Wings of Honor: Saving Grace

Chapter 20: Grace Under Fire

The NightWing reared up, flaring his wings, making himself so humongous and strangely unfamiliar and angry-looking that if we didn't have mindreaders and recognized without a doubt that this was him, I would've believed we'd cornered the wrong dragon. But the strange buzzing was most definitely here.
"No, that's him, all right," Moon said. "I'm sure."
This is our guy.
I nodded, crouching down and splaying my wings, looking threatening, growling low. I felt the rifles burning holes into the enemy dragon already.
Then Peril spotted his pouch of shape-shifting jewelry at his feet and the case that held the scroll around his chest. This was most definitely him.
"Father!" Peril shouted. "Stop! I don't want to hurt you, but I will!"
"And so will we," Winter hissed, the sound of frostbreath gathering under his words.
Chameleon froze, but Peril still had never seen such a look of fury and disgust on him before.
"That's him," Winter said to Qibli and Turtle. "That's the dragon who attacked us and wounded Kinkajou."
Turtle growled softly in his throat, and Qibli raised his venomous tail, digging his claws into the muddy riverbank.
But what concerned me the most, was a sudden rage threatening to boil over on my back. With everything going on already, I felt like my lungs were threatening to become crushed. A finger twitched, braced against a trigger.
"But that's impossible," Moon said. "We hit him with my fire and your frostbreath ... this dragon has no scars, no injuries, nothing."
"It's the enchantment," Qibli guessed. "It probably starts the shape off new and uninjured every time. He just has to take it off, and all the wounds disappear — then when he puts it back on, the scroll makes him a NightWing per the instructions all over again. No lasting damage, ever."
I hummed low in understanding.
"That's useful," said Peril. She recalled how Ruby's injuries had disappeared when she turned back into Tourmaline. "Is that right?"
Chameleon breathed a small plume of smoke, then nodded. She wished he would say something, instead of just glaring at all of us — at her especially — with those narrow, black, eyes.
"Listen," she said. "We just want the scroll."
"No," he spat, spikes bristling all along his back. Although his rattle was eclipsed by the rattle of rifles settling into shoulders, prepared for a deadly and true shot.
"Actually, I want the scroll and justice," Winter said. "I think he should pay for what he did to Kinkajou."
"Me too," said Turtle.
"Me too." Marvin growled through his teeth.
"Me too," admitted Moon, "but the scroll is the most important thing."
"And I think taking it from him will be punishment enough," said Peril.
I narrowed my eyes at him. Winter snorted disbelievingly but Peril ignored him.
"I'm sorry, Father. But you can't keep it, not after what you've done with it. We can't trust you."
"I won't do anything terrible," he pleaed. "I was only following Scarlet's orders. You know all about that."
"You weren't following her orders when you put Kinkajou in the hospital," Qibli observed. "That was all you."
You can't use that defense. Marvin thought, his breaths rapidly hastening.
"And you could have chosen me over her once you knew we were family," Peril said. "You didn't have to betray me by taking away my memories. You could also have stayed and been loyal to Queen Ruby, but it's clear you're not planning on that. You've had choices, and we haven't seen you make any good ones yet."
I didn't dare let Chameleon leave my sight, even for a moment. I did my best to not become partially camouflaged, although that was broken up by splotches of dark reds running all over me. I didn't have to look in my reflection to see how intimidating I've become.
"But this is an easy one," Moon said. "Give us the scroll, and we let you go."
"Or don't give us the scroll," said Qibli, "and get another face full of flames and frostbreath. Wow, try saying that five times fast."
I couldn't even react to that.
"You'll still have your treasure," Peril said. And she would still leave him the scraps of scroll he'd already enchanted with his different shapes. He could still be Soar and Shapeshifter and Cirrus and whoever else when he didn't want to be Chameleon. She knew what it was like to wish for different scales, and she knew how much he needed them, as a RainWing with no scale- shifting powers. "You'll keep having your great life wherever you decide to go. You just won't be able to hurt anyone else."
Even I nodded at that. I followed her logic, I didn't want to leave Chameleon like that if I couldn't help it. He could keep his other forms, he just couldn't be an animus threat anymore.
Winter hissed again at Peril's suggestion.
"But it's mine," Chameleon said, clutching the metal sheath to his chest. "I found it, I get to keep it. Why should you have it? What makes you all any better than me?"
Peril didn't really know the answer to that question. Was she any better than her father? Did she know these other dragonets well enough to say that they were? What would they do with power like that?
If only she knew.
But she knew one thing: she couldn't leave it with Chameleon.
"Give it to us," she said. "Please don't make us fight you for it."
"Please." I pleaded, spreading my wings to slightly cover Moon and Peril on the other side.
"Or do," said Winter. "I'm ready."
"Can you please shut your mouth?" Marvin growled at the IceWing.
"You think you can hurt me," Chameleon snarled. "But I've made some modifications to this shape since we last met, IceWing. Shapeshifter already had strength beyond any dragon — but now I also have scales that cannot be harmed and flames as hot as my daughter's scales. I foresee a pretty horrible death ahead for most of you."
I let out a shaky exhale.
Peril felt sick. Why didn't I seen this dangerous, power-hungry side of him before? I don't want anything bad to happen to Turtle. I am pretty sure I'd even be able to muster some sadness if anything happened to Winter.
"But, Father —" she started.
Suddenly, movement caught my eye. A shiver ran through me. Marvin's eyes contorted to squint.
"What's happening?" Chameleon suddenly shouted. He scrabbled at his chest. "How are you doing that? Stop! It's mine!"
Peril stepped back in astonishment as the sheath unbuckled itself and started to wriggle free of the hulking NightWing's talons. Chameleon held on to it desperately.
"No!" he roared. "You can't take it!"
The metal sheath hesitated, poised in the air as if it were trying to launch itself out of Chameleon's claws. And then it pivoted abruptly and started bashing him in the face.
Chameleon yowled with pain, let go of the scroll, and fell back, covering his snout with his talons. Blood was running from one of his eyes. His black eyes.
We all watched in horror as the sheath bashed him in the face once more, with what looked like the force of a mountain falling behind it. Chameleon shrieked, no doubt because several bones in his snout were broken.
"That's enough," Peril cried out. She knew that soon he'd recover from the shock and gather the strength to take off his NightWing shape, and then he'd be healed instantly. But it was still beyond horrible to see him suffering like that. No matter what he'd done, she believed there was a part of him that had wanted to help her ... that had wanted to be a family.
For a moment, the sheath hovered in the air, as if considering whether to listen to her, and then it spun slowly and floated over to land in Turtle's talons.
I nearly lunged forward with the medkit, but was held back by Marvin's hand. Leaving a one-handed trigger grip on his Springfield.
"Let's go," Turtle said. His eyes distant, as if he couldn't understand what he just did.
He just attacked a dragon for the first time.
Marvin could only control his breathing, but he motioned us upwards. We all spread their wings and lifted off at once; Peril swerved to make sure she stayed clear of the others.
"That scroll is mine!" Chameleon screamed as they flew into the dark clouds. "I'll find you! I'll take it back! You'll be sorry! It's mine, it's mine, it's mine!"
I took a shaky breath, letting it out. The two soldiers continued to track them until he was gone, and Marvin kept watching him with his Springfield scope after that. Rifle on safe.
Peril glanced left, at Turtle's determined jawline, and then right, at Moon's nervously twitching talons.
But as she looked back forward for flying, she thought back. Now that they had the most dangerous scroll in Pyrrhia ... what were they going to do with it?
I felt a cold front wash over me.
What would we do with it? What now?