Seven of them that I can see from where Sesca and I have stopped to hover. They swoop and dive in ways that seem erratic at first. But after a minute of watching them, I begin to notice patterns—to see the way they're all ultimately drifting in the same direction. Something is organizing them. Something is steering them toward the Mouren lines.
I don't have to guess at what that something is.
Sesca lends me her vision again, and with it comes the ability to spot the culprit quickly: Malachi is standing atop a hill overlooking the valley, a sword hanging casually at his side.
He's not fighting. He's barely moving. His eyes are on the sky—on the dragons—and as I breathe in and open mysenses to all the magic in the air, I can feel it: the control he's exerting.
It's like a current building beneath the still surface of water, silently reaching, catching at whatever it finds and pulling. I can almost see it winding through the air, similar to how I can pick out elements—though it looks less like wispy threads of creation, and more like wires that are nearly translucent, shimmering noticeably only at certain angles.
These wires wind around the dragons, leashing them, and one by one they begin to drop toward the Mouren Army. A massive black-scaled beast with a broad head and curved horns takes the lead. Mouren's soldiers hold their formation until this dragon is low enough that its wingbeats create a spinning storm of dust and dry grass, and then they all seem to realize at once thattheyare its target.
And it isn't stopping.
Screams ring out.
The beast opens its mouth, something dark and churning gathering around its mouth.
No.
It's a quiet rebellion in the back of my mind. Not even a thought so much as a reflex. But somehow, it's enough to make the beast hesitate, its bat-like wings unfurling with a suddenness that jolts its flight to a stop and sends it tumbling end-over-end. It rights itself quickly, giving several furious flaps to stabilize. The dark energy around its mouth thins out, dispersing like harmless smoke into the wind. It snaps its jaw shut on nothing, confused and looking for direction.
The other six dragons careen toward it, and they all collide and tangle together in a chaotic knot of snapping teeth, flashing talons, and lashing tails, seemingly fighting to determine who will take the lead next.
Be still, I think—another quiet refusal of the violence, the chaos.
The dragons untangle themselves and turn slowly toward me, hovering with slow, methodical beats of their wings, mirroring Sesca’s calm, watchful body language.
Malachi's attention follows a moment later.
The moment his eyes land on me, pressure strikes my arm. It shoots through the Flamebound mark, sinking deep into my bones and settling with a heaviness that takes genuine effort to breathe through.
Sesca tucks and tilts her wings and we soar lower. Low enough that the violent energy of the battlefield rises over us in palpable waves. Close enough that I can truly catch and hold Malachi's gaze across the distance between us for one long, deliberate moment. Another pulse of pressure claws through my arm.
I push through it.
I think of what he said about love being weakness. Of the life I once knew going up in flames, leaving nothing but embers behind.
I think of another fire rising up from the ashes of that old life, and of everything I have survived to make it here, to this point, rising above it all on the back of a dragon with divine power and potential and world-altering magic coursing through my veins.
Then I say to Sesca:Bring me to him.
She answers with a roar that shakes the air.
We descend.
Chapter Forty-Seven
The other dragons are already shaking off whatever hold I had over them.
They're circling restlessly, taking aim once more at Mouren's lines, so Sesca doesn't hesitate after dropping me on top of the hill where Malachi stands; she banks hard the moment my boots hit the ground, wheeling back toward the sky and streaking off to corral them.
I watch her for an instant, concerned about how outnumbered she is.
But I have my own fight to focus on.
Malachi is already moving toward me.
The battle continues to build above and below us, the noise of it enormous and strangely distant all at once. Malachi strolls forward as if he's forgotten about everything except me, wearing an odd expression that takes me a moment to pin down. It looks almost like respect, or maybe intrigue—both of which feel more dangerous than the anger I expected. I can almost see the wheels turning behind hisdark gaze, his desire to possess me surging into something even more maniacal than before.
