“Maybe we should visit Glarraden House. I can’t train for a few days anyway—not like that.” I nod toward the Elite Wing, fire roaring, tails thumping, fangs and talons slicing the air. The warbirds streak in and out, twisting and burning. Rim almost hits Arran’s wing, and my heart jerks, but they pass each other without colliding. Maia whips her tail around, aiming for Fyrestar. She only misses because Fyrestar calls up a burst of speed that surprises even me. I exhale in relief as he darts away from her, gathers Rim, and they come back again, ready.
Grambolt and Featherspear veer off from Kellan’s wings and dive as one. They skim low to the ground, then pull up abruptly, their feet punching into Danica’s flank in unison as she heads for Arran. The phoenixes would’ve punctured an enemy’s flesh with their talons and ripped it away, spilling blood and intestines. Danica is only knocked off course. Bale and Wade dive in to protect her while she readjusts and comes back roaring.
“Rita and Gerard don’t keep rats. Always hungry there.” Sol’s sullen little comment speaks volumes about how much my adoptive parents care about me and my warbirds.
“But you could really stretch your wings on a flight to Glarraden. And the hunting is good around the pond and the marsh. Lots of beavers.” The last time we went, the flight to southwestern Torridaig was too much for Sol to handle in one go. She should be fine this time. It’s been months, and she’s grown. “Besides, most places don’t keep rats on purpose. Bale does that especially for you.”
“You’re always nice to them,” Sol says, and I know exactly who she’s talking about. “Why aren’t they nice to you?”
Ah. From the mouths of babes. “Rita and Gerard aren’t unkind to me. They just don’t really think about me at all.”
“That is unkind.”
I stroke her feathers. Sol has the brightest yellow plumes of all the warbirds, with a smattering of fiery orange mixed in that reminds me of the best sunsets behind Drayke Mountain. “What they do or say or think doesn’t really matter now. I have you and Rim and Fyrestar. I have the team. I have a home—with a great big roosting wall for you,” I add. “I have all the family I need.”
And it’s true. Wondering what I am doesn’t mean I’m interested in finding a long-lost family—the people who abandoned me. I’ll never know if they left me on the doorstep of Glarraden House out of necessity or simply because they didn’t want me, and while a small part of me does care, it’s not the question that haunts me.
Why gold still shows up on every Dragon’s Night is also a good question. Whoever left me there hasn’t forgotten about me in two hundred and twenty-six years. Now that’s dedication. Except…not to me.
Rita and Gerard are among the richest people in all Torridaig now, and the only work they’ve ever done in their lives was making sure I didn’t die for the first thirty-five years of mine. When everyone realized I hadn’t changed at all in about ten years, my adoptive parents declared me something other than human and shipped me off to school. We’d known I was fast and strong, which is why they chose soldiering instead of scholarly pursuits, but I had no idea how fast and strong until a teacher put a sword in my hand and showed me a few moves.
“Idallia!” Bale’s somewhat more guttural dragon’s voice cuts like a rusty knife through my thoughts. “Run a lap around the lake. Start building up your strength. Embersol flies with you.”
Groaning, I turn to Sol. “You’ve got the better part of this deal.”
“Good deal,” she chirps.
“That’ll take me two hours!” I call back. The lake is huge.
“Then you’d better get started if you want to have dinner with the crew.” The flat look in Bale’s eyes as he flies past us does not invite argument.
“I told you Bale was in charge of me,” I mutter to Sol as I slip off the rock and start stretching.
“In charge,” she trills far too cheerfully.
I give her a sour look that somehow turns into a huge smile and take off at a slow jog. She joins me, her jaunty little face turned to the wind and happy sparks trailing behind her.
Sol makes my heart sing and my feet move faster. The lap around the sun-dappled lake goes quicker than I expected, and I do feel stronger afterward.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
BALE
I shouldn’t, but I can’t help following Idallia when I see her and Fyrestar fly past my mountaintop lair flanked by Rimblaze and Embersol. I still haven’t let her get back to training yet, although she’s been diligent about building up her strength and was probably ready a few days ago. Now she’s getting restless, and that’ll turn into aggression before long—especially toward me.
She hears me land in the meadow next to Upper Drayke Lake and cracks open an eye as I shift into skin, but then she goes back to sunbathing as if I’m not even there.
The irritation rising in me at her apparent indifference fades like an eagle’s cry on the wind as I move closer. She’s lying in the grass with her warbirds surrounding her. Her hair is down, the long black locks a silken pillow. My breath hitches. The sheer beauty of them together. Idallia so cool and pale and dark-haired, and the birds so bright and colorful and burning.
The phoenixes watch me approach, even if Idallia doesn’t. My affection for these birds is boundless. Not only did I create them, but they’re the ones I know best. They flew with me until Idallia was ready for them. My feelings for her are more complicated. There’s affection, but that doesn’t account for the tumble in my stomach when I see her or the ever-increasing need to seek her out.
“Do you know the origin of your name?” I ask, sitting beside her. I lean back on my elbows and cross my legs at the ankles, soaking up the same rays as Idallia.
“No.” She turns her head toward me, her golden eyes opening. She shades them with a hand, adding, “I’ve never really thought about it. I know I came with a name. I didn’t think about it having a meaning.”
“You never looked it up?”
She shrugs. “My early schooling was an odd mix—whatever an available private tutor knew or wanted to teach me. My later schooling was all about weapons and war and protecting Torridaig. If you want, I can list every border city and give their approximate population and the specific dangers they face. But I didn’t know my name meant anything and never thought to look it up.”
