Her Elemental Dragons: The Complete Series
Her Elemental Dragons: Ride the Wave: Chapter 35

I felt a tug through the bond, urging me to go to Kira, and I changed course immediately to swoop down toward her. She stood in front of the crumbling temple, covered in pale dust, making her red hair appear almost white. As I drew near, she leaped onto my back, her eyes blazing with determination.

“Let’s stop Sark, once and for all,” she said.

A grin spread across my face, making my fangs emerge. Sark had taken everything from us—and now he was going to pay. “I was thinking the exact same thing.”

I launched us into the air, the wind whipping at my wings. Sark rose before us, his blood red body shining under the sun. Hatred filled my chest, along with my need for vengeance, but I didn’t let it consume me. This wasn’t only about revenge or justice. This was about stopping him from hurting anyone else.

My body was already burnt in three places, and my ice had torn through the scales on Sark’s back. We’d already been fighting for what felt like hours, but neither of us could best the other. With Kira by my side, that might change.

The Crimson Dragon opened his mouth and scorching hot fire flew toward us. I let out a stream of water from my own mouth to combat it, while Kira threw bolts of lightning and blades of ice at Sark. He managed to dodge them all, moving unnaturally fast despite his size. In both forms he was an expert of combat, and he’d had many years to hone his skills. He was the one fighter I was willing to admit might be even better than me.

Across the field, the Black Dragon suddenly let out another of her terrible screams, which tore through my ears, struck me in the heart, and ripped through my bones. Balls of fire suddenly rained down from the sky, as if the sun itself was attacking us, and soldiers below us screamed in agony as they hit the fields and consumed them. Kira did her best to stop more flames from falling or the fires from spreading, while I blasted what I could with water, but it was too much for us to handle. The Black Dragon’s magic was too strong, fueled by her pain over her mates’ deaths and the lives she’d been stealing.

She fixed her beady black eyes on the temple and suddenly rushed toward it, flying so fast she was little more than a dark blur. A spike of panic shot through me. Auric, Jasin, and Slade were in there, and they were no match for her. Doran flew after Nysa only seconds later, but one of his wings appeared to be injured, slowing him down. They might be able to distract her for a short time, but that was all.

“Heldor must have fallen,” Kira said.

“We need to take out Sark now!” I called to her.

“Get me close to him!”

Sark was momentarily stunned by the death of Heldor, but he quickly recovered and let out a roar of his own. He blasted us with unending fire, but I wove through his attacks, while Kira deflected them away from us. But every time I tried to get close to him, he darted away.

I reached for Auric’s magic through the bond and summoned thick clouds around us, hiding us from Sark’s gaze. He tried to burn them up with streams of fire, searching for us in the haze, and I flew past him, then swept back around. I approached him from behind as quietly as possible and drew up alongside him.

Kira launched herself off my back, using her air magic to guide her onto Sark’s crimson body. As she landed, he spun around and let out a harsh shriek, while she held on tight so she wouldn’t fall. He swiped for her with his claws, but she drew her sword and stabbed it into his back, forcing him to release another pained roar. Ice began to form around the wound, but then his entire body erupted into flames and melted the ice.

The bastard wouldn’t die, and I worried he would hurt Kira if this continued. She was immune to his fire, but not his fangs or claws. She yanked at her sword, unable to budge it from his scales, as he tried to knock her off him and slashed at her.

I flew up high then dove down toward him, pressing my wings close to my side. When I was seconds away from slamming into him, I shifted into human form, my black cloak flying behind me as I drew my swords. Flames scorched me and I covered myself with a layer of ice, but it quickly melted away. I had no air magic to guide me, but I landed on his back beside Kira, and stabbed both my swords into his thick neck.

Sark let out an unholy scream and the flames shot higher, burning me despite my own magic’s protection, but I refused to let go.

“This is for my family,” I said, as I dug my father’s twin blades deeper into Sark’s neck. Ice spread from the dual blades and across his body, consuming the flames. As his body froze, he tried to knock us off him, his wings beating at the sky and his talons reaching for us, fighting until the very end.

The last bit of life left Sark as the tips of his wings froze, and we began to plummet to the ground. Another mournful, horrible scream came from the Spirit Temple as the world rushed up at us. We were too low for me to safely turn to a dragon—we’d hit the ground before I could raise my wings.

Kira grabbed me around the waist, and I felt her magic wrap around us. We jumped off Sark’s back just before he struck the earth with a heavy thud. His body cracked into a million pieces of ice at the impact, and they all exploded outward with dirt and grass from the garden where he’d crashed. Kira and I leaped wide, her air magic guiding our landing, taking us away from the danger and safely planting us on a patch of grass nearby.

I straightened up and brushed myself off, while eyeing Kira to make sure she was all right. My clothes and magic had melted into my skin from the knee down, and now that the fight was over the pain from my burned and blackened skin became agony. None of that mattered though, because Sark was gone. The millions of pieces of ice that had once been his body melted away under the dim sunlight and sank into the earth, and the weight of my families’ deaths lifted off me. They were avenged, along with Kira’s family and friends, and everyone else who had lost their loved ones to the Black Dragon’s enforcer.

“Three Dragons defeated,” Kira said, with something like awe or disbelief in her voice as she stared at the Spirit Temple’s remains.

“The Black Dragon must be weakened now,” I said.

She took my hand and clenched it tight. “Time to face her.”