Maybe he thinks: Breathe. Line the shot. The round will pierce the scale if the alloy holds. If it doesn’t? There’s always the next clip. He probably thinks I'm too high, too bold. That he can drop me and watch me fall.
The whites of his eyes are stark against night lenses. He can’t see scales, but he’s betting on silhouette and luck. I dart sideways, flame lancing to gut a fourth charge.
CRACK.
The round finds me anyway.
White heat detonates across my ribs. For one suspended heartbeat, the world vanishes—no wind, no sound, just a deafening ring that drills into my skull as the sky blurs in smears of copper and flame. My limbs flail through a void of nothingness, weightless and burning.
Then gravity slams back in, savage and final.
I snap my wings wide—one dragging, the other flaring hard—and bleed off just enough lift to crash behind a maintenance shack. The landing is brutal: grit erupts beneath me, my knee gives out, and the stench of scorched metal floods my lungs. Scales vanish in a rush of steam, pain sparking sharp and sudden. I hit hard, one hand braced against jagged debris that bites deep into my palm.
I can feel my scales lying under my skin—dulled, no longer blades, but brittle glass under pressure. I count each step to the convoy in steady rhythm, syncing breath with movement, willing the toxin surging through me to pause—just long enough.
The world tilts.
Blood burns against my fingers—tainted, sluggish. Poison. Clever bastard.
I thumb the comm. "Dragon’s clipped. Target has anti-scale ammo laced with something nasty."
"Pull out," Dax orders.
"Negative. Charges neutralized. Proceeding to Phase Two."
I crawl to the truck queue, body already shaking. The poison chews through me in slow, acidic waves, each one leaving a deeper burn than the last. My vision warps at the edges, shapes smearing into heat trails, each shadow stretching and collapsing in the shimmer of unreality. A coppery tang coats my tongue—metal and toxin fused together. I blink hard, once, twice, but the afterimages linger, seared into my sight like overexposed flame. My balance tilts, off by half a degree, just enough to make every step a gamble.
Focus. Plant trackers, then get clear.
I wedge a Blackstrike tag against the axle of the first trailer. A second tag slips into a wheel well. Two more to go.
Greer’s silhouette prowls the area, scanning. He fired like he was hunting something larger than a bat—ammo like that isn’t meant for guesswork. He doesn’t know dragons heal fast… normally. The bullet fragment still sears deep, black ooze welling as the flesh struggles to close around it.
A footstep behind me.
I twist—too slow.
A merc swings a baton. It cracks across my cheek. Pain flares white, but I slam an elbow into his throat. He gurgles, drops. I shove the final tracker into the brake housing, trying to sprint for the fence.
Sirens wake. Spotlights blink on, slicing desert shadows.
I fling myself over razor wire, ribs tearing, vision tunneling. I try to shift midair, instinct screaming for wings—but nothing answers. The poison clamps down, a merciless vice lockingmy dragon deep beneath flesh and pain. My body convulses once, twice, then drops me hard on the far side. Behind me, engines roar—the convoy rolling early to cover their mess. Good. Blackstrike will follow every mile.
At the ridge crest Liv appears—hair a tangle of ember-lit curls, eyes blazing like I hung the damn moon crooked. She grips my forearm as I stagger.
"Kade...”
"Charges neutralized," I rasp, sweat cold on my spine. "Convoy tagged. But Greer—he’s escalating."
Blood seeps through my fingers; the wound smolders an angry greenish black.
Her gaze drops, horror flaring. "You’re bleeding."
"Just a scratch," I lie.
"That’s poison."
A cold dread knots low in my gut—if this fragment holds what I think it does, it's more than a weapon; it's a declaration. They're not hunting dragons by accident anymore.
