Sybil stands. “It’s late, and I’m ready for bed. You should rest too. I know you leave at dawn.”
I get up and follow her to the door. “Take care while I’m gone. And tell Stuart thank you.” I touch the torque again, finally getting used to it. It’s less hot and stinging now.
“I will, but it was Bale’s idea.”
My chest contracts, squeezing my heart. “Why start with me? Against Bloodwold raiders, everyone fights in skin.”
She gives me a penetrating look. “Why, indeed?”
Heat sweeps through me. “Are you implying something?”
“Should I be?” I must look like a rodent caught in a hungry phoenix’s gaze, because she shakes her head, laughing softly. “It’s just my wishful thinking. Bale is too alone and barely willing to lean on anyone. And you’re highly capable and every single male dragon shifter’s dream.”
I huff a laugh, ignoring the fire building inside me like a fever burning through my veins. “They can keep on dreaming. It’s the single life for me.”
“You won’t be testing any compatibility theories with that attitude,” she teases as she opens the door.
Grinning, I playfully roll my eyes at her. My face falls the second she’s gone, not only because she’s right, but because my now wildly beating heart is drumming Bale’s name in my ears.
CHAPTER TWELVE
BALE
The Elite Wing is more subdued than usual as we set out for the northeast of Torridaig. Did I make a mistake by eliminating the usual race to the pillars? No challenge, no pumping blood, no rivalry? For my right and left wings today, it probably feels boring and undeserved to step into a position without fighting for it, and while Maia probably isn’t bothered, we all know Idallia loses interest when she isn’t losing.
Flying on my left wing, Idallia is quiet and visibly troubled this morning. As usual, the team takes its cues from her. If she’s quiet, they’re quiet. If she’s worked up, their energy reflects her mood. She holds out the palm of her hand, and everyone jumps into it.
Including me.
My lips pull back in irritation, baring my fangs to the cold wind. I call forth more inner heat to counter the high mountain air, since my expression remains grim.
Isn’t that what I trained her for? Leadership?
But what about the hard decisions? The ones your heart doesn’t want to make but your head knows you must.
I glance at Rimblaze. His feathers glow hot and bright, and he looks overjoyed to finally be flying at Fyrestar’s side again.
Idallia looks the opposite. Is she angry? She’s definitely upset. Rimblaze is flying out on a mission with us for the first time since his rebirth, and she obviously didn’t like my imposing that yesterday, panic surging across her face like a wildfire she couldn’t put out. But Rimblaze is ready, and I’ve already been holding back on giving him his final tests simply to avoid that awful look on Idallia’s face.
Because we’ve all seen it before—and far worse. When Embersol took so long to come back three years ago, and we all started to doubt, I think she nearly died of grief.
Her vampire-repelling torque flashes in my eyes, but she hasn’t looked at me once. The way she paled on the mountain terrace yesterday twists inside me again, but these are warbirds, and war is one more failed Council meeting away. I need everyone who can fight, and Rimblaze is ready.
I glance behind me at the rest of the team. It doesn’t help that Kellan is throwing his renewed sullenness into everything. He’ll be off on a mission by himself soon, though, and I’m counting on the break helping to calm the tension that’s been growing ever since he carried Idallia home.
The memory of her wrapping herself around his dragon’s body and clinging to his back slices through me. I quickly push the stab of jealousy aside, hoping to actually be rid of it this time. The last thing I need right now is to think like a man instead of a king. I’ve already been doing too much of that for too long.
My frustrated, fire-licked snarl is loud enough to make Fyrestar turn his head. Our gazes meet, his igniting in question. The wind whistling past shouts at me to answer, even as my gut and the dragon I am both tell me to shut the fuck up and not lose what I have.
Sick with the same indecision that’s plagued me for decades, I break eye contact with Fyrestar and turn back to the horizon. Bloodwold is dead ahead.
Those golden eyes—the only phoenix to have them. Does Idallia never suspect why? Does Fyrestar?
The early morning sun blazing in my eyes might not burn away my worries, but it helps drive them to the back of my mind. So does the beauty of Torridaig as the central mountainous forests give way to a moorland terrain of snaking, silver rivers and wild, gorse-and-heather-dotted hillsides. Hamlets break up the landscape, few and far between. Southern Torridaig is much tamer and more populated, especially around the lake country. Today’s flight to the east will soon take us toward cultivated land and larger settlements as these rough uplands turn into grassy valleys and swaths of trees, but here, the craggy, wild terrain rolls endlessly below, the air stirs the soul, the light fills it, and the warm, bright sunshine feels far holier than any distant, cold light of the stars.
We reach the city of Porthwood by midday and land at the local garrison. Rimblaze shows signs of fatigue, but that’s to be expected. He hasn’t flown this far in one go in his current lifetime, and our pace was the same as usual—blistering.
I meet with Titan James, the commander of Porthwood’s soldiers, and explain our mission to him while the team settles their wing guards into a large inner courtyard with several good perching trees.
