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I squint against the lingering flurries, and the sight robs me of my breath. Because it’s been flying up while we were flying down, it’s nearly level with us, mirroring our flight path with eerie precision.

The black wings and body stand out in stark contrast to the surrounding white. This creature could be a shadow of Kaida. Twisted and distorted, the beast is enormous, longer than the largest dragon I’ve ever seen from tail tip to chin. Wings sweep like waves, boneless and once again too long, too pointed.

Four appendages hang below it, tapering off into razor-sharp points. Its tail is too long and whiplike, and there’s no defined head with a snout and frill. Instead, a bulbous shape tops the end aimed in our direction, and hungry, black eyes devour us with malevolent intent.

A horrified shudder racks my body as the utter wrongness of the creature swamps me.

“Drachen!” I gasp. My voice is barely audible even to myself, so I start screaming to make sure he understands. “Bastian, that’s not a dragon. It’s a drachen!” A fully corporeal drachen.

Panic spikes in my chest, mixing with the ceaseless terror emitting from the creature as my dampening shield falters again. The realization hits me hard as Kaida bellows in fear. Bastian hunches low, his body rigid.

Every time I screw up, Kaida suffers too, but now isn’t the time to freeze.

Not when every second counts. Not when the lives of those I care about hang in the balance.

I refuse to let the fear claim me. Not today. Redoubling my efforts, I dampen again, knowing if I falter with the drachen this close, it could be the end of all three of us.

No pressure.

Every instinct screams at me to flee, to escape this embodiment of nightmares. “Keep going, Kaida! Get us out of here!”

I don’t know if we can outrun a drachen, but we have to try.

“We can’t just try to outfly it all the way back to the palace!” Bastian urges Kaida to move faster. “We need a plan.”

A plan.

Right.

“Working on it!”

The drachen, a slithering mass of darkness and dread, elongates impossibly before my eyes. It lunges, bulbous head splitting into a gaping maw lined with daggers for teeth, aiming straight for Bastian and me.

Kaida’s reaction is instant, his heavy tail swinging with the force of a trebuchet.

The clubbed end connects with a sickening thud, sending the drachen reeling to the side.

I want to send my praise directly to Kaida but can’t with the dampening shield in place. Unable to share emotions, I need to rely on voice and body language, like any other dragonrider. “Nice one!” I shout, clinging to Kaida’s scales as he rights himself in the air.

My mind races. Every weapon we used against the drachen before proved useless. Not once did our spears or swords or arrows connect…all bladed weapons. Is it the bluntness of Kaida’s tail that makes the difference? Or maybe this nightmarish creature has somehow evolved into a fully physical form that can be wounded, unlike the shadowy creatures we first encountered.

Either way, relief is short-lived as the drachen recovers with frightening speed, charging at us again with renewed hunger.

“Shit!” Bastian curses as he twists around to track its approach, his focus sharp as flint.

We can’t keep dodging this thing forever.

Fire answers Bastian’s call, sitting in his palm before he snaps his arm forward and lances it, spear-like, at the approaching drachen.

Flames dance at my fingertips, desperate and ravenous. Every time the drachen nears, I pepper its eyes with a multitude of small sparks. In front of me, Bastian does the same, his magic less potent but more concentrated since he doesn’t need to hold the bubble of warmth at the same time.

The drachen weaves through our fiery assault, its form contorting like smoke on the wind to evade the deadly heat. It seems more concerned with avoiding Kaida’s tail than our fire, but anything to keep us alive is good enough for me.

Unless it’s stalling so more will come? How did a drachen get this big in the first place? There’s no way we’re getting out of here if there are more drachen this size. I’m not sure we can survive facing this one.

Bastian’s fire streams harmlessly down the neck of the drachen, splattering off its shoulder. Fire worked on the drachen during the attack at the palace, but only to drive them back. This one—hundreds if not thousands of times larger—doesn’t seem fazed by our flames at all.

Every time we encounter the drachen, they’ve changed. Like they’re constantly evolving and getting stronger.