Wings of Fire Legends • The Blue Comet

Chapter Nineteen

Snake Pit – or what was left of it – was unmistakable in the night. The canyonland glowed with blue fire like a beacon, beckoning Bisque closer. Through the thick smoke, she could make out the source: a blue light swirled around the city.

     The Blue Comet.

     "It's still there!" Bisque roared, preparing her wings for a dive. She heard Jaguar shouting for her to wait, she would never put off her revenge again.

     She dropped into a spiral, cutting through the smoke and emerging into a hot sea of flames. Because of the fire's blue colour, it indeed looked like a strange hissing, burning body of water. Bisque remembered her dream where she had been hunting the alligator gar as the water had boiled. It no longer felt like a dream.

     But she could not let up. She would not. Bisque soared on the updrafts of the flames, cruising just under the smoke, which was very easy to do. She barely had to spread her wings to achieve lift. She found herself spreading and folding her wings periodically to make sure she did not rise too far into the smoke. It was the most effortless flying she'd ever done and if the circumstances were not as grave as they were, she would have enjoyed it.

     Bisque flew over a cold spot – a patch of scorched soil in the middle of a burning field – and dropped like a stone. Her luck saved her as an arc of fire passed over the spot she'd been in. Heat rolled over her exposed back and Bisque hissed. Her shoulders tensed as she turned in time to catch sight of her enemy through the smoke. The blue light whizzed away just as quickly as it appeared.

     "Comet!" she shrieked, but the dragon did not acknowledge her. Her voice was swallowed by the roar of the flames. Bisque screamed with rage and jumped back into action, leaving the cold spot with powerful flaps of her wings ("cold" meaning "slightly less hot than the rest of the canyon"). She coughed and wheezed as she was carried into the smoke, the ashes making her eyes, throat, and lungs sting.

     Flashes of blue light beckoned to her. Bisque followed them, holding her breath, her lungs burning with agony until she felt like she could not take any more...

     Then the smoke cleared.

     The Blue Comet was right in front of her. Wings spread, wreathed in flames, burning the market stalls to the ground. Dragons scattered, those lucky enough to survive the initial blast diving for the river.

     Bisque spread her wings, rising, on course to intercept the target of her anguish and rage. She let loose a furious roar, claws outstretched and ready to strike. She would finally put its fire out – she would rip its head off its shoulders.

     But, at the last moment, The Blue Comet's head turned. A blast of heat came rapidly towards her. Blue light blinded her. Fire. In her face. She would have a face full of fire soon.

     There was no time to move. She could only close her eyes and feel the heat ready to overpower her.

     Something slammed into her left side and she faintly felt herself falling out of the sky. A scream of pain followed but it was not hers. Bisque and her saviour slid down the canyon wall.

     Bisque roared in outrage, throwing off the invisible weight and clawing her way back into the sky again.

     The Blue Comet had paused in its razing of the market, watching for where they'd fallen. Bisque could tell because the light hovered in front of her, hidden in the smoke.

     The smoke also helped hide her. Bisque burst from the darkness, hissing real, orange fire at the Comet. The dragon inside the blue flames shrieked – though not from pain, from surprise – and as it was turning away Bisque's talon reached through the flames and struck its side.