Sneak Peek Time: Book Three – Maga’s a Beast… or is it a Dragon?
The noxious odor threated her senses with each step she took. She knew nothing of what she would see when she were to finally lay eyes upon him.
She saw his eyes first. They glowed like red flames of a fire. Then she gasped at the size of him. He more than filled the space he had in the throne room, and more than likely refused to leave it for fear of destroying his castle and everyone in it. He slithered, more than walked, across the small rise of the room where his throne may have sat before his cursed days. His head hung low, so as not to get hung up on the rafters. Karen watched as he moved on all four, dragging behind him a snake like tail covered in scales and spikes which extended up his back side and along his long neck. He snapped his head back as he caught a bird in his mouth and swallowed it whole. Karen grimaced as he brought his long clawed foot up to his mouth to pick a feather from between his pointed teeth.
A gust of wind swept through the room, pushing the stench of him onto Karen, forcing her to gulp a breath into her lungs. She hadn’t realized, until she choked on it, that she had been holding her breath.
She exhaled long and hard as she noticed where the wind had come from. Large wings moved behind Ourobus as he belched from his fast flying meal. His scales started to glow black and gold as he looked upon her and opened his mouth as if he would swallow her in one bite as well. He drew in a breath and as he started to speak to her a stream of billowing smoke escaped his mouth. Karen stepped back, fearful of what he might do, when a shudder flew through her as the heat of flames licked her skin. She looked up and Ourobus was breathing flames of fire out of the windows of the large room. She noticed then that they were now free of glass.
“Excuse me,” he choked back, “where are my manors? May I offer you something to eat?” He asked snatching up a small birds nest from the sill of the window. “No?” He threw the nest to the floor and stomped on it with a roaring laughter, which turned into another bought of coughing up smoke.
She remembered the smell, how could she not… it still held in the fabric that she wore. It reeked of burnt wood and maybe even flesh, she couldn’t be sure. She hadn’t dared to wonder how many had gotten just a few feet too close to him.
He spoke to her in brief spurts, but his message was clear. He knew of the plans to reunite his son with her daughter, and he was happy for it. He wanted the curse lifted, as he despised his beast form.
Karen got much information out of him that day. Ourobus had a gathering of maga, just waiting for the curse to be lifted so they could give him all their power to defeat the one who was prophesized to defeat him. In the meantime he would use them to destroy the princess and bring his son back to him, to be his prince and rule by his side. She knew his plans would include taking all of Pylira, including killing her and Rowan, but she still hung to the hope that his plans would fail.
