Page 210 of Feralheart

“Let me help.” Fen moved to Aristus’s other side.

We worked the buckles free. The saddle came off in my hands, and I set it aside.

The sound Aristus made vibrated through his chest.

I ran my hands along his neck, checking for pressure points. Feeling for inflammation. My magic stirred beneath my skin, responding to something it sensed even though I couldn’t identify what it was yet.

The collar sat where it always did, warm from Aristus’s body.

The moment my fingers got close, heat exploded in my palms, though this wasn’t the gentle warmth of healing. This burned like touching metal left too long in a forge fire.

I jerked back with a gasp.

Fen was beside me in an instant. “What’s wrong?”

“The collar.” I stared at my hands. The red lines glowed brighter than they ever had, the light climbing past my elbows. “My magic felt it when I saddled him for you.” I should’ve mentioned it right away, not waited until the trial had finished. “Selira says the wild ones have always known. I hoped I was wrong or that this was just pain where the collar rubs.” The words came out ragged.

“Every bonded dragon wears a collar. They all have abrasions under their tack.”

“We remove the harnesses, breastplates, and saddles, but never the collar. Why?”

“Without it, they’ll die.”

I tilted my head, studying the collar interwoven with runes. “Will they or is that what you’ve been told?”

He raked his good hand through his hair. “I…don’t know.”

“Has anyone ever removed the collar?”

He shook his head. “No one would dare try. Every child dreams of bonding with a chosen dragon. We want this.”

“But do the dragons?” I stroked Aristus’s leg. “My magic thinks this is a serious wound, not just an abrasion. Let me…” I reached out again, slower this time, letting my magic lead. The heat built as I got closer, but I pushed through it, my fingertips brushing the metal.

The world tilted.

Images flooded me. Not mine. Aristus’s.

Twenty-three years of pressure. The collar magically adjusting as he grew. His scales deforming around metal that never went away. Magic flowing through runes that weren’t just restricting his fire. They were restricting him. His growth. His healing. His ability to be what nature intended.

He was dying, slowly fading away into nothing.

I pulled my hands back, but the images didn’t stop. They kept flashing through my mind.

You see now, Selira said through the bond. We try to warn young ones, before the metal. We say, stay away, stay away. They do not always listen.

How could they listen when they were stolen the moment they hatched from their eggs?

“Do the mother dragons fight when you take their hatchlings?” I asked.

He blinked a moment before shaking his head. “I’ve never seen that part of the process. The council handles this for the kingdom.”

“There are no records?”

“None I’ve found, and I’ve read extensively in the archives.”

Hmm. I couldn’t fix that part of all this now. Only what was happening to Aristus. Assuming I could fix it.

The retirement pens were full of dragons barely thirty years old who moved like creatures three times their age. Aerie dragons stopped responding to anything but pain, while the wild ones stayed sharp. They were alive in ways the bonded ones weren’t.