Page 33 of Wild Bond (Wild Bond #1)

I came awake with a start, once again not knowing where I was. I was growing sick of this.

Daisha.

Anger flared at the sudden thought of her, and everything flooded back. The fight on the cliff’s edge, losing the flowers, the pain—

Falling.

I’d fallen from the cliff and the pain . . . the pain was gone. Nothing felt broken. Nothing hurt. Which didn’t make sense. I should not have survived that fall.

I slowly assessed my body and realized I felt perfectly fine. How was this possible? I had felt my bones break on impact before I blacked out. I should be dead—but I wasn’t. Was I dreaming? How was I healed so completely? As I got to my feet, I realized I no longer bore any of my other injuries either. The now dried blood was still there on my skin and clothes, but the slashes and claw marks from the harpy and the hounds had disappeared.

Then I realized the barrier between Skye and me in the bond was gone. I wanted to cry with relief. I could sense her. She wasn’t far, and she was on her way to me. How had she gotten free?

Looking around, I saw my sword lying on the ground not far from where I had fallen. By some miracle, it wasn’t broken or damaged. Picking it up, I tucked it into my belt.

Glancing up, I could just make out Skye’s silhouette among the stars above. There were also two other dragons not far behind her.

Skye landed beside me. Her happiness at seeing me was only rivaled by my own, and all my questions about what had just happened were forgotten as my dragon lowered her head and my arms went around her muzzle in a crushing hug.

A sound rattled in her chest, almost like a rumbling purr.

Before I could do more than bask in having Skye back, the other two riders landed not far away. I was surprised and relieved to see Dembe was one of them, though I didn’t know the other rider.

“Rin!” Dembe cried, moving to my side. “Thank the Nine you’re all right. When I saw Skye among the other dragons, I didn’t know what to think. How are you here?” he demanded. “How did you and Skye enter yourselves in the trials?”

“I don’t know,” I fumbled. “I mean we didn’t, we—”

“I think the more important question,” the unknown dragon rider said, speaking over me, “is how your dragon was able to break the enthrallment spell without the help of the flowers?” I turned to regard him fully now and could just make out a sharp face with Zehvitian features as he finished in a slightly accented voice, “That shouldn’t be possible.”

I shrugged as I admitted, “I don’t know. A lot about what has happened tonight hasn’t made any sense.” I glanced at Dembe. “How are you here? I thought dragon riders weren’t allowed to interfere in the trials?”

Dembe shook his head. “We’re not. Prince Amir and I, as well as a representative of Halmar, were assigned to watch over the entranced dragons, since they’re in a vulnerable state until their riders free them. When Skye broke the enthrallment, we followed her to investigate.”

I jolted at the realization that the other rider was a prince. The Zehvitian king’s second born, going by his name. Pushing that aside for now I asked, “Does what happened with Skye mean I can’t continue to compete, then?” I felt surprisingly disappointed at the thought of stopping now.

The prince and Dembe shared a look before the prince spoke. “I don’t see why you shouldn’t continue. If you fail, it won’t matter anyway, and if by some miracle you pass, we can always discuss what happened with Skye and the circumstances of your arrival. The rider leadership can decide if they will let it stand, or if you are disqualified.”

Dembe looked at me, worry and so many questions burning in his eyes. “It’s your decision, Rin,” he stated. “I can escort you around the mountain to the other side of The Rift where everyone is waiting, or you can continue.”

I turned to look up at Skye whose neck was still lowered, her snout only a few feet above my shoulder.

Well? I asked her. Con had hinted that this next part of the trial would involve her as well.

She snorted and released a small grumbling huff as she stared down at me with her large emerald eyes. That, paired with her excitement for the coming challenge, was confirmation enough.

Flying low on Skye’s back—Dembe having lent me his dragon’s saddle—we approached a small clearing in the trees below, just before the entrance to a menacing wall of rock that overhung a massive cave opening.

Dembe and Prince Amir were trailing me, and I saw another rider I didn’t recognize. The woman stood beside a pale-yellow dragon; she had to be the rider from Halmar that Dembe had mentioned. There was also another dragon, this one larger, male and grayish-black that sat back on its hind legs, tail curled around it. He stared vacantly at a glowing golden orb that floated before him in the air.

I sensed Skye’s desire to glance at the shining object that illuminated the surroundings in a soft light, but thankfully she resisted. I assumed this was what held the dragons enthralled, and if Skye allowed herself to be entrapped again, I didn’t have any flowers to free her.

I assumed I was only one of two riders left in the trial who hadn’t yet entered The Rift, if the grayish-black dragon was any indication.

“Hurry, Rin!” Dembe called. “You don’t have much time before sunrise, less than an hour.”

I waved back at him. Without letting myself think too hard about it, I pulled the sword from my belt, and as one, Skye and I dove down toward the dark cave mouth and entered The Rift.

Ever since Con had mentioned caves were part of the trial, I had been mentally preparing myself for this moment. Trying to, at least. Still, entering another cave, a cave darker and much more forbidding than the one beneath the temple, where I had panicked so thoroughly, was difficult.

I could feel the familiar panic rising, but I pushed it down. Instead, I focused on Skye’s calming presence and my desire to prove to myself, and everyone else, that we could finish the trial.

The utter darkness was still disconcerting as Skye flew further into the cave, and I was sure it would have been even if I didn’t have a strange phobia. I knew Skye could see just fine in the dark, but a shiver still coursed down my spine. Not only at the darkness, but the complete stillness and absolute quiet around us, broken only by the occasional sound of dripping liquid or the quick skuttle of movement.

I was about to ask Skye to breathe fire, even if only for a moment so I could at least have an idea of what our surroundings looked like, when there came a screeching from above. I gasped as something hard hit me in the shoulder.

With a roar, Skye released a jet of bluish yellow flames upward toward the threat.

Unsure what was attacking us, I looked up, trying not to squint at the sudden burst of light. When I saw what it revealed, I almost wished I hadn’t.

Cave goblins. Dozens of them. Swarming over the stone ceiling of the cave like locusts.

The goblins had huge shining opaque eyes so large they took up the majority of their faces, and a greenish tint to their hairless, wrinkled skin. Knobby shoulders and arms that appeared longer than their bodies hung down so that they used them more like forelegs to climb over and grip the stone with sharp clawed hands.

Several of the creatures shrieked as they burned and fell and were encompassed by the darkness below. The rest of the creatures hissed and shrunk back from the light of the flames.

Still more goblins continued throwing what I now realized were stones at us, moving so quickly along the cave walls and ceiling that I couldn’t keep track of them all as Skye continued flying and breathing fire.

As I ducked to miss the rocks, I saw that the cave narrowed significantly up ahead. The goblins were congregated there, waiting, knowing we had no choice but to pass through.

As we approached, adrenaline raced through me, and I raised my sword. The rock walls jutted out so Skye’s wings only cleared them by inches. As we passed between them, half a dozen goblins leapt onto Skye.

I swung out with my sword, slicing one across the chest. The force of the blow made the goblin lose its balance and fall from where it had latched onto Skye’s side. I turned just in time to duck and block the slash of another’s claws. The goblin screamed in fury as Skye flung another free from her tail, whipping it off like it was no more bothersome than an annoying gnat.

Skye had now cleared the narrow pass, and the cave opened up around us again. As I continued to engage the goblins, it was made all the more difficult by the fact that there were moments between Skye’s breaths that I couldn’t see anything at all and was temporarily blinded. Luckily, goblins were sensitive to light and seemed just as disoriented by the rapid flares of light and darkness as I was, otherwise, I no doubt would have been bludgeoned by now.

One of the goblin’s claws cut through my shoulder, and I grunted in pain before stabbing clean through the creature’s chest and kicking it free of my blade. Another crawled up the back of Skye’s neck. I warned Skye in the bond, and she whipped her head around in time to snap the goblin from her neck and crush it in her large jaws.

Eventually, we managed to get rid of the goblins that were clinging to Skye, but only had a moment of respite before we passed through another narrow section of the cavern and even more of the goblins clambered onto her back.

Skye and I quickly fell into a rhythm. I slashed and swung my sword, kicking and hitting the goblins if they came near, while Skye used teeth and claws to lash and bite, tearing and ripping through our enemies. At one point, Skye was forced to claw her way up the cave wall, with me bent low to her back, just managing to squeeze through a narrow passage that was barely big enough for a dragon her size to pass through.

I realized there must be more than one route to make it out of The Rift. Even though we were one of the last pairs to enter, I had yet to see another dragon or dragon rider since entering the caves. And there was no way most of them would be able to fly through that opening with their much larger dragons.

I quickly dismissed the thought as other creatures joined the goblins, creatures even more grotesque and hideous, with spindly limbs, sharp teeth, and misshapen bodies. I didn’t even know what they were. Skye blasted them with her fire at every opportunity, but the parasites were like a swarming plague that never ended. Even as her breath melted them to the very stone, more appeared, crawling over the dead to take their place.

The experience took every ounce of my training and then some. I heard Rake and Dembe’s voices in my mind constantly, reminding me, instructing me. I kept the bond open, continually communicating with Skye as we flew and spun and fought. I wondered faintly if it was past dawn already. It was impossible to tell in here. It was so dark in the cave that I could only see anything when Skye’s flames lit up the shadows.

Just when I thought this battling and eternal darkness would go on forever, Skye sensed a faint lessening of the darkness ahead. It took only a few minutes until I could see it, too. A weak gray light came into view, growing steadily lighter until I could just make out a break in the cave wall.

A rush of exhilaration zinged through me at the sight. Slashing through a final leathery-skinned creature, I shoved it free of my blade as Skye released a final breath of flame. Her serpentine head whipped from side to side as the fire engulfed the area around and below us. The shrieking cries of the dying creatures were drowned out by the licking crackle of flames and Skye’s roar that echoed off the stone.

Go! I urged Skye, knowing she wouldn’t hear me if I yelled it aloud. Sunrise could only be moments away, if it wasn’t here already.

Feral excitement reached me, and I could almost feel her bloodlust as we shared in the pulsing adrenaline of battle. Gripping the saddle, I leaned low over Skye’s neck as her wings pumped and stretched, and she put on a burst of speed.

The opening grew larger, looking like a great jagged scar in the darkness, letting in the predawn light.

We were out of time.

“Come on!” I screamed. We were almost there. I leaned further forward, willing Skye to go faster. Our connection was such that my breaths were heaving in and out of my chest as if I was the one exerting the effort to propel us forward.

Almost . . . there . . .

Skye and I shot through the opening, just as the first rays of sunlight crested the peak of the mountain and shone down on the waiting crowd of dragons and dragon riders below.