BEACON WAS A GRIMY SMUDGE OF A CITY. THE AIR WAS STAINED gray-brown from the factories that handed out jobs in exchange for pumping noxious fumes into the sky. The streets were so jammed with carriages and horses that, looking from above, they resembled fat black veins. Most of the trees had shed their leaves in preparation for Solstice and looked less like lush herbage and more like wizened hands clawing for help.
Faron hated it.
She hated even more that she still had to save it.
Lightbringer flew unimpeded to a massive structure called the Saint Tower, named, Iya was sure to tell her, for the Gray Saint. It was a clock tower made of brick and limestone, topped by a tiled spire. The four glass clock faces were illuminated from within, and the silvery iron dials informed her that it was midafternoon. Above them, close to the top of the spire, was the belfry, which contained no fewer than four bells that chimed on the hour. The entire building was the first thing Faron had seen in Beacon that could reasonably be described as beautiful.
Lightbringer wrapped his colossal body around the spire and belched a cloud of fire over the congested city. “The time for deliberation is over,” Iya said, voice echoing through her head like a roar. “Who will join me?”
“A bit dramatic, don’t you think?” Faron sent back to get ahead of any suspicions. “I’m sitting right behind you.”
“I realize this will be difficult for you to process, but not everything is about you.”
Faron resisted the urge to pinch him and watched the sky instead. If his message had been meant for all the other Riders and dragons, they would soon appear on the horizon and everything would begin.
The stone from Rosetree Manor felt warm in the pocket of her riding leathers. Until now, she had kept it wedged in a hole in her pillow while she figured out how to use it and when. She could have put it anywhere else, but Rosetree Manor hadn’t just been Gavriel Warwick’s home. Reeve had been raised there, too. It felt as if she were carrying a part of him with her.
Sometimes she liked to lie in bed and imagine he were there, giving her an unwanted lecture on the architecture of the building and the theory behind the magic that protected it. She’d yawn, as if he were boring her, and he’d roll his eyes at her, and they would both smile, amused by each other’s quirks now that they had found common ground. She had never been in a relationship—and she hadn’t paid attention to the boys and girls Reeve had dated—so all she had now was her imagination. Iya had stolen any chance they’d had to explore what they could be. Keeping the stone in her pillow felt like stealing something back.
Besides, she’d slept dreamlessly since she’d stashed it there, as if the stone kept out Iya from her head at night. That magic alone was useful. Useful enough for her to carry the stone with her today.
She hoped the warmth of it meant that it was keeping her thoughts—her nervousness—from wafting Iya’s way. If this didn’t work, she’d just have to hope her overall plan went off without a hitch before he finally murdered her.
A sage dragon flew from the direction of the National Hall, lightning quick. A carmine followed at a more measured pace. From the direction of the distant Tenebris River, a medallion approached, bobbing like a dandelion on the wind. Iya’s mouth stretched into a grin that Faron could see from his profile, and Lightbringer sprang from the tiled spire to greet them all.
She expected him to launch a wave of fire down on Beacon to begin his destruction. Instead, he dropped beneath the approaching dragons and flew past them, toward the National Hall. His wings pumped hard to outrun the swifter sage, making the ground blur into a rush of dark colors. The brief flashes Faron caught of the city showed none of the panic and dread her people would feel with this many dragons in the sky. Life, peaceful and unremarkable, carried on here despite the war.
Her hands fisted around Iya’s waist.
Instead of attacking, Lightbringer landed in what looked like a massive field designed for that purpose. Faron saw flower beds, cobblestone paths, and a topiary clipped into the shape of dragons in flight. The Hall itself was a castle not unlike Hearthstone, with a sloped roof, and marble steps that led up to the back entrance. People were surging from the open doors, though many changed direction or stopped in their tracks when they saw the bone-white dragon staring them down.
“You,” said a tan-skinned man in a dark suit with silver pauldrons, his voice thick with loathing. Something about him seemed familiar, but Faron couldn’t figure out what. “How dare the two of you show your faces here.”
The two of you? Faron’s mind echoed. Iya did not respond, which was a relief. It meant he couldn’t hear any thoughts she didn’t specifically direct toward him. It meant the stone was doing its job.
That was the only relief from those venomous words.
Iya tilted his head. “Have we met?” When he spoke again, the curiosity had been replaced by delight. “Ah, my key to freedom. You look well.”
Faron studied the man again, but Iya saved her the effort. “This is Barret Soto, who created my dragon relic and aided the Warwicks in making contact with me,” he explained through the bond. “Former Mausoleum prisoner turned leader of Langley.”
“Your descendant,” Faron realized.
“Not as such,” said Iya. “He married into the family. But my descendants will catch up with us soon enough.”
“Please,” Faron said aloud, locking eyes with Barret Soto. “Tell my sister—”
“Stop allying yourself with Iya,” Barret interrupted, “and you can tell her whatever you like.”
“You don’t understand—”
“You waste your breath on your enemies, Faron,” Iya drawled. “They’ll only understand you when you speak in chains. If even then.”
Iya stood up in the saddle, and four of the people with Barret Soto immediately drew dragon relics from their pockets and beneath their clothes. Barret’s pauldrons were glowing, and his hands gestured until that golden light resolved itself into a translucent shield that protected the entire crowd.
“Iya and Faron Vincent, you are under arrest,” he said coldly, “for a long list of crimes that amount to treason. Come quietly and—”
Lightbringer roared, and it sounded almost like laughter.
“I wish I had the time to see you try,” said Iya. “But I am not here for you.”
Iya climbed the column of Lightbringer’s neck, turning his back to the group. Faron followed his line of sight to the sage dragon plunging toward them.
The very familiar sage dragon.
“Zephyra,” she breathed. Her sister’s former dragon. Faron hadn’t seen Zephyra since they had left San Irie, but she felt as if she’d known the war beast her whole life. After all, she had skimmed Zephyra’s soul three times before, each in a desperate bid to keep Zephyra from succumbing to the Fury. Now the dragon’s soul felt like an old friend. Her chest warmed even though she knew that Elara wasn’t here, not now that her dragon bond had been broken.
Then her stomach dropped. She twisted her head to look at Iya and his outstretched arm. “Wait, what are you—”
He closed his fist. Zephyra jolted, landing hard. Her wings carved holes in the lawn, and her Rider—Signey Soto, Elara’s girlfriend—jumped free of the saddle to keep from being buried beneath the dragon’s weight.
“Stop it!” Faron said, unstrapping herself from the saddle and climbing toward Iya. “STOP IT!”
“It is done,” Iya replied, settling between Lightbringer’s neck spikes. His smug expression made her want to punch him in the face, so she did. His head snapped back, and when he looked at her again, blood spilling from his nose, there was a feral smile on his face. On Reeve’s face. “Do it again. It changes nothing.”
Her own nose ached as she felt his pain through the bond, but nothing hurt as much as the guilt that twisted in her stomach. Hurting Iya hurt Reeve. Her anger had made her forget, and now Iya seemed delighted that she’d lost control, which just made her angrier. How many times would she lose to him before this war was over?
A roar as loud as a gong rent the air. Zephyra was back on her feet, snarling like a wild animal. Her eyes rolled from one person to another, her talons digging into the grass as if she were deciding who was the biggest threat. It was so unlike the gentle, intelligent creature Faron remembered that dread filled her.
“What did you do?” she whispered.
“Her bond is broken,” Iya murmured back. “She is free.”
Zephyra roared again and took to the sky. Flames sparked from between her teeth. Signey Soto was on the ground beneath her. Faron saw the disaster that was about to happen with perfect clarity. The cataclysmic flame, searing and unstoppable. The nauseating smell of burning skin, putrid and sour. The charred remains of Signey dropping like a brick to the blackened ground. And then the massacre: a feral dragon, surrounded on all sides by prey, ready to consume. To destroy.
Iya had not just broken Zephyra’s bond. He had transformed her from partner to predator. A beast of war returned to her martial instincts.
And they would all suffer for it.
Faron gripped the stone in her pocket. Her soul surged toward Zephyra.
The first time she had connected with the dragon’s soul, she had felt overwhelmed by the state of feral rage, the Fury that gripped Zephyra, brought about by Faron’s connection to Lightbringer and his own rage at being trapped in the Empty. She had never felt anger like that, power like that. It was like the magic of the gods, but destructive where theirs was creative. It was the kind of fire that demolished, not the kind that warmed.
This time was worse. Beneath the wrath, there had been a mind—lost to the Fury, but still present to take over once Faron had eased that pain. This time she felt nothing, or worse than nothing, because there was an absence of what should have been there. Zephyra’s thoughts were not simply buried; she was now incapable of rational thought. Her intelligence, her wittiness, her personality—gone. Her soul was a jumble of instincts and hunger.
She was an animal. Faron had never tried controlling the soul of an animal.
At least the stone kept her efforts from the grinning god behind her.
Stand down, she pressed into the cosmic force that was the dragon’s soul. These are your friends. Your people. You don’t want to hurt them. Stand down.
Zephyra released her flames in a blinding column of red and yellow.
Faron screamed, their connection severed.
When her vision returned, Signey was still there in the grass, her hands gripping her own head. Casting her in shadow were the broad wings of a carmine dragon, whose body was unaffected by Zephyra’s flames. Strapped to the dragon’s back were Jesper Soto and Torrence Kelley, two more of the Riders who had fought for San Irie. Jesper reached down toward his sister. Faron couldn’t hear them from here, but she assumed he was asking Signey if she was all right.
Barret and his group had scattered, some racing back inside to evacuate the building and others racing toward Zephyra to neutralize the situation. Another stream of fire from Zephyra arced across the grass, cutting off Barret from his daughter. Faron could hear his pained shouts of Signey’s name, could hear Jesper’s answering plea for him to stay back. Dragon relics glowed like stars as the Langlish soldiers drew on the magic to fight the flames.
Zephyra was no less pleased by the appearance of another dragon than she was by all the humans. She spewed fire a third time, and the carmine—Azeal, if Faron remembered correctly—blew flames right back. They collided in the air, throwing light and sparks across the garden. The dragon topiary was next to catch fire, only for fountains of frigid water to bubble up from their heads and put out the flames.
Through the blaze and the smoke, Faron looked back at Signey. Signey, who was still crumpled on the ground like a discarded ball of paper, pulling at her own curls as if she wanted to tear them out of her head. She was finally facing in Faron’s direction, and her expression wasn’t horrified. Not even close. It was hollow. Haunted. As if she’d forgotten how to feel, how to think.
As if the breaking of the bond had also broken her mind.
“I warned you,” Iya announced as a medallion dragon was next to arrive, distracting Zephyra from the rear while Jesper released his straps and dropped to the ground to check on his sister. “Join me or lose your dragons. You have two weeks before I come for another. Then one week. Then…”
He didn’t finish that sentence, but he didn’t need to. Instead, he shoved past Faron to climb back into the saddle. She couldn’t drag her eyes from the scene. Zephyra wove past Azeal and the gold dragon, avoiding their flames. The colliding blast pushed the dragons apart, leaving Zephyra to fly free.
“Take them,” Iya said over the bond. Once again, he was not speaking to her, but she could hear him as though he were. He wanted her to hear him. “And let’s go.”
Zephyra zipped toward the Sotos. Jesper shoved his writhing sister out of the way seconds before Zephyra’s talons gripped him as if he were a rag doll. Zephyra pumped into the sky, too high for him to struggle without risking a fatal drop, then hovered as though she planned to dive a second time. Lightbringer rose at a slower pace, belching fire toward the medallion dragon and Azeal to keep them from interfering.
“Leave her,” Iya said. “For now.”
Zephyra soared toward the Hestan Archipelago with Lightbringer close behind.
Faron tightened her grip around Iya even as her soul slipped from her body again. This time, she flew toward Signey. It was like feeling broken glass, if the shards could dissolve back into celestial matter on contact. The parts of Signey’s soul that had been interwoven with Zephyra’s were in pieces. If Faron let it carry on like this, Signey would have nothing left of herself. She would be nothing but an empty shell. She had to fuse Signey’s soul back together before it was too late. She had to try.
Faron drew on the enhanced power that Iya had knitted together for them and pumped that into Signey’s body, into Signey’s soul. Even if he couldn’t hear her intentions, he would soon feel the drain, so she worked quickly. Magic flowed from their bond, through her body, to her soul and into Signey’s, welding her soul back into one whole, commanding it to be unbroken, and giving it the power she needed to follow the command.
Signey, she said, pressing her words into the girl’s very being. Tell my sister I would never betray her. Tell her that I love her. Tell her—
Signey’s soul surged like a wave, slamming Faron’s consciousness against an invisible barrier. It felt like the shield she had found in the minds of Estella Ballard and Briar Noble, but even more hostile. The control that Signey exerted over herself was stricter, and returning her to full consciousness had weakened Faron too much to overcome it.
GET OUT OF MY HEAD! Signey screamed seconds before Faron was flung back into her own body. She collapsed against Iya, dizzy from the force of Signey’s fighting spirit and from the depth of the hatred Signey felt for her intrusion on her soul. If she had heard Faron’s commands at all, she’d shown no sign. In fact, Faron feared she had just made an enemy.
“Exhausted?” Iya asked cheerfully as they breached the clouds, Zephyra little more than a green spot before them. “We’ll be home soon.”
Faron let her eyes slide shut, hoping for sleep to claim her. Hearthstone was not her home, and never would be. But did that matter if she would never be welcome home again?
Her throat tightened. She thought of the newspaper from San Irie. Barret’s condemnation. The death of Zephyra’s personality. Signey’s hatred. The way her own silent actions looked like complacency.
Maybe she didn’t deserve to be welcomed home.
Maybe she never would.