this?”
“My privilege, remember.”
“Okay.”
“All you do—”
“I know what to do Dad. I sort of became a dragon.”
“I heard.”
“What do you mean, you heard?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’m never going to see you again.”
“Elena, now is not the time, you have to claim him. Now think of a place you feel comfortable and claim him!” he yelled.
“I know what to do!” I shouted back at my dad and started to focus back on the Coliseum. I knew how to do it, Blake had shown me. The only problem was my imagination just needed to be stronger than his.
I saw a rock with very sharp horns in front of me, and all of a sudden, the color of the rock turned back to a purple-red. It was him, trying to attack at close range.
I grabbed the horn on his head and lifted myself onto his back.
At once the Coliseum came back but only for a second. The swamp returned and then the Coliseum again.
“It’s no use Blake, this place will not get you anywhere.”
“That’s it, Elena. Show him whose abilities he is carrying.”
“You’ve got nothing I don’t know about. It sucks you don’t have any secrets from me, doesn’t it?” I whispered inside his huge, frilly ear.
He roared again and I was thrown off his back. I fell flat on my back and had to roll around in order to dodge the huge paws that tried to crush me. The earth shook every time he stomped those huge legs of his.
My father was yelling but I was concentrating too hard on not being squashed like a bug.
“Grab onto one of his legs and let him think he’s thrown you unconscious.” my father’s voice finally got through to me.
I did what he said, although it wasn’t easy and I slipped which actually counted in my favor, but he did manage to dislocate my shoulder.
He threw me to the side and I used my telekinesis to make the landing a little bit softer.
“Now lay still,” my father said. “It’s working. I’ll tell you when to strike. It was the same way I claimed his father. Just stay down.”
I did what my dad said and tried to will back my energy. It wasn’t easy and my head ached but I could feel my core being filled and my tired muscles and lungs felt as if I hadn’t even shed one drop of sweat. I just wished I could do something about my shoulder, and then, like magic it disappeared. My healing ability kicked in.
“He’ll go with the pink flame, I can see it inside his throat. Use your ice and freeze the son of a bitch. It will buy you some time to tie him down,” my father spoke inside my head. Like the game, I thought. “Now!”
I pushed myself up and it was exactly as my father predicted, his throat was filled with the Pink Kiss. I released an orb of ice and chucked it inside his mouth. A familiar feeling of déjà vu jolted through my core. Lucian’s voice was yelling in the back of my mind to attack him with everything I had.
Blake’s entire face was a solid brick of ice and it started to run down his front legs and toward the middle of his torso. His one wing was iced in the process as well.
I had nothing to tie him down with, so I imagined the one place where I’d seen this done before. It was back on the mountain where Goran had used that Dragonian to try and kill all of us. Huge trees and roots grabbed him the way they’d grabbed Sammy that day and Blake was forced slowly to the ground.
The ice on his head and legs melted fast and he let out a growl that blew my hair back. The force of his breath was making it hard for me to breathe. He broke free and I found the two of us back in the Coliseum. I didn’t have him.
“Again, imagination doesn’t work, Elena, but you had a really good idea. Now do it for real. Use your strength, grab the roots buried deep down in the ground.”
“I’ll wreck this place,” I yelled in my head.
“Just do it.”
I did what my father said and spread my hands downward as if I’d called for roots a million times before.
The earth shook and four different roots jumped from deep within the ground. I brought my hands over my head and saw the roots tightening over Blake’s body.
Blake growled again and