wall. My startled cry was choked off by the billowing smoke roiling from the flames still spewing from the werewolf’s mouth. All around me, people—and animated objects—dove out of the way, screaming profanities.
Without any sign of the fire hurting him, Terry Moore stood tall and proud—at least, I think he did. I couldn’t see much through the smoke and fire surrounding him.
The crested panda hopped to my side and blurted, “What the bloody hell?”
“It’s an infestation of the British,” I muttered. There was no way I could hide the fact I was hallucinating, not any more. Normal people didn’t cower against the wall watching a werewolf puke flames at an annoying elite. Part of me was jealous; I wouldn’t have minded being in the werewolf’s shoes for a few minutes.
“Hardly,” the panda replied. “It’s probably not very safe standing here.”
I had upgraded to sensible auditory hallucinations since my last run-in with narcotics. Did that mean the drugs were working their way through me? Grunting, I adjusted my hold on the papers and considered how to get out the front doors. If I burned to death due to a figment of my imagination, would I still die?
“Indeed,” I agreed. The flames, the werewolf, and even the panda weren’t real. Steeling my nerves to defy what my misfiring brain was telling me, I headed around the pair.
Terry Moore roared, halting me in mid-step. Wind gusted through the door, and the fire went out, leaving my fellow student standing on scorched marble. The other side of the hallway smoldered.
“Really not a good idea,” the panda warned.
“Is that the best you can do?” Terry said, the scorn in his voice drawing an infuriated snarl from the werewolf.
“Seemed like a good effort to me,” I muttered.
The panda didn’t seem very impressed with my comment, jabbing me in the side with his furry elbow.
The werewolf opened his mouth to say something when Terry Moore burst into a pillar of flame. Heat washed over me, so intense it singed my skin and left my eyeballs dry. I hissed and blinked. The pain didn’t last long, though my skin was smarting and had turned as red as my usual allergy rashes.
Where Terry had stood moments before was a winged lizard covered in hundreds of glittering scales and gemstones. I had always thought dragons would have leathery membranes like bats, but my fellow student had scales shaped like feathers, and they were studded in rubies and diamonds.
At around two feet in length, Terry didn’t look all that menacing, especially since the bulk of his body was made up of his neck and tail. All things considered, he was rather cute with the added bonus of being decked out in a fortune of jewels. Did I need to keep his hide intact to make the most money out of him, or would popping out the gemstones be sufficient?
I wondered what I’d really end up with once my hallucinations faded.
Terry the Miniature Dragon belched fire at the pink-winged werewolf. The werewolf, like any other sensible creature, took offense at Terry’s flames. Maybe my fellow student was a freaking dragon, but the werewolf was larger—and hungry. I flinched at the crunch as the supernatural creature chowed down on an appetizer of scales, gemstones, and dragon meat. When his yellow eyes focused on me, I lifted my hands in a placating gesture.
“I don’t think that’ll bloody help,” the panda hissed at me.
Movement behind the werewolf caught my eye, and with his hands in his pockets, Rob strode in, pausing long enough to take in the smoldering walls, the scorched floors, and the werewolf. The tip of Terry’s tail hung out of the side of the werewolf’s muzzle.
With a snap and a pop, the scaled hide crumbled to dust.
“You should have kept your hunting to after curfew,” Rob announced, arching a brow at the werewolf.
What curfew? I blinked. What had I missed after fainting on my kitchen floor?
The pink-winged werewolf drew in a breath, probably to breathe fire