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shrieked, jumped sideways to free myself, and knocked Kandy flying across the alley. I willed my jade knife into my right hand, slashed at the shadow, and met absolutely no resistance.  
    I stood there, knife in hand, staring at nothing except the deepening shadows of the evening. The echoes of my scream rebounded off the buildings to either side, their presence making me feel suddenly claustrophobic.
    “What the hell?” Kandy muttered.  
    I spared her a glance. She was sprawled on her ass on the asphalt, rubbing her arm. Her bad arm. Shit.
    “The shadow … Jesus, I’m sorry. I thought the garbage can shadow just tried to … latch onto me.”
    The green of her magic rolled across her eyes as Kandy silently rose up and onto the balls of her feet without placing her hands down on the ground. She stared into the shadows behind the garbage can, then shifted her gaze to look behind the recycling bin. Every hint of the giggles was gone from her demeanor now.
    “I don’t smell anything,” she whispered, her voice low and intense. “Magic?”
    I shook my head but didn’t sheath my knife. I couldn’t taste any magic nearby other than Kandy’s.
    Great. Now I was hallucinating terrors out of thin air. Sure, it was shadowy air, but I’d ruined our buzz over nothing. “I’m sorry —”
    Thunder cracked and a bolt of lightning split the air about twenty feet in front of us. The alley flooded with mind-numbing magic that somehow tasted of metal and electricity, along with the underlying spiciness that I always associated with dragons.
    Kandy was growling beside me, leaning into the press of the magic as if fighting for her footing.
    A dark figure of a man appeared — legs astride and arms akimbo — at the core of the light.
    I felt Kandy’s magic shift, two-inch claws appearing where her fingernails should be as she slashed at the magic still buffeting us. I stepped one pace ahead and shifted to place her just behind my right shoulder, shielding her from the bulk of the magic’s force with my body.
    The electric white magic — some sort of transportation spell, at best guess — disappeared with a snap.
    The man was dressed in dragon leathers and easily over six feet tall. He was dark blond, broad shouldered, and unarmed as far as I could see. But with the amount of magic he wielded — especially if the transportation spell was of his own making — I knew that visible weapons meant very little.  
    “Dragon,” I whispered for Kandy’s benefit. “I … think.”
    “You think?” she asked, her wolf growl infusing her tone.
    The possibly-a-dragon-or-possibly-some-hybrid-I’d-never-met opened his eyes. With the dim light in the alley paired with the near dark of the night, I couldn’t distinguish their color.
    “Sie! Frau!” he shouted.
    Immediately after the foreign words left his mouth, he threw back his head, arched his body forward, and screamed in agony. Then he collapsed onto the asphalt before us.
    “That can’t be good,” I said.
    Kandy had slammed her still-clawed hands over her ears at his scream, but she dropped them as we cautiously stepped forward. She prodded the possible-dragon with her foot, then looked at me.  
    I shrugged. “His magic is dim.”
    “Does your knife cut dragon flesh?”
    “Haven’t had a reason or a chance to try it yet.”
    Kandy raised an eyebrow at me. Yeah, dragons were pretty quick on their feet, even in training.
    “Okay,” Kandy continued. “Well, if he tries to kill me …”
    “I’ll skewer him. Dragon or no.”
    Kandy grabbed his shoulder and rolled him over with a grunt. “Heavy.”
    “Dragons usually are.”
    We stared down at the black leather-swathed dragon at our feet. He was out cold. Everything about him was definitely broad — as in shoulders, chest, nose, cheekbones, and jaw.
    “At least he’s damn cute,” Kandy said. “You know, if he’s here to eviscerate us.”
    Kandy and I had very different opinions on what qualified as