Page 2 of Scales ’N’ Spells: Volume Two

Mentally crossing his fingers, Ravi darted forward, putting on as much speed as he could muster to reach the plane. The clouds of smoke pouring out of it provided him with some cover as he got into position above the plane.

It was older than he’d expected, by the looks of it, but in excellent condition. He tucked his wings close for a moment, trying to match the plane’s speed and timing it so that he could wrap his talons around the nose of the beast.

His claws pierced the outer coating and a horrible, shrill squealing rose up as he used his wings and his own control over the wind to stop the plane’s spiral. As he got the plane well in hand, he threw out his wings to their full extension, catching the wind and slowing their descent. But it wasn’t enough. He was too small, and the plane was too heavy.

Sucking in a heavy breath, Ravi summoned more wind. He drew it deep into his lungs and exhaled, using the gust of wind he created to help slow them further. His heart pounded in his ears above the sputtering of the plane engine, and he thought he might have heard a bewildered shout from the pilot, but he couldn’t worry about the human. He had a new problem.

The ground was still coming up very quickly. Like. VERY. QUICKLY.

And there were people on the ground who might go squish if he didn’t control the descent better. Squishing people was bad.

Ravi mentally talked himself through this, even as he put more effort into slowing the plane down. Perched above it like this, he had no way of landing normally, so he had to slow it enough to gently drop it. Yeah. Really gentle drop, that’s what you need to do, okay, self? Right. And then somehow bounce ahead and not land on top of the plane you just dropped.

Oh, and avoid the people on the ground. That would also be a good step.

Shit, he really could use more space here. There wasn’t a lot of room to maneuver.

Even as all of this went through his head, some part of his brain issued a warning. He was going to be seen. Oh shit, Alric was going to be pissed.

But it was okay. He was saving a life. Alric would understand. Ravi would get the plane safely on the ground, make sure the human was okay, and then he’d get the hell out of there before someone got a camera pointed in his direction.

It wasn’t a great plan, but at least he had a plan in place. For Ravi, that was actually rather amazing.

As he and the plane got closer to the ground, he was relieved that the human at least had enough sense to put down the landing gear. Ravi didn’t want to damage the plane more than he already had with his massive talons.

Muscles strained and his wings trembled with exertion. He was going to be so damn sore later. The ground rose up faster and faster. Ravi slowed them further with another exhalation of breath, forcing them to drop more speed, his wings back-flapping hard. He clenched his teeth and was about to close his eyes when something else caught his attention.

More people.

Lots more people.

People with cameras and lights and microphones…and was that a catering table?

Big cameras like the ones they use to make movies.

Oh shit…

He thought the pilot had been in trouble and aiming for an empty field in which to crash.

But the pilot hadn’t actually been in trouble at all. He’d been shooting a scene for a movie. And Ravi had flown right into their shot.

Oh yeah, there was no doubt about it now. Alric was going to skin him and mount his head on his office wall.

Maybe it had been a controlled flight before, maybe not, but Ravi had complete control of it now. And he had to focus on getting them to the ground before he really screwed this up. He back-flapped again, and this time he was able to drop the plane the last three feet to the ground.

Before Ravi could come up with any kind of plan to escape this new mess, his heels hit the dirt hard, causing him to skid forward. Dirt and dust were flung into the air in every direction, creating a small cloud around him and the plane. But not nearly enough for him to hide in. He might not be a large dragon, but he was big enough that his shining blue scales showed bright against the silver metal and vibrant green grass.

When he and the plane had come to a complete halt, Ravi carefully balanced himself, leaving his wings half-unfurled as he regarded the gathered people. No one moved. If he hadn’t known better, he would have said they were all props, mannequins. Except for the fact that several of them were holding up their cellphones, recording everything.

Ravi lifted his head and looked into the cockpit to find the human who was sitting there, looking stunned and utterly confused. But his chest was rising and falling rapidly, and he blinked a couple of times. Good. Still alive. At least he hadn’t given the poor guy a heart attack.

He waggled his claws at the human and tried to smile, but the man just got paler. But then, he seemed more focused on Ravi’s enormous teeth than his friendly expression.

Not that humans were good at reading friendly on a dragon’s face. Cameron had teasingly said that dragons either looked like they wanted to eat you or were bored. Right now, the pilot looked like he was reading eat you on Ravi’s face.

Sighing, Ravi slowly moved to where most of the humans were gathered on the grassy field. He stood there for a second, wracking his brain. Nothing really useful was coming to him, so he waved one talon-tipped hand at the people.

“This is not the dragon you were looking for,” he said in his most hopeful tone.