Page 45 of I Dream of Dragons

That’s it. That’s my entire goal at this moment.

As we coast lower, I chance a glance to the side and my mouth drops open, because…Wow.If I thought the view from the top of the Sea Palace was breathtaking, well, this… this takes the cake.

I feel as if I can see the entire world from up here. Which is impossible, but the firmament bends around us, an upturned silver bowl, and the shallow sea and the lagoons bleeding out into the plain curve upward to meet its rim at the horizon, betraying the world’s real shape.

It feels like we’re flying in the core of the world’s eye with the Pillar revolving in its center, the sensation claustrophobic and impossible, yet somehow freeing.

Now we circle down over the Sea Palace, and I close my eyes as both draks dive toward the roof terrace.

The yellow drak is lagging behind us now, but I can’t turn my head to see why. The wind is a living thing trying to rip me off my seat and chuck me into the void. My teeth are rattling and my thigh muscles burn as I struggle to stay in the saddle. The reins are leaving burns on the inside of my fingers and palms. My teeth hurt and I feel that if I raise my lashes, my eyeballs will fly out.

Yikes.

As we spin lower and lower, the palace approaching us at an alarming speed, I wonder how you stop a drak. I mean, we all know by now how bad draks are at landing. It’s a miracle they haven’t gone extinct as a species, honestly.

Can one stop them? Should one st?—?

“Leave the landing details to me,”Keres’ dry voice stabs inside my head like a dead twig snapping.

Oh. Good.I think I’m weeping from stress and fear and relief, but it could also be all that wind, making my eyes leak just to restore moisture. My eyeballs feel baked. My hair has probably left welts in my neck and cheeks from lashing so hard as we flew.

Below us, I see people on the roof terrace. They are scrambling away as the drak’s shadow falls over them, elongating and continuing to stretch. There are tables and chairs and a tent over a pavilion. Were they preparing to celebrate the survivors’ return? Or the lack thereof?

Fragmented, disjointed thoughts.

Then we’re touching down, the drak’s claws screeching on marble tiles, probably leaving grooves. The fae nobility is likely to have an apoplectic fit at this destruction of their perfect terrace, but who cares?

The impact jars my bones and teeth, rattles my brain inside my head and drags a groan out of me. I’m prepared for it this time around, though, and hold grimly on until it’s over.

Predictably, the drak skids and slides across half the terrace before hitting enough furniture to come to a complete halt.

Behind us, another crash signals the landing of the goldfinch drak and I have enough presence of mind to turn and quickly check that Jai is still in the saddle.

For the record, he is.

All good, then. That’s all my exhausted mind can process right now. Both of us have made it out of the arena and into the palace, and both of us are still in one piece.

Shivering in my wet dress, the ends of my hair dripping down my back and over my breasts while the rest is surely a dried nest around my head, I slowly unclench my hands from around the reins.

The burns I felt have translated into wounds cutting through my palms and fingers. The reins are sleek with blood.

When I experimentally shift on the saddle, I bite the inside of my cheek to keep in a pained sound. The inside of my thighs has been scraped raw against the scales, painting them red.

Still. Mostly in one piece. There were moments I hadn’t thought it possible.

Moments when I thought I’d never reach the surface again.

I hunch over in the saddle, mulling this over. The thought of returning to the deep doesn’t appeal, and again the thought sends a shiver through me. Such thoughts are dangerous. The deep is where I belong, not here, among the living. My stay here was supposed to be temporary, quick—get in, kill the king, and get out.

Dive back under.

But of course I’m not ready to go back, I realize. I still haven’t finished my mission, and I need answers. Mars is here, a king now, and there’s so much I need to ask him?—

A fanfare jolts me, a blaring of trumpets, horns, and conches.

Then the king appears as if summoned by my thoughts, guards arranged around him, their wooden, gilded wings gleaming as brightly as the tall crown on his head. I stare at him and wonder what I want.

What do I really want? Me, Rae?