Inkway to Albreton

Chapter Ten

"Tighten your grip," Ellindris commanded.

Jasmine feverishly did so.

"Do not let go."

Jasmine nodded, terrified and voiceless as she scraped her chin against Ellindris' scales.

Kur bellowed. He drew in breath, held it in his belly for a moment and then expectorated three more icicles towards Jasmine and Ellindris.

But Ellindris was quick. She reared onto her hind legs, slashed one of the icicles to bits before catching the second in her other claw and opening her mouth wide to swallow the third, which melted on contact with her snout.

That was when Jasmine noticed it. Ellindris was getting warmer, steadily as if she contained within her a great teapot filled with boiling water, a teapot almost ready to whistle. Jasmine couldn't see Ellindris' face from where she was at the base of the dragon's neck, but if she could she would have seen the steam rising out of her nostrils and how she pulled back her reptilian lips to reveal her teeth, which were steadily being covered in purplish black mucus.

Kur staggered backwards midair with a few precise twitches of his wings. He, or whatever was inside him, knew that pose. Ellindris was going to breathe fire on him and she wasn't about to hold back. He had angered her, angered the Dragon Queen.

Even though she was focused on clamping herself fast to Ellindris' scales, Jasmine sensed the unease in Kur's demeanor. She humored the thought that she and Ellindris might get out of this yet.

Sure enough, just as Jasmine imagined Ellindris about to blow, she did. The Dragon Queen inhaled sharp and long and then expelled a stream of fire at Kur, the scales all over her body bristling ever so slightly to show the searing red skin beneath them. Blasted with hot air, Jasmine winced and gritted her teeth, trying to soothe the burning sensation spreading suddenly across the side of her face that was pressed atop Ellindris' scales. Her palms parched and then blistered so fast the pain barely registered in her mind, but she smelled and heard her flesh sizzle in every place her gray witch's outfit didn't serve as a barrier between her skin and Ellindris' scales. The left side of her face was numb in a way that made Jasmine think it might never feel anything again.

Ellindris reached over to her wing, pulling out the icicle that was lodged in it with a grunt before she faced her husband, who was collapsed, a giant white and teal heap in the river, the water boiling and evaporating all around him. Crawling over cautiously, Ellindris faced him with half-folded wings and a snakelike flick of her tongue. She inquired, "Kurventhor?"

To which the white dragon moaned, shook his head and gazed up at Ellindris in confusion. He said, his voice sounding too meek to be that of a dragon's despite its volume and resonance, "...Ellindris."

Relief flattened Ellindris' scales once more and Jasmine almost got her hand caught underneath one, but had the sense to pull it out before it came down completely. That movement, unfortunately, forced her to see the state of her palm.

"I am here," Ellindris was saying to Kur. She moved her wing the wrong way and hissed, twitching it the other direction.

Kur saw the black blood oozing from the hole in Ellindris' wing. "Your wing!" His jaw dropped to reveal his own set of grayish blue fangs, "Your beautiful wing!" Closing the distance between himself and Ellindris, he curled his neck around hers to get a better view of the injury, oblivious to the fact that Jasmine was studying her own trembling hands with awestruck, wide eyes.

Jasmine's palms were blistering in brown and white puss, her skin taking on a leathery texture similar to Ellindris' punctured wing. Her hands were swollen and starting to sting, but the most terrifying and surreal part was that Jasmine couldn't feel anything in the places the burns looked the worst: the very centers of her palms and the tips of her blackened fingers. Her scream bubbled in her core before rippling out of her mouth, loud and shrill and horrified.