Thea, Foro and the legionaries were gathered near the entrance to one of the secret passages Thea knew about. They wore dark, easy to move in clothing and tried to act as inconspicuous as they could, considering the circumstances.

“Legatus why is there a tunnel that leads from the palace to here?” one of the legionaries asked.

“This…” Thea started and stopped. Her cheeks held a slight blush since the contents of the district consisted of places that catered to the vices. “Some of my relatives felt like they were living in a cage, so to speak.”

“Stop teasing the Legatus,” Foro grumbled. “How long is it going to take before the dragon does something?”

“He probably wants all the advantages he can get,” Thea explained. “If there are too many of those shadow users even he could be in danger of dying. It damages him just as easily as it does us.”

They found themselves squinting in the twilight as the sun went behind the horizon. Their vision was at its worst aside from being in pitch blackness. From somewhere out in the city they heard a deafening roar that seemed to rattle the walls even from such a distance away.

“He shifted?” Foro looked like he wanted to panic.

“Get in the tunnel,” Thea ordered. “This should definitely give us the distraction we need.”

They made their way through the tunnel and soon crossed into the compound. Thea cracked open the secret doorway that hid the entrance to the tunnel and peeked out. There were still some people running around in a panic but there were significantly fewer people that there needed to be to properly guard the place.

“Move,” Thea ordered as she opened the door the rest of the way. “Remember what to look for and don't take any unnecessary risks.”

“Yes Legatus!” they responded in sync. They shifted to their half-blood states to allow the extra maneuverability of flight and scattered in different directions.

Thea marched with the air of a messenger who was rushing to deliver an important communique. She kept the hood of the flame resistant outfit up in order to hide the red in her hair and stayed in her human-form knowing the crimson streaks in her wings would draw too much attention.

Thea entered the palace through a little-used servants entrance and found herself in the empty dining area. She paused out of surprise, not only was it empty but it looked like it had fallen into disuse. There was quite a bit of dust on the benches and tables. She wondered what the cause could be before moving on.

She walked down a hallway keeping her hand along the wall searching for the mechanism that opened another secret passage that led to the upper floors. There was one tense moment as someone rushed past her, but they were in such a hurry the paid her no mind.

She finally located the mechanism and a small door disguised in the wall slid open. She brushed past some cobwebs and carefully made her way up the rickety wooden steps that spiraled up to the second floor.

Thea couldn't hold back the gasp and brought her hand up to her mouth from the shock of what she saw when she came out from the other side of the passage. She had been expecting it to an extent but it hadn’t prepared her for how thoroughly her room had been gone through and trashed. What really irked her is there was nothing of any political importance in the room. Just a few of her childhood artifacts and personal items. Which now lay shredded and broken on the floor.

Thea took a quick glance around while she fought back the tears of having her home stolen away from her. She gritted her teeth and opened the door to the hallway. She peeked around the corner and saw it was clear, much to her amazement.

Thea walked the two doors down to what had been her parents' nest. She slowly opened the door, ready and expecting to have to fight her way into where the eggs should be. Her eyes widened in shock when she saw no trace of another being in the room. The only thing there was two phoenix eggs nestled close together in the center of the room.

She knew this had to be a trap, there was no way, if they were important to the usurper's plans, that they would be left unattended during an attack. She also knew that she had to spring it.

Thea walked towards the eggs nervously glancing over her shoulder, constantly wary of an ambush she knew had to come somehow.

She reached the eggs and knelt down to examine them. Her face paled when she saw that they were darker than they should be and seemed to have shadows moving about inside them. It had to be the work of those strange humans who had aided in wiping out her men and the ones Zag sent her remaining legionaries off to kill.

She picked up the eggs and cradled them to her breast as she stood up from where they had been. She tried to calm herself down and think rationally, fighting back the panic that she would lose these last members of her family before they even hatched. Her racing mind kept coming back to one thought, over and over, the thought that the dragon might know what to do somehow.

Then as she turned around she wondered when she had started to see the dragon as a crutch to solve problems that way.

“Hello cousin,” the voice of a man came from the doorway.

**

Foro had split off from the others and had made his way to the wall of the guest quarters. He figured it would be as good as any place to start looking for the humans who wielded that strange power.

He had relayed and reminded the legionaries as to what the human he had killed when he escaped the battlefield had been wearing. Foro also told them to look for humans that seemed to be giving orders or instructions since any humans native to the city wouldn't be in such a position of authority.

The dragon had emphasized to them to use their newly acquired dragon fire to finish them off quickly, and they had spent what few hours they could to practice their control over it.

He tested the windows as he went along until he found one that was unlocked. As he was about to open it and climb into the room he heard voices from around the corner of the building towards where the back exit from the guest quarters would be.

He couldn't understand the language. Based off that alone he knew it had to be them. Every being on the continent spoke the same common language with only some variance in dialect. For him not to be able to make heads or tails of it meant they were either from across the sea or from the far north.

He peeked around the corner of the building and saw six humans arguing with each other. They were standing in a circle, so he couldn't jump out and ambush them without being seen and there wouldn't be any reason for a soldier or guard to be coming from the direction he would be.

He pulls back to look around and see if he can find a way around them without being spotted. As he turned his head he almost jumped out of his skin and into the sight of the arguing humans. He found Ketai standing next to him where she definitely shouldn't be.

“Wha... Mph!” he started to exclaim before she covered his mouth with her hand.

She indicated to him to be quiet before removing her hand and motioning him to move, so she could look around the corner of the building.

“Ketai, why are you here, it isn't safe!” Foro hissed in a whisper. He started to frantically look around for a place to hide her.

She motioned for him to move out of the way again, but he grabbed her shoulders and tried to direct her towards a storage shed. Shockingly he found he couldn't move her at all once she took a step to brace her foot to resist him.

She grabbed his shirt and looked up at him. Her eyes flashed into those of a dragon, and he could feel her aura pressing down on him. He let go of her and sighed before he stepped out of the way.

She peeked around the corner and then pulled back. She motioned Foro to wait and then sprinted around the corner towards the gate that was on the other side of the arguing group.

They were distracted by her, yet they weren't decisive enough to try to stop her and the ones who would have been able to spot Foro turned their eyes to follow her as she sped by. Foro didn't waste the opportunity.

He jumped out and sprinted toward the group. Crimson flames danced in his hands. He took the first two at the same time, jamming his fists into the back of their heads. The result went well beyond his expectations, he knew he was strong enough to fracture a human skull with such a move normally but what was left of their heads was a charred lump with a crater in the back. He began to think intent played as much of a role with dragon fire as it did with phoenix fire.

He smacked the third one as they reacted to his presence. His face simply melted off. It was the most horrifying thing Foro had ever seen. He shifted into his half-blood state and let off an explosion of golden flame laced with crimson stripes much the same way Thea had done to block the dragon’s attack what seemed like so long ago now. The flames engulfed two of the remaining humans. They seemed able to resist the golden flames but each time the crimson stripes touched them they left gashes in their skin. They were cut to ribbons in a matter of moments.

The final one managed to shield himself and blasted Foro away with the black shadow or mist, whatever it was. He felt the soul-searing pain he remembered eating away at his eye and quickly burned it off and healed himself.

“How! You shouldn't be able to harm us with your fire,” the remaining enemy exclaimed. “You’re going to tell me how.”

Foro smirked and lunged at the man trying to get a blow through his defense. He was repulsed although he could tell it took the man some effort to do so. Foro kept coming and saw his opportunity when the man stopped defending himself and clutched his head in agony. After finishing him off Foro looked up to see Ketai, her eyes in full draconic glory, standing not far away glaring angrily at what now was the man’s corpse.

“Do you even have a concept of the danger you’re putting yourself in?” he asked her in exasperation. “You shouldn't have come here.”

She looked at him before pointing to the corpses on the ground then to him and then making a cutting gesture across her throat.

“I understand but I would have found a way to deal with it.”

She shrugged at him and then points off to her left and motions him to go that way.

“You need to hide somewhere and lie low,” he tried again to get her to go out of the combat zone.

She looked up at the sky when some of Zag’s roars echoed from above the city before turning back to him. She gave a grin that with her golden draconian eyes looked downright feral and almost caused Foro to feel a shiver running down his spine. Then she stuck her tongue out at him and walked off towards the direction she had indicated.

“Is insanity a racial trait?” Foro muttered the question before hurrying after her.

**

Thea stared at the man with a mixture of rage and disgust.

“Fotismos, I see you’ve been dabbling in something rather disgusting,” she commented when she saw the pitch black streaks running through his hair.

“Yes, well what you have been dabbling in looks much more fetching I will admit,” he smirked. “Huilei was supposed to kill you although I’m glad you survived, it’ll be so much nicer to have a trio of sisters instead of just a duo.”

“You’ll get nothing more than an early death,” Thea clutched the eggs tighter to her chest.

They shifted at roughly the same time, Thea’s wings laced with dragon flame spread open behind her back the fire burning so strongly with her anger that various flammable things scattered throughout the room combusted from the heat. Fotismos with his wings laced with eerie shadow began releasing tendrils of dark mist that crept towards her feet.

As the mist approached her crimson flames would lick out and incinerate it. However, she hesitated to get closer, she didn't want to put down the eggs or risk getting them damaged if the fight came to close quarters.

“Those eggs are already mine, my power has already seeped into their very souls,” Fotismos sneered and more mist spread off from him.

Thea didn't bother responding to his taunting. She let the flames come off of her in a wreath along the ground completely obliterating the mist and if it wasn't for him generating some of his phoenix flames laced with the shadow power around his feet, Fotismos would have been two feet shorter than he currently was.

“This is quite unfortunate, this power you have makes you a bit too dangerous to keep around,” Fotismos said as he gathered darkness and flames in front of him in a roiling mass. “Luckily I don't really need your sisters or you, we can just substitute some other eggs, yes that should work fine.”

Thea frowned as he seemed to be almost talking to himself at this point. She also felt her instincts screaming at her not to get hit by that roiling mass of darkness and fire. She looked to her sides and let loose with a massive wave of dragon flame behind her. It slammed into the wall blowing it out in an explosion that left the edges of the remaining stones glowing cherry red.

She turned and sprinted towards the opening putting as much dragon and phoenix fire as she could between her and that roiling mass that she knew would be coming. She wasn't sure if she imagined it or if she could actually feel it getting closer. Either way to her it was like time slowed down.

The writhing mass got closer and closer until it lapped at her wings. The pain was excruciating but in all likelihood saved her life. When the pain shot through her wing she stumbled and fell. Since she didn't want to throw or crush the eggs she rolled to her side and the mass of darkness shot over her and exploded through the hole in the wall.

Fotismos was cackling like a madman as Thea writhed in pain while trying to protect the eggs. Her wings were nothing more than mangled stumps with flames and blood shooting out from the wounds as the black mist and shadow tried to eat away her flesh and bone.

“Maybe I should keep you after all! Yes, I should keep you like this, it’s so wonderful, it’s so beautiful…” he rambled on further down the road to madness.

Thea managed to get the wounds and pain under control and looked up at him with pure hatred.

Fotismos continued his ranting as tendrils of darkness spread out from him slowly creeping like a set of vines towards Thea and the eggs. Thea clutched them tighter to her chest once again and closed her eyes. She was too exhausted and wounded to continue the fight this way. She prayed out of desperation to any godly being who would listen. To the spirits, the humans worship, to the old gods locked away in their prisons. She even prayed to Agios Ba who may even want her killed. It was none of those who crashed into the side of the palace with such force that part of the ceiling crashed down and almost hit Fotismos.

Fotismos jumped back, the dark tendrils retreating with him, top dodge the debris. As he landed, he saw a man climb through the hole in the wall. The man walked towards Thea in his brazen glory. He exuded an aura that left Fotismos feeling terrified. As the man checked on Thea’s condition the terror started to feed Fotismos’ madness and it grew into an insane rage.

“Ah... Ah, you! Dragon, they are afraid of you!” Fotismos spat at the man. “I’m not, not afraid, I’m the strongest. Even Huilei will fear me, I’ll eventually take Agios’ place in the world!”

“What was done with these eggs?” Zag asked looking up at him for the first time. The full weight of Zag’s aura slammed into Fotismos with the question.

“Mine, mine! They made them mine! For me!” Fotismos shrieked at him. He shifted to his pure-blood phoenix state and the shrieking continued in the wordless screams of a phoenix.

Zag spread his wings and started to walk towards him.

“In the time that has passed since I have last killed a being many lifetimes have gone by for the shorter-lived. There are maybe only a few left alive that truly remember the horrors of the war with what you fools call the ‘Forgotten Kingdom.’

Perhaps you’ve heard the stories, perhaps you haven't but the biggest terror for the Covenant soldiers who participated in the destruction of that kingdom was me.

You think you’re stronger than a dragon? A being of the first races who was hatched when the revolt against the old gods still raged in this world? By all means, show me this!”

Zag had walked step by step until he was standing right in front of Fotismos. He brushed off the mist and phoenix fire sent his way from Fotismos attacks. The shadowy mists ate into his skin but it wasn't enough to bring him down. The phoenix fire did effectively nothing to him.

Zag reached upwards with his hand as Fotismos struck down. He tried to grab the beak but Fotismos twisted slightly to the side and bit into his shoulder. Zag’s arm was pulled off in the razor-sharp beak of the giant bird.

He jumped using his wings to gain further momentum and followed the head of Fotismos as he brought away his arm. Zag reached out with his other hand and grabbed the beak with his remaining hand. He pulled himself up and wrapped his legs around the base of the beak. Then he just squeezed.

Fotismos beak cracked. He started to writhe around as he flapped helplessly trapped in the room unable to escape. Zag used his own wings to further disturb Fotismos’ balance and managed to cause him to stumble and fall on his back.

The bloody mess that was Zag’s shoulder erupted in golden fire, an effect that caused Fotismos’ eyed to widen in panic even through his madness. When the flames dissipated, what was left was Zag flexing a brand-new arm. He slammed the newly minted fist into Fotismos’ eye and crimson fire burst forth. The flames enveloped Fotismos’ brain and shot out his ears, his nostrils, and his other eye. He let out a pitiful moan as he died and his head reduced to ashes. Ashes he would never revive from.

Zag stood up and left tracks through the puddles of blood on the floor as he walked to wear Thea was crouched down.

“Can you heal your wings?”

She shook her head that she could not. She couldn't even focus enough to respond verbally. Thea held up one of the eggs and looked pleadingly at Zag. Zag examined the egg without taking it from her, his eyes roamed over it and followed the shadows within.

“I think I know of someone who can help, but we can do nothing here. Just hold onto them,” Zag told her as he reached down and picked her up.

She gave a start but was really in no condition to protest. It would take her wings some time to function properly even if they were healed right away. She could see Zag wince as he readjusted the regrown arm. It seemed like dragons even suffered the pain of a regrown limb.

“The two closest times I’ve come to dying have been around you,” Zag snorted. “Even as much as the Covenant wanted to kill me during the war, they never came this close.”

Thea gave him a sarcastic pat on the arm as he leaped out from the hole in the wall, and they sped away from the palace and the phoenixes brave enough to take to the skies with a dragon.

**

Ketai had led Foro to several more of the shadow users and since they were only in pairs or alone he dispatched them with ease.

When they saw Zag dive into the palace Foro motioned Ketai to stop searching, and they made their way to the first rendezvous point. The other legionaries had the same idea since most of them had already arrived and the rest showed up a few moments after Foro did.

“Good, I see you’re all more or less intact. Does anyone have any wing damage?” Foro checked with them.

They reported that everything was good to go in that department. Foro tried to ignore the confused looks directed towards Ketai.

“Commander, why is Miss Ketai here?” Foro resisted the urge to punch the legionary who just had to ask.

“I am not in 'the know,'” Foro replied in monotone while Ketai smirked at him.

The legionaries, their confusion not alleviated, simply shrugged and went with the flow. They had never in their lives expected to see Foro brought to this state by someone, not in his command structure.

“Well since we’re all in good shape then scatter and meet up at the second rendezvous point,” Foro ordered as his eyes followed Zag flying out of the palace with Thea in his arms.

**

By the time they had all gathered together in a clearing outside the walls Thea had regrown her wings and was sitting on the ground wincing. Zag was pacing back and forth in some loose fitting clothes they had left at the location ahead of time and the eggs were sitting in a nest made of blankets.

“What happened?” Foro asked as he went up to Thea.

“Fotismos had the same shadow powers those humans did,” Thea responded through a grimace.

“That’s disturbing, is he neutralized?” Foro looked concerned.

“The dragon burned his face off, although he didn't escape unscathed either.”

Foro turned to look at Zag and saw he had stopped pacing and was squinting at some far off point in the sky.

“Foro, why is Ketai here?” Thea asked.

“She showed up while we were in the palace grounds and wouldn't leave,” Foro reported. “I haven't been able to convince her to go home.”

“She’s a dragon, you can't make her do anything she doesn't want to,” Zag absentmindedly explained without taking his eyes off the far off point.

Ketai suddenly started to make a growling noise and her attention snapped to the same point in the sky.

“All of you want to get back, and get the growling girl back even if you have to tie her up,” Zag ordered in a low voice.

“What why?” Thea asked as everyone turned to look at the point in the sky. “By the Old Gods, that’s another dragon!”