A screech comes from the West, but my eyes are riveted on the burning wall we worked so hard to keep standing as it crumbles before the might of dragons.

A dragon of golden scales lands on our tower. I throw a knife, embedding it into the eye of a woman on the dragon’s back. She slumps forward, but the one before her still has the dragon in control. The dragon hisses, its gullet glowing with flame.

Tim releases a battle cry then jumps, landing on the dragon’s nose. It rears back, surprise flickering in its brown eyes.

Tim brings his broadsword down on the head, and it shivers from the head all the way to its tail, a ring of metal on scale reverberating through the air over the screams of men and women and the clash of swords.

It shakes and Tim jumps at the tower, but his foot slips. The dragon leaps from its perch, flapping uncoordinated wings as if still trying to regain its equilibrium.

I barely take note as I reach for Tim, missing his hand by inches as I lean over the rail. I watch in slow motion as his warm brown eyes widen with fear and shock, the whites stark and wide next to his dark skin.

I jump from the tower, grasping his hand just before he would’ve fallen to his death. I use my other hand to grip the edge of the crenellation of the round tower.

We jerk to a stop and my arms scream at me and the rough wood bites deep into my palm and back.

My numb hands are slow to respond, and I feel my grip weakening even as adrenaline and my wolf floods through my veins to combat the cold seeping from my soul.

“Drop me, Roland,” he says, his voice strained as my palm slicks with sweat and makes his hand slip. My hand spasms, and he slides another inch.

“No,” I growl, letting my wolf come out to play and not entertaining losing anyone else. No more death. Not today. “This is going to hurt,” I warn him.

His eyes grow somehow wider, but he nods, fear clear in his eyes but combated by trust. In me.

I grip both him and the wood palisade with claws.

I pierce wood and soft skin, and something in me aches with his grunts bordering on swallowed screams of pain. But I will do what I must to save his life.

Hands scrabble against my fur to help pull us up as a dragon screeches from above and falls with a ballista bolt in its chest, close enough the wind from its wings brushes against my cheek.

With a pained yell, I lever him up. He uses his legs to scramble along the wall and uses his good hand for handholds. An inch more… and there.

He clutches the edge of the palisade and other hands grab him and his chain mail, pulling him up and over the edge.

My hands spasm with him safe and if not for my claws dug knuckle deep in the soft wood, I would have fallen.

I painfully ease myself up and over with many gripping my fur and helping me over, collapsing against the wall. I don’t have the energy to keep the wolf, and my body morphs back into soft skin and nails instead of claws, my shirt shredded with the shift.

I run my tongue over dry, cracking lips.

“What possessed you to go jumping on a dragon?” I growl, rolling my head to glare at Tim. If I had the strength, I’d punch him. Not too hard. But hard enough.

David and a healer in a soft tan robe tend to his hand.

He grins at me. “Flash be telling us about how you kill dragons,” he says, wincing when the healer washes the wound with alcohol, then wraps the bleeding gashes with soft cotton strips.

Cynic bursts into laughter.

I look away, unable to say anything. Seems Flash has been telling all of my secrets. I should kill the cat before he gives them all to the humans. Good thing he can’t tell my most damning ones.

My eyes see the wall burning and the dragons overrunning the tiny people along the palisade. I try to get Beast out, but he’s sluggish and only barely escapes my shadow before I feel cold seep into my brain and I almost pass out.

Great.

No Beast.

No Nova.

Alicial is likely going to be running for the hills soon if she has not already.

I bow my head, my heart sinking.

We have failed.

Videlia is lost.

Wait, comes that small voice on a sigh of wind, sounding almost giddy.

I’m out of tricks. We need a miracle. It seems I can’t do this all on my own.

You were never alone, my son. It’s time you learn to forgive and live.

I snort in derision, leaning my head against the wood as my strength seems to seep from my veins as I lose hope.

Live? At a time like this?

A soft trill reaches me through the crackle of flame and the screams of the dying. I almost don't believe it, but somehow my heart already knows. I turn sharply, my numb and trembling legs stumbling as I race to the western corner of this tower, hope returning. Tim, the two wolves, David, and the healer flank me. Tim’s hand is held to his chest and bandaged where my claws had pierced his skin.

I feel for him but I would have felt much worse should I have let him drop.

I turn to the skies.

And there, more beautiful than the stars of all worlds combined, is a black dragon.

She came.

My shoulders pull back and my soul lights with an inner warmth as she flares her wings and arches her neck for a bugling cry that shakes the ground. Smoke rises around her from the fires along the city and walls, making her appear like some sort of ethereal being, highlighted with the sun at her back.

Shapes that are a third to half of her size stream beside her. They are golden, red, and brown streaks that undulate with odd, almost dancing and flowing movements as they fly, but they are too quick for me to get a good glimpse of why they move in such hypnotic and twirling movements. They look like ribbon streamers that humans get out to celebrate certain harvests.

And then there are the others. Winged tigers that as big as a grizzly fly beside her. They are stripped, but they are mostly silver and black with one golden and black leading the way.

One I remember seeing long ago in the woods of Dragon's Valley… and I later would put out fresh meat and fish caught from the stream in the same area I saw the creature. And after I left, I asked a Were to continue to put out meat. The creature had looked slightly thin, and I did not want him starving as we hunted the land and drove off prey.

Two creatures of legend fly before me: the wyverns and the leonoavis

I send a warm and grateful thanks, hoping to reach my dragon. She beats powerful wings, her head turning to study the wall and surrounding lands as if she were a queen looking upon her world. The other creatures circle the city, roars and screeches shaking the city and causing the dragons along the wall to pause, looking up through slit eyes and bared fangs.

Then Nova’s eyes lock with my own and I feel a pull deep in my soul. She dives, coming to land on houses and tall buildings along the inside of the wall, trying not to kill anyone as she snakes her head up and her feathers bristle on the top of her head as she looks at me with a curious and lovely hope. She’s so big her nose is as tall as the wall if she stands on her hind legs.

I reach out a hand, and she gently touches her nose to it, blowing out and bathing me in her pipe smoke scent.

Emotions that are too many and much too large for me to decipher bombard me. But then she pulls them back with a gentle sigh and sends one emotion.

I lean my forehead against her snout, reveling in the warmth of her scales that combats the bone-deep cold still trying to send me to the ground. “I missed you too, dear one. Shall we fly?” I ask.

She trills, the feathers along her neck flaring with her excitement as her eyes pop open and she kneads the ground with her back claws.

A cracking sound comes from below as her kneading forces a blocky building to collapse.

I sigh, and she snakes her head down to look at it, her ears flat back and the feathers flush against her head and neck. She glances back up at me, her eyes wide and innocent.

I shake my head, a chuckle rumbling from my chest.

“Let’s get you off the ground before you cause more trouble,” I say, laughter in my voice.

She grumbles low in her throat, her eyes narrowing, even as she bends her head forward so I can hop on and use it to traverse to her neck.

Cries and rings of pain and steel on scale surround me, but I feel peace and hope. My friend has returned. And she brought help.

“Are you sure about this?” the human healer asks, his voice unsure.

I smile back at the wolves and humans watching with wide eyes.

“We’ll be your guards from the skies. It’s up to you to take the ground.”

David bows his head and salutes, his eyes twinkling when he looks back up and his eyes steely with determination. “Don’t have too much fun without us, son. Wouldn’t want to steal all our thunder.”

Tim salutes me. “We even, kino!” he yells with a smile, and I remember the time he caught me what feels like another lifetime ago when I had jumped from a wall and he broke my fall. That was the first time I’d met him. Who knew he’d turn out to be such a beloved and trusted friend?

I shake my head, a smile pulling at my lips as I climb on Nova’s head and down her neck, settling into the crook at the base. It seems Flash has told them another secret… this time the name Barry and Jed call me. I am going to kill that cat if the jingoist army doesn’t get to him first.

Warmth seeps into me from Nova’s soul to mine, easing some of the sharp, cold pain and the jagged shards Beast had torn into my soul.

“Let’s hunt,” I whisper.

She pushes into the sky, collapsing more buildings as she beats her wings and roars her agreement.