Free Trial By Fire (Avalon: Web of Magic #6) by Rachel Roberts Page B

mouth—
    “Momma!”
    —and licked Adriane so hard, she was lifted several feet into the air.
    “Drake?” Adriane laughed as she landed on the ground. “It is you!” She threw her arms around Drake’s neck, hugging the dragon as tight as she could. Then she stepped back to look him in the eye. “Wow. You’ve really grown!”
    The dragon was happily shuffling back and forth from foot to foot, tongue lolling out. “Momma! Momma!”
    Thud!
    The ground shook as Drake rolled over onto his back, legs and arms akimbo, waiting for Adriane to scratch his belly.
    “Tickle!”
    Adriane giggled, reaching over to rub the great creature’s amazingly soft belly. “I missed you so much!”
    The group watched, mouths opened in stunned silence.
    “Well, now I’ve seen everything!” Ozzie stomped over to inspect the dragon.
    Emily smiled. “It’s Adriane’s baby dragon.”
    “Some baby,” Kara muttered as she nervously scanned the skies. For all she knew, full-sized dragons traveled in packs like the pesky dragonflies. She could not handle another fan club—especially not one with members as big as the Drake.
    “Don’t worry,” Lyra told her, reading her mind. “The red dragons hatch only once every thousand years.” She eyed Adriane and Drake. “He’s imprinted on Adriane.”
    “Everybody, this is Drake.” Adriane introduced the dragon to her friends.
    “Hello!” Drake snorted, sitting up. The dragon’s lips parted, revealing rows and rows of razor-sharp teeth. Kara hoped it was a smile.
    “Dragons grow very quickly,” Storm observed.
    “You can say that again,” Kara replied.
    Adriane first met Drake when he was still inside his egg. When she left Aldenmor, he’d barely hatched. She knew that dragon magic was incredibly powerful, but she never expected her friend to grow so fast.
    “Such a sweet boy,” Adriane cooed, playfully scratching Drake under his chin. The dragon laughed, shooting sparks out his nostrils. A small fireball shot out of his mouth.
    Emily, Kara, and the others leaped back.
    “AhH!” Ozzie shouted. “Try to keep it on low flame!”
    “Sorry.” Drake hung his head over Adriane’s.
    “Drake, where’s Zach?” Adriane suddenly realized Drake had flown in by himself. She tried to keep the worry out of her voice.
    “He went after Moonshadow and the mistwolves,” Drake replied. He sounded worried himself. “ Zach told me to stay outside so witch would not capture me.”
    “Wait, if that wasn’t Zach, then who—oh.” Kara flashed on B*Tween’s warning about the Skultum.
    “That wasn’t Zach, and I’ll give you two guesses who it really was,” Adriane said grimly.
    “That means Zach is captured, in a spell somewhere,” Emily said.
    “I have not heard from Zach at all,” Drake admitted. “Then I heard Momma and came here.”
    “The Dark Sorceress has the mistwolves,” Storm said. “That is the only way she could be using their magic.”
    Dreamer snarled.
    “But how is that possible, Storm?” Adriane asked.
    “I do not know. It takes very strong magic to capture or kill a mistwolf,” Storm said.
    Drake nodded, shuffling on his huge feet again. “Have not heard from Zach!”
    “If she has Moonshadow,” Adriane figured, “then she has his fairy map. And she must be using it to open the portals.”
    “The map was given to Moonshadow,” Storm insisted. “He would guard that map with his life.”
    “Perhaps he doesn’t have the strength to prevent it,” Lyra said quietly.
    There was a long moment of silence as the group considered this sobering thought—and another that nobody wanted to say aloud: maybe Moonshadow had defended the map with his life.
    “They tried to capture Kara.” Ozzie paced. “Why? What has she got?”
    “This.” Kara held out her backpack. “No, I mean, this!” She removed the fairy map. “B*Tween told me the Skultum would come after me.”
    “Why does she still need Kara’s fairy map?” Emily asked.
    “We stopped the