Once in a Dragon Moon - Ophelia Bell Page 0,34

his head craned back, gaze fixed high, following every shift of the fight.

The black dragon drew in her wings and plummeted, stretching them out at the last second and then banking hard, her right wing skimming the sand as she shot back into the sky at Ksenia, who’d barely turned in time, looking around to find where her opponent had gone.

She wasn’t as skilled at flying fully shifted, which surprised the hell out of Gunther. They hadn’t actually spent that much time testing her on her flight skills in her full dragon form; she was a dragon, so what was the need? She’d been amazing at it with only her wings manifested from her human body.

Midnight Star was far too fast a flier fully shifted for Ksenia to react quickly enough. She tried to backtrack with her wings, but her only other option was making herself a smaller target. Except she was too high up to shift.

“Come on, baby, flap those wings. Get out of her fucking way at least,” Jacob muttered, his hands clenched around the rail so hard his knuckles turned white.

Gunther couldn’t help but wince, dreading the inevitable collision, though he refused to close his eyes. Ksenia flapped hard, trying to rise, to backtrack, to spin as Midnight Star closed the distance even faster than Ksenia had with her first attack.

What happened next, he couldn’t quite process. One second Ksenia was there, struggling against the air, and the next she’d disappeared, as if she’d blinked entirely out of existence.

Midnight Star faltered and reared back as if she’d just hit something, then a split-second later, the red light on her chest turned green.

The point buzzer blared and the announcer’s voice blasted through the air over the din of the crowd. “Point to Desert Flame. We have a winner! Wait, no . . . it seems both champions have scored on each other simultaneously. Well, this is an unexpected turn. We’ll have to consult the referees to determine the final outcome.”

“What the actual fuck just happened?” Teague asked. “Where is she?”

They stared up into the air in confusion where Midnight Star still hovered, looking just as bewildered at the green glow on her chest as they were.

“There,” Gunther said, pointing to the middle of the arena where a breathless Ksenia now stood, staring up into the sky.

The crowd was going wild with the turn of events. Midnight Star slowly lowered herself to the ground and shifted, then marched to Ksenia. They had a brief conversation and the two women embraced, but when they parted, Ksenia’s deep frown told him she knew she’d failed, and his heart hurt for her.

“This is fucking bad,” Jacob said. “Goddamn her, why didn’t she tell us she could do that?”

The announcement drowned out any further conversation. “Arena fans, I’m sorry to say that Desert Flame’s win is forfeit. Pursuant to League rules to abstain from use of unbalanced abilities, she will not be advancing to the next round. Midnight Star is by default the victor today.”

“She can cloak herself,” Gunther said. “Well, I’ll be fucked.”

13

Ksenia

“Fucking stupid, stupid idiot,” she muttered as she stalked down the ramp into the locker room. She knew her dragon’s cloaking ability would likely get her disqualified. She hadn’t intended to use it, though.

The three figures waiting for her just made her want to run back to the Sandrekar caves and hide forever, if she could even go back. She brushed past them without looking and slammed open her locker, then began to jerkily undress.

“Ksenia,” Jacob said. “You were fucking amazing out there today.”

“Not amazing enough. I fucked up. Don’t tell me what I did wasn’t worse than actually losing.” She shot him a glare that made him clench his jaw. “Just fucking say it already.”

“We’ll appeal. It was a draw by anyone’s count. You two were so well-matched it wasn’t funny.”

“Do I look like I’m laughing?” she yanked out her towel and soap and stomped toward the showers, eager to get the gritty sand off her skin and out of her hair, and to wash off this stupid makeup.

She felt like crying, but wouldn’t fucking cry. She’d done this; it hadn’t been done to her. The most exciting event of her life had just happened. She’d squared off against the Midnight Star and nearly won.

Astra Garrick had turned out to be one hell of a fighter, not to mention an incredibly classy dragon. From their first shared taunts, she’d seen how amazing the other woman was. Even her last