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I fell, the wind rushed, the bridge’s lights stuttered but stayed on as they shrank from me.

I hit the water hard, punching through it, back first.

I gasped. Water poured down my throat. But the renewed fire inside burned hotter, brighter.

This water was nothing.

This world was nothing.

I was fire, I was devastation, I was destruction.

My name was Mydros, and I was dragon.

A roar tore from my chest as I broke the surface. Wings stretched, I climbed the struts holding up the bridge, and made quick work of the tower.

The world seemed so small now, and everything in it miniatures of reality.

Atop the tower, I spread my wings and unleashed the burning, tumultuous rage born from a lifetime of being hunted.

I was free.

But not safe.

Not yet.

The dark sorcerer had become an enormous storm, its shape vaguely humanoid. Tendrils the size of office blocks writhed and knotted around it. And as I targeted it in my sights, all of its rage and fury turned on me.

No, I was not safe. Nobody was until this monster was dealt with.

“Glorious power!” the creature that had been Gideon Cain boomed. Whatever had been in that bead, his innate power had amplified it, like Zee’s had amplified the effects of the bead he’d swallowed.

One of Cain’s whipping limbs lashed out and cracked toward me. I beat my wings and lifted off, spiraling higher into the sky. Lightning flashed. My heart burned, stoking the fire in my throat. Higher, I spiraled, into the clouds, until there was nothing around but darkness. Arching around, I tucked my wings in, and dove.

The fire built. Burning in my chest. Surging, broiling.

There was only one power strong enough to defeat darkness—and that was light.

Bursting from the sky, I swooped down, toward the bridge.

Gideon’s spray of thrashing limbs reached for me, like a net closing in. I spread my jaws and unleashed a wave of fire, blasting the bridge deck. Cars exploded one by one, igniting the asphalt, the air, everything around Cain.

His howl churned.

I swept out, across the inky waters of the bay. San Francisco’s gleaming city lights glinted at the edge of my vision. My home. I knew that now. I had a home, a family . . . people who needed me, loved me. I’d destroy anyone and anything that threatened that and them.

Cain, ablaze on the bridge, thrust all his limbs upright and let loose a lance of dark, pulsing power, thrusting it into the sky. Lightning scattered and the sky split, tearing apart.

That couldn’t be good.

Especially as all my fire had done was warm him up.

I was going to have to get up close and personal.

With the bridge coming up fast, I beat my wings, slowing, and came in to land between the red towers. The bridge groaned, its deck stretching under my clawed feet.

Cain saw me, and flung one of those dark-funneling limbs as though to skewer my chest.

I snapped my teeth at it, and tore the limb in two.