A Match of Monsters

Chapter Sixteen

Everything blazed with colour, burningly bright to Elain's mortal eyes.

From the centre of the cavern, right above where her Ladyship lay, flames erupted. Each tongue unfurled and spread itself out like the petals of a great flower. They flickered with more shades than the rainbow held, leaving behind no trails of smoke as they headed towards Elain and every other shadow in the expanse.

She bit into the soft flesh of her lip until she felt as if her lower and upper rows of teeth were touching each other, all the while holding tightly to a terror-stricken kit as she attempted to cover him once more with her body in vein of his struggling. She curled her back as tightly as she could, the worry for her own wellbeing and that of the kit's overwhelming her thoughts. Her mind conjured nothing but the smallest glimmer of idle curiosity for how the two dragons behind her fared.

That changed when she heard a roar, flinching in trepidation as the muscles in along her spine twisted the vertebra along her torso and neck until she could see Manasseh out of the corners of her eyes. He stood directly opposite her, across the crater, and Elain's neck ached as she stared back at him unflinchingly. She knew from his face that he could finally see her and her young charge through the dancing flames and heat-warped atmosphere.

He showed his teeth in a hear-felt snarl, the terror of it only emphasized by his dripping magenta scales, as the spell slowly melted them from his body. He opened his maw once more and screeched, through Elain could not tell if it was towards her or the Lady. "A hatchling still lives!"

Manasseh's eyes pierced deeply into Elain's, inducing a terror so great that she became paralysed.

They were facing off on either side of the expansive crater. Buried deep below the twisted beauties of metal, stone and bone, rested the broken body of their leader, impossible to see as she was behind the aura of magic that filled the area from cliff to cliff. The wispy tips of it just brushed against Elain's ankles where she perched on the rough, sorcery-hewn edge, even as they obscured the view of the male's bloody talons, jagged edges and all.

She did not notice the smoke cloying the air around them, beginning to force its way down her throat and corrupting her lungs. Nor could she feel the cave as its ceiling shattered and began to fall, to cut through Manasseh's soft flesh where it had now become unprotected as his scales melted away. It was only when he tore his glare away from her that she was able to move again.

Elain payed no attention to the dragon other than to witness of snarls of pain and fury set off the falling rocks. For in comparison to the storm, of stones that pelted down towards them, what had been before was a mere trickle.

All of her thoughts were focused on how to protect the kit and survive the onslaught – it was as if the mountain itself was fighting back as it shook and attempted to crush them. The broken floor buckled beneath her widespread feet, spitting apart to form endlessly spreading small ravines, until there was not an unbroken tile left in the entire cave. Elain watched in horror as her Ladyship's once beautiful lair systematically destroyed itself.

Broken carvings accelerated towards the ground in the thousands every second. Everywhere, the magic drove them down until something broke in the impact, falling across every square inch – except for where Elain stood clutching the kit. Together, they clung to each other trembling in fear of the deadly shower that's projectiles hit everything but them.

When the human looked to her toes, her eyes widened in terror. She could feel the air rushing past her as the expanse of nothingness continued to grow beneath her leather-padded feet. The ground appeared to shrink beneath her as she continued to fall upwards – there was no other way to describe it.

Around her, magic sharpened shards continued to whir about and race towards the ground. They came ever so close to her and the kit, some of them even cutting through the thick layers of her clothing. But none of the stones so much as nicked their flesh. Above her, Elain could see the shards parting – changing their trajectory so as not to harm her. Every time one of them flew past, she could just hear the high pitched ringing of the enchantment protecting her. The hatchling struggled in her arms as they continued to move upwards.

Right towards a hole in the ceiling that was barely the size of her fist.

Elain's heart sped up, and she barely noticed the way solid rock seemed to warp itself so that she could fit through as she was forced upwards into the impossibly tiny air shaft. As soon as the last part of her had gone by, the sediment once more changed itself until it was back in the formation that it had been before Elain and the hatchling had come past.

Above her, far beyond where stone had begun to warp, a pinprick of light steadily expanded at the same rate she approached it. And more suddenly than Elain had expected, she burst through it into a world illuminated so brightly that it had become blinding.

Author's Note

 - As always, this book is dedicated to my amazing father 

 - Over the next 2 weeks, I'll have a lot more time in my hands, and I intend to write at least another 10 chapters for you. I also just want to thank everyone what has begun my story so far.