Page 66

66

B EHIND THE WHEEL of the sailraft, Graylin fought against racing faster across the sea of black glass. From a quarter league off, he had watched Nyx and Daal vanish into the chasms of Evdersyn Heep. Despite his trepidation, he forced himself to maintain a slow pace. They dared not alert the Dragon, to stir it into looking this way with a panicked surge of flames from the raft’s forge.

While Nyx’s willfulness aggravated him, he could not truly fault her. He even suspected where she had gained that trait. In the past, he had broken an oath to a king, all for the love of Nyx’s mother. His young life had been one of brash actions and reckless disdain. He had not needed the words of an ancient Nyssian to confirm what he knew in his heart. Their shared blood was evident in the steel of her manner, the rebellion in her actions, even the deep-seated resentment toward him. He could hold a grudge, nurse an insult, just as stubbornly.

Still, such acknowledgment did not lessen the pounding of his heart or loosen his strangled hold on the raft’s wheel.

Graylin sweated, both from the heat and tension. He had hoped to see Nyx and Daal reappear by the time they neared the Heep. As the cliffs rose ever higher, that did not happen.

“Where are they?” he muttered.

Arryn watched over one shoulder. He gaped out the window, clearly amazed to view his world from this height.

The Chanr? huntmaster, Irquan, looked far less enthused. He hung farther back, clutching a leather strap in a white-knuckled grip. His eyes, the only feature visible through his headscarf, kept well away from the window. He no doubt regretted his decision not to accompany his people aboard those stone sleds being pulled by curl-horned beasts.

Vikas and Kalder stayed near him, as if guarding Irquan from cranking the rear hatch open and flinging himself out.

Shiya stirred from the hold’s stern. Up until now, her lids had hung low, allowing only a narrow slit of azure fire to show. Caught in the reflection of the window, her eyes flashed open.

Graylin glanced over his shoulder as she strode forward. The movement of her heavy bronze form wobbled the small raft. She quickly joined him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her.

She pointed toward the broken cliffs of the Heep. “A blaze of bridle-song, rising like smoke. Sudden and fierce.”

Graylin took a sharp breath, understanding what this meant.

Nyx and Daal are in trouble.

Heedless of the risk, Graylin slammed a pedal. Flames shot out of the stern forge, their reflection blazing across the black glass. As he raced toward the Heep’s shattered scarp, he prayed their flight did not draw the Dragon’s attention.

Still, he aimed most of his pleas toward one hope.

Let us get there in time.

N YX STRAINED TO maintain the fiery nimbus of bridle-song around her and Daal. The golden glow had shattered back the initial assault by the shadowy wraiths. But that would not last. Her lungs already ached from the tension. Her throat thrummed in agony to maintain her chorus.

Bashaliia aided her efforts, keening brightly, amplifying her song all the brighter.

She sensed the deep well of Daal’s strength, but he remained out of reach. Pyllar battered at any mankra who whisked too close. Fangs snapped with slathering poison, warning the horde back.

Still, it was not her weakening gift that panicked her the most.

At the start, she had cast shining strands out into that savage flock, trying to bridle one or two. But as she reached those wild hearts, she touched the emerald inferno that burned there. The same fire shrieked at them, tearing into the flare of her song.

She immediately knew this shining madness was not born out of any poisoning, like the raash’ke who had suffered under the tainted enslavement of the Spider. This ravening was pure feral ferocity. Even still, she sensed the brittle age of it. The anger that stoked this fire echoed from far in the past, some faint memory of what had been ripped from them, of a unity and community shattered. That pain had been writ into their bones, branded into their hearts—and they raged because of it.

Recognizing this, she fought to maintain her flaming corona of gold—not only to hold the ravening horde at bay, but to shield that emerald fire from Bashaliia. She dared not let the madness be the strike of flint on dry tinder, to ignite the same poisoned emerald inside her brother, to flare it into a raging conflagration. If that happened, with Bashaliia at the heart of this fiery storm, she would lose him entirely to the feral madness, maybe forever.

I can’t let that happen.

Still, these wraiths guarded their nest with fury. Their screeching battered at her fiery shield. To maintain it, she had to shrink her fraying nimbus, to coalesce it tighter, to flare it brighter.

She cast a glance to Daal.

If she drew her protective corona any closer, he and Pyllar would fall outside of it. Her heart agonized with the choice squeezing down on her. Under this assault, she could not guard them all. If she tried and lost Bashaliia, then all four would fall.

But to shield Bashaliia, could she sacrifice Daal and Pyllar?

She knew the answer.

Her misery sang out in an anguished chorus as she drew her fiery nimbus more firmly around her and Bashaliia. A wraith shot through and crashed into Daal. He managed to shove off the bat, one the size of a yearling calf. Still, he got knocked crooked in his saddle. A claw raked his arm, ripping through his riding leather.

More dove at him.

But before they could strike, a flaming sun crested over the rift. It plummeted through the dark mass of wraiths, washing fire through them.

The sailraft…

The horde scattered in all directions, fleeing this flaming intruder. Even those diving on Daal flung themselves away in a panic.

One whipped past her, shying from her golden glow.

As the beast rolled away, she got her first clear look at a mankra. While clearly a bat, it was nothing like Bashaliia or the raash’ke. Its body was far more svelte and stretched into a sinewy length that extended into a long tail, one that fanned out at the end to aid in agile flying. Its wings looked built to the same end. They were thinner, nearly translucent, giving the creature its wraithlike appearance.

As the mankra fell from her shield, its wings tucked and vanished against its body. It now looked more snake than bat. It dove down to a narrow crack and writhed into it.

Still, what caught most of her attention was the swell of the mankra’s chest, the warbling of its ribs as it screeched. These mankrae seemed built for two functions: agile speed and savage wailing. She remembered Arryn’s description of their hunting ability, how they could rip a ta’wyn out of the sky with swift ambushes and gales of ravening bridle-song.

Maybe it is this madness that makes them all the stronger.

In a matter of a few breaths, she had been nearly defeated.

Still, with relief, she watched the rest of the mankrae flee, crashing back into their dark burrows and cracks, seeking shelter from this strange fiery apparition that had fallen upon them.

Nyx understood their terror. Nothing like this had ever flown their skies. Intimidated and terrified, they had sought safety, for a chance to size up this new threat. But there was no telling how long such restraint would last.

Clearly recognizing this, too, Daal pointed up, while he cradled his injured arm.

Already the sailraft headed skyward, rising swiftly. The forge’s flames glowed across the walls, driving any lurking shadows deeper into crevices.

Daal headed up in the wake of the ship. Nyx followed, maintaining a golden shield to protect their retreat. As she did, she stared into those fire-illuminated fissures, wondering at the warren hidden in those depths. She also glanced down, making sure none dared strike from below.

Then a glimmer drew her eye to the right, a twinkling of golden shine, as if her shield reflected off water. That tiny star of brightness rose from farther down the chasm, where it pinched near the end.

Something’s out there.

While she wanted to ignore it, she sensed something calling to her, an urgency in that shine that reached her heart. Maybe Bashaliia’s, too. Her brother turned from their ascent, either at her whim or his own.

Daal noted her hesitation. “Nyx!”

She tightened her throat and let her shield fray apart into a tangle of golden strands. She wafted them toward that star in the deeper shadows at the end of the chasm. As she did, that feeling of earnestness sharpened, shining with a plaintive need, nearly sorrowful in its poignancy.

She fell toward it, inescapably drawn, as if bridled to it.

Daal rushed down to her. “We must go before the wraiths rally again!”

She understood the danger. Her earlier haste to enter the Heep had nearly gotten them killed. Still, if there was any hope to be found in this poisonous labyrinth, perils had to be faced, threats endured.

She swept ahead, calling back, “Can’t you feel it?”

She knew Daal shared a gift of sight, weaker than hers but still there. She glanced back, touched her eye, and pointed ahead: Do you see it?

He frowned, then suddenly stiffened.

She kept staring at him until he finally nodded.

Only then did she swing away and dive toward the star. The chasm walls closed on both sides, forcing Bashaliia to tilt ever steeper. Ahead, the beckoning glow shone from beyond a narrow pinch.

As Bashaliia lifted and balanced on a wingtip, Nyx tucked tight, clinging low to her saddle, gripping with her thighs. She sucked in a breath to shrink lower. Still, the wall brushed her back—then they were through.

Once clear, Bashaliia swung level again. Nyx settled back into her saddle. They swept a circle around a grotto, surrounded full around by high cliffs. Only here, the red sandstone had been blasted to black glass, like the sea they had left behind. Some sections had calved away long ago, crashing to jagged shards below and exposing the raw stone beneath.

Nyx pictured the ancient war that laid waste to this land and created the Dragon and its surrounding sea. She stared at the glass walls.

Had a final battle been fought here, marking some last stand?

Behind her, Daal swept out of the rift and joined her. As they spun together, Nyx noted the mouth of a large cavern below. It gaped open like a frozen scream, echoing the pain of that last battle. Or maybe it only seemed that way due to the star shining out of those depths. Its golden chorus was suffused with grief, with loss, with an agony that clutched Nyx’s heart.

She understood that pain. It sang to all she had lost in the past, what would be destroyed if she failed, even the misery that would be wrought if she succeeded, when millions would still die.

That pain drew her down.

How could it not?

It is my story, too.