Page 86 of Bad Blood Alpha

But instead of taking, like Ragnor had, he gave.

Power arced through her. A column of blue magic burst into the air. She felt bonds breaking, snapping inside her, and a rush like a roaring waterfall.

She could feel him arch in pain, the magic burning through his nerve endings. And still he gave, all his heart, all his soul, all his strength and love.

Kira felt the Change happen. Her bones melted and turned to molten fire. Her hands and feet became claws. Her body grew, great black wings sprouting from her back.

She launched herself into the air, and Flynn crumpled to the ground. She wanted to go back, to touch him, to heal him, but the red dragon had reached the peak of its climb and was hurtling down towards the battle.

“NO!”

The word reverberated through her. There was a thunderous ‘boom,’ and magic burst out from her like an explosion. Twin blue arcs shot through the air—one to Emon, still battling the red dragon, and the other back down toward the ground where Mayah lay.

The Al-Maddeiri magic finding its way home.

The red dragon screamed down at her in a steep, terrifying dive. Kira gave a great heave of her brand-new wings and threw herself into his path, feeling his body strike her, tumbling her over and over in the air.

Flynn sank to the ground, his body on fire. Everything inside him had been hollowed out, streaming into her.

His dragon. His love. She glowed, all her power coming home to her, and then bursting out into her dragon form.

She was breathtaking. Black as night, every scale lined with the red-gold of the rising sun. Full of power and love, exactly the way she was always meant to be.

He sank to the ground next to Mayah, brittle as a dead leaf, to be crushed and blown away on the breeze.

But death never came. Instead, a bolt of blue magic came out of the sky, enveloping him and Mayah.

He thought he’d felt pain before, but this was something else. Agony. Power. Voices—a thousand voices from a thousand dragons, all calling his name.

Mayah, glowing blue, erupted into dragon form, launching herself into the sky. Above him, he saw Emon surrounded by magic, his silver muzzle evaporating away, his wounds healing.

The three draken of Al-Maddeiri screamed in triumph, and flew into battle.

Flynn dragged himself to his feet. The battle still raged below him; the voices screamed within him. The power had burned away his clothes, and the grass beneath had turned to ash. He glowed with blue flame.

The blue and black dragons had the red ones on the run. The hellhounds were falling back. And yet, Flynn could feel something wrong. That prickle between his shoulder blades…he could feel it even through the raging magic…

He whirled around, just in time to see Ragnor step out of a rift in space. Of course. It was his valley—the wards didn’t apply to him.

Without thinking, Flynn swung at him, wielding the blue magic like a sword. Ragnor barely ducked in time.

“You think to best me, Lion? The transfer of magic is not yet complete. If I kill you, I weaken them all.”

Flynn circled him, poised to attack. He beckoned to Ragnor with his fingers, grinning like a fucking maniac. “Come on, Wizard Boy.”

Black lightning slashed at him, and he blocked it with blue. They locked together, magic to magic. Flynn could feel his bones melting, his nerve endings exploding from power they were never meant to handle.

His body was dissolving, only sheer will and magic keeping him in human form.

Ragnor pressed his magic against Flynn’s—an experienced wizard against raw power. Flynn felt that evil ice slithering into him.

And this time he fought, not with rage, but with love. Kira. Everything he felt, everything she was to him. All the love he wished he’d given her poured into the power and shaped it into a weapon. He beat back Ragnor’s icy magic, turned the hatred and greed and lust for power back on its owner.

Ragnor fell back a step, and Flynn pushed his advantage. He was burning up, dying, but he wasn’t going out without taking down Ragnor first.

Ragnor, with his secret lab and his torture chamber and his belief he could just fucking take whatever he wanted.

Not Flynn. Not Kira. Not her family. His love was a shield and a weapon, bolstered up by the power of all the Al-Maddeiri who had come before him.