The ground drops away beneath me and panic spikes sharp and immediate. My wings beat frantically, trying to catch air that suddenly feels too thin to hold me. Dragon body or not, every human instinct screams that I'm falling, that this massive form can't possibly stay aloft.
Easy.Finn's voice across the bond, steady and certain.Feel the air. Trust your wings.
I force myself to stop fighting it. Stop thinking like a human who's plummeting to her death. My wings spread wide and suddenly I'm not falling—I'm gliding. The wind catches beneath the membrane and lifts me, and something ancient and primal in my chest recognizes this as right.
Dawn breaks over the ocean, painting the sky in shades of gray and gold. The world spreads out below me in a way I've never experienced. I've studied the ocean from boats, from shore, from diving beneath the surface. But this—this is something else entirely.
The air currents become visible in my mind. Not literally, but I sense them the way I used to sense underwater currents. Warm air rising from sun-heated stone. Cool drafts sliding off the water. Pressure differences that create invisible highwaysthrough the sky. My wings adjust without conscious thought, catching thermals, banking into turns that should be impossible at this size.
The physics shouldn't work. My analytical mind tries to calculate wingspan-to-body-mass ratios, tries to understand how something this large generates enough lift. But dragon magic doesn't follow natural law. The same fire that burns in my chest defies gravity, keeps me aloft through sheer elemental force.
I beat my wings harder, climbing higher. The ocean sprawls beneath me, endless and ancient and mine in a way it never was before. I understand now why Finn chose the cliffs. Why he needs the sky and the sea. Why being grounded would feel like suffocation.
This is freedom.
Not the theoretical freedom of choice or the intellectual freedom of pursuing knowledge. This is pure physical liberty—the ability to go anywhere, to claim the sky itself as territory. Power thrums through muscles designed for this, through bones that are simultaneously lighter and stronger than human anatomy.
I bank into a turn and the world tilts. For a heartbeat terror returns—too steep, I'm going to fall—but then my tail compensates, my wings adjust, and suddenly I'm spiraling through air with precision that makes my breath catch.
Beautiful.Pride and possessive satisfaction flow across the bond.
I glance toward Finn. He flies beside me, crimson scales catching the dawn light, massive and lethal and somehow graceful despite his size. His aquamarine eyes glow with predator focus, tracking my every movement. Protecting me even now, ready to dive if I falter.
But I don't falter.
I spread my wings wider and climb higher, testing the limits of this body. The air grows colder. Thinner. My lungs process it differently than human physiology would—dragon metabolism extracting oxygen with brutal efficiency. Below us, the island is a dark mass against lightening sky. The ocean reflects emerging sunlight in shades of silver and gold.
I've never felt this powerful. This alive. This free.
Pride radiates across the link as Finn monitors my flight. And beneath it, concern about what we're flying toward. Absolute certainty that if Mikhail appears, Finn will position himself between the phoenix and me.
The northern cliffs rise in jagged formations that speak to volcanic origins. We land on an outcropping where the Brotherhood waits in human form.
I shift back to human. Declan tosses clothing to both of us without comment—standard protocol when calling someone to travel by wing. I dress quickly while Finn shifts beside me, already pulling on jeans before moving to block me from view of the cave entrance.
Declan speaks first. "We tracked phoenix ash here. Found his workspace. You need to see this."
We follow them into a cave that's been converted into something else. Research facility. Laboratory. Obsession made physical.
The walls are covered in diagrams. Anatomical sketches of dragons in flight, during transformation, breathing fire. Detailed notes in cramped handwriting documenting behavioral patterns, magical signatures, combat techniques. And in the center of it all, sketches of Finn. Dozens of them. Hundreds. Spanning what must be centuries of observation.
Horror crawls up my spine. This isn't recent surveillance. This is centuries of study.
"There's more." Grayson gestures to a table covered in papers.
I move closer, scanning documents that make my blood run cold. Timeline charts showing intervals marked with coded notations. Behavioral analysis tracking grief responses, isolation patterns, rage manifestations. Years of observation mapped out like data points in an experiment.
Because that's what this is. Mikhail didn't kill Saoirse and move on. He killed her to study what grief does to dragon fire. To document how emotional trauma affects magical output. To prepare for the moment when he'd do it again.
"He planned this before Saoirse was even targeted." Finn's voice carries no emotion, but fury burns across the bond. Ancient rage carefully contained. "She was always meant to die. I was always meant to grieve."
I find photographs next. Recent ones. Me on the coastal path. Me at the tidal pools collecting samples. Me outside Finn's cave with field equipment. Surveillance documenting our interactions.
Ritual components are arranged on a stone altar. Candles in specific patterns. A ceremonial knife. A basin designed to catch blood. And diagrams showing a convergence point—a location marked with notes about ley lines intersecting, magical energy amplified by celestial alignment.
The notes reference lunar cycles and astronomical charts. I cross-reference against what I know about ritual magic from comparative mythology texts.
"Tomorrow night." The conclusion forms with scientific certainty. "The timing has to be exact for whatever working he's planning."
