I was having lunch with Tinus when a panicked Drokai flew into our table like a meteorite. She didn’t land, but the table would’ve exploded if she did.

  “What’s wrong?” Tinus snapped.

  “Humans,” she said. “Humans found the teleportation circle.”

  “They’re mine!” I yelled. “There’s no other humans in the forest!”

  It occurred to me then that the Drokai in Serenflora had arrangements with the Wraiths—but Helfine didn’t. They were sent to guard the teleportation circle. Only that.

  “We didn’t think they could break the ward, so we wanted to watch. But we spooked one of them—and they attacked.”

  “Who could see you?” Tinus asked.

  “I don’t know. But he’s strong.”

  “Malo…” I blasted away from the table with my wings. I thought I would just tip the table, but I didn’t know my strength. Kira’s winds hit the table so hard that it cracked in half, and when I flew over the water, it left waves like a speeding boat.

  Unlike the Drokai, I hit the ground in front of the teleportation circle like an asteroid. Thankfully, everyone there knew about the situation, so no one questioned my presence. They just let me recover from the impact and released the ward.

  —---

  Five minutes prior to Mira’s arrival, Tyler was moving toward Mira’s teleportation circle with a grin on his face. “Where do you think she went?” he asked.

  Aiden shrugged. “Somewhere dangerous, I’m sure.”

  “She didn’t tell you anything?” Tyler asked as he cupped his hands on the ward, staring at the ward like a window shopper on Christmas.

  “No~pe,” Aiden said. “Spent a whole year with her, and never heard a peep about any of her plans. You’d think it was just about Brex but it’s not. She doesn’t talk to anyone.”

  “That’s lame. I’m going to have to ask about it.” He turned and saw Malo with his hand on his sword. His body was trembling, and he was taking shallow breaths. It scared Tyler.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Tyler, carefully walk backward and run.”

  “From wha—”

  He never got to finish his statement because Malo had already attacked. Hundreds of wind blades cut through the air, cutting the trees into firewood-sized chunks of wood.

  “Run!”

  Tyler’s training had instilled battle discipline in him. So he didn’t panic. He unsheathed his sword and wrapped it in wind magic as he tried to run—but he was way out of his league. He couldn’t even move before the divine caribou was upon him.

  Tyler thought about swinging, but he didn’t have the time. So this creature charged him, and he thought he was dead. But to his surprise, the beast didn’t kill him. It picked him up and ran out of the way just in time for a terrorizing blast to rip through the earth.

  Tyler thought it was a missile. The blast was so intense that it created a tidal wave of dirt and stone that sent him, and the third-evolution carrying him, flying.

  He coughed and looked up and saw that a hundred meters of ground and trees had been blasted out of the ground.

  “Malo!” Tyler screamed by reflex. He thought he was dead—but he wasn’t.

  A meteor shower of black streaks flew across the sky, weaving in the air in an erratic dance. When they touched down on the ground and hit trees and rocks, they dissolved. It was as if this black fire destroyed matter itself.

  And it wasn’t just him.

  Two of the Dantes were protecting him with barriers as he fought invisible forces.

  “Run!” Malo yelled in the distance.

  Suddenly, he disappeared, and the barrier shattered. Another Dante guard escaped with him, but the area he was standing in was vaporized in blue fire that tore through the ground like napalm, and a dozen explosions went off in rapid succession.

  “Run…” Tyler whispered. He turned to see the caribou that had started running, but then he realized what had happened. Aiden had convinced the creature to protect his life. “Where’s Aiden?” He turned and saw Aiden trapped under a tree, groaning.

  “Aiden!”

  “Stay away!”

  Tyler came here to protect Aiden, but Aiden protected him. He needed to help his benefactor. That was his job. That was what he came here to do.

  Mira was going to be pissed—but he had to help Aiden.

  So he did.

  A war of blues and blacks and reds blasted the ground around them. Thankfully, none of the attacks were directed at him. So he rushed up and helped lift a half-shattered tree off him.

  “Leave, you idiot!” Aiden said.

  “Shut the hell up,” Tyler said. “Mira is going to punish everyone if I die—I get it. But she gave me this job! So I’m doing it!” With superhuman strength that surprised even him, he lifted a thousand-pound chunk of tree and threw it off Aiden. Then he grabbed Aiden and slung him over his shoulder and turned. That’s when he realized he was screwed.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  There was a Drokai behind him—but she wore strange armor with a crest that he hadn’t seen. She wasn’t with Nethralis.

  “You’re… a Drokai.”

  Her face contorted in strange angles as she glanced behind him. A war was raging, and she whispered, “What do I do?”

  To Tyler’s chagrin, she didn’t think about it long. His body whirled around on its own, Aiden flung off him, and Tyler suddenly felt a searing golden blade against his throat.

  “Stop or he’s dead!” she screamed.

  The fighting stopped, and Malo rushed to a hilltop with the Drokai he was fighting.

  “Kill him, and the guardians will turn on you!” Malo warned.

  “We are the guardians,” a cold voice replied.

  “We have a deal with Nethralis,” Tyler said.

  “That’s too bad. Because we’re not from Serenflora.”

  Malo's body turned rigid. “Let him go. I’ll pay for this misunderstanding.”

  The air turned still as Drokai flew in the air and said, “Are you with Mira Hill?”

  “We are. That’s her brother.”

  “Okay,” the Drokai said. “Out of respect for Mira, we will let Mira’s brother and the others go. But you will die for attacking us.” Suddenly, a massive sword materialized out of raw, golden mana.

  “No!” Tyler screamed with tears in his eyes. “Don’t!”

  “Never show weakness!” Malo yelled back. “Especially in front of your soldiers. In times of war, soldiers may die, but the commander must not. For if a commander falls, thousands, or even millions of soldiers, will die. So remember this day.”

  Aiden suddenly called out. “Then let me die! I brought them here. If it weren’t for me, we would’ve never found this place.”

  “Shut up!” Malo yelled. But the damage was done. The Drokai turned his sword to Aiden. “If that’s true…”

  The atmosphere turned rigid and cold. Fear spread through Tyler like a sharp knife, and suddenly, the Drokai shifted the sword from Aiden to Tyler. “You’re their leader, right?”

  He nodded solemnly.

  “Then you choose. Your people attacked us and injured two of our people. For peace, one of these men must die. It’s up to you.”

  Tyler’s stomach wrenched in strange and terrifying ways, and he looked between them. He didn’t want to choose. Aiden was Mira’s friend—but Malo was his mentor and teacher. He spent almost six months under Malo’s care. He loved him like a second father.

  Neither of them should die, so he said, “I’m the leader. That means that I—”

  Suddenly there was a bright flash and a woman screamed, “What the fuck is going on?”

  The blade suddenly turned in the direction of the voice.

  “Your men attacked us—and they will pay for that.”

  “Says who?” Her voice was suddenly above him, and then a cool chill passed across Tyler’s back as the Drokai holding him hostage blasted away from him, hitting a nearby tree.

  Kline materialized behind him—or at least a panther that generally looked like Kline. Calico fur—but otherwise strange and different. Then an angel came into his view. She had wings like Kira, but she wasn’t Mira. She looked nothing like her, and her voice was… sexy, almost. But she was angry—like an angel from a wrathful god. He thought she was a Valkyrie or another mythical being until he heard her next words.

  “This is my brother! These are my people! I’m a guardian—and you, a , are going to determine what happens to them? Are you insane?”

  ? Tyler thought in confusion. ?

  “You think you’re a guardian because you gained our approval?” he asked. “You—”

  Another voice spread through the airwaves, cutting him off. “Drop your sword.”

  “Tinus!”

  The sword disappeared in a split second, and all the tiny Drokai flew toward the ground as a new Drokai flew into view, overlooking the damage. He turned to Malo. “Did you do this?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “We came to examine Mira’s teleportation circle when I noticed powerful figures all around me. I didn’t know what they were. They were blending in. But they were powerful—so I struck preemptively, hoping to give Tyler time to run away.”

  Tinus overlooked the devastation. Tyler would later see that an acre of land on the other side of the barrier had been destroyed, burnt, or shredded in the fighting.

  Two of the Dante were silent, two groaning. Only Malo remained unscathed, which was rather incredible, given the devastation.

  Tinus turned to the angel flying above them. “It seemed Hego held back. None of your people have died.” He motioned to a Drokai, and they flew forward, healing everyone with a blinding flash of green light.

  The woman wasn’t convinced. “Haven’t died?” she laughed. “They’re mutilated.”

  “And we will heal them back to full health,” Tinus said.

  “You can regrow their limbs and heal those burns?”

  “We can.”

  “Then do it. Do that, and we will look aside this incident.”

  Tinus nodded and then turned to the Drokai who had the sword. “Hego. Return at once. You will face punishment for your behavior.”

  “Tinus!” Hego yelled. “That man injured our people. He—”

  “And I will take that into consideration, in addition to you having the sense not to kill anyone. But the fact remains—the battle was over, Mira’s brother was held hostage, and the group had surrendered. You did not have the right to decide who lived and died.”

  The man fell silent.

  Tinus turned to the Drokai next to him. “Summon Aska. Take Hego and the others with you.”

  And just like that, the Drokai left through the teleportation portal. It was over.

  Or so Tyler thought. The angel suddenly flew toward him with such ferocity that he thought he would die. But instead of hurting him or stopping before him, she wrapped her arms around him and lifted him in the air. He panicked and squirmed, but her emotions radiated raw passion, and he found himself hugging her.

  “Tyler…” she cried.

  He hugged her back in confusion as she lifted him to the ground. Then he said, “Mira?”

  She released him on the ground and then took a step back. “Tyler? What’s with that tone… oh…”

  Tyler watched as the woman probed her face with her fingers. She looked up with wide eyes. “Do I really look that different?”

  Tyler laughed like a squeezed chew toy. He had never seen anyone so beautiful and proportionate before. Her hair was brown and flowing, her skin perfect and gentle. It felt as though she was wearing makeup, and he only knew otherwise because she wasn’t wearing eyeliner that would’ve otherwise made her green eyes pop. And it was the little things you don’t think about that made her stand out. She had a red tongue that was unmarred by bacteria. Her ears were unpierced. Her eyelashes were large.

  There was no way this was his flat-chested sister. Everything from her face to her body was filled out with curves, and she was even taller. If she weren’t wearing her special cloak, he wouldn’t have even considered it was her.

  “Is this a joke?” he asked. “You don’t even sound like my sister.”

  “It’s that insane, huh?” She touched her throat, as if to probe her voice box. She turned and glowered at Kyro. “You should’ve let me look first!”

  “Why?” Kyro asked, drinking from his flask as he overlooked the guards. “Your faces are priceless.” He wasn’t even looking at them.

  “Wait… you’re serious…” Tyler said. “You’re actually serious…”

  “I’m serious,” Mira said. Then she looked down and saw Aiden, realized that he hadn’t been healed, and panicked. “We need a healer over here!”

  Tyler panicked, too. Aiden had passed out due to blood loss after the Drokai knocked him off Tyler’s shoulder. He could’ve died. But he didn’t. The Drokai known as Tinus personally healed Aiden, and Mira sighed in relief.

  She turned to Tyler. “We’ll speak later. Till then, just… shut the fuck up. Okay? Not just you, everyone. I’m having trouble handling this.”

  That’s when Tyler knew that he was talking to his sister. She was just as flustered and surprisingly foul-mouthed as usual. She spoke like Mira. She was Mira—and she had gone through a whole lot of changes.

  Tyler shut up and checked on Malo and hugged him. “Aska” showed up, and she healed the limbs of the other Dante, and soon they were whole again. Only after a break, as Mira finished speaking with Tinus, did Tyler process the nature of the situation.

  Mira really had changed into a beautiful freak of nature—and it was going to be really hard to explain to people. And as Mira’s brother, he couldn’t help but grin at the prospect of what was to come.

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