The Aerian guards that had survived were now aiming for her.
* * *
“Can everyone see me?” she asked the familiar, as she was jerked to the side to avoid becoming a large pincushion for spears.
No.
“But they can?”
Demonstrably. I believe they are aware of what you intend. How much injury are you willing to risk?
“Just get me down to Bellusdeo.”
As you wish. There was a pause, a lurch, and something that felt a lot like an uncontrolled drop, as the familiar obeyed.But remember, Kaylin—there is always a cost.
She accepted the cost—whatever it was—as she landed. The dragon familiar’s claws clung, for one moment longer, to her shoulders as Bellusdeo bucked at the sudden addition of an unfamiliar weight; Kaylin screamed her lungs out just to stop the Dragon from breaking her.
And even in her rage, Bellusdeo somehow heard it. Kaylin wasn’t certain how, and didn’t question it, because she didn’t have time. Her hands descended to the flat, hard surface of golden scales—scales that were a little too warm to be comfortable, but not hot enough to scald or burn.
“Mandoran—”
The black Dragon breathed. His fire was a focused beam, more like a stream of liquid than breath, and it was aimed in its entirety at Private Kaylin Neya. But the familiar had collapsed in on himself; he was small again, and he was perched stiffly on Kaylin’s shoulder; the stream of fire split to either side of Kaylin as if she were a rock and it were water.
And that was as much as she had time for. She focused on Bellusdeo’s so-called minor injury, cursing the golden Dragon as she did.
* * *
I heard that, Bellusdeo said. The healing built a bridge between them; it was like, and unlike, a True Name bond. And it was the single biggest reason why immortals usually refused to be healed.
Sorry.
You are not.
Well, no, I’m not. He goaded you. He tried to enrage you. It was just as much an attack as his fire or anything else about it—and youlethim. My drillmaster would have eaten you forlunchif he’d seen you do that.
Oh?
If he could enrage us, we got the worst dressing-downever. Hawks—and Swords—can’t afford to let their anger or their tempers decide the battle. Other people, yes—but we wear the damn tabard. We lose control, and the tabard suffers. The Hawks suffer. Now can you shut the hells up and let me heal you?
Bellusdeo was the only immortal Kaylin knew who would. She didn’t like it—none of the immortals did—but a lot of her dislike was measured in the cost to Kaylin, and not the exposure of her own secrets, her own interior life.
I have nothing to hide now—because I have nothing. I am not Emperor. I am not the leader of my flight. I am not the Queen of the mortals. I have—
Maggaron. And me. Now—
There. She’d found the point of entry. And she felt the Shadow as if it were in her literal hands; it was cold enough to freeze. It was sharp enough to cut. And it did both.
* * *
The power that had been funneled, slowly and subtly, into the slight wound Bellusdeo had taken became fully focused in an instant. It was no longer attempting to lay down a structure to support itself within the golden Dragon; it was trying to remove Kaylin.
She shut her teeth, hard, to muffle the sounds the pain caused. The Dragons were continuing to roar, continuing to fight—but Bellusdeo had, if gracelessly, allowed the Emperor to take the forefront in their two-pronged attack.
And I resent it.
Kaylin heard the golden Dragon at a great distance. Everything was at a great distance. She could no longer see or hear her familiar. She could no longer see or hear anything. No, she thought, that wasn’t entirely true. She could see Shadow. She could see darkness. She could see the glimmer of light that implied that color was dangerous. And she could hear a word, a whisper of a word, as if it were being repeated, out of sync, by a chorus of ragged voices. Ragged, desperate voices.
She remembered, then. She had seen the outcaste before. She had seen hisName.
