Dragons shadow, p.1
Dragon's Shadow, page 1
The Dragon's Shadow – The Heirs of Pendragon, Volume 3
Copyright © 2026 by Nadine Travers
Published in Quebec, Canada
by
68 Arcana Publishing St-Eustache, Quebec
Epub – ISBN: 978-2-925105-64-0
Paperback - ISBN:
Legal Deposit – Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec, 2026
Legal Deposit – Library and Archives Canada, 2026
All rights reserved.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, or places is entirely coincidental.
Warning: unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal.
Publisher website site: https://68arcana.com
Author website: https://www.nadinetravers.com
Cover design website: https://coversbychristian.com/
Contents
Author's Note
1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14
15. Chapter 15
16. Chapter 16
17. Chapter 17
18. Chapter 18
19. Chapter 19
20. Chapter 20
21. Chapter 21
22. Chapter 22
23. Chapter 23
24. Chapter 24
25. Chapter 25
26. Chapter 26
27. Chapter 27
28. Chapter 28
29. Chapter 29
30. Chapter 30
31. Chapter 31
32. Chapter 32
33. Chapter 33
34. Chapter 34
35. Chapter 35
36. Chapter 36
37. Chapter 37
38. Chapter 38
39. Chapter 39
40. Chapter 40
41. Chapter 41
42. Chapter 42
43. Chapter 43
44. Chapter 44
45. Chapter 45
46. Chapter 46
47. Chapter 47
48. Chapter 48
49. Chapter 49
50. Chapter 50
51. Chapter 51
52. Chapter 52
53. Chapter 53
54. About the Author
55. By the Same Author
Author's Note
This story is set in the heart of Old Montreal, and the dialogues reflect the Quebecois flavour of that world—phrases, rhythms, and expressions that capture the spirit of my characters and their universe.
These local touches aren't meant to create distance, but to draw you closer to an authentic, living experience. I hope you enjoy this adventure where magic and identity intertwine.
Enjoy reading!
Nadine Travers
Chapter 1
The Broken Squad
Arthea
The sport mat slaps under Garrett's weight like a muffled gunshot.
He stays down, shoulders against the black rubber, mouth open on a cut-off breath. His golden eyes search the ceiling as if the answer to what just happened is engraved up there somewhere.
I step back. My boots make no sound.
"Dead."
The word drops between us, flat and final.
Garrett grunts, rolls onto his side, plants a hand against the mat. His solar tattoos glow faintly under the fluorescents, pathetic, really, compared to what they're supposed to do in full daylight. He gets up like a building that refuses to come down.
"Again," he says.
His voice is deep, resonant. Too calm for someone who just got humiliated in three seconds.
I cross my arms.
"No. Not again. Not until you understand what just happened."
He frowns, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. A streak of dust stays caught in his beard.
"I charged. You dodged."
"You telegraphed."
I take a step toward him, point at his right shoulder with my chin.
"Right there. Half a second before you moved. Your shoulder tipped forward. Your eyes locked onto my left leg. A twelve-year-old would've seen it coming."
Garrett's jaw clenches. His hands close, like he's looking for something to crush.
"I'm a frontline warrior. Not an assassin."
"Yeah, well, a dead frontline warrior is useless to everyone."
I turn away, grab a water bottle off the bench against the wall. The gym air clings to my skin, thick and hot, loaded with that burnt-rubber smell that reminds me too much of le Chaudron after someone set the fryer on fire. I take a sip. The water is lukewarm.
Behind me, Garrett doesn't move. I hear his breathing, slow and controlled, like he's counting internally to keep from blowing up.
I set the bottle down.
"You never telegraph against an enemy who can read shoulders, Garrett. Never. The moment you telegraph, you're predictable. And the moment you're predictable, you're dead."
He's quiet for a beat. Then:
"How do I fix it?"
His voice has shed a little of its assurance. Not much. Just enough for me to know he's actually listening.
I turn around.
"You hide your intention until the last fraction of a second. You look elsewhere. You breathe like you're going nowhere. And when you move, you move all at once. Not gradually. Not with a build-up. Direct."
I take a step toward him, hands loose at my sides. My eyes drift toward his right, like I'm tracking something on the wall behind him.
Then I pivot.
My foot catches his shin before he can react. Not hard enough to drop him. Just hard enough to punch through his balance.
I step back.
"See? You didn't see it coming."
Garrett blinks. Something flickers in his gaze: respect, maybe, or frustration. Hard to read.
He nods.
"Again," he says.
This time, I don't refuse.
Garrett straightens, wipes the back of his neck with his palm. His fingers leave a damp streak on his skin.
"I'm not used to fighting without light."
"Yeah, I noticed."
I pull on my hair elastic, redo my ponytail. My fingers snag a strand plastered against my temple. The gym air sits on me like a wet blanket.
"What are you used to, exactly? Crushing things in broad daylight?"
He doesn't answer right away. His eyes drift toward the fluorescents on the ceiling, white and harsh, giving everyone a corpse's complexion. Not exactly the midday sun.
"I fought under the sun for fifteen years. Never lost."
"Great."
I wipe my forehead with my wrist. Sweat clings to my skin, salty and sharp.
"Except Dreadmore doesn't attack in broad daylight. Neither do the creatures that crawl out of la Porte. So if you're useless the second it gets dark, you might as well stay at le Chaudron and pour beers."
Garrett's fists close. His runic tattoos glow faintly, a dull and nearly-extinguished gold under the fluorescents. A smell of ozone rises from his skin, light but persistent, like the air just before a storm that never arrives.
He's managing his magic badly.
Makes me think of an engine running too hot without oil. It'll hold for a while. Then it'll blow.
I cross my arms.
"You're leaking energy. Right now, in real time. You don't feel it?"
He frowns, drops his eyes to his hands. The runes pulse faintly, irregularly, like a heart searching for its rhythm.
"I..."
"You're compensating. Forcing your magic to run without a natural source. It'll hollow you out in ten minutes."
I take a step toward him, point at his chest with my chin.
"Shut it down. Now."
"How?"
"Stop reaching for the light. Accept that it's not there."
Garrett looks at me like I just asked him to stop breathing.
"That's not how it works."
"Then change how it works."
My voice comes out sharper than I intended. The pressure rises behind my temples, not a migraine, not yet, just that familiar weight reminding me the clock is running.
Seventeen days.
Seventeen days to turn a solar warrior into a shadow fighter. To forge a team out of pieces that barely hold together.
Seventeen days before everything burns.
Garrett inhales, closes his eyes. The runes on his chest tremble, partially extinguish.
Not enough.
"Deeper," I say.
Ivy raises her left hand, fingers spread like she's pushing against an invisible wall.
Nothing happens.
She frowns, looks at the Ledger open in her right palm. The pages glow faintly, covered in symbols that dance and reorganize too fas t to read. Her lips move, counting or reciting, impossible to say which.
"Manifestation probability at sixty-eight percent," she murmurs. "Optimal vector identified. Deployment in three... two..."
Her hand trembles.
The air around her fingers ripples, goes blurry, like heat shimmer off summer asphalt. A sour smell rises, not unpleasant, just wrong, like lemon mixed with burnt metal.
I step back.
"Ivy."
She doesn't hear me. Her eyes stay locked on the Ledger, on the calculations cascading across it. Her breathing accelerates, short and choppy, like someone fighting off a sneeze.
"Parameter adjustment. Recalibration to eighty-two percent. Manifestation imminent."
The distortion around her hand intensifies. Violet sparks crackle between her fingers, not light exactly, something denser, leaving phosphorescent streaks in the air behind them.
That's not a shield.
That's an unstable flare three seconds from detonating.
"Ivy, lower your hand."
My voice cracks like a whip. Same tone I use when a patron at le Chaudron is about to put a chair through the window.
She blinks, looks up at me. Confusion moves across her face, like she just woke up mid-PowerPoint.
"I... the data indicates that..."
"The data's wrong. Lower. Your. Hand."
The violet sparks sizzle, spreading up her wrist like electric roots. The burnt-metal smell thickens, coats the back of my throat.
Ivy lowers her hand.
The sparks implode with a dull pop, like a bulb bursting underwater. A wave of dry heat rolls through the gym, rattling the fluorescents.
Silence.
Ivy stares at her palm, mouth slightly open. The Ledger still glows faintly in her grip, completely indifferent to the disaster it just helped cause.
Behind her, Trent snickers, brief and dry, almost involuntary.
"Fascinating," he says. "You almost blew us up with a shield."
Ivy turns toward him, teeth tight.
"The Ledger confirmed the spell's viability. The calculations were correct."
"Yeah, except you missed one thing."
I cross my arms, feel Excalibur's weight against my back, not threatening, just there, the way it always is. A permanent reminder that everything can go sideways at any moment.
"Magic isn't math. You can't just follow a formula and expect it to obey."
Ivy opens her mouth. Closes it. Her fingers tighten around the Ledger.
I don't have time to shout.
The violet spark explodes outward like an invisible fist trying to demolish the room.
I dive sideways.
My shoulder hits the mat. The impact travels up through my collarbone, sharp and clean. I roll, come up on my knees, one hand pressed flat against the rubber.
The shockwave passes above me, hot and acrid, dragging that burnt-metal smell with it. The fluorescents shriek, a sharp and drilling sound that goes straight through my eardrums.
Then darkness.
Two tubes shatter with a crystalline crack. Glass rains down on the mat in a fine shower, tinkling like hail on tin.
I stay still, breathing shallow, eyes fixed on the ceiling where the surviving lights flicker and fight for life.
Silence.
Then a shaking exhale, somewhere to my left.
I turn my head.
Ivy is standing frozen, arms still outstretched like she's holding something that isn't there anymore. The Ledger hangs limp in her right hand, pages open but dead. Her face is bone-white, eyes wide, mouth cracked open on a word that won't come.
I get up.
My legs hold. That's something.
"Stop."
My voice snaps in the silence. Ivy flinches, stumbles back a step, like I slapped her.
I move toward her.
"You're forcing it. Treating magic like a muscle you can just flex harder until it obeys."
Ivy opens her mouth. Nothing comes out. Her fingers tighten around the Ledger, hard enough for the leather to creak.
"Magic isn't a muscle. It's a channel. Something that moves through you, not something you manufacture."
I stop a meter away, cross my arms.
"The second you block it, resist it, try to micromanage it with your analyst brain, it blows. Exactly like it just did."
Ivy blinks. Once. Twice. Her jaw sets, and I watch the corporate armor slide back into place, that professional facade she pulls on like a shield every time she feels exposed.
"The Ledger confirmed the theoretical viability of the spell. The parameters were correct. If I'd had more time to adjust the variables—"
"No."
I cut her off before she can finish.
"The problem isn't the variables. It's you. You ran this like a project kickoff. Identify the problem, optimize the solution, execute. Except magic doesn't care about your Excel spreadsheets."
Ivy steps back again. Her heel catches a piece of glass. The sound ricochets through the silence, too loud, too sharp.
I breathe. The pressure pulses behind my temples, not against her, exactly. Against the situation. Against the fact that I've got seventeen days to turn amateurs into fighters.
Against the fact that I'm two steps from torching the whole thing.
Behind Ivy, Trent leans against the wall, arms crossed, face unreadable. His silver-gray eyes track me, measuring, like he's deciding whether the scene is worth wading into.
He doesn't move.
Smart.
I bring my attention back to Ivy.
"You're an analyst. That's your edge. You're genuinely good at it. But down here, in this broken gym with the lights that just blew because of your flare? You're not in a boardroom."
My voice drops, each word landing separately.
"So you're going to stop treating magic like a problem to solve. You're going to listen to what this —"
Lance steps forward.
No urgency. No visible tension. He crosses the gym the way he does everything: one step, then another, smooth and unhurried, like a man who always knows exactly where he's landing.
He places a hand on Ivy's shoulder.
The violet magic dies.
Not gradually. Not with a flicker or a fade.
All at once.
Like someone pulled the plug.
The burnt-metal smell hangs in the air, but the sparks that were crawling up Ivy's wrist are just gone. Absorbed by the simple weight of Lance's palm against her shoulder.
Ivy blinks, mouth slightly open, like she surfaced from a dream she can't quite place.
Lance says nothing.
He just leaves his hand there, steady and anchored, and Ivy pulls in her first real breath in five minutes.
I don't move.
My arms are still crossed. Something burns behind my ribs, bitter and too familiar.
He just did what I couldn't do.
Not by pushing harder. Not by explaining better. Not by making it a fight.
Just by showing up.
The soul bond hums between us, not warmth, just presence. Like a hand resting on a shoulder you can't see but feel straight down to the bone.
I hate that.
No.
I hate that it works.
Ivy looks up at Lance. Then at me. Then at the Ledger in her hand. Her fingers still tremble slightly, but she doesn't drop the book.
"I... sorry."
Her voice is small, stripped bare. Nothing like the clipped, analytical tone she usually weaponizes.
Lance removes his hand, steps back.
"Breathe first. Talk after."
Three words. No condescension. No reproach.
Just a simple directive that somehow sounds like permission.
Ivy nods. Inhales. Exhales.
Behind her, Trent glances away, like he witnessed something private. Garrett stays fixed near the wall, eyes on Lance with an expression I can't quite parse.
Respect, maybe.
Or something he hasn't named yet.
I don't move.
My gaze stays on Lance, on the way he holds himself, straight without being rigid, present without performing it. The way the team orients toward him. Not out of fear. Not out of rank.
Trust.
The word settles into my chest like something cold.
They trust him.
More than they trust me.
Lance finally turns his head my way. His eyes find mine across the room.
He knows what I'm thinking.
He knows exactly what just happened.
And he says nothing.
Because he doesn't have to.
