The Envoy

The creature stalked into the light only a few seconds later. Michelle hadn’t known what to expect. She knew the legends about dragons, had been told that it resembled the creatures of old Earth mythology. But seeing it in reality was something completely different.

It was blue, almost the color of the ice around it, and easily forty meters long from head to tail. It walked on four legs with its wings folded against its torso and small leathery ears tucked back against its skull. Its eyes were the color of night, and it glared at her with pure venomous hatred.

The dragon moved forward with a sinuous, side to side motion on its short legs. It sniffed twice and clicked its jaws. Two glands on either side of the mouth flared open.

Six ear-shattering cracks echoed through the cavern. The dragon flinched and looked up. The Envoy had gained higher ground on an ice shelf. His silhouette, gun in hand, could be seen against the backdrop of white light through the ice above. The dragon leapt, wings flapping to gain altitude.

Warren made an inhuman jump. He landed on its head, firing again and again. The dragon shook its snout furiously, throwing him to and fro like a doll as they slammed into the ice. He held onto a nostril with one hand fired with the other.

The dragon reared onto two legs and slapped him against the ice. The Envoy was finally thrown, his weapon spiraling into the darkness. He hit a wall and didn’t move. It hissed at his limp body and darted forward.

Michelle lashed out with her telepathy. She didn’t have time to think, to remember the warnings against trying to Read an animal. She was inside the dragon’s mind in an instant and she pulled. It stopped stock still above the Envoy and turned toward her. Its eyes were almost human.

They were a threat to her home.

Michelle barely had time to realize that the thought had been the dragon’s before it dove toward her. It was a flash of blue with a raging hiss as Warren pushed her to the side. Pain lit up the side of her face as she slid across the ice.

He was standing between her and the dragon, barehanded, crouched in a fighting stance. The ice behind Michelle crackled as acid ate through it.

The dragon moved forward cautiously, its eyes scanning up and down Warren with frightening intelligence. A few silent moments passed.

It leapt into the air, roaring, and pounced on Warren, jaws first. Michelle screamed as he disappeared beneath a flare of scales and leathery wings. The dragon’s tail slashed at the air and beat against the ice. Michelle barely had the sense to scramble out of the way.

It fell down onto its legs and was strangely quiet. It whined.

Warren was lying under its mouth, a spiral web of cracked ice where his back was jammed against it. One hand held the beast’s lower jaw, the other the top, by the teeth. His black scarf had fallen and revealed a strong chin with three day’s stubble. He was grinning.