A Perfect World

Chapter 25

“A hundred?” Matanakia roars, a white wisp of flame escaping his mouth, “That’s impossible! How could a hundred dragons hide from us for all these years? We’ve sent search parties through these mountains for as long as Rogues have existed!” He cries, birds and other animals running for the safety of the deeper parts of the forest or the skies. Nania rubs her head against his neck, calming him down a bit, but he’s still visibly angry. I step back from the blue dragon, back between Matanakia and Synthia, and watch as he reorients himself.

“What did you do? How did you do that to me?” He cries, trying to attack me, but the other dragons move inward, forcing him away.

“I’m not telling, but you are. What else do you know?”

He hesitates, watching everyone fearfully, then says, “They’re planning to assassinate the Alphas tonight and take over the clan. They had Traveler spies planted for the last few weeks.”

“Does Xyryn sound familiar?” I ask, suddenly suspicious of the little black dragon.

“Yeah. Xyryn was a larger Traveler from the west, he didn’t want anything to do with us.” He says with a snort, dark red fire appearing for a half second.

“Good,” I say, satisfied with his answers, “Let him go. I’m sure anything the Rogues will do to him will outmatch us.”

“No, we’ll kill him here, one less attacker tonight,” Daren says, taking a step inward.

“Daren! Leave him. We’re letting him go.” Nania cries out, stepping back, the others following her lead. The veins on my skin which had been black in juvie, but had since faded, are dark again. My shoulder still burns, and I hear someone behind me, so I spin to face them. I come face-to-face with nothing, so I turn back to the others.

“What’s the plan from here?” Claire asks, her wings free of the sticky goo, and only slightly damp as she flutters them lightly to dry them the rest of the way.

“You’re leaving with the Fates, a dragon battle is no place for mortals, no matter how peculiar,” Matanakia growls, the irritation obvious in his voice still.

I decide against fighting him, knowing full well how right he is, and how much I miss my family, especially Dan, and my brothers. “That’s probably a good idea,” I say, and a branch snaps behind me, reminding me of who I was supposed to meet up with.

“One second, I’ll be back,” I say, jumping into the air and gliding into a dense patch of evening shadows and foliage. I clip one of my wings against a tree and lose my balance, landing in a roll in the dirt.

“You decided to come, did you?” Syven says irritably, his appearance in Lewis's body throwing me off, “I’ve been trying to get your attention for hours.”

“Sorry, if you didn’t notice there were 6 dragons, all 3 Fates, and 2 people who would very much not like to have to deal with you at this time,” I reply a bit too sharply, causing him to wince, though he does a very good job of covering it up, “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that…” I apologize much more kindly.

He brushes it off, continuing with what he wanted to say, “You have my mark. That’s what I was so anxious about last night.”

“How? I haven’t done anything.” I ask, thoroughly confused.

“Exactly. When casting spells, using charms, and making potions there is an exchange of energy between the caster and the other party, the one giving the energy to do it, but with you, that gets skipped completely. You don’t give any energy back when you cast spells, which is why you able to do so much so easily last night, and also why you’ve earned my mark,” He explains.