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Nikki looked over at Gunter to see their dragon frowning. He was clearly not happy with the plan, but in the end, he nodded. “That does sound like the wisest solution.” His reluctance was understandable. Yet another trip to this compound and they still didn’t have a clear direction of the Jaeggi. Time was against them. Those bastards needed to be found. They did not want them once again holing up somewhere, shoring up magic and defenses. The Jaeggi always hunted down mages when they had the security to do it. And attacked the dragons. Nikki was really sick of this cycle. They knew the dragons had to be well past that point.
“So, you and King Alric had a few drinks last night,” Dimitri drawled as he led the way toward the building. He avoided the sidewalk and headed through the little grassy area to the right of the entrance. His tone was conversational, but laughter bounced among the words.
Gunter groaned and Nikki bit their lip to keep from laughing. “The king and I are old friends. We were just sharing a few drinks and chatting about some personal things. We haven’t had a lot of time to talk recently.”
“Really?” Dimitri’s tone indicated that he wasn’t buying a word of it. “That’s not the story around the breakfast table this morning.”
Nikki lifted an eyebrow. Maybe they should have lingered in the dining hall a little longer to catch the buzz. Or at least tracked down Ravi. The wind dragon always seemed to know the gossip around the castle. Nikki might not understand who he was talking about most of the time, but the dragon did tell the most interesting stories. It was better than watching TV or reading a romance novel.
Dimitri went on to say something else that sounded teasing from his tone, but Nikki didn’t catch the actual words. Their attention was drawn to this perfect shaft of sunlight shooting between the branches of a tree and what appeared to be a pair of fractured buildings. They followed the beam of light down to the building where it landed on the dull brown paint in a nearly symmetrical shape. Almost rectangular. Where the light hit, the paint sparkled faintly, like the dancing golden motes of dust in the air were actually clinging to the building. Like magic.
“Stop!” Nikki screamed. It was too late. Dimitri crossed through the light, his broad shoulders making the shaft of light flicker and disappear from the wall for only a heartbeat, but it was long enough to trigger the spell.
Gunter didn’t hesitate. The fire dragon lunged forward and caught Dimitri by the arm, hauling him backward. As he turned, he caught a frozen Nikki around the waist.
The world exploded around them. A flash of heat cooked the air and the earth rumbled under Nikki’s feet, and then they were flying a short distance away. The blast was an angry roar of noise, deafening them. They saw what they thought was a blur of red wings, but they swore they never felt the change in Gunter’s arms from human to dragon.
They hit the ground hard as a trio, with Gunter on the bottom. Nikki flew free of Gunter’s embrace, landing with a soft oof in the grassy area. They pushed to their knees and looked back to find the building completely engulfed in flames. There would be no returning to inspect it with mages. Very soon there would be nothing left. A couple feet away, Dimitri picked himself up.
Nikki’s breath was caught in their throat when they located Gunter. He was moving, but so very slowly. Giant wings protruded from his back, but they were already shrinking. Their dragon had had enough time for only a partial shift. Gunter had forced out his wings to try to shield them from the blast.
“Gunter!” They half crawled, half ran to their dragon’s side. Closer, they could see the left side of Gunter’s shirt was shredded and blood streaked his shoulder and back. Nikki slid to a stop next to him as the dragon carefully moved into a sitting position.
“I’m okay.” Gunter lifted their left hand as if he meant to cup Nikki’s cheek but winced and lowered it again, quickly shifting to the right hand to grasp Nikki’s wrist. “I’m okay, I promise.”
“You’re not okay! You’re hurt!”
“It’s nothing—”
“How bad is it?” Dimitri knelt next to Gunter and started to lean close to inspect his shoulder, but Gunter waved his right hand in Dimitri’s face, shooing him away.
“It’s okay. Just a little road rash. A hot shower will fix this right up.”
“Can you shift and fly?”
Gunter winced again, seeming to hesitate.
“No, he can’t. You need to carry us both. We’re heading home right this second so you can be treated,” Nikki demanded.
Gunter sucked in a breath and opened his mouth like he was planning to argue, but the words never came out. Dimitri was shifting into his brilliant white dragon before Nikki could even finish speaking.
