“Are we going to talk all day, or fight?” Gretta asked. Her voice was steady, but her gut told a different story.

  “Dew,” Meg said, sharp and low. “You can’t fight a dragon.”

  Smoke curled from the dragon’s nostrils as it chuffed, amused. Its scales shimmered like sunlit obsidian, each breath warping the air around it.

  “Indeed not,” the dragon said. “Maybe you need a demonstration as to why?”

  “She may not know your power, but I do,” Meg said. “There’s no need.”

  “Gretta Sullivan,” the dragon said, each syllable slow and heavy, soaked in magic.

  Gretta dropped. Not fell—dropped. Her body stopped being hers. Limbs refused to listen. Breath came shallow and fast, like it belonged to someone else.

  Panic surged, wild and useless. She tried to move, to twitch a finger, to clench her jaw—but she may as well have been carved from stone. She couldn’t even blink.

  The sky above swam in and out of focus. Something vast shifted at the edge of her vision—wings unfolding, the air bending with heat.

  This is how people die, she thought. Not screaming. Not fighting. Just lying there while the world moves on.

  Somewhere above her, Meg stepped into view, planting her boots between Gretta and the dragon like she meant it.

  “Auremyr,” Meg said.

  The dragon paused mid-step, one massive claw still lifted. His head tilted just slightly. “Bold to say my name aloud,” he rumbled, more curious than angry. “But you do not know the magic to wield it.”

  “If you press me,” Meg said, “we’ll find out if I do.”

  The dragon chuffed, smoke curling from his nostrils. “Lesser fae with dangerous mouths. If I let that go unchallenged, I’d spend the next decade reminding the rest of your kind why I am the lord of dragons.”

  His voice echoed through the glade like falling stone—slow, weighty, final. Then he added, with mild interest, “Perhaps a bargain would be less tedious.”

  “The queen’s consort hunts you,” Auremyr said, voice low. “And the queen will be eager to win his favor.”

  “We’re not here to fight the queen,” Meg replied. “We’re here to free her.”

  The dragon’s eyes narrowed. “The Frost-born seeks to aid Summer? Curious times.”

  “Not just Summer,” Meg said. “Fairy itself. You must feel it—the soil thinning, the magic fraying at the edges. The demons aren’t just poisoning courts. They’re draining the world.”

  “You’ve stood apart for centuries,” Auremyr said, his gaze sharp and unreadable. “Why now?”

  “Because even neutrality dies if there’s nothing left to be neutral in,” Meg said. “You know that better than most.”

  “The queen’s Essence Seed will find you soon enough,” Auremyr said. “Even I cannot keep her eyes turned forever. So—what do you offer in trade?”

  “A chance for a better world in exchange for safe passage,” Meg said. “Nothing more. We’re headed to the summer court.”

  The dragon let out a slow exhale, smoke curling like mist. “I could not stop the demon lord. Do you truly believe you can?”

  “We don’t need to defeat him,” Meg said. “Only to cut off his power source. If we can reach the queen… there’s still a chance.”

  “Anathina,” the dragon whispered. There was no magic in the name—only grief. “You will die if you face him.”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Meg nodded once. “We’ll all die if I don’t.”

  Auremyr let out a long breath, smoke curling upward in lazy spirals. “I will grant you passage—but you must add a new treasure to my halls. I cannot allow such a potent artifact to fall into the hands of the demon. It would fuel him for centuries.”

  “I cannot give up my sword,” Meg said.

  The dragon huffed, not unkindly. “I speak not of your blade. I speak of the feather your companion keeps up her sleeve.”

  Gretta couldn’t move, but she felt them both looking at her. The feather was still tucked near her wrist, smooth against her skin.

  “It’s not mine to offer,” Meg said quietly.

  With a casual flick of a claw, the dragon released Gretta from the spell. Magic snapped back into her like breath after drowning.

  She rose unsteadily, brushing her arm—feeling the feather there, still.

  “If you can keep it,” she said, pulling it free, “it’s yours.”

  The dragon leaned in slightly, great golden eyes narrowing. “Fate is tricky to hold, is it not?”

  Gretta hesitated. She hadn’t meant to. Her hand stopped just above his massive, waiting palm.

  It was just a feather. It had always been just a feather.

  Except it wasn’t.

  She set it down.

  The moment it touched his scales, the feather shimmered—then ignited in a spiral of green fire that wrapped around the dragon’s body like a memory come alive.

  He closed his eyes. For a moment, his wings spread as though he were young again. The fire danced along his limbs before fading.

  “Ohh,” Auremyr said, voice thick. “I’ve not felt such power since the first age. A worthy exchange.”

  He lowered his head solemnly. “Go now, before the unicorns arrive and destroy you.”

  He pointed with a single claw toward the ridge. “There is a hut, just beyond that hill. Walk through it front to back, and you will find the Queen’s court.”

  Gretta dusted soot from her sleeves, more out of habit than need, and gave the dragon one last glance. “Nice guy,” she muttered. “Let’s never do that again.”

  Her voice was flat, but something clenched beneath it. The feather was gone. Just like that.

  Meg didn’t answer. She was already moving, jaw tight, eyes fixed ahead.

  They crested the next rise in silence, boots crunching over dry roots. Then—

  Thump.

  A pause.

  Thump-thump.

  The ground shivered slightly beneath their feet.

  Gretta slowed. “Is that—”

  “Don’t look,” Meg snapped.

  “I wasn’t going to. I just—what the hell is that?”

  “Unicorns.”

  Gretta turned to her, raising a brow. “Like… sparkles and rainbows? Maybe a motivational sticker pack?”

  Meg stopped long enough to look her dead in the eyes. “Warhorse-sized nightmares. Horns that mesmerize. Hooves that crush. If you stare, you freeze. If you don’t, you die tired.”

  Gretta’s breath caught. “Huh.”

  “Run.”

  The hoofbeats surged louder, each one a thunderclap against the earth. Gretta didn’t need to see them—she could feel the pressure of massive bodies closing fast. Her teeth ached from clenching.

  She veered left, boots slipping on loose dirt, and dropped to one knee near a patch of half-buried roots.

  She slapped her hand to the soil and whispered, “Taluneth.”

  Magic pulsed outward like a heartbeat.

  The ground split. Thick vines erupted, snarling around one another in a woven snare. Roots twisted like serpents, driven by something older than instinct—protective, furious.

  Behind them, a shrill whinny turned guttural. Something massive hit the vines with the sound of trees snapping.

  Gretta didn’t look back. “Move!” she shouted, grabbing Meg by the sleeve.

  They ran.

  The hut emerged ahead—more ruin than refuge, its boards barely clinging to their frame.

  She didn’t slow.

  The world flipped.

  One moment, she was sprinting toward splinters and sunlight. The next—

  The air thickened. The stink of dirt and sweat vanished, replaced by cloying incense and the shimmer of heat.

  Gretta stumbled, vision bleaching white, then filling too fast with color. High arches. Cascading silks. Sunlight caught in gold and crystal. The scent of roses and rot.

  Her shoulder slammed into a warm wall—no, a pillar—and she grunted, teeth clenched.

  Meg appeared at her side, crouched and tense, one hand near her blade.

  A shadow fell over them.

  Two ogres loomed at the edge of a long hall, armor gleaming like hammered bronze. Their brows furrowed in unison. One took a slow step forward and reached for his weapon.

  “Intruders,” he said, low and uncertain.

  Gretta didn’t like the way his hand tightened around the hilt. That uncertainty wouldn’t hold.