Gabriel drew in a deep breath as he crept out of his bedroom and took one last look at his sleeping Kaia and their daughter. He knew she would kill him when she woke and discovered he'd gone without her but he couldn't take her with him. If she died it would leave Artemis motherless and he wouldn't be able to carry on without her but he equally couldn't take his own life and leave his one-month-old daughter without a parent. This was for the best he told himself again as he silently closed their bedroom door and went down to the drawing-room. 

Raphael, Duncan, Winston, Maude and Nettie were all sitting waiting for him. 

"You talked Rouge out of coming?" He asked Raphael. 

"Umm... in the same way you have Kaia. I removed the mirrors and snuck out while she was sleeping. She still thinks we're going tomorrow." Gabriel nodded. He didn't like lying to the women but they wouldn't risk them on this mission. 

"Marie has set up the hospital and is pacing a track on the floor. Cas is with her and Azrael is still there talking away to himself." Gabriel nodded at the werewolf. Poor Azrael, he hadn't left the hospital since finding out Victoria was there. Once this was out of the way he and Maude would help Azrael. But until the girl would tell Maude where her body was and what might be anchoring her they couldn't do much else. 

Looking up at his little team he took a breath and picked up his sword that Winston had set out for him on the table. As he did Raphael picked up his. Winston donned his dwarven battle helm and hefted his huge axe up onto his shoulder making it clink against the chain mail he wore. Being tall for a dwarf, although still short compared to the over six feet tall vampires he looked dangerous and fearsome. Not like the kind but formal dwarf who'd helped raise them. 

The two wolves faced away from the group and began removing clothes before they shifted into their animal forms. Duncan was a huge wolf, nearly as tall at the shoulders as Winston's full height with a shaggy auburn coat, bright Amber eyes and a huge snout full of sharp fangs. In contrast, Nettie was small and sleek with black fur, yellow-green eyes and a long angular snout. Gabriel glanced over the two wolves for a moment contemplating how different the two breeds of wolf were, one Olympian God descended, one the Egyptian God descended. Then turned his attention back to the mission they were heading out on. 

***

Duncan sniffed at the Hidden doorway and made a small whine deep in his throat. Gabriel stood beside the wolf and gave his team one last look, Maude gave him a salute as her body shimmered and became translucent before disappearing altogether. He raised his hand and counted to twenty before they all stepped through one by one. 

Maude was translucent again and hovering over the body of a troll whose sludgy black blood was oozing out across the dirt from a large hole in his throat. She pointed a barely visible finger down the long barely lit passage, her voice came out in a barely audible whisper like it was being carried on the breeze. 

"The dragon is round the corner at the end." Winson nodded and took the lead, his chain mail clicking quietly as he marched towards his possible death if the dragon didn't recognise him. The rest followed silently, with no sound but the slight pat of footsteps. 

Winston gazed up at the huge beast as he rounded the corner to find her hulking form. She was lying on top of a pile of broken Grecian columns and statues. As he stepped a little closer her huge nostrils twitched and she opened her yellow eye to look at the dwarf who was tiny in comparison to her. Her pupil narrowed to a slit as she raised her head. The air smelled of sulphur as her jaw began to open. 

"Pyra, it's me, Winston. Amaranth's adopted son. I'm here to free you." The dragon froze and tilted her head to look at him. As she moved forward Gabriel raised his sword, readying to race out of the shadows and save the dwarf from her jagged teeth. Turning her head to the side she moved so close to Winston her left eye was in striking distance of his axe. He removed his helmet slowly and kept his gaze on hers. 

Lifting her head the dragon began to make soft twittering sounds like a bird that in different circumstances would have had Raphael and Duncan laughing like hyenas. 

"No gentle dragon. Amaranth died many years ago now. But I have some of her sons with me." He gestured behind him and Gabriel, followed by Raphael stepping out of the shadows. The dragon moved her head forward and sniffed at them before twittering again at Winston. 

"My axe is as ever at your service, great lady." He said as he hefted it off his shoulder and held it in his hands. 

"You understand her?" Asked Raphael quietly, his eyes wide as he stared up at the huge beast with her shiny black scales and red-tinged head. 

"Yes," replied Winston, "and she understands you." Raphael nodded respectfully. 

The dragon lifted one of her leathery wings to show the dwarf a huge metal stud that was pierced through it and chained to another that had long healed into her scaled side. The chain only allowed her to lift her wing a couple of feet from her body. Rattling her tail she showed that it too had been pierced by a metal stud and was chained to the ground. She made the twittering sounds again followed by a sad sigh. The dwarf turned back to Gabriel. 

"They have her egg. If she does not eat anyone who makes it into this place they will smash it and kill her unborn infant." Gabriel studied the dragon for a moment. 

"Great lady, we are here to free the Oracle. But I swear to you on my mother's sacred tree I will do all I can to save your egg from your captors." Pyra studied him again then looked back to Winston and twittered again.

"Master Gabriel is the most honourable man you will ever meet and would never swear on Amaranth's tree lightly." The dragon turned her head and twittered quickly to Winston before laying her head back down and closing her eyes. Winston gestured to those behind him and raced behind the motionless dragon. The others all followed suit and crouched behind her body and waited. Winston whispered in a barely audible tone.

"Someone's coming." 

Moments later a woman shuffled into the garden. She balanced a colossal wooden platter on her left hand that had a huge slab of meat on it and leaned heavily on a roughly made wooden crutch with the other. Her right leg was missing from halfway down her thigh and she moved in a way that said it was an old injury and she had long ago learnt to get about without it. As she placed the platter on the ground Gabriel noticed her fingertips were long since gone as were the ends of her toes on her remaining foot that was bare and calloused. 

Pyra opened her eyes and twittered quietly to the woman who straightened and looked directly at Gabriel as the dragon lifted her head. 

"Are you sure?" The dragon twittered again. As the vampire locked his blue eyes on the woman's liquid gold ones he felt his heart begin to race. His eyes flicked to the ragged fabric that was tied about her forehead as a head scarf and her right hand that was also missing its fingertips. Winston stepped forward. 

"My adopted mother Amaranth was a friend of Pyra when I was a child, of yours too I believe. We are here to free you all." She stared wide-eyed at the dwarf for a few moments.

"You're here for the Oracle." She said as she narrowed her eyes at the vampire who was still staring at her. 

"We are, but we will free anyone who is held here." Replied Winston as the dragon twittered excitedly. "We will get Pyra's egg back for her too." Said the dwarf as he rested a hand on the dragon's neck. 

"You're one of the hinds." Whispered Gabriel. 

"Why do you say that?" The woman tensed as if she was awaiting an attack. her eyes flickering to the dwarf and back to the vampire.

"Kaia is at home with our daughter." As soon as the name left his lips the woman staggered back a step as the cold hard expression left her face. 

"Kaia?" The emotion in her voice couldn't be missed but almost as soon as it had surfaced she straightened and wiped at the one tear that had escaped her eye.

"We have little time. There are few guards here but they will smash Pyra's egg as soon as they see us. The key to the Oracle's chains is also suspended above the fire nest she made for her egg. If they drop it before we reach it she can never be freed as it burns with dragon's fire and will melt instantly. The chains are infused with magic and only the key will release them." Gabriel nodded. 

"I will take your lead." She looked at all the others and back to Gabriel. 

"What species are you? I know the dwarf and wolves." 

"My brother and I are vampires. We also have a phantom with us." Maude slowly manifested beside Nettie but remained incorporeal as she floated beside her mate. 

The hind studied them then looked to Smaugen then to Winston. 

"Your axe is dwarven-steel?" 

"Yes, my lady." 

"It should smash the chains that hold her then." She thought again for a moment.

"Can the phantom," She said the word phantom slowly like it was unfamiliar, "touch things? Could she grab the key before it falls?" The creepy whisper of Maude's voice carried to them like it was on a breeze. 

"I can get the key. I have seen it and where it hangs." Frowning a little at the ghostly words that sent a chill down her spine she considered again for a moment.

"Winston. Wait here with Pyra, and when the silence is broken smash her chains and bring her to join us." She turned back to Gabriel who hadn't missed that she used the dwarf's name without being told it.  

"Can the wolves smell the egg and make straight for it?" Duncan stepped forward and nodded his shaggy head. She nodded back to him. 

"If the phantom gets the key and the wolves the egg safely into its fire nest that leaves twelve guards for us to dispatch. Six trolls, four ogres and two demons." 

"Five trolls." Came the distance voice as Maude pointed back to the entrance. Nodding the hind looked them all over. 

"We will likely all die." Raphael snorted.

"It's fine. If we don't, our brides will kill us when we get home anyway." Giving him an unimpressed look the hind turned and shuffled towards the archway she had come through. They followed her silently into the darkness.