Firedragon Rising

US copyright ©2015 by Mary
Fan

All rights reserved. No part
of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
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Published in the United
States by Glass House Press, LLC, 2014. GLASS HOUSE PRESS and
colophon are trademarks of Glass House Press, LLC.

_____________________________

ISBN
978-0-692-49708-1

Library Of Congress
Cataloguing-in-Publication is on file with the
publisher.

________________________________________

Cover by White Rabbit
Designs and Creations

Formatting by
Inkstain Interior Book Designing

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3
1

First Edition

ANGER
FLAMED THROUGH AURELIA’S VEINS
, burning so
hot that she was sure she would explode. She’d been unleashing her
rage on practice targets for half an hour, but the fire still
blazed in her chest.

The Triumvirate, the
Enchanter-run nation that had raised her and turned her into a
deadly fighter, had tried to kill her, for no reason other than
that she’d been a convenient sacrifice. And to think, up until
three months ago, she’d considered them the
good
guys, fighting against the Lord
of the Underworld—who had escaped his dark dimension almost a
hundred years ago and unleashed his supernatural beasts upon the
earth. He’d been defeated by the Enchanters—humans born with
magic—decades before Aurelia was born, but the creatures remained
long after his demise.

For her entire life, she’d believed the
Triumvirate was humanity’s guardian against those supernatural
dangers. They’d erected magical barriers around the cities to keep
the monsters out and sent Sentinels—a special class of Enchanters
who both ran the government and fought the supernatural—and
Defenders—elite non-magicals who worked for the Sentinels and
helped slay the beasts—to protect people.

But then the government had forced her into
the International Challenge, a monster-fighting competition where
she, along with all the other non-magical fighters, was supposed to
die to prove that only those with magic could guard the people from
the Underworld’s fiends. She’d defied their plans and ganked the
beasts that were meant to kill her, winning the contest, but the
Triumvirate had stolen her victory. They’d gone out of their way to
keep the world from knowing the truth: that a girl born without
magic—a Norm—had slain the monster that defeated the world’s best
Enchanters.

She’d always known that the government did
corrupt things—keeping the Norms down to favor Enchanters like
themselves, choking off any voices that dared disagree with
them—but until the Challenge, she hadn’t realized how deep their
corruption ran, or how evil they truly were.

And recently, she’d
learned something that made her fury overflow: The Gold Triumvir,
the most powerful of the nation’s three rulers, had killed her
mother. A friend who wasn’t supposed to say anything broke his
silence to reveal the truth about her past, which was that the Gold
Triumvir, Adlai Salvator, was the reason she’d spent all
fourteen—almost fifteen—years of her life as the state’s ward. More
like their property.
She’d
certainly never had any say about whether she
wanted to be raised by the slime-ball-run government, who watched
and controlled every second of her life.

She strode across the brick-walled training
room, her thick ponytail clinging to her sweaty neck, and a stray
lock of black hair fell over her eye. Clutching her practice bow,
she tried to focus on what she was doing, rather than on things
that were out of her control.

Archery wasn’t her favorite form of combat,
but she was still pretty freaking good at it. And it was an
important skill, especially since razorbirds—the most common
monster in the Triumvirate of North America—were only vulnerable to
silver-tipped arrows for Norms like her.

Also, shooting things helped vent her
anger.

But maybe supernaturals
like razorbirds weren’t the only things people needed protecting
against. She approached a bin filled with practice arrows, wishing
she could use her skills to fight
against
the government instead
of
for
it … which
was what she did each time she obeyed another order to gank a beast
lurking outside the Capital’s enchanted perimeter. Beside the bin,
a tall rack gleamed with scores of other weapons—swords, guns, and
knives of every size. She grabbed an arrow and faced the wide area
before her. Ordinarily, this space was used to train ten to twenty
Cadets—students training to be Defenders—at the same time. But she
was far from ordinary. She was the Firedragon, the best Cadet the
Academy of Supernatural Defense had ever seen. And that came with
certain privileges. Like full access to any training facility at
the school whenever she wanted, as long as it wasn’t being used for
classes. Her abilities had even drawn the attention of the Gold
Triumvir himself.

That rotten murderer!

Livid, she quickly raised her bow, eyed the
furthest of the many targets dangling from the ceiling, and
pictured the Gold Triumvir’s face in its center. Then, remembering
that she wouldn’t be standing still in a real-world fight, she took
off running, lifted the bow again, slapped the arrow against the
right side of it, and drew in mid-step. She released the projectile
without missing a beat and watched as it hit the target straight
through the center.