I try. Several times, I attempt to sneak away after she calms down. Each time, I'm struck again with her panic, her distress, her certainty that something terrible is about to happen to me.
“You ridiculous, dramatic creature,” I say, making my way back to her for the fourth time. It doesn't come out as harsh as I intended, though.
Because I don't think she's truly being dramatic.
Something is wrong, something is stirring in the darkness beyond these walls, and we both know it. It feels like we're trapped in a fragile shelter while a storm is starting to build outside. Like we're bracing for impact together. And, not for the first time, I'm at least glad I don't have to face whatever's coming alone.
So I decide to stay, settling down on the ground beside her.
Blight shifts closer, curling her body around mine.
I lean into her slowly, reluctantly.
And that's how I eventually fall asleep, hours later—with her warm scales pressed against my back, while the clouds roll in a strange wind and the distant roar of dragons echoes throughout the night.
Chapter Fifteen
“Well now,thisis an encouraging sign, isn’t it?”
I startle awake at the sound of Gareth’s voice. It takes me a moment to orient myself; I’ve spent the past hour caught somewhere between dreaming and waking, convinced I must have been imagining the strange world around me.
But no, I’m actuallyhere—resting against the side of a dragon, trapped in the shadow of the Mouren Palace, still wearing the dirty clothes I fell asleep in during my impromptu visit to the arena last night.
I scramble away from Blight, combing my fingers through my hair and rubbing my eyes, trying to make myself look somewhat more presentable as I stand to face Gareth.
“You two must be getting closer if you’re cuddling up to sleep together,” he comments.
“Or maybe I was just exhausted,” I mutter with a yawn.
He turns away, his reply more to himself than me. “Yesterday was an exhausting day…and night…for many of us.”
“For you too, huh?”
“Yes.” He doesn’t elaborate on his absence, or on anything that happened—nothing about thebusiness in Dunnalthat I heard the king mention. My mind spins with questions, but I know he won’t answer them now; he’s always pure business at the start of any given training session.
I stretch and move a bit, and it’s then that I notice the trial taking shape around me—at least twenty stone-faced soldiers are arranged strategically along the length of the arena. Every one of them is armed with a bow, full quivers ready at their hips.
I swallow a groan.
Gareth clearly has no intentions of going easy on me, regardless of what kind of terrible night either of us just endured.
“A firing squad?” I joke, scanning the line of archers. “Does this mean you’ve officially run out of patience with me?”
“They’re blunt-tipped arrows.” He rolls the tension from his neck and shoulders. “Well, most of them, anyway.”
“…Most of them?”
He shrugs. “If you avoid them all, you won’t have to worry about the ones thataren’tblunt.”
I exhale a long, slow breath, trying to keep my pulse even.
Make progress, or your friend is doomed.
Kestrel’s words have haunted me since she spoke them yesterday evening. Repeating them to myself gives me the courage to scan the arena again, to prepare myself and start making a plan. Whatever Gareth throws at me…I can do this.
I have to do this.
There are barricades set up between the archers, as well as sections where the arena’s sand has been purposefully scraped or built-up, creating uneven terrain. It’s a wholedamn obstacle course. I have no idea how I slept through all of this being set up; I must have been even more exhausted than I realized—or maybe it was the odd, otherworldly warmth that surrounds Blight, making me sink into a deeper slumber.
