Page 24 of I Dream of Dragons

He flies away on his black drak and plunges down toward the towers bobbing in the arena. I lose sight of him as he dives behind them.

Then he flies up and swings his drak around toward me. With powerful flaps of its wings, the black drak reaches the platform, flying right over me, and Phaethon leans sideways and hollers, “Come with me! We are under attack.”

“Attack?” I’m standing there, my white dress whipping around my legs. “What do you mean?”

“Drak squadrons!”

“Squadrons?” I gape. Is this a joke? They actually set asquadronon us? Have they gone insane? As if they need such measures to kill us off when the arena is doing such a fine job of it.

“You’re coming now!” he yells as the drak swings around and makes another pass over me. “Come.”

“Fine.” No reason to refuse now. “But how do I get up there?”

“I’ll grab you.”

I reach up and as he passes again, black hair fluttering like ribbons of rough silk. He sends down a thin rope of darkness, made of entwined shadows, to wrap around my arm.

Oh right. Shadows.They slither down my body, wrap around my waist and yank me up. I shout in panic as I dangle under the drak, whipped by the fierce wind of its speed as it flies past the edge of the platform, but the shadows lift me higher and higher, finally placing me on the saddle behind him.

Shaking, I slide my arms around him, clinging to his broad back as we fly off, my heart pounding its way up my throat. Did I mention I’m not good with heights? I hope I won’t throw up all over both of us.

The drak banks to the right, going at a speed that knocks the air from my lungs. A strand of hair is plastered to my face, half-blocking my vision, but there’s no way in all the hells that I’m freeing a hand to push it out of my eyes. I press my face to his back and hold on for dear life.

Jai—Phaethon—doesn’t wait to see if I’ve settled in okay or ask how I’m doing, but after a while, as we circle over the arena, I become aware of the shadows still wrapped around me. Holding me in place.

And I gradually also become aware of the hard planes of his chest under my palms, the coiled, hard muscles of his back shifting under my cheek, the steady heartbeat under my ear.

Distracting.

Is Jai the one making sure I don’t fall off, or Phaethon?

Does it matter?

I blink, startled by my own question.

“Get her!” someone yells from above us, and I recoil.

With a growl I feel in my chest, Phaethon jerks the drak downward. Flares of fire split the air on either side of us.

The squadron draks are trying to fry us.

Maybe we’re flying too high. Maybe we weren’t supposed to zip around the arena but stick to the game and these are the guards making sure we don’t run away.

The aerial watch. Making sure nobody has the chance to take the easy way out.

But as the attacking squadron draks spit more fire and our drak jerks, I wonder if it’s more sinister than that. If this is part of the trials.

Have we been hit? The black drak rears up, screeching, then jerks again, as if trying to throw us off.

Smart move.

But Phaethon murmurs words I shouldn’t be hearing over the wind, words that echo through my mind, and I feel his power pulsing against my skin. With a sure hand on the reins, he steers the drak to the left and down, into an almost headlong dive toward the water.

With the rushing wind pushing at me, snatching my breath, I peek to the side. The water underneath us is choppy but still reflects the black mass of the drak hurtling toward it.

A shiver rattles my bones but fear refuses to take root. Seated behind Jai’s back,Phaethon’sback, I feel unaccountably, stupidly safe. The feeling fills my chest, warms me up like a cozy fire, and I like it much more than I should.

I can’t trust such feelings.