I feel shocked by how easy that was.
“Again,” Zeriel orders.
I side-eye him. “You could say ‘please.’”
His gaze doesn’t leave the dragon. “And waste my breath?”
I snort. “Gods forbid you show basic decency.”
He tilts his head slightly. “If I wanted decency, I wouldn’t have claimed you.”
Scowling, I make the opposite motion, and the dragon again follows, turning right. Then I try something more complex: a figure eight. The marsh runner traces the pattern perfectly, its movements graceful and precise.
I gasp quietly.
“Interesting,” Zeriel says, staring at the creature. “Champions who've trained for years can't achieve this level of… cooperation. Not without extensive conditioning.”
I lower the rod, feeling strangely protective of the marsh runner. “They can’t achieve this because they're trying to break the dragons, not understand them.”
Understand them. The words bring a memory.It’s what Selen wanted us to do.What she wanted to teach us. I wonder again what her personal endgame is in all this.If only my magic was mind-reading.
“The Ironhold doesn't care about understanding. It cares about results,” Zeriel says.
I pause and turn to glance at him. “And you? What do you care about?”
“Winning. Restoring my family’s name. Surviving. Anything else is decoration.” He takes the rod from my hand. “We’re not as different as you might think. Sentimentality is a luxury neither of us can afford.”
“Yet here you are, gambling everything on a forbidden connection,” I observe. “Sounds rather sentimental to me.”
“It sounds tactical,” he corrects, though something flickers in his eyes. “The dragon trials are worth triple points in the tournament. Mastering them could mean the difference between victory and death. Especially for you. My fate is lashed to yours now. If I burn, you burn. So I’d suggest you try not to stumble.”
I walk in uneasy silence as he continues leading me through the pens. As much as I hate it, I’m unlikely to forget the fact.
Zeriel begins prompting me to test my connection with other breeds. Some respond more readily than others. The marsh runner and storm wing proved most receptive, their minds curious and surprisingly open. The embermaw, all smoke and simmering heat, allowed a tentative link before pulling away. A glade serpent coiled around a dead tree branch and watched me with cool detachment, offering no resistance but no welcome either. The frostclaw, skittish and sharp-minded, darted away themoment I reached out. And the heavily-scarred battle drake remains stubbornly resistant despite multiple attempts, its mind a locked gate bristling with remembered pain and fury.
I can’t help wondering if this would be easier with less iron surrounding me. Based on what I know of the original traits of fae-kind, I have to assume so. But at least I’m not completely stymied.
By the time we've worked through half the enclosures, I'm exhausted, my head pounding from the mental strain of so many connections.
“We need to go,” Zeriel says, checking a small timepiece. “The pre-dawn patrol will begin rounds soon.”
I nod, relieved. As fascinating as this experiment has been, each connection has taken something from me—energy, focus, pieces of myself I'm not sure I'll get back.
I don’t know how we’ll use this yet, in a way that wouldn’t give our game away to everyone in an arena. Particularly given Selen’s warning, further visible dragon-whispering is the last thing I can afford to risk. It would reveal my magic to the world, assuming that’s what this truly is. Plus, if I’m going to need blood to even initiate a connection, that would be a practical impossibility.
But perhaps as I grow more into… whatever this ability is, blood won’t always be necessary.
As we prepare to go, I pause before the storm wing's enclosure one last time. The dragon moves to the bars, watching me with those intelligent eyes. Without the blood to facilitate a deep connection, I can only sense the faintest echo of its consciousness, but it's enough to feel its reluctance to see me go.
“I'll come back,” I whisper, not sure if it can understand me without the blood bond.
The storm wing makes that soft chirruping sound again. Then, to my surprise, it extends one wing slightly through the bars, not aggressively, but almost like an offering.
I hesitate, then reach out to touch the delicatemembrane. The contact sends a shiver through me, not as intense as before but unmistakable.
“What are you doing?” Zeriel calls.
“Not your business,” I mutter, and withdraw my hand reluctantly.
