Page 100 of Feralheart

She turned back toward the falls and dove through the water again, landing in a spray of droplets that caught the light like jewels.

I slid off her back. My legs gave out, and I smacked on the ground, shaking.

My wet hair slapped against my face and my soggy clothing clung.

I was shaking again, but for a different reason now. I slumped onto my side, and Selira curled around me, her body forming a wall on three sides, her wing draping over me in a blanket that weighed more than I did. Her body heat seeped through my soaked leathers.

In the aerie, dragons tolerated touch.

Selira was offering it. Choosing to curl around me.

I pressed my face against her foreleg, letting myself be small for a moment. Tomorrow, I could be big and brave again.

Tonight, I could be me. I could be held.

Safe. Mine. Protect.

“Yours to protect,” I said, my voice breaking. “And you’re mine.”

I lay there, savoring the sun peeking through the falls and just…being.

The practical part of my brain finally resurfaced.

“The race begins tomorrow at dawn,” I said.

Her attention sharpened.

“I’ll have to ride in front of the elite. The people who’ve been hunting you.”

Curiosity came through the bond. And underneath it, smugness.

Let them try hunt.

“They’ll see you’re wild.”

We fly together or not at all.

“I registered your name. Selira.”

My lungs twisted in my chest. Lykor was safe in the aerie pens, his scorched wing healing, his body used up by the system that had broken him. He’d saved me in the fire maze. Shielded my body with his when the flames came. And I’d repaid him by registering a different dragon. It didn’t matter that racing him would kill him or that this was the only choice that gave either of us a chance at surviving.

It still felt like betrayal.

“I had another dragon,” I said quietly. “Before you. His name is Lykor. He’s… He’s been through enough.”

Understanding flooded back through our bond. And approval.

You chose mercy. For him. Now choose victory. For us.

“After I win,” I told her, the words a promise to Lykor and to myself. “I’ll make it right.”

Selira’s approval flooded the bond. She understood debts owed, the honor among those who flew.

“It could get us both killed.”

Her head swung toward me, and her eyes held mine.

Then we die together.