For her, though, it was about survival, which meant she forgot their identities and focused on their weapons. She prioritized them in her brain as they surged toward her as one angry mob.
Kristen dodged a jab from the shiv—she absolutely could not let herself get stabbed, not without her dragon powers—and that earned her a crack across the shoulders from the chair leg. She tumbled in pain but relieved that the wooden leg had connected and not the piece of rebar.
Before she could stand, she was kicked by the dragons who could reach her, but she scurried out from the mob, found her feet, and attacked.
She dodged a swing from the rebar and kicked the woman with the chain in the throat. The female dragon staggered back and gasped.
That left her open to the dragon who had the brass knuckles and had obviously spent some of his credits on hair gel. He capitalized on her vulnerability with a punch to her arm. The pain was intense, but she knew she was lucky. If he had struck one of her bruised ribs, the fight would be over.
The blow made her stumble, but she still had to seize the opportunity. She dodged the chair leg and targeted the dragon with the shiv. That was the priority.
The woman anticipated her attack and held the sharpened screwdriver up. Still, it was obvious that Kristen had far more experience disarming thugs with knives than the dragon had using them without her powers. When the Steel Dragon kicked her hand, she lost the weapon, which thunked into the dust a few feet away.
Obviously aware of the lethal potential of the weapon, the dragon dove to retrieve it. Kristen was faster, placed a foot on it, and dragged it toward her enough that the woman couldn’t reach it. She bent and picked it up—she couldn’t let it be used against her—but that left her open to the man with the rope.
He was the skinniest of the human-shaped dragons who had attacked her, and she knew what that meant given his weapon of choice. He wouldn’t fight with the rope but try to strangle her.
It dropped over her head and he immediately pulled it tighter and tighter around her neck. Part of her brain—firing at rapid speed from good, old-fashioned human adrenaline—was impressed. He knew how to work a rope, which meant he must have strangled before. It was not a skill she thought a dragon would have possessed. Fortunately, she knew what to do about him.
She spun the sharpened screwdriver in her hand so the point was closer to her pinky and jabbed it into his gut.
He yelped, but didn’t let go—again, impressing a part of her—so she stabbed him in the leg.
His only response was to pull tighter.
The assailant with the chair leg came to help and clubbed her in the solar plexus. The blow forced a gasp from her, and she struggled to fill her lungs because of her blocked windpipe.
Her peripheral vision began to fade as the man pulled tighter. She flipped the shiv in her hand, raised it, and used one of its sharpened edges to cut the rope.
It snapped and she stumbled forward, free and able to breathe.
With her first breath of air, she hurled the shiv as hard as she could and it sailed over the fence. No one else would be stabbed today.
Kristen flinched when the piece of rebar came down hard enough to almost crack her skull, but her instincts saved her. The weapon continued past her and wedged in the springtime mud of the yard.
She looked at the thugs and reassessed the scene. The dragon with the rope was out, thank God. When Kristen had pushed away from him, the chain had caught him in the face with a strike obviously intended for her. The hangman now lay in the fetal position and clutched both his face and his gut, where she had stabbed him. His leg bled freely, but he only had so many hands.
The woman who’d had the shiv was also now unarmed, but she didn’t look ready to quit. Neither did any of the other five.
When the man with the rebar yanked his weapon free—it was close to three feet long—she had to consider her assessment concluded.
Cautiously, she backed toward the fence to prevent them from surrounding her again but only succeeded in cornering herself.
The dragons with the longer weapons—rebar, chair leg, and chain—came forward, able to inflict damage from a distance. The man with the knuckle dusters and the dragon who’d formerly brandished the shiv hung back, no doubt looking for an opportunity.
Kristen dodged when the rebar swung and again, the piece of metal descended with enough force to get stuck in the mud. She grasped it and tried to throw a shoulder into its user. Although she succeeded in pushing him away, the chain arced menacingly and she had to let the potential weapon go or risk it breaking her fingers.
The chair leg cracked her across the back with enough force to send her stumbling against the chain-link fence. Its wielder struck her again, then once more before she could dodge. Again, the length of chain struck where she’d been a moment before. It was an odd sensation to be thankful to be hit by a chair leg but there it was.
She straightened and rushed the woman with the chain, who was quickly proving to be the biggest remaining threat.
Unfortunately, she didn’t get far though before the now shivless dragon who had hovered in the background caught her hair and yanked her head back. The brass knuckles drove into a rib and for a moment, pain was all she knew.
She heard something through the hurt and held an arm up in front of her. The chain struck her and wound around her forearm. It hurt, but not that badly and better yet, nothing was broken. With a much better hold on the weapon this time, she pulled the woman who held it toward her. It was wrapped around her forearm instead of only held in her hand, so she was able to wrench it free.
The dragon screamed in outrage but was shoved out of the way by her cohorts with the chair leg and rebar. Kristen actually let the first attack connect. The dragon had aimed the chair leg at her arm, which at this point, she considered expendable—especially given that the man with the rebar now attempted another sword-like swing directed at her head.
Thinking quickly, she held the length of the chain up and managed to absorb much of the rebar’s force, but not all of it. The tip struck her on the head and hot blood began to ooze from her scalp.
Tangled as she was with one assailant pulling her hair and another refusing to let go of the weapon now caught in the chain, she was open for attack.
The brass knuckles worked her side and pummeled her ribs brutally after landing one particularly vicious blow to her mouth. At the same time, the dragon wielding the chair leg proceeded to batter her back with the piece of wood. Each blow grew stronger and stronger until she could hear the wood at its breaking point.
Luckily for her, it would shatter before her bones did.
Her teeth clenched, she wouldn’t quit. Instead, she slumped. The woman holding her hair didn’t release her so the pain from her scalp was intense, but the ploy brought the dragon into the path of the chair leg, which cracked upon her skull and knocked her unconscious.
Her hair now free, Kristen fell to her knees.
The man with the rebar was inches from her, so she borrowed a page from Obscura’s book and spat in his face.
“Bitch!” he bellowed as he wiped his eyes.
Kristen tottered forward, clutching her chain.
She turned to see four dragons still facing her. The broken chair leg had created two makeshift shivs. The man with the rebar managed to yank his weapon free from the chain. He looked tired but unhurt. The woman she’d taken the chain from looked pissed that she’d been disarmed but was still in the fight. The dragon with the brass knuckles still looked as fresh as a daisy.
Kristen spat blood and a tooth and wondered if she’d regrow the molar if she ever got the silver cuff on her ankle off long enough to give her back her dragon healing powers. Those knuckle dusters had really done a number on her face.
“Do you dinosaurs ever play sports?” she asked and wiped the blood from her mouth as she began to spin the chain at her side.
Only one of the four answered as he raised his brass knuckles and smiled. “Boxing
. I held the heavyweight title until they realized I was a dragon.”
“So you were cheating?” she asked.
“Did that feel like I was cheating?” He pointed at her jaw.
“Face it, Steel Bitch, you’re beat. There’s no point stalling,” the man with the chair-leg shivs said.
“I’m not stalling, merely asking.” She spun the chain faster and faster at her side, then made a circle above her head and crossed over, keeping the momentum and the acceleration. “Before I knew what I was, I played all kinds of sports. Soccer, tennis, color guard.”
“Isn’t that the one for girls?” Rebar asked.
“Mostly. We used to twirl flags.”
“Big fucking deal.” The other man advanced with his wooden weapons at the ready.
Kristen spun her chain into his face with enough force to knock his head back and catapult him into the mud. That left three.
“This chain reminds me of those flags.”
Already, she could tell the fight was down to two versus one. She’d done far more damage than the dragon who’d originally wielded the chain had done. The woman clearly knew they wouldn’t win. She didn’t step back or anything or even lower her fists, but her muscles weren’t tensed to attack. While she wouldn’t run away—that would make her lose far too much face—she wouldn’t lead the attack either.
“Are we going to do this thing or what?” She maneuvered the chain into a complex series of twirls that went in front and behind her body.
The other two attacked as one. The rebar swung first and she trapped the metal with the chain, but this proved to be a mistake. As soon as her weapon was tangled, his comrade rushed in. She moved her free arm to block and he simply hammered the brass knuckles on it. Each punch hurt like hell, but he didn’t crack her bones so she endured it.
She yanked the chain toward her, which brought the dragon in with it, and tried to kick him into the boxer. He was too quick, released the piece of rebar, and stepped away.
Kristen dropped the chain and picked up the steel club. She swung it at the boxer, who dodged, then ran his hand through his gelled hair.
“Hey,” he said as if she’d crossed some kind of line and he and all his cronies hadn’t struck first and been fighting six on one.
The piece of metal was an even more familiar sports implement than a chain, of course. She had played lacrosse for years—much longer than she’d been in the color guard, honestly. Thankful for the weight of it in her arms, she raised it in readiness.
“Bring it on, Steel Bitch,” the boxer said.
She stepped toward him but swung her weapon in a wide loop around her head. When he cursed, she felt exultant. The idiot who’d let go of the piece of metal had attempted to snag the chain. Now, he was unconscious.
“Your move, Fancy Fist,” Kristen said.
“Fancy Fist? What the fuck you talking about?” the dragon demanded, but the goading had worked. He moved forward, ready to pummel her.
Kristen swung down once with all her might. He parried the strike with his brass knuckles. That wasn’t good. If he could block her at her strongest, he could block everything she had left. He hadn’t really taken many blows, while her jaw hurt and her face was swelling so badly it threatened to close her eye. Her ribs ached, which made breathing difficult. Her arms were both exhausted from the fight and sore from being hit. And the boxer was fresh. Even though it was finally one on one, she felt like the odds were more against her than ever.
He seemed to sense her hesitation and started forward with both fists raised, the one with the brass knuckles slightly higher than the other.
She struck and he blocked.
When she swung again, he dodged.
“Why are you doing this?” she demanded. “Obscura has no loyalty to you.”
The boxer shrugged. “I’m bored and I’m not a fan of the human turned dragon turned cop. No one in here is.”
Kristen attacked as he spoke. It was a dirty trick, but so was ambushing one unarmed person with six armed people.
He stepped back but not quite fast enough. She caught his forehead with the tip of her piece of rebar and blood dripped down his face.
“You cut me.” He smiled. “It takes me back to the ring.”
Apparently unaffected by her attack, he surged forward.
In the senseless brawl that followed, she managed to land a few strikes on her opponents back, but it paled compared to what he did to her. She hammered his shoulders—the shoulders of a man who quite obviously spent too much time in the gym—while he pulverized her middle. And yet she couldn’t pull away. If she did, she knew he’d aim for her face. One punch with those things on his fists would knock her out and perhaps kill her.
That couldn’t happen.
But by that point, she had no idea what else to do. She was losing strength, losing blood, and losing hope. Her ears were ringing—screeching, in fact—and her limbs seemed heavier and more sluggish by the second.
She was almost at the point of giving up when suddenly, the fight was over.
Kristen was lifted off her feet and levitated in midair, the wind whipping at her jumpsuit. The boxer was also elevated about ten feet away from her.
“Ladies and sirs, fighting is not allowed. We will have to confiscate your weapons and you will be sent to solitary. All credits are suspended until further notice,” a mage said and tried not to let his voice shake. She was thankful that he had broken the fight up before she’d been beaten or done something she’d regret. It also impressed her that he was obviously scared yet had stepped in anyway.
“Now, please, who was involved?” he demanded.
“Only us two, that’s it,” the boxer said and raised an eyebrow at her, asking her for cooperation that he hadn’t even remotely earned the right to.
“It was this asshole plus five others. I knocked four of them out but there might be one making a break for it. Copperstrike, I think his name is.”
“Snitch,” her adversary said.
“Coward. If it had only been you and me, I’d be in solitary. You’d be in the hospital.”
He grinned. While he knew the truth of the threat, he didn’t admit defeat. Instead, he spat, a futile gesture as the whirlwind that held them both suspended whipped it away.
The mage lowered them, and she discovered that another ten guards had arrived. She had to admit she was a little impressed with herself. That seemed like quite a response for a scrap she hadn’t even been prepared for.
All seven combatants were shackled and taken to solitary.
She remained on her feet when they threw her in the padded room. Doggedly, she stood in silence when they slammed the door. She stayed on her feet as she listened to the other doors slam, but when she heard the last one finally close, she collapsed and passed out from her wounds.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Solitary confinement turned out to be much worse than she expected. The cell was clean and well maintained. The guards brought food two times that day, and the lights seemed to be on for roughly daytime and off at night. But that was all the context she had for what was happening. She had no clock and no window to the outside world, no notebook, no visitors, and nothing to break the monotony. Not even the guards would talk to her. One of them had told her what she’d be eating for the first meal but had been reprimanded for it. She hadn’t heard another word spoken by another being—human or dragon—since then.
As time passed in the cell, she felt her mind slipping away from her. There simply wasn’t anything to anchor it. She could be lost in a thought forever with no need to come back to reality for any reason. To her—a person who’d spent her entire life thinking about others, both as competitors and as people to help—it was torture.
The thought she couldn’t escape most of all was what she was. A dragon. A human. A woman. A monster.
When she first discovered what she was, she had seen it as a boon, even a gift. She’d been able to protect the people she loved and was invulnerable,
impervious to bullets and able to withstand grenades. But even in that first encounter, she’d lost a friend. Although she’d felt invincible, she hadn’t been, not in the way that mattered anyway. She’d transformed to protect her friends, yet Jonesy had died. And if she hadn’t been a dragon, maybe it wouldn’t have happened.
That seemed to be her entire history of being a dragon. She had the abilities to protect her family, but now that she was a dragon, her family was a target. Her powers hadn’t made them safer. They’d put them in peril. Being a dragon was fun to her, but wasn’t that an incredibly self-centered position?
Besides, it was no longer fun. She hated feeling that being a dragon wasn’t enjoyable, but there it was. Her mind was only able to escape the feeling for so long. She loved being able to run at superhuman speeds and have superhuman strength and senses. And then there was the sensation of transforming into an actual dragon. There was no feeling she could compare it to. In a breath, she could change from being a regular human into a silvery being capable of flight. And oh, how she loved to fly. She wasn’t great at it yet, but it was an absolute joy to take to the air and to fly over her city and look at her people below.
That thought—the thought of her people—made her mind spiral off in another direction. She tried to work out for a few minutes, but she was still too injured to sustain any kind of activity, so her mind went back to exactly where she didn’t want it to go.
Her city and her people. Kristen had been with dragon culture long enough to begin thinking like them—hat people were hers to protect and they were her responsibility. But was that a bad thing? She honestly didn’t know but thought it was honorable for the more powerful to stand up for the powerless. That’s what she expected and rarely saw from politicians. It was why she had wanted to become a police officer in the first place. She’d wanted to help those who couldn’t help themselves.
Now that she was a dragon, she could really do that. Before, when she’d only thought of herself as a human joining the police force, she’d unintentionally never thought about the dragons. She knew they were there, of course. Everyone knew that dragons were there, but there simply wasn’t any point in dwelling on them. There was nothing a human could do to a dragon. If they ran afoul of one, they could be incinerated, snatched from the earth, and dropped from the sky. Hell, they could be eaten and there would be little recourse besides the family asking for a cash payout. She had known this when she was a cop but she couldn’t spend time thinking about it because there was nothing she could do.
The Steel Dragon (Steel Dragons Series Book 2) Page 47
