How to Lose Your Dragon (The Immortality Curse Book 1) by Peter Glenn (beach read TXT) 📕

had the dog. I was left wondering why a little too long, and the other two got the drop on me.

Bat Boy’s left hook caught me right in the jaw, and I spun as stars filled my vision for a half second. I ended up smacking into the car, and it was all I could do to keep on my feet as my weapon fell clattering to the ground.

I spun back around just in time to see Pipe Guy lunging for me again. I managed to dodge around the side of him, and he slammed into the car as well, his head going through one of the windows.

A hail of glass shards and blood flew everywhere as his head was torn to pieces by the old window. Apparently, these ones weren’t made to shatter gracefully like the stuff in the pricey models.

I landed a few blows to Pipe Guy’s kidneys, and he stopped moving, at least for the moment, while I turned to face the inevitable follow-up from Bat Boy.

But Bat Boy wasn’t attacking me anymore. He was staring into the open car, eyes glinting in the moonlight.

The blood drained from my face as I realized what Bat Boy had found. Grax’thor was there. Their goal. Some defender I’d turned out to be.

I rushed forward, head low and aimed at his abdomen right as Bat Boy’s arms reached into the car.

The two of us tumbled into the open door and I heard a loud creak as the door flew backward on its hinges, coming off the car and sending both of us tumbling to the ground. The impact hurt a lot. Bat Boy had something else hard in his pocket, and it jammed itself into my leg as we fell, leaving behind a nasty bruise.

I strained to get up on my feet, panting and leg throbbing, and failed. Instead, I started crawling, struggling to get back to the car. I had to defend Grax’thor. It was Mei’s only hope.

Lanky Guy and the failinis finally made their move. The dog pounced on top of me, wrapping its jaws around my injured leg. With its mouth clamped around my leg, I howled in pain. I was stuck in place, helpless to do anything but watch while it thrashed and growled on top of me.

“Grax’thor!” I screamed. “No!”

But Lanky Guy was undeterred. He sauntered up to where the car door had been and reached in to pull out Grax’thor. He held the blade for a moment and stared at it as it glinted in the moonlight.

Bitch.

“You lose,” he said in a gruff tone, looking down at me, the corners of his lips curled into an evil smile.

All around him, the other attackers were starting to rise off the ground. Well, most of them, at least. Half-Naked Guy wasn’t moving, but the other three were all shambling back to their feet.

“Failinis!” Lanky Guy commanded. The dog’s incessant noise stopped for a moment. “Finish him.”

Well, wasn’t that just awesome? Being mauled by a mythical dog was not how I wanted to go.

The dog released my leg, and a low growl erupted from his jaws. I braced myself for the attack, but nothing happened.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched in amazement as a rather large fireball flew through the air, slamming into the failinis’s side.

I blinked, not able to believe my luck. Had someone just saved me from certain doom?

The dog yelped and got back to its feet, but another fireball followed the first, careening into the beast’s head. The failinis went slack a moment later as the acrid smell of burning dog hair assaulted my nostrils. I watched it for another moment, but it stopped moving.

“Leave Damian alone!” a shrill voice demanded from somewhere behind me.

A big smile crept over my lips. That had sounded like Rick. Was he secretly a wizard this whole time? What a conversation that would be, huh?

I spun around to look at the voice. It was Rick, all right, but Sheila was next to him, fire blazing between her fingertips.

Saved by the blood mage, then. Slightly less shocking, though I was curious as to Rick’s part in it all the same.

Lanky Guy’s eyes went wide, and he stared at the new threat for a moment, then his grip tightened around Grax’thor and he took a step toward Sheila.

Two more fireballs flew out of her hands. The first one landed at Lanky Guy’s feet, the second crashed into Pipe Guy, who was standing next to him.

Pipe Guy screamed and fell to the ground in a mass of burning flames and skin. The smell was even worse than that of the failinis.

“We said leave him alone, eh?” Sheila told him. “And we meant it.” She doubled down on her attack stance, face looking grim, and readied more fireballs in her hands.

Lanky Guy huffed and let out a whistle, then he turned and left, his prize in his hands.

Wiry Chick and Bat Boy followed closely at his heels, dragging Half-Naked Guy with him, and soon enough, it was just me, Rick, Sheila, and a couple of burning corpses piled around the remnants of the rental car.

“Grax’thor!” I cried out, one hand held over the wound in my abdomen. “They took… Grax’thor!”

Either Rick or Sheila must have heard me, because I heard the sound of footsteps rushing toward me, though my vision was starting to blur, so I couldn’t see which one it was.

“Are you all right?” Sheila’s voice broke through the stillness of the night as she reached my side, placing one hand behind my head to cradle it. “Are you all right, Damian?”

My lips cracked into a toothy grin. “Never better.”

Then it all went black.

12

When I woke up, the first thing I noticed was that I had a crashing headache. The second thing I noticed was that it was now daylight.

I rummaged around and pulled my phone out of my pocket to look at it. No missed calls or messages, which wasn’t exactly shocking, but the time was