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CHARLIE

T he day of Essa’s challenge came, the silvery light of dawn piercing the haze of a gray morning. Light rain drizzled from a blustery sky as I stood at my window, gazing out on the north wing of the palace and the city beyond. Below, in the courtyards, banners, tents, and bleachers were being assembled, for unlike the other Skrathan challenge events, this main attraction took place directly over the city and the palace. It gave the event a bit more of a dangerous thrill I supposed, since in theory one of the dragons or their riders could fall down onto the heads of the onlookers—not unlike the airshows back home.

Everyone loves a thrill.

But I felt more or less dead inside.

Yesterday after the duel I’d been brought back here. It was the same chamber as before, but it had been transformed into a true prison cell now. Guards had stormed through and removed anything that could be used as a weapon—fire irons, firewood, chairs and tables, my trusty oilskin bag, even the sheets and canopy from the bed. Healers had come, stitching my wounds and declaring without much enthusiasm that I would be fine; Braimar’s worst strikes had either glanced off a bone or simply not been very deep—a lucky outcome. The healers had patched me up then left, locking me in.

I’d paced, kicked the stone walls, even dropped and tried to do a few painful push-ups, anything to burn the pent-up energy I felt. All night I thrashed in my sheets, unable to sleep for the smoldering anxiety that burned its way through my gut. Yet I must have slept at some point, for I arose shivering in my cold, fireless room, feeling as listless as I’d felt passionate the night before, as if I were a candle that had burned down to nothing.

Today is the day. Essa will live or die. The thought reverberated through my mind over and over in an endless loop.

Whatever happened to Essa, I would be dead. Executed. There could be no reunion for us, no romantic denouement, no happy ending. I thought I could at least write a letter to tell her how I felt—but they’d taken the damned paper and pen, too.

And how do you feel about Essa? Some coy inner voice asked me. I knew. But something kept me from uttering that truth, even to myself.

I’d never told Kitty I loved her, even when we got engaged. She was not the I love you type. The closest we’d come was a flirty, you’re alright, kid.

But comparing my feelings for Kitty to my feelings for Essa was like holding a flashlight next to the sun. It wasn’t just that the picture of Kitty kissing the counterfeit Silver Wraith had soured me on her. I’d never truly loved Kitty. I didn’t even know what love was before Essa.

If I could just see her one more time. The things I would say to her. The things I would do…

Essa wasn’t the only loss that pained me. Worry for Parthar plagued me as well. What would they do with him, now that they knew he existed? Would they fling him from the cliffs as they’d done to the eggs? Kill him for bonding to a foreigner? Or would they try to re-train him somehow, brainwash him to forget me?

Whatever their plan, he wasn’t dead yet. I could feel him when I reached out with my mind, but his only response was a lonely, distant whimper that I hardly found reassuring.

I was a fighter. An ace. I’d killed five dragon riders in one night, once. I’d been admiringly called a cold son of a bitch on more than one occasion. And yet here I was, my heart breaking in two ways at once.

Maybe this is a magical place. It’s changed me. It’s ruined me, I thought as I paced.

Out the window, the preparations for the challenge continued below. It would take place at noon. What time was it now? Curse this place and its lack of clocks…

The door open and I spun to face it, eager to see Rohree and to get a bit of news. But it wasn’t the sprite, just a pair of guards, a stocky male guard holding a tray of food and a blonde female who stayed by the door, sword drawn.

“Excuse me, can you tell me what time it is? How long until the challenge begins?” I asked.

The stocky guard set the food tray on the floor and stood, glaring at me. “Just be glad you’re alive to see it, Admite,” he said, glancing to the window. “Normally a prisoner would be placed in the dungeon, but our merciful queen wanted you to have a front row seat—so you can watch the traitorous princess you corrupted drop out of the sky.”

I stepped forward, ready to throttle both of them, but they’d already backed out of the room, the door banging shut and clicking locked behind them. I heard the two laughing as they departed down the hall.

Grumbling curses, I knelt over the tray. The breakfast fare, too, was that of a prisoner and not a guest: a slab of dry, hard bread and pale, tepid tea in a tin cup. I rose, crunching and sipping, not at all hungry but knowing I should face whatever was coming with a bit of food in my stomach.

Back at the window, I ate and drank, gazing out over the palace’s opal battlements and the city beyond. It truly was a beautiful place. And so vast and varied and magical that Essa and I could have spent one hundred lifetimes exploring it together and still failed to unlock all its mysteries.

How unfair it felt, to face death now. I felt like I’d only just learned to live.

I reached out to the window and tried to open the casing. I’d scaled down the tower once, after all. But someone had thought of that; the window had been sealed shut.

So accept your fate, I thought. All aces ended the same way, eventually. It was the nature of fighting gravity. What goes up must come down. When it’s a plane, it usually does so fast and in flames… Death had always awaited me; I was just meeting it in a different way.

But Essa. She still had a chance. And if she could live, if she could somehow triumph, it would all be worth it.

As if in answer to my thoughts, that low, booming horn sounded, its blast ringing across the battlements. I looked down to see throngs of people filling the streets, finely dressed nobles taking their places on the courtyard bleachers below. At the sound of the horn, a shout of excitement seemed to rise from every corner of the city. I squinted beyond the palace walls to see the merchant buildings, houses and stables squirming with bodies as scores of onlookers climbed up to watch from the rooftops.

And then, from the direction of the mountains, the dragons came, hundreds of them filling the skies, slicing the clouds with their wings, lighting up the heavens with their exuberant blasts of fire.

And in the midst of them, two dragons flew apart from the others, a great, dark blue akmerius, and a smaller, gray libran. Tryce and Othura. Riding them, I knew, were Laynine and Essa.

The final challenge was about to begin.

God, I hope Othura’s wing holds up…

A restless energy still compelled me to pace, but I was loathe to miss even a moment of what was to come. So I stood, restlessly drumming my fingers on the window frame, tapping my foot, biting my lower lip, as the two dragons alighted in the courtyard below. Words drifted up to me from beyond my windowpane. I couldn’t make out what was said, but from the tone I could tell it was the queen speaking, and from the timber of her voice I guessed she was reciting some prescribed speech wishing both riders good fortune—as any good, impartial monarch should. After a few minutes, the speech gave way to a roar of the crowd and the flourish of horns.

Far, far below, the two riders took their mounts. Perhaps I imagined it, but I thought I saw Essa’s head tilt back to look up at my window.

“I’m watching. I love you,” I blurted. I instantly felt foolish. Of course she couldn’t hear me from so many stories above her. Then, her voice was in my mind.

I love you, too.

I froze, feeling at once naked, exposed—and strangely connected. It only took me a second to understand what had happened. Now that she knew I was bonded with a dragon, we were able to communicate through our dragons, the way Skrathan did.

Though it was a bit like the game of telephone children play, the communication still felt surprisingly intimate. The inclusion of the dragons as intermediaries somehow made the messages more meaningful rather than less.

And now, in what was probably the last hours of our lives, why not be honest with our feelings?

We’ll be together when this is over, I thought to her. And I’ll explain everything. I know there’s a lot to explain…

For a moment she didn’t answer and my heart began to dip like a falling kite. Then she replied.

Yes. Yes. I fly for you.

Then the two dragons surged skyward, and I watched, gripping the window frame with both hands as if I were flying with her, as if I were hanging on to Essa for my own precious life.