me, and I flinched.
“All right there, m’lady?” came a voice from my right.
I had never been so happy to see Rio in the short time I had known him. He patted my shoulder and stepped in front of me.
The dragon backed off a bit, but in doing so grew even closer to Levent. The dark-haired kin was conscious, but still trying to recover from his quick trip into the wall. My heart skipped a beat when I saw that he was bleeding from his head again. As the flailing creature neared him, he stumbled backward to avoid being hit.
“Unfortunately, madam, I seem to have lost my favorite dagger in the mouth of a great smelly beast,” Rio said dramatically. I was unsure of how serious he was until he added,
“I’d better go get it,” and ran straight toward the dragon.
I yelled something that ended up being, “Whaey?” after him. It was not a word, but it was all I could get out with such short notice.
The half-blood stuck his right hand into the air, swirling it around, and for a moment I thought he had truly lost his mind. It was just before he reached the dragon that I saw he was gathering moisture from the humid air and solidifying it in his hand. He soon held a shard of ice the size of his forearm.
The dragon squirmed, but did not seem to notice either Rio or Levent. The kin was now standing and staring, dumbfounded, at the half-blood. I watched Rio stab the icicle into the dragon’s upper lip just as it opened its mouth to screech again. It wriggled away from the pain, but when it tried to close its mouth it screamed even louder as it ended up stabbing itself in the lip.
The half-blood took this chance to dart forward. Planting one foot on the dragon’s bottom lip, he pried the dagger from its tongue.
Now suddenly bleeding freely, the dragon’s eyes widened. It tossed its head – and Rio with it. Though Levent was able to hit the side of the valley and get up without breaking anything, the half-blood was much more brittle. I could not help but wince as he hit the ground.
I heard the bone in his leg snap from where I stood ten yards away, followed by the rough grunt that escaped his lips. He wilted to the ground in pain. I rushed to his side before I could think better of it.
Though blood now oozed from the dragon’s mouth, it had stopped writhing