The sky became a battlefield of wings and fire and death.
Kaelen threw us into the chaos without hesitation, his emerald form cutting through the air like a living weapon. Shadow dragons wheeled around us. Massive, wrong things with scales that seemed to drink light. They moved with terrifying coordination.
I tried to loose the black fire, tried to be the weapon I’d been training for, but everything was moving too fucking fast. The wind tore at my hair, my eyes watered, and every time I thought I had a target, Kaelen would swerve to avoid claws or teeth or streams of that sickly green flame.
“Easy, there.”His voice rumbled through my mind as I nearly slid sideways off his back during a particularly violent roll.“You’re not ready for aerial combat.”
“I can handle it!” I snarled back, but even as the words left my mouth, I knew they were a lie. I was clinging to his neck like a terrified child while dragons who’d been born to this dance of death and sky moved around us with lethal grace.
A shadow beast dove at us from above, claws extended like obsidian spears. Kaelen twisted away at the last second, the motion so sudden and violent that I lost my grip entirely. Forone heart-stopping moment I was sliding down his flank, my fingers scrabbling desperately for purchase on his scales.
“I’ve got you.”But the words were strained as he levelled out, giving me just enough stability to haul myself back into position.
Below us, I caught a flash of twilight purple as Lincatheron’s dragon spiralled down toward the burning camp in a dive. Even from this distance, I could see the way Lincatheron sat his mount like he’d been born for this.
He landed in the middle of the chaos and was off his dragon’s back in one fluid motion, steel singing as he drew his blade. Lincatheron carved through Nyxarian soldiers like they were made of paper, rallying the scattered defenders with bellowed commands that carried over the din of battle.
That’s what a real warrior looked like. Not some half-trained girl clinging to a dragon’s neck like deadweight.
“Kaelen.” I had to shout to be heard over the wind and screaming. “Take me down. I need to be on the ground.”
“Absolutely not. You’re safer up here.”
“I’m fucking useless up here.”The admission tore out of me.“I can’t fight like this—I can’t even stay on your back properly. On the ground I can actually help.”
“On the ground you can actually die.”
“I’m going to die anyway if I can’t contribute to this fight.”I could see more shadow dragons closing in, could see our allies being overwhelmed. “Please, Kaelen.”
He was quiet for a long moment, banking away from a stream of poisonous flame that came too close for comfort.
“You’re going to be the death of me.”
“Not today,”I promised, already preparing myself for the controlled fall that would get me to the battlefield.“Not if I can help it.”
“I’m staying close,”he warned as he began his dive.“The moment things go sideways—and they will go sideways—I’m pulling you out of there whether you like it or not.”
The fierce protectiveness in his voice made something warm and desperate unfurl in my chest. “Please do,” I said, meaning every word. “I’m not ready to lose you either.”
Kaelen hit the ground like a meteor wrapped in emerald scales, his claws carving furrows in the blood-soaked earth as he skidded to a halt. The impact rattled through every bone in my body, but I was already rolling, already moving before we’d fully stopped.
The battlefield was chaos. Soldiers screamed, steel clashed on steel. The acrid stench of burning canvas and spilled blood thick enough to taste. I hit the dirt hard and came up running, moonsilver daggers singing as they cleared their sheaths.
That’s when I saw him.
Lincatheron had his back to me, locked in combat with two Nyxarian soldiers whose armour drank light like hungry mouths. His blade moved like liquid lightning, but he was focused entirely on the enemies in front of him, completely unaware of the third soldier creeping up behind him with a wicked curved blade raised high.
Time crystallised.
The blade was already descending toward the vulnerable space between his shoulder blades. Lincatheron’s death was written in the arc of that strike, inevitable as gravity.
I threw myself forward without thinking, without hesitation, without any regard for my own mortality. My boots found purchase on the churned mud and ash, every muscle in my body coiling like a spring as I launched myself between them.
The blade met my crossed daggers with a shriek of metal that carried over the battlefield din. The impact drove me to myknees, moonsilver humming as it held against the darker steel, sparks cascading around us like falling stars.
The Nyxarian soldier’s eyes widened behind his helm.
“Behind you.” I snarled at Lincatheron through gritted teeth, my arms trembling with the effort of holding the larger weapon at bay.
