Page 20

Aurora

S creaming, I reached out to try to grab onto something, anything, that would stop my slide into the darkened canyon below.

Stone cracked deafeningly as a huge swath of the ledge simply came apart on either side of me. My fingers snagged on an outcropping. The rock dug deep, but it held.

For a moment.

There was another horrifying crack as a line appeared in the rock, and it gave way, flying off from the edge as I slid down the nearly vertical wall that was all that was left of the path I’d been standing on an instant ago.

My feet hit first, sliding as I tried desperately to slow the descent. Then my body hit, and I bounced off the rocky incline, more scree coming loose and clattering down around me as I half-slid, half-fell.

Eventually, I hit the bottom, catching my knee and spinning around. I screamed once more, but the effect served to turn my fall into more of a barrel roll, which lessened the blow as I hit the bottom and rolled away onto a blessedly horizontal surface once more.

My body was screaming at me from the fall, and I groaned in pain from the multitude of bumps and bruises I’d surely accumulated.

But I was alive.

“ Aurora! ”

Damian appeared far above me, still in the daylight, looking like an angel sent from the heavens, his face aglow.

Before I could respond, the ledge under him gave way as well, forcing him to scramble farther back.

“Shit!” I screamed, hauling my battered and sore body out of the way as fresh rocks came crashing down, some big enough to do serious damage if they hit me.

“ What is it? Are you okay? ” Damian’s voice called from somewhere out of sight.

“I’m fine!” I shouted back, the fresh spike of adrenaline from avoiding the mini-avalanche having cut through the brain fog post-fall. “Sore. Some cuts. Probably a lot of bruises. But nothing broken, no serious damage. But you have to stay back. If you get too close, more will fall, and that could be bad.”

“ I’m coming down to you! ” he hollered back.

“No! Not yet. It’s not safe. You’re going to put me in danger. Just hold on,” I said, dusting myself off. “Ow, fuck, that hurt.”

“ Aurora? What was that about? What hurt? ”

“Nothing, I was just dusting myself off and forgot my body is going to be one giant bruise. I’m fine!”

His concern was warming, and I tried to make sure I didn’t bite his head off, despite the full-body ache currently slamming into me as my nervous system properly catalogued everything that had been hurt.

“ You’re sure ?”

“Yes, I’m fucking sure!” I called back, turning sharply to direct my voice right at him. The abrupt movement triggered new waves of pain. “Fucking ow . Dammit. Sonofa bitch! ”

There was a long silence, followed by what sounded like someone covering up …

“Are you laughing at me?” I shouted at him. “This isn’t funny!”

“ Of course not!” came the disembodied reply. “ I would never do something like that!”

I paused midway through my scan of the canyon, its base littered with rockfall debris, both fresh, and older that had become covered in a layer of dirt and moss. Had I imagined the hitch in his voice?

“Was that a joke , Damian? Are you making a joke now, of all the times to demonstrate a sense of humor?”

“ I have a sense of humor ,” he protested.

“Oh, sorry! I just wasn’t aware you packed it today. Usually, you leave it locked in the safe.”

“ That’s so not true.” Long pause. “ I don’t lock the safe.”

Despite everything, I sputtered with laughter until a few tears trickled down my face.

“ Feeling better? ”

“Yes, yes, I am.” I took a deep breath. “Thank you, Damian. I’m okay now.”

Whether his little back and forth was preplanned or not, my breathing was slowed. The pain, while prominent, was no longer in the driver’s seat, leaving me free to assess my situation.

I didn’t like what I saw.

“ I don’t know how I’m going to get down to you from here. Not without risking another rockslide.”

My mouth opened to tell him to just fly down here and get me.

Shit. He can’t.

“I agree,” I said instead, grateful I hadn’t spoken. Damian didn’t need that extra pressure right now. I couldn’t begin to imagine what it must be like to be in his place, missing a core part of himself. “Let me look around a bit down here. Maybe you can follow the ledge and see if it presents itself a way down. Then we can meet up somewhere over there?”

I moved to the middle of the canyon, noting it was the area clearest of rocks and thus probably the safest for me to be while I explored.

“ Shout loudly if something happens. I’ll hear you ,” he said before heading off.

Looking both directions, I weighed my options on which way to proceed. Going back didn’t seem to make sense. Damian couldn’t go that way, not safely, and the canyon ended just before the plateau where the ground leveled out. But it was forty feet above me, and I didn’t recall any ramp down to where I was at.

Which meant going forward. Picking my way, I kept an eye out for anything that might help get me back up and for any potential danger. The last thing I wanted was to get caught in an even bigger landslide.

No more than fifty feet and a corner later, I came to a stop. The grayish ground ahead was marked by a giant dark spot. In a circular pattern around it, smaller dots were visible.

It looked like than an impact sight.

Was it blood?

I looked around, suddenly aware I had no idea what sorts of predators might exist on the island. Birds and other wildlife had become far more prevalent during our flight out, and it only stood to reason that with prey would come hunters.

Had I just wandered into the territory of one?

Nervous but knowing that going back was even less of an option now since it would only trap me in a dead end, I crept forward. My head swung back and forth nonstop, scanning the walls and the ledge high above. Mountain lions wouldn’t hesitate to drop down on me.

My foot scraped on the stone, and I froze, the noise wildly loud in my ears as it reverberated off the walls.

If whatever creature was down here didn’t know it wasn’t alone before, it certainly was aware now.

Somewhere ahead of me there was a noise.

Blood pressure spiking, I crouched down, taking a rock in both hands. It wouldn’t be of much help in a fight with a wild beast, but it would be better than my bare hands.

Could it be a bear?

Frozen in place, my feet unwilling to move forward to investigate, I tried to stay settle into place without making a sound.

In the deafening silence that followed, I strained to listen for even the slightest sound. I was in hostile territory and thus at a disadvantage. Whatever was out there likely had far better hearing than I did. My breathing was probably loud enough to draw its focus. I just had to hope Damian could get there in time and—

My ears perked up as the sound came once more. It sounded vaguely familiar. Almost like a low moaning.

Tiptoeing forward, I spied the source of the noise.

“Damian!” I shouted up and out of the canyon. “If you can hear this, hurry up! I found him! I found the guard!”

At least, that was who I assumed the prone figure lying on the canyon floor was as I rushed to his side.

He did not look good. One leg was twisted at an unnatural angle, and his entire body and face was one massive wound. I looked back at the blood spatter behind us, trying to figure out what had happened to him but drew a blank.

“Hey, it’s okay, we found you,” I said, crouching down next to him.

The guard didn’t stir. Just another low moaning, almost keening sound. He was unconscious.

A cold chill stirred in my chest. Dragons healed fast. Yet the guard hadn’t.

Was he missing his dragon, too? It had been over a day, reportedly, and it still wasn’t back?

What does that mean for Damian? Will his dragon ever return?