I stood, wide-eyed, frozen in shock. People around me rushed over to my mom to see what happened, and a shadow fleeing through a broken window caught my eye. The shadow of the killer. I turned to get a better look, then took off after it at full speed. I managed to corner him and he spun around to face me. True, he was twice my size, but I was still a Royal Dragon and he was only a Shadow Dragon.
"Just a puny 800 year old?" he laughed.
"Why did you do that?" I demanded.
"It's time for dragons to take back the land that was ours," he growled.
"What land?"
"The human's lands. It belongs to the dragons and we'll take it back."
"No," I said firmly. "We gave that land to the humans."
"It was a stupid decision. But it doesn't matter whether or not the Royal Dragons are on our side. It's happening, and you can't stop it."
"And that's why you attacked my mom?" I growled back. He got into a fighting stance and I did the same.
"It's what had to be done," he said. I narrowed my eyes at him. "And if I have to kill you too, so be it." He lunged at me. I ducked out of the way and jumped ontop of him, pinning him down. I took a deep breath, preparing to breathe fire. He rolled over onto his back, knocking me on the ground and he put his foreclaws on my chest, pinning me down.
"Light Dra-" I started, but he swiped at my snout, interrupting my spell and resulting in a deep scratch the reached from my eye to my chin. I swiped my tongue over my lips, licking off some of the blood from the scratch. I kicked up with my hind legs, pushing him off and trying to cut into his underside with my claws, but my claws weren't sharp enough to do little more than leave a mark.
"White Dragon Roar!" I said, and the roar hit him dead-on. Once it died off, he was battered and bruised, but still standing.
"You little brat," he hissed. "Shadow Dragon Ro-"
"Royal Dragon Explosive Energy!" I yelled before he could finish, and he was caught in the middle of an explosion of pure magic energy. I heard him scream briefly, then fell silent. I staggered from exhaustion from that last spell and tried to blink the blood out of my eyes. Panting, I stood back up and forced myself to fly as fast as I could back to Mom. My siblings and Dad were gathered around her while the guests were standing a few steps back except for the stranger who Mom was talking to earlier. I rushed over to Mom's side, shouldering him out of the way to make room.
"Miriel, you're bleeding! What happened?" Nyra exclaimed.
"I went after the guy who did this," I said.
"You didn't…?" she trailed off, but I knew what she was asking. I nodded and she gasped. "You killed someone?"
"Your first kill," Mom said quietly. I looked down at her and she coughed up a bit of blood.
"Mom, don't die," I said.
"It's my time to go," she said.
"Why healed her?" I demanded.
"We tried, but she's too far gone," Dad said gently.
"Try harder then!" I said. "She can't die!"
"Miriel," Mom said. I looked at her, tears blurring my vision. "It's okay."
"No, it's not!" I protested.
"I love all of you," she said, then her breathing slowed to a stop and her eyes closed. I burst out into tears, as did my siblings. I don't remember much of what happened after that. I remember my Dad pulled Nyra, Marina, and Spy away from Mom and the stranger pulled me away from her and they took us to our rooms and I cried for so long. Mom was the first victim in an upcoming war. And my fight with the killer had given me my first real taste of blood.