BLOOD GUSHED FROM THE BLACK WELT FARON’S ATTACK HAD opened, slicking Lightbringer’s body in crimson and green. Even with his chin hidden again, Faron continued to throw out lightning. Her world had narrowed to this beast and her power. He had made her stronger, even without access to the gods, even without the bonds, and now he would fear her the way he had sown fear throughout her world.
She wouldn’t stop until Lightbringer fell from his perch, executed the way he had executed Aveline.
Tears dampened her face, and hate swelled in her chest. He’d wanted a massacre. They would bring him one.
Lightbringer was so distracted that he didn’t notice the tiny black spot climbing up the column of his neck. Gael Soto was slick with substances Faron didn’t want to give name to, but Lightbringer was being attacked from so many sides that he must not have felt the sword Gael was using as a piton between his scales. A scarlet gleam seemed to follow Gael’s every movement, as though he were using all this blood to help propel himself upward.
Gael had been confident that he would be able to get close enough to Lightbringer to climb his back, but Faron hadn’t quite believed him until now. Until he’d gotten so close that now, more than ever, they needed to keep Lightbringer from becoming aware of him.
Faron swiped at her face before her blurred vision could become a liability. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw Aveline. Alive and raising one patronizing eyebrow as she corrected Faron’s behavior. Dead and leaking blood around Lightbringer’s massive spike. Alive and laughing beneath the stars during a rare moment of peace during the war. Dead and plunging through the air like an anvil.
The night before the official end of the first war had been Aveline’s birthday. They had brought her a headscarf sourced from a stall in Seaview months before, and Aveline had held it in shaking fingers before asking if they were scared of what lay ahead. Faron had looked up at the young queen’s face—so old, she’d seemed then, when she had been only seventeen, the same age that Faron was now—and she had said the same thing she still believed now: When the queens died, when they took Port Sol, everyone in Deadegg thought that was it. We’d lost. We’d be Langlish again, and enslaved again, because we fought back. But then, Irie answered my prayers. She led me to you. And together, we’ll win.
Together.
They were supposed to win together.
And now Aveline was dead. Part of Faron had died with her.
“Faron, he’s noticed Gael!” Elara’s voice echoed through from the panel in front of her. “Why aren’t you attacking?”
Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Faron shook herself free of the past and focused on the present. Lightbringer’s neck twisted as he tried to spear Gael Soto with one of his sharp teeth while Gael tried desperately to hold his position. Faron blasted holes in Lightbringer’s hide, strike after strike in Aveline’s name, until the dragon’s legs gave out and he collapsed on the rooftop. Nobility had even joined the fray to avenge their fallen queen, raining fireballs down from above to keep the dragon from trying to fly into a more advantageous position.
Gael got closer and closer to Lightbringer’s head.
But the dragon refused to give up.
Lightbringer shook his head from side to side, trying to dislodge the smudge of black that was Gael, but Gael clung to the dragon’s snout with the kind of tenacity Faron recognized in the boy who had told her he had only ever wanted to protect his people. Sometimes he slipped, but he never once fell. Every time she saw him, he had risen higher and higher, until Gael sank his sword into Lightbringer’s right eye, dragging his weapon down until the organ collapsed.
Lightbringer’s roar shook the world.
Faron grinned, teeth bared like a feral animal.
Crimson gushed over Lightbringer’s face, joining the stains on his neck and body. He twisted his head even harder, but Gael had already yanked his sword from the socket. Faron aimed her next attacks at that eye, knocking Lightbringer back against the flat roof of Hearthstone.
Gael rolled to his left, bloody sword still in hand, and then came to a stop. His motionless body stretched out beside Lightbringer’s like an offering.
“He’s been hurt,” Faron realized. “He’s been hurt! If Lightbringer sees—”
“No, no, no,” said Elara. “He’s in Signey’s brother. He can’t—we can’t lose Jesper. Not like this. I have to—I have to help—”
“Elara, don’t—”
Faron had no idea how to end that sentence. They had a plan, but, with Gael out of commission, the plan was in tatters. How could she ask Elara to leave Jesper Soto in peril after all Elara had done to save her? How could she watch as Signey Soto lost her sibling after Faron had brought this on them all just to protect her own? They might have been safer in the air, but she wouldn’t be able to live with herself if Jesper died like this, asleep in his own body as it fought without his consent.
She unstrapped herself from the pilot’s seat and stretched her fingers, the scalestone bracelets rattling on her wrists. Ready for a fight. Ready for vengeance.
Ready as Valor shot toward the roof of Hearthstone, toward the writhing half-blind dragon who could spell their doom.