"I—am done—holding back."
Angie's voice thundered like a drumbeat in the bones of the earth.
Her back arched, arms flared wide, and flames surged from her skin like molten rivers.
Her eyes blazed molten gold, feral and ancient.
Flesh split. Light consumed.
Her human form exploded upward in a column of crimson fire, devouring sky and sound.
Wings of flame unfurled. Her body stretched, coiled and expanded.
In the blink of a breath, Angie no longer stood as a woman. She had become a dragon.
A true dragon.
Her form stretched across the heavens: long, sinuous like a celestial river, every crimson scale shimmering like burning rubies.
A mane of living fire whipped through the sky, trailing behind a face crowned with regal, curved horns.
Her eyes glowed like twin suns, and heat pulsed from her body in visible waves that bent the air.
The forest withered. Trees wilted and cracked. Ash scattered in the breeze.
