by Amelia Jade
Beside him, he heard Ana jolt at the name. “The Red Devil’s place?” she asked, using the alternative name for it.
He blinked in surprise. “You have heard of it?”
She nodded. “Yeah, legend had it that a real asshole lived there. Even when I was young and just traveling, he was barely more than a legend. A guy who did whatever he wanted. Who was immortal…” she trailed off, comprehension dawning. “Holy. Shit. You. It was you!” she exclaimed.
Ferro grimaced, nodding unhappily. He wasn’t proud of the actions of his earlier life. This was one of a very few remaining legacies of it. Even then, time had eradicated much of the memories of the place. Only a few local stories still mentioned him, and even then, he was more of a boogeyman than an actual figure. Only those in the dragon shifter world still knew of it.
And apparently at least one outside of it, he corrected.
“Who else knows?” he grumped, unhappy about the whole situation.
Ana smiled. “I would wager very few. It’s not like most people live as long as I have, or are as widely traveled.”
She squeezed his hand tightly, letting him know she was okay with it.
“So, Merlin?” he asked, returning to his original question.
His son shrugged. “Perhaps,” he agreed. “It’s the first I’ve heard of it. More than likely it’s a trap though. I wouldn’t follow it up just yet.”
Ferro was forced to agree, glad that he and his son’s instincts were the same on this one. The look Korbin had given him as he revealed the information had all but given it away.
“We should be going though,” Merlin said as the sun began to dip over the forest to the west. “The Order will be back, and we don’t want to be around when they are.”
“You go,” Ferro said. “We are going to figure out a plan of attack. Continue to organize the Council, and do your best to protect those of us who still are uninvolved. Try to keep them that way.”
Merlin nodded. “Best of luck, Father,” he said, enveloping his arms around Ferro. He and Ana exchanged a brief hug, and he whispered something into her ear so quietly even Ferro couldn’t pick it up. Then he turned, and disappeared back into the village.
“Where to now?” Ana asked once he was gone.
“First, we get our things from in there,” he said, pointing at the place they had stayed the night.
“And then what?” she pressed, following alongside him as they headed indoors.
“Then,” he said with a smile. “Then we are going to fly.”
Chapter Eleven
Ana
Fly?!
“Umm, I hate to break it to you,” she said, “but I can’t fly.”
Ferro just smiled as they took the stairs and swiftly gathered their things up.
“I know,” he said at last.
“Can I ask your genius plan then?” she asked. Her hand was still in his as they held each other tight. Ferro was guiding them outside of the village. To her left, the sun was beginning to fully set.
“Yes,” he replied, barely covering up his snicker.
It was like the mountain all over again.
“What have I done,” she moaned. “I finally find a man who can live forever, and he insists on driving me crazy!”
Ferro laughed and snatched her up into his arms. She only resisted slightly. The truth was, he was holding her tightly to his chest, and she rather enjoyed it. There was something about Ferro, something that made her just want to be as close to him as possible.
“This isn’t going to save you,” she warned him, just so he knew it wasn’t over.
“Shh.” He tossed her a wink, and when she made to try and scramble down from his arms in mock protest. He hushed her by pressing his lips to hers.
Ana inhaled his scent, relishing the touch of his soft lips as she returned the kiss as passionately as she could from within his arms. After a long, lingering moment, he set her down.
“What now?” she asked.
They were standing in the middle of an open field that dug deep into the side of the forest, obscuring them from view of the village. Not that it mattered anymore. The villagers had seen them already. She just thanked their lucky stars that technology had passed the villagers over.
“Now, you need to stand back and give me some room,” he requested.
“I still don’t know how you expect this to work,” she told him, but dutifully moved back.
“Farther please,” he motioned, and she kept moving back until there was well over a hundred feet between them.
She watched then as Ferro knelt in the clearing. He was wearing a long jacket, black pants, and a dark gray long-sleeve shirt. The jacket fell around him, and she watched in awe as the air around him began to shimmer, forming a bubble. That bubble began to rapidly expand, until it occupied most of the clearing. Ana was forced to move back several more paces.
Within the sphere, Ferro began to grow. Even as he did, other things happened as well. Talons, like those that had grasped her the other day, sprouted from his hands and feet, swelling rapidly in size. A tail, long and sinuous, shot forth like the biggest snake she had ever seen. On his shoulder, huge bulges appeared, and seconds later thick membranous wings exploded from them, instinctively curling around to block her view of him. Scales appeared across the parts of his body she could still see, and just as the shimmering air bubble disappeared, a majestic head reared up from within the confines of his wings, bursting through the bubble and completing the transformation.
Ana was unable to speak as Ferro, in his natural form, swept his wings back and turned to face her. She’d seen dragons shift from beast to human before. But despite the events of the past few days, this was actually the first time she’d seen them go from human to dragon. Even Merlin earlier had shifted after she had taken off.
“That was…impressive,” she said in mute awe.
A deep, rumbling chuckle came from the dragon’s throat. Ana was mildly disappointed there was no smoke emanating from his nostrils at that. She knew that wasn’t how it worked, but part of her still thought it should happen.
Damn legends and stories, coloring my thoughts.
“So, now what?” she asked, nervously approaching the massive creature.
“Now, my lady, climb aboard,” he all but purred. The huge dragon head lowered itself to the ground near her.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” she teased, making her way to his neck.
“I am,” he replied. “Here.”
An ocher wing swept forward, the rust-colored membrane providing a platform for him to lift her up to where his neck and body met.
“Uh, now what?” she asked. Her legs fell on either side of his thick, scaled neck. The off-red coloring screamed at her that it would stain her clothing, but the scales weren’t dirty. In fact, they were so sleek they almost shined, even in the coming darkness.
“Squeeze your legs, and find a scale to hold onto.”
She stared at him like he was crazy, but the huge, yellow orb outlined in silver simply stared right back at her.
“Okay,” she said with a shrug. “We’ll do it your way. But if you hear screaming, don’t look back, look down, because that’s where I’ll probably be.”
Ferro’s eyes widened in surprise at her tone, and then she began to shudder slightly as he laughed.
“I like your spirit,” he said, “among other parts of you.”
She blushed at the sexual undertones of his words, which only brought more laughter forth from the massive dragon.
“I shall not drop you,” he reassured her.
Ana nodded and hunkered down, her fingers finding hold on one of his scales. She put a brave face on, and vowed not to scream in terror.
His huge wings spread wide, and below her she felt his muscles tense. With a giant push Ferro leapt into the air, his wings propelling them up even higher.
The noise that came from Ana’s mouth was not a scream, she told herself. A peep, perhaps. She would
allow herself a startled cry. But not a scream. Absolutely not.
“Everything okay back there?” Ferro asked, his head turning back to inspect his rider.
“Eyes on the sky!” she shouted, releasing one hand to point ahead, before frantically scrabbling for purchase as she brought it back.
Ferro laughed again, and she saw his long snout open as if to say something more.
Probably about my lack of restraint.
“Trust me,” he said simply instead, before returning his eyes to the sky in front of them.
The words reverberated through her soul. Trust me. That was a big request to make of her. Ana knew she already trusted him to a degree, but that wasn’t what he meant. Ferro was asking her to trust his decisions without reservation, to believe that she would be okay in his presence without ever having to think about it.
She had never trusted someone like that before. Even now, as she clung to his neck, hundreds of feet in the sky, Ana wasn’t sure if she was ready for that. It took longer than a few hours to undo centuries of mistrust. Even with the bond they were forging between them, it would be a while yet before she achieved that level of comfort with him.
Hopefully Ferro would understand that.
***
“Ferro,” she said, stifling another yawn.
“Yes?” The reply from such a magnificent beast—she was still caught off guard that he could speak English while in animal form—seemed so gentle and caring, almost impossible for something of his size.
“We have a problem.”
“And what problem is that?” he asked, his neck flexing so that he could turn an eye upon her.
“I’m tired, and I’m not secured in,” she told him.
They had been flying for several hours now. The sun was well below the horizon, its light long since extinguished for the day. The moon was beginning its ascent, but it was at its weakest now. They barely had enough light to guide them onward.
The reply from her dragon—and yes, she was beginning to accept that the fates had somehow brought them together—was not at all what she expected.
“That is about to be the least of our worries,” he said. Then his eye narrowed, focusing beyond her. “I fear we may have lingered too long.”
“What? Why?” she asked, twisting around in her seat, all pretense of exhaustion gone as adrenaline coursed through her.
His eyesight must be exceptionally sharp, even in the dark, because it took her a solid thirty seconds to locate what he had seen.
“Shit.” The single word echoed both of their sentiments exactly. “How the hell did they track us so quickly?” she mused.
“I can think of two ways,” Ferro replied, his powerful wings becoming even swifter.
They gained speed, the massive ocher membranes propelling them through the sky. Air began to whistle as it rushed over her, and Ana’s eyes narrowed to slits to keep them open.
“First is that they already had more agents closing in, and they saw us as we were flying. That’s more likely, and more pleasant.” He paused. “As pleasant as this can get, at least.”
Ana frowned. “And the less likely?”
“Merlin.”
She hissed. “They got to him after we left?”
“Either that, or they got to him long before we ever arrived.” Ferro’s voice was heavy with regret.
Ana shook her head. “No, I can’t buy that. Either they captured him and made him talk, or they just so happened to have another team inbound who saw us take flight.”
“I feel as though you are right, but we must stay on guard from here on out. Anyone who says they are with the Council must not be taken at face value.”
Their list of friends, already extremely slim, just grew even smaller.
A sarcastic voice spoke from within her. Sounds just like your normal state of existence. Ana rolled her eyes at the caustic tone of her inner self and concentrated on the situation they now found themselves in.
“Regardless of how, the fact is they are here now,” she told him. “What do we do?”
Ferro flexed his powerful wings again. “Hopefully outrun them,” he forced out. He was beginning to breathe harder already. “It has...been a while...since I tried that,” he confessed.
Ana risked another glimpse behind them. “Well, they still seem to be closing.”
A rumble sounded under her. She looked around frantically, until she realized it was the sound of Ferro growling.
“Yes, they have the high ground,” he said angrily after casting another look behind them. “This is…going to get rough.”
Her stomach lurched at how hard he tried to say that calmly.
“What I wouldn’t kill for a harness right now,” she muttered, her fingers trying to dig deeper between scales, hoping to find better purchase. She kicked off her shoes, watching them tumble away below before her toes dug in between scales as well. Ana could live without shoes for a while. She wasn’t going to live if she fell off during a sharp turn, and something told her the turns were going to be the least of her problems.
“Prepare for a hard brake,” Ferro warned softly, so that his voice wouldn’t carry. She barely heard him, forcing him to repeat his words. By the time she understood and pressed herself against him, it was already time.
With a dragon-sized grunt, Ferro snapped his wings out to full extension and pulled back. The sudden deceleration as they went perpendicular to the ground, his tail pointing straight down and their heads looking up at the stars, smashed her into his scaled neck roughly. She bashed her lip open on the corner of one protrusion, cursing his oddly-shaped scales in her head.
Beside and above her the three dragons that had been pursuing them flew by, jaws snapping at them. The sudden change in speed had caught them off guard though, and they passed by without incident.
A blast of heat washed over her as a cone of blue-white flame spewed from Ferro’s mouth, crisping the wing of one of their attackers. She screamed as the backwash of heat seared hair from her body, her skin glowing bright red.
It hurt. Bad. Every nerve in her body was pounding her with agony, but she still didn’t let go. Ana shunted the pain aside as best she could, forcing her fingers to dig ever deeper into the space between his scales and the skin beneath, even as the ones nearest his fire began to crack and blister. She could feel his skin under the scales growing warm, and Ferro grunted in pain as the target spun away into a downward spiral, the ground rushing up fast.
She prayed the same wouldn’t happen to them.
“Are you okay?” Ferro asked, craning his neck around as best he could to view her.
“I’ve felt better,” she managed through parched and split lips, her lungs seared from the heat as well. Her accelerated healing was already having an effect, dulling the pain. It would soon start healing the rest, but for the moment, she was still in agony. “I won’t let go, but um, maybe point that thing elsewhere next time?” she asked with a painful laugh. The slight sexual connotation of her wording helped ease Ferro’s tension at the fact he had wounded her.
“I am sorry, Ana,” he said sincerely.
“Belay that,” she snapped. “We’re deep in shit right now. You do everything you need to to get us out of here, short of outright blasting me with that breath.”
She waited until Ferro nodded his understanding before she added, “Besides, your morning breath is way worse.”
The big dragon barked a laugh. “Hold on tight,” he warned, sending them surging after one of the other dragons.
Ana scanned the sky, calling out their locations as Ferro banked and weaved, slowly closing the distance on one of their foes. The dragon he had hit had come out of his death spiral and was beginning to gain ground on them from behind. The third was winging hard for higher ground.
“This big blue bastard to our three o’clock is going high,” she shouted, her lungs now only stinging her when she talked, her wounds beginning to heal. Dead skin was flaking off her right hand, which had taken the
brunt of the heatwash.
Ferro grunted his understanding. He was intent on the prey ahead of them, a metallic-green-colored dragon. It occurred to her then that she had seen more dragons in the past two days than she had in her entire life up to that point. While they were beautiful to look at, she would be perfectly okay if she could avoid seeing any that weren’t rust-colored for a long while after this.
“The one you hit, the bright red one, he’s coming up underneath you!” she shouted, hoping Ferro would hear her over the rush of the wind.
Up ahead, their target suddenly took a nosedive, trying to escape. Ferro, without thinking, dipped a wing and spun after him. This meant for several long seconds he was upside down. Ana screamed, holding tight to the scale underneath her. Ferro bellowed his anger and fear for her.
And over it all, she heard a sharp tearing sound as the scale pealed back from Ferro’s body. Weakened from where she had been pulling back on it, and where it had been exposed to the blowback of heat from Ferro’s fire, it could no longer support her weight.
With nothing holding her secure, Ana tumbled away, plummeting into the black of the night sky.
***
Ana barely had time to scream before she collided hard with something, a flash of blue flickering across her vision. She began to slide down the smooth surface, nothing slowing her progress.
Uncaring of what it might be, she stiffened her fingers and drove them as hard as she could into whatever it was she had hit before she fell over the edge. Only when “it” howled with pain did she realize that through some broad stroke of luck, she had managed to actually land on the blue dragon that had been coming up to attack Ferro from below.
Her fingers were now clutching desperately to his wing. It was the weakened wing, she noticed, her fingers plunging through the area that was still healing from Ferro’s attack earlier. That was likely the only thing that saved her, or she would have gone right off the end of the wing.
The dragon flicked his wing repeatedly, thumping her up and down against it as he tried to shake her off, but Ana clung to his wing, unwilling to die this way.
