“I know,” she said, “they’re so good at it.” So good at being in love. Ava felt like she was so far from it she couldn’t even imagine what it would feel like up close. She loved Cale. But could she love—really love—anyone at all?
The pulsing of black dragon wings as they pushed the air around them. Meel landed with a thud, leaves and dirt flying as his paws found the ground. He gave a shuddering roar.
“We are here to keep watch.” Pendulus announced before he slid off the back of his dragon with a frown.
Meel growled and tossed his head.
“By God, Meel, I don’t want to be on your back any more than you want me here.”
As soon as his rider removed his saddle, Meel contracted into the smallest version of himself. He hissed at Pendulus and clawed at his leg, drawing blood.
Pendulus shouted out in his tongue. He shook his leg and caught Meel in his satchel, fastening the leather latch.
Shiloh chuckled and stroked his even-tempered Rane as he readied
his own saddle.
“What are they saying?” Cale asked as their group approached the no-ir.
“Pendulus called his dragon a name,” Shiloh answered. “Translation loosely is ‘devil-licker.’”
Ava snorted. “He did take a piece of his leg off, so I guess that’s accurate.”
“I’d like to see what would happen if I took a big bite out of you sometime, Ava.” And he pretended to bite at her finger.
She laughed, pushing his face away with her palm. “I’d kick your butt, Anders, before I shoved you into your little satchel.”
Cale and Myra froze. Both looked at Ava in surprise.
“What?” she asked. She touched her face, making sure she wasn’t bleeding or anything. Then she turned behind her. “Is there a siren or something?”
Miriam, who had been standing idly by with her suitcase, frowned, lines wrinkling her forehead. “How are you saying those strange words, Ava? When did you learn that?”
Cale ran to her, wrapped his rider up in a hug. He was warm, as always, and smelled like soap and ash. “Ava,” he said into her hair with a laugh, “You spoke my tongue.”
She could hardly breathe with him holding her so tight. But that was okay. She didn’t need to breathe.
Shiloh laid a steady hand on Rane. “I could speak to Rane in our tongue from the moment we were born.”
Cale pulled away, his heart so full he felt imaginary. It was easy to ignore how jealous he was of Rane and Shiloh’s inseparable bond.
“So that’s good?” Ava asked. “Speaking red tongue?”
Shiloh hummed before he spoke. “Only when someone truly understands the core of a dragon can they speak their tongue.”
Ava let him hold her a little longer. If only they knew how hard I’ve been trying to understand.
Juliette peeked out from the cave, her hand on her wriggling belly. “Where’s my Miriam?” she asked Shiloh. “I thought you promised she could come with me?”
“She is here,” Shiloh said as he walked over to his love. He put his hand on her back and kissed her full on the mouth.
Cale gasped. He could almost feel how much the skin of the black dragon rider should burn the tender Juliette. But instead of screaming out, she closed her eyes, savored the touch of his lips. She spoke to him in the floating vowel sounds of no-ir tongue, and he let kisses fall on her fingertips, her cheeks, her forehead. Then, he knelt and put both hands on her belly. The shaking, tumultuous kicks grew still, almost as if the baby was listening to his hushed words.
“I still do not understand how,” Pendulus said, his lips pursed as he stood next to the others. “The blood beneath our skin is meant to torture those we interrogate with a simple touch. It is to be very painful. How is it that Shiloh can touch her in this manner?”
Myra rolled her eyes at all of them. “You guys really haven’t figured that out?”
Pendulus stole a sideways glance at her. “You are supposed to be intimidated by me, red dragon. Yet you speak so boldly to me. How is it that I am frightened by you?”
“I can be…offputting.” Myra crossed her arms in self-defense. “And you seem to be very unthreatening.”
Meel who had shrunken down to the size of a fat tabby, wriggled out of his satchel, spread lazy wings, and carried himself over to Myra, perching on her shoulders.
“See? Your dragon isn’t scary, either.”
Pendulus narrowed wide eyes set in a square head. “Meel is not scary. He is evil.”
Shiloh hissed under his voice. He’d left Juliette and mounted his Rane. “It is not our way to speak ill of our dragons, Pendulus.”
Pendulus gave a harrumph. “I would agree. But Meel is no dragon. He is merely a fat lizard.”
From Myra’s shoulder, Meel shot a dart of black poison smoke at his rider. Pendulus cried out and covered his eyes, cursing in his tongue.
Shiloh sighed. “Let us go, before we witness something more sinister than a spitting match.” He turned to Pendulus. “You are sure you will do this for me?”
Pendulus, rubbing his eyes, nodded. “Shiloh, you and Rane saved our lives despite what the grey dragons said. I will follow you, despite all adversity. Though we be hunted, I will not waiver.”
And the two grasped each other’s arms in a sign of friendship—a sign that the no-ir were prohibted to display.
“I will see you soon, brother,” Shiloh said. Forbidden words.
Pendulus took a deep breath. He had already decided. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for the one who’d spared his life. If Shiloh had not defied the grey dragons when they were young, he and Meel would be long dead. So if Shiloh asked him to defy them again on his behalf, no matter the reason, it was for something good and right.
Meel grew in size so Pendulus could help the women on to his back.
Miriam looked down at Ava and tried not to cry.
“I’ll see you again soon, Miriam,” Ava offered. It was the best she could do.
Miriam wrapped her arms around Juliette and nodded down to the girl she’d tried for years to make her daughter. “I never stop thinking about you, Ava. I’ve always thought being family is a promise. And I promise to never stop thinking about you, wherever you are.”
Ava wanted to tell her it was okay to forget about her. That she would never be the daughter Miriam needed, the daughter she deserved. That Juliette was sitting right there, needing her, when all Ava had ever done was prove how independent she could be.
But she said nothing to her foster mother. Because that was Ava.
“Be well,” Shiloh said to Juliette, grapsing her hand one last time. “Be well until I see you both again.”
Juliette’s freckles stood out against her flushed cheeks as she touched Shiloh’s face. “You are not allowed to die, Shiloh Deathbringer. Be well.”
Pendulus snapped his reins, and Meel lifted heavy wings, propelling them upwards through the trees until they vanished into the void.
“Rane can carry no more than three at once,” Shiloh said to the remaining crew, refusing to waste time. “I will have to come back for one of you.”
Myra stuffed her hands in her pocket. “Will you take me over first? I don’t want these two running off and forgetting about finding Cam.”
Cale frowned at her. “He’s my brother, Myra. I’m not going to forget about him.”
Myra didn’t answer. Only stood and stared at the giant beast before her. Suddenly, she was unsure. “I don’t feel right about riding that thing. It’s not natural.”
“Rane is not a thing,” Shiloh corrected. “And he is nobler than any dragon you’ll ever know. If he says he won’t hurt you, he won’t.”
“I didn’t hear him say anything.”
And Rane riled up on his haunches and let forth a face-melting bellow, so loud that Myra dropped to her knees and covered her head. Shiloh laughed when his dragon was done, patting the hide of his neck from atop his back, even though Myra still knelt, cowering.
&nb
sp; “Climb on or I will leave without all of you. You have ten seconds, red.”
“Myra, get on,” Ava yelled over Shiloh’s steady counting.
But she was still huddled in fear, almost catatonic. So much for the courage she’d shown in the face of the feisty Meel. Rane was of another caliber altogether.
“Try and talk to her, Ava,” Cale suggested, nudging his rider with his elbow.
“How about I talk to Shiloh, and you convince her to get on?”
Cale nodded, while Ava ran over and grabbed hold of Rane’s bridle. “Wait, Shiloh.”
The look on Shiloh’s face frightened even Ava. He grew darker, taller even, at the sight of Ava holding his dragon’s reins. “Unhand. My. Dragon.”
Ava let go, wiped sweaty hands off on her jeans. “Look, just be a little patient. You know how the red dragons feel about riding with you. Rane just scared her, that’s all.”
“She was being disrespectful.”
“Yeah…she was. But maybe it was because she didn’t want to face how afraid you made her feel.” Ava was pulling lies right out of the air. “In a way, that’s how Myra paid reverence. By trying to act unaffected.”
Shiloh looked down to Rane as he shuffled, impatient to leave. “Rane says you are a liar, phoenix.”
Ava crossed her arms. “How about you two show me a little reverence.”
Shiloh chuckled. “I’m surprised. I did not think you knew.”
“Of course I knew.” Knew what?
“You act so convincingly as though you know nothing of your power or your prominence. But you are right. I should give more respect to you, phoenix.”
Ava nodded. “Right, because if you didn’t…I could…I could….”
“Well, you could do anything you wanted if you had enough will. You could toss me into that shrub there. You could turn Rane on his head. You could strip a tree of its leaves. Anything….”
Ava’s brain clicked into working mode. “I could feed Cale. Anytime. Anything he wanted.”
“Well of course, if your will is strong enough to relocate food items from one place to another.”
“How do I know if I’m strong enough?”
Rane snorted, still agitated. Shiloh tightened his reins. “I am not the phoenix. I don’t know everything.”
“But how do you know what you know?”
Shiloh frowned at that. “I…am becoming better at listening to our core. It tells me things.”
Cale came closer with a dazed Myra, but she wouldn’t move near enough to climb onto Rane. With a sigh, Shiloh hopped off his dragon, walked up to the girl, and clocked her in the jaw. She fell like a tree with no roots.
Cale caught her before she hit the ground. “You have to stop punching people and breaking houses, Shiloh. What is wrong with you?”
“Time wasted cannot be regained. I have to be there when Juliette gives birth, and we are throwing precious minutes away on coddling each other.”
Shiloh, hands gloved, helped Cale slide Myra up onto Rane’s back, then jumped on behind her. “She will awaken on the other side. I shall deposit her near the monastery door and return for you both.”
Rane spread wings wider than the day was long and took to the sky, vanishing before he made it to the clouds.
“I hate the void,” Cale said, staring after them. The last time he went through, he’d been thrown into the anger and seething hate of his herd. The time before that, he’d awoken in Sirce the Accuser’s bed, breathing into the same pillows the judge rested his horrid face on every night.
But Ava wasn’t listening to Cale. She was concentrating. She could feel the vibrating of her soul, her will leaking form her cells. For Cale, she thought to herself, saying it over and over again. For Cale, for Cale, for Cale.
“Why do I smell bacon?”
Cale peered down at the piece of fried meat in his hand. “Am I losing my mind?”
Ava looked it over, her hand cool against his as she studied the meat. “Does it look okay?”
His stomach grumbled at the smell. “I don’t understand how I got bacon in my hand. Did you bring a snack with you or something?”
“No. I willed it. For you.”
“You what?”
“Willed it. You know? With my will.”
“You can make bacon appear? Like, whenever you want?! You’re a personal breakfast genie!”
“No, it’s not just breakfast foods. It’s anything I want.”
Cale’s eyes widened as he stuffed the strip into his mouth. “Like lamb?”
Ava concentrated again. She pushed, searching her mind for what lamb was like and forcing her cells to bring it to existence. The lamb chop dropped to the forest floor, and Cale scooped it up, brushing off the leaves.
Ava exhaled. The surge of prickling pain beneath her skin manifested in a shimmer of gold. She chose to ignore it. If I can will food out of thin air, I can will away a little discomfort. But it didn’t work that way. She knew it didn’t. Ixora had told her. The one thing she couldn’t change, no matter how hard she tried, was that she had to be a phoenix. She had to die. She had to go to ownworld. She had to leave her dragon.
The no-ir pair reappeared seconds later, and Cale and Ava took no time climbing onto Rane’s saddle, Ava behind the straight-backed Shiloh. Cale positioned himself behind his rider, his arms around her. Ava could tell he was nervous by the way his chest thumped against her back. “It’ll be over soon,” she whispered, hoping Shiloh wasn’t listening.
“Mmhmm….”
But he rested his forehead on her back and closed his eyes. It wasn’t normal, wasn’t right for him to fly through the void. A red was supposed to fly with his rider. That was the right way, the only way.
Ava knew she was supposed to comfort him. She wanted to pat his arm, or hug him back somehow, but she couldn’t figure out what to do. Why can’t I just know? Cale always knew. Every single time, he knew.
“Ava?”
“Yeah?”
“If you’re relaxed, I’m relaxed.”
Ava wished she could see his face. “How did you know I wasn’t—”
“I’m dying here,” he cringed.
So Ava put aside her anxiety and inhaled, exhaled. She let her will settle within her, felt her mind clear. It was easier for her to imagine herself in ownworld. The stress vanished, dissipating as her heart rate slowed. Cale’s body relaxed, his breathing slowing with hers. Ava almost smiled, but she hesitated, forcing her lips to stay unmoved.
“Smiling helps even more,” Cale said.
Ava gave in. “You’re creeping me out, Anders. How do you know what I’m thinking?”
He put his hand over hers. “I don’t. I’ve been working harder to feel what you feel. Am I doing alright?”
“Yes. In a scary kind of way.”
“Ava?”
“Cale?”
“In the end, when everything is all over….”
“In the end, it’ll be you and me, Cale.”
“That’s not a lie, is it?”
Ava took a deep breath. “You and me.”
Cale could sense it all in Ava. The hesitation, the need and desire to do something, to connect. But there was something else. Something that was more and more every day. A void between them he couldn’t see and couldn’t measure. There was a part of his rider he just couldn’t feel.
But still, he tightened his arms around her and breathed her in—the strength of her back as he leaned on her, the focus of her energy on what needed to be done.
“Count to ten, and it’ll be over,” Ava said. She finally managed to put an unsure hand over his arm.
Cale, his eyes squeezed shut, took a deep breath. “One, two....”
The crushing blast of the ocean hitting rock. Cale gasped at the ice water that swept him under. The void had been life-sucking, but the sea was like a battering ram, tumbling him into the rock formations along the mouth of the underwater cave.
He pushed every muscle he had to get himself to the surface,
too aware of the hairline fractures in his ribs he hadn’t given adequate time to heal. When he broke through, the cool air singed his lungs. There was nothing. Nothing but the jagged rocks of the cliff he clung to and the open ocean.
“Ava!” He knew she was close by, but he couldn’t see her.
“Cale!” She was just behind him, trying to clutch the rocks with desperate fingers.
Cale wanted to go to her, to make sure she was alright.
“No, don’t let go, you’ll get crushed!” She disappeared for a moment as the waves towered over them, coughing as it receded, still holding on.
“He’s trying to kill us!” Why else would the black rider bring them through the void to a death trap?
“He brought us to where we need to be, Cale. We’re near the door to the monastery.”
Cale tried to look around him. “Where’s Myra?”
Ava wanted to call out her name, but a seizing flow of pain rippled beneath her skin. She shut her mouth tight to keep from groaning. Cale couldn’t feel that, but he’d certainly hear if she verbalized it.
“How do we get out of here?” Ava asked, swallowing a splash of salt water and gagging.
“I think we have to swim down.”
Ava’s eyes widened. “Are you insane?! We’ll drown.”
Cale let go of his rock and dived under, pushing himself towards Ava. He resurfaced beside her, holding on to her rock, putting his arm around her so she could rest a moment.
“I’m not going to let you drown, Ava. You should know that.” They braced themselves for another blast of ocean.
“I know that, Cale. But what if you drown? Who’ll save you?”
He leaned forward, touched his lips to hers. “You will.”
Ava took a good look at him. His dark hair was soaked, his tan skin beaded with salt water. He was so sure. His light brown eyes didn’t waiver, didn’t flinch, not for a second, not even when the waves beat them into the wall of rock.
“How are you not afraid?” she asked him. “How are you never afraid?”
He waited for the wave to hurl into them, then subside. “Ava, I’m scared every single day.”
“Then why? Why stay? Why fight with me?” Why look at me? Why touch me? “Why stay?”
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