My stomach drops as we rise, the ground falling away beneath us at a dizzying rate. The drake's wings beat powerfully, propelling us higher and higher.
I can't help the gasp that escapes me as we soar above the treetops. The sensation is unlike anything I've ever experienced: terrifying and exhilarating in equal measure. The wind rushes past, whipping my hair around my face despite the hood, carrying with it the scent of pine and distant mountains.
As a child in the Lower Wards, I'd watched dragons flying high overhead and wondered what it felt like to be so free, so untethered from the earth. Now I know. It feels like being reborn. Like every limitation I've ever known has suddenly dissolved into nothing.
A wild, breathless laugh escapes me. For the first time since my capture, I feel something like joy, pure and uncomplicated. It seems impossible that I'm experiencing this now of all times, after being dragged to the Ironhold. Flying was a privilege reserved for nobility and champions during ceremonial games—never for someone like me, a nameless girl from the slums.
As we gain altitude, the Ironhold comes into full view below us, and I'm struck by its true scale for the first time. The fortress isn't merely large. It's monstrous, a sprawling complex carved into and built upon the mountainside like a parasite. The main structure vaguely resembles a dragon's head with its jaws open wide—the notorious Dragon's Maw entrance—but extending from it are countless towers, barracks, training yards, and what must be dragon pens, identifiable by the plumes of smoke rising from their depths. From this height, it feels less a fortress than a living thing,a monstrous hive clinging to the mountainside, patient and eternal. A curse, a scar, fae-ruin given form.
The sight curdles my exhilaration. How many prisoners are trapped within those walls? How many have died there? How many more will follow for the rest of time?
I tear my gaze away as Orphara banks to the west, her powerful wings carrying us away from the mountains. To my surprise, I realize we're heading toward a distant smudge on the horizon, a smudge that gradually grows into the unmistakable silhouette of the imperial capital. The Crown City.
“She's taking us to the city?” I call to Selen, but my voice is lost in the wind.
We soar over the dry scrublands that separate the Ironhold from the city: a barren stretch of dust and sparse vegetation that serves as a buffer zone, ensuring no settlement grows too close to the emperor's prison fortress. As we draw closer, the sprawling metropolis takes shape beneath us. It spreads across the landscape like a vast spider's web, with the imperial palace at its center and concentric rings of districts radiating outward, each more impoverished than the last.
Did our ancestors really want us to live like this?
I crane my neck to look down as we pass over the outermost ring: my former home. From this height, the slums appear almost picturesque, their squalor disguised by distance and sunlight. But I know the reality: narrow alleys choked with refuse, crumbling tenements packed with the desperate and the dying, smoke that never quite clears from the air.
“Home sweet home,” I murmur to myself, a complex mixture of emotions tightening my chest.
As we continue inward, the contrast between districts becomes stark and unmistakable. The middle ring, with its merchants' quarters and craftsmen's guilds, boasts orderly streets and tiled roofs. Beyond that, the upper ring gleams with marble facades and private gardens. And at the center of it all, rising like a monument to excess and power, stands the imperial palace.
I've never seen it up close—few from the Lower Wards ever do—but now, as Orphara flies directly toward it, I'm struck by its imposing grandeur. The palace isn't a single structure but a complex of buildings, towers, and courtyards, all surrounded by massive walls of polished black stone. The central dome, plated with gold that catches the afternoon sun, dominates the skyline, flanked by fourteen slender spires that represent the current fourteen provinces of the empire.
The architecture itself seems designed to inspire awe and fear in equal measure. Every line is sharp, every surface gleaming with unnatural perfection. Guards patrol the walls in precise formations, their armor glinting in the fading light. Massive ballistae are positioned at strategic points, ready to defend against aerial attacks, or perhaps just to remind the citizens below of the emperor's reach.
She's taking us right to the palace,I realize with growing alarm as Orphara continues her direct course.
I glance sideways at Byron suspended feet away from me. But his profile cuts sharp against the sky, wind tousling his blond hair, jaw set, eyes locked with intense focus on the looming structure ahead.
As we near the palace, Orphara begins to climb higher, her powerful wings carrying us in ever-tightening spirals. I realize with a jolt of panic that she's aiming for the highest spire. The central tower that rises above all others, piercing the sky like a dagger. The emperor's personal quarters must lie directly below.
“Is she mad?” I whisper, my heart hammering against my ribs as I understand Selen's target. This is the very heart of imperial power. The sanctum above which no unauthorized citizen has ever flown. The penalties for such trespass would be beyond imagination.
Orphara's trajectory leaves no doubt. We're headed for the pinnacle itself: the very apex of the empire's power. The place from which all authority flows, where decrees that have crushedthousands of lives originate. The source of the edict that condemned us all to the Ironhold.
The void drake slows as she approaches the highest point of the central spire, her massive wings now beating gently to keep us hovering. I notice a small surface at the very top, barely large enough for us all to stand on, with no railings, nothing between us and the dizzying drop to the palace grounds far below.
With impossible grace, Orphara extends her foreclaws toward the surface. I feel myself being lowered, her grip loosening as my feet touch solid stone. Across from me, Byron steps free with similar ease, his eyes cool and steady as he surveys the scene.
One by one, Selen ushers the others off Orphara's back. They inch their way down her scales, movements stiff with nerves. Selen is the last to disembark after whispering something to the drake, who remains hovering in the air.
I step forward cautiously, my legs unsteady after the flight. The wind is fierce at this height, whipping around us with enough force that I instinctively crouch lower, seeking stability. The platform beneath my feet is warm from the day's sun, the stone smooth from centuries of weather.
“Look around you,” Selen says, her voice carrying despite the wind. “Take it in.”
I raise my eyes, and the breath catches in my throat.
The entire empire of Thalyris spreads beneath us in all directions, bathed in the golden light of late afternoon. The city's concentric rings, the sprawling countryside beyond, the distant mountains where the Ironhold squats like a malignant growth—all of it visible from this single point. I can see the river that cuts through the Capital, glittering like molten copper in the sunlight. The great coliseum where imperial champions fight. The industrial districts belching smoke into the air.
“We stand at the highest point in the empire,” Selen continues, walking to the edge of the platform. “Higher even than the emperor himself.”
I glance at my companions, seeing my own awereflected in their faces. Ellis stands with his mouth slightly open, wonder transforming his scholarly features. Lira's gray eyes shine with an emotion I can't quite name—rage or revelation or both. Nyx stands tall, her muscular frame silhouetted against the sky, her expression fierce and proud.
Sariah's gold-flecked eyes scan the horizon as if memorizing every detail, while Vex crouches at the edge, her fingers pressed against the stone as if to anchor herself. The Laverte twin—Talyra?—stands apart from the others, her face taut with a complex emotion that seems to war between fear and longing.
