“Adrissu!” Pollux cried, turning toward him.
“Get the cannon!” he snarled, reaching up and pulling against the heavy bolt. This one, stuck fast in his joint, did not come out as easily as the crossbow bolt had. He groaned as he struggled to stay in the air, then gripped the bolt again and surrounded it with magic, forcing it out of his body, despite the agony screaming through his shoulder and neck. If the cannon had been fully charged, it very well might have punched straight through him or even tore his foreleg off. The thought made his stomach twist with a primal fear that he had never truly felt before—a fear that he might actually die.
Blood gushed from the wound when he finally got it out, and something else dripped from the bolt that was a dark, almost-black purple—he stared at it, wondering what kind of poison it might have been, remembering Heriel. But he would have to worry about it later. Below him, Pollux was streaming fire onto the cannon. The cart burst into flames, and the guard operating it had fled, but the weapon itself was still standing.
Adrissu swooped down, landing heavily on the stone path, and screamed fire at the cannon. The two streams of fire burned white-hot where they met. After a moment, the dark metal began to sag and droop, unable to withstand the heat of two dragons’ fiery breath. The wooden parts of it were charred and blackened, filling the air with an acrid, bitter smoke.
Mortals only knew dragons to be solitary creatures; they never would have anticipated two working together.
Once the cannon had melted enough that Adrissu was sure it would never work again, he turned away, looking up at Pollux.
“Head for the tower,” he called, but Pollux was looking behind him with a snarl. More mortals were coming at them, this time both guards and citizens with their own swords and crossbows—their faces a mix of fright and grim determination. Pollux made a wide circle in the air, heading straight for them, and breathed fire down at their ranks, making the street erupt with screams and destruction.
The mortals were dogged in their pursuit, though, as those who had survived the first blast split into two distinct groups: one still coming for Adrissu, the other chasing after Pollux. Adrissu’s heart sank. He had to make sure they were not followed. If more of the city were in shambles, it would distract them enough, dishearten them enough, that perhaps they would not follow after the dragons.
“Zamnes!” one human shouted, a young man brandishing a sword and shield, stupid and arrogant and surely hoping to win his fame and glory being the one to slay the dragon of legend. Adrissu sneered at him as he approached, turning away to swing his tail hard at the human. The man made a choked sound, flying through the air before landing with a crunch against the stone wall of a building off to the side, where he remained motionless.
“Flee!” he roared, his voice echoing through the streets. “Flee Polimnos, if you want to live!”
Despite the agony still coursing through his shoulder, he lifted himself into the air, wincing with every flap of his wings. A few crossbow bolts skittered across his scales, but none made purchase. Flying over the crowd, he breathed fire down at them, keeping the stream going even as he passed them by. In moments, every building on the street had erupted in flames. He could hear panicked cries, and the screams of women and children as he passed by, and for an instant felt a pang of guilt—they had not been trying to harm him, after all. But none of them mattered compared to Pollux, so if killing them would spare his mate, then he would kill them all.
Pollux was ahead of him, but seemed to notice that he was slowed, partly by his injury and partly by the destruction he was causing.
“What are you doing?” he growled.
“Making sure they’re too busy to follow us out of the city,” Adrissu answered, and realization dawned on Pollux’s yellow eyes. For a moment, he too had an expression of guilt, then his face hardened, and he nodded.
“I’ll do the same,” he said. “I’ll go the long way along the northern wall. Go straight for the tower, and I’ll meet you there.” His eyes flicked to the bleeding wound on Adrissu’s shoulder, the sluggish flap of his wing on that side, and his brows furrowed in concern. “No, nevermind, I’ll stay with you.”
“I’m fine,” Adrissu snapped. “Go the way you planned. We’ll meet at the tower.”
Pollux hesitated, but finally nodded and swooped away again, heading for the north side of the city and spraying fire beneath him the entire way. Adrissu watched him for only a moment, then resolutely moved on, alternating between breathing fire down at the streets and landing hard on the tall buildings nearest the town square. The city had descended into chaos, people screaming and fleeing wherever he went. Some pursued him tenaciously with their weapons, but only the Dragonslayer Cannon had truly frightened him, and that was gone now. For the most part, no one even got close enough to remotely threaten him with their swords, and the crossbow bolts that did reach him never pierced his hide.
Still, his shoulder hurt with such intensity that it left him breathless. It was only the adrenaline coursing through him that was keeping him from collapsing in agony, he was sure, so he had to take advantage of the time he had before it incapacitated him. As he flew, still breathing fire down below, he also used his magic to reach out tendrils of force to collapse roofs, shatter windows, and erupt stone pathways through the city. The air was hazy now with smoke and ash.
Adrissu realized with a surge of strange guilt that he was approaching the district where Ruan had once lived—the home he’d bought with the wages Adrissu had paid him. He moaned with sorrow and pain, turning away to give the neighborhood a wide berth. The thought of harming that house felt somehow forbidden, and he did not have time to parse through his feelings about it.
Even though his route was shorter, his movements had become sluggish and pained, so Adrissu could hear Pollux roaring from the tower long before he reached it. When it came into sight, Pollux was perched atop it again, though luckily it seemed no one had followed him yet.
Vesper, he thought, grief striking him anew.To me.
An answering awareness echoed in his chest, and then she was gone. The fraction of himself he had set aside and formed into its own distinct being returned to him, filling him with a surge of extra magic, enough energy to get him out of the city. He could always summon another familiar, later on, but he did not think it would be the same. It would not be Vesper, not quite.
“Destroy it,” he shouted at Pollux as he approached, landing hard on the side of the tower. “We have to make sure no one can find the entrance.”
“But Vesper,” Pollux started, and Adrissu shook his head.
“She’s already gone,” he said. Pollux frowned, confused, and looked down at the tower beneath his feet. For a moment, they were both silent and still.
Adrissu had not considered himself sentimental, but the thought of purposely destroying his home agonized him—all the trinkets within it, all the memories of his mate’s past lives. It had to be done, but he did not think he could do it. Ruan’s shield, Volkmar’s paintings, Braern’s poetry, Kian’s research—they were all in the tower, spread through his study and the kitchen and their shared bedroom and all the other rooms of the tower. It was all about to be rubble, now.
But his mate washere.That was all he had ever wanted, all he needed. Pollux was still watching him with uncertainty, so Adrissu squeezed his eyes shut and forced himself to be the first to act. The tower was more stone than wood, but still he craned his neck to breathe fire at it, shooting the stream of flames through an open window. The storage space that had once been Volkmar’s room burst into flame. He crawled along the other side of the tower and screamed his grief into the gaping hole Pollux had created when he’d landed on it earlier in the day. His study, and his collection of books along with it, was reduced to ash in an instant.
With a roar of frustration, Pollux shattered the stones beneath his feet. He drove down and down, until the tower rumbled and collapsed around him, forcing Adrissu to leap into the air to avoid falling with it.
“They’re coming,” Pollux snarled, looking beyond Adrissu. Adrissu nodded, unable to summon the strength to turn his head and look behind. “We have to go.”
“Let’s head east,” Adrissu panted. “Far enough to sea they can’t follow us, then—I don’t know. We’ll find somewhere to land then. Just head east.”
