I toss him a mock frown. “What’s more fun than beating everyone else?”
“We don’t always win,” Rimblaze chimes in. “Especially with Embersol, who can barely make fire. Or form complete sentences.”
Sol squawks in protest. The little sparks escaping her oblong nostrils heat my ear. “Sol’s fantastic. She’s quick as a whip and sneaks in when no one sees her coming. She hardly ever participates in training, but she still saved your feathered behind just a few days ago, so give her some credit,” I scold.
Rim huffs smoke, his beak half open in annoyance. The thirteen phoenixes of Torridaig all sprang from the same magic, and the sibling rivalry is real, especially for the birds who end up as younglings again at the same time. I’ve only lost Fyrestar once, and it was nearly a century ago. He’s far too mature to get sucked into the younger birds’ shenanigans.
“Aren’t you going to admire yourself some more?” Fyrestar asks with a smirk in his voice. “Blow another kiss to the mirror?”
“You saw that from outside, did you?” I grin, not embarrassed at all.
“It was hard to miss. The new swords and belt look good. Although I think you look better slicing through real enemies until you’re covered in blood and painted red enough to match our feathers.”
“Wow.” I laugh. “Who’s a rainbow of fun now? As long as it’s not my blood. Or yours.” I shudder, sobering.
“It’s never your fault,” Rim says quietly, all trace of his earlier snark gone. “You defend us well.”
Great Cealastra, my eyes start to prick. Rim took a werebear’s claws in the neck so the lethal tips didn’t shred mine. And poor little Embersol. We both fell when the arrows hit her. The vampires tried to suck her everlife from her, but I fucking killed them all.
The satisfying memory of revenge doesn’t stop the gut-wrenching recollection of my phoenixes’ rebirths from surging up too. Of watching sparks circle sparks for agonizing days until the glowing magic finally solidified into tiny little birds right here in Drayke Mountain, where Bale first created them. Just like the phoenixes are growing more slowly now, it took longer for Sol’s rebirth last time. I stood vigil for five more torturous days than usual, terrified that Ellonrift’s fading magic would take her from me, from Rim, from Fyrestar.
Blinking, I clear my throat. “We defend each other,” I say hoarsely. “Forever and always.”
“Forever and always.” All three of them instantly chirp our personal motto, but instead of making me feel better and calmer, it just makes me worry about where Cealastra is and if she’s ever coming back to restore magic in Ellonrift.
Torridaig’s battle horn suddenly blares from the peak of Drayke Mountain, cutting through my perpetual underlying dread with its hard, sharp blast.
Or maybe adding to it.
“Bloodpit,” I growl. “No training today.” It’ll be the real thing instead. I lift my shoulders, urging the babies off me. “Back to your roosts.”
“I can fight,” Rim says. “I’ll be your right wing.”
I almost wish he could. Everyone else on the team is a dragon shifter. The only fire and flight I have working in my favor comes from my birds. “Not yet, love. You haven’t passed your tests.” Sol’s small talons leave my skin. Rim’s larger ones depart more reluctantly. Even as fledglings, they recall everything about their past lives and form a bond with me immediately. Strength, reflexes, inner fire, and the ability to communicate mind-to-mind in the language of Ellonrift are slower to return.
“Come back safe,” Rim says as I grab my boots and pull them on.
“Safe,” Sol echoes in her little voice.
Nodding, I grab a short, fur-lined vest from the foot of my bed, slip it on, and hook it closed. My weapons are already on me, and I don’t have time for more. My heart already pounding like the drums of war, I turn and race for the open window. “Fyrestar! Go!”
He launches off the sill in a whirlwind of heat, and I dive after him, blasting through the wall of searing air he left in my window frame. Outside, direct sunlight slams into my skin and eyes, the shock of it always abrupt after being inside the cool, dim mountain. Squinting, I spread my arms and legs, free-falling down the sheer mountainside until Fyrestar swoops underneath and picks me up.
Straightening, I wait for my vision to adjust as I brace my legs firmly around Fyrestar’s body and grip the tough black feathers ringing his neck. Wind rushes through my loose hair, and I cringe at the oversight. The headmistress at school would’ve had my hide for showing up in the training ring with my hair down, and Bale is sure to do the same.
I tap my pockets, hoping I might’ve forgotten a leather strap inside. No luck, and I can’t easily tie my hair back while flying anyway.
My stomach sinking, I press lower against Fyrestar’s feathers, cursing vanity for making me take down my daily tight bun to indulge in a moment of birthday frivolity in my bedroom. It’s a rookie mistake, and now, it’s too late. We have a mountain to climb, and if Kellan reaches the war room before I do, he’ll win right wing again.
Fyrestar ascends, the near-vertical angle forcing me to hold on tight and squeeze my legs. “Are you all right, Idallia? Too steep?” he asks when I slip back more than I should.
“No. Keep going. I want right wing.”
“You’re too competitive. It’s not the wing that counts.”
It’s always the wing. I’m the foundling. The nobody. The youngest. I don’t know who I am. What I am. I stopped visibly aging when I reached my prime, so Rita and Gerard eventually decided I wasn’t human after all and must be strong enough to train for war. Even though I don’t have fire or flight, they dumped me at the school pumping out soldiers for Torridaig and paid the headmistress enough to keep me there—the only student who wasn’t a dragon shifter in the whole starsdamned place. They left with a vague goodbye before hurrying back to Glarraden where they could continue to only pay attention to each other without me around to try to gain even a scrap of their time.
My memory is too sharp for comfort, and that rush of excitement I’d felt about starting at the Drayke School of Fire and Flight hits me before souring just like my school years did. I thought maybe I’d finally make some friends. But then a student I recognized from around Glarraden lifted his hand on my first day, pointed straight at me, and said, “Why is she here? She’s the gildenfae-gold kid.”
