Page 104 of To Fight and To Fold

He was clutching his wings and limbs close, and Aaryn feared the worst as she neared. If struck just right, the bellies were the most tender on a dragon, ripe for blades and arrows as long as the attacker got between the scales.

"It's okay," she cooed. "Let me see."

Where was Carissa? What about her husband?

Voices around her called for the healers.

The dragon's labored breaths were calming, and his wings twitched where they cradled around him.

"Where's Carissa?" she asked softly. "Rolim? Either of them?"

The dragon huffed, and then his wings moved.

Aaryn gasped at the bloodied figure clutched in his arms. "Carissa!"

The dragon relinquished her to Aaryn, who dragged her onto the soft surface of the grass. It didn't seem to be her own blood, but she was unconscious. Aaryn looked back up to the dragon, and found what she feared.

Great slashes and arrows dug into the dragon's belly.

The healers arrived, but they were not armed with bandages and ointments. Instead, magic glowed softly in their hands as bit by bit they saw to the dragon.

Vaelen herself came to Carissa and knelt down, expression grim. "It's not her blood," Aaryn told her.

With a gentle push of magic from the archdruid, Carissa awoke with a gasp. "Rolim!" was on her lips, and Aaryn steadied her.

"Carissa, you're in the circle. You're safe. What happened?"

She sat up, searching for her dragon, who was breathing much easier now, his wounds healing quickly, aided by magic.

Her eyes were wild, darting around, connecting dots. She grabbed Vaelen's arm with a conviction Aaryn had not seen in her before. "They're attacking Skymore."

"Who?"

"Evergale. We were—the honeymoon. Rolim and I were separated. Stormstrike got me out of there, but not before⁠—"

Vaelen cupped her cheek. "You are safe."

"Please find him," Carissa said, tears in her eyes. "Rolim's still down there."

Vaelen glanced down, her gaze softening on the woman in Aaryn's lap. "We will do our best, child." Her attention shifted to Aaryn. "Take her somewhere calmer."

Aaryn nodded, because there was no way she would put up an argument, not with the intensity of Vaelen's eyes, the energy in the air.

Things moved quickly from there. Vaelen called out orders, confident, strong.

In a flurry, bodies shifted and moved like a well-trained army, and in moments the Awakened were mounting their dragons, taking off, flying through the barrier as druids worked magic to open it, before diving down and to the west, toward Skymore, with riders on their back. Some of the Awakened were armed, and some of the largest dragons carried things like cots on their back, between their wings.

"Thea," Aaryn heard, just as she got Carissa to her feet. She lifted her head, finding Thea on the other side of Vaelen's figure. Whatever Vaelen said, Aaryn didn't understand, but then she moved on.

Thea stalled.

Time seemed to pause as they studied one another in the midst of the chaos, but the healers rushed between them and when her path was clear once again, Thea was gone.

23

NOSEDIVE

Aaryn felt wrong, trembling with adrenaline and awareness as she walked away from the chaos, holding Carissa steady with an arm around her waist.