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Isitdor and Tachril fought from the skies, flaming wildly at the human Magikas rushing toward the dragons on the ground. Guarding their flank were Nazscal and Hyoogan.
Now I could see why we’d only had ragged assaults on the human captives – most of the army’s efforts were focused on the dragons. A flood of soldiers plunged toward the dragons still bound on the ground, Magikas in their midst flinging fireballs as the dragons in the air dodged and rolled to avoid the sticking fire.
But the dragons were anchored to this spot. They didn’t dare leave it to use their advantage of mobility – not when three dragons lay on the hillside, immobile. I picked out Izhoedi’s form first. He was still chained in place, his head fighting wildly at the chain keeping him in place. At least he was still alive! If I could get to him, I could unchain him.
I heard breathing behind me and then Devind overtook me, rushing toward his trussed dragon like an arrow from a bow. The shouts behind me told me that the others were following, too, but I needed to keep running. If anyone could get Izhoedi free, it would be me.
“Just do it from here!” my mimic urged. “You keep forgetting everything that you can do. You’re wasting time!”
He was right. I reached out to the lock on the chains through the ring around my neck and snapped it free. The chains fell off Izhoedi like cut vines as he thrashed them away, his wings unfurling. Devind barely had time to leap on his bare back before he was in the air, scouring the earth before him with streams of flame.
The attempted theft of the dragons’ souls clearly hadn’t weakened all of them.
But Izhoedi’s leap into the air revealed the two Green dragons lying still on the ground behind him. They didn’t lie tense like they were trapped and waiting to be freed. They lay limp, wings deflated, heads lolling.
And one of them wasn’t a Green at all.
“Saboraak!” the cry ripped from my lips and I ran, stumbling, rolling across the dirt, getting up again and then barreling forward with no thought to what was behind me or under me or above me. Had they succeeded? Was she dead?
I reached her side, my vision a blur as my heart beat too fast.
My hands reached her muzzle first, running over it. She was hot – burning hot. Her eyes were closed – but she was breathing. Her breath was weak and thready for a dragon, but it still puffed out her wide nostrils.
“Saboraak.” My tears splashed on her hot face leaving little puffs of steam where they hit. “Hold on. I’m here. We’ll get you out of this.”
But how was I going to help her? I released the lock on her chains, letting them fall away, but the long tube that ran from her neck was still there. I followed it with my eyes to a metal rod on the ground. The tube seemed to be jammed between her scales. I reached for it to pull it out.
“I wouldn’t,” the mimic warned.
Why not? It was what had done this to her! It had sucked the life out of her!
Beside us, I saw Lenora fall to the ground, skidding across the mud to get to her dragon.
“Lypukrm!” she wailed. But there was no warmth rising off Lypukrm. And the rod on the end of his tube glowed with an unearthly light.
“I think they were sucking her soul out,” the mimic said.
“Got it in one guess, genius.” His words stirred a fury in me. I reached again for the tube. It shouldn’t be in her. She shouldn’t be disgraced like that!
“Stop!” my mimic screamed at me. “Listen!”
What?
“You have power over souls. You suck them here and shove them there. Just pull it out of the rod and put it back in her!”
I froze. It couldn’t be that easy.
“Easy? What are you, divine? Moving a soul from one place to another is not what anyone else would call easy!”
True.
“If you don’t try, you’ll lose her forever. Look at Lenora. Do you want that to be you?”
I glanced at Lenora, draped over her dragon bawling. On either side of her Nostar and Letina stood, fighting off any soldiers who pushed past the flames of the dragons above. There weren’t many, but those who came had bloodlust in their eyes.
My hands shook as I held the tube, not pulling it away this time, but instead concentrating, focusing, forcing my will upon it.
“Come on!” the mimic encouraged.
I tried to be gentle. I tried to be enticing. I tried to ease the energy from the rod back into the tube and move it toward my dragon. Instead, it flashed through the tube like lightning, blowing me back with the force of it.
I fell backward, hitting my head on the dried mud ground. Stars danced across my vision but when I opened my eyes my dragon was pulling herself up onto her feet, shaking like a dog out of a pond.
Tor? What took you so long.
I stood, shaking, joy filling me like a sunbeam in my heart. She lived! She was fine.
“Oh, you know me,” I said. “Always like to make an entrance.”
Her dragon smile made the world right again.
We seem to be under attack. Mount up!
But I had something to do first. Could she take my friends? I motioned to Gran and Stef, standing back a little, their eyes large as saucers as they watched Saboraak’s transformation.
Of course. But hurry. Isitdor says we need to move.
I nodded. But I wanted to make sure that all of us could move. I ran to where Lypukrm lay in the mud. Gently, I shook Lenora.
“Lenora? You need to stand up.”
“I can’t leave him like this,” she said, her eyes red and puffy.
“Just let me look, okay?” I tried to keep my tone kind as I bent over her dragon.
It might not work. After all, Saboraak had not been completely drained when I got to her.
I put my hand on the tube and called to the life in the rod.
Nothing.
I tugged a little harder, asking it to come.
Nothing.
Skies and Stars! What was with stubborn souls? Irritated, I yanked at the soul in the rod, demanding it return to the dragon it belonged to.
I should have expected some blowback after what happened with Saboraak, but I was too focused on the task.
The world went dark.