Page 151 of Shadowborne: Reckoning

I didn’t respond—anything I said would only confirm her suspicions, and I knew I couldn’t do that. “Can you help me get to Ronen?” I asked faintly. At least she’d given me clean leathers, even if they weren’t dragonhide. I’d get to Donavyn’s apartment later when no one was watching.

“Of course.”

I didn’t speak to anything she’d said—which I realized later was a confirmation in itself. But by the time I made the connection, it was too late. I leaned heavily on Terra, but also let myself look as if I’d strengthened from eating and her herbs, so that I could move independently. I needed to get around tonight without someone hovering over my shoulder.

Terra walked me all the way back to the launch hollow, where Akhane remained stretched on the slope, though she’d curled her legs up now and her head rested on her foreleg.

I hurried to her, keeping my steps unsteady, then lowered myself to lay in the crook of her leg, stroking her, while Terra spoke with Tato and Nila.

“I’m worried about Akhane,” the healer said to both me and Terra. “She’s extremely weak, but she doesn’t want to be touched. It will make it difficult for us to help heal her—”

“Just give her time,” I said hurriedly. I didn’t want them doing anything that could reveal that she wasn’t as bad as she appeared. “Please, just give us both time.”

‘Akhane,’ I sent as Tato looked worriedly at Terra and they quietly discussed us. ‘Are you going to heal? I need to get to my brothers and find a way to connect with the other Shadowfang, but I’m worried about you. Tell me what you need.’

‘I will heal, Bren. But I am spent. I will lay here this evening. Tomorrow… tomorrow I’ll return to the stable. Only…’

The image of Kgosi’s stable, quiet, and with only the cold remnants of his smell after his absence, echoed through my head, along with her pain and grief. I swallowed hard. ‘They’ll be back soon. I’m sure of it. They can’t be more than a day behind us. You said yourself, Kgosi can fly faster.’

‘But if Carnage injured him or… Bren, we must go back soon. I’ll be able to locate him if I can just get closer—’

There was a shout from one of the Furyknights on the other side of the launch hollow, near the stable. I looked up. Terra and Tato both turning to look quickly as well. But all our attention was drawn overhead.

The night sky remained dark, stars twinkling, and a half-moon casting light on scattered clouds so that certain portions of the sky glowed as the clouds were lit from behind.

But when I followed the gaze of the Furyknight who’d shouted and looked up, I saw an arrowhead of dragons, high above—no more than five or six in formation. But as I was about to turn away, I saw two more.

Then five.

Then twenty.

Gaping, I scrambled to my feet. Terra jerked to look at me, a question in her eyes, then another shout went up—several shouts this time—as dozens… no, hundreds of dragons appeared, peppering the sky—all of them flying high, silhouetted against the clouds, or rimmed in silver by the moon. None of them circling to land. But there were so many.

Akhane’s head rose quickly and she struggled to her feet.

“Akhane, no. You need to rest—”

‘These are not our herd, Bren.’

“Oh, shit.”

Terra and Tato turned to look at me, but before I could tell them, a dragon near the stables bugled, then another, and suddenly, screams and calls rose throughout the dragon Keep, as one of the many, many dragons in the sky descended, approaching the launch hollow.

It was impossible to tell in the dark. I frowned as my fears crept up in my chest, to form a lump in my throat…

But it was Akhane, screaming and hauling herself to the top of the launch hollow slope that made my heart sink.

‘Bren! Bren—run! It’s Carnage!’

I had been scrambling after her, pulling myself up the slope to the grasses at the top, but I turned and whirled when I got there, just in time to see a massive, blue male landing heavily in the launch hollow. I felt the earth shudder under my feet as his footsteps thudded into the dirt.

And then all the dragons in the sky began to circle.

No… no! It couldn’t be! Kgosi had to have killed him!

“Akhane…” I breathed, my breath hitching. It can’t be. It couldn’t be. ‘Akhane would you know? Would you know if Kgosi… if they’d…’

‘I don’t know, Bren!’ Her voice was too high.