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Elora put herself between her and Khalstorm and thrust out her arms protectively. “I won’t let you hurt him.” Even as she smirked. She was facing Celeste, so he couldn’t see it. He also didn’t see her maneuvering her fingers in a silent spell.
Celeste’s heart thundered, and she braced for whatever her mother had planned, gathering magic in her palm and preparing to counterattack. Khalstorm snarled at the more obvious show of magic. Did that mean he equated her as his enemy? He wouldn’t know which one of them to attack or defend. Might be waiting for one of them to make an aggressive move.
One of the onlookers suddenly bellowed, gripping his head and doubling over. His scream turned heart wrenching. Then she heard the sound of bones grinding.Crunch, crunch, crunch. A pained gurgle surged from the man’s lungs. In a gruesome display, his body began to mutate and deform as if . . .
Celeste realized what was happening. He was starting to shift into a dragon but seemed to be resisting the transition.
Just as the man burst into his dragon form, another onlooker, a woman, clutched her head and began screaming. While her transformation was underway, the first dragon trained a hostile gaze on Khalstorm.
Another scream rang out. Another dragon shifted. Elora’s smirk turned sinister. Somehow she had control over these people, even without a collar. Perhaps even the whole town.
She expected panic to surge through the crowd, and did witness the start of one, but then, one by one, their eyes began to glaze over, and they stared like puppets waiting for their strings to be pulled.
“What have you done to them?” Celeste demanded of her mother.
Instead of answering directly, she turned to Khalstorm and in a perfectly distressed voice, cried, “She’s bespelled them. She’s controlling them. Watch out!” At that, the dragons attacked, swiping out at him with claw and fang.
“No!” Celeste raised her hands to fling the gathered magic at the group, but Elora struck first, sending a concentrated ball of magic her way. Just before impact, Celeste threw up a protective shield. The strength of the attack forced her back several feet, her boots leaving twin trails in the gravel.
Khalstorm let out a roar of protest, his gaze shifting between Celeste, the Celeste-disguised-Elora, and his attackers as he fended them off. He was already bleeding from several slashes to his thick hide. He didn’t know which Celeste to aid, and dividing his attention was harming his defense.
She was in the same boat, worrying over him and not focusing on the immediate danger. Her gaze narrowed on Elora as she let fly another powerful blast. Fury building, she flung it away with the swipe of her hand and sent it into a nearby building, gouging a chunk from the corner.
“Where’s Rathmort?” she hissed. “I’m surprised he would trust you to capture me without him.”
A deep scowl carved into Elora’s features.How odd to see that expression on my own face. “Unfortunately, he’s been called away. Besides, I can handle one defiant brat. I’ll return you to your cell before he returns, and he’ll be so pleased with me.” Those cuffs dangled from Elora’s slim belt. At the first opportunity, they’d be back around Celeste’s wrists.Never again!
“Rathmort doesn’t care about you, mother. He only cares about power.”
Unfazed, Elora replied, “What else is there?”
Her mother might have loved her once, but there were no lingering maternal feelings left in that cold dead heart of hers. As Elora gathered magic in her palms, so did Celeste.
* * *
My woman is in danger!
Khalstorm’s attention was alternately split between the two Celestes battling one another and the three vicious dragons going for his throat. Try as he might, he couldn’t tell the girls apart. They were identical in every way. They even smelled the same.
A great claw-tipped paw swiped out and caught him in the jaw, rendering him momentarily dazed. He shook his head to clear it and retaliated with a blast of deadly fire. His attackers scattered, but quickly regrouped, two of them using their bodies like battering rams and slamming him into the inn. The building groaned and swayed at the impact as half the wall disintegrated under the crashing force.
More people rushed into the courtyard, the inn emptying from the ruckus.
From the corner of his eye, he spotted the two girls facing off, exchanging harrowing blasts of magic. He could taste the bite of magic in the atmosphere. The air sizzled with it, like the moments just before an electrical storm. Ominous black clouds gathered above. Seconds later, strange black lightning shot down, narrowly missing the Celeste to his right who had sifted out of the way at the last second.
His attention was diverted once more to his attackers, all lunging for him at once. He swiped his massive tail at one, knocking him off his feet, before butting another in the head with his hornshard, knocking her unconscious. The third managed to break through his defenses and slash him with his own set of sharp horns. Khalstorm felt warm liquid drip down his chest, but he barely felt the wound, with so much adrenaline numbing the pain.
Flaring his wings, he used the sharp talons at the ends to slash back, catching his opponent in the jugular and soft upper belly. The dragon howled and retreated just as the other male pulled himself off the ground and hurled himself at Khalstorm. Rearing up on his hind legs, Khalstorm used his front claws and jaws to catch hold of the dragon and used his own momentum to toss him back into the inn. His huge body took out nearly the entire first floor. The building groaned, the sound a death knell, before the entire structure crumbled, burying the dragon in rubble.
Suddenly bits of the fallen rubble rose into the air, hovering for a moment.
Head swinging around, Khalstorm caught movement from one of the Celestes, her hands rising, palms up, controlling the stones—then something hooked at her waist caught his attention.
The cuffs!
Elora had had them last.
With a fierce look of determination, the other Celeste, the real one, braced for impact.
