by Bob Dattolo
The group of seven guys laughed and exchanged back slaps.
Samantha’s hand clamped onto my wrist, “Don’t say a fucking word, Maddie!”
Angelica sighed, “You gotta be…that’s not gonna stop her and you know it.”
“Fuck!”
“Hey, you pussies looking for me?” Magic pushed my voice, making it loud enough that almost all of the talking stopped entirely. Hundreds of eyes pointed my way as I waved to them. “Hey, hi! Thank you for coming! I wasn’t sure when I answered the post to help you guys put in a tampon if you really meant to come. It’s so hard when you’ve lost your twig and berries and have to learn how to handle things with a vagina. They’re trickier than penises and all. I got you covered, though, I bought the extra wide ones since I know you’ve been spreading ‘em for the other guys in your class. I heard it’s like fucking an open door, so I’m gonna hook you up.”
“Shut the fuck up, you tiny whore!” A massive water mage in the group of seven yelled at me.
“Look, stop talking to your sister and pay attention! I didn’t come out here for the fun of it!”
Kirk in the middle of the circle laughed at me, “There you are! I heard about you. Your boyfriend here stopped me from finding you. When I’m done with him, you and I can talk.”
I focused back on him, “Oh Princess, you’re funny. You’re not leaving that circle alive.”
He spit on the ground, “You don’t have a fucking clue. Just wait there and me or one of my boys will be over to wear you like a glove before you die. That way you don’t have to worry about making it through the trial. Stupid stricken. I gotta kill your boyfriend here first.”
Magic pushed my laugh, which I enjoyed, “You’re a laugh riot, you know that? Levi my boyfriend? He tried to kill me I don’t even know how many times last year. The first thing he said to me this year was that he was gonna kill me.”
“Then why did he step in and protect you?”
I smiled wide, “Why? Probably because he wants to kill me himself. After all, I tortured his rapist parents to death before coming here last year. I have a feeling he wants to do it himself and not leave it to someone as useless as you are. As for your friends?” I waved to the others again, “When this is done, I may pay them a visit. We’ll see if we don’t have another challenge or seven coming up soon after this. Or maybe one. Me against all seven of them.”
“Now I know you’re fucking insane. Any one of us in the third year could kill you without even trying.”
“Don’t worry your pretty little head over it. Levi’ll kill you here in a minute. Then you don’t have to worry about the trial. Then your little psycho buddies can maybe learn what pain is before the end of the day. We’ll see how that goes if they want to push it.”
A spray of power shut everyone up as Headmaster Anderson took control of everything. He walked through the rules and all of that, then left them behind. Levi and Kirk began working on magic. Given what Kirk’s classmate did, I’m wondering if he’s going to attack the same way. Or at least close to it.
The fight started with complete and utter abandon. My brain struggled to keep up with what was happening because I was in complete awe. Levi’s been sandbagging things in class. That much is obvious. Kirk, on the other hand, is a freaking animal. I’ll give him credit for that, because he came on like a freaking tornado.
Gravity, sheering forces, metal blades, metal balls, then a dozen other things hit in rapid fire succession.
Levi countered with his own fluctuating gravity, walls, metal balls and blades of his own, and then lights, physically grabbing him, paralysis, pain, and more.
Each of them bellowed in pain as some of the spells made it through their protections, just not as much as I would have expected for the volume.
That started them moving into fist range.
I want to help so badly. I can cast spells without people knowing, so I can possibly do it…but the result of being found out is death. Even if the person you’re working with dies. Cheating equals death for any reason, and that’s kinda the ultimate cheating. I mean, other than pulling out a gun or something like that.
I could do it, though. Suck the wind from his lungs and I bet that’d make him falter. Yet…I can’t.
Dammit. This is so freaking painful to watch.
They waded into each other, fists flying, kicks, elbows ramming into faces. Blood sprayed from Levi first and I swear I saw a tooth in the arc of blood before he waded back into the fray. The crunching of broken ribs was evident even over the sound of the cheering and screaming kids around us.
Kirk looked like he was in agony, but that didn’t stop him.
Levi’s left arm broken with from an armlock looking thing, but he very nearly tore Kirk’s ear off with his free hand before gouging at his eye. He nearly made it, too. Kirk got lucky when he dropped and missed losing it. That freaked him out enough that he backed off, limping from I don’t even know what.
Levi didn’t want to give him room, so he pushed ahead, left arm held to the side a little. He’s moving his fingers, I’m just not sure he can do much with the bone broken. At least that’s not a desperation thing.
More punches. More kicks. More spells triggering in the gaps, just nothing like what happened to begin with. They moved around the circle, pushing and battering at each other, and I’m still not entirely sure whose spell went off that tossed them towards the edges. It was like an explosion, just not an actual explosion. It didn’t seem to favor one over the other, so I’m not sure where it came from
I just knew that they’re both hurting. Levi catches my eye as he struggles up, “Tear him to pieces, Levi. Full body rub to you for a reward if you do!”
His smile is crooked and shows me more than one missing tooth, then he starts to contort into his shift.
Fuck, I hadn’t even noticed Kirk already trying to shift. He’s farther along, but Levi may shift faster, because he’s catching up. It’s a freaking miracle that Levi stretched his head forward and released his jet of breath at very nearly the same time Kirk did. Their colliding breath was freaking breathtaking and sounded like jets trying to take off right there.
Screams around the circle as kids backed up. They don’t have barriers around the circle that can stop rampaging dragons, and it doesn’t quite pay to get killed by accident due to a tail whipping out at you.
More magic triggered, with most of it bouncing from scales or dissipating. When their breath ended, Kirk started forward, only to get bowled over as Levi jetted forward with his wings. I’m not sure any of us were expecting that, because that also caused screams galore. Made worse by blood flying across everyone on that side of the circle as claws and teeth went to town. Levi’s arm is still broken, so he’s not getting good traction there. The only saving grace is that Kirk’s ribs are messing with that side, so he’s not up to full strength on that arm either.
That doesn’t stop their legs and teeth and other arm, though.
More blood flies. Then more. Then some magic begins to hit. Metal balls tear up part of Kirk’s wing. Blades hit Levi’s. The leather part is torn to shit before he manages to absorb the metal. Unless he manages some fantastic healing, he may not fly again from that.
My heart dropped at seeing the damage accumulating. We have the trial on Wednesday, and what I’m seeing…he may not heal in time to walk in there.
A roar of agony yanks me back to catch Kirk pulling away from where he just shattered Levi’s other arm with his teeth. A laugh starts from the silver dragon at knowing he’s won, and my blood goes from cold and fear-filled to boiling. Beyond boiling.
He’s in there because he wanted to protect me. Not needed, but the fact that he’s risking himself for me?
The laugh cuts off as raking back claws nearly eviscerate Kirk, getting his head to come down. Flashing teeth and more blood as Kirk bites at Levi again and again, with Levi still holding his own. His front legs are fucked, but he’s biting and biting and working magic that I can�
�t make out at first. It triggers just as he manages a lucky grab, snapping his jaws shut around Kirk’s mouth, his front fangs barely missing the silver dragon’s eyes. It looks like he wanted to swallow him whole.
That’s just about when the rain of metal saw blades hits the huge silver dragon. One after another fail to pierce, but then some hit injury sites. Those don’t shatter against scales. Kirk’s roar of agony is swallowed by the larger Levi, then they’re lost entirely as a jet of dragon breath rams directly into the face of the soon to be fucked third-year dragon. Dragons can withstand the breath of others of the same type pretty well. It’s just that this breath is going directly into the nose of the dragon that’s being pierced again and again by blades going several hundred miles per hour.
More magic swelled in the circle as Levi’s breath ended, but I knew it wasn’t going to be needed. Too many of the blades cut deep, and I’m pretty sure that breath completely fucked Kirk’s lungs. He’s barely alive as he’s released, then he’s dead as Levi leans in and crunches through his head, triggering the last spell to absorb his magic.
He managed one long roar of victory before collapsing, blood pooling from him in massive streams.
That’s enough to kill him unless it’s stopped.
Dammit to hell.
Headmaster Anderson called the victor just as I passed the line, heading for Levi.
“Maddie, what’re you gonna do?” Samantha sounds freaked.
“He risked himself for me. He’s not dying because of this bullshit!”
“You can’t heal someone!” Her voice fades behind me as I approach the downed dragon. His flanks are heaving as he struggles to breathe, but his eyes are open as I round his head.
He sees me immediately and tries to speak, barely managing a sound. Certainly not one that I can understand. “Hold on. I’m healing you. I don’t mean for this to hurt, so bear with me.”
Headmaster Anderson touches my shoulder, “Maddie, no one can heal something like this. I’ve seen enough of these to know…he won’t last much longer.”
“With all due respect, Headmaster? Levi’s not dying here. Not after that.” He doesn’t get a chance to respond before I push out power, forcing Levi’s shift as more power builds inside of me. I let my hair fizzle with light from the second stream of power as I readied my spell. I don’t have my ring with me, so this has to be all me. I can heal myself, so please, please let that mean I can heal him of this. I know I can do eyes…I just have this fear that I can only do eyes.
Levi’s shift back goes quicker than normal, leaving me with a fucked classmate. His arms are broken to hell. His face is fucked. He’s hurt in more places than I even remotely expected. He grunted twice before passing out as his much lower human levels of blood began to spurt out, then my magic triggered, and he twitched as it sank deep inside of him. I pushed it hard, trying to watch my outlay, and ignored the calls from the other kids around the circle. They’re not what I need to focus on right now. Levi is. He risked himself for me. I know I did it for him, but I did it not expecting anything in return.
He returned it and was so close to paying the price. So freaking close.
More magic flowed into him as I roamed through him with the magic. He’s hurt, so freaking hurt, yet…yet the spell seems to be working. Deep injuries are starting to heal, coming together at the deepest level and then working their way out. Crushed bone came together. Broken tendons stretched and connected. Severed blood vessels healed. Torn muscles grew anew. Finally, his skin began to heal. I could feel the damage on his back being corrected and knew that his wings would be whole again from this.
Then, on a whim, my magic focused on his face. The scars I gave him in our fight began to lighten as the damage was filled, until even that was restored. Leaving me with a fully healed Levi.
And overflowing levels of rage.
Chapter 37
My humanity took a look around the place, packed its bags, and walked the fuck out. Headmaster Anderson stared at me in utter shock as I turned to him, “Pick him up and carry him out of here.”
I expected him to respond. To tell me not to talk to him that way. I sure as hell didn’t expect him to grab Levi and run to the sidelines.
The yelling kids around the circle were a mix of shock, awe, excitement, and anger. The third-year kids were mostly anger, with some shock in certain places. Probably from the healing.
My eyes locked onto the seven that I called out in the beginning as Samantha’s voice cut through the growing silence, “This is gonna be fucking bad!”
“Kirk threatened me. He wants to kill me. Drain me. Levi stopped that attempt from happening and nearly paid the price for it. Now Kirk’s dead. He’s a big freaking corpse. A memory of a person.” Magic flowed out and wrapped the huge body in scintillating waves. “He decided to come hunting for me. You seven losers had the same idea. He paid the price for thinking he could do whatever he wanted. Leaving the seven of you. Too bad Kirk decided that he wanted to check out early.” I snapped my fingers and my spell dug into the dead dragon, driving deep. The kids had maybe three seconds to wonder what the light was doing before the explosion of heat and fire ripped through the massive body, reducing it to cinders in less than 30 seconds. I channeled the heat up so that no one was parboiled from it. They should thank me for that, because a burning dragon creates a metric assload of heat.
“What…what the fuck was that?” One of the seven steps across the line of the circle.
“That was me clearing the space. You seven decided that you wanted to fight me. Drain me. Well, here I am.” The tiny, tiny flickers remaining of not-homicidal-me grabbed some popcorn and sat back to watch the show. “My name is Maddie Stricken. I spent nine years of my life blind and in agony. Mortmagi pounded into my skull by my own father. Now I’m here. You assholes think you can take me? Then here I am. Open challenge from me to all seven of you. At the same time.”
“Girl, you couldn’t handle one of us if we were drunk!” Another calls out, getting laughs from some of their classmates.
“Don’t fucking do it! Don’t go after her! I told you what she did against four shifted dragons at the same time!” One of their classmates yells from another side.
“What a bunch of shit. I don’t know how she burned up Kirk, but she can’t do dick against us.”
“Here I am. You think you can take me, then get your asses in here and take me. You set this in motion with your buddy. You threatened me. He nearly killed Levi. None of you deserves to live. I’ve gone out of my way to let people live. To not fuck with them. Well, guess what? Now you get my complete and utter attention. Time to put up or shut up. Open challenge. Me against you seven. Right now.”
They exchanged looks, completely ignoring the calls telling them to not do it. It seems a number of them have seen some of the fights and they’re a little more aware of what I bring to the party.
All the while, my mind is whirling as I work magic without letting anyone see it. Something has been running through my head the past few days, and I’m wondering if I can really do this. It’ll be interesting if I can. I guess we’ll see.
Assuming I live.
Without much actual talking, the seven of them step into the circle. They’re a mixed bag of mage and dragon and affinity, which isn’t too shocking. I’m more shocked that they had eight of them in a group. That’s a huge group when it comes to allies. Makes me wonder if they’ve been basically lording it over the others in their class.
I’m thinking yes. At least mostly.
They spread out a little, with two of them hanging back. One by one, they announced their acceptance of the challenge. That was Headmaster Anderson’s cue to step back in and call out the rules. I caught sight of two researchers across the circle and I nodded at them. They clearly picked up my state of mind and my stance, because they both blanched before giving me a slow nod in return.
“So, so fucking bad…” Samantha sounds almost traumatized. That makes me wonder what the othe
r dragons are picking up from me.
Our headmaster reaches the side and steps across, and all seven of them light up the fucking world with spells. The two in the back were already falling towards the ground as they started to shift, but we can’t have that now, can we?
Want to know the fun thing about a ton of magic going off at once? Yeah, it can be pretty blinding. Especially when I cast light and create an actual rock wall thick enough to block pretty much anything they throw at me. They completely miss as another spell shoots me up and over them still in my human form, only to come down on the first fuckhead with a punch that shattered his head, ending his shift without warning. His magic flowed into me, but I locked it up with my new spell and held it.
The second dragon tried to move away from me, which is awkward mid-shift, especially when I ramped power into him and forced him to shift back to human. Not that I let him do that, I just wanted his body to get kinda fucked up and confused. Which it did.
Then he too was dead.
That’s the point that the other five realized some of the screams and yells were for them to turn the fuck around.
Magic from the second one nestled into a locked cubby near the first as the guy at the rear turned to look behind him. I have a feeling he was expecting to see a shifted ally. Instead, he saw my fingers ramming into his head, blinding him and sucking his magic out as his neck shattered in my grip.
Three down, four to go.
The two to my left realized the error of their ways and screamed, getting the other two to turn and start aiming spells at me. The first wave were met by my new scales as I shifted in an explosion of growth. One of the guys on my right ran at me, yelling something about Barry, but he didn’t make it. One of their spells winged him, making him trip just enough that I caught him with my claws and tore him to shreds. The guy he had been standing with went down as I hit him with the armless, legless, and headless torso.
That left two of them standing, and they finally realized that things just aren’t going as they expect them to. I can’t make out their yells over the sound of spells going off, so I decided to ignore it as I used my wings to dodge spell after spell, all the while plinking them with smaller spells. One’s an earth mage and the other is an ice dragon, so I hit them both with metal blades and balls, fire, and then some crushing gravity just to mess with them. They still attacked, only rarely getting something through my scales.