Quiet Change

In the corner of his eye, Nelson saw emerald vines shoot up from beside his feet, following close behind the spear, as if they meant to charge with it.

"I know you can hear me. I apologize for my rashness and suspicion just now," Andros's voice rang out from the mayfly by Nelson's ear. "You saved a young life. I will repay you."

"Stay hidden down there." Nelson waved his Wand, and rock sealed the hole completely, stuffing the vine back in as well. "Keeping this city-state is more useful than coming out here to die."

He leaped, and beneath his feet appeared a Silver Falcon with wings spread and a cry that split the sky, rushing toward the spear's point of impact.

The spear plunged into the Dragon's throat, triggering an earth-shaking explosion and tremor. Even the dark clouds that blotted out the sky were shaken into ripples like water. The dragon's head fell from the air, and foul-smelling dragon blood poured over the empty city-state, where not a single building remained.

It wailed, its body struggling and beating its wings, yet it could not resist the pull of the earth. Its head and body smashed to the ground one after another, but the two parts still kept thrashing. Under Herpo the Foul's curse, it could neither live nor die.

Amid the rain of blood scattered by the Dragon, Nelson saw Herpo the Foul's face.

His youth felt unfamiliar to Nelson. There was none of the exaggerated makeup a world-ending villain might wear, nor could he see the madness that would fill those eyes two thousand years later.

The instant he noticed Herpo the Foul, Herpo the Foul saw him too.

There was no declaration of war, no bow, not even rules. Spells blasted against one another in the