by Amelia Jade
Overhead a pair of dragons circled, while higher in the sky a gryphon eyeballed them, as if waiting for the right moment to make its dive run. Asher knew it wouldn’t, not in Cadia itself. There was, generally speaking, a permanent truce in place between the different types of shifters. If you were a bear and you headed south to where the wolves guarded the border, or north to where the tigers and lions patrolled the vast plains, then you were on your own.
But in Cadia? Everyone was expected to behave.
“Asher,” said a walking colossus as he moved past him, heading the opposite direction.
“Ranger,” he replied with a nod of his head at the bear shifter. He didn’t know Rick “Ranger” Podnam very well, but they had met during a drunken night and teamed up to take on a quartet of very angry wolf shifters who thought they could get the better of the pair.
It hadn’t gone well for the canines.
Since then the pair had been friends, if not overly tight. Asher didn’t pause to talk though; he was on a mission that morning.
The building that served to house Cadia’s government and services, such as they were, loomed over him. It was a five-story building—a monstrosity compared to most of town, where few buildings were over three stories—and it was all rounded sides, a flowy design that did nothing for him.
That was where Cadia Immigration was located though. They were the department that handled permissions for all non-shifters to enter, and gave passports to all shifters who wished to leave. He shouldered his way in through the door and approached the desk. There wasn’t a line. There never was. Few shifters ever wanted to leave, and even fewer humans wanted to come in.
Both sides liked it better that way.
“Yes, what can I do for you?” the elderly woman at the counter asked before he’d even stepped up to her desk.
“I’d like to file the necessary forms for passage. One human into Cadia,” he said, sitting down in the chair.
The woman eyed him for a moment, and then reached behind her to a drawer and pulled out a stack of paper.
“Fill these out, and then give us several days to check them over.”
“Thank you,” he said, nodding as he picked up a pen and began to fill them out. He’d grilled Quinn this morning on all the standard information, so that he knew what to put down for that. He just hoped that there wasn’t some sort of wild question on there that he hadn’t asked her.
Occupation.
Shit.
All the questions, and he had never thought to ask what she did for a living. He shrugged, and wrote “Park Ranger.” She’d said she was a nature buff. Hopefully she could use that knowledge to bluff her way through if they had any questions to ask.
He had no problems lying about how they had met, putting down “internet dating.” It wasn’t the truth, but it would serve its purpose, and also gave him an easy answer for the reason why she was seeking entry into Cadia. To see him. By signing that, Asher was basically accepting responsibility for Quinn while she was in Cadia, if she was accepted.
He added his signature where required, finishing the last one with a flourish and pushed the stack of papers back across the table.
“We’ll be in touch,” the woman said and turned away from him.
Asher shrugged to himself and got up to go.
He stiffened when Loran Grik came in through the front door. He was one of the two gryphons who had tangled with him while he was trying to get Quinn out of Cadia. The gryphon recognized him immediately and snorted.
“What are you doing here, Owens?”
Asher rolled his eyes. “Whatever I want. Got a problem with that Grik?”
The other man’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah, I do if you’re trying to smuggle another human in here,” he spat. His eyes gleamed with venom as he said that aloud.
Asher knew he only had one recourse. “What did you just accuse me of?”
“You heard me. There was a human on your back. I saw her.”
“I think you’re imagining things, Grik. Maybe it was from that blow you took when you fell from the sky. Might have knocked even more things loose up there.”
“I know what I saw. You were smuggling in a human!”
Asher stood up tall and stormed over to where Loran was standing, trying to gloat.
“Falsely accuse me one more time. I dare you,” he said, loud enough for everyone to hear, but pitched to be threatening only to Loran.
“You and that filthy human—”
Asher didn’t let him finish. His punch sent the other shifter flying through the air until he hit the ground, rolling and coming out of it as he charged back at Asher. With a grunt the dragon shifter moved in, using his superior size, reach, and strength advantage to open the gryphon’s face up in several places. He took blows in return, but it wasn’t a contest until someone unexpectedly hit him from behind. Asher pitched forward, right into a rising knee from Loran. He tried to roll out of the way, but the blow still left him dazed and staggering.
The two gryphons—he saw Myles Chalmer had joined them now, his other foe from their night in the air—set to work beating on him.
The doors burst open and three men ran into the room. Two of them quickly subdued the pair of troublemakers, while the third kept Asher from retaliating any further.
The Guardians had arrived, and all the involved parties knew it was a very, very bad idea to piss one off.
“Thank you,” Asher said as he recovered his wits, preparing to stand.
One of the other men rose and turned on him. “Don’t you thank me yet, Owens,” Zander Pierce, one of his instructors at Top Scale, said. “And get your ass back on the ground. You stay right there until I get ahold of Blaine. We don’t tolerate this kind of shit at the Academy, and he’s going to grind that point into you until you never forget it. Understood?”
Asher swallowed hard, but he nodded anyway.
Fuck Fuck Fuck. Why did it have to be Zander?
He had screwed up big time now, and it sounded like they might kick him out of Top Scale! After just getting admitted into it, Asher was now on the verge of washing out. He slammed a fist into the ground and glared at Loran, who was grinning at him.
Zander noticed the look. “You aren’t in a better situation half-‘n’-half, so wipe that grin from your face or I’ll do it for you,” he vowed.
Loran turned an angry glare on Zander, but the dragon Guardian just let it slide off him. The term half-‘n’-half was a derogatory reference to the half-lion half-eagle makeup of the gryphons. They were proud of their heritage, and hated being mocked for it.
The pair sat there while Zander made a phone call. He spent a few terse moments speaking before he said something with a nod and returned to where Asher and Loran were.
“Asher. Leave is canceled. Go to the Academy from here. Understood?”
He opened his mouth to protest. Going straight back wasn’t an option! Quinn was expecting him back. They were going to have a nice picnic in his backyard, and then go stargazing again that night. He couldn’t just up and leave her. She would panic.
“Is there a problem, Owens?”
He clamped his jaw shut. Protesting wasn’t an option either. What was he going to say? “Sorry sir, I have a human staying illegally with me, who I’m falling for, so I can’t go there right away?”
Yeah, that wouldn’t work.
Asher shook his head. There was no way to detour quickly on his way either. His house was one way, and the Academy almost the direct opposite. Zander would know. Fuck. He had no choice.
“I’ll be on my way there then?” he asked, making sure it was okay to get up.
Loran still looked smug over the whole thing.
“Get out of my sight,” Zander said with an angry gesture. “I have to take care of this punk. We’ll see how impressed his elders are when I tell them what he’s been up to.”
The gryphon shifter’s face went pale. The elders of his kind were not the most forgiving folk when their youngster
s got into trouble. Asher flashed him a smile, knowing that he had it better.
Although he still had to face Blaine.
Gulp.
***
Asher tried to remain focused, but it was hard. He’d lived under what was effectively house arrest the past day and a half, the last of what was supposed to be his leave. Unable to even leave the dorm, he’d never felt more like a prisoner in his life. As a dragon, he longed for the sky over his head as often as possible. So in effect, Blaine and Daxxton—the Academy Commander—had tortured him.
Now he was outside, but still grounded, and it irked him. He wanted nothing more than to be back in the sky. Instead, he was waiting there for the other two recruits, as he had been since the night before. Blaine had told him to report to the parade ground, the term for the broad swath of stone circles out behind of the buildings.
“Owens! Get over here,” Blaine shouted.
He spun to see the Senior Instructor with Zeke and Dominick walking out from inside. He hurried over and fell into step.
“Today, we’re going to work on formation flying.”
The other two cadets groaned, but Asher kept his mouth shut. He wanted to remain as invisible as possible for the next little while. Not that he didn’t want to protest, mind you. Formation flying was boring, and while it helped ensure that they flew better as a team, it was generally useless to a dragon shifter.
“Don’t make noises at me. You can thank Owens for this one. His dedication to a little rough and tumble fun while on leave is the reasoning.”
Asher stared straight ahead as Zeke and then Dominick glared at him.
“Let’s start with some wingtip drills. Shall we say, four laps?”
Nobody responded.
“Perfect. Five laps it is,” Blaine said. “Get to it.”
Asher clenched his jaw and moved away to an unoccupied stone circle and summoned his dragon in a fit of fury. The spray of icy darts was stronger and more powerful this time, earning him a look from Blaine. But since it didn’t hit him, he said nothing, though Asher knew he would pay for it in time.
The course they were to fly—staying in a straight line with wingtips practically touching—was a ten-mile loop that was strategically marked out to avoid any and all thermals. So the dragons were forced to work the entire time. And now they had to do it five times. It wasn’t as bad as the other day, when they’d had to do it ten times. As a warmup, all while staying in such close proximity to each other, it would be more than painful enough.
“Sorry guys,” he said as they lifted into the air in their improving but still clumsy manners. “A gryphon started insulting me, and I just couldn’t hold back.”
“Fucking gryphons,” Zeke said, and Dominick grumbled his own reply. “I probably would have done the same. Did you win at least?”
“I was, until the second one hit me from behind without warning. I didn’t get a chance to recover and beat them both before Zander arrived with several other Guardians.”
There was some more angry rumblings, and then they reached cruising height, about one thousand feet give or take. By silent agreement, Asher took the center spot. The middle dragon was always slightly in front, and thus did more work. As the originator of the punishment, it was only fair that he did the brunt of the work.
The laps passed by slowly, monotonously. He grew frustrated. This was easy stuff. He wanted to be learning more, to be working at harder things and generally becoming a better flier.
He wanted to try The Course.
The course was a five-mile-long obstacle course, designed to challenge one’s swiftness, agility, and reaction time. The cadets were not allowed to preview the course. They only knew what was coming next as they achieved it. So far none of them had made it more than a mile in. The twists, turns, loops, and other terrain obstacles—it was all close to the ground—meant that it was grueling, and they just weren’t up to that standard.
Yet.
Asher was going to get there.
“Done!” Zeke crowed as they finished the last loop. He and Dominick peeled off, heading down to the stones for more instructions.
Asher pushed on, banking to the right and descending toward the first part of the Course. There were large metal circles that the dragons had to go through, each marked in ascending numerical order.
The catch was, most of them weren’t big enough to go through with his wings extended. As he approached the first, he brought his wings in and dropped through the first one in a near vertical descent before snapping them out to the side and angling into a forty-five-degree dive. Wings in, and he was through the second, only to beat frantically as he needed to move up to hit the third.
He made it through the sixth, flinging his wings out wide as he banked hard to the left right away and then rolled onto his back before dropping straight down through the next loop, which took him down into a trench-like canyon. Now he was forced to operate in close confines.
This is where it got tricky, and where he’d bailed out at the end. The next series of gates had him moving in an upward climb to the right, until he was literally headed the opposite direction at the end. It required some sharp abilities that he had yet to master.
Concentrating, he hit the gates with full speed, a tactic he had not tried yet. There was time for a single course-correcting beat of his wings between gates, and then he was forced to snap them in and out in rapid-fire motion.
He cleared the third of five, tendons screaming as he rolled up and over, inverting for a precious second to help reorient himself. Four! Only one more to go. He’d never gotten this far before!
I’m going to make it, I—
A bolt of Electrofire slammed into his side, rendering his wing useless.
Asher didn’t think; he just reacted to the sudden attack. His wing drooped to his side, but it was too late. He snapped his other wing in, tumbled through the fifth hoop and rolled to his side, inhaling sharply. The familiar tingle of his Frostfire came to him and then, in a burst of sudden clarity, the feeling intensified to a level beyond anything he’d felt before.
A cone of Frostfire spewed from his mouth, tracking up the side and across the golden wing of his attacker. Still he vomited the fire at his foe, a powerful, unending streak of it.
Dragonfire came from the glimmering yellowy snout, slamming into his Frostfire with a massive force, melting it faster than he could spew it.
As Asher tumbled out of range at last, he got a complete glimpse of his attacker.
His golden-colored attacker.
It was Daxxton Ryker, Wing Commander of Top Scale Academy.
He’d just attacked the most feared dragon in Cadia and much of the shifter kingdom.
Oh fuck. Why is it always me?
Asher slowed his fall, watching as the golden dragon flexed its powerful wing and the coating of ice shattered, falling to the ground below. Some of it bounced off of Asher, but he decided against saying anything. Instead he continued to descend back to the cluster of stone circles by the Academy. He didn’t look over his shoulder, but the shadows on the ground told him Daxxton was pacing him.
He shifted back immediately as the gold dragon landed next to him. A frosty mist that flickered with electricity rose up around the dragon and then evaporated a split second later as Daxxton reappeared in his human form.
“Asher. What were you thinking there?”
He paused. Hot rage, fury, anger…he had expected that from Daxxton. The cold steel of his voice was anything but, however, and it cut through all the meager defenses Asher had been preparing.
“Sir, I just reacted to the attack and—”
“Not that, Asher. You were told to do ten laps of wingtip formation.”
“Yes sir. We completed the required laps.”
“Why did you not report back here with your fellow recruits?”
Here it comes, he thought. I’m fucked now. “I,” he hesitated. “I’m not really sure, sir. I wanted to prove to myself, I guess, that even af
ter doing the laps I wanted a bigger challenge. Something more. After that, I didn’t think, I just reacted. Through the entire course, even when you hit me with the bolt. I wasn’t thinking, I just reacted to the attack sir. That’s why I made it as far as I did, and that’s why I fired back at you sir. I wasn’t thinking.”
It was the truth. Asher had fallen into a different sort of mental zone while moving through the course this time. Everything had seemed to slow around him, and he just knew what to do.
“Sir,” he asked before Daxxton could respond.
“What is it, Asher?”
Still the calm, unyielding steel that didn’t seem to carry any anger with it. He had to be upset though, but he was doing an impeccable job of not showing it.
“Do dragons have the ability to slow time? Or to increase their reaction speed faster than normal? While I was flying it was…different. I could almost see much faster than I was moving, and process those thoughts, so that I could make the proper course adjustments as I went. But I wasn’t actively thinking about it. I don’t really know how to describe it, sir.”
Daxxton looked at him oddly, then stepped closer.
“It is an ability,” he said with a nod of his head. “But few dragons are blessed with it. In fact, I only know one other.”
“Really, sir? Who, if I may ask? I would like to talk to them about it.”
Daxxton gave him a long look. “Me. And perhaps we will talk about it at some point. For now though, you need to shape up, and obey orders. You are going to be in a world of trouble when Blaine gets here.” He nodded at the Senior Instructor who was angrily walking over to them.
“But you did better on the course than any cadet has done in their first semester in over three centuries. And you not only manifested your breath weapon, but you were able to keep it manifested. You may have gone about them in the wrong way, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t good work. So between you and me, we shall call it settled. But I cannot promise what Blaine is going to do to you.”
“Yes sir,” Asher said, trying not to jump with excitement.
No matter what Blaine might do to him, he’d just received high praise from Daxxton Ryker himself! He could live with more drills. He’d fly fifty wingtip laps if necessary. He didn’t care!