As he should.My irritating, winged human actually just pointed out something interesting.For the first timeever, we’ve found a way to feed all the blessed...without killing any others of our kind.Maybe this isn’t as terrible as I thought.We just need to round up enough humans.
You can’t just bond any human,Gordon says.Only the bright humans can be bonded—and we’re not sure whether the earth blessed can even bond humans.They couldn’t before.
“And I know you don’t remember this,” Liz says, “but before we left Houston, you forced the dragons to release any humans who didn’t agree to the bond—you gave the humans the choice they never had.”
The humans did use the ones we left behind to kill the blessed they were bonded to,Gordon says.
“Which was only possible because they shouldn’t have bonded humans who didn’t want to be bonded in the first place.”
Ensnaring Liz must have impaired my judgment.Leaving bonded humans behind was a major error in judgment.It left all their blessed vulnerable.
Liz looks like she wants to argue, but she doesn’t.
Let’s go, I say.
“If you allow the blessed to forcibly bond my siblings, you’ll regret it,” Liz says.
Oh?I look her up and down.She’s fierce, for a human, but so small, and so weak, I can’t really credit her threat, even with my swords.
“I’ll kill myself if you allow it, and then who will you chuck into the volcano to retrieve your precious heart?”
She threatened the same thing before,Gordon says.
Liz rounds on him.“Whose side are you on?”
Axel’s.Gordon frowns.Always Axel’s.
Liz huffs, like she can’t believe he’s saying that.“He doesn’t even remember whose side he’s on.”
Ignoring her muttering, Gordon continues.When you first bonded her, she threatened to kill herself, thereby weakening you when the humans attacked, unless you kept her siblings safe.
And I agreed?
Gordon slowly nods.
That was a bad decision on my part, wasn’t it?I watch Liz carefully when I say,I think that this time, I’ll do the opposite.Any blessed here can bond her siblings—it’s a matter of life or death.
Liz crouches and then launches into the air, her wings pumping.Apparently she plans to protect them against more than ten thousand blessed all by herself.
Gordon and I follow, and I can’t help my curiosity.What in the name of the heart does this little person think she’s going to do?She has no power, no real leverage at all.If she actually tries to kill herself, we can probably stop her, and if she succeeds, we’ll find another way to reach the heart now that we know where it is.
Once Hyperion and the other blessed learn it’s her fault the earth dragons can no longer reproduce, they’ll be more than happy to end her short and insignificant life.
Everyone’s already gathered, thanks to the planned mating, so when we arrive, Liz lands in the center of the dais, next to her siblings.She wasn’t wrong in her guess.The blessed are already clamoring to bond them.
They all fall silent as Gordon and I land beside Liz.
We’re still learning about everything that happened in the volcano, in our ongoing pursuit of the heart.However, it appears that earth blessed can no longer consume any sort of food—only a blessed who has ensnared a human can.
And we have four right here,Asteria says.Four brights—you can witness how it works to ensnare one.
“That would be a mistake,” Liz says.“Many of you will recall our Thanksgiving celebration.It was the first time I talked to most of you about the importance of humans having achoicein the bond.”
That was fine when blessed didn’t reallyneedbonded humans except for our own convenience,Asteria says.But now it’s a matter of life and death.
It’s the same thing I said moments before, but for some reason it sounds wrong to me.For the humans, it would change their entire life.
“What’s a life without choices?”Liz launches into the air again, flying around above the blessed.“Every single human you will bond will have family, friends, connections, and a job.Every single one will be forced to give all of that up foryou.Their lives matter as much as yours—you should be asking if you want them to sacrifice all that to save you.”
