The white heat of the elemental fire was blinding, even to Drache. She felt the way it seemed to suck the moisture out of the air, turning her hair crisp and brittle. She poured everything she had into it, sure that at this point, with death oozing towards her and Raffey, that she had nothing to lose.

She was wrong.

[color=ed1c24][i]"...what?"[/i][/color] The fury of her magic fizzled out and her eyes widened with terror as the catastrophic damage was healed in the blink of an eye. [color=ed1c24]"A true dragon...?"[/color]

The maw opened to exude the toxic miasma into the room and Drache stepped back, finding Raffey's fingers in her hand. She squeezed hard, the sensation of his scaleless skin keeping her grounded in reality. A gesture of shared doom. And then the implied offer came. [i]A true dragon?[/i] What did it mean? Desperation made her guts sguirm. It had to be lying. It had to be some trick.

[i]It was offering her the one thing she wanted most in the world.[/i]

Tilting her face down, she opened her mouth to say something to Raffey, perhaps her last words, and the barrier shattered. [color=ed1c24]"Kraven?!"[/color] It couldn'd be. And then Sirik too? Hope flared bright and hot. The grip on Raffey's hand became a fierce tug as the half-dragon dragged him up to his feet, her eyes on Kraven and Sirik as she watched the human's shield go up and keep the foul fog at bay. 

Drache hesitated, glancing from Kraven's straining back as he held the shield up against the full force of the God's breath to the awesome monstrosity. He'd never be able to hold out against it! Kraven glanced at Sirik next to her and she saw the resolute look on his face.

[b][color=ed1c24]"No!"[/color][/b]

Before she could do anything, however, Sirik's strong arm hooked around her waist and she could do little but cooperate with the drow as he rescued her and Raffey from the arena. Twisting back, clawing desperately at Sirik, she needed to see...

She would remember it for the rest of her life, however long that might be. Like the flay winds that supposedly swept lethal and unchecked through the desert, the half-dragon watched Kraven, a man she knew, crumble into nothingness, standing less than a single stride from where she had been moments before.

Something hot and vile twisted inside her. A hatred that was deeper than anything she'd ever felt before. Something that buried deep rather than blazing hot only to fizzle out shortly. And still...a [i]dragon[/i]? Her?

[color=ed1c24]"It's getting closer. We have to run."[/color] Her voice was harsh, dry. She tore her amber eyes from the monster and glanced at Sirik, seeing the devastation in his face. She knew that to the men her own face would look as it usually did, beastly and impassive. Good. No one needed to know what she was thinking.

Drache dragged her pack around to the front to settle over her belly and then beckoned to Raffey, her wings loosing from her back so that he could climb up piggy-back. [color=ed1c24]"My magic is spent but I have strength enough to carry you. Please, I can't see another fr-... person die today."[/color] Her voice was an urgent hiss. And she hoped that the keremis would let her, if only in the interest of getting as far away from Coria as fast as they could.