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The voratrice is wrapping Kyreagan’s wings with its tongues. I can sense what’s about to happen, how it will constrict those beautiful wings, how the bones will snap and crumple. Kyreagan is panting, agony threaded through each strangled breath.
“No!” I scream as I heave up the biggest rock I can manage and beat it against the blunted head of the largest worm. “No, fuck you! You can’t have him! If anyone is going to kill this bastard, it’s going to be me!”
The skin of the monster is thick and ribbed, apparently fireproof and tough as old leather. Nothing I’m doing is working. I’m not strong enough to hurt it.
The tongues around Kyreagan’s wings tighten. He bellows in anguish, but his voice changes mid-roar—
And so does his body.
A flash of searing purple light explodes outward from him, and then he shrinks so abruptly it’s like he’s there one second and gone the next. The tongues fall limply to the ground as the giant wings they were clutching vanish altogether. They begin to poke around blindly, as if searching for the dragon they had in their grasp. Although I can’t see eyes or nostrils, they must have some sense of heat and movement, or perhaps they taste the air like a serpent does—but the blast of magic seems to have dulled their ability to sense prey.
In the center of those writhing tentacles stands a tall man with long black hair, graceful horns, and light brown skin.
I know it’s Kyreagan instantly, and I don’t question it. Survival is paramount. Everything else can be sorted out later.
He seems stunned, so I rush to his side, hopping over the confused tentacle-tongues, and I drag his arm around my shoulders. “You have to run,” I tell him. “Forget everything else. Run!”
His long legs are clumsy, but with my help he hobbles down the slope. We reach the treeline just as two tongues scrape against the backs of my legs. I scream and shove Kyreagan forward faster, until we’re out of reach. When I look back, the tongues are prodding the trees and wiggling through the undergrowth. I hope their seeking senses are permanently damaged.
“Come on.” I grip Kyreagan’s arm and hustle him through the woods.
“What just happened?” The words sound garbled, like he’s struggling to form them with his unfamiliar teeth and lips.
“Don’t talk yet. Keep moving.”
We don’t stop until we’re on the beach. His legs give out then, and he collapses on the sand. I take off my ruined slippers and keep going, desperately, determinedly, until I reach the surf, where I wash the dragon shit off my arms and legs and scrub my skin with handfuls of wet sand until I feel clean again. The saltwater stings my scrapes, especially the cuts on my leg, but I welcome the pain. I want that area thoroughly purged of the voratrice’s touch.
I can’t deal with Kyreagan yet.
I can’t deal with any of it.
He transformed.
He fucking changed into a human—or mostly human.
Could he always do that? I highly doubt it, judging from his reaction. This must be new.
The enchantress arrived today. Maybe she promised to perform the spell the dragons wanted, and instead she did something else. Something unexpected.
My limbs are finally clean, but I’m also soaked from the neck down, and the chilly ocean breeze raises goosebumps on my skin. Still, I remain where I am for another long minute. I stare at the flat gray sea and follow it to the horizon, where it blurs into the deep gray of the oncoming night.
Finally, inhaling a deep breath, I turn around, and I face the dragon prince.
He’s sitting where I left him, bare-ass naked on the sand. Dark blood stains his brown skin in several places, and a streak of grime marks his left cheekbone. In the lingering glow of dusk, he looks like a beautiful, wounded god who washed up from the sea. His ebony hair cloaks his shoulders, strands of it lifted by the breeze.
With quick, tense steps I walk toward him. My heart hammers in my chest as it sinks in—the reality of what happened, and what almost happened. He nearly died, and the transformation saved him.
“You’re human,” I announce breathlessly.
“So it would seem.” He shapes each word carefully, his tone hollow with shock.
“Why are you human?”
“The enchantress, Thelise.” He tries her name a few times before managing to pronounce it correctly. “She tricked me. There’s no other explanation.”
“Do you think she only changed you, or all the dragons?”
“All of us, I suspect.” He’s adapting quickly to his new mouth—his words become clearer as he continues speaking. “She warned us to stay on the ground with our captives tonight. Made it sound as if it was for your benefit, so you would be safer and more comfortable during the change, but clearly she didn’t want us transforming in midair, falling out of the sky, and smashing ourselves to bits. A small mercy, I suppose.”
