CHAPTER 18

Byron

When the house was blasted out of the tree, I was lucky enough—relatively speaking—to be thrown through the window of a disintegrating side wall.Stunned and spinning in the air, I had just barely enough presence of mind to go to dragon form and watch, horrified, as that entire section of the tree with the house and everyone still inside collapsed to the ground, breaking and burning.Meanwhile, shock waves from the shattered transmitter globe knocked the Callaway brothers, Phillips, Ayers, and Dominic down onto the floor of the forest clearing.The transmitter pole was on the ground.Wild, whiplash-like bolts of blinding power came twisting out into the air from what was once the transmitter, along with jets of sparking flame.Some of them hit the ground and made flaming, smoking spots all around, while others shot out and struck the edge of the forest itself, turning it to fire.My first reaction was to dive down to the wreckage of the tree house and help get Jenna and everyone else out.

That was when I saw Dominic pull himself up from where he was lying, pocket the pistol that he’d used to destroy Marshall Callaway’s work, morph to dragon, and take off over the flames and through the smoke.My shocked, scrambling mind quickly put together what had just happened from the memory of what Dominic shouted just before he shot the globe—“In the name of Gorgonos!”—and my thoughts spat out just two words.

Traitor!Spy!

My next thought was, Jenna, Elliot, Cade, forgive me—as I beat my wings and flew off like a rocket in the direction that Dominic went.

For a few seconds, everything was churning, swirling darkness as I flew through smoke that even the beating of my wings couldn’t sweep away.When like a huge curtain the smoke parted around me and I flew out into clear air again, I swept the sky with my dragon vision that was as sharp as the eyesight of a bird of prey and made out a shape with wings and a tail shooting off into the distance.I growled at the sight of the figure heading fast over the treetops and toward the horizon.There you are!I’ve got you!

Beating my wings with every bit of my strength and slashing the air with my tail, I flew faster than I’d ever flown before, using every bit of power I could summon to close the distance between myself and the saboteur and would-be murderer who’d pretended to be a friend.I flew furiously and watched him grow larger in my sight, until I could make out the scales on his craven body.Another few minutes and I’d overtake him and bring him to ground; and then he’d answer for what he’d done to all of us, especially to Jenna and if anything happened to Jenna because of him, his revered Gorgonos would not save him from me.

I hissed at the rush of air over my scales.Since our adventure in Reptos, before we crossed over to Earth, I had started practicing, sharpening skills that I’d long been neglecting, in anticipation of danger coming for Jenna again, preparing myself for just such a thing as this.When we left my apartment after getting the call from Jenna’s uncle, I’d prepared myself a little more.I reached down and unsealed a certain pocket of my trousers and pulled out a little cylindrical object.At my touch of a button on one end of it, the cylinder produced what it contained:a retractable sword that I was now prepared to use.Brandishing my sword at my side, I prepared to repay this lurking betrayer for the havoc and harm that he’d caused.

Dominic was flying just a few body lengths ahead of me, unaware of my pursuit and of my gaining on him, until I opened my snout wide and shrieked out my furious challenge.Only then did he suddenly swerve around in mid-flight to face me and shriek back his defiance—with his gun drawn.

At the sight of the metal of his weapon glinting in the air, I braced myself for his attack, which came instantly.I began to fly in a swiveling pattern, making myself a more difficult target at the same second that Dominic fired off his first shot.The trail of energy from his gun sizzled through the air, tearing through the spot where I’d been a second before.He kept firing and I kept swerving and dotting, thinking I wasn’t letting him get a fix on me.Then, one of his beams burned against one of my horns, and I snarled at him.Son of a wyvern, you think you’re going to shoot me out of the air, do you?

A second later, one of Dominic’s shots sparked against the edge of my blade.He started firing faster, more wildly, almost as fast as I could evade his attacks.I roared in sudden pain when one of his bolts grazed the upper part of my wing, then another clipped me against the scales of my upper arm.Closing up the distance between us, I realized, was making me an easier target regardless of my evasive actions.Sooner or later, either I’d catch him and then I’d have him, or one of his shots would hit me in a way that I couldn’t shrug off and I’d be lost.I couldn’t afford the second thing.I needed a strategy here.

When he got me across the sword arm with one of his next shots, I roared out as if he’d hit me worse than he actually did; and before he could see I wasn’t as badly hurt as he thought, I went into a dive for the treetops.With luck, Dominic would think I’d go crashing down into the forest canopy and be lost.Letting myself plummet with wings flailing, I watched him from the corners of my eyes as he sped on, and I guessed the damned betrayer was now thinking just what I wanted him to think.Good, I thought.You just believe that.

Letting Dominic get a few more body lengths away, I beat my wings hard again and pulled out of my “crash,” skimming the treetops instead of vanishing into the canopy, and went into a power climb at a sharp angle back towards my retreating opponent.If I came fast enough, hard enough, I’d catch him so fast that as the saying goes, he “wouldn’t know what hit him.”The wind whooshed in my ears as I rocketed up at him, and sure enough, Dominic didn’t bother to look behind and below him.So he was unprepared when I came up under him horns-first and battered him right in his belly.

Dominic roared in shock and protest, and I was only sorry that I’d butted him instead of ripping out his innards.But the brutal, pummeling force of our collision was enough to knock him out of his flight and send him spinning downwards like a meteor—and make him drop that damn gun!Now I was the only one of us who was armed, and I went into a dive after him, sword and all, as he fell.If Dominic pulled out of this fall and managed to land safely, I’d have the drop on him, and then he’d answer for his treachery.

Below us, the forest opened up with a meandering stream that cut its way through the wilderness in the direction of the Intercross encampment where we’d spent the night.The stream fed into a little lake that the people at the encampment used as a reservoir.Dominic managed to take enough control of his fall to steer himself towards the stream.I dove after him, sword raised, hissing with determination.In a few seconds, Dominic hit the surface of the rolling waters, and I swooped over the splashing spot where he went in.A couple of seconds later, he scrambled up onto the rocks around which the water flowed, and raised his head at me, showing me his fangs and shrieking his fury at me, as if he dared to be the one to act defiant after the harm he’d caused.I swooped around and landed on the rocks, facing him.Dominic hissed menacingly at me, and in response I lunged at him with my sword.

The next minutes passed in attack and defense.Dominic, though no longer armed, had every bit of the same dragon agility and speed as I possessed, and was as determined not to be taken as I was to get him.My blade sliced through the air at him, almost catching him here, almost cutting him there.Damn his scaly hide, I hated his speed as much as I hated his deed.But he couldn’t evade me forever.I swung at him again and again and he kept weaving and dodging.But I was getting closer.Sooner or later I’d connect with the point or the edge of my blade, and as soon as I drew blood, the pain would start to cut him down.He must have known that was true, for a second after he leaped back from my blade slicing him across his chest, he gave a mighty beat of his wings and started to get airborne again.

No! I thought, hissing in wrath, as I watched Dominic begin to climb back towards the treetops.I am not chasing him again!Before he could make good his escape, I dropped down and grabbed from the water the biggest rock that my free claw could hold.I rose up again and threw it as hard as I could, making my best aim—which caught Dominic right at the back of his head, behind his horns!With a shrill sound of pain, he dropped out of the air and splashed back onto the rocks of the stream.

I leapt at Dominic where he lay on his side with wings twitching in the babbling water and the hard, wet stones, and thought he wouldn’t move.But as soon as I was upon him, he rolled onto his back, wings splayed in the water, and whipped his tail up and out at me, wrapping it around the wrist where I held my sword.Now the two of us were caught in a hissing, roaring tug of war, with Dominic trying to pull me all the way down into the water and rocks, and me trying to wrest myself out of his grip.With one hand Dominic grabbed a big rock, which I could only guess he intended to pound against my head and perhaps cave in my skull.I went for strategy again and let him pull me down to him.But before he could bring that deadly rock into play, I raised the blunt handle of my sword and brought it down with a hard, sharp crack onto Dominic’s head.

The betrayer let out a sudden bellow of shock, then went limp as I fell down on top of him in the water and this time, he finally didn’t move.

Dominic’s tail uncurled from my wrist.I dragged myself up to my feet, standing in hard-won triumph over him.As I looked down at the beaten betrayer, he was already shifting back to human to heal whatever injury I’d done him.With Dominic unconscious below me, with the stream babbling around us as the only sound, I turned my dragon neck to look up above and behind me at the plumes of smoke rising in the distance.

I had caught our betrayer, but at what cost?I had effectively abandoned my friends and my lover.If Jenna, Elliot, and Cade were unharmed, I’d feel that much less guilty for leaving them.But if any harm had come to them, I would hold myself responsible.