Page 56 of Fanged Secrets
He wasn’t dead, but he’d be in for a headache that would make him wish he was. A grim voice in the back of my mind noted that this was probably what she had intended to do to Don when she slammed him into the wall back at the gathering.
For a moment, I could only stare, my pulse racing. Dylan was already turning toward me, giving a curt nod. Her form flicked in and out of clarity like she was part of the darkness rather than shrouded within it. My mind recalled the early days of sharing her apartment, and the night she had drifted through the living room like a wraith. At the time, I thought I was dreaming. Now, I wasn’t so sure.
But there would be time to grill Dylan on the schematics later, when we lived through the night and made it to the morning. I hurried out of the bushes and up the porch steps, dashing past her and into my old home. The air inside was thick with dust, the darkness pressing in from all sides. The familiar sight of the grand staircase and slanted chandelier did little to comfort me. Every corner held a memory, every shadow a ghost.
I paused at the foot of the rotting stairs and glanced over my shoulder. Dylan stood in the doorway and I signed for her to keep watch.
A second later, the wall above the doorway caved in.
I couldn’t hear any of it, and it took a split second too long to realize what was happening. The facade crumpled inwards,crushed by a collision from the outside. Brick and drywall crashed to the floor, taking part of the collapsing ceiling with it. I stumbled backward, barely avoiding the falling debris. I watched in shock as a massive form burst through the crumbling plaster, dust and debris billowing outwards from where it crashed to the floor.
A reptilian creature, horned and scaled. Oksana, in her dragon form, wings extended and gleaming darkly in the dim light.
The sheer size and power of the shifter took my breath away. The dragon’s eyes glinted with a terrifying fury as she twisted in the rubble, her wings folding back against her sides. The ground shook beneath my feet, and I instinctively backed away. Oksana still showed human qualities, but barely. Only her eyes were truly her own, an abyssal black – but unlike before, it swallowed her pupils, irises and sclera alike. The dragon shifter blinked, nictitating membranes moving in the opposite direction of her eyelids.
Just beyond, Dylan was climbing to her feet, covered in dust, surveying the chaos with wide, horrified eyes. Behind her, there was motion and a new set of headlights silhouetting her frame. Oksana wasn’t our only problem. My blood ran cold in my veins. Don was here. Moments later, five more white-haired shifters barreled toward the porch. Behind them, I saw my father’s own men, armed to the teeth and making a beeline for the woman in their path.
Dylan’s searching gaze alighted on me, and with a quick, sharp gesture that matched her mouth, she signed, "Run."
I hesitated, gaze flicking between Dylan and the monstrous figure of Oksana. Dylan didn’t wait for me to decide. She lunged at the dragon shifter, her nimble speed giving her the edge, but I could see the way Dylan staggered slightly, her body already battered from Oksana’s chaotic entrance. The two creatures clashed, flesh meeting scale, and the house shook under thestrain. Shadows danced around Dylan’s frame, more apparent in the yellow light of the last remaining bulb of the demolished entryway.
My mind raced. I had to help Dylan, had to even the odds. It was more of a hunch than anything else, but it was all I had to go on. I darted toward the old electrical panel I knew was hidden in the nearby alcove. The switch was stiff with age, but it moved with a resistantclunkthat I felt in my fingertips. The sparse lights throughout the building flickered and died, plunging the entire place into darkness.
I could feel the shift almost immediately. The shadows deepened, and Dylan melted into them, becoming one with the night. I had to move, to make the most of the precious seconds she was earning me. But for a moment, I watched, awe-struck.
Dylan disappeared and reappeared at will, the darkness swirling around her like a living thing, fangs glinting before sinking into exposed skin. It was like watching a death dance – silent, graceful, unstoppable. She took down the men and dragon shifters alike, her movements fluid, her strikes precise. The terror on their faces as they realized they were being hunted by something they could barely see sent a chill down my spine.
But my moment of wonder was cut short.The egg.I had to find the egg.
With renewed urgency, I ran through the darkened halls, the only light coming from the occasional flash of moonlight through the windows, peeking from behind mottled gray clouds. I tore through rooms one by one, each empty of any furniture, covered in a filmy layer of dust. The narrow corridors seemed to close in around me, and I moved with a frantic urgency.
I couldn’t hear the chaos erupting behind me, but I could feel it, the tremors in the floor, the shifting shadows. With a timer ticking down in my head, I made it all the way to the scullery in the back without finding anything.
Then I remembered it. A small metal door outside the house – the one I used to crawl through as a child to escape into the garden. I burst through the back door, digging through the foliage at the base of the building, and found it, half-hidden by ivy. I tugged off my heels, hiking my dress up as I gripped the rusted handle.
I sat in the dirt and planted both feet against the wall on either side of the door, hauling it open with enough effort to make my shoulders pop.
It was a tight squeeze, and my pretty evening dress was practically ruined, but it was also a breakthrough, and the cold, damp air of the basement greeted me as I descended the narrow steps within. With little light to work with, I had to feel my way around, getting by on the slitted glow of swaying light that shone through the ceiling boards above my head. Someone had a torch up there, but with the way it was moving, they were clearly preoccupied with the murderous vampire rampaging through the building.
The cradle was exactly where I remembered it – my cradle – tucked away in the corner, now covered in dust. And there, nestled in the rotting wood, was an egg.
It was bigger than I expected it to be, the size of a football and covered in hard, silvery scales. I reached out and lifted it, cradling it carefully in my arms. A choking relief flooded through me, the emotion spurred on by more than just the retrieval of the egg. But it was short-lived.
A shadow fell over me and I turned my head. My blood turned to ice. Up the rickety stairs on the far wall, my father stood in the doorway, his silhouette sharp against the torchlight flickering behind him. He was holding a gun.
That menacing weapon in his hand caught the light as he descended.
Don took the stairs slowly, and I caught the faint movement of his lips. His words were lost to me, shrouded in shadow, but the glint in his eyes told me everything I needed to know. With my heart in my throat, I waited, watching, until he was level with me.
My father reached out a hand – reached for the egg. He waited expectantly and with my heart in my throat, I hung my head and shuffled toward him.
He didn’t expect a trick until it was too late.
With all the strength I could muster, I kicked out at the towering stack of old boxes and broken furniture beside us. The tower toppled, an avalanche of dusty keepsakes from a life he banished to the basement. I saw the leg of a bent chair nick him in the forehead and he stumbled, covering his mouth, gun in hand, as the billowing dust crawled down his throat.
I bolted, clutching the egg to my chest as I climbed the stairs and took off down the dark hallway. I didn’t need to look back to know my father was following me.
I couldn’t hear him, couldn’t tell how close he was. All I could do was run.
