An orphan must betray the dragon that gave him a true home and family in order to save his guardian's life. Fourteen-year-old Foxkit plays with fire by striking a bargain with the ferocious dragon Aerohim: Let six runaway orphans hide in his den in...
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The two stallions faced each other beside the Lake of Sundered Blue. Only one of them could keep his horn—that was the oldest unbreakable law of a unicorn duel.
King Highbolt tossed his head, his spire glinting like a blade rising from his gray mane. "I won't let you wet a single hoof in these sacred waters, Lord Ash!" he vowed. For this lake was unlike any other; clouds swirled in its odd sapphire reflection that never matched the clear amber sky above. The world possessed many realms twisted together like the whorls of a flower—and Sundered Blue was gateway to all of them.
"No need to resort to blustering, Sire; for what it's worth, you're truly a fine young king," Lord Ash said as his tail gave a lazy flick at a passing fly. "But even in the prime of your strength, is it wise to quarrel with the Red Unicorn?"
"Filthy kinslayer!" Highbolt stamped his hoof and shattered a quartz boulder jutting from the grass to glittering shards. "You have no right to call yourself 'unicorn' anymore," he snapped.
Lord Ash gave a delicate sigh as the quartz dust settled. "I never claimed that title, it was a gift from many of your herd—their last cry, you might say."
He jerked his head once, and Highbolt shuddered as warm red droplets splattered the turf between them. Lord Ash still wore the form of a snowy unicorn, but the golden spire welded to the base of his fractured horn dripped beads of blood that matted his mane into dreadlocks and dyed his coat with a fresh scarlet tinge.
"Now be a good little champion and let me and mine go without a fuss," Lord Ash continued. "I should think you glad to see me gone from your pastures."
Highbolt resisted the temptation to step aside and let the nightmare that had stalked the unicorn herds of Arvustel for generations simply dissolve in Sundered Blue. But even without the blue seer eyes marking him as a sage, Highbolt knew better than to unleash this twisted menace on other realms . . . whatever the Red Unicorn wanted there would surely come back to haunt—no, destroy them all.
"Why so eager to abandon your territories here after spending centuries to steal them?" Highbolt demanded suspiciously.
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