Night's Fury

A few choice words, none of them friendly, went through Jade’s mind as Sandman and Jack jumped to the window.

“Come on! We can find Pitch!” The winter spirit encouraged, jumping out into the wind’s hold.

Sandman seemed torn for a moment, but Jade’s swift departure seconds after made the decision for him.

He worried about what would happen if Pitch got his hands on the girl.

A sense of dread was pricking at the back of her mind, like a warning, and Jade caught up in a burst of speed.

In a synchronized display of firepower, the frost-boy and the dragon-girl blasted the Nightmare to dust.

Fueled by adrenaline, Jack landed next to the frosted, torched black sand with a grin.

“Did you see that? We’re awesome!”

“We?” Jade echoed, smirking. “What is this we you speak of? All that awesomeness was me.”

Chuckling, Jack swung his staff half-heartedly at her head, knowing she would dodge.

Her laugh warmed his heart, and the winter spirit turned away to avoid showing it, poking the strange sand as a distraction.

Noticing this retreat, the now-old confusion returned, mixing with concern in her belly.

Jack had never been awkward with her before…

Then again, they had never almost kissed before, either.

A blush only just started when a presence brushed the edge of her senses.

Whipping around in a crouch, she fired, missing Pitch by only a few scant centimeters as he disappeared into the shadows.

Now on-guard, Jack scanned the rooftop as Jade slowly stood, ear horns twitching and tail stiff.

“What are you two doing here?”

Both teenagers jerked around to face Pitch, who was standing on a higher rooftop with a slightly frustrated expression.

“This isn‘t your fight.”

“You made it my fight when you stole those teeth!” Jack claimed, unwilling to admit how upset he was by the Boogeyman’s taunts towards his friend earlier.

“The teeth? Why would you care about-?”

All three of them were startled by Sandman’s sudden appearance, and the little gold man did not look happy.

Jumping away, Pitch collected himself with a dark chuckle, smirking.

“Now this is who I’m looking for…”

Jade’s pupils narrowed.

He had lured them out here on purpose?

Sandman proved to be very skilled with his whips of dream sand, and there was only a short confrontation before he caught Pitch’s wrist and flung him around like a rag doll.

Once the Nightmare King was tossed onto the street below, Jade could only give him an impressed look.

“Remind me to stay on the nice list around you.” She half-joked.

“Make that double for me.“ Jack agreed.

This earned them a smile, and all three floated down to confront the scrambling spirit of terror below.

“Okay, easy! You can’t blame me for trying, Sandy!” Pitch voiced, struggling to his feet. “You don’t know what it’s like to be weak, and hated…It was stupid of me to mess with your dreams, so I’ll tell you what…”

His pleading expression turned predatory, and Jade knew it was a trap.

“You can have ‘em back.”

Nightmares rushed up from the shadows, an entire army of them, and Jade found herself back-to-back with Jack and Sandman as they were surrounded.

“You…take the ones on the left, I’ll take the ones on the right?” Jack offered, strained.

“I think I prefer the right, actually.” Jade replied, tone forcibly light. “Being left-handed and all, it might be nice to switch things up.”

Honestly, she could not help the joke; years of being cornered had built in a psychotic defense mechanism that involved a rain of fireballs and a wild need to get out of there.

It was the only way to keep from going crazy.

From atop one of his trusty steeds, Pitch smiled evilly.

“Are you scared, little dragon?”

“I’ve seen more frightening things than you.” Jade snarled, wings flaring. “You don’t even make the top ten.”

Pitch found that was true; she was not even slightly afraid of him.

But that did not mean she was fearless.

“Oh, but I’ve found some old friends of yours that might have.”

Her ear horn twitched in confusion.

Old friends?

“It’s been a long time, Night Fury.”

That voice sent a shiver of true fear through her bones, and Jade flinched at the sight of her old tormentors.

“My, haven’t you grown?” A female Nadder voiced, her smile full of razors. “You were only a toddler when I sliced open your face, and just look at you now! Almost full-grown!”

The words dripped with false affection and poison, corrosive and deadly.

Jack was too angry to care.

They had hurt Jade.

“You did that?” The winter spirit demanded, the asphalt icing under his feet.

“You must be the one who took away our little toy.” The other noted, spiked tail swaying dangerously. “We can’t have these two interrupting our fun, now can we?”

“Of course not.”

Neither noticed the sudden slits of Jade’s pupils at their not-so-subtle threat, or felt the sudden swell of power as her spark flared.

It was their only warning.

Even Pitch was startled by her speed; Jade was nothing but a dark blur as she tackled the nearest Nadder into a brick wall.

“No one hurts my pack.”

With a screech, the other Nadder rushed to her friend’s aid as the army of Nightmares charged.

Meeting the challenge with a roar, Jade grabbed her stunned opponent and used her to smash the other across the face, tangling their limbs.

Releasing her hold, the Night Fury took a deep breath and fired off three balls of blue flame in rapid succession.

Shrieking at the burn, one of the Deadly Nadders pulled herself free and charged, jaws snapping closed like a bear trap a hair’s-breadth from Jade’s throat as the smaller dragon swiftly evaded.

Instinct and natural intelligence took over, and the dragon-girl knew exactly where to strike.

One punch struck the unprotected side, painfully smashing into a kidney, and a swift kick shattered the kneecap.

As the woman tumbled through the air, delirious from the pain, Jade blocked the claws that aimed for her face, sending back a strike which hit squarely on a nerve bundle that paralyzed the diaphragm.

With a growl, she grabbed her by a wing-joint and threw the woman into the street below, adrenaline storming through her veins.

Fire crackled up her throat, begging for release, but a shout from above tore the Night Fury away from her violent thoughts.

The sight nearly made her heart stop.

Jack was falling.

Her magic streaked the air as she rocketed up mid-transformation, the only thought in her head being that Jack couldn’t die.

Tumbling through the air, unable to call the wind, Jack yelped when he suddenly landed on something warm.

Blinking rapidly, the winter spirit took in the myriad of black scales beneath him for a moment before realizing what had happened.

“Took you long enough.” He teased, tightening his hold on the Night Fury’s shoulders.

A laugh rumbled up from her chest as Jade caught the frost-boy’s crook in her soft mouth, and she offered it to him with a turn of her head.

Jack twirled the wood in his hand for a moment, smiling at the familiar feel, before Nightmares charged at them.

“Ready, fluffy?” The boy wondered, patting her neck.

With a smile full of hooked teeth, Jade twisted out of the way and blasted a fireball at the unsuspecting mare’s underbelly.

The game was on.

Jack could not help laughing as they weaved through the Nightmares, freezing and burning them if Jade’s wings or tail failed to shatter them.

Riding a Night Fury was almost as fun as riding the wind.

With a twist, Jade launched a fireball at a Nightmare that tried to sneak up on North’s sleigh, and Jack jumped onto one of it’s fins as she swooped away.

Dark sand surrounded the Sandman, closing in on him, and the Night Fury let loose a barrage of lightning-blue fire to weaken the ring.

Before she could repeat the attack, a thick quill struck her in the side from below, the pain sharp enough to force a transformation.

Hissing as she pressed around the quill embedded near her hip, Jade bared her fangs at the furious Nadder, whose wings beat slightly out of time with each other.

“I’ll kill you, you little eel!”

More quills flew from the dragon-woman’s tail as she twisted, and Jade spun to avoid being struck a second time, pulling her wings in to dive-bomb her enemy in those few moments of vulnerability.

They tumbled through the air in a snarling, hissing mass, Jade wincing as claws dug into her shoulders.

With a roar, she ripped them out and used all her strength to kick her opponent straight down.

“SANDY!”

Jack’s shout yanked the Night Fury’s attention back up to the little golden man-

Just as an arrow of dark sand struck him in the back.

“No…”

It was like her heart twisted, and Jade took off like a shot, bursting through the dark sand and out again, Sandman held to her chest in a hug.

“Sandy? Sandy, are you okay?”

But the darkness was spreading like a virus, and she felt tears building up behind her eyes.

“Sandy…”

A sad, reassuring smile filled his face, and his untainted hand came up to pat her nose.

The tears came then, and a sob caught in her throat as Sandman dissolved into black sand in her grasp.

He was gone.

Through the blur of her tears, she spotted Pitch, and the sorrow morphed into white-hot rage.

His death would not be in vain.

Pitch had not expected any real retaliation; the Guardians would be too grieved by the loss of their comrade to do anything but retreat, and Frost was not strong enough to do anything by himself.

The Night Fury was not part of his calculations.

Fire exploded on impact with the nightmare sand, scattering it into a useless spray, and Pitch moved just in time to avoid getting tackled off his cloud.

Her eyes were like green fire, the pupils thin as paper, and he knew she was aiming to kill.

All Jade felt was rage; there was no pain, no fear, only the burning thought that Pitch deserved to burn, too.

A tidal wave of nightmare sand rose up, threatening to swallow her whole.

“JADE!”

Then Jack was there, between her and danger, draining out all of the rage to replace it with sharp surprise in a moment.

“Jack-”

And they were swallowed by darkness.

Shielding her face from the sharp grains, Jade felt a wave of cold wash over her before a massive blast of ice froze the sand into an explosion of black hail.

Thrown back by the force, the dragon-girl could only had a moment to catch her breath as Jack wobbled, losing his grip on consciousness in midair.

Swooping in to catch him, she held the frost-boy close as she turned and raced for the sleigh, guilt gnawing at her insides.

If she hadn’t lost control…

Crumpling in the sleigh, Jade winced as the adrenaline faded, checking her wounds as they escaped through a portal.

Tooth gasped at all the blood staining her clothes, and even Bunny looked ill when he spotted the large quill still buried in her hip.

Taking a few deep breaths to cope with the pain, Jade looked towards her friend as he sat up, still dazed.

“Jack?”

“’M alright…” He muttered, vision swimming for a moment before zeroing in on all the red.

Seeing the sudden concern in his eyes, the Night Fury tried to smile.

“It’s really not that bad. I’ve had worse…”

“Like what? Ya lose a leg?” Bunny demanded gruffly, moving to put pressure on her shoulder wounds as Tooth fluttered around in a panic and North urged the reindeer faster.

“Almost got my arm bitten off…” Jade admitted jokingly. “Does that count?”

Her nonchalance about the whole thing was more disturbing than all the blood.

Jack felt his heart squeeze as helped put pressure around the quill, not caring that it stained his hands red.

What exactly had Jade been through before he found her?