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“Could this possibly get worse?” Pepha groaned, dropping her head into her hands.

Mezhimar pulled her into his arms, the gesture tentative and new, but Pepha curled into him.

Iryana closed her eyes in defeat.

“Uh, it can,” Mezhimar breathed.

“Why would you say that!” Pepha snapped, voice shrill.

“Look.”

They all turned.

A great winged beast was on the horizon, flying right toward them.

Iryana paled.

Chapter Forty-Nine

“The nemak is back?” Lidishta held a hand over her eyes to see better.

“Didn’t it fly in that direction though?” Vabihn pointed a bit farther north.

Iryana strained, trying to see. The winged shape was a bit blurry, but then the shape split. There were two of them.

“Ah, shit.” Shahn groaned. “Those are dragons.”

Mhakiza had sent her dragons?

“Perhaps they aren’t coming for us,” Iryana suggested weakly. But what were the odds?

She could hear the others discussing, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away. She had the sinking suspicion that this was her fault. That they were coming for her. She tuned the others out as much as she could.

“Or the metal-badger?”

“Can’t the dragons sense that it’s dead?”

“And why would they need two dragons to kill one metal-badger?”

Pyetar held her hand.

They stood there, watching the dragons fly closer, long enough that the cold started seeping through their coats and winter gear, despite their fire-imbued layers.

“Back away from the metal-badger,” Pyetar ordered, ushering everyone to the far end of the dirt clearing to leave as much room between them as possible.

As they neared, Iryana realized they were a bit different from each other. One of the creatures was the color of cooled ash, but the other looked more like burning embers. Their mouths reminded her of stories of alligators from southern Istri.

Iryana swallowed, half-convinced they were about to be eaten alive.

The jolt of their impact ran up her legs and rattled her teeth. The landing was much more controlled than the one at the fortress, though they knocked over a few trees. They perched on the far end of the clearing, staring at them and not the body of the metal-badger.

Gods, they were huge. Their legs were longer than she was tall. She wasn’t sure she could have reached a dragon’s stomach from the ground unless it laid down.

“Maybe we should have run,” Pepha squeaked.

“They’d just chase us down,” Vaneshta reminded her.

The dragons shifted and Iryana braced herself, but they just settled themselves against the ground. From this new angle, a figure was visible astride the back of each dragon.