Lucien and Serenith sit at a little table just outside her house, sipping tea, watching Val and the Beast Mother tear the meadow apart.
A golden dome of holy magic arches over the house behind them, rippling every so often under the impact of a stray boulder or a wayward torrent of flame, the barrier flaring bright gold each time something connects. What used to be pristine, rolling meadow now stretches out in a slowly widening ring of scorched earth and cratered wildflowers, smoke curling lazily up into the once-turquoise sky, beast and dragon colliding again and again in bursts of raw, dramatic power.
