They flew after us, keeping themselves about four feet off the ground.
Araquiel was the first to dart toward us with a loud bang that echoed through the entire colosseum. In a split second, he was but a flash shooting toward us. Elonora was the first and only one capable of a reaction. She pushed out a barrier strong enough to knock him to the side and break his supersonic flight.
Vesta and Ben covered our tracks with curtains of fire as we reached the first flight of stairs and glided down to the ground floor. I moved to guide our group back into the jungle, but the Perfects caught up and blasted through the corridor like lightning, forcing me to pull back and take the opposite exit.
They were ruthless and arrogant beyond belief, like cats toying with their food. Judging by the indelible smirk on Araquiel’s face, they were wholeheartedly enjoying this chase.
I muttered a swamp witch spell under my breath and released another cloud of black smoke—not as big as the first one, but dense enough to make them stop as we reached the open-air arena. Diamond steps led us to the bottom, from where we only had two options: stay and fight or find another way out and get lost in the jungle.
We reached the middle of the arena, while the Perfects’ sonic booms thundered through the colosseum and reverberated outward. I grabbed Vesta’s wrist. “Everybody, hold hands. I’m going to try again!” I said.
My heart was beating frantically as I focused and tried to teleport us out of there. I cursed under my breath when I realized that nothing was happening.
“It must have something to do with the Perfects,” Elonora replied.
“I’ve got a feeling that, as long as they’re close by, I won’t be able to zap us out of here,” I said. “I think they’ve figured out a way to block me somehow.”
Just then, Araquiel and his crew made it out. They jumped up and spread their wings. They shot toward us in a wide arch, coming at us from both sides. Ridan huffed.
“That’s it! Time to roast these chickens!” he snapped.
“By all means,” Dmitri muttered, motioning for him to go ahead. “The floor is yours, sir!”
Ridan smirked, then dropped his backpack and burst out of his clothes and into his dragon form. This was the first time I was seeing him—and he was both fearsome and beautiful as a specimen. His scales were black all over, and his big silvery eyes sent shivers down the spine of anyone who dared look at him. He shuddered, then stretched his wings outward and roared, spraying a veritable inferno toward the four incoming Perfects.
I mentally calculated our odds, hoping Ridan had enough strength and energy in him to hold them off long enough for us to figure another way out of this hot mess. My calculations went right out the window when the Perfects pierced through his fire, seemingly unaffected, and proceeded to attack us.
It was virtually impossible to predict their moves, given their speed and ability to suddenly change course. Nevertheless, we tried our best.
Araquiel, Douma, Oriphiel, and Elyon flew overhead, flashing back and forth with thunderous booms in a masterful display of their incredible abilities. They were basically our worst nightmare come true—creatures that were so fast and strong and resistant to our key abilities that they didn’t even need weapons to fight us.
Fireballs rained down on us as the Perfects coordinated a first attack.
Vesta and Ben spread a fiery shield above us, and we got closer to each other in an attempt to make it easier for the fae to protect us. Every other second, Elonora came out and pushed a barrier toward the Perfects. They effortlessly dodged each one, then retaliated with another blazing attack.
Ridan growled and flew upward. He rammed into Araquiel first, while the other three pulled back but didn’t intervene. I watched them stop and hover in midair, as they observed Ridan’s attacks on Araquiel. I had to give the dragon credit. He was beyond ferocious, his jaws almost crushing Araquiel twice.
But the Perfect wasn’t even trying all that hard to defend himself. I understood then that they were all observing Ridan, figuring out his physical features and registering his movements, overall. They were studying him—and they were going to react soon.
“Ridan, watch out!” I screamed, just as Elyon darted toward him at high speed.
My warning prompted Ridan to turn his head in time to spot Elyon coming in fast. He spat fire, but Elyon was unaffected. He pierced through the blaze and through Ridan’s wing, tearing a three-foot hole.
My heart stopped as the dreadful new reality settled in. Not even dragon hide was immune to the Perfects’ attacks.
Ridan roared from the pain but was nowhere near ready to capitulate. He was barely able to stay in the air at that point, struggling with the hole in his wing—which was relatively small, compared to the size of his wing. Nevertheless, the damage was done, and his flight was severely hindered. Araquiel took him head on, going in to deliver a solid punch, then quickly withdrawing and picking another attack angle. Ridan wasn’t fast enough to prevent all of Araquiel’s hits, but the constant fire that he spewed did help him slow the Perfect down. While Araquiel wasn’t easily burned, he wasn’t immune to fire, either. That much I could tell from how his wings began to blacken whenever he passed through one of Ridan’s flames.
The others watched the scuffle, while we were stuck on the ground, frozen and terrified.
“We need to get out of here,” Ben murmured, staring at Ridan and Araquiel as they fought. “Any second now, the others will come after us.”
“What about Ridan?” Dmitri croaked. “We can’t leave him here!”
“We don’t have a choice!” Ben shot back. “Once we’re out of here, he won’t have a reason to stick around and take such a beating, anyway! Besides, I don’t know how much longer he’ll last with a busted wing. He’s struggling up there because we’re still here!”
“Ben is right. We need to go,” Rose replied. “Now! We’ll regroup with Ridan later. We cannot let ourselves get captured today. Under any circumstances!”
I nodded, then pointed to our right and up the arena stairs. “There could be another exit there,” I said. “Once we’re out of the colosseum, I should be able to zap us anywhere.”
We moved toward the stairs. Lightning struck the ground in front of us.
The bang nearly ripped through my eardrums. The shockwave nudged us back by a couple of feet. The smoke cleared out quickly, revealing Douma. She scowled at us, then cocked her head to the side.
“Where do you think you’re going?” she asked, rhetorically.
Above us, Oriphiel and Elyon flapped their wings, watching us with contempt.
I looked around, but, deep down, I knew we’d come to a moment we’d all been dreading. We were going to have to fight them. We were going to give it our best shot, and use every weapon, spell, and trick in our arsenal in order to get ourselves out of there in one piece.
With enemies like these, I dreaded to think what captivity under Ta’Zan could be like. At least out here we were fighting for our freedom, so we could get another shot at finding our parents and warning GASP about the horrors unfolding on Strava.
My entire body hummed as I mentally prepared myself for what came next. I could feel the Word surging through me like electricity, crackling through my joints and begging for release.
At least I had that working for me.
Dmitri
(Son of Victoria and Bastien)
Douma was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen.
She was also my most probable cause of death in the near future. My survival instincts had kicked in, and I was ready to claw my way out of the arena, if that’s what it took. But, before it got to that, I had to try something.
“You don’t want to do this,” I said to her. “We’ve come in peace, and we mean no harm to anyone. We just want our family and friends back, that’s all.”
Douma looked at me, keeping a straight face despite the blue fires burning in her eyes.
“You don’t understand, do you?” she repl
ied. “Your fate was sealed the moment you set foot here. I’m going to ask you one last time to surrender peacefully. Otherwise, my brothers and sisters will take you by force, and Father doesn’t need you alive for his work.”
Elyon and Oriphiel landed with spine-tingling thuds, on both sides, forcing us to split our efforts in three. I had Nevis and Elonora with me. Ben, Rose, and Hunter turned to face Oriphiel, while Zeriel, Vesta, and Kailani focused on Elyon.
Elonora’s eyes glimmered gold as she looked at Douma.
“You have to let us go,” she said, her voice lower than usual. I realized then that Elonora was trying her luck with sentry mind control, but, judging by Douma’s calm expression, it wasn’t working.
“You know, I can feel you trying to poke around in here,” Douma shot back, pointing at her own temple, “but it’s not going to work, little girl. I’m far above your measly mental abilities.”
Elonora scoffed. “Funny you’re calling me a little girl. You’re three days old at most!”
“And yet, perfectly capable of tearing you apart, piece by piece,” Douma replied dryly.
A crackling sound drew my attention to Nevis, who was fashioning a heavy sword from Dhaxanian frost. He gripped its handle with both hands, then charged at Douma. She effortlessly dodged the first and second hits. She brought her fist out at the third.
Her knuckles broke through the ice.
Nevis stilled, watching in horror as his sword crumbled into thousands of icy shards.
Douma smirked, then punched him right in the chest. The hit was so powerful, it sent him flying backward at least twenty feet. He landed on his back, coughing and holding his chest. I’d heard the bones crack.
Elonora brought her sword down, but all Douma did was gently shift to the side. Elonora stumbled forward, then turned around and tried to hit her again. They moved like that for a while, and I waited for Douma to turn her back on me.
All I needed was a second and the right angle.
Behind me, the others were fighting Oriphiel and Elyon. I heard some of my teammates falling. I heard the winds howling as Vesta summoned them in an attempt to distract the Perfects. I heard Hunter growling as he clawed and snapped his fangs, eager to tear into the hostiles’ flesh. But it wasn’t looking good for any of us.
Up in the air, Araquiel was taking his sweet time with Ridan, tiring the dragon out and confusing the hell out of him with multiple attack angles.
I refused to let despair take over, though. I hadn’t come to Strava to get buried here.
“I don’t get it,” I said, prompting Douma to look at me right after she avoided another attack from Elonora. “Why are you doing this?”
Douma scoffed, then flashed around Elonora and punched her in the back. It cut off my cousin’s breath, forcing her to drop to her knees.
I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to do something.
I brought my sword up and launched my first attack against Douma, despite the painful knot that had settled in my stomach. She smirked and slapped the blade away, making my arms jerk to one side.
“Our race will grow and spread,” she replied.
Nevis managed to get back up. He made another ice sword and came running, raising the ice blade as he approached Douma. I knew I couldn’t let him go in alone, so I delivered my attack from her left.
We both reached her at the same time, but Douma was gone in the blink of an eye. The sonic boom almost deafened us. She reappeared behind Nevis and punched him again, this time harder, right in the ribs.
She broke something, for sure. Nevis collapsed, wheezing as he struggled to catch his breath again. Elonora roared. She shot to her feet and swung her sword toward Douma, who simply tapped the blade with her index and middle fingers, sending powerful vibrations all the way down to the handle.
The effect was so fast and unexpected, it jolted Elonora, forcing her to drop the sword.
I lunged at Douma once more, before she could punch Elonora, but she backhanded me so hard, I wound up lying on my back, seeing white. I heard Elonora’s grunt as she fell, then Douma’s footsteps as she came closer to me.
“Soon enough,” Douma said, “we will be the most perfect—the only lifeform in the entire universe.”
“That is absurd,” I groaned, blinking several times until I could see Douma towering over me, her wings stretching behind her. “You can’t just wipe out every other creature because you think you’re the best. It goes against everything that makes this world function!”
Douma smiled.
Part of me was transfixed by her beauty. But it wasn’t enough to override the sheer dread that had swallowed me whole, gripping my throat and clutching my heart, warning me of what would come next.
“Everything that has existed so far is weak, inferior,” Douma replied. “It doesn’t belong in this world. The old rules are gone. The Perfects are coming.”
That last part of her statement made my blood curdle.
I’d seen enough during my GASP training and early missions to recognize imminent danger. Douma and her people were far worse than anything I’d ever experienced or even heard of. She, alone, made Azazel, the Druid megalomaniac that had nearly destroyed Eritopia, sound like a walk in the park. Hell, she made Shaytan and the Mara Lords of Azure Heights sound like nothing more than an extra-sweaty gym session.
One quick glance at the sky, and I knew Ridan was in big trouble.
These Perfects were impervious to pretty much everything we threw at them. The technology used to create them was a complete mystery to me. They were even capable of keeping Kailani from teleporting us out of here.
Deep down, what hurt me the most was the fact that my grandparents were out there, somewhere, captured by Ta’Zan. If these Perfects could basically obliterate us, I didn’t even want to imagine what Ta’Zan could do to my family. I couldn’t give up. I refused to give up.
Rose
Oriphiel knocked me down with a left hook that made my ears ring.
I spat blood, lying on my belly. My arms were weak, my joints trembling as I struggled to pick myself back up and fight again. I heard the fire roar as Ben tried to burn her. I heard the punch she delivered, then Ben falling a couple of feet away from me.
My heart broke. Defeat seemed imminent, yet I couldn’t bring myself to give up. I just couldn’t. We had too much riding on this. My parents needed me, and I was no good to them dead or in some cage.
I knew we had to find a way to get far enough away from the Perfects that Kailani could teleport us out of here, but, for the life of me, I couldn’t see an exit.
“You people are blinded by hubris.” Oriphiel chuckled. “Can’t you see? You can’t even touch us!”
I managed to look up at her, baring my fangs. “You know, as much as I’ve trained myself not to feed on anything other than animals, I have to admit, I look forward to tearing your throat out.”
She smirked. “Please, do try,” she replied, raising her arms to her sides as she mocked me.
Hunter was on the ground behind her. One look at me, and he knew exactly what he had to do. He darted upward and jumped on Oriphiel. It caught her by surprise, but it wasn’t going to last long. I only had a second to do the craziest thing in my entire freaking life.
I shot to my feet as Hunter wrapped his arms around Oriphiel, temporarily restricting some of her movements. I rushed toward her and sank my fangs into the side of her neck. I tore through the skin and drew blood.
She gasped and whimpered from the pain as I suckled at her wound.
I managed to drink maybe a quarter of a liter before she elbowed Hunter in the ribs and pushed me away. One look around us, and I knew I’d done something none of the Perfects had thought was possible. Both Douma and Elyon were stunned.
Oriphiel was downright outraged, her mouth gaping and her eyes nearly popping out of their orbits as she pressed a palm against her neck wound to stop the bleeding.
That wasn’t even the most surprising twist. The blood I’d taken
from her not only tasted amazing, kind of like honey and mild spices, but it had an immediate effect on me. I felt a peculiar heat spreading through my chest and limbs, giving me the kind of energy I’d never experienced before. Something surged through me, boosting my senses to incredible new levels.
Oriphiel darted toward me with her unnatural speed, but everything seemed to move in slow motion. There was definitely something different about me. I could see her coming. I had time to anticipate her move. I dodged her punch and clawed at her stomach. She yelped, then slid past me and came to a grinding halt, panting.
She turned around to look at me, utterly shocked.
“How did you do that?” she hissed.
I was confused. “Do what?”
“You were as fast as her,” Hunter muttered, staring at me.
He was equally stunned. Twenty feet away from me, Elonora had seen what had just happened. It took me a second for things to click and fall into place. I’d drunk a Perfect’s blood. I now was as fast as a Perfect. Elonora was quick to pick up on that.
“Nevis, I need Perfect blood,” Elonora said.
The Dhaxanian prince nodded, then managed to get back on his feet, pulling Dmitri up with him in the process. By the time Oriphiel tried to attack me, and failed a second time, Nevis had successfully trapped Douma in ice, using Dmitri as a distraction. Elonora bit into Douma’s forearm and drew some of her blood before the Perfect burst free from the frosty trap and smacked her away.
The third time Oriphiel came at me, I was ready. Confidence burned through me. I ducked and avoided her punch, then rammed my clawed hand through her stomach. She froze, while my hand went right in. I could feel her warm entrails rubbing against my fingers.
“Oriphiel!” Elyon shouted, visibly distraught.
The Perfect blood had a quick effect on Elonora, who was now able to engage Douma on equal footing. They darted around like sudden bursts of light, kicking and punching at each other. At some point during their fight, Elonora managed to pick up her sword, making her attacks even more dangerous.