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Prologue - Axle
Axle had been away from the dragons for so long that being together with them again felt divine. A sense of connection with people he had known most of his life. Knowing they would be together, living well into the centuries to come, brought a sense of peace to Axle.
But then, they would only stay alive if they didn’t have enemies. At that very moment, the dragons were on their way to face off an enemy unlike any they had ever witnessed.
An enemy that could take their lives in one strike, and nullify their healing process as well.
Levi, Adebayo, Victor, and Chase sat in the car as it drove them several hours from Ridgeshire to Castlewood Canyon in Denver. Axle drove, as he knew the roads better than anyone else, and Levi sat in the front passenger seat. Axle looked up at the rearview mirror to see Chase looking around with panic and nerves emanating from every move he made.
“Hey kid, it’s going to be alright. Just do what Levi tells you, stick to the plan, and we’ll all be fine,” Axle reassured the new kid.
Chase nodded and relaxed in his chair, taking a breath. “Okay.”
After Garret and Val had turned on the dragons and were killed, Levi knew they had to get their numbers back up. Stray dragons were rare, but occasionally one would wander off, or be left behind after their pack got killed off. Chase had never had a pack, and had been living on his own in the middle of nowhere. He had wandered near Ridgeshire and did his best to stay away, but Victor and Levi had tracked him down and brought him in.
Regardless, they still had small numbers. Chase was just nineteen years old, and still very much a child. He had seen his fair share of action, but he had also seen death and loss, and knew how hard it was to survive against the other paranormals out there. Axle could sense his tension and trauma, and knew he had to take care of the kid.
“If Kanai is here, we need some sort of plan to take him down,” Adebayo said from the back seat, his gruff voice cutting through the sound of the tires on the dirt path. “We can’t just face him head on.”
Victor nodded. “He’s right. Of all of the things I’ve faced in my time, I have seen weapons that can take away our healing, I’ve seen poisons and charms, but I have never met a demon that can do it himself. Kanai has powerful magic that’s unlike anything I have seen, and if we’re going to take him on, it has to be fast.”
Axle looked at his older brother Levi. He watched as Levi’s eyes scanned the road ahead, his mind deep in thought. There were many reasons Levi was the head of the dragons, and his tactical mind was one of those reasons. He drummed his fingers on the side of the window, thinking quietly for a moment.
“He can take away our healing with just his strikes, but that doesn’t mean we can’t heal,” Levi spoke up. “Axle has a cut on his face, but that healed, didn’t it?”
“Naturally, yeah. I had to get it treated and all that. It took a while, but it healed naturally, like normal human healing time,” said Axle.
“Then we know that we can heal, just not at the rate we normally do. Which means two things—we can afford to get hurt, but we can’t afford to take a deadly blow. One that wouldn’t kill us before would end our lives now,” said Levi. “He does it with his claws, right?”
Axle nodded, remembering the time he had faced off against Kanai. The demon had taken down a werewolf in two strikes, knocking the creature down and then pulling out its heart. Axle had managed to get away with just a strike that almost took his sight.
“We need to go for the arms then. He should be tough, but there’s enough of us. We take his limbs off, that negates his ability to hurt us. Then we finish him off. Adebayo, you and I are the strongest, we have to blitz in and restrain him, pin down his arms and hold out each one. Axle, Victor, you have to make sure the arms are taken off.”
“What about me?” Chase asked.
“We’re dealing with someone who is immensely powerful. I don’t think you should get too close. There might be other low-level demons, so if you can take those out that would be nice. But do not go up against Kanai, no matter what. If someone gets hurt, you get them away from the fight and back to the car. That’s your job.”
Chase nodded and relaxed into his seat. Axle turned to his brother, nodding to him. It was about to get rough, and they would have to get through it together, as always.
Axle gunned the car down the dirt path, bringing them down until they were at the dig site where he had tracked Kanai down to. He pulled the car to a stop, and they all dropped from the vehicle.
Chase walked up beside Axle. “If they can sense us coming, why don’t they run?”
“Kanai isn’t just an entity like a lot of the low-level demons. He has intelligence, something he wants. I don’t know what it is, but I know that what he wants is inside this cave. That’s why he’s here. Even if he can hear us, he’s too full of himself to run, especially not without getting what he wants. I’m leaving the key in the ignition.”
“Okay,” Chase replied, understanding why. If someone needed to be taken out quickly, Chase would need to drive them away from the scene.
They made their way down to the cave, following the lights which had been set up along the sides. The cave was a human dig site, and while Axle wasn’t sure what they were digging for, he had seen a few humans there. But at that moment it was deserted, and they couldn’t sense any humans in the area.
Soon, they made it to the heart of the cave, a large cavern with digging tools, helmets and other materials piled in the center. Axle didn’t see any demons around, but he could sense them. Everyone had drawn their claws, ready for action, but they just couldn’t see the enemy.
Chase stayed by the corridor, and Axle took one last look at him to make sure he would be safe once the madness started. But just as he turned, he spotted a demon crawling slowly down the entrance wall, right above Chase. Axle reacted quickly, kicking up a rock by his foot and catching it in his hand.
He hurled it as hard as he could and it slammed into the head of the demon, driving its skull into the wall. Chase jumped backward and saw the demon struggling to get to its feet. As it was a lower level, he quickly pulled his claws and grabbed the sides of the creature’s head, pulling as hard as he could and killing it instantly.
“On the roof!” Axle yelled to the others, as they looked above to see the demons.
Levi quickly shifted, his wings coming out of his back as he flew up to the roof. Adebayo leaped high, grabbing one of the demons right off the roof before spinning and slamming the creature face-first against a boulder, crushing it with his knee.
