“I like the name,” Felicity said.

  Tristan put on some clothes, and looked at his damaged armor. “Let’s get all of that to the gnomes for repair. Once its fixed up, you, me, and Onyx – or another unicorn if he is still busy with his firstborn foal – we’ll head to the Wild Realm. I need to find an enchantment dragon to prepare for our assault on the Demon King’s fortress.

  Felicity shifted to her fairy dragon form and grabbed the whole mannequin holding the armor. She opened her surprisingly well-organized pocket dimension, and threw the whole mannequin inside; the metal clanging against other pieces. “Okay. Off to the smiths!”

  The two left the Queen’s Wood and Tristan instructed the gnomes to begin repairs. Dorni was there, and cleared his throat after Tristan finished giving his instructions. “Lord Tristan, the repairs will take about an hour. Your new vessel has been prepared.”

  Tristan blushed, and Felicity cackled from her perch atop his head. “Thanks,” Tristan said as he took the now-offered vial and grasped the silvery metal with a firm grip. “I . . . I’ll be back in an hour—for the armor.”

  Dorni chuckled and walked away. Felicity batted at Tristan’s ears from atop his head. “So . . . did you need to take care of something for this new bloodline?” Tristan felt his blood racing and turned on his heel, heading into the Queen’s Wood once more. Felicity flapped away from his head and landed on the ground, swapping to her Elfanoid form and smiling lasciviously. “Come on, Dragonbloom. Let’s do what must be done.”

  “Here you are,” Tristan muttered as he handed the filled vial to The Matriarch. She accepted the item with reverence, and placed it into her storage dimension. “I’ll be departing the Fey Realm for a short time. No more than a day.”

  “Safe travels then.” The Matriarch bowed and then departed, walking over to the training yard to advise and instruct fairy dragons in their rotation.

  Tristan headed over to the gnomes and acquired his armor and weapons, re-equipping all of it. Then, willing his Fey Realm wings to manifest, he jumped up and flapped, tensing his muscles expertly to rise into the skies. He made a course for the Springthaw Meadow, and as he raced overhead through the air, looked for the black shapes of Onyx and Midnight. He felt a smile spread across his face as he saw the duo trotting, and a smaller, black unicorn right between them. Tristan landed in front of them with plenty of distance so they could stop, and he folded his wings back in. “Onyx. Midnight. Congratulations.”

  Both destrier unicorns came to a stop, and their foal; a perfect mirror of the two full-sized ones, struggled a little to slow down. Instead, the foal moved around Tristan and then looped back through the grasses, letting out a whinny.

  Onyx walked forward and dipped his head. “Our child is healthy and hale.”

  “Cute,” Felicity said as she hung off of Tristan’s head.

  Midnight walked up next to Onyx as the foal ambled toward the two, huffing and puffing. “Go ahead, little one. Tell your ruler your name.”

  The foal dipped its head. “I’m Ebony, Lord Tristan.”

  “Keeping with the naming scheme?” Tristan asked as he knelt so that he was on its level.

  “Yes,” Onyx replied. “It makes sense given our color compared to the rest of the unicorns.”

  “Pardon, I can’t tell – boy or girl?” Tristan asked, addressing Ebony.

  “I’m a boy,” the foal replied, letting out a little snort. “Don’t you see my bigger horn on my head?” He nudged his horn toward Onyx and Midnight, and Tristan focused on comparing the two horns.

  Huh. I never noticed, but Onyx’s horn is a bit thicker. Maybe because I already knew their gender I didn’t really pay attention? Tristan chuckled. “Sorry. I should’ve assumed such a mighty unicorn was a boy.”

  Ebony seemed to puff up with pride, and trotted over to Midnight. “See, mother? I told you I would impress him.”

  “That you did, little one.” Midnight nudged Ebony with her head.

  Tristan looked at Onyx. “I intend to return to the Wild Realm for a short duration. I would never ask you to leave your family; especially after having a new child. But, if you wish to carry me, I would be gracious.”

  Onyx seemed torn for a moment, and glanced between Midnight and Ebony, then back to Tristan. “I would ask that you permit me to stay here in the Fey Realm for a while yet. I wish to truly know my child.”

  Tristan raised his hands in mock surrender. “I understand completely.” He glanced around, and scanned the environment for another unicorn. Then, he paused in his scanning. “Thanks.” He manifested his wings and jumped up, lifting into the sky as he flapped over to just in front of the Queen’s Wood, at his usual departure point.

  “Not going to get a unicorn to ride?” Felicity asked.

  Tristan shook his head. “I plan on doing a quick visit to the Wild Realm. We’ll get there through the inter-realm market, and then I’ll use Wing Glide in conjunction with Dragon Leap.” He grinned. “I doubt that a dragon could stand much of a chance against me, especially if I ambush it from above with knowledge of its weak spot.”

  “Assumed weak spot.”

  “True. I don’t know exactly where an enchantment dragon’s weak spot would be. But, I can make an educated guess.” He spun his crucible, pushed the essence into his ring, and the world flickered white. He reappeared in the inter-realm market, on the edge of the marketplace proper.

  “Oh! Right.” Felicity muttered something in Orcish, and Tristan felt that tingling sensation all along his body. “There we go. Alter Form for your Demonkin persona.”

  Tristan reached up and felt the horn spiral out of his head. “Thanks.” He went to the portals and stepped through the one leading to the Wild Realm. The saturating warmth of the cracked steppes met him like a warm embrace, and he breathed in deeply as he tasted the dry air. “We need to start moving a direction,” Tristan said. He turned to his right and began moving away from the city and its bustling markets.

  Felicity clung to his horns like a pair of handles. “Are you going to fly?”

  Tristan smirked and began sprinting. He had not done a full-out sprint since his trial of the sap, and wanted to see how quick he was. To his immense satisfaction and slight surprise, he was running at the equivalent of pre-unicorn Onyx’s gallop. He let out a laugh at his sheer physical capabilities, knowing that he could outpace any non-mounted pursuer. Glancing back, he saw black-robed forms in the distance step through the inter-realm portal. Assassins waiting for me. Too bad for you, you can’t keep up.

  He turned to face the front and kept sprinting, focusing his intent on finding an enchantment dragon. The world around him began to warp and distort, and his breaths came to him steadily as he focused all of his desires on that one, singular goal. Finding a dragon to devour that would protect him from spells that Duberceix or his minions might try. The world began to blend and shift, and Tristan felt the ground under him changed from a baked, cracked plateau to a crunching, soft soil. He skidded to a stop as he heard a roar, and drew his sword.

  In the skies above, two dragons were engaged in violent combat. His heart skipped a beat at his incredible fortune. Two dragons? And they’re ones I haven’t seen before!

  The first was a deep, pink color. It looked very similar to the demon dragon he had fought – a sinuous form that was covered with scales, rather than flesh. Four stubby legs with extremely large claws extended underneath its body, and it twisted through the skies without wings. The second was one that Tristan instantly recognized from Hurvun’s sketches – A deep, steel-colored dragon just like one of the elemental realm variety. Big, stocky body, massive wings, huge legs, a long tail that was tipped with a spiked mace. An Elemental Realm of Metal dragon. That one was adult sized, while the enchantment one seemed to be wyrm size, if the comparison to the demon dragon’s size was anything to go by.

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  “Felicity. Full invisible, and stay out of danger.”

  “Got it!” She took off, flapping to the left.

  Tristan felt that hunt-urge rising in his chest. Bubbling up from within. The desire to defeat and consume. He drew his sword and spun his crucible at full-force. Multi-colored essence surged out of him – all the different hues representative of the dragon essence crucibles he had consumed. He surged it into his armor, activating Scales of Our Foe, Armor of Ice, Near Miss, Lucky Instinct, and then into his weapon, activating Elemental Imbuement – Multi with a focus on Ice and Lightning, and Dragon’s Doom. His armor expanded over his body, and he crouched down.

  He tensed his legs. “The very weapons you rend and tear are mine to use. The very plates that protect you shall protect me as well. I will glide on these mighty wings. With this tail, I shall crush my foes. Your mighty strength will flow through me and lift me to heights never thought possible.” He jumped up, and pointed his toes down. “The skies unfold before me!” He blasted up from the ground, and as he got above the two warring dragons, he angled himself for what he knew was a weak spot. Take out the metal dragon, and make this into a one-on-one fight. He rolled his shoulders back and descended in a rapid swoop.

  The creatures didn’t notice him coming, and he slammed into the neck of the metal dragon, tip of his weapon pointing down. The enchantment dragon – maw locked around the metal dragon’s wing-joint – looked at him with eyes that went wide with recognition of a new threat. Tristan’s strike was true, and his blade instantly found the weak spot as he drove deep. The perfect dragon killer – unseen from above, fast and small enough to go right for the weak spot before they could react. Even the near-impenetrable plates seemed to be useless against his assault, as the family-only dragonbane spell enabled his weapon to strike that vital point without issue – the blade slipping between the crevices between scales as if guided by fate.

  The metal dragon went limp and began to fall. Tristan turned to the enchantment dragon with a manic smile on his face under the helmet. The hunt-urge roiled through him, and as the enchantment dragon let go, he jumped once more. “The skies unfold before me!” His essence churned, and he flew forward, slamming into the side of the enchantment dragon which let out a roar of pain.

  He felt the all-too-familiar pressure of enchantment on his temples – but it was strong. Stronger than anything he had ever experienced. Stronger than when The Matriarch had used her enchantment spell on him so long ago to help him understand what it would feel like. He focused singularly on one feeling to prevent the attempt to usurp his conscious mind. That hunt-urge that billowed through his body like a tempestuous tornado that whirled and churned along with his essence. A storm of instinct that could not be stopped, could not be swayed, and could not be reasoned with. He was the hunter, this was the prey.

  The dragon seemed to realize the spell wasn’t working on Tristan, and sensing its peril, attempted to fly away. But Tristan dug his left claw-hand into its hide, finding a gap between the scales that he dug into. The flesh beneath his claw-tips gave way, and he was able to keep firm purchase. He brought his sword up and began slashing at the body of the creature. It roared and began spinning rapidly in place, trying to fling him off. But Tristan held firm, and kept slicing, stabbing, and digging his claw deeper to affix himself to his prey. “Fucking die!” he screamed in Elvish.

  The enchantment dragon curled its body in on him and began to squeeze; clawed legs on the inside scraping against his metallic shell and trying to crush him with scything blades. Tristan just poured essence into his sword’s cross guard and activated Winter’s Wrath. An explosive storm of ice and rime surged around him and immediately chilled the monstrous coils that looped upon him. The scales began to freeze over, and Tristan felt his crucible steadily draining from the precipitous need of the spell to fuel its icy might. The creature tried to uncoil itself, but could not – and yet it remained airborne.

  Tristan growled and began shaking his hips back and forth, trying to move his draconic, phantasmal tail like a flail to crack and smash the icy shell coating his foe. He could not build up enough momentum from the swing – but it gave him an idea. He glanced up and saw the open sky above. Once more, he cast Dragon Leap and rocketed up, through the coils, ripping his claw free with an enormous rip of flesh and muscle. Frosty chunks of blood shot skyward, and Tristan flipped in the air before angling his wings for a dive.

  I hope this works. He somersaulted, building up a spin as he continued to generate momentum with his tail. Between spins, he saw the still-frozen and airborne enchantment dragon – slowly chipping away at the ice keeping it in place. Its flight mobility must rely on its ability to move its coils. He approached in his rapid spin, and felt the impact of his phantasmal tail as it slammed into the enchantment dragon’s partially frozen torso. A massive crunch echoed out, and the creature let out a pained cry as Tristan’s impact sent him in a backspin, tumbling down toward the ground. He had to rapidly deploy his Wing Glide spell and stabilize, but watched with satisfaction as the enchantment dragon began to plummet to the ground.

  He was dizzy, but angled his shoulders to dive down at the now-falling form. He slashed down with his sword, cutting a deep, bloody groove across the top of it. He must have nicked the heart, because the creature became lethargic and seemed to stop fighting against the drop. It slammed into the ground with a massive thud that shook the local area. Tristan swooped down and landed on top of it. With both hands on his sword’s hilt, he slashed down with deep, lopping chops until he found the heart and cut it in twain.

  With both dragons dead, he sheathed his sword, and immediately set to consuming blood from both. The enchantment dragon’s blood tasted sweet. Sickly sweet. So sweet that Tristan felt sick almost immediately. But he choked down the feeling and kept slurping up the vital ichor, stopping when his stomach was half-full and moving to the metal dragon’s corpse. That one he was more familiar with the taste of; iron and copper, with flakes scraping against his throat. He sucked down the blood until he was full.

  Felicity landed on the metal dragon’s shoulder near him. “Want me to collect some in those vials?”

  Tristan stood up and let out a belch. “Excuse me.” He nodded, and as Felicity set to work, he turned to face the enchantment dragon’s corpse. Clasping his hands together, he closed the temporary claws as he spoke the spell phrase. “Mighty beast which now lies slain, I take from you what you can no longer use and is mine by right of conquest.” The multi-colored essence poured from his hands, coated the body of the enchantment dragon, saturating it, and returned to him. He then turned to the metal dragon he was atop and performed the same feat. And now I’m protected against enchantment, he thought as the warm sensation in his chest faded. He took stock of his current essence. About thirty percent left.

  A warbling in the distance caught his gaze, and he turned to face what he assumed were the assassins chasing him. “Felicity, drop the Alter Form spell.”

  “You sure?” she asked as she grabbed another vial from his bandolier for the metal dragon’s blood.

  “Positive. Let’s show Duberceix and his assassins that Lord Dragonbloom is alive and well. The Winterbloom Elf lives, and is growing into a greater threat.” He felt the tingling across his body, and let his helmet recede. “I am Lord Tristan Dragonbloom, formerly Winterbloom!” he shouted in the Standard Tongue. Brandishing his blade on high, he watched the slight distortion fade. Invisible, eh? Fine by me.

  A bolt of green shot toward him from the left, and he dodged with ease. Sending essence into his cloak, he activated Thrice Command. “Dismiss your invisibility!”

  Twelve assassins appeared as his enchantment forced their compliance. All were dressed in the black cloaks with armor on underneath, holding the familiar to-Tristan gold daggers. Their voices overlapped in panic, speaking in Demon’s Tongue, and Tristan swapped to their language. “I will kill you all, and you will reform at your master’s feet.” He felt rage boiling within, and grit his teeth as the memory of finding his mother’s corpse came back to the forefront of his mind. Gertrude dying in his arms. Obadai and Shandra’s kidnapping. His own near death experiences.

  There was no more talk, just action. Tristan moved fast – faster than the first assassin could react to. He chopped the man clean in half from shoulder to opposite hip, sending both halves flying apart from one another. Turning to the second, Tristan swatted away the green-ichor-covered dagger with a clawed, draconic hand, and stabbed the assassin clean through the chest with a single thrust.

  Fire flew toward him, and he simply faced it, allowing the essence-weaving to flow over him and affect him with the ignited condition. He ignored the minor inconvenience and dashed to the next assassin, who tried to backpedal toward his allies. Tristan was ruthless, and sliced his legs out from under him at the knees before following with a vicious kick that sent the legless man flying. He shouted in Elvish. “Felicity! Capture that one!”

  “On it!” she flew over, invisible to all but Tristan, and did something to the man that made him fall unconscious. She then used rejuvenation to heal his stumps to prevent bleeding out.

  Tristan moved his gaze to the next foe, and several of them vanished once more. “No you don’t!” He surged a bit of his dwindling essence into his weapon’s hilt, and pointing the blade, activated Rime Blast. A huge cone of ice and blistering sleet blasted forward, coating the invisible forms as shards drew blood. With the targets effectively marked, Tristan moved with brutal, inhuman efficiency from one target to the next. He slaughtered one after another after another, until all were slain.

  He let his spells fade, wiped his blade and claws clean on the still-remaining cloaks, and walked back to Felicity. “We have a captive,” he said bluntly.

  She grinned. “Yup! Got him! Why did you want to capture him?”

  “To send a message,” Tristan replied.