Asher returned today. Gods help us if anyone finds out. I’m not sure I’ll ever forgive him for what he’s done to her.
—Journal of Captain Lilith Sorrengail
If the irids fired the wardstone as the seventh breed, then Aretia is safe. Most of Tyrrendor is.
It’s too surreal, too easy. Emotions beyond names hit me from every side, but fear replaces them all when Feirge swings her body to confront the irid, lowering her head and baring her teeth.
“No!” Andarna bounds from Tairn’s side, leaping over the wyvern to put herself in front of Feirge. “He’s of my line!”
The Green Daggertail retreats a single step but leaves her head near the ground as Rhiannon dismounts, jumping straight to the platform of the temple.
Xaden tenses at the sight of the irid, even though there’s no sign of red in his eyes. “You handle that, and I will see what needs to be done…here.”
Considering what happened the last time he met with an irid, I nod.
“Give him my gratitude,” Xaden says quietly as Rhi races our way.
“I will,” I promise, locking eyes with Rhi.
She bobs her head in acknowledgment, and then we walk down the stairs.
“No weapons,” I tell Rhi as we walk between Tairn and Sgaeyl. “They’re pacifists.”
“Got it,” she notes, keeping pace at my side. “So he shouldn’t burn us to death, right? I refuse to tell Feirge that she was right. She’ll never let me live it down, even if I’m dead. And I really want to know what just happened with those dark wielders.”
“I’ll fill you in,” I reply as we approach Leothan and Andarna. “Just be prepared for—”
Rhi gasps and covers her ears.
“That,” I finish with a wince.
Leothan glances at Rhi, then turns his back to the corpse of the wyvern with a look of what can only be called disdain.
Andarna moves to my left when we reach them, flooding the bond with a mix of apprehension and excitement.
“I would expect a warmer greeting from a green,” Leothan lectures Rhi, then turns his golden gaze on me.
“Thank you,” I blurt awkwardly, craning my neck to look at him. “You’ve saved everyone in this province.”
“I did not do it for you,” he says, peering down at Andarna.
“Harsh,” Rhi whispers.
“I give my thanks,” Andarna replies, her head high.
“Your human is as dangerous as we feared.” He studies her with a tilted head, and my stomach sinks. Whatever he’s seen has only confirmed the reasons they denied Andarna in the first place.
“She defends her people,” Andarna retorts, her claws flexing in the rain-soaked grass. At least the weather has eased to a drizzle. “And ours.”
“As do you.” Leothan’s voice softens. “I have been watching you since my arrival.”
And no one knew. Tairn bristles, and my throat grows tight.
“And what have you seen?” Andarna’s tail flicks overhead. “What judgment have you passed?”
Her caustic tone certainly isn’t going to help, and neither is the growl rumbling in Sgaeyl’s throat.
The irid narrows his eyes. “Your behavior is abhorrent and your actions misguided—”
“She is a credit to our riot,” Sgaeyl hisses.
“As we hoped she would be.” He swivels his head toward Sgaeyl, and Tairn angles into a striking position. “Yet in none of the ways we value.”
Rhi steps closer to my side.
“None of which is her fault,” I interject, and he looks my way. “You set her up for what you consider failure when you left her here to be raised in the ways of the Empyrean.”
“You really want to yell at the massive unknown dragon?” Rhi whispers.
“I do,” I answer, looking straight at him. “There is nothing wrong with her. We can never thank you enough for what you’ve done tonight in firing our wards, but if you’ve only come to point out all the ways you believe her to be lacking, you’ll find Feirge’s greeting warmer than mine.”
He tilts his head, then dismisses me, swinging his gaze to Andarna. “Your motives are honorable,” he says. “That was what I was going to say before I was interrupted by the blue.”
“Sgaeyl,” Andarna corrects him, her tone a knife’s edge softer than before.
“Sgaeyl,” he repeats, then focuses on Andarna. “We are separated by many generations but share the same bloodline. Unlike the others you encountered who are of a more distant line, we are of the same den, or would have been had you been raised among us.”
He’s her family. My heart clenches.
“Your human may stay,” he replies to Andarna. “The rest may not participate in our conversation.”
My eyebrows rise.
“I will not leave them unprotected.” Tairn’s claws flex next to Rhi.
“The fact you think they need protection is why my words are only for them.” Leothan keeps his focus on Andarna. “I will only offer once.”
Andarna tenses, then whips her head toward Tairn and Sgaeyl. “I must hear him.”
Sgaeyl startles, and Rhi’s hands jump to cover her ears.
Tairn snarls, and I reach down the bond, but there’s a stronger shield than his blocking us. Leothan.
It’s oddly similar to the effects of the serum they dosed us with during RSC. Every part of me rebels at the disconnect, but I owe it to Andarna to stay with her.
“We will begin once they depart,” Leothan promises.
“He’s cut us off from you,” I say to Rhi, then look up at Tairn. “I’ll be all right.”
Sgaeyl bares her teeth, then pivots abruptly and turns toward the temple, toward Xaden.
“You’re sure?” Rhi asks, worry knitting her brow.
“I’m sure.” I swallow the growing boulder in my throat. “I won’t be the reason she can’t hear him out.”
Rhi looks like she’s going to argue for a second, then nods. “We won’t be far.” She follows Sgaeyl, and Tairn growls in warning at Leothan before pivoting.
Andarna’s tail curves over my head.
“It did not sit well with me that you were judged by the shortcomings of others,” Leothan states, dipping his head to Andarna’s eye level. “Even the dark wielder you seem…fond of.”
Hope flickers in my chest, burning away the expected insults, and Andarna’s scales ripple in shades of black.
“You should be given the chance to learn our ways,” he continues. “To choose our ways.”
“You will stay and teach me?” she asks.
“You will come home with me,” he answers, holding her gaze. “It may take a few years, but the others will accept my decision. By then you will have learned enough to know your truth.”
Years? My stomach launches straight into my throat.
“We cannot leave for years.” Sorrow drenches Andarna’s words.
“You can,” he rebuts.
“By myself?” She freezes.
Oh gods. My spine stiffens, and a terror I’ve never encountered before locks my muscles. He means to separate us.
“I have saved the human you care for by firing the protections in place,” he states, like he’s checking off boxes that might impede her departure. “She will be safe from all but her own kind under the wing of your mentor.”
“I cannot leave her!” Andarna’s head draws back.
My heart thunders a dangerously quick beat.
“You must. This was not meant for you, nor any of our line. Look at what happened tonight. Had I not interfered, you would no longer exist.” His scales flicker, taking on a pearlescent sheen. “There is nothing here for you but war and suffering.”
And me. And Tairn. And Sgaeyl. It takes all my self-control not to scream it, not to ruin this moment for Andarna.
“I am bonded.” Andarna’s tail lowers, curving around me. “Our lives, our minds, the very energy that forms us is intertwined.”
Right. That. Exactly. I find myself nodding.
“So end it.” He angles his head, and the scales above his eyes furrow into a single line. “Bonds are merely magical ties. You are irid. You are magic. Bend it, shape it, break it as you see fit.”
Wait. What?
“I cannot.” Andarna’s tail winds closer.
Air becomes scarce, and my head starts to swim.
“And yet you already did.” He glances down at me. “Who bonded you first?”
This can’t be real. Maybe I’m dreaming. Or in Xaden’s dream. Though we’ve definitely stumbled into nightmare territory. “They chose me the same day.”
He sighs in annoyance, and steam gusts over me. “Who spoke to you first?”
My eyes shift, and I throw my thoughts back to Threshing.
Step aside, Silver One. Tairn’s voice rumbles through my memory.
“Tairn,” I whisper, turning my face toward Andarna. I take in everything about her, from the pattern of her scales, the slope of her nose, the angle of her eyes, up to the swirls on her horns that match his. “You didn’t speak to me until you gave me your name on the flight field.”
She blinks.
“See?” Leothan shifts his focus to Andarna. “Humans should only be capable of bonding a single dragon, and yet you forged a second connection where there shouldn’t be one. Only an irid can do that. Your instincts are excellent, but you need instruction. Break the connection and come with me.”
My heart thunders like hoofbeats in my ears.
“But Violet…” Andarna’s tone shifts from denial to… Amari help me, is that worry?
I blanch as it hits me. She wants to go. Of course she does. He’s her family—the only dragon of her kind willing to accept her. I’m the one holding her back.
“Her other bond will sustain her life,” Leothan states like that’s all there is between Andarna and me. “Should you choose to return, you can always reforge the bond.”
When she doesn’t respond, he lowers his head to my eye level. “She is emotionally ensnared because of her age. What would you have her do?”
Andarna ducks her head.
“I…” Warmth drains from my face, but I keep my eyes on her, memorizing every detail like it might be the last time I see her. The possibility is unfathomable—I developed my signet out of sheer need for her—and yet it feels like we’re hurtling toward some kind of precipice. “I love you and I want you to feel complete,” I tell her, and she slowly meets my gaze. “I want you happy and safe and thriving. I want you to live.” My voice breaks. “Even if it’s not with me.”
“Admirable,” Leothan says. “I understand your choice.”
Yearning floods the bond, so deep it aches within my own chest, and the pain of it sucks the breath from my lungs. I force my head to nod, feeling everything she can’t say.
“I do not know how—” she starts.
A shrieking whistle sounds in my head, and then only silence remains. I reach for the bond and find only a wall…then nothing.
Andarna whips her head toward Leothan.
He launches without warning, springing high above me. His wings snap open, and wind blasts my face as he gains altitude. His scales flicker, turning the color of the cloudy night sky, and he begins to disappear.
Andarna roars up at him, and then her gaze swings wildly, focusing behind me, then to the right, then landing on me for the length of a heartbeat. Her eyes flare like she wants to say something, and I throw myself at the wall where our bond should be.
But it’s gone.
A breath later, so is she.
All that’s left is a gust of wind as her scales blend into the sky.
A roar vibrates my very bones, and my ears ring as the edges of my vision darken. My heart stutters, and my lungs cease their struggle. There’s no air and no reason to seek it. I was infinite yet moored, and now I’m hollow and adrift in waters too vast to comprehend.
My knees buckle, then collide with the ground.
“Violet!” someone shouts, and racing bootsteps register a second before she crouches in front of me, her brown eyes searching mine for answers I don’t have. “Are you all right?”
I’m nothing.
The sky darkens, and the ground trembles. I look up into the black void, and my vision narrows in an ever-shrinking circle. Not the sky. A wing.
Stern, demanding golden eyes appear.
“You will breathe!” His deep, gravelly voice fills my head, and unyielding strength barrels down the pathway that connects us.
Tairn.
He exists, therefore I must, because we are bound. Never alone. Always connected.
I gasp and air rushes in. My heart pounds in an erratic, painful beat, but the edges of my vision clear. “She left us. She left us. She left us.” It’s all I can think.
“We remain,” Tairn orders, as if I have a choice not to.
“What happened?” Someone hits his knees beside me, and my gaze swings, meeting amber-flecked onyx. Not someone—Xaden. “Violet?” Worry and fear slide down the bond that tethers us, and the connection anchors my heartbeat.
I exist for Tairn, but I live for Xaden.
“I don’t know,” Rhiannon answers, and I find her watching me with heartrending worry that I instantly want to soothe.
Rhi’s still here. So are Mira, and Brennan, and Ridoc, and Sawyer, and Dain, and Jesinia, and Imogen, and Aaric…everyone is here but her.
“How could she do this?” Sgaeyl snaps, fury sharpening the words to daggers.
“She’s gone,” I whisper to Rhi, then crumple under the weight of the unbearable truth. Xaden catches me, tugging my shoulder against his chest, and his brow furrows as our gazes collide. “Andarna’s gone.”
