Audrey Wright

When I returned home, I called up the coroner who didn’t answer at first. Maybe he was busy. I had never been a patient person, though, so I waited a whopping five minutes before calling back.

This time, he answered. “Audrey, I’m busy.”

“Good. So am I. Just one question. That’s all I need.”

“Audrey, I don’t have time—”

“Then why did you answer the phone?”

“Because I’m not rude.”

“The name. I just need the name of the person who was attacked tonight.”

“I don’t know yet.”

“You don’t?” I asked, shocked. “No wallet or purse found?”

“No ID on him.”

“Him,” I murmured.

“Yes. It’s easy enough to figure out the gender when you have access to the entire body,” he said dryly.

I flushed, so glad that he couldn’t see my embarrassment. “Anything else you know about him?”

“I know I need to get a cast molding of his teeth. So that we can hopefully ID him through dental work.”

“Great. Will you call me once you—”

The line went dead.

“—ID him?” I finished even though he couldn’t hear me.

Great.

It was nearly midnight by now, but I wasn’t about to go lie down. No way would I be able to fall asleep. I was too worried and anxious. Someone or maybe something was killing humans. I had to find out who or what it was.

I had been sitting on the couch in my living room while I’d had my unfulfilling talk with the coroner. Now, I grabbed my purse from the coffee table and left my house behind. My keys jiggled as I grabbed them out of my purse.

After a few deep breaths behind the wheel, I turned on the car. An hour or so of driving, and hopefully I’d be able to fall asleep. Maybe. If I was lucky. I had to do something. I was a doer. I tended to always be pacing or tapping or talking. Something, anything. I couldn’t ever be completely still. Even if I wasn’t talking, my mind was always churning a mile a minute.

The moon was full tonight, huge and swollen. Its slightly orange hue gave the world an eerie feeling.

Just then, a shadow crossed over the moon, far too small and traveling too quickly to be a cloud. What in the world?

I blinked and tried to find the object again. What could it have been?

It had been heading northwest. Hmm.

With my hands tight on the wheel, I whipped the car, speeding along, trying my best to keep the object in my sight. Yes, I was following it. I had no idea what it could be, but maybe it was a large flying creature. Maybe that thing was the one responsible for killing so many.

Or maybe I was seeing things. It was late at night, and I was trying to follow an enormous dark shape in the sky that I could hardly make out. What if my eyes were playing tricks on me? That was possible. It was getting late, and I hadn’t been sleeping much lately.

Eventually, it seemed like the animal landed in a field. I had to park and rush over to on foot to where it was.

But the winged creature was gone. Startled, I glanced all around and tripped over something large and surprisingly heavy. Like a small boulder.

After rubbing my ankle, I stood and whipped out my cell phone to use it as a flashlight.

Not a boulder after all. It was an egg, a strange egg with weird designs on the façade. Had someone found it and painted it? No. The designs were nearly engraved, and the colors were displayed so perfectly at random that I had to wonder if that had been done intentionally after all, by nature of course.

The moment I picked up the egg, the sound of beating wings had me whirling around. Towering over me was a massive dragon.

It couldn’t be, but it was. And worse, it was opening its mouth. It completely terrified me that a huge ball of fire was forming at the back of its mouth.

I managed to dart and roll out of the way as the fire blast erupted from the fire dragon’s mouth. Hopefully, I was dreaming and this wasn’t real, but I couldn’t deny that I could feel the heat from that blast.

A dragon. Unreal. If I wasn’t so worried that I was about to get sliced to ribbons like the other victims, I might’ve been impressed.