Page 36 of Wings of Destruction

The marks are hidden beneath my clothes where no one can see his expertise in finding which tendons and veins will sting the most when he pays them attention.

After several days of breakneck pace, we round the final hill with only miles to go to our destination.

One of the guards clears his throat and points. “Ahead.”

His voice is husky, knocking me out of my head long enough for me to force my bones into motion. I’ve frozen from being in one position too long. The fabric tent protecting the carriage from the sun’s glare pulls back under his scarred fingers.

There.

My mouth dries and the excitement I always thought I’d feel repositions solidly into unease.

DragonSpear Academy is a blight on the landscape. Or maybe my overactive imagination paints it as such.

The massive castle dominates the sharpest spear of the mountain range and rises above the rest of the smaller cliffs. Five distinct levels terracing higher, piled on top of each other, twin spires bookending the bulk.

The grand, fairy-tale castle was built by an earlier king to educate the kingdom’s youth. Once, in another life, I pored over books on its medieval architecture and opulent rooms.

Each arched gothic window is a black hole absorbing light rather than reflecting it and there are thousands of them cutting through the storm gray stone exterior.

We traverse the gorge below it until the rocky hill comes into clear detail.

That life is over. The sight of the structure sets my teeth clacking again.

The guard settles back into his slumped, cross armed posture, his eyes closing behind the slits of his helmet. The carriage joints pull and squeal as we take the first switchback up to the castle, the incline sharp.

A jolt sends me careening toward the railing and the guard reaches out to grab the ropes around my ankles before I topple over the side. My breath catches.

If he hadn’t grabbed me⁠—

He keeps the rope in hand while we rise, the air thinning and the flapping fabric granting glimpses of the valley below. The road we took thins out then disappears between the press of trees.

We’ll be there soon enough. Every exhale is a countdown to doomsday for me.

The school I’d thought would be a fresh start, a way for me to hone my skills, to make myself into something worthwhile, it’s all twisted now.

“Whoa!”

Tristan pulls up beside the cabin, working the reins of his horse between his calloused palms, and his smile freezes the blood in my veins.

“We’re here, gorgeous.” He leers at me and somewhere in the distance, his red beast of a dragon gives a roar of acknowledgement.

Andromeda, I’d heard him call her.

“I’ll knock your pretty nose out of joint if you come any closer.” My voice hardens. “It might add character.”

He leans closer. “We both know I’m gorgeous. And you’re ruined.”

Tristan drops the flap and the clatter of hooves against cobblestone marks his departure. The moment the wheels stop turning, the guard spurs into action, the others dropping from horseback to escort me into the bowels of the castle.

It takes three of them to get me out of the back of the carriage. I rear back, kicking out against open air, my legs tethered together.

Twin attendants man either side of the open doors, their shapeless uniforms blending into the stone at their spines. They nod at our approach but their eyes stay averted. Off of me.

Why the front door?

I snarl, twitching and tugging against the men holding me by the elbows, the other at my knees.

The open doors of DragonSpear are thick enough, heavy enough, to need more than those two attendants to draw them closed.