soldiers waiting outside the walls of Zeporia. Yet the tiny dots that had appeared on Caelan's map did little to genuinely prepare her for the reality of what awaited them on the ground. She was a little surprised to see that Vyses's army was entirely crimson colored. Part of her had expected the clones of her ice soldiers to remain icy blue, as it would have been much harder for her and Caelan to tell them apart.
Coloring the clones a bright crimson color was simply a poor move on Vyses's part. One that leveled the field more to their advantage.
"We can do this!" Caelan's words almost vanished within the chaotic sounds of intense battle. "Are you ready?"
Ravenna sucked in a deep breath.
Then she jumped upward. Caelan's dragon form vanished from beneath her and she plummeted toward the ground. Her hands moved fast. A massive wave of ice rose upward into the air. It caught her and brought her to the ground. The moment her feet hit the earth, the wave of ice exploded around her. Jagged shards of ice shot outward, zipping through the air and eliminating a fourth of the soldiers that immediately surrounded her.
She looked upward, instantly locating Caelan. Ravenna attempted to remain hypervigilant of Caelan as she started to fight. She did want to get too far separated from him — nor did she want to accidentally hit him with any magic.
He swooped in overhead and crushed a cluster of crimson soldiers beneath his massive dragon-body as he landed.
As he fought, Caelan switched between his dragon and humanoid form effortlessly. At one glance, he appeared as a human — slashing his way through the crimson colored ice-soldiers with a glowing white longsword. Another glance, and he stood tall as a dragon, an endless stream of fiery ice spewing from his mouth.
It was an impressive sight to behold.
Yet Ravenna did not have much time to marvel at him like she wanted.
A crimson colored soldier lunged at her. She lifted her arms to protect her face. A wall of ice burst from the ground, growing upward and blocking the soldier's melee attack. Before she could even lower her arms, another soldier swung its sword at her head from behind. She dropped to the ground and kicked out. The soldier hit the ground hard, cracks forming across its torso and armored head.
