Leading Tricia and I to an elevator, Philippa slides her I.D card into a slot beneath the button console, and we start moving, downwards. And downwards.

  I fidget nervously, wondering what this 'Grand Incantor' is like, since that sounds like quite an important title. Philippa takes my hand and squeezes it.

  "Don't worry, you'll do fine! She's not as scary as all that, I promise."

  The elevator chimes, and the doors slide open, letting the three of us step out into a rge room, with hallways leading off in different directions, with people coming and going purposefully.

  Philippa saunters along, waving in greeting to a few people she knows, while I hover around Tricia, ready to help her if she needs it. She bats me away good-naturedly.

  "I'm fine, Rika, stop fussing! I've gotten stronger while you've been training, you know? I can even go without a crutch at all at least half the time!"

  I sigh. "I know, I just... I'm worried, that's all. Sorry."

  Tricia boops my nose. "Don't apologize, little sis. Focus on your meeting, and just... chill out, okay? You're gonna be great, I know it."

  I smile nervously, as Philippa pushes through a set of double doors. "Hello, Grand Incantor! I brought my sister to meet you for her assessment!"

  The room is exactly what you'd visualise when you think of "wizard's tower". Books in stacks, desks littered with scrolls and bottles of glowing, smoking liquid in various unnusual shades of green, blue, red, purple, and orange. Dried, pickled, preserved or otherwise stored ingredients of unknown origin and purpose.

  Several people, both men and women, are hard at work, heads bowed over massive books or measuring out extremely precise amounts of powders and liquids into small crucibles and cauldrons, each one bubbling without any visible source of heat or fme.

  And, standing at the back of the room, reading through a scroll hanging in the air in front of her, is a woman in simple clothes. She doesn't LOOK anything impressive, but, when she turns her gaze to me, a powerful chill runs down my back. I feel the same kind of 'pressure' that I felt when I first met the Drakeblooded Cities' Council.

  That feeling of being crushed, the desperate desire to flee, eases slightly as the woman narrows her pale green eyes at me.

  "Good morning, Philippa Crane. It is a pleasure to see you again. Have you run out of Memoria stones already?"

  Philippa shakes her head. "Good afternoon! No, thank you! I've still got a handful left. No, I'm just dropping my sister off for you to assess her!"

  I step forward. "Um, hello! I'm Rika Crane!"

  The woman opens her eyes properly again, and I stiffen, feeling that incredible pressure. And yet... it isn't as powerful as Aurexiar's pressure, or the combined power of the Council. I step foward again, taking several paces as I approach the Grand Incantor.

  She rexes her gaze once I'm standing in front of her, a small smile starting to curve her lips.

  "Now, THIS one, I like. She's strong, or at least resilient enough to resist my arcane aura. Tell me, girl, what ARE you? An electrokinetic, like Philippa? A Gravitar, like Tricia?"

  I swallow. "Are you... are you giving me permission to transform?"

  Several of the nearby mages look up at that, and she waves them back to work.

  "Well obviously, youngling. Show me what you are!"

  Taking a deep breath, I close my eyes, and feel my body itching all over, my bones warping painlessly as I push for a rapid dragonshift, my wings exploding outwards. Wrapping them around myself, I feel my horns, fangs, cws, scales, and tail erupt into pce.

  Spreading my wings wide with a snapping ripple of leather, I stand there, facing the Grand Incantor as she raises her eyebrows. "Ohhh, I see! Now THIS is interesting! A dragonshifter, and quite the powerful one!"

  I blink slowly at her. She holds out a hand to shake, and I carefully take it in one cwed, scaled hand. She inclines her head slightly in a nod.

  "I am Lysandra Managold, Grand Incantor of the Woven Circle, Archmage of the Seventh Moon, High Elder of the Graven Seal, Lady of Pentacles, and Progenitor of the Glow Eternal. Call me Lyse."

  I smile, trying not to bare my fangs. "It's a pleasure-!"

  She interrupts. "Guess how old I am!"

  I blink several times, before making an attempt. "Uh.... somewhere around three-hundred-and-fifty?"

  Grand Incantor Managold tilts her head. "Not a bad guess, although I am a little curious as to why you leapt straight to the multi-hundreds. I am just about four-hundred-and-fifty-two."

  I nod. "I'm guessing you've used magic to extend your natural lifespan?"

  The Archmage looks a little disappointed. "Really? That's the extent of your reaction? Children are so much harder to awe than they used to be. Anyway, you may turn back to normal."

  As I drop my dragonshift, I expin, "well, if I'd met you six months ago, I'd have absolutely been impressed, but.... well, I've met someone who's around sixty thousand years old."

  That makes her blink. "What??? Where on Earth did you meet someone THAT old that I haven't ever heard of??"

  I smile. "I didn't meet her on Earth. She's a resident of the Drakeblooded Cities."

  Grand Incantor Managold's eyes sparkle. "Oh, Adalinda's little secret, yes? That makes things so much clearer. And are you reted to that harridan Julia, by any chance? She's been tearing around here recently, looking for power-siphoning spells or rituals to move essence from one vessel to another. I told her to leave lest I turn her into a chipmunk!"

  I snicker at the mental image of my mother as a very angry rodent, before realising that, likely without knowing it, this ancient magus had probably saved me from some terrible fate.

  "Sadly, yes." Philippa sighs. "She's having way too much trouble accepting that she has one more daughter than she thought she did."

  Lysandra's green eyes narrow. "I see. Then I am twice as gd I told her to piss off!"

  She fixes me with a discerning look. "So, young dy. You wish to join your sisters in battling monsters? Do you have any experience?"

  I smile. "I've fought a Twin-Head, a Battleshell, and been training in combat against an elite executioner and his apprentice for six months!"

  Philippa grins. "I can vouch for that! I've personally seen her in both those fights, and she was winning both handily!"

  The Archmage purses her lips thoughtfully. "Hmmm, excellent. As far as I'm concerned, that's good enough. BUT, even someone as wise and powerful as I am has to follow the rules. Come, Rika Crane, I will test your physical might!"

  I blink. "I... don't think that's fair! I've never fought a magic-user before!"

  The Grand Incantor ughs. "Not ME! You'll be fighting someone more suited to your skill level. Don't worry, I will step in if things look like they're going too far on either side. So feel free to go all-out! In fact, I INSIST you do. This is your opportunity to demonstrate EVERYTHING you are capable of!"

  She ushers me into a rge chamber, where a girl in a sleeveless denim jacket, shorts, and scuffed trainers is waiting, her wild red hair held back by a headband. She grins at the Grand Incantor.

  "Is this her, Granny? She looks kinda wimpy, honestly. You REALLY think she can give me a thrashing?"

  If she'd said that before I'd begun my training, I'd have gotten annoyed. But, thanks to Jekk needling me in efforts to make me lose my temper during my daily combat-education, I'm calm and collected. That was nothing!

  Lysandra nods. "Let's see. But I have high hopes that she'll prove more of a threat than you expect, Soleil! Anyway. Philippa, Tricia, we'll observe from the booth. And..."

  The three of them vanish in a fsh of green light. I look around for the booth, and smile as I see them already there, Phili waving pyfully at me. I giggle, "okay, teleportation magic is awesome!"

  The girl, Soleil, cracks her neck from side to side. "So, you're supposed to fight me. Don't worry if you get hurt, the healers here are real good, so you'll be patched up in no time. And don't worry about hurting me, because you won't be able to anyway!"

  Okay, WOW this girl is egotistical! But maybe she's got something that gives her a reason to be so cocky.

  I face her across the surprisingly-spacious arena, waiting for the signal to start. The voice of the Grand Incantor sounds from thin air. "Alright, both of you assume your battleforms! Chop chop, some of us have pces to be!"

  With a loud ripping noise, my wings and tail reappear, my body altering as I push my dragonshift into full effect, the temperature around me rapidly dropping several degrees.

  Then a wave of heat washes over me. Blinking, I stare at Soleil as she beats... her... wings. She's hanging there, a couple of feet off the ground, huge, red-and-yellow-feathered wings sprouting from her shoulders, her lower legs looking remarkably... avian. She's surrounded in an intense heat-haze, her eyes sharp and fixed on me.

  "Okay, maybe Granny's onto something! What are you, a Basilisk? No, maybe a Wyvern? Tatzlwurm? No, not that."

  I take off, rising into the air with my own wings, the leather booming in the open arena space. I grin, exposing my fangs.

  "Nope. One of the only creatures more well-known and feared than anything else! I'm a goddamned DRAGON!"

  I go for her, slicing the air around me as I sh my tail in a wicked swing, the bde at the end cutting across the space with a shriek of wind-resistance, but she jinks back a little, eyes widening, before she knees me in the ribs, pushing for distance between us, and starts throwing fireballs at me.

  I dodge two of them, then get an idea. Focussing to thicken the scaly armour ptes across my belly and breasts, I take the third one straight to the torso, a cloud of smoke erupting around me. I can see through it without issue, thanks to my dragon eyes, and emerge with a sinuous spiral, driving my cws towards Soleil's face as I ssh at her.

  She shrieks in surprise, pulling her head back as my cws leave a shallow gash on her cheek. "Whoa! That was a direct hit, how are you unharmed?!"

  I grin, letting vapour drift from my jaws. "Your fire's not hot enough to burn me! I've been subjected to worse than that while shopping!"

  Then, I lunge, making an aerial rush at her. She spins to let me pass, thinking she'd dodged, only now I'm able to hit her directly in the wing as I draw in a huge breath, and exhale it, the freezing beam of white encasing her right wing in thick, crystal-clear ice. She drops from the air, unable to support herself with only one functioning wing, her eyes wide in shock.

  "You're an ICE DRAGON?! I CALL BULLSHIT, GRANNY!!!"

  The Grand Incantor's voice comes through the air as if she's standing in front of us. "I told you this one wouldn't be as easy to defeat as your st few! Ha!"

  While Soleil starts spitting some rather creative curses, most of which are both obscenely-biological and physically-impractical, I prepare to attack again, exhaling ice-breath and enhancing my cws, then whipping my tail round in front of my face. With a pang of pride mixed with sadness that she isn't here to see it, I coat the end of my tail in a tight cone of spikes, just like...

  "Skadi, I'm going to steal one of your moves. Sorry!"

  I murmur, before descending on Soleil as she bursts into fmes, the ice I'd bsted her wing with melting rapidly. She looks up, only to meet one of my cwed feet coming down in a diving kick, the blow catching her right in the stomach and punting her back several feet.

  With an angry, hawk-like screech, Soleil grabs me by the ankle and yanks me out of the air when I try for a second kick, but my left-hand ice-bde cws shred her right bicep. That really has to piss her off, since she begins punching me, HARD, and FAST. I can't even see her fists anymore, only the fmes shrouding them as she rains blows on my face, chest, and stomach, aiming to beat me unconscious.

  However, while she's definitely strong and quick, she doesn't match up to either Jekk or Skadi, and I've spent the st half a year getting the ever-loving crap kicked out of me on a daily basis, which has made me both tougher, but also a lot calmer while under attack.

  I smack her in the face with my wing, the talon at the top joint almost gouging her in the eye, and use both feet to propel her back, vaulting from horizontal to airborne in a heartbeat. When Soleil spreads her own wings to follow, clearly not done trying to beat me into a smear, I swing my tail like a whip, the CRACK followed by a hail of icicle tail-spikes, just like Skadi's signature move.

  Soleil lets out a shriek as several of the sharp icicles pierce through her, before I dive like a scaly kamikaze fighter, the bde on the tip of my tail scything round.

  When I impact, there's a meaty 'thunk!', and my eyes widen. Soleil, distracted by being briefly turned into a pincushion, hadn't managed to dodge in time. And my tail-bde.... is lodged in her chest, right where her heart is.

  I scream. "Shit!!!"