by Amelia Jade
It took several moments for the shouts to penetrate his sleep-infused fog.
“What?” he asked, sitting up.
“Move it, cadet!” Blaine Wingstar, senior instructor at the Top Scale Academy shouted at him. “Outside, on the double.”
Zeke shook his head, but his body was already responding. He slid from the bed, pants halfway up his waist before he even realized he was doing it. Socks, shoes, and a shirt followed, and he headed outside the fastest way he knew how.
The three-story drop out the window from his room to the ground was nothing with his enhanced muscles. He dropped to one knee, powerful legs absorbing the force of the landing easily. Rising, he strode across the large stone circles that dotted the rear courtyard of the tri-winged Academy building.
“What’s going on?” asked Asher Owens, one of the two other members of the cadet trio. He came up alongside him, having used the same method to descend.
“No idea,” he replied as they approached the figures in the dark.
He knew their outlines by heart at this point.
Off to the right, shorter and slimmer than the others, was Rhynne Nova, a Fire Dragon like him, and one of the instructors at the Academy. She specialized in breath weapons. Her disinterested face and crossed arms were a constant, something that Zeke now realized was not because of the cadets, though they often received the brunt of her displeasure.
To her left was Zander Pierce, a Brass Dragon. He was their aerial combat instructor. Skilled at the art of fighting while flying, Zeke had learned much from him, though he still had a lot more to learn judging by his test scores. The Brass Dragons were a bit of an oddity among shifters. They could breathe the very wind itself. It didn’t sound like much, but Zeke had the bruises to prove that the force of condensed air hurt. When in flight, it could completely derail his wings, sending him spinning from the sky.
He and Asher came to a halt several paces in front of Blaine. Blaine was a Green Dragon shifter, who could breathe clouds of noxious fumes at his opponents that affected the nervous and circulatory system. He was in charge of them from day to day, unless something big or serious came up.
In which case the shifter to his left, standing tall and serene as he surveyed the group of dragons, came into the spotlight.
Daxxton Ryker, Wing Commander and Master of Top Scale.
The single most feared dragon in all of Cadia, and possibly the world. Asher and Zeke, along with the late-arriving Dominick, the third cadet, all bowed their heads respectfully. They did so to all of their instructors, but most of all to Daxxton.
Daxxton was a Gold Dragon, the most powerful, and rarest type of dragon shifter. Larger than his contemporaries, he was nearly as fast as Zander, stronger than Blaine, and could choose between three breath weapons that all hit harder than Rhynne could. His ability to spew Frostfire, Dragonfire, or Electrofire was a powerful tool that left him as the undisputed power in this part of the world.
Whenever he addressed the cadets, they listened.
“Tonight, we have a different task for you,” Daxxton said.
Zeke straightened, both at the words and also the tone. Daxxton was often formal and slow-speaking. Today, he was all about business. The message was clear.
Shut up and don’t fuck around. This is serious.
“One of the Border Guardians to the northwest reported an incursion of some sort. As they were on foot, they were unable to follow and lost it. There was a commotion, and what sounded like lots of screaming. There’s a possibility of shifter involvement, and perhaps someone coming into Cadia from outside. As the nearest group of flight-capable shifters, we have been tasked with scouring the area from the sky.”
Daxxton turned and gave instructions on certain areas to Rhynne, Zander, and Blaine, who immediately turned and made their way to the center of one of the stone circles. Zeke wanted to watch, but his attention was dragged back as Daxxton continued to speak.
“As you are not yet graduates of Top Scale, nor are you Border Guardians, I am obliged not to send you out on your own.”
Zeke frowned. Why get them up then? That made no sense.
A slight smile crossed Daxxton’s face. “However, I will be sending you out together as a team. You will have the area directly to the south of Carver’s Peak. Do you know the one?”
“I do,” Zeke said. “It has two points, as if someone hit it with an axe.”
“That’s the one. Go now. Search the area. Report back here after you have surveyed it completely. Understood?”
The three nodded eagerly.
“Get going then,” Daxxton said as he moved to the center of his own circle.
Zeke, despite wanting to watch, turned and sprinted for the nearest empty circle. All around him the others did the same. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw green mist swirl up and around Blaine, obscuring him from view. He knew similar scenes were occurring behind him. For now though, Zeke was focused on himself.
He slid to a halt in the stone circle and reached inside himself, into his mind, closing his eyes.
There.
The wellspring of power came to him quickly, and he let it flow out from the carefully constructed cage he kept it in. The bright light in his mind rushed out eagerly, almost sentient, as if it knew what was coming. Smoke and flame swirled up from his feet until it encompassed him.
Flickers of red and orange appeared in front of his eyelids, moving in and out of sight as the dark gray smoke obscured them. His eyes remained closed; he knew the sight well by now. Instead he focused on the way it affected him. His limbs swelled in size, joints reversing in on themselves as his head pushed away from his body.
It didn’t hurt, but there was a brief moment of confusion, though it lasted barely an eyeblink. Then he felt the thick, armored scales erupt across his skin, and his eyes snapped open.
Huge blood-red wings the size of a school bus snapped open, reaching from one end to the other of the fifty-foot-wide stone circle. They beat once, twice, and then Zeke launched himself into the air with a powerful spring from his legs. He continued to drive upward, his wings sending huge gusts of air downward. The air swirled the last embers of the fire that had spread across the stones and extinguished them.
He saw Asher lift off from his circle, the stones covered in a thick layer of ice the same brilliant white as his scales. His friend was a Frost Dragon, imbued with the ability to create Frostfire.
Neither of them, nor Dominick—the sapphire-hued shifter now lifting away from a miniature storm of electricity that fizzled out over the stones—could shift as smoothly as their instructors.
Nor could most dragons, hence the stone circles everywhere they went. This not only gave a designated place for shifting, but ensured that the ground was kept intact elsewhere, and not destroyed by the frequent comings and goings of his kind.
“Lead on,” Asher said as the arctic snow-colored dragon drew even with him. “You know the way.”
Zeke nodded, easily able to understand the words, even though they came from the dragon’s snout with a bit of a sibilant hiss to them.
“Of course,” he replied. “If you two will just assume tri-wing formation, we shall be on our way.”
Dominick snorted at him from the other side, but fell back off his right wing. Asher did the same on his left, forming a triangle. Zeke guided them to the nearest thermal and they spiraled upward into the sky with ease before winging their way north.
“So what are we looking for?” Dom asked, his voice barely labored from the exertion of flying as fast as they were.
Months ago, Zeke knew they would all have been dying from exhaustion already. But the rigorous training, exercises, and knowledge of just how to tap into the power their dragon halves represented had allowed the three of them to become faster, stronger, and more agile than all but the best of their kind.
That was the goal of Top Scale. To take a regular dragon who could barely fly and turn him into something more. Few got this opportunity, and Z
eke had tried as hard the rest, wanting to make the most of it and prove he was worthy. So far nobody had sent him home, but he hadn’t graduated yet either. So every day he pushed himself harder.
“Anything out of the ordinary, I guess,” he said, unsure himself.
“Are we supposed to report you then?” Asher asked from behind him.
Zeke rolled his eyes, and with a quick glance over his shoulder, smacked his tail against Asher’s long neck. “Play nice,” he ordered with a laugh.
The others joined in, the mood jovial. For the moment. As they drew closer to their assigned search area, Zeke grew more serious. Someone must suspect something had happened, otherwise all the dragons would not have been dispatched. This was big, and they needed to be on point—alert and cautious. It could be anything. Wars between shifters were largely a thing of the past, but if one of the other territories had decided to try and take over Cadia, he wasn’t going to let his team be caught unawares.
Listen to yourself. Shifter wars? There hasn’t been a full-scale war between territories in nearly two centuries. You need to get a grip, and start searching.
“Let’s fan out. Five hundred feet separation. Follow my lead.”
The others acknowledged and began to drift away from him, their attention focused on the plains below them. This territory was mostly occupied by tigers, lions, and other big cats. There were few trees until they got closer to the mountains.
Zeke looked northwest. Due north the mesa they were on descended into the vastness of the other plains, the border of Cadia to the north. But to the northwest, pocketed on three sides by smaller offshoot mountains, was the home of the gryphons.
He made sure not to venture too far that way. Gryphons were notorious for their hatred for dragons. Straying into their home would be a quick way to get hurt, or worse.
They soared through the air, their huge membranous wings keeping them aloft and steady as their ultra-sharp eyes scanned the ground, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Even in the dark, they were able to pick out small details, despite being a thousand feet up.
Like that mouse darting for cover as his form briefly eclipsed the moon over it.
Or the owl swooping in, already having locked onto its prey.
But he saw nothing out of the ordinary. Intermittent checks with his fellows indicated they too weren’t seeing anything.
“Let’s make one last check between the two mountains, and then we’ll head on back I guess,” he said, banking to the left. Although the border of Cadia did not officially end at the pass between the two peaks, it was where they stopped patrolling. The other side was just open ground, not suitable for anything.
The three of them crossed into the open area without incident.
It was Dom who spotted it first.
“Anyone see what I’m seeing? Three o’clock,” he said from his position to Zeke’s right.
The Fire Dragon swiveled his head on its long neck.
“What the hell?” he asked, and the trio banked in near unison, heading closer to the unexpected sight.
“That looks like…” Dom was so thrown off he couldn’t finish his sentence.
“Construction equipment. Human construction equipment.”
Without saying anything, Zeke dropped lower. There did not seem to be anyone around. His eyes picked out what they were doing, and traced the black line snaking back toward human-owned land.
“It’s a pipeline,” he said, regaining altitude and rejoining the others as they circled the spot briefly.
“Well, I think this qualifies as out of place,” Asher said, the others agreeing heartily.
“Let’s go then.”
Zeke nodded and their wings dipped, turning the huge creatures back onto a course for Top Scale.
They made it back across the plains before he spotted it.
“Stay here,” he told the others as a flurry of movement caught his eye.
Zeke folded his wings in and dropped from the sky like a stone before they could respond. Behind him he heard Asher curse, but he pushed it out of his mind.
Something down there looked out of place. He couldn’t see in infrared, but his eyes told him that something was unnatural. As he descended, he realized it was the orientation of the leaves organized in a cluster. His wings snapped open at the last minute and he forced them downward.
The wind gusted and blew the long, oval-shaped leaves away.
Leaving behind one terrified huddled form.
A human form.
***
His taloned paws settled down into the earth and he folded his wings alongside his body, keeping some distance between him and the human.
Her.
It was a female, he realized with a start. She was dirty and shivering in the cool night air. Without thinking he inhaled and unleashed a breath of warm air, hoping to help warm her slightly.
“Please don’t kill me!” she yelled, curling up even tighter, if it was at all possible.
He recoiled.
“Kill you?” he asked in confusion. “Why am I going to kill you?”
She had her fingers clamped over her face. At his words, two of her fingers split apart, revealing a hazel-brown eye that focused on him with sudden intelligence.
“You can speak?”
“Either that, or you’re hallucinating,” he replied, trying to lighten the mood after his aborted attempt to help earlier.
The hands fell away from her face and she sat up. The woman was still shivering and covered in dirt, but the meek helplessness suddenly dissipated into thin air. If Zeke could have arched an eyebrow in his current form, he would have. The change was so abrupt it would have been impossible for him not to notice.
“I’m not going crazy.” She frowned. “Yet. I mean, I am talking to a dragon, but I know where I am, and I know dragon shifters really exist. It’s amazing, yes, but it’s definitely real. I just didn’t know you could speak English while like that.”
The analytical side of her surprised him, but he found himself smiling. She was strong, this one.
“Who are you, young lady?” he asked. “Why are you here?”
She crouched down, eyes widening in fear slightly as the other two dragons descended beside him.
“Stay back,” he said loudly to his friends as some of her skittish behavior returned.
The other dragons, recognizing something in his voice, moved away, muttering amongst themselves until they were out of hearing range. He purposefully tuned out some of the mutterings, knowing they were intending for him to hear them.
“Why are you here?” he asked again, injecting a bit of steel into his voice.
“I’m honestly not sure,” she said, wrapping her hands around her knees as she sat upright, looking over at him.
Zeke thought about resuming his human form, but decided it wasn’t worth the energy expenditure just then. Not until he knew more about the situation.
“How did you get here?” he asked, trying another tactic.
“I was…” she trailed off, then looked up at him. “I was kidnapped,” she said, as if she didn’t truly believe it. A harsh laugh came from her throat. “There’s a sentence I never thought would apply to me.”
“Kidnapped?” he asked in surprise. “That’s a rather harsh accusation. And where are your kidnappers?”
He was trying to be firm and analytical, but he couldn’t stop himself from staring at her. It was getting harder to be a neutral party. She was gorgeous.
Medium height, with shorter hair that barely reached her shoulders. The black locks bounced as she talked, creating yet another distraction. She was slightly thicker around the hips and waist, but her movements told him she wasn’t self-conscious about it, and made it work for her. He admired that.
Her brown eyes were, while stunning, still brimming with intelligence. He saw that each of her ears had two piercings, a small hoop at the bottom, and a stud near the top. It was a nice look, one that suited her well. It complemented her up
turned nose and rosy cheeks quite well.
Despite his sudden raging attraction to a woman whose name he didn’t even know, Zeke forced himself to maintain composure. And he definitely did not allow himself to look at the way her current pose pressed her breasts together, showing ample cleavage through the rip in her shirt.
Or her plump, utterly kissable lips. Nope, he definitely wasn’t looking at either one. And Zeke was absolutely, positively, not switching his gaze back and forth between them. Not at all. That would be rude and inappropriate.
Angry at himself, he tore his eyes away and focused back on her face.
Talk. Talk to her. Focus on that instead. Get her name.
“I don’t know,” she said, responding to his question before he could ask another.
“What is your name?”
She looked at him warily, as if trying to decide whether she could safely let him know.
Zeke looked around at the nothingness that surrounded them, as if saying “Where else are you going to go?”
“Amber,” she said at last, reluctantly. “My name is Amber.”
He nodded. “And why would someone kidnap you and drop you here in the middle of Cadia, Amber? Would it have anything to do with the pipeline being built just beyond those mountains?” he asked, pointing over to his left with one wing.
She squirmed, looking unhappy, but nodded. “Yes, but probably not for the reason you might think.”
He stayed silent, allowing her to continue speaking.
Amber finally picked up on this. “I work for Imperial Petroleum Products,” she said, naming one of the huge multinational corporations that existed out in the human world.
Zeke didn’t know much about them, but they were large enough that the name had leaked its way even into Cadia.
“So somebody found out you were building in prohibited areas, and decided they would do something about it?” he supplied.
“No,” she replied instantly and firmly, the sharpness of her tone catching his attention.
“No,” she said a little more gently. “That’s not quite correct. You see, I was the one who discovered that we were not building the pipeline along the specified path, but had instead deviated inside of Cadia.”