‘Come on, everyone,’ said Horatio when the monsters were dead, ‘we haven’t got a moment to lose. As far as we know the Cult haven’t summoned Brax back from Hell yet, but while we’ve been standing around talking they’ve probably been getting closer and closer to doing it! We’ve got to get to that tower and get the Sword!’

He let out a battle cry, and began to run in the direction of the tower, to close the last [fifty] or so paces that lay between them and its entrance doors.

When he looked round briefly, everyone was following after him.

Everyone, that is, except Silvia, who was knelt down next to Alex’s fallen body.

Horatio stopped, and the whole party stopped with him.

‘Silvia!’ he called to the thief girl. ‘What are you doing? Don’t dally! We haven’t got a moment to lose, remember!

‘Hang on!’ Silvia called back. ‘I’m busy!’

Horatio let out a sigh of frustration, and walked back over to the girl. The others came with him.

Silvia had her hands inside the front of Alex’s white robe and was rifling around with them.

‘What in Gard are you doing?!’ Horatio asked when they reached her.

‘What does it look like I’m doing?’ said Silvia as if it was obvious. ‘I’m searching Alex’s body for loot. No sense in just plodding off without strip-searching him first. That’s just wasteful! He might have some good gear on him; something we can use. At the very least these white boots look nice and sturdy. And—oh, hang on…what’s this?’

The girl pulled an item out from inside Alex’s robes and stood up, holding it out for the party to inspect.

In her hand she held a single, large, beautiful feather of red, orange and yellow plumage, the colours so intense that it seemed to be on fire. In fact, as Horatio looked harder it seemed that it was burning with a magical fire that did not consume it, nor hurt Silvia’s hand.

‘Great Heaven,’ said Ceres, which was probably swearing in her book. ‘Is that…is that what I think it is?’

‘What do you think it is?’ said Horatio.

‘I do believe it is…’ said Primus

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‘Is what?’ said Horatio. ‘Will somebody please tell me what you’re talking about?!’

‘It’s a Phoenix feather,’ said Ceres. ‘A single feather of Phoenix down. They are incredibly rare. So rare that many have speculated as to whether they really exist. And they…they contain Qind’s power to resurrect the dead.’

An ear-splitting roar pierced the air.

Horatio spun. A massive serpentine creature with a huge head filled with hundreds of gleaming fangs like rows of daggers was flying through the air towards them from the top of the tower.

‘Another dragon!’ said Wyvera. ‘How many of them have they got in there? I really need to change up the theme of my wardrobe. Does anyone have a spare mask?’

Maybe humour was her way of coping with the trauma of the situation.

Horatio gripped the hilt of his sword tight, which hadn’t left his hand since their last monster battle, and braced himself for impact.

But instead of attacking them immediately, the dragon pulled up in front of them, its long, pale blue, snakelike body twisting and looping back on itself as it hovered in the air. While this dragon did not have legs or wings, it was capable of levitating magically without them.

‘Where did you get that?’ it boomed at them in a deep but oddly sing-song voice, though its jaws did not move. ‘How did you get that?’ It must mean the Phoenix feather.

‘None of your business!’ Silvia yelled back it, showing remarkable spirit, or stupidity, in the face of mortal danger. ‘I stole it fair and square!’

‘You cannot be permitted to keep it,’ said the dragon. Its eyes—if you could call them eyes—were just empty white orbs. Had they spotted the Phoenix feather from its perch on the top of the tower? Did they see only into this world? This didn’t appear to be the regular kind of dragon—for a start, it didn’t seem to breathe fire. ‘In any case, it will not work this deep into Braxia, this close to the home of my master. Hand it over.’

‘Liar!’ Ceres called back to it. ‘Why should we trust anything you say? Your master is the very father of lies! We’ll never hand it over to you!’

Horatio sympathised with the sentiment, but did the girls need to reply to the dragon quite so defiantly? It may not be the fire breathing kind, but he was fairly certain it would have some other equally, if not more deadly, attacks at its disposal. And those teeth looked very sharp.

‘Fair enough,’ said the dragon. Huh? ‘No matter—you need only trust that I will kill you all and take the Feather for my master anyway. And you shall have ample evidence to believe that I am capable of that in but a moment.’

Ah. That was more what Horatio had been expecting.

The dragon shot out of its coiling equilibrium and darted towards the party, fangs-first.

Dragon attacks. [Re-insert some more battles earlier to break up talking / add double battles to previous two battles.]

Boss.