The twins and I had barely made it more than halfway down the street when I could already feel the exhaustion crashing over me. There was no way we were going to make it on foot, especially not knowing how far the trucks had gotten before Vali and Cole caught them.

“Guys,” I puffed. “We need transport.”

“Caleb! Austin, Kit! We need help!” Wesley's yell drew our attention to a side street where a truck had been overturned. He and River were trying to lift unconscious shifters free of the trailer, but the engine was smoking and the smell of gasoline was strong in the air. The twins both looked at me with uncertainty, but I gave them a firm nod.

“Help them; that truck could explode at any second. I'll catch up to the overgrown lizards.” They both looked like they would argue with me, so I quickly darted over to the motorbike sitting outside Frank's Auto Repair. Somewhere in my memory the image was stored of him having tested the engine just moments before accosting Wesley and I in the street, so I took a gamble that the keys were still in it.

Yes! Win for Kit! Relief flooded me as I swung my leg over and kicked it to start. The engine roared to life, and I wasted no time, skidding out onto the road and gunning the accelerator. Apparently riding a motorbike was not as easy as Cole made it look, and I wobbled dangerously as I took the corners of the road with speed, but my fast reflexes allowed me to recover my balance before I ate shit.

It only took a couple of minutes to reach the trucks where the dragons had caught them. From the looks of things, they kind of had it handled as well. Working as a team, Vali was standing in front of a crashed truck, his wings outstretched as he appeared to guard the unconscious inhabitants while also blocking the road. If any of the mercenaries came close, he would shoot balls of fire in their direction, sending them ducking for cover or, in some cases, lighting them up into a human torch.

Meanwhile, Cole was in the air, ducking and weaving, dodging bullets, and occasionally darting close to the ground to snap up an enemy combatant in his jaws. The sounds of their bodies breaking between his massive, razor sharp teeth was enough to make anyone a bit queasy, but I didn't let it affect me as I crashed my bike to a sliding stop and rolled a couple of times to regain my feet.

Pushing myself to utilize my speed, I wove between the assholes trying to shoot my dragons, swinging hard fists as I got close and hearing the satisfying crunches and cracks of breaking bones as I went. The world around me seemed to slow down as I moved, and I used it to my advantage, staying clear of live weapons while sliding in close enough to disable these motherfuckers with my bare hands.

“Where is he?” I panted as I slid to a stop in front of Vali's huge dragon form. He ducked his scaly head down to my level, giving me a sharp look with one granite gray eye.

“Ugh, yes, I know, dragons can’t speak, and you have no idea who I'm talking about,” I yelled, venting my frustration and anger.

Where the fuck was he? Where was Simon?

Another mercenary popped out from his spot behind a truck to try and shoot at Vali, and he nailed him with a direct hit of fire. The man’s screams as he was engulfed in flame made my blood curdle. It looked like Vali's magical dragon fire was the sort of stuff that didn't require any fuel. It had just instantly bonded to the man's flesh, and within moments, he was a burnt out husk of a body smoking on the ground.

“Holy shit,” I muttered, impressed as hell but also super freaked out. That was one insane skill he had.

A warm breeze ruffled my blood-crusted hair, and a weird chirping noise came from Vali’s reptile throat. He was chuckling. Fucking psycho. Not that I should be surprised, given his rather brutal nature as a human.

Cole darted down once more, breathing out a sheet of blue flame that engulfed three more black-armored mercenaries who were belly crawling toward us from behind another vehicle. The flame seemed to do a very similar job to Vali's, but left the victims with burnt out skeletons dusted with ice crystals.

“Jesus, fuck, you two are scary as shit right now,” I whispered to no one in particular as Cole skidded to a stop in front of us and jerked his head to the road past Vali.

“What?” I asked him. “What are you trying to say?” He huffed frost at me then jerked his head at the road again, this time baring his massive fangs and growling.

“Fuck me, I feel like I'm talking to Lassie,” I muttered. “What's up there? Is it Simon?” Cole huffed another breath, but this time his baring of fangs seemed to be more of a wicked dragon grin. Excellent.

Another two mercenaries popped out from their hiding places and began firing on us. Cole launched back into the air once more while I dove behind Vali's outstretched wings, taking off at a run up the narrow, ice-packed road. Not a single piece of me doubted the dragons had my back and that they could handle themselves without me.

Several times, I slipped and nearly fell on the ice when I tried to use my super-speed, so was forced to slow to an infuriating regular human pace. Half running, half sliding down a steep descent, I rounded a corner and spotted my prey. Some half a mile ahead of me, Simon was limping his way along the road, and a rush of satisfaction washed over me. There would be no escaping this time. With a towering, snow-covered mountain to one side and a deep gully to the other, his only option was to keep following the road.

“Simon!” I bellowed, and the sound ricocheted around the valley. Simon stopped in his limping run, his shoulders slumping like he knew he was beaten. He turned slowly to face me, and I continued toward him, slower now that I had him in my sights. The last thing I needed was to slip and fall down the crevasse beside the road.

“So, you've caught me!” he yelled back, pointing out the painfully obvious and no doubt preparing to try and weasel his way out of the painful death I was plotting for him.

“No shit, fuckface,” I snapped, then had to brace myself as there was a rumbling roar and the ground shook slightly beneath my feet. Simon lost his balance altogether and hit the deck hard, swearing and rubbing his ass as he tried to stand again.

“What now, Kit?” he called back to me, brushing snow from his jacket and glaring daggers my way. Before I was able to respond, detailing all the excruciatingly painful ways in which he might die, the ground shook again. This time when it stopped shaking, there was an ominous rumbling from higher up the mountainside.

Without any further warning, a massive wave of snow and ice came crashing down onto the mountain road, directly where Simon had been standing. For what felt like an hour, but can't have been more than a minute or two, tons upon tons of snow flowed down from the mountain above and into the gully below while I watched wide-eyed in shock.

When it finally slowed to a stop, all that was left of the road where Simon had stood was a massive wall of white. From the way the road had curved around the edge of the valley we were in, I could tell that a section of almost three hundred yards had been wiped out by the mini-avalanche, taking my nemesis with it.

Well, fuck.