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Across the courtyard, Mobile Command remains stationed near the central stairs. Rhyven stands beside Dax and two senior wardkeepers.
Caelen isn't there. Northern Operations. Soren is somewhere along the eastern perimeter. Maelis is stationed near the residences. Everyone separated deliberately. Coverage. Efficiency. Response time. Everything we spent today preparing.
Rhyven looks toward me. Again. Not often enough for anyone else to notice. Often enough that I do. Nyra has ruined my life. Before last night, I might have thought he was checking the unit. Checking Vayne. Checking the archway. Checking literally anything else. Now? I know. Stay where I can find you. Apparently he meant it. I look away first. Mostly because I'm not giving him the satisfaction. Also because my heart has become irritating. Eleven fifty-seven. The command crystal remains blue. One of the third-years beside me shifts his weight. Vayne looks at him. "Stop."
"I'm not doing anything."
"You're bouncing."
The student looks down. Apparently he is. He stops. Ten seconds later, he starts again. Vayne doesn't bother correcting him. I flex my fingers inside my gloves. Evidence gloves. Not combat gloves. Everything tonight has been designed around what happens after. After the bells. After someone vanishes. After we arrive too late. I hate that.
But maybe tonight– No. Don't. Hope has been punished enough lately.
The crystal above us flickers. My head snaps up.
Blue. Steady. Nothing. I exhale. Professor Vayne notices. "Normal fluctuation."
"I know."
"Do you?"
"No." Fair.
Eleven fifty-eight. Somewhere above the western towers, a dragon calls. Low. Long. Nothing unusual.
Another answers from farther north. I recognize neither. I have gotten better at identifying them. Not good. Better. Vyrael is easy. Nobody mistakes Vyrael for anything. His voice is deeper. Older. Something you feel through stone before you hear it. He is somewhere beyond the northern ridge tonight. Rhyven sent him there two hours ago. Long-range perimeter. Sylvorin is closer. Kaelthor too. I think.
There are too many dragons in the sky now to keep track. Which is probably the point.
The command crystal turns white. Not gradually.
One second blue. The next—White. Every rune around its base flares. Professor Vayne moves before I understand. "Reading."
One wardkeeper grabs the measuring instrument. "Drop."
"Where?"
"Western—" The crystal pulses. The wardkeeper's face changes. "Dragon grounds."
Everything inside me goes cold. No bells. Not yet.
Because nobody has been reported missing. But Mobile Command is already moving. Rhyven turns. Someone shouts coordinates. I don't hear them.
Because somewhere west of us— a dragon screams.
I have heard dragons roar. I have heard them warn.
Challenge. Call. Complain. I have heard Vyrael produce a sound that made thirty students instinctively crouch. This is different. This isn't aggression. It isn't anger. It is panic. Pure. Immediate. Violent. And then every dragon near Varethia answers. At once.
The sound hits the Academy like a physical force. Windows shake. Students shout inside the residences. Another dragon shrieks overhead. A third. A fourth. Professor Vayne is already running.
"Unit Two!" We move.
I look toward Mobile Command. Rhyven is gone. Not disappeared. Running. I've never seen him move that way. Not in training. Not in combat exercises. Not even when the bells rang for Aelindra. There is no measured Chief stride. No controlled urgency. He runs like something is chasing him. Or like something he loves is ahead.
"Move, Vaelith!" Vayne. Right. I run.
The western dragon grounds sit beyond the second training fields. Normally, it takes eight minutes on foot. Tonight we make it in less than four. I don't remember crossing the first courtyard. Barely remember the stairs. People flatten themselves against walls as response teams pass. Wardkeepers shout. Somewhere behind us, the first general alarm begins. Not four bells. A continuous low tone. Magical depletion. The new system. Working. Gods. It worked. Something happened anyway.
