He could only hope his suspicions were right.
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
SOFIA
Sofia watched the chaos unfold from the tree she’d been tucked in since morning. She didn’t expect the fuse they lit to explode so quickly, but perhaps that was stupid of her to assume. The wolfshifters and humans had been too easy to push over the edge. A few dropped words exchanged between Javi and Juan in the darkness where the shifters could hear. A stolen bag of grain and some dried meat. The two groups were aching for a battle, and they simply laid the weapons at their feet.
She hated sitting and waiting. Her blood was racing for a fight. She’d watched Fox, half-dazed and caked in dried blood and wished she were a shifter so she could sweep down there and tell him they were coming. Instead, she watched as arrows descended around the cage, a few landing inside, missing him by inches. She nearly leaped out of the tree as a wolfshifter crashed into the cage and clawed at him. Her knuckles were white from gripping the branch beside her, holding herself back.
Sofia realized at the same time as the shifters that the arrows were tipped with iron. They howled as the arrows pierced their hearts, dropping dead instantly. She almost felt sorry for them—almost had empathy as they screamed and growled, furious at the betrayal of the men they’d helped over the past few weeks.
But she also remembered the smell of their rancid breath when they’d first kidnapped her. She remembered the ones they’d run into in the field—where they didn’t belong—claiming the land as their own. She remembered Lumi’s screams and their blood. So, she watched as dozens of wolfshifters died and the rest fled when they realized they were outnumbered.
Harlow didn’t step out from the shadows until the last wolfshifter had disappeared, leaving behind the scattered bodies of their comrades. There were plenty of human soldiers dead among the rest, though not enough for Sofia’s comfort. She refused to feel guilty at the thought. They’d chosen their side, and each dead soldier was one less person in the way of getting to Fox and Chalia.
She’d seen her dragon only briefly when she’d first arrived the evening before. The rest of the resistance had been scattered throughout the forest for the past few days, laying the pieces of their plan, but Sofia had delayed coming. She was afraid. Afraid of seeing Fox locked away and afraid of seeing Chalia’s deadened eyes. But when she’d arrived, she couldn’t stop herself from moving toward the east where she knew they were keeping the dragons chained in their own separate clearing, growing in number with every attack.
She hadn’t gotten close, too afraid of being scented by the creatures, but she needn’t have worried. They lay, chained and barely moving among the stumps of recently felled trees. Soldiers watched over them, but even they were bored. Any fight these dragons possessed had been drained from them fully, leaving behind empty husks.
Sofia had made eye contact with Chalia, chained along the outer border, but the dragon hadn’t noticed her. She had blinked milky white eyes as flies buzzed around her face. She saw the angry red cuts along Chalia’s neck, in the shape of a “J”. Acid rose in Sofia’s throat and she swallowed it back down, sour on her tongue. She ran away then, not stopping until she was far enough to vomit in peace.
Seeing Fox in his cage hadn’t been much easier, though at least she still saw a glimmer of light in his eyes.
“Jobin,”Sofia sent, reaching for the dragon who was just a half-milesouth.“Tell Micael and the others we’re ready to go. The wolfshifters are gone, and the camp is going to be recovering. It’s time.”
She waited, perched in the tree until she heard the first flap of the dragons’ wings and the horn blew from somewhere in the camp.
The battle had begun.
Despite the strain in her muscles screaming at her to move, Sofia stayed in the tree, waiting. The beat of the dragons’ wings above her counted the seconds in rhythm with her heart. She only had a dagger with her, too afraid of climbing the tree with a sword clanging at her waist. The plan now depended on her own patience.
She watched as the dragons swept through the sky and dove into the camp, sprays of ice, snow, and water destroying tents and sending soldiers running. The only problem with attacking at this moment was that every soldier already had their weapons out, but they had decided the surprise and chaos of the previous battle outweighed the risk.
Jobin spun, Samuel clinging tightly to his back as the dragon snatched two soldiers from the ground and threw them across the sky.
It took less time than Sofia had wanted for the Dereyans’ dragons to rise above the tree line and shoot toward the camp.
Sofia watched, breath held, only half-listening for Javi to come with her weapons. She could see Eha, Harlow scowling from her flanks, and then she saw Chalia, a soldier she vaguely recognized mounted on her back, holding on to the collar wrapped around her neck. Her scales were red and raw beneath the coarse rope, and Sofia clenched her jaw. Even subdued by the magic, the soldiers felt the need to bind them.
From her distance, she couldn’t see the bones around the soldiers’ necks, but she knew they must be somewhere on their persons. Even as she watched, one shifter jumped from the back of the dragon they were on, flipping into the air. A moment later, a fox was running up the spine of the large blue dragon and snapping at the soldier mounted there. The man screamed and swung his arms, trying to dislodge the fox, but he moved too quickly and the dragon jerked as the rope pulled taut against its neck. The soldier went flying into the air just as the fox shifted back into a small human. One hand clung to the back of the blue dragon andthe other held a white bone aloft in triumph. The shifter pulled the dragon above the chaos of the battle as best he could.
“Yes!” Sofia said. It wasn’t a loud exclamation, but there were dozens of soldiers with their swords and bows out just a few yards away.
“Hey!” one soldier yelled, and she looked down to see him squinting into the trees.
She saw the moment he saw her, his eyes widened and mouth opened to yell. An arrow shot from a tree a few yards away, punching through his throat and dropping him. But the damage was done.
“Ground attack!” another soldier screamed as he swiveled around, bow taut, looking for the enemy. Sofia didn’t move a muscle. A dagger would be useless against these men.
An arrow shot from a tree on the other side of her, but the soldier was ready, pulling his right arm up to block with his small shield. Less than a second later, he’d let loose his own arrow, and Sofia heard the hiss as it hit its target. Whoever was in the tree didn’t fall though, and she hoped it had been a shallow wound.
A sharp whistle broke the silence of the forest at her back, and Sofia smiled. It was her time to shine.
She dropped from the tree in three leaps, staying low once she was on the forest floor. A few arrows whistled toward her, puncturing the ground a few feet away.
Javi whistled again, and she found him hiding behind a thick tree. She grabbed the sword he was holding out to her. It was heavy in her grip, and she breathed—once, twice—trying to remember everything Fox had taught her.
“Ready?” Javi asked.
