Instantly, I saw the same confidence and determination enter the eyes of everyone else in the room, and the fire within me grew. My wyvern let out a bellow in my mind.
“We have to fly back to Alfemir,” I stated, quickly falling back into planning what had come to my mind earlier. “My parents are the rulers of the wyverns. We have to make a plea with them to understand the time is now to come out of hiding. There have been whispers of it for hundreds of years now, but no one has ever made the decision to actually fight back. IknowI can convince them.”
Gabe, ever the voice of reason, asked, “Will they be furious about you bonding to Ronan and now telling us the secret of your people, while also bringing us to their location? I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
Ronan let out a rumble as I admitted, “They allowed my bonding to Ronan as a means to spy on Alfemir. However, I will absolutely face backlash for the rest of that.” I saw Ronan’s lips purse as his mind began to whirl, and I knew I needed to nip that in the bud right here and now. “They would never have understood our bond, Ronan. I had to frame it in a way that theycould accept. I’m the crown prince. I had to make it seem like this was a mission solely for our people.”
He offered me a glance, our gazes clashing as I watched the wheels turn behind his eyes. Finally, he relented, giving me a nod. Relief washed over me, the tension from my shoulders loosening as I let out a breath.
“I’ve made it in and out of Alfemir many times,” Gabe offered. “I can find the best path for us. I just need you to look at a map with me, Niz—I need to know exactly where we’re going to be able to find the path of least resistance to your people. The goal is to get there without being spotted, but it’s going to be a hell of a lot harder than me going in by myself.”
Kieran quickly cut in as my mouth was opening to answer.
“If we’re spotted even once while trying to get in and we can’t quickly dispose of the angels, we won’t move on with our plan to get to the wyverns. No matter what. I will not risk them being discovered.”
If I wasn’t already inexplicably drawn to Kieran, I would have said this was the moment I started to fall in love with her. The truth? I knew all of us in this room had started to fall for Kieran well before now.
17
KIERAN
Gabe warnedus of the strenuous flight ahead, but because I went through the portal when traveling down to the Rebellion camp, I hadn’t fully grasped his meaning.Now,I was acutely aware of how hard this journey would be.
Every inch of my body felt the struggle of fighting against gravity as I shifted my wings, propelling myself into the sky toward Alfemir. My white wings moved swiftly in the air on either side of me, and I couldn’t help but glance at them with a bit of confusion.
I understoodwhen they had changed color—and even why, clearly having something to do with my rebirth—but I wasn’t surehowI felt about it. I had liked the physical manifestation of the change I had gone through when becoming a fallen. Now the proof of that massive change in my life was gone, as if it had never existed in the first place.
I also hadn’t missed the way the men around me had stared at them before we’d taken off, leaving the Rebellion camp. I didn’t have the bravery to ask what they thought of them, especially since the white wings represented so much of what we were fighting against.
Everyone seemed in relatively good spirits, though, and I was trying to keep up the facade that I had as much energy and vigor as them. I wasn’t sure how long that would be possible to maintain, though.
The grueling flight, which had already taken over four hours, was slowly zapping me of any energy I’d regained following my incident with the stars. Of course, it didn’t help that each of us were carrying a sizable backpack of essentials, including the dagger that Noah insisted I bring along.
Yesterday, after laying out our plan, we visited Noah and Amelia to get approval for our proposed journey under the guise of reconnaissance, not wanting to reveal Niz’s identity. I was happy to have been able to check in on her before leaving, and thrilled when Noah had brought up bringing the dagger with me.
Gabe and Ronan pushed ahead of us, leading our group, while Bastian and Niz guarded the rest of us from behind. Steele had, surprisingly, decided to stay by my side throughout the flight, and while we weren’t talking, trying instead to focus on holding our direction as a group through the thick cloud cover, I found comfort in his presence.
But I also knew that if I showed the slightest weakness or hesitation in my movements, he would notice. Steele was excellent at pinpointing weak links, and I refused to be that to these men.
Yet, after another fifteen minutes passed, I began to break a sweat, tightening my fists on my backpack straps in an attempt to steady myself. My back strained with each flap of my wings as I continued to move them at a steady, albeit slower, pace than before. I didn’t want to ask them to slow down, especially now that I knew what I was capable of. It shouldn’t have mattered if I was in the process of regaining my strength.I should have been able to do this without a problem.
My shoulder suddenly seized, and a curse left my lips. My left wing momentarily gave out, dropping me nearly twenty feet in the air. A whoosh left me as I plummeted?—
“I’ve got you, Princess.” Steele’s rough voice tickled my ear as my eyes widened in shock, the man appearing out of nowhere. Logically, I knew he dived to grab me the moment I faltered, plucking me from the air and pulling me swiftly into a secure bridal hold against his chest before I could reach where Bastian and Niz were flying below. But my mouth still hung open in surprise as he soared upwards, making up for the lost progress and then some.
My wings retracted on their own as my body sagged in relief at finally being able to rest. I stared up into his face, the pale skies appearing to make his eyes glint like metal, as he offered me a questioning look.
“Nothing? No sass? No snarky remarks? I would have thought for sure?—”
“Shut up,” I groaned, letting my head fall back as I rolled my eyes. “I was about to thank you, but now you ruined it. And here I thought you were being considerate of others for just a moment.”
His muscular arms disappeared from under me as I screamed, “Steele!”
He reappeared a split second later to catch me. Adrenaline coursed through my body and I let out a frustrated growl at the deep laughter that filled the air between us. My hand clutched, white-knuckled, onto his shirt just in case he considered dropping me again.
What an asshole.
“I accept your gratitude, Kieran,” Steele said smugly as I narrowed my eyes on him. There was so much I wanted to say back but considering my exhaustion and the potential of himdeciding to drop me, I let it go. At least he hadn’t gotten a truethank youout of me.
