At least he'd seen that Kailin was safe before bolting, but it was still a cowardly thing to do.
He must have made the same instinctive calculation I had, reaching the same conclusion that he could never catch her in time. Thankfully, Onyx and I were far enough below to make the physics work.
Miraculously.
A one-in-a-million chance.
I held on to Kailin, my arms wrapped tightly around her. "Your asshole of a dragon flew off as if he was being chased by demons."
"Because he was," she whispered into my chest. "The ghosts of his past are the demons chasing him. He couldn't handle one more death."
On some level I understood, but I couldn't accept it. I wouldn't. Morgateth wasn't fit for a rider. He was unreliable.
"Ask him," I said. "Ask him why he left."
"He left because he knew you caught me. He knew I was in good hands."
She couldn't have seen him hovering above and bolting only after I caught her. She'd been busy falling to her death.
"How do you know that he waited to see that you were okay?"
She lifted her head off my chest and looked into my eyes. "Because I felt his terror, and then his relief, then his fury."
"What was he furious about? Letting you down?"
"Yes. Even though none of this was his fault."
She was probably right, and I was already thinking about the hell I would rain on everyone who had access to her saddle. But I was furious too, and at the moment my fury was directed at the dragon who should have stayed by his bonded rider.
"If you don't want to talk to him and give him a piece of your mind, I'll ask Onyx to do it."
"He's blocking me,"Onyx said."You gave us all quite a scare, Little Warrior."
"Sorry," Kailin said, and her shaking intensified again.
"It's not your fault." I rubbed her back.
"I should have double-checked everything like Alar told me to. I checked only once, and I was distracted."
I wouldn't let her take the blame for something that wasn't her fault. I'd seen her go through the routine, and she hadn't missed a thing.
"You didn't make any mistakes," I said. "Someone must have sabotaged your saddle, making it seem as if everything was working fine, and I'm going to find out who."
"The saddle fell down to the ravine,"Onyx said."Do you want me to go down to look for it?"
"No!" both Kailin and I said at the same time.
"I'll go looking for it later, after I put you two on solid ground. It seems like you both need it."
"Yes, thank you." She rested her head on my chest again, and despite everything that had happened, I cherished the closeness.
Onyx knew where to take us. I didn't need to direct him, and he also knew to go slow and not make any sharp turns because Kailin simply couldn't take it.
I kept gently rubbing her back, acknowledging that it was as close as I'd ever get to her, and that I'd better enjoy it while it lasted.
"I can't reach him," she said after a few moments. "He's blocking me too."
"Coward."
