Page 19 of Wings of Destruction

He’ll be able to grow up, if there is a force out there willing to protect the innocent and the good.

Will his mother actually return? I hope so. The settling feeling at the base of my spine only grows wider, and I wonder if it’s a warning for me to disabuse myself of hope before I cling too tightly.

Hope will only get you hurt. As will expectations. Those two things are the main ingredients in a recipe of pure disaster.

I lose my breath as the dark warrior comes up against my sister Elspeth. Oh, Ether, no.

I clamp down on the shouted warning that will give me away. Elspeth, please, run!

Turning away makes me weak. Hiding my eyes because I can’t bear to see who will be the victor in their head-to-head makes me as helpless as the farmers nestled at the very end wall of the cave with their spines turned to the light. They don’t want to see or know or hope.

And I’m joining them.

The seconds tick by but curiosity always wins out in the end, like an itch with the best intentions not to scratch only to eventually succumb.

I swivel back to the fight, and the warrior is off at a different part of the field. Elspeth is nowhere to be seen.

My throat constricts, and sickness bubbles up from the pit in my gut. No, no, what hap⁠—

A roar blots out the beat of my pulse. A piece of clear sky separates from the rest with a flap of wings.

Every part of me goes still and chains clank around my heart. That’s not the sky. The dragon is larger than any I’ve ever seen before, its head more massive than our stables, and its rider invisible from this angle.

My blood goes cold. The dragon swoops lower through the clouds and scatters them.

Leave. Our herd has to get out, they have to disappear and try to find places to hide. They can’t allow themselves to be seen by this creature. My scream of warning is lost at the back of my tongue. I can’t.

The toddler wakes long enough to sniffle and hiccup out a groan that will certainly end in another round of sobbing. He’s not alone. The rest of the children fill the cave with the echoing laments of their fear and sorrow, like the sound will drill into the stone and remain trapped here.

The children are scared, and I can’t make it worse by screaming for help. I freeze from the outside in.

Please, no.

My traitorous body has never learned to listen to my demands. There’s nothing but horror left as the pale dragon tilts back its sinuous head, and its lower jaw drops. The inky hole of its mouth fills with a blinding glow. I’m useless.

And I’m alone.

The realization screams through me as I watch my mother, my family, and all the other unicorn riders disappear under a wave of flame, burning to ash in seconds. The heat scorches the field, and the world constricts to red and orange and black.

There was no time to cry out a warning.

No time to run.

Everyone on the field is dead.

Five

Kieran

My pulse beats out a ferocious rhythm, echoing inside my skull, too loud to be ignored.

Wincing, I squeeze my thighs when Mozi twists to the left to avoid another swipe of Omram’s wing. This one is even less casually cruel than the first.

“Kieran.” General Roman Ryson flashes his signature grimace and the creased tawny skin around his eyes pulls tight. “I should not have to clean up your mess.”

Head lowered, I bite down on my tongue until pain flickers, keeping the words to myself. I wince against the tirade he’ll surely liberate on me.

There is no such thing as trading quiet words with my father.