Inferno

by Amelia Jade

  “For us, Nyxie. Our race. Things have changed drastically. The technology, the weapons they have. We are no longer safe. We must conceal ourselves. Fighting like this will only kill the both of us!”

  “No, Obsidian. It will only kill YOU!”

  The last word was accompanied by a tremendous roar, and the bronze dragon protecting her was thrown backward. His hind leg hit Hollie and she went tumbling across the packed dirt, bouncing and rolling until she came to a halt twenty feet away in a coughing, heaving pile of pain.

  Really, really bad pain. Perhaps not excruciating, but certainly on par with, if not a little above, stubbing a toe or hitting a shin off the corner of an unruly coffee table. It took her several long moments to recover her breath. Behind her she could hear the sounds of struggle.

  She turned just in time to see a dragon of deep silver use its tail to connect with Obsidian’s head. The bronze dragon fell, stunned, though he still managed to keep himself between the larger purple dragon and her. Hollie watched in horror as Nyx jumped into the air, beating his wings swiftly to gain attitude. He swooped low once, sending her diving for cover before he turned and winged away.

  Directly toward Drake’s Crossing. Toward her home.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Obsidian

  “Sid!”

  Something tiny was shaking his head. He blinked and shook himself slightly to clear the cobwebs from his brain. He vaguely heard a shriek and something that sounded like “Hey, watch it!” but he ignored it.

  “Ow. What the hell was that?” Lifting his head, he looked around cautiously.

  “Uh, that was the tail of what I guess is your brother,” Hollie replied. “But you need to focus on me for a second.”

  “No, I need to get him. To stop him.”

  “No,” she said fiercely. “You need to change back to your human form. I can hear shouts coming from the tunnel. We need to leave, but not with me riding your back.”

  He looked around and nodded. She was right. He focused for a moment, and was back into his human form. Picking himself up gingerly, he accepted her offer of an arm, though truthfully he didn’t need it. But it helped Hollie feel like she was helping, and while she was perhaps not doing so physically, the mental and emotional component to it was just as important to him. She was telling him she would be there to pick him up when he fell, that she would stand by him.

  To Sid, that meant a lot.

  “Come on, my car,” she said, dragging him by the elbow. “No time to lose.”

  On that front she was right. Nyx was swiftly fading into the distance. He could fly a straight line, whereas they would need to drive along the road. Stopping him before he got in range of the town was going to be hard.

  “Holy shit!” he yelped as Hollie’s car shot forward, slamming him into the back of the seat from the acceleration. “Don’t kill us, woman!”

  The feisty brown-haired woman slammed on the brakes and Sid barely got his hands up in time to stop him from hitting the dash. “What?!”

  She glared at him. “Do not refer to me as ‘woman’ like that. I am a woman, but my name is Hollie. Got it?”

  He swallowed, momentarily more afraid of her wrath than facing his older brother. “Got it.”

  “Good. Now, do you wish me to catch up to your brother, who you just so happened to not tell anyone was also buried there, or shall we take a nice, stately drive back to town and arrive only after it’s in flames?”

  Sid thrust out his lower jaw angrily.

  “Fast?” she prompted.

  He nodded, refusing to speak.

  “Good. Then buckle up and hold onto your nuts, flyboy!”

  The car was already racing ahead before she finished speaking, flying through a curve with a loud screech as the tires made contact with the hard surface of the road underneath. The sound reached his ears, followed moments later by the smell.

  “Ugh, what is that?”

  “Will you stop complaining?” she muttered, focusing on the wheel as they raced down after the receding purple form of his brother. “Seriously, you fly faster than this.”

  “Yes, but I’m not surrounded by a huge box of metal on the ground!” he protested. “And besides, when I’m flying I’m in—” He stopped abruptly.

  “Go on,” Hollie urged as they hit a straightaway and accelerated even more.

  Sid shook his head violently. “Nope, I’m good.”

  “Please, do enlighten me. When you’re flying you’re in…what?”

  He shook his head again, making negative sounds, refusing to answer.

  “Wuss.”

  “Genius,” he countered with a smile, willing his fingers not to destroy anything as he sought for something to hold onto as they swerved around a particularly tight corner. His insides tightened considerably.

  But as they rounded the next bend he saw that they had gained considerably on Nyx.

  “There he is!” he pointed excitedly. “Get me closer, and I’ll stop him.”

  Hollie just nodded, tightening her grip on the wheel. Sid stayed quiet as they raced to beat the dragon. The town was still around one final hill. It appeared Nyx was taking the leisurely route, or perhaps he wasn’t even aware of its location, because he was winging along between the hills instead of angling up and over the final one on a straightaway track. If Sid could reach him soon, he could stop him before anyone saw what was going on.

  To their right the ground rose up suddenly, driving them along a cliff face as the ground to their left fell away into a gorge containing the North Fork River. Sid had learned that it was called Drake’s Crossing because farther upriver the land caught up with the gorge, providing the only easy crossing for a hundred or so miles in either direction.

  “Open this!” he shouted, pointing at the window in the roof of the car. “It opens, right?”

  “Sure does, press and hold that button,” Hollie said in a normal voice, taking her hand from the wheel for a second to show him.

  He stabbed the button down and the window retracted six inches before stopping.

  “What? Is that it?” he complained. “I can’t fit through there. Not without breaking it.”

  “Then break it!” she cried. “You can pay for it later if we make it through.”

  Shrugging, he wrenched the glass up and out of the way.

  “Now, care to tell me why you broke my perfectly good sunroof, Sid?” she asked casually.

  He stood up, speaking loud to be heard over the sudden rushing of wind.

  “My name is OBSIDIAN!”

  The last word came out as a trumpeted challenge that he flung at Nyx, cruising below them in the gorge. His legs flexed and his hands propelled him upward into the air. Huge bronze wings erupted from his back, catching the wind and forcing him out into open air. He waited the split second for the change to be complete, then tucked his wings in tighter and dove down on his older brother like a bird of prey.

  “NYX!” he roared as he closed on the amethyst dragon.

  A bolt of jagged rock as dark as his brother’s heart raced at Obsidian. He rolled and unleashed a blast of fire from his own mouth, the white-hot ball of flame flashing across the distance.

  Nyx flipped over and dropped out of range, but his stomach still discolored slightly from the heat, and Obsidian knew he’d dealt the first blow. He twitched his huge wings into action, propelling him closer with greater speed.

  “Fire, dear brother? Really?”

  Obsidian ignored the jabs and followed it up with three blasts of his own rock, focusing on the glands in his mouth that would produce the weapon. Nyx cursed and only avoided two of the three ten-foot-long lances that shot at him. The third creased his neck, popping a few scales off as it passed.

  Nyx spat four fireballs at him in rapid succession. None of them would be fatal—they were small in size—but he followed that up with a flurry of lances of dark rock as well. Obsidian’s eyes went wide at the sheer display of power. To unleash so much energy all at once
must have really taxed his brother’s reserves. Obsidian smiled.

  That had always been the difference between him and his brother. Nyx was unbeatable in a straight-up fight. He was one of the most powerful dragons Obsidian had ever known. But he was shortsighted, and had little stamina. If one could withstand his brutality for long enough, he would tire himself out.

  Which is how his little brother had imprisoned him nearly six hundred years earlier, after learning he’d wiped out an entire civilization in this part of the world. Humans thought the disappearance of them a mystery, but Obsidian knew the truth. His brother was a monster.

  Deep down he maintained hope that there was still good in him, but he’d yet to figure out just what the catalyst was that would bring it out. It was why he’d buried him alive last time, forcing him into the sleep, instead of killing him. Obsidian couldn’t bring himself to kill his brother. Not even after all the horrors he’d been responsible for over the years.

  You’re not innocent yourself. You have much to atone for in this new world. If you survive, you will be working a long, long time to pay for your sins.

  Obsidian brought himself back to the present just in time to roll out of the path of his brother’s assault. All but one lance of rock missed him. That one impaled his hind leg, forcing a roar of pain from his mouth that he couldn’t hold back, but it was far from a battle-winning injury.

  “Give it up, little brother!” Nyx told him, powering himself ahead with huge strokes of his wings. “I have returned!”

  “You imbecile. You’re not even fully awake yet. You can’t beat me!” he shouted back. “Stop this madness now before your wings give out and you drown!”

  Nyx just laughed and fired more bolts of rock at Obsidian.

  Angrily he showed his brother just how much energy he had to waste. Inhaling, Obsidian used his fire to burn the lances from the sky, a casual waste of power that even Nyx would realize was telling of how overmatched Nyx was at the moment.

  But when his vision cleared, his brother wasn’t there. Obsidian looked around frantically, until he spied him higher in the air, flying out of the gorge.

  And right toward Hollie, who had stopped her car to watch the battle.

  Obsidian had one chance. He focused his will, wanting to try a new trick with his breath weapons, one he’d not considered until reading about some of the modern weapons humans had. He could form the long lances and send one after another of those slowly at his brother. That was tried and true dragon warfare, using the power of their earth to fight each other, to impale limbs and shred wings until their foes plummeted from the air.

  But any lance would defeat his dragon scales, one of the few things he knew that could. There was no reason it had to be ten feet long. Even the five-foot lengths seemed excessive.

  Which is why when Obsidian exhaled a literal storm of lances no more than a few inches long flew at his brother. He vomited a near constant stream of them, aiming for the space between Nyx and Hollie, and then backtracked.

  Nyx looked at the last second and did the only thing he could think of. He spread his wings wide and halted his momentum, hanging there in midair. Unfortunately for him, the fléchette gun that was Obsidian’s breath weapon had already been tracking for him.

  Dozens of tiny spears of black rock pierced his brother’s wings.

  Obsidian watched as his brother seemed to flip over backward, and then plunged from the sky. Grimly he saw him hit the river, sending a plume of water high into the sky. A massive wave rolled out from the point of impact, the crest rising eight or nine feet high as it headed downstream, the current washing away the rest.

  “Are you okay?” he shouted at Hollie.

  There was no response from where he had last seen her up on the ledge looking down into the gorge as he and Nyx did battle. Fearful for her safety, he beat his wings frantically, expending energy rapidly until he cleared the edge.

  A piece of black stone whipped across the edge of his snout as he crested the top, followed swiftly by another.

  “Hollie!” he shouted, ignoring the pain from the impact. “It’s me.”

  She screamed and threw another piece.

  “It’s Sid. Hollie. It’s Sid.” He landed on the edge. “Are you okay?”

  His mate finally paused and looked up at him. “You made it.”

  “Yes,” he assured her. “I did. I need to know if you are hurt. Nyx is down, but I need to ensure he stays that way.”

  “I’m okay. Terrified and not entirely sure my legs are working enough to let me stand up, but I’m not hurt,” she told him.

  “You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that. Now, stay here.”

  Obsidian pushed off with his hind legs, ignoring the pain from where he’d been hit, and swooped down into the depths of the gorge where Nyx was just pulling himself from the river. His wings were starting to repair, but the damage had been extensive enough that it would require much of his energy. The battle was over.

  “Hello brother,” Nyx said as he approached.

  “Shut up.”

  The amethyst-scaled dragon laughed weakly. “You’ve grown up, I see. Learning new tricks, as well.”

  Obsidian sighed, his wings vibrating slightly. Behind him his tail twitched. “Brother, it has been six hundred years since you were last awake. So much has changed, it is impossible for us to understand. What I have read…you wouldn’t believe some of it.”

  Nyx snorted. “You sound infatuated.”

  “Perhaps I am. But the things they can do these days… The technology has advanced so far beyond what we’d ever imagined. They have harnessed the power of lightning, and use it to operate all sorts of contraptions.”

  “Like that metal box your mate was moving?”

  “The car, yes,” he said with a sharp glance. “How did you know she was my mate?”

  “Your scent is all over her. It clogs my nose and makes me want to vomit. It is obvious for anyone to see. Be wary of that, little brother. Others will come now. They will have sensed our battle today.”

  Obsidian growled angrily. “I’m aware. Which is why I tried to talk to you.”

  Nyx flapped his wings in defeat, the equivalent to a human shrug. “I never was much of a talker. That shouldn’t surprise you.” He scowled, a fearsome expression when displayed on a dragon visage. “Though I seem to remember you being a little more bloodthirsty yourself. Obsidian the Destroyer, was it?”

  He slapped the ground with his tail. “That time is over, Onyx. The past is in the past. We must adapt if we wish to survive. The weapons that humans have now, they are vast and powerful. They have things that could obliterate us, and they don’t even need to close to use them. Oh, their little guns are still no threat. But the bigger ones, and the advanced ones…I have seen video. They can send chunks of metal hundreds of times faster than we can fling rock at ourselves.”

  Obsidian looked around, fearful that they may have already been spotted. “We are lucky that no one seems to have spotted us yet. It means there may still be time.”

  His brother looked up at him as Obsidian shuffled slightly around. “Time left for what?”

  A bronze-scaled tail slammed into Onyx’s head, dropping him flat.

  “Time left to bury you under a new mountain.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Hollie

  Eventually the rumble faded away.

  At first she’d thought it was a noise, but eventually she’d come to the conclusion that it was more a vibration than anything, emanating from under the side of the miniature mountain upon which her car was currently parked, and where she was lying on the ground, trying to sort out everything that had just happened.

  All around her lay black rock that had bounced off of Nyx. The sound of it as he’d been hit dozens of times had been deafening, and his wings had flung many of the tiny projectiles out and away from him. They were scattered across the ground, some lying on their sides, others sticking up from the ground. More had punctured her
car’s body and now just hung there limply, too small to have done much more than superficial damage to the metal.

  Unfortunately, Hollie’s leg wasn’t made of metal. She rolled back over now to take another look at the piece of black stone that was embedded deep within her leg. The pain was near unbearable and even from that little movement she nearly passed out. Concealing it from Obsidian had been almost impossible. She figured it was only because he had been so focused on Nyx that she got away with it.

  Now though she sprawled out on the ground, moaning softly to herself, trying to ignore the agony as well as the damp wetness that indicated blood.

  “Well fuck me,” she cursed softly between ragged breaths.

  It was her own stupidity that had killed her. After Sid had leapt from her car like a secret agent in some sort of spy movie, she’d kept up with the dragons until she’d come to this bend in the road. The metal guardrail extended out, providing parking and viewing space of the gorge for several cars. She’d watched the fight happen from there, until the purple dragon had come for her. All Hollie had to do was hide, to get in the car and drive away, or get behind it. But instead she’d stood her ground and started shouting obscenities, even as death loomed up before her.

  Never before had she been so scared. Not even in the cave with Sid on the day her life was changed forever. Seeing Nyx bearing down on her had produced some of the bone-deep horror that you only ever read about, that she’d never thought could affect her. So she’d stayed in place, both yelling at him and screaming at the top of her lungs, until the hail of black daggers had appeared as if shooting up from the ground.

  The warmth on her thighs was slowly spreading. She didn’t want to look, not wanting to see the mangled ruins of her leg. Her only goal now was to hold on long enough for Sid to return. She needed to tell him something. To let him in on what she’d been holding back. Hollie had hoped they would have time, time for her to ensure that what she was feeling wasn’t just a rush of feeling that happened anytime she started to crush on someone. It felt different, and she’d heard of people who just knew that someone they’d met was the person for them. Until Sid, however, she’d been a little skeptical of those claims. Now though, with her remaining time limited, she wanted to ensure he knew how she felt. Hollie wanted no secrets.