Christmas with Dragons: Book 4: A Post-Apocalyptic Holiday Tale (Dragon's Breath Series)

by Susan Illene

  “Go!” he yelled.

  The lead dragons took off into the air, snapping and clawing at each other as they lifted higher up. Two of them had their wings torn before they’d reached more than fifty feet off the ground, both plummeting back down. Aidan finally took flight, swerving around the milieu. He didn’t care that it added time and forced him to fly farther. What mattered was not getting injured to the point he couldn’t fly fast enough.

  One of the burnt orange dragons from the Faegud toriq spotted him. This one had flown in the previous race and had seen how fast Aidan could fly. He kicked another dragon that was snapping at his feet and headed for Aidan with malicious intent. For some, the race was about the battle to get to the finish line, and the damage that could be done, as much as it was winning in the end.

  Not wishing to get into a fight so early, Aidan streamlined his body and sped up. The wind was blowing from the west, pushing at his side as he went south. He flapped his wings harder. The Faegud dragon was falling farther and farther behind with each second that passed, unable to catch him. Up ahead, Aidan spotted two competitors—one with burnt orange scales and the other dark red. The one from his toriq led by a small margin. With all the other dragons steadily falling out of the race as they fought with each other, Aidan only had to get past one Faegud and one Taugud. They still had many miles to go before they reached the Red River.

  He kept his speed up until he was on the heels of the Faegud shifter, moving into the slipstream behind him. It would slow the dragon down, and he’d eventually get tired of pulling the extra weight, but Aidan would ride it as long as he could so that he could gather his strength for the rest of the journey. The Faegud banked left, then right, trying to shake Aidan. It didn’t work. Aidan was very good at maneuvering fast, and he was smaller than the other dragon, which made it easier for him to adjust quickly. He stayed at the Faegud’s tail until the river appeared up ahead, then he surged forward.

  Aidan flew directly on top of his opponent and lowered his arms to claw at the dragon’s eyes. The Faegud roared, blinded by blood. He began falling and spinning out of control as he lost his sense of direction. Aidan continued on his way, glancing back once to catch the Faegud crash into the trees.

  Only one more opponent to go.

  Aidan got his first close look at the shifter in the lead and cursed. It was his own pendragon—Nanoq. Somehow, Aidan hadn’t noticed him at the startup line before the race. Nanoq was already diving down toward the pile of blue stones sitting next to the river bank. In one swift move, he grabbed a stone and then rose back up into the sky.

  They passed by each other as Nanoq began his return journey north. Aidan gave his pendragon a determined look. You will not win!

  Keep telling yourself that as you stare at my back, Nanoq replied.

  They were both competitive and would do anything to emerge as the victor. Aidan needed to fly faster. Focusing ahead, he dove down toward the blue stones. In a move even smoother than the pendragon, he grabbed one, banked around, and soared back upward. Flapping his wings as hard as he could, he worked to close the gap between himself and Nanoq.

  Chapter 11

  Bailey

  I stared at the southern sky, waiting for any dragons to appear. It had been over an hour, and none had returned yet. Phoebe, who stood next to me, said that it would take at least that long for the contestants to make the journey. The anticipation was killing me.

  “Think he’ll win?” I asked her.

  Her brows furrowed. “He’s one of the fastest, but there are others who can compete just as well, and I heard Nanoq is in the race. It’s going to be tough for Aidan to beat him.”

  “I take it he can fly fast, too?”

  “He used to win all the races back in Kederrawien, but he hasn’t competed in a couple of years.” She shrugged. “It’s hard to say if he’s still in the right shape for it.”

  Shouts rose up across the field. We turned and caught Donar and Lorcan making their way toward us from the boulder tossing contest, both of their faces bitter and red. Neither held a prize in their hand.

  “How’d it go?” I asked when they got closer.

  Lorcan shook his head. “We tied for second place.”

  Phoebe laughed. “I guess you guys aren’t getting any bragging rights. So who did win?”

  “I did,” Freya said, joining them with Ruari at her side. She held up a shiny gold medallion. “And they gave me this as my prize.”

  “Ooh, very nice!” Phoebe traced her fingertips over it. “They’ve really gone above and beyond for these games.”

  Donar glared at Freya. “She cheated and used her half-beast form. She would never have beaten us if she’d stayed human like everyone else.”

  Ruari put an arm around Freya’s shoulders. “You are only mad because you lost to a female, but I am proud of her.”

  I was surprised to see Aidan’s brother no longer afraid of his prospective mate. With her in human form though, she was one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. I wouldn’t have guessed a shifter could appear so delicate and have such light coloring. It was hard to believe she could take such a big and ugly shape—one that would probably give me nightmares for the next week. Maybe Ruari was trying to focus on the human side of her.

  Freya tweaked his nose. “It helped having you rooting for me.”

  “I take it you two worked your issues out?” I asked.

  Ruari’s expression turned uncomfortable. “We have decided to give each other a chance.”

  “You could call it a truce,” Freya explained. “As long as he behaves like a sweet and doting male the way he should, I won’t change to my half-beast form and frighten him.”

  “That’s not going to last long,” Donar muttered.

  I agreed. If they made it to sunset before a fight broke out between them, I’d be amazed. More than once during the previous evening, Ruari had run into the common house to hide. Freya would inevitably come in and drag him back out. What happened outside the building, I never wanted to see or find out.

  “Look,” Phoebe said, pointing toward the sky.

  I turned and squinted. Far away above the trees, two dragon shapes appeared. They were still quite small and far away. “I can’t tell who they are.”

  “We’ll find out soon enough,” Lorcan replied, taking a few steps forward. “As fast as they’re moving, we’ll be able to identify them within the next few minutes.”

  I didn’t take my eyes off of the sky as they steadily grew bigger. The only thing I could tell for sure was that they were Taugud since their coloring was distinctly red. Both flew close to each other, almost touching. I gasped when one of the dragons snapped at the other’s wing. The wounded one faltered for a moment, falling behind. Then he surged forward and bit into the tail of the lead dragon. Back and forth, they took turns leading and attacking each other. Finally, they got close enough for me to identify one of them.

  “Aidan is up there,” I said, excited. “Is that Nanoq with him?” I glanced at the others, who had seen the pendragon in his beast form a lot more times than I had.

  Phoebe nodded. “Yes, it is.”

  Nanoq clawed at Aidan’s back, causing him to flounder in the air. I curled my fingers and tried really hard not to gasp or appear worried about my mate. Aidan had emphasized before we came to the festival that we had to show complete confidence in each other. Some of the spectators were watching my reactions almost as closely as they watched the incoming dragons.

  At what I estimated to be a half mile from the finish line, Nanoq held the lead by almost two body lengths. I forced myself to stand still. Aidan flapped his torn wings as hard as he could, working to catch up. In an impressive feat, he managed to surge forward and narrow the gap. As his head came even with Nanoq’s tail, he opened his jaws wide and let out a roar of flames. The orange and red fire swept over the pendragon, blinding him. Aidan shifted his trajectory upward to fly over Nanoq, then breathed a second round of flames at his opponent
’s head.

  Everyone on the field became silent, watching the scene play out.

  “If he can just keep that up a little longer,” Phoebe said, barely speaking above a whisper.

  The two dragons zoomed toward the edge of the woods, heading toward the open field and the finish line, which was a twelve-foot log set on the ground and painted yellow. Aidan and Nanoq were even at this point with one flying above the other. But from what I understood, they had to touch the log to finish. The pendragon had the advantage being closer to the ground.

  How would Aidan get past him? I was half-tempted to shut my eyes and wait until the race was over to find out who would win. There wasn’t a single move I could think of that Aidan could do to get ahead with so little time left.

  Gasps rose up from the audience. Aidan had snapped his wings shut and fallen onto Nanoq. Then he began to shift to human form, flames covering him and his opponent. Still more than a hundred feet in the air, the pendragon floundered under the weight of his unexpected passenger. He dropped in altitude as he soared over the field, twisting and turning as he tried to get free.

  Aidan, who had finished shifting, grabbed Nanoq’s shoulders and pulled hard to slide forward over him. Then he kicked off of the pendragon’s wings, flattening them in the process, and leaped off of his back. Aidan sailed through the air, hit belly first on the ground, and slid all the way to the log. He slapped it like a baseball player would when coming into home plate. Nanoq reached it a mere second later.

  “And we have a winner!” the race organizer announced. “Aidan of Taugud has taken first place.”

  Everyone cheered, and many commented on his surprising tactics to win. Aidan lifted himself off the ground, covered in dirt and blood, and grinned for the audience. Hildegard came forward with a statue of a dragon with its wings flared open. It was about half a foot tall and made of solid gold. She congratulated Aidan and handed him his prize. I’d never seen him more proud than in that moment. As soon as she was finished speaking with him, I hurried across the field and wrapped my arms around him.

  “That was a close race,” I said, my face mere inches from his.

  He kissed me full on the lips, lingering there for a moment before pulling away. “Yes, it was. Nanoq is a formidable opponent in any contest.”

  The pendragon came over to us, having shifted into his human form, and clasped Aidan’s arm. “Every time I think you can’t surprise me anymore, you do. Good race.”

  “You didn’t make it easy,” Aidan said, letting go of Nanoq’s arm.

  I was glad to see the pendragon could lose a contest gracefully. He even looked proud.

  Hildegard called everyone’s attention to her again. “The dueling contests will begin next. Everyone who plans to participate should come forward and name their opponent.”

  “Guess that’s me.” I pulled away from Aidan. “This time you can be the one to watch from the sidelines.”

  “You’ll do well,” he said, a confident gleam in his eyes.

  I headed toward the organizer standing next to Hildegard. He had a line formed ahead of him that was already more than twenty contestants deep, standing in both human and dragon form. More joined behind me. I listened as the Faegud pendragon explained the rules while we waited, which were somewhat more complicated than previous events.

  There would not be brackets where fighters could advance due to time constraints. Instead, each duel would count for points. I was glad that at least that meant I only had to fight once. The more blows a contestant landed on their opponent, with some strikes counting for more than others, the higher their score. If we stepped out of bounds, we lost points. The person with the highest score at the end would win the event, but if anyone killed their opponent, they forfeited their points, and they would be punished severely.

  Lorcan reached the organizer before I did and gestured at me to join him up front. The shifter jotted down our names and that we would be fighting in human form. His script was in a different language than English. I’d heard a few of the shifters speaking in the dragon tongue, but for the most part, they hadn’t used it since I’d gotten there. It was kind of strange now that I thought about it.

  “How come everyone has been speaking in English?” I asked Lorcan. Just because I planned to be slicing him up with my sword later didn’t mean I couldn’t be civil with him now. Plus he was the closest person I could ask at the moment.

  He glanced down at me, a smile playing at his lips. “We hope to assimilate with humans as much as possible, taking into consideration our differences, and part of doing that is using the local language. This festival is good practice for us. It also makes it easier for the humans who are here to understand what we are doing, and as a result, they feel more comfortable.”

  “Oh, well that’s good.”

  The organizer looked up from the thick parchment paper he wrote on. “Lorcan of Faegud and Bailey Monzac—you will duel in round three at the field over there.” He gestured toward a circle of stones to the south of us. “Do not miss your turn, or you will forfeit your entry.”

  “Thanks,” I said, nodding respectfully.

  We walked away, heading toward Aidan and the others where they waited nearby. I stopped in front of Aidan. “Can you give me my sword?”

  The blade appeared in his hand, having been kept safe in shiggara until I needed it. He held it out to me. “Are you going to warm up?”

  “When the time gets closer.” Unlike Lorcan, who seemed bent on wearing himself out with all the different contests, I wanted to be fresh. I wasn’t about to tell anyone, but I didn’t care about winning the dueling games. All I wanted was to beat Lorcan as fast as possible. Points and the prize didn’t matter to me so much as proving I could take someone down in a swift battle.

  We moved to the area where Lorcan and I would fight, intending to watch the first round. The circle of rocks was maybe twenty feet in diameter. We’d been assigned one of the locations designated for contestants who would battle in human form, whereas some of the rings nearby were much wider to accommodate those who would fight as dragons. There were a total of five rings set up outside the village. Judges were stationed at each to tally points, and make certain everyone followed the rules.

  The first round at our location was between two male Faegud shifters. They had chosen daggers as their weapons of choice and began the bout by slashing at each other. I suspected they hadn’t fought too many times as humans because their footing was all wrong, and they appeared to have no training in how to properly hold their blades. Not that it mattered since every slice to an extremity got them two points, and they managed to do that frequently enough against each other. Both of them were bleeding heavily by the time one of them finally got his blade at his opponent’s throat. A simulated death strike ended the duel. Only the winner got his points counted, which in this case added up to sixty-six. He would have had even more if he hadn’t stepped out of bounds twice.

  In the next round, one female from the Taugud clan and one female from the Faegud clan entered the circle. They chose to forego weapons and fight fist to fist. It wasn’t a bad plan since punches to the face and chest gave more points than blade strikes to the same areas. The women tore into each other as soon as the organizer yelled “fight!”

  Within minutes, both of them had broken noses and busted lips. They scratched each other, which got them one point for each swipe, and they bit each other, which netted them two points if they drew blood. Mostly, they just kicked and punched each other to oblivion. While they did that, I started the warm-up exercises Aidan had taught me months ago when he started training me. They helped get my blood pumping, and my mind focused. Lorcan got his own sword out, but all he did was practice jabs and strikes. From the corner of my eye, I paid attention to his technique and logged it all in my head for future reference. He had to be rather confident in himself to give away such details right before a fight.

  “Finished!” the organizer called out.

  I
glanced over and saw the Faegud woman had put the Taugud in a headlock. She let go, and both women stood, their chests heaving from battling for so long. At least half an hour had passed, which could feel like a lifetime when fighting non-stop. There was a reason boxing and martial arts had time limits and breaks during matches.

  The organizer gestured Lorcan and I forward, announcing our names. We were pointed to the positions where we should stand before the fight started. Word must have spread fast because by the time I moved to my spot, almost all the festival attendees were gathering around the circle—not only shifters and dragons, but also most of the human servants. Yeah, I definitely didn’t feel the pressure closing in on me. But then Aidan caught my attention from where he stood outside the rocks behind Lorcan. He gave me a nod, but his gaze said so much more. I might have been fighting one of his childhood friends, but I was his mate, and he had trained me. He wanted me to win, and he believed in me. That meant more than I could possibly describe.

  I tested my sword one final time, feeling its weight. My blade and I had been through a lot together since I fought my first dragon back in August. How many kills I’d made since then, I couldn’t say. This time, I didn’t have to slay my opponent, but I did need to make the point that I was capable of it. No one believed I could fight. The whispers from the crowd reached my ears, stinging me with their criticisms.

  “She will be down in less than a minute,” one person said. “Unless Lorcan toys with her for a while for points.”

  “How many strikes do you think she can take before she cries like a little human girl?” another asked their friend.

  The taunts continued, one after another. Aidan’s gaze never left me though, and his confidence never wavered. Phoebe, who stood next to her brother, smiled at me and mouthed the words, “make him hurt.”

  Donar made a slicing motion across his neck, then pointed at Lorcan. I almost laughed.