Raven’s heart pounded in her chest as she strapped on the large hiking backpack, in which all of her and Owen’s supplies were securely packed. She cinched the straps as tightly as they would go against her body, and then gave Owen a small nod.

“Alright,” she said. “It’s now or never.”

“And we’re invisible right now, as best you can tell?” Owen asked. He was standing in front of her completely naked, ready to shift into dragon form. They were both doing their best to ignore Saul’s dragon, which was still circling above Sandview and yelling out booming threats at its horrified citizens.

“I’ve cast the strongest invisibility shield I possibly can,” Raven said. “We don’t have a protective shield around us, because I’ve focused all of my magical power into the invisibility shield to make it as strong as possible. I think we both agree that staying invisible is our only hope of survival, anyway. A protective shield won’t last half a minute against an army of this size.”

Owen nodded. “Alright, then. Let’s do this.”

He stepped forward and gave her a soft kiss on the lips. Warmth flooded from his body to hers, and the heat felt like a reassuring hug wrapping around her. She could use all the comfort she could get right now. She was a seasoned warrior, and had made it through several battles in the last year. But she knew that if Saul’s soldiers saw them, all her military training would not save her. She took a deep breath to steady her nerves, then looked down at her magic ring. It was glowing with a soft light, reassuring her that her invisibility spells were in effect. All she could do was hope that they held long enough for Owen to fly them out of this hornet’s nest.

He had taken several steps backward now, so that he would have space to shift into dragon form without knocking her over. She met his eyes and gave him a brave smile. He smiled back, his eyes sad. They both knew that their lives, as well as the fate of the dragon amethyst, hung in the balance.

“Hey,” he said, taking another couple of steps backward. “You know I love you, right?”

Raven’s heart leapt happily in her chest. “I know,” she said. “I love you, too.”

His smile deepened, and then, a rush of energy hit her like a wall of water. He began his transformation into a dragon, while Raven nervously watched the sky. Her heart clenched in fear, thinking of what would happen to her and Owen if any of Saul’s soldiers saw them right now.

But the invisibility shields were still doing their job. No one so much as glanced in their direction, as far as Raven could tell. All eyes were still on Saul, as he circled and made terror-filled threats against the citizens of Sandview.

When Owen had completely shifted into dragon form, he bent low to the ground so that Raven could climb on. She checked the straps on her backpack one last time, and then hoisted herself onto her dragon’s broad back. He glanced back at her, checking to make sure that she was secure. She gave him a thumbs up sign, then grabbed firmly onto the thick scales on his back. Reassured, he began pumping his wings, and moments later they were rising into the dark sky, leaving behind their rocky hideout.

Raven held her breath, her heart rate increasing as they rose higher and higher, and the view of Saul’s army became clearer and clearer. Owen took a long, circular route around Sandview, which kept them well clear of the mass of bats shifters and wizards that crowded the airspace near Saul. But they were so high that Raven could still see the streets of the town in the distance, and she was surprised to see that they were full of people. She would have thought everyone would hide inside at the sight of a dragon, but perhaps the sheer incredulity of a dragon’s existence was enough to keep them gawking. She wondered if they would give in to Saul’s demands, and join his cause. They probably would, she thought bitterly. And could she really blame them? What choice did a small town of humans have against a fire-breathing dragon who practiced dark magic? She felt especially sorry for those people who were in Sandview as tourists. They’d come to enjoy a relaxing vacation, and instead had discovered a sinister dragon. Raven wondered whether Saul would allow them to leave and go back to their homes. She guessed not. He wouldn’t want them spreading rumors about him, or trying to get help from the government to squash his army.

And could his army be squashed? Raven glanced doubtfully over the mass of bats and wizards in the air, and then surveyed the horde of shifters on the ground. She was beginning to wonder if even the dragon stones would be enough to stop them. She’d been told by all the experts that the dragon stones were immensely powerful, and could take on even the strongest of armies. But the more Saul’s army grew, the harder it was for her to imagine defeating him using just a couple of gemstones. She hoped that the stones were truly more powerful than they looked. Otherwise, the small army working for the forces of good was going to find itself quickly overcome by Saul and his horde.

They had passed the airspace crowded by Saul and his soldiers now. Owen’s wings sliced silently through the air, lifting them higher and higher until Saul’s army looked like toys. Owen was picking up speed, and Raven finally began to think that they might actually make it out of here unnoticed. She scanned the airspace all around them, looking for any strange blurry spots that would indicate someone was hiding under an invisibility shield. She saw nothing unusual, although the darkness hung so heavy that locating a possible invisibility shield would have been difficult even for her well-trained eyes. She could only hope that the darkness was keeping their own invisibility shield strong and undetectable as well.

Raven had no doubt that Saul would have scouts hidden for miles all around the town of Sandview. He’d want plenty of guards watching out for trouble while he made his ridiculous speech to its townspeople. So far, Raven hadn’t seen anyone, but that only made her more nervous. Saul’s soldiers were definitely out here. But where? And were they being lazy and doing the bare minimum of watching out for visible threats, or were they constantly casting counterspells in an effort to detect invisibility shields? Raven could only hope for laziness, but she worried that she might be hoping for too much. She crouched low on Owen’s back as he flew, searching the horizon with her magic ring ready. If they were attacked by a large group of guards, there wouldn’t be much she could do. She was a well-trained fighter, but still—she and Owen were only two people. One dragon and one wizard could only do so much.

The further Owen flew, though, the more Raven started to relax. Saul and the city of Sandview were growing smaller and smaller on the horizon, and surely they were nearly past the danger zone. Raven would be surprised if Saul had posted guards much further out than this. She took a deep breath and let it out in a long, relieved sigh. They were going to make it. They had actually managed to sneak out of there right under Saul’s nose.

Raven sat up and smiled, then reached to pat Owen on the shoulder in celebration. But as her arm stretched out in front of her, she felt a sudden, sharp pain shooting through it. She recoiled, jumping backwards so quickly that she lost her balance and fell over on her side completely. If Owen’s broad dragon back had been any smaller, she would have fallen off and gone catapulting downward toward the earth, and certain death.

But even though she’d managed to not fall off of Owen’s back, she still couldn’t be sure that she wasn’t facing certain death. Another sharp pain hit her, this time in her side, right below her right hip. In the next moment, she finally saw them. A group of about twenty wizards closing in on her. They must have been casting strong counterspells, because Raven’s invisibility shield was not fooling them. They picked up speed as they headed toward her, and their own invisibility shields began to fail. Even the dark magic spells of these dark wizards were not enough to hold an invisibility shield at the speeds the wizards were traveling.

Raven quickly abandoned her own useless invisibility shield, and focused all her magical energy on a protective shield. Within moments, these dark wizards would be in close enough firing range to do some truly serious damage.

“Magicae arma!” she yelled out. A force field of protective energy surrounded her and Owen, and just in time, too. A split-second after the shield went up, several huge blasts of laser fire from the dark wizards magic rings came rushing toward Raven and Owen. The laser beams collided with the protective shield and set off a huge shower of sparks. Those sparks were the first thing that alerted Owen to the fact that they were in trouble.

Raven saw Owen turn his giant head backward toward her, his eyes quickly checking to make sure that she was alright. Once he knew Raven was okay, he looked behind them, where the attacking wizards were now in full view. Raven saw his dragon eyes beginning to glow green with anger. Unlike Saul, Owen could not speak while in dragon form, but Raven was pretty sure that, if he could have, he would have been spewing out a stream of curses right about then.

“Just fly!” Raven yelled at him. “Our only hope is to fly faster than them and escape. I can’t hold this many of them off for long, and I’m worried that there are more out here who will join in the chase once they realize what’s going on.”

Owen let out a low roar, and Raven could hear the frustration in the noise. But he didn’t have time to express himself much beyond that roar, and he knew it. They needed to fly, and fly like the wind. Owen turned his head forward again, and started pumping his wings even faster than before. He’d been holding back his speed a bit so that Raven could maintain their invisibility shield, but now, with the hope of maintaining any kind of stealth completely gone, he threw all of his energy into flying as quickly as he could.

And oh, how he could fly! Raven felt the wind that whipped at her face growing steadily stronger as Owen’s pace increased. Behind them, the dark wizards, who had been so gleefully laughing at her and throwing out magic attacks, were starting to look angry. Raven couldn’t keep a smug smile off her face. Dark magic might be powerful, but it did have its limitations. There was no dark magic spell that miraculously made you better at flying. Flying was a skill that could only be learned through a great amount of time and effort, and Saul’s soldiers were all much less experienced at flying than the Falcon Cross wizards or Redwood Dragons. Owen had spent his entire life practicing his flying skills, and it showed. Even Raven’s hair was unable to stand up to his speed. Her long locks came loose from the bun she had pulled them into and whipped around her face in a tangled mess.

She did not bother trying to shoot off any magic attacks at their pursuers. At this speed, the odds were pretty low of hitting one of them with a blast strong enough to knock them off their broomstick. Raven focused all of her magical energy on the protective shield she had cast around Owen and her, hoping that it would hold long enough for them to get out of range of the dark wizards. Their chances of that seemed good. Owen pulled ahead of the group a little more with each passing second.

“Come on, Owen,” Raven whispered under her breath. “You can do this. You can get us out of here.”

As if he could hear Raven’s silent encouragement, Owen seemed to pick up speed. He sped forward at an impossible speed, and Raven would have let out a cheer of victory if she hadn’t been so busy concentrating on keeping her balance as she crouched on Owen’s back. The dark wizards behind them were starting to grow smaller and smaller in the distance, and Raven breathed a sigh of relief. They were going to make it. Escape was theirs.

And then, disaster struck.

Raven heard the whizz of a broomstick right above her head just before she saw it. She attempted to throw an attack out at the wizard, but she was too late. She couldn’t get the laser beam out of her ring fast enough, and before she could even finish the words to the spell she was trying to cast, she found herself completely frozen. She was surrounded by what looked like a blue force field, and even her lips could not move. She’d seen stunning spells hundreds of times before, and experienced a few of them herself, too. But all of those stunning spells only froze someone from the neck down. She’d never seen or heard of a spell that could freeze someone completely, even freezing up their face.

Raven told herself not to panic. She was still on Owen’s back, even though she was frozen. If he could just keep flying and get them out of there, then she would have time to figure out a way to do a counterspell that might release her. She just had to remain calm and hope that Owen could get her out of there before they actually caught her.

That hope didn’t last more than a few seconds, though. Raven felt a sudden jolt, like the kind you might feel if you were in a vehicle that suddenly braked to a screeching halt. She couldn’t move her neck to look around, but it didn’t matter. She was positioned perfectly to see that she was now suspended in her blue ball of energy in midair, and no longer on Owen’s back. Not only that, but she now saw, as she faced forward, that a fresh wave of wizard guards was ahead of them. There must have been another line of guards still to come, and the guards that had been chasing Owen and Raven had somehow alerted them that a dragon and wizard were heading their way. Raven felt her heart sinking in her motionless, suspended body. There was no way they were going to get away now. There were too many enemy soldiers, and Raven could not help Owen at all. She was a helpless, motionless ball in the middle of the sky. She wanted to cry, but the stunning spell had frozen even her tears, it seemed. She could do nothing but watch in horror as Owen rapidly slowed his flight. He had realized that she was no longer on his back, and that he was facing a wall of wizards both in front of and behind him.

Raven wanted to scream at him to keep going, and to save himself. But she could not scream right now, and even if she could have, he would not have been able to hear her. They had been fools to think that they could get away from Sandview unnoticed. Saul’s army was too massive. They should have known that there would be enough guards to practically form a small army themselves.

Owen had seen Raven’s predicament, and he was in full-on fight mode now. He was breathing fire in every direction and slashing with his claws, taking down wizard after wizard in his rage. He moved steadily toward her, spinning in a circle as he flew and doing his best to hold at bay the wizards that surrounded him in all directions. He was doing a pretty impressive job of it, too. The large size of his dragon body was deceptive—he could maneuver with incredible speed. And his thick dragon hide protected him from the constant laser beam attacks that the dark wizards were sending out from their magic rings. Slowly, but surely, he was making progress toward her.

Raven could not move her lips, but she silently prayed for strength and good luck for him. Was it possible that maybe, just maybe, they might make it out of here yet? She wanted to hope for escape still, but she wasn’t sure she dared. She was sure that there were hundreds of wizard guards ready to fly over and join the fight if they realized what was going on.

Owen continued to fight, and the air around Raven grew hot as he got closer. The flames he was shooting out of his mouth were lighting up the sky and filling it with heat. Even though she couldn’t move her body at all, she could feel her heart beating wildly in her chest. She had been in a lot of frightening situations in the last year, but this one felt like the worst. Her normal coolheaded demeanor was abandoning her now, and she could feel panic rising in her chest. And then, just when she thought things couldn’t get worse, they did.

The blue force field around her, which had been holding her up in midair, suddenly dissolved. She felt herself go weightless as she fell through the air. The stunning spell that had held her frozen in place dissolved as well, and she could move again. This didn’t do her a lot of good, though, since all she could do now was flail helplessly against the wind created by her fall. She opened her mouth and screamed, but she had no idea whether Owen could even hear her, or if he’d be able to get to her in time.

Ironically enough, it was one of the enemy soldiers who saved her. She felt the whizz of a broomstick as it rushed by her, and she felt a strong, rough hand grabbing her out of midair.

“Gotcha. Saul’s gonna want you alive, Darling,” the wizard said. Then he pointed his magic ring at her and yelled “Magicae suspendo.”

Raven once again found herself suspended in midair, surrounded by a blue force field. But this time, the wizard who caught her didn’t use a stunning spell on her, so she was able to move. She looked up above her, where the battle was raging on. The wizard who had caught her and put her back inside a force field trap was zooming upward on his broomstick to join in the fray. Raven tried to point her magic ring upward and shoot out a magic attack, but she soon found that her magic wouldn’t work inside the force field.

“Freaking dark magic,” she said through gritted teeth. She felt helpless as she watched Owen high above her, taking down wizard after wizard with his streams of fire. He was holding his own against them remarkably well, but it didn’t matter much. The wizards kept coming. In the distance, Raven could see the light beams from dozens of magic rings. More wizards had been alerted to the fact that a rogue dragon shifter and wizard had intruded on Saul’s territory. It was only a matter of time before Saul himself heard about this, if he hadn’t already.

Raven tried to yell at Owen, to tell him it was useless and that he should just attempt to escape. But the force field that had trapped her seemed to block sound, too. She couldn’t hear the noises from the battle above, and no one paid any attention to her screams, leading Raven to believe that no one out there could hear her.

And then, suddenly, the force field disintegrated again, and she was once again falling through the air, flailing and screaming to no avail. This time, not even the dark wizards seemed to notice her. They were too busy swarming around Owen, trying to take him down. Raven felt panic rising in her chest again as she picked up speed, falling faster and faster toward the dark earth below. She had to be less than a minute away from impacting with the earth, and she whimpered, unable even to scream.

Stop panicking, she told herself. Think. You have to think. How can you save yourself?

And then, in an instant, she had a flash of brilliance—a crazy idea that just might work. She pointed her magic ring toward herself and yelled out the spell that made objects as weightless as a feather.

“Magicae pluma,” she said. She felt a shock of energy go through her, and then, her rapid fall abruptly stopped. Instead of hurtling toward the ground, she was floating now, just like a small feather. It took her a full minute to get her breathing back to normal, and to realize that she was not moments from certain death, after all. The bile that had been rising in her throat gradually subsided and she was able to think clearly.

Owen must have killed both of the wizards who had tried to hold her inside of the force fields. When a wizard died, any spells that they had been using immediately ceased to operate. That’s why the force fields, and the stunning spell, had ended so suddenly. Raven was surprised that none of the dark wizards seemed to have noticed now that she was missing. She was, after all, the one holding the dragon amethyst. They must not know that she and Owen were actually carrying the amethyst. That was the only explanation. And, if that was true, it was best if things stayed that way. If Saul or any of his soldiers suspected that the amethyst was so close, the whole throng back by Sandview would be after Owen and Raven in an instant.

Raven couldn’t see anything on the ground clearly in the thick darkness, but she had to be getting fairly close to it. Owen and the battling wizards looked very far away. Raven had a feeling that he didn’t even know where she was, which no doubt made him quite unhappy. She tried to think of the best way to get his attention. Just as she landed on the warm, sandy ground, she hit upon an idea. Raising her magic ring high above her head, she took a deep breath and prayed that this would work.

“Magicae scintillula,” she said. Instantly, a large shower of shimmering sparkling light shot upward from her ringed hand. She held her hand steady, and waited.

A few moments later, as she’d hoped, Owen saw her. She knew that he’d seen her, because she saw him start to dive downward toward her by the light of the dark wizards’ rings. She held her hand steady, praying that he would reach her first, before any of the dark wizards. Her heart beat faster the closer he got.

“Come on,” she whispered. “Fly, Owen, fly.”

She watched as he got closer, outpacing the wizards despite their best efforts to catch him. Her heart leapt with joy as she saw him approach her with his feet and claws outstretched, ready to scoop her up.

He plucked her expertly from the ground, wrapping his razor sharp claws around her perfectly so that he held her firmly without harming her. He barely slowed down as he swooped by, and the sudden forward momentum made Raven somewhat dizzy. She took a couple deep breaths to steady herself, and then yelled out, “Scintillula terminantur.”

Instantly, the dazzling sparks that had been shooting out from her ring disappeared.

“Magicae arma,” she yelled out, concentrating on putting a protective shield around her and Owen. Owen’s dragon hide protected him fairly well, but he did have a few vulnerable spots. The last thing she wanted right now was for him to get hit in one of those spots and go down. And she herself was vulnerable, an easy target as she hung suspended by Owen’s claws.

Owen was flying faster than Raven had ever seen him fly before. The battle, and nearly losing her in it, must have energized him. His body above her was straightened into a perfectly streamlined shape. He looked like a bullet as he zoomed through the air, only his flapping wings breaking up the aerodynamics of his form.

Raven glanced behind them, seeing to her relief that the dark wizards were losing ground. Owen never looked back, and never slowed. He just flew forward as if his life depended on it. And it probably did. Raven knew that if they were caught, Saul would likely torture them for information and then kill them. He would quickly discover that they held the dragon amethyst, and steal it to use for his own evil purposes. This would be a great blow to the good shifters and wizards, and would be an ultimate failure on the part of Raven and Owen. Their task had been to get the dragon amethyst safely to the shifter protectors in Texas. As long as Owen could outrun the group behind him, they might still have a chance of doing that.

They were far enough away from Sandview now that Raven hoped there were no more guards ahead of them. If she was right, and their enemies were all behind them now, then it looked like they were going to make it. Raven felt her heart pounding in her chest, as it had been for most of the last hour. She felt helpless as she watched Owen above her, putting all of his energy into flying. She couldn’t do much to lend a hand, other than pray for strength for him. She didn’t know whether praying would help all that much, but she prayed, anyway. Anything that had the slightest chance of improving their odds of escape was worth a try.

Raven didn’t know if it was her prayers, Owen’s flying skills, or just dumb luck, but at some point it became clear that they were, in fact, going to escape. The lights from the dark wizards’ rings grew smaller and smaller, and eventually disappeared. No new enemies appeared in front of them, and Raven felt herself relaxing somewhat as they flew. The only sound she could hear now was the whooshing of the wind as it flew past her ears in a steady stream.

Owen was not relaxing. He was flying as fast as ever, speeding through the sky. Raven had a crick in her neck from the odd way her body was positioned in his claws, and she wanted to tell him to stop and take a break. But something about the way he was flying kept her from actually making any kind of move to stop him. There was an urgency to his movements that she had never seen before, and she had seen him in some very urgent situations. He flew for hours, never slowing down, until she wondered at how it was even physically possible for him to maintain such a pace for so long.

Finally, just when Raven thought she couldn’t handle the discomfort of the flight any longer, she felt him slowing and descending. She could see that they were approaching the outskirts of another small town in the middle of nowhere, and he must be planning to stop here for the night. She breathed a sigh of relief. She could hardly wait to get her feet on solid ground again.

And she hoped with all her heart that this small town didn’t harbor an army of bat shifters, like the last small town they’d been in had.