13
No creature is coming to save me.
When the man leapt, the dragon instantly parted from its pack. I hear nothing as I fall, nothing but the howling wind.
It stings my eyes, burns my nostrils, whips against my cheeks, as if in punishment for my being so very stupid.
I got lucky with the sword. No creature wants to claim me. Why would they? My intentions are not pure. They are not honorable.
My heart is a pile of ash in my chest, made of pure vengeance and regret.
I mean to destroy this land. I mean to claw my way into the sky, pull the gods down from their clouds, and paint the world with their blood.
So close, I think. I got so close.
But close isn’t ever enough.
Roaring fills my ears as the ground rushes up to meet me. It’s stone on this side of the tree. Pure stone with sparkling veins. It would almost be beautiful if it wasn’t about to be my grave.
I close my eyes and hear the rock shatter just before darkness swallows everything.
Death feels like flying.
I’m carried by a wind, and it’s almost peaceful. Almost beautiful. Until the pain hits me like a battering ram.
“I’m not supposed to hurt anymore,” I croak, surprised by my own voice.
My eyes open, and I realize I am—somehow—very much alive. The stars blink back at me, diamonds threaded through a dark quilt. The moon is just a fingernail crescent.
I’m in the sky.
I’m flying.
I try to move my hand. It takes a few moments for the sensation to reach my fingers again, and then— Scales. Beneath me. I turn, only to see a shredded silver wing.
A dragon. I’m on a dragon.
It saved me.
It takes several tries to get up, and then I’m promptly blown back down by a gust of wind. My spine hits the scales, tearing the breath from my lungs. Choking, I turn carefully, clutching ridges, until I’m on my stomach.
I sort through my memories, trying to make sense of this. None of the dragons above claimed me, I know that for certain. I remember the ground fracturing … It couldn’t have been me who did that. I would be in pieces. The dragon must have been below. It must have risen, just like the sword, to meet me.
Not that I want to complain about someone saving my life … but why?
As if feeling that I’m awake, the dragon begins to fly lower, and my sweaty hands fight for purchase again. Shit. I grit my teeth as it soars down, right toward a field. The dragon lands smoothly, but my body slams against its back, then slides. I barely manage to stay on.
The moon is still out. It’s dark.
My chest clenches with panic, just before I spot the sun, just beginning to crest the horizon. The dragon flew all through the night. For hours. For me.
It sighs loudly beneath me, as if the journey cost it something. I finally stand, wincing at the pain in my bones, grateful I somehow didn’t break any. Then, I slide down its leg and promptly fall on my ass.
The dragon is staring at me.
It has large silver eyes, and scales like a mosaic of moonlight. A crown of spikes adorns its head, continuing down its neck, between a set of glimmering spiral horns.
“You—you saved me,” I say from the ground, like an idiot.
It just breathes heavily through its nostrils, like it was an awful imposition.
I stand slowly, studying the dragon up close, aware that it could kill me a thousand ways before I even reached for the sword I can barely carry. But it wouldn’t have saved me and flown all this way if it planned to kill me … right?
Its head is larger than my body, and its body is larger than a house, but it’s not the largest dragon. There were bigger ones in the sky above the Beast Tree. Still, despite its relatively small size, it has an energy around it, just like my sword.
Its color is the most special part of all.
“You’re silver, like me,” I say, pulling down my collar. Showing it what I’ve never shown anyone but Stellan and my family before.
The dragon dips its head to my level. I should stumble back—but I take a step closer. I extend my hand, aware the creature could eat it, or incinerate
it, in a moment.
Instead—it bows into my touch.
All at once, a spark jolts through my arm, down to my feet. A connection, just like the one I formed with my sword. A light erupts from its forehead in the shape of a star, which fades into a glimmering scar.
I don’t know what it means. All I know is that this creature is the reason I’m not splattered across rock right now.
“Thank you for not letting me die,” I say. The dragon huffs through its nostrils. It flares out its wings.
The beautiful silk-like silver webbing is shredded.
I gently touch one of them, and the dragon makes a warning sound.
“What happened to you?” I ask. The dragon just looks at me. The star on its forehead glimmers again and somehow … somehow, I know it’s a girl.
“Do you have a name?”
I don’t know what I’m expecting. Nothing, really. Which is exactly what I get. That doesn’t stop me from talking, though. Apparently, this is how lonely I am.
“I’m Aris. From Silverside. It’s on Stormside, past the gates. I’m here on
a quest to reach the gods.”
She just blinks at me.
Then, she shifts onto her side, as if she’s resting.
Right. Of course she’s tired. As she sleeps, I take out the crumpled map from my pocket. Only when it’s unfurled do I remember Zane.
Zane. Was he able to find his weapon? Did he reach the Helmhawks?
He doesn’t have the map now.
I close my eyes as another thought clenches my heart and mind.
Kira. Floating away in a boat. She’ll also be okay. I say it confidently to myself, as if I can will it to be true.
Circumstances change in moments. This map is one of my greatest assets. My dragon is asleep, and it’s not like I’m going anywhere without her. Carefully, I sit, lean against one of her legs, and decide to memorize the map, just in case I lose it.
The way to the gods is treacherous. There are several mountain ranges.
Forests with various names and shading. Wide fields. Bogs. Countless villages. Stretches of land that seem uninhabited. And there it is again, the City on Fire. I frown. Could it possibly be on fire? Or has it been burned away, just like my own home?
I draw the entire thing in the dirt with my sword, arm straining with each stroke. I memorize every name. Every peak and valley. Then, I erase it. I make it again from memory. Check my work. Try again. Again, until it grows tedious.
Then, I finally allow myself to study my glorious blade.
Every moment since I claimed it has been full of danger. Or I’ve been too tired to do anything but sleep. Now … I have a few seconds to simply admire it.
The hilt is storm-silver, with intricate etchings that are so small, so precise, I need to squint to see the details. Its pommel is sharpened into a point. Its cross-guard juts out like two wings. A diamond is buried between them. The entire piece almost looks like the front of a crown.
“Masterful,” I whisper. I make weapons. I pride myself on my focus, and the meticulous way I carve metal. It’s the only task that can truly quiet my mind and sorrow.
Still, even if I had years—even if I had lifetimes—I could never make anything like this.
The blade itself is sparkling, otherworldly Starside steel. It glimmers as if a million diamonds and stars were melted down to make it.
“Why me?” I ask it, and I must be out of my mind, asking questions of beings and things that will never answer.
The blade—it glints. And I really must be losing it, because it almost feels like a response.
“Maybe you should have chosen someone who could actually get you off the ground,” I say, through my teeth, as I stand and use both arms to lift it.
Every single inch up feels like its own battle. Without panic running through my blood, it feels impossible to even get it to my waist.
I need to learn. This sword will help me reach the end of this … but only if I can use it.
The dragon watches as I fall into my stance, the one Stellan taught me. I lift my sword again, using my core and legs to ground me. It helps, a little.
But this sword is heavier than anything I’m used to.
I clench my jaw. Pretend that there is an enemy. I slice up through the air, and the weight sends me forward, until I end up skewering the ground.
The noise the dragon makes sounds almost like a laugh.
I glare up at her. “I’m trying,” I say.
Then I tug and tug at the ground, trying to get my sword out of the dirt.
I’m sure I look like an utter fool. I pull so hard that I end up stumbling backward and falling on my ass.
This time, the dragon does laugh, a huff that feels like steam upon my
skin.
I take a deep breath. Settle myself.
And try again.
The dragon watches as I cut invisible enemies to ribbons, both arms fighting to hold the metal. As I stumble more times than I don’t. As I fall more times than I can count. As I get up. Again. Again.
I’m practicing advancing, feigning blocking hits, when, in a flash, silver is hitting my own. I gasp, stumbling—only to see that the dragon has launched her tail at me.
For a moment, fear grips my heart. I think this dragon has grown tired of my inferiority and is about to skewer me with her spikes.
But no—with an impatient growl, I see that the dragon … she’s helping me train.
Her tail battles with my sword, lightly striking. It’s thicker than my entire body, but it clashes just like a weapon. It moves as fast as one.
And having an opponent, having someone to practice against … it helps.
It helps me find my energy. Find my strength.
My arms tremble. I can’t get the sword up high enough, but the dragon doesn’t give me a break. She doesn’t go easy on me. She strikes again and again, and I’m forced to haul the metal up as high as I can to escape the wrath of her tail.
I steel myself and fight. I’m strong. I can master this sword, just like I’ve mastered plenty of impossible things. Step by step. Hour by hour.
We duel until finally my sword slips from my hands. The dragon’s tail stops just short of me. She looks me over and huffs with something like
approval.
I sink to the ground with exhaustion.
With a sigh, the dragon curls herself around me.
“What do you eat?” I ask the dragon hours later, when it feels like I can move again.
At that question she gets up, and I’m knocked onto her back in a flash.
Before I can recover my stolen breath, she’s in the air.
“You can’t just—” I cough, sputtering. “You can’t just—”
She looks at me over her shoulder, as if to say, I’m a dragon. I can do whatever the fuck I want.
That smug look shuts me up. I grip her scales and see where she might take me.
The air is cold up here. It feels like flying through an icy river, without fear of drowning. I peer over the side and forget to breathe.
This far up, the land looks like the weaver’s quilts—cut into patches.
Forests I’ve been told to fear are just streaks of green. Mountains that would have taken days to scale are just daggers, dug into the ground.
Stellan taught me never to trust anyone. But all I can do up here is trust.
If this dragon shifts to the side, I’m dead. If she decides her food is me, there’s nothing I can do about it. That doesn’t scare me. No. Because she saved me. I trust her, and it means I don’t just have to count on myself anymore. Someone is leading the way. Someone’s got me.
We fly for less than an hour before she begins her descent. This time, I hold on better, and only slightly bruise my ass when she lands.
We’re in the center of a small field, at the base of a mountain, in front of a sparkling gray rockface.
I look around, confused. It’s … empty. There aren’t any creatures roaming about. I can’t hear anything. I slide off my dragon and onto my
feet, then pause. Listen.
Nothing.
“What—”
The dragon turns in a flash of silver. With a thunderous whip of her spiked tail, the stone begins to fall away, revealing cluster after cluster of glimmering red gems. Rubies? My mouth goes dry. I inch forward, blinking
quickly as if this could be some sort of illusion. Priceless. These gems must be worth enough to feed a quarter of Stormside.
My dragon lowers her neck— And devours the stones, teeth crunching them into powder.
I watch, dumbfounded, as the wall slowly goes gray again, picked clean.
Only then does my dragon sit back, tired, having had her fill.
“You eat … gemstones?” I ask, incredulous. “You’re going to be an expensive creature, aren’t you?” She huffs as if she’s saying, Look at me.
Were you expecting anything less? I frown. “Your diet. Is that why you were underground? Do all dragons eat precious stones?”
She doesn’t answer, of course.
I sigh. “Strange creature,” I say. By the way she nuzzles up against my side, she takes it as a compliment.
Unlike the dragon, I don’t eat rubies. It doesn’t take long for my own stomach to grumble. After a few minutes, my dragon seems to tire of the sound. She sighs, then lowers her neck. Come, the motion says. Then we’re off again.
I understand now why the writer of the journal said a creature was so crucial to this journey. My dragon knows these lands better than a map ever could. With her, I likely don’t need a map at all. Before long, she’s landing in the center of a forest.
Red is everywhere, just like the rubies. But instead of gemstones … these are berries. I slip off my dragon and grab handfuls greedily, smelling them for a moment, then shoving them into my mouth, eating just as quickly as my dragon did. I close my eyes and groan. Sweeter than honey. Sweeter than anything I’ve ever tasted.
I eat until my stomach twists in pain, and then I gather the rest to keep for later. “Thank you,” I say, offering some to the dragon.
Her huff says, I don’t eat anything as pedestrian as fruit.
Very well, then. More for me.
The sun is almost setting.
My dragon takes off into the sky, and I grip her scales. We glide like that through the pinks and oranges, flying through the sunset. Tears prick my eyes. I’m not alone. Not anymore. She is going to take care of me.
We are going to take care of each other.
My chest is flush against her back. I can hear her heartbeat somewhere deep inside. It’s in sync with mine.
“Thank you,” I say, because I’m not sure I did before. “For giving me a second chance.”
Her chest rumbles beneath me, a response.
“I never thought I would do anything like this,” I tell her, my words being swallowed by the wind. I huff a cruel laugh as I think of all the impossible things I’ve done in the last few days. “I was never brave, not really. I would run into my parents’ room almost every night, as a child.
Every creak of the wood of the house scared me. But then … my sister came, and I realized I needed to be brave for her. So, I was. I tried, and—”
Sometimes trying isn’t enough.
I go quiet, wondering if the dragon heard me at all, but then her chest rumbles again. She hears me. She’s listening.
So, I keep going. “What I’m trying to say is I never thought I would leap from a mountainous tree. Or wield a sword. Or race toward certain death.” I smile, a little. “I never thought I would fly through a sunset.”
I reach down to brush her scales— And jolt back as she shudders.
She screams, and the sound doesn’t just pierce the sky. It lances through me. I look down to see if I’ve been struck, but no. Just her.
There’s an arrow through her side. It’s long, sparkling metal. Starside steel. Strong enough to go through her scales.
A roar rattles the skies.
Then a monstrous dragon like a barbed shadow blocks out the rest of the sinking sun. He’s twice as large as mine. He parts his jaws in another bone- rattling shriek, then dips, revealing his rider, holding a bow.
Cadoc.
Fury flames through my bones. He killed Stellan. Now, he’s wounded my dragon.
How was he able to claim such a creature? Did he kill its original rider?
If dragons are anything like swords, the connection must be accepted both ways.
Which means this beast is just as wicked as Cadoc.
Everything in me wants to kill him. But I can feel my dragon’s panic as if it’s my own. We won’t survive this fight. I grip her scales. “Go,” I say, and she rushes down, fast as lightning, but it’s useless.
The creature is beside us in a moment. Wind howls in my ears as I turn to see Cadoc, grinning.
“First, I’ll take your sword. Then I’ll take your dragon,” he yells through the wind. “I’m going to feed it to mine.” His dragon turns his head.
Through the beast’s dark scales, red rises. Orange. Like a sunset spreading through his stomach. Fire.
I gasp just before a column of flames shoots right at me.
My dragon lifts her wing at the last moment, blocking the flames like a magnificent shield.
I can feel her pulse quickening—the move has cost her. Some of the fire goes through the thick shreds of her wings, setting them ablaze.
“Down!” I scream. “Go down! We can’t win up here.”
He’s larger, and faster. Perhaps lower, in the cover of the trees, we have a chance at escaping him.
At first, I think my dragon either doesn’t hear me or isn’t going to listen.
Then, just as Cadoc’s beast opens his maw again, fire rising, she nose-dives like a shooting star, right into the forest.
Fire paints the sky like a second bleeding sun. We crash through the trees, branches snapping, dirt ballooning all around us, and land with a bone-
splintering thud.
Then the woods go quiet.
Everything hurts. It doesn’t matter. My dragon is injured. The fire through its wings is out, but I can smell the burned flesh.
The arrow is buried close to where I sit, and I lean around, snap its end— and slowly slide it out. She tenses. The scale the arrow hit is now missing.
I’m going to kill Cadoc. I’m going to fucking kill him. But not today.
I slip off her back and face her. Her eyes are looking in all directions.
She’s focused, listening with her superior hearing.
She goes still, and I know what that means. They’re close. They’re
coming.
“He wants me,” I say.
She looks at me almost in warning, as if she could possibly anticipate what I’m about to say.
“You’re injured. That dragon—he’ll tear you to pieces. He’ll burn you to ashes.”
She huffs steam out of her nostrils. But that’s the extent of her power. She doesn’t have fire. She doesn’t stand a chance.
A shriek tears through the skies, just above us.
They’re here.
There’s no time. I lean forward, my forehead against hers, and she lets me. I think about all the people lost because of me. I won’t lose anyone else.
“Go now. He’ll see you’re without a rider. He’ll chase me instead of you.
I’ll be fine. Go.”
She doesn’t move an inch.
The forest trembles as the monstrous dragon lands nearby. “Go,” I say, my voice breaking on the word. “I will find you. I promise. But for now— for both of us—go.”
She looks at me with an intensity I don’t think I’ll ever forget. Silver eyes. The star on her forehead gleams.
Then she’s gone. She shoots up into the sky. I hear yelling. I tense,
watching.
But no one chases her.
They’re going to chase me.
I run.
There’s more movement. More creatures approaching. I see them in the sky, through the treetops, a mess of wings.
Cadoc and his friends have all claimed creatures. They’re all hell-bent on getting my weapon.
The forest floor trembles as they land, one by one.
“You can’t hide forever,” a voice calls, close by. “Night is approaching.
And you’re going to be trapped on the ground.”
Fuck.
In my attempt to save my dragon, I forgot the simplest rule of this side: Be anywhere but outside at night.
I shoot a glance at the horizon. The orb of the sun is completely gone— only its smear remains. And even that is weakening.
I run faster.
Suddenly, a pillar of flame charges through the forest, roaring like a beast, burning everything in its path.
The fools are going to try to trap me. They’re going to try to burn their way to me.
If I can just survive until nightfall, they’ll have to take off into the sky, right? But then I’ll still be here, in this burning forest. Without a plan.
Another roar. Flames getting closer, lighting up everything. I run through the burning trees, racing, panting as I look behind me.
And nearly crash into the side of a rocky cliff. I look up—and there’s an opening. A cave? All I see is a place to hide. A vantage point. Can the night demons climb? Will I be safe here?
Behind me, the trees rustle as if something is tearing through them.
Getting closer.
It seems my choice has been made for me.
Dirt lodges beneath my nails as I scale up the rock face, fear melting down my spine as I hope the trees don’t part and they don’t see me here, vulnerable, on the side of this cliff.
The sword is heavy on my back, weighing me down, but soon enough I’m reaching into air—the opening.
I haul myself inside and scramble to my feet. I turn to look out into the forest below, and swing my scabbard to the front, my hand curled around
the hilt, ready to unsheathe my weapon.
I swallow.
They’ve made a maze of the woods. Long lines of crackling fire burn everything in their path. Smoke curls into the crimson-brushed sky. My heart hammers, remembering. Everything is burning. Just like it did that night. That night.
Leaves fall in balls of flame. Branches crash down and ignite the forest floor.
Everything alive and beautiful is gone. Gone.
A brutal command echoes through the forest. “Find her.” Cadoc.
I take a step back, moving farther into the cave, and tense. Somehow, I feel it, prickling the back of my neck—an awareness.
I’m not alone.
With trembling hands, I slowly unsheathe my sword, inch by inch, and hold it in front of my face. In its reflection is a towering shadow right
behind me. A monster in human form.
Harlan Raker.