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“Is this about the curse?”
The vamp twirled the dagger in his hand, so fast that it appeared to be a blur. “The dragon fall? Probably. All I care about is the bounty on that one’s head. Now, move.”
Bounty…
There wasn’t time for any more questions. They lunged at me, a flurry of claws and fangs. I dodged a swipe from the dagger and used my forearm to twist the vampire’s arm. The dagger clattered onto the floor. I kicked it across the space, far from the vampire’s reach.
Each movement I made was a dance of survival. I spun, ducked, and attacked, each decision made in a fraction of a second as I tried to lead them away from Robby. My muscles screamed with the effort, the adrenaline numbing the pain.
I couldn’t turn into my dragon without bringing this place down around us, but I could still fight like my dragon.
Flame engulfed my hands, licked up my elbows. I didn’t feel any heat, but the vampires sure did. Their skin was marked with burns everywhere I landed a hit, but they continued to fight, continued to try and get around me. I could almost feel Robby’s vulnerability press into me. He had no abilities, no training, no way to fight them off.
If they grabbed him, it’d be over.
Suddenly, the bigger one of the two lunged toward me, his fangs bared and gleaming under the pale lights. If he got those into my neck and ripped through my aorta, I’d be dead in seconds. I pivoted, ready to counter his attack, but a bone-rattling roar shook the platform, freezing everyone where they stood.
The basilisk.
It had turned around to face us, its serpentine mouth revealing rows and rows of diamond-sharp teeth. Those rich green scales looked different than mine, more arrow-shaped and smaller, tightly packed. A forked tongue whipped through the air, so large that it cracked with an audible sound against the ceiling.
Its massive head swooped down, pinning the vampires under its amber gaze. Its eyes blazed like twin suns, casting an eerie light in the otherwise gloom-filled space. They both froze, like a pair of hares staring down a fox. They couldn’t even blink. I could hear the hissing breath of the basilisk, a chilling sound that echoed off the stone walls.
I knew what would come next.
“Close your eyes,” I shouted to Robby, snapping mine shut and grabbing him in my arms. I pressed him tight against my chest in case he, too, was hypnotized by the deadly beast, making sure not to crush his beagle friend in the process.
The serpent’s eyes flashed, the bright glow shining through my eyelids.
Just like that, it was over. The vampires collapsed, their bodies having turned to stone, then crumbling to dust in an instant.
So much for immortality.
A deathly silence fell on the scene. The remaining vampires, the ones that were just now beginning to heal from their wounds, backed away, their confidence replaced by unchecked fear. For a moment, we all stood frozen, caught in the gaze of the basilisk.
With a suddenness that had me reeling, the basilisk turned its globe-sized eyes away, retreating into the shadows of the tunnel. The Marvel that had been controlling it crawled back up onto the platform from the tracks, looking shaken but unharmed, his robe stained with dirt and blood.
“Is it… is it over?” Robby’s voice, shaky yet filled with relief, reached my ears. The beagle jumped from his arms and was surrounded by a shimmering fog, growing approximately five feet into a teenager, looking equally as shaken but also as unharmed.
“Thank you,” he said, turning to Robby, then to me. “I was—holy shit. That was crazy.”
A chorus of heavy-booted footsteps came from the stairwell. Was that more of them? Shit. We had to go, had to get somewhere safe.
“Come,” I said, grabbing Robby’s hand in mine again without thinking.
But it wasn’t another gang of bounty-hunting vampires that appeared on the platform.
Instead, it was a group of ivory-robed Enforcers. They were an independent collective of Marvels that worked as a sort of police force, keeping things from ever spiraling too far out of control. They were also the only Marvels who had the ability to manipulate onyx threads. With those, they could sever a magic user from their connection to their mana or a shifter from their connection to their animal.
They couldn’t do shit to dragons, though.
“What’s going on here?” The woman who led the group already had her hand whipping up threads of visible red mana. She was getting ready to bind us all with a single swipe of her hand.
“Vampire attack,” I said, explaining before they got any ideas. Robby’s hand fell from mine. “You guys are about two minutes too late.”
“Were you three witnesses? Involved in the attack?” Her questions were carried with a forceful tone that emphasized her position. Her blonde waves of hair fell down against the gilded, lined robe, some of it picked up into a tight ponytail. My mother used to wear her hair like that.
