Unknown - Scorched

It was inching forward. If Alessandro had to guess, he would have said it was curious. He backed away, dragging Ashe with him. This was his first dragon. He wanted a moment to plan.

“We have to separate. Find cover. We’re too good a target standing together.” Fire loomed large in his mind. Vampires burned all too well, and toast didn’t rise to walk the night. “Find a recessed hiding place. Stone shelters from the heat.”

“Got it.” Ashe pulled away from him and slid into the shadows, her form melting into the dark on the other side of the corridor.

Alessandro felt grudgingly glad to have her there. A family that slays together stays together? He slid back along the corridor until he found the entrance to a side passage where he could let it pass. They weren’t going to win by strength, so he wanted to attack from the dragon’s blind side, away from its flame.

As it closed in, the creature’s outline became visible, lit by the radiance of its eyes. No one Alessandro knew had ever seen one of the great beasts, though legends were plentiful. Unlike the weres or the vampires, dragons were truly wild creatures. They killed, ate, and laid their eggs as they had since the age of their dinosaur cousins. Human settlements were a convenient snack bar. This was the type of creature the Castle had to be meant for—one for which there was no suitable place in the outside world.

The creature’s savage beauty struck him first: the delicate bones of the head, the almost feline face surrounded by a flaring fan of skin and bone. The hide was smooth, brick-red with points of cream.

As it came closer, Alessandro could see the short legs were covered in hard, opalescent scales, the claws curved hooks of solid black. It was shorter than a man, but the body was a good twenty feet long.

Just beyond his hiding place, it stopped, round eyes blinking like the flash of rubies, the blast of heat from its flesh like a furnace door opening. Alessandro had willed his lungs to stop, protecting himself from the dragon’s breath, but he could hear Ashe coughing convulsively.

The noise was why the beast had stopped. It sniffed, its nostrils flaring to reveal the hot, steaming red of its inner flesh. It looked far too interested in what it smelled. Alessandro had to act fast.

How smart were dragons? Smarter than Holly’s cat? He pulled some loose change from his pocket and tossed it as hard as he could down the corridor in front of the creature. The coin landed with a clatter.

It jerked its head around with eerie speed, glowering down the Castle hallway, ready to pounce. Silent as the dead, Alessandro threw a second coin. The dragon took off with a strange side-to-side shuffle, its long body weaving as it ran, the belly scraping over the hard stone floor.

Ashe sprang from her hiding place. Alessandro followed barely a beat later. They raced after it, lagging behind almost at once. For a big creature, the dragon moved like lightning, the lashing, muscular tail ready to crush everything in its wake. Alessandro had to leap more than once to avoid its whip.

It reached the point where the coins had fallen, sniffing the ground like a hound searching for scent. Disappointed, it snorted out a gust of steam and smoke that curled over its head like a question mark. It hunted a moment more, the big head swinging from side to side.

Alessandro felt a glimmer of hope. They were behind the dragon, safe from its flames, and it had stopped. So far everything was going according to Alessandro’s hastily sketched plan. The next step was to attack it from both flanks at once.

He communicated the plan with a gesture while they ran. Ashe seemed to understand.

But the dragon started forward again, catching a stray scent. Not good. If it reached the end of the corridor, the hellhound families were as good as dead.

Alessandro leaped into the air, using flight to close the gap before the dragon could take aim with its jaws or its fire. He slashed with his sword, trying to catch its throat, but it twisted away. Alessandro dodged, and it snapped the air where he had been a second before.

Ashe fired into the creature’s side, making it flinch. The short hail of bullets didn’t penetrate its scales, but they must have hurt. The dragon, with a sinuous, writhing movement, turned, jaws open like a trapful of knives. It loosed a blast of flame, fire flowing over the stonework with lascivious tongues.

Ashe!

She hit the ground as the flame roared over her head, the gun clattering as it hit the stone.

Alessandro dropped from the air, his sword driving into the side of the creature’s neck in a two-handed thrust. He wanted to aim for a more vulnerable spot, but there had been no time for strategy. Immediately, the flame stopped, scraps of it breaking loose and flying into the air before vanishing to nothing. In its place, a roar ripped the dark passageway, jagged with fury and pain.

A jerk on the sword told Alessandro it was stuck fast. In his desperate attempt to save Ashe, he had pierced the scales, bit into muscle, but had done no real harm. He’d just made it mad. Merda!

The dragon convulsed, a shudder passing over its snakelike body down to its thrashing tail. The force of it threw Alessandro off, leaving the sword stuck fast in the beast’s neck.

He hit the ground hard, feeling as if his spine connected with his back teeth. A wave of shock short-circuited his muscles. The dragon wheeled, shaking its head against the lopsided weight of the sword. One paw landed on Alessandro’s chest, the long, black claws puncturing leather, cloth, and flesh.

Pain of several colors sang through Alessandro’s body. He could smell burning flesh and knew it was his own, and felt his dark, sluggish blood sliding down his ribs. He heaved, but the beast was too heavy.

Movement caught his eye. Far to his left, Ashe peeled herself off the floor and rolled to her knees. She was coughing convulsively, barely able to sit up, but she was aiming her weapon.

The dragon looked down at him with the fixed, intense stare of a hunting cat. The tables were turned. After centuries as a predator, Alessandro was at last the prey. Wild denial gave him one last burst of strength, but it was useless.

Gunfire lit up the corridor. A sudden tearing sensation stole Alessandro’s wits as the dragon lifted its foot, the claws hooking and shredding as it pushed away. Ashe fell back on her heels, firing again and again, but the tough armor protected the beast.

Alessandro’s round of curses matched the gunfire. Anger alone was going to get him off the unforgiving stones and back into the fight. He staggered to his feet, refusing to acknowledge the shifting, crunching feelings in his chest. He was a vampire. He would heal.

Once up, instinct took over. He launched into the air, grabbing the sword again. With the strength of desperation, he tore it out of the dragon’s sinewy neck. It hadn’t penetrated much past the scales. It had probably felt like a bug bite. The creature roared its annoyance, its mouth stretching wide. The teeth framed its jaws in wicked symmetry, each canine as long as Alessandro’s forearm.

He swung for the eyes. The dragon snapped, rearing up as high as the ceiling would allow. Alessandro flew up, but had to dodge as the dragon’s tail snaked around. Injured, he wasn’t fast enough. It caught him in the side, tossing him against the wall.

The dragon fell back on all four feet, but not before Ashe grabbed the sword from Alessandro. As the dragon opened wide for another blast of flame, Ashe went for the throat. From the inside. Right for the soft flesh above the tongue.

The dragon gnashed down before Ashe’s lunge was complete. She jerked aside, barely saving her arm. The sword was not so lucky. The dragon spit it out like a munched-up stir stick, then shook its head like a wet cat.