They made haste across the remaining distance. Ralph was his strong arm, pushing materials out of the way and clearing a path for them to get to the glider. It was further than he expected from their previous vantage. But the trip would be well worth it, Louie kept reminding himself whenever his clothing snagged on a metal snarl or he had to climb over a particularly steep chunk of concrete.
They approached the glider, and both stopped at the same time. Louie didn’t need to ask if Ralph saw what he saw. For there was no denying the spot of white shining in the faint moonlight as if protesting the inky blackness that tried to close in around the figure.
The glider was half atop the woman, a Chimera by all appearances. But there was something different about this one. Louie stepped forward.
“It may not be safe.” Ralph stopped him.
“Anything worthwhile rarely is.” Louie grinned madly, brushing him away.
Ralph stayed in his place.
Louie approached the semi-crushed figure with interest. For the first time, he saw the creature up close. There was no mistaking it—the unique coat alone was proof enough—each detail met every first-hand account perfectly.
The White Wraith was a woman.
But that was not Louie’s most important revelation of the day. No, there was something far, far more curious about her. A spear of iron was stabbed directly through the side of her stomach. Her body was, no doubt, struggling to heal the wound despite the presence of the foreign object. But no magic could remove the iron, so blood continued to ooze around it before slowly fading into the night air.
Louie squatted next to the unconscious woman, touching his fingertips lightly against the wound. Sure enough, the blood was warm. It was truly coming from her. He had encountered many valuable things over the years and dealt in everything from secrets to organs, weapons to schematics. But Louie had never found something so rare, so precious, and so dangerous that it could change the world.
He grinned, already thinking of the possibilities for how he was going to work this discovery to his advantage. Not only did he have what he well suspected to be the infamous White Wraith of Dortam in his clutches, he also had a Chimera the likes of which Loom had never seen. Though he didn’t understand exactly how, he knew the creature before him would shake the very foundations upon which their world was built.
He had what guilds wanted and Dragons feared.
He had a Chimera that bled gold.