Warning! This chapter may contain depiction of violence that maybe be upsetting for some readers.
By the fourth night, Valia’s lips were blackened. Her skin was marked by ash and scales where her bloodline fought to surface under exhaustion.
The assassins grew desperate as the deadline drew nearer. Some set traps; some used fire. One filled the forest with burning mist that poisons a young dragon's lungs.
Valia crawled through it, blind, coughing up blood. Then she paused and listened. The faint hiss of movement through smoke.
She held her breath, crouched low, and waited.
The assassin swept past, missing her by inches. In one fluid motion, she lunged low, her blade severing his tendon. He collapsed with a strangled groan, and before he could recover, she forced his face into the mud.
