Last Dragon Standing (Heartstrikers #5)(20)
He’d said it for Svena.
The White Witch was standing in front of the porch with her infant daughter clutched in her hands. The white whelp was squirming, but her mother didn’t seem to notice. Svena’s eyes were fixed on the little girl clinging to Bob’s back. The human child who wasn’t actually human at all.
“What are you talking about?” she demanded, holding out her daughter. “This is the next seer.”
“No,” the Black Reach said. “What you hold is merely a child. That”—he nodded at the golden-eyed dragoness clinging to Bob—“is Estella’s replacement. Brohomir hatched her from a dud egg using Amelia the Planeswalker’s fire thirty minutes before you laid your clutch.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Svena of the Three Sisters. I’m afraid you lost before you began.”
His lips curled as he finished. It was a tiny motion, barely more than a twitch, but Julius had been watching powerful dragons all his life. He knew a pulled trigger when he saw one, and from the way Bob was struggling to free his legs from the ice, so did he.
“No,” Svena whispered as frost began to form in the damp air around her. “No.”
By the second no, a strange expression spread over Bob’s face. On any other dragon, Julius would have called it panic, but seers never panicked. He was still trying to figure out what it meant when Bob snatched Chelsie’s daughter off his back and tossed her at the Qilin a split-second before a wall of ice took him off his feet.
Standing right beside his brother, Julius felt the cold of the ice as it flew by, but he was miles too slow to do anything about it. The blow had already slammed Bob into the spiral of Skyway on-ramps that sheltered the house, sending his sword—the Magician’s Fang—flying off into the darkness. Julius held his breath as the cement guardrails cracked, waiting for Bob to pop back up to his feet as he always did…
But not this time.
When the ice released him, Bob fell hard, landing facedown in the gravel at the start of Julius’s driveway. When he finally pushed himself up, blood was running from his mouth. He was still wiping it away when Svena lunged at him, her hand already raised as the icy bite of her magic filled the air.
“Svena, stop!”
The white dragon froze, her blue eyes flicking to Amelia, who was running to Bob’s side faster than Julius had ever seen her move. “Back off,” she snarled, smoke curling from her lips as she put herself between the white dragon and her brother. “Brohomir is under my protection.”
“He stole my seer!” Svena roared at her. “My clan’s legacy! He played me for a fool!”
The killing rage in her voice was enough to make Julius cower. Even Amelia looked nervous, glancing warily down at the thick carpet of frost that now coated the driveway and everything around it. “I know it hurts,” she said, melting the ice from her own feet with a flick of her fingers. “But he had his reasons.”
“Reasons?” Svena cried. “He stole from us!”
“He did,” Amelia agreed. “But you’re just going to have to let it go, because the only way you’re getting to my little brother is by going through me, and we both know you can’t.”
That wasn’t bravado. Amelia was simply stating fact. Now that they were standing face-to-face, even Julius, who was terrible at judging dragon magic, could feel the power gap between them. But despite being hideously outclassed, Svena showed no fear.
“You see, this is why we’re not actually friends,” the white dragon said bitterly, glaring at Amelia with hard, hurt eyes. “A friend would not allow this crime to go unpunished. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t need to beat you to win.”
The Spirit of Dragons snorted. “How do you figure that?”
Svena’s lips curled in a vicious snarl. “I invoke life debt. You will not interfere with my fight until the Seer of the Heartstrikers is dead.”
Amelia’s eyes went wide, but it was too late. The moment the words left Svena’s mouth, the Planeswalker’s own blazing magic closed on her like a bear trap, binding her in place. After that, all Svena had to do was step around her to stand triumphantly over Bob, who was still pushing himself up off the ground.
“I suppose it’s too late to say it wasn’t personal?” he asked, giving her a weak smile.
Svena’s answer was to kick him as hard as she could, aiming her delicate pointed shoe right at the spot in his chest where Chelsie had clawed him. He shifted at the last second to avoid the worst of the damage, but the blow still sent him slamming back into the on-ramps. It wasn’t until the cement barriers cracked completely, though, that Julius finally realized Bob wasn’t faking. He was so used to the seer’s tricks, it hadn’t even occurred to him that this might not be part of his brother’s plan until he heard Bob’s ribs snap. When he moved to help him, though, an iron hand landed on his shoulder.
“Don’t get involved,” Chelsie growled, her green eyes hard as stones as she watched Svena advance.
“But he’ll die!” Julius cried.
“Better him than you,” the Qilin said quietly, stepping up beside them with his arms wrapped firmly around his youngest daughter, who was still desperately trying to get to Bob. “The White Witch is one of the most dangerous dragons in the world. Even I would not wish to tangle with her when she’s this angry.”