Also something I don’t have time for at the moment.
But this is the path Simone is running, so this is the one I have to stay on—which means I can’t afford to duck or change course or do anything at all but what I’m doing.
So I do exactly that, even though it means flying straight at Joaquin.
You know, if anyone had told me six months ago that I’d be playing a supernatural game of chicken with a dragon, I would have suggested they stop smoking whatever it was they were smoking. But six months makes a huge difference in this world—hell, at Katmere Academy, six minutes makes a huge difference—and I can’t afford to blink. Not now. Not this time.
So I stay the course, no matter how scared I am.
No matter how fast my heart is pounding.
No matter how loudly my brain is screaming for me to stop, to go back, to turn around because there’s no way I can win in a collision with a two-thousand-pound dragon.
But I have to win—this collision and this game. Which means there’s no way I’m backing down now.
A quick glance at the field shows me that Simone has passed the ball off to Cam, who is now running for the goal even faster, with the wolves quickly approaching to flank him on either side. I have no idea where the other dragon is—and I try not to let that fear distract me—because I’ve almost caught up with Cam, and I need to get this giant freaking other dragon the hell out of my way.
So I’m just going to have to count on beating the warlock to the goal line and keeping the ball in play.
How I’m going to do that is another matter altogether, though. Especially since there’s only one way I can think of to do that while we’re both thirty feet off the ground—and it’s pretty goddamn awful.
I know everyone on the ground thinks I’m out of my mind. I know they’re convinced I’m about to die right here in midair, and maybe they’re right. But times don’t get much more desperate than this, so I aim for the dragon and brace myself for impact.
I let myself wonder briefly about not surviving the upcoming crush. And if I’m really willing to take that chance.
But the truth is, if I don’t take that chance—if I don’t fight this fight and win—I won’t survive anyway. Besides, I’d rather die fighting for what I believe in than live as the victim of somebody else’s whims—especially if that person is as evil as Cyrus.
There’s no way I want to spend the rest of my very long life being Cyrus’s prisoner or personal gargoyle-for-hire.
That being said, I don’t actually want to die. And so I lay on the speed, using every ounce of strength and energy I have to go faster, faster, faster. Joaquin is still coming at me, but I can tell from the way he’s flying that he’s convinced I’m going to chicken out at the last minute. Convinced that there’s no way I’m going to actually let myself get into a giant collision with a dragon.
But he’s wrong, way wrong. And his mistaken conviction means I have an advantage. Right now, it’s a small advantage, but I’m willing to take anything I can get. Which is why, as the dragon bears down on me, wings spread wide and flames shooting out of his mouth, I do the only thing I can do.
I veer just a couple of inches to the right and clench both my hands into fists as I straighten my arms out directly in front of me and tuck in my own wings…and then I punch a giant hole in the center of his wing and fly right through it.
Joaquin screams in agony and starts spinning out as he plummets to the ground, unable to do anything but fall with his broken, torn-up wing. I feel bad—of course I do—but an injured wing is totally fixable, especially with Marise in charge of the infirmary.
A gargoyle’s lifetime chained up in a dungeon? Not so much.
Leaving half the Circle to run wild, power hungry and unchecked, throughout the paranormal world? Double not so much.
I vaguely notice Joaquin magically disappears from the sky just before he hits the ground, likely teleported to the infirmary. Either way, they’re down a player, and that can only be good news for me.