Elijah stood in the silence of the Vega backyard, a burlap sack slung over his shoulder. Bloodless as it was, the stench of burnt undead still seeped through the fabric. Inside were the finely sliced remains of the wight that had dared to trespass.
Its bones rattled softly with every step.
Across from him, Ethan adjusted the strap on his back, the weight of his twin katana comforting against his spine. The surrounding air shimmered faintly with heat, though he hadn't summoned a single flame.
"Mom's going to flip," Ethan said softly.
"She already knows," Elijah replied.
From the sky, golden light spilled into the dark. Holy and sublime, Queen Maureen stood before them elegant, radiant, eternal. She met Elijah's gaze with an ancient fire burning in her eyes. The backyard is bright with holy light, light that can only be seen by the worthy.
"I've seen what you're planning," she said through the glass. "You'll take your brother." His fire will be your backup and your shield.
Elijah nodded once. A smirk on his face.
"You can scry our progress," he added. "I'll allow it."
Queen Maureen raised her eyebrow, my son I would have, rather you liked it or not. Maureen approached the brother and placed her hands on their shoulders. I will watch not only to see if you're ready to spread your wings, but I'll be ready to erase that mountain if that filth even lays a hand on my boys. Ethan laughed, mama dragon is baring her fangs again.
A pause. Then, warmth behind her strength. "I know you're ready, but don't think for a second that I won't be there if things go sideways.
The trust in her voice made something ancient in both boys stir. A thousand years of dragon instinct, bred for dominance and fire, bent under the gravity of her trust.
To Ethan and Elijah, Maureen's faith was worth more than empires.
With nothing more to say, the brothers stepped away from the house.
Ethan rolled his shoulders as a slow, volcanic crackle echoed from within him. The bones of his human form snapped and twisted—not in pain, but in transformation. Wings erupted from his back with a horrible, wet cracking—red and black, jagged like obsidian daggers, wreathed in soft embers. With a whisper of a spell, his body vanished—completely invisible save for the heat he left behind.
Elijah, by contrast, simply moved.
The ground shattered under his step as he vanished into the shadows, traveling at near-sonic speeds with bursts of silent thunder trailing in his wake. Electricity coiled from his shoulders like hunting serpents, dancing through the air and arcing into nearby power lines.
And together, the two dragon princes raced through the night.
The streets blurred into lines, trees bending from the force of their passage.
Where Ethan passed, the air scorched.
Where Elijah moved, thunder answered.
Above, the clouds began to boil.
The sky knew what approached.
In the Duskworn Mountains
Within a fortress of bone and obsidian, beneath a ceiling of stalactites and frost, Alexander Dread-Rot stirred upon his throne of rotted ivory.
He had not moved in hours—not since the vision of his soldier's death had replayed itself, again and again.
The moment Elijah's blade cut through his creation, he felt it.
A flash of speed. A blade of storm.
A silence that came before total annihilation.
He had underestimated the dragons.
He had grown arrogant, believing the whispers that the royal spawn were still fledglings.
Now… he wasn't so sure.
Alexander's skeletal hand clenched the armrest. His jaw clicked softly. Regret—an emotion long dead—ghosted through his hollow chest.
And then he felt it.
The subtle ripple of scrying magic.
Eyes… watching.
His empty sockets flared with blue flame. He reached out with necromantic sense, piercing the veil—
—and saw her.
Through the magic, Maureen's form appeared in a vision like a living painting burned into his mind.
Her wings were not scaled—but feathered, immaculate and holy. A dragon not of ruin, but judgment. Her hair flowed like molten gold, and her eyes—her eyes were stars. Infinite, burning, ancient.
She saw him.
And then, with a scream like creation itself…
She vanished.
The vision shattered.
If Alexander had a beating heart, it would have stopped.
He sat rigid, cold, and—for the first time in a millennium—afraid.
I targeted the Dragon Queen's sons…
His undead mind began to comprehend the magnitude of his mistake.
But it was too late.
The mountain shook.
Heat rose.
The ceilings groaned.
And from above, the stone walls glowed red. Flames began to spill from every crack in the rock—not wild, not natural—but controlled. Fury made manifest. The stone melting and cracking under the intense heat. Alexander holding his hand out to try and relieve the heat from his rotting face, with no success. Thunder shakes the foundations of the mountain, a low humming of electricity coursing through the stone of the tomb. Alexander begins to panic, not fully understanding what is happening.
and then.
A roar shattered the silence.
Followed by a second—deeper, sharper, and full of thunder.
The twin voices of fire and thunder echoed through Alexander's throne chamber.
Then the flames were gone.
The rumble stopped.
Silence returned.
A vision forced itself into Alexander's mind, the force of the psychic assault forcing him back to his throne with a thud.
A vision of a burlap sack lay at the mouth of the mountain's gate, perfectly placed.
Inside, what was left of the wight.
And then a message burned directly into the Lich's mind.
"We've returned your minion, Lich.
Touch our friends again… and you will burn in dragonfire.
You will be struck by lightning that even your deathless bones cannot survive."
The magic behind the telepathic voice was raw. It crackled with youth, with hunger, with the fury of a rising god.
Alexander clenched the edges of his seat until the bone cracked.
He said nothing.
But he would remember. He would never cross these beings again. Not without powerful allies. Doing so again would be a mistake, a deadly one.
Far Above, in the Storm
Ethan hovered unseen in the air, wings spread wide, watching from above like a burning ghost. He didn't need to speak to Elijah. Their bond was older than memory.
Elijah stood atop a cliff edge, his arms crossed, eyes glowing with faint arcs of lightning. He looked down at the mountain below—his message delivered.
"We go," he whispered.
And in a flash of shadow and a silent gust of flame, the brothers vanished, leaving behind only the scent of ash and the memory of wrath.
The mountain will remember.
And the undead would learn to fear the princes of flame and storm.