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“May I?” He motions toward my sword.

I nod, and he retrieves it, stopping a step away from me.

“After the rebels attacked, I found your sword on the ground near the healer’s quadrant. Cole recognized it was yours, and that’s how we knew something was wrong. We spotted you before the rebel took you into the forest. When I originally picked it up, I noticed this...” He traces a fingertip over the textures on the handle, outlining a ring of circles overlapping each other in the middle. “The mark of the King’s most inner assembly. Some say they know the kingdom better than the King—”

He pauses, realizing the insult he implied to the King. “I-I mean, some say they know the King better than the kingdom—” He laughs awkwardly as he runs a hand through his hair. “Okay, maybe I don’t know what I’m trying to say. But it’s a nice sword.”

He hands it back to me. I stare down at the hilt decorated in intricate patterns with hidden intersecting circles.

What was a rebel doing with a sword from the King’s close circle?

“Stay away from the shoreline. We have to cover your tracks,”I call out after Daeja as she approaches the lake. As soon as the camp fell silent in the late night, I slipped out to see her.

Daeja turns to me, her eyes catching a reflection of moonlight.“Why?”

“Because if someone catches you, they’ll kill you. Remember?”

“Why would they want to kill me?”

I think of the people who lost their lives in Padmoor. How the dragonfire left scorch marks along the cobblestones. The man who tried to run in the street from the dragon, torched to a heap of ash, and now a distant memory.

But my thoughts fade to the memory of her as a hatchling. Diving around with my dagger in her mouth. Chasing after a butterfly and trying to catch her own tail. The corner of my lips lift into a smile. Maybe if they knew Daeja like I did, they would see she isn’t a threat.

“I don’t know.”

Doubt tightens the invisible bond between us. “I’ve been thinking…what if we get to the Dragon Lands and the other dragons don’t like me?”

“Why do you say that? Why wouldn’t they like you?”

“What if I’m different? What if I don’t know how to be like the other dragons?”

I chuckle as I pat her neck. “It doesn’t matter if you know how—it’s what you are.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”She snorts and bumps me with her hindquarters. I stumble forward, thrown off by how powerful she is. She nabs the back of my shirt in her teeth, catching me before I land on my face.

Steadying back onto my feet, guilt swarms me with how out of place she must feel. Stuck in a land that doesn’t want her and without her kind. Limited from her natural tendencies and capabilities.

Perhaps I know what can make her feel better, even if it’s only for a fleeting moment.

I mount her, climbing onto her back as she turns her head to grin. If dragons can grin. I cling to the horns lining her neck, my hands already anxiously sweating.

“Fly.”

She ducks her head and charges for the lake. Her wings flap and thunder, and we lift above the water, her talons grazing the surface. The wind sings around me, stealing my breath as we soar. I don’t let my gaze fall lower than her head, for fear of losing my grip and slipping into the water below. The roaring wind dies down, and she slows to a graceful glide.

Slowly, I dare a peek down. The reflection of the moon and stars glitter across the lake’s glassy surface. I drag my gaze up to the sky. Remembering the times my mother, brother, and I used to shout how much we missed my father up to the sky, as if he could hear us. Absent-mindedly, I reach one hand up, as if I could touch the stars. Wondering if they were looking back down at me now.

A shooting star streaks across the sky, so fast I almost second guess I actually saw one.

For the rest of the night, we fly in circles under the stars. And for the first time, in a long time, it makes me feel as close as I ever have to all of my family.

twenty-three

KITTEN

“Given the most recent rebel attacks, we are upping our training. We will have mandatory training for all outpost positions,” Cole calls out in the center of the sparring ring. Although, Marge is the exception in the entire squad. She mentioned she had more than enough experience and didn’t need extra training.

My theory is she didn’t want to admit she’s too old. And Cole knew better than to argue with her.