The air outside bit at our cheeks, but the sky was clear, and the wind promised good flying. We made our way across the stone courtyard to the Ascension Grounds, the wide field already humming with the first heat of sunrise.
I reached out with my mind and felt her.
Kaelith,I whispered.
She came like a whisper of thunder, wings slicing the air as her purple scales caught the early light and scattered it in a thousand fractured hues. Hein was beside her, his bulk a silent shadow. One by one, the dragons of Thrall Squad arrived—Temil, Kieren, Kass, Narvea, Koddos, and Zola, gleaming and proud, their presence drawing gasps from a few servants already setting up the day’s drills. Lowborn Squad’s were next.
As soon as Kaelith landed, I strapped on her saddle. I vaulted up without a rope, my hands gripping the curve of her neck as I settled into the leather. Zander mounted Hein in perfect rhythm. Our squad didn’t need prompting. We were fluid motion, practiced unity.
Then—
“Wait!” a voice rang out, shrill and desperate.
A court courier sprinted from the castle, a sealed scroll clutched in his hand.
That was close,I messaged Zander as Kaelith surged into the sky beneath me.
Too close,he replied, his tone edged with steel.
The courier skidded to a halt on the stone, his eyes lifted toward the fading silhouettes of our dragons.
He’d be delivering Theron’s commands to empty skies.
We flew hard and fast, the wind nipping at our armor, the horizon barely a smudge of violet beneath the rising sun. The Blood Isle loomed ahead, jagged and black like something carved from shadow itself.
As soon as we saw the rocky outcroppings jutting up from the sea like broken teeth, Kaelith dipped her wings. The others followed, their massive forms cutting soundlessly through the sky before landing in the narrow crags.
“Stay low,” I whispered, dismounting as Kaelith folded her wings and pressed her body into the rock, vanishing into the natural shadows. Hein curled around her like a living shield, his eyes always moving.
Riven, Jax, Cordelle, and the rest of Thrall Squad stayed behind with the dragons, crouched behind stone and bramble. But I scrambled upward with Remy and Zander at my sides, my boots crunching softly on loose shale as we climbed.
The view at the top made my blood run cold.
The Blood Isle stretched out before us—twisting black trees, rotting structures, and spires of bone and obsidian rising like thorns from the earth. A sickly-green mist clung to the ground in places, shifting unnaturally with the breeze.
“What’s the best way to the other side without being seen?” I asked, crouched down beside a slab of rock, with my heart thudding.
Remy, lying on his stomach and peering through a spyglass, pointed skyward. “Create a storm. A good one. Let it roll in thick and violent. We’ll fly above it and drop down once we’re past the cliffs.”
Zander nodded. “Push the storm a mile west. Let it drift toward the isle like it formed over the sea. If it looks too targeted, they’ll know it’s magic.”
“Got it.” I closed my eyes and reached for Kaelith.
Her power met mine in a sudden rush of static and wind.
Together, we called the storm.
Clouds coalesced in the sky like spilled ink, spiraling outward from a point just west of our position. Wind howled over the water, tugging at my hair as the sea responded to our summons. Bolts of lightning cracked through the clouds, jagged and white-hot, followed by deep, booming thunder that echoed across the waves.
Rain pelted the ocean in sheets. The skies churned.
And the Blood Isle never saw it coming.
“It’s beautiful,” Remy said softly, his voice almost lost in the wind.
Zander smirked. “Let’s hope it stays that way until we’re on the other side.”
I wiped the water from my cheek and stood. “Then let’s fly.”
