In the hope and excitement this new development of the bonds between dragons, gryphons, and their humans brings, I wonder who has stopped to contemplate the nature of magic’s balance. Do we not risk the equal rise of the very powers we seek to wield?
—Recorded Correspondence of Nirali Ilan, Commanding General, Cliffsbane Fortress, to Lyra Mykel, Deputy Commanding General, Basgiath War Camp
“I rid?” I blink and fight like hell to keep my face blank.
“Yes, your irid.” Theophanie surveys the sky, then the landscape behind us as Garrick staggers to his feet, sword in hand. “Some do not believe, but I knew as soon as the cream-robed scholars whispered about the seventh breed in your war college. Pity I had to leave so abruptly. One hasn’t been seen in centuries, and I was so hoping to set…eyes on her.” She finishes the statement like the threat it is, bringing her crimson gaze to mine.
Andarna. Terror races up my spine and lightens my head.
“Irid,” Andarna whispers. “Yes. I remember now. That is what my kind are called. I am an irid scorpiontail.”
“Fly for the wards!” I scream mentally. “She’s not here for me. She wants you.”
“I will not abandon you,” she roars.
“Everyone on the Continent needs you alive. Now fly.” My fingers brush the conduit hanging from my wrist, but it’s of no use to me without Tairn’s power. I need to stall, give Andarna enough time to escape. “She’s out of your reach.”
“Hmm.” Theophanie studies my face. “Disappointing, but it wouldn’t be fun if I caught my prey on the first attempt. You truly don’t know what she is, do you?” The dark wielder’s mouth curves into a delighted smile that instantly sickens my stomach. “What a prize you’ve won. Sometimes I forget just how short mortal memory can be.”
Mortal. As opposed to what? Immortal? How fucking old is she?
She moves sideways, toward the village, and Garrick and I both mimic her movement, putting ourselves between her and Tairn. “When the shadow wielder comes to us—”
“He won’t,” I snap. Power hums, filling me at a trickle as the sound of wingbeats fills the air.
Tairn’s waking up, but whatever’s coming at us is coming fast.
“He will,” she says in that same infuriatingly certain tone Xaden uses. Lightning cracks like punctuation, branching through the cloud overhead.
She didn’t even have to lift her hands. Holy shit, I’m outmatched in every possible way.
“And when you come with him, you will remember that I let you live today and choose me, not Berwyn, as your teacher.” She retreats step by slow step, extending her arms out at her sides.
Maybe venin lose their minds with their souls, but humoring her gives Andarna more time to flee. “And why would I do that?”
Power comes flooding back, scalding my bones, and I let it gather and coil.
“Besides the fact that he’s subpar and you’d be chained to him, powerless to resist his orders?” She sneers in disgust, then schools her features. “I’ll let you keep both your dragons while giving you what you want most in the world.” Her gaze drops to the conduit as wind pulses. The others must be here. “Control and knowledge.”
Tairn swivels and his head snaps toward Theophanie, but his teeth close just short of her feet as she’s plucked off the ground by the claw of a wyvern. Its gray wings beat fast and hard, blasting us with wind and carrying its creator from the battlefield.
“Holy shit, we’re actually alive,” Garrick says, lowering his sword. “She left us alive.”
“Are you all right?” I ask Tairn, my voice cracking.
“I am not deceased.” He gains his feet, his talons digging into the rocky soil.
Relief pricks at my eyes, and my vision wobbles.
“Do not dehydrate on my account,” he lectures. “It takes more than weather to fell me.” His golden gaze drops to my knee. “Wish I could say the same for you.”
“Yeah, you’re just fine,” I mutter, then turn toward Garrick, who’s already picking up one of my lost daggers. “You don’t have to do that.”
“You’re not exactly in a position to walk,” he reminds me, scooping up the second.
“Did you?” I ask quickly as the wingbeats grow louder. “She called you a walker.”
He’d traveled a thousand miles in minutes, and there’s only one way I’ve read about to accomplish that, but no one has done it in centuries.
Garrick wipes the back of his hand across his temple, and it comes away bloody. “Yeah, and she called you a leash.” No wonder he’s best friends with Xaden. They’re both excellent at dodging questions.
“You have a second signet, don’t you?” And like Xaden, he hid the strongest one.
“So do you.” He hands back my daggers and sways. “Or at least you will.”
“Thank you.” I hold his gaze while sheathing the blades and wade through the significance of what he’s concealing. “You know the last time someone wielded distance—”
“Never said I did,” he interrupts, looking toward Chradh with a flash of a smile as the Brown Scorpiontail lumbers to his feet. “Scared me there for a second.” He scoffs. “Yes, I know how much energy it takes. Trust me, you’re missing far more skin than I am.”
“You should go.” I motion toward Chradh and my knee throbs as the adrenaline starts to wear off. “Now, before they get close enough to see you. I know he’s blocked out the riot, so your secret is still safe if you leave in the next few seconds.”
Garrick’s gaze swings to mine, clearly torn. “Getting you into the saddle—”
“Thank you for risking exposure by coming to help me, but go.” I lift my brows. “My squad will help me.”
Garrick tilts his head like he’s listening, then nods. “You’ll come straight back to Basgiath?”
I nod. “Run.”
He stays a second longer, then takes off sprinting toward Chradh. He launches in the shadows, flying out of sight as my squad nears.
“Did you know?” I ask Tairn.
“We do not gossip about our riders.”
Good point. If they did, Xaden would be dead by now.
• • •
“This is ridiculous,” I tell Tairn as he descends not into the flight field but straight into the courtyard of the quadrant twenty hours later.
“So is thinking you can hobble back from the flight field.” Screams sound from the dozen or so cadets who run for the safety of the dormitory wing as Tairn lands in the mud. At least it’s stopped snowing.
“Violet!” Brennan charges past the fleeing cadets, his brow pinched with worry.
“Did you seriously tell my brother?” I glare at Tairn, knowing full well he can’t see me.
“Of course not.” Tairn snorts, and steam covers the dormitory wing windows.
“I told Marbh,” Andarna announces, landing on Tairn’s right, her scales as black as his.
“I’m fine!” I call down to Brennan, ripping the belt free and cursing when the stitches catch again. Biting my lip keeps me from crying out as I force myself out of the saddle. “So much for not gossiping.”
She snorts, and I begin the humiliating exercise of scooting over Tairn’s back on my ass while she looks on.
Tairn dips his shoulder when I reach it, and I fail to smother the sharp gasp of pain as I lift my right leg so I can slide down. “How about you go get me a set of crutches, and I’ll—”
“How about you get down here,” Xaden says, standing where I’d expected to find Brennan. My heartbeat jolts. Gods, he looks good, staring up at me with the kind of intensity that used to rattle my nerves when I was a first-year. He lifts one arm, and shadows rush up from beneath Tairn and solidify as they wrap around my waist. “Now would be preferable.” He crooks his fingers at me. “I would do the same for any wounded rider.”
“I somehow doubt that.” I slide down Tairn’s leg, and the shadows turn me sideways at the last second and lift me into Xaden’s waiting arms. “My, my.” I brush a lock of dark hair off his forehead, then hook my arms around his neck and settle against his chest, ignoring the throbbing protest of my knee as it bends. “What else can you do with those shadows, Lieutenant Riorson?”
He locks his jaw and keeps his eyes straight ahead as he carries me away from Tairn and past Brennan, who holds the door to the dormitory wing open.
“Commons is closest,” Brennan says, quickly catching up to Xaden.
Every line of Xaden’s body is rigid as he follows Brennan through the rotunda and up into commons. Tension radiates off him in waves of shadows that swirl like footprints as I look back over his shoulder, and when I reach out mentally, he has me blocked.
“You’re angry,” I whisper as Brennan charges ahead, ordering cadets out of a meeting room to the right of the announcements board.
“Anger does not fully describe my current feelings,” Xaden replies, striding through the door into the windowless chamber. Shadows shove all six chairs on this side of the long, coarse table out of the way, and he sets me on the surface with extreme care, then retreats, putting his back to the wall.
“I did exactly what you would have in the same situation,” I argue, bracing my weight with my palms as Brennan moves to my knee, leaving the door open. “If you would—”
Xaden lifts a single finger. “Not. Yet.”
My eyes narrow on him as Brennan slices through my wrap with a dagger. “And I thought you were headed home?” I ask my brother.
“Just helping put the finer points on the alliance.” He grimaces at the black-and-blue expanse of my knee. “Lucky for you, I’m still here. Twenty hours in the saddle didn’t exactly help the swelling, Vi.”
“Neither would have trying to dismount at Samara.” I wince as Brennan prods the joint.
“I brought some arinmint with me. I’ll have it steeped in milk to help speed the deep healing.” He nods to himself. “It helped after you were poisoned.”
“You brought arinmint out of Aretia?” Xaden glowers at my brother.
“Breaking the law in front of the duke,” I try to tease my brother, but the pain makes my words pitchy and it falls flat. Fuck, that hurts. My leg throbs twice as hard without the wrap.
“I’m well versed in how to use it. You know they don’t take too kindly to walking out of negotiations when you speak for your province, right?” Brennan spreads his hands over the joint and looks over his shoulder at Xaden. “You’re not just a rider anymore and should probably get back—” He blinks as Xaden delivers a withering glare. “Never mind. I would not want to be you,” he says under his breath at me, then closes his eyes.
“It’s not her fault!” Garrick shouts as he races through the doorway, all but skidding to a stop at the foot of the table.
“Oh?” Xaden asks.
“Crossing into Poromiel was definitely a choice.” Garrick shucks off his flight jacket and drops it on the nearest chair. “But the tornado? A regional hazard. The dark wielder—”
“You’ve already pled her case. Twice.” Xaden’s tone is almost bored as he folds his arms.
“I don’t need to be protected from him.” I shake my head at Garrick as heat envelops my knee, then glance Xaden’s way. “I own my decisions.”
“Well-the-fuck-aware.” Xaden closes his eyes and leans his head back against the wall.
“She’s here!” Rhiannon calls out from the doorway.
Second-years flood into the room, including Maren and her two little brothers, who seem glued to her side.
“You two sit,” Maren says gently to the boys, and Trager pulls out two chairs across the table for them. The twin boys are seven, with her ochre complexion, dark hair, and honey-brown, grief-stricken eyes, which must be why the two feel so familiar to me. They were also silent every time we stopped on the flight here. She crouches in front of them. “We’ll get it all sorted out. I promise.”
“Sit down,” Trager says to Cat, pulling out another seat.
“I’m fine.” She wobbles and rubs the back of her neck.
“You’re swaying where you stand.” He gestures to the chair. “Sit.”
“Fine,” she grumbles, all but falling into the chair. “Maren, you too.”
Every single one of us is exhausted.
“You disobeyed a direct order?” General Aetos storms into the room, then startles at the sight of Brennan and Xaden.
The heat intensifies at my knee, and the pain lessens slowly as Brennan mends the stressed ligament and swollen tissue.
“We were ordered to make ourselves useful, and did so”—Rhiannon steps between Aetos and the rest of the squad—“sir.” The title doesn’t come out like a compliment. “Our early return was signed off on by Lieutenant Colonel Degrensi, given that they did not have a mender at the outpost and are already overwhelmed with wounded. Surely you’re satisfied now that Cadet Sorrengail is wounded. We completed your punishment.”
“And we’ll do it again.” Ridoc kicks back in his seat, throwing his feet up on the table. “And again, and again.”
Aetos’s face flushes. “I’m sorry, cadet?”
“He said we’ll do it again.” I lift my chin and note the shadows creeping across the stone floor toward Aetos. “We make decisions as a squad. We’ll take whatever punishment you want to give us as a squad. What we won’t do is stand by while civilians die, regardless of what citizenship they hold. And before you ask, every single dragon and gryphon agreed.”
Hatred flares in Aetos’s eyes, but he quickly glances at Brennan. “You have no right to be here, Aisereigh. This is a quadrant matter.”
“It’s Sorrengail,” Brennan says without opening his eyes. “And even if Article Two, Section Four of the Basgiath Code of Conduct didn’t allow for menders to be granted access to all areas of campus—which it does—well, I don’t answer to you.”
My throat clogs when I spot the newly sewn name tag on his uniform.
“And who answers for them?” Aetos points to the boys. “King Tauri has refused to open our borders.”
Even now? I struggle to keep my jaw from dropping. How is that not part of the negotiations?
A corner of Aetos’s mouth rises, as if he knows he’s won. “They’ll have to be returned home. Immediately.”
My gaze swings to Xaden, and I find him already watching me. I lift my brows and he sighs, then turns his head toward Aetos.
“As we’re concluding this round of negotiations this afternoon, Lieutenant Colonel Sorrengail will happily take the boys home—” Xaden starts, and Maren gasps. “To Tyrrendor, seeing as they are now Tyrrish citizens.”
“Since when?” Aetos stiffens, and the heat in my knee dissipates as Brennan lifts his hands.
“Since I said so,” Xaden answers with icy authority.
“Ah. I see.” If Aetos gets any redder, I’m afraid he might pop. “And with the negotiations wrapping up this afternoon, I expect you and Lieutenant Tavis to be joining the Eastern Wing as ordered, so there won’t be any need to remind you that commissioned officers aren’t readily welcomed within the quadrant, nor encouraged to fraternize with cadets. The leniency you enjoyed this fall will not be extended under my watch.”
No. My heart sinks. Xaden won’t be allowed to come and go as he pleases like he did in Aretia, which means we’ll be separated. And on the border, there’s every chance he’ll have to pass beyond the wards, where his access to magic won’t be limited.
“I doubt Sgaeyl would agree,” Xaden warns in a tone that reminds me just how little guilt he feels when it comes to killing enemies who get in his way.
“Your dragon is always welcome in the Vale. You’re simply not welcome in the quadrant.” Aetos’s focus snaps to Garrick. “You and Lieutenant Riorson will depart by tomorrow afternoon for the Eastern Wing as ordered.”
“As General Melgren ordered,” Garrick responds with a slight nod. “Seeing as we’re under his chain of command. Or at least I am.” He glances back at Xaden. “Not sure about His Grace over here, since it’s been a few centuries since any sitting member of the Senarium has worn black, but I’m pretty sure he commands Tyrrish forces now.”
Xaden doesn’t deign to reply.
“I don’t care who orders whom as long as you get out of my war college.” Aetos straightens his lapel. “For the rest of you, classes resume tomorrow.” His gaze finds mine and lights with nauseating cruelty. “I’m afraid I’ll have to leave you, seeing as my belongings are currently being delivered to the commanding general’s quarters. Have to say, there’s a lovely view from the personal office.”
The comment hits as intended, and my chest threatens to crumple at the thought of Aetos living in the space Mom and Dad used to share.
Brennan straightens to his full height, and Aetos backs away with a smile, disappearing into commons.
“I fucking hate him,” Ridoc says, rocking forward and putting all four legs of his chair on the floor. “How did Dain turn out halfway normal with that prick as a father?”
“Language,” Maren hisses, though I doubt the boys heard her, considering they’ve both nodded off.
“He had ours, too,” Brennan replies to Ridoc.
“Until he didn’t,” I mutter.
“Is she mended?” Xaden asks without bothering to look at Brennan, his eyes locked on mine.
“She is,” I note with a smirk, then bend my knee damn near painlessly.
“No pain?” Brennan asks, swiping the back of his hand across his sweaty forehead as he looks at me.
“Nothing more than usual.” I flex the joint again. “Thank you.”
“Get out,” Xaden orders without looking away, but I’m more than aware he isn’t talking to me.
Everyone stills.
“Let me rephrase,” Xaden says slowly. “Everyone get out now. And close the door.”
“Good luck, Violet,” Ridoc calls back over his shoulder as Rhi pushes him out the door with the others, Maren and Cat carrying the twins, and in under a minute, I hear the distinct click of the door shutting.
“You can’t seriously be angry with me,” I start as Xaden surges off the wall, coming at me with the force of a hurricane. “You’ve never once begrudged my autonomy”—he reaches over me, takes my hips in his hands, and yanks my ass to the edge of the table, turning me to face him—“and I’m not going to tolerate you starting now. What are you doing?”
He grasps the back of my neck and slams his mouth against mine.
