Page 52 of The Crimson Walls Of Algorath

Her heart sank. The thrill of flying and euphoria of the aurora borealis waned at the thought of Azriel. She should have experienced them both with him, not Kall. Not a dhemon she had once despised. It should have been her husband who held onto her waist, ensuring she did not fall into the darkness far below. Rather than riding on Razer’s back, the dragon who shared the heart of her love, she sat upon the beautiful Bindhe.

Releasing a long breath, she blinked back the tears that pricked at her eyes. At least the fear had evaporated. Replacing it with that hollow chasm, however, was not ideal. She had done so well at hiding the horrible ache behind every strike, roll, and drill that built her strength and endurance. Only in her moments of silence, between breaths of consciousness and the sweet relief of sleep, had she been forced to endure his absence.

Now it punched her hard in the chest, knocking the wind from her.

To his credit, Kall said nothing. He did not point out any more magnificent views or ask any questions. He merely soared through the sky with her in silence.

The rest of the night, they passed over the Keonis Mountains. The peaks rose up around them, and when they were unable to fly between the craggy cliffs, Bindhe took them higher. So high were they forced to climb, in fact, that the air grew thin. Ariadne’s head spun, and after expressing her concerns with Kall, the dragon searched for a lower altitude.

It was during that time, when they dipped below the ridgelines and banked side to side, that Kall’s body grew tense. When she looked up at him, his ruby eyes swept around them. She had not seen him quite so serious since the night he had arrived on the highway to save her, Azriel, and Madan from Ehrun’s ambush. His tight jaw and low brows told her that this was not the safest route through the mountain range.

When he turned to look back the way they had come, Ariadne asked, “Are we safe?”

He grunted in response and righted himself, refocusing on the path ahead.

Fucking dhemons. If she had a coin for each time one of them had foregone the standard yes, she would have rivaled the Dodds’ coffers.

To her relief, however, she did not spot any adversaries in the sky or on the rocky surface below. If Kall or Bindhe saw or suspected anything, they kept it hidden from her, for which she was thankful. The last thing she needed while racing through the night sky was to worry about plummeting to her death because Ehrun’s cronies had found them.

So when dawn threatened to break over the horizon not long after they wove out from the last of the mountains, Bindhe began her descent into the desert. She moved slowly and with purpose. Ariadne’s ears pounded with pain, then released pressure as they went. Too quick, and she was certain the sudden shift of altitude would have ruptured her eardrums.

They landed in the cold sand, far from the main highway through the Saalo Desert. With no fires, tents, or any living creatures for as far as the eye could see, Kall dismounted and helped Ariadne from the dragon’s back.

Her legs and rear screamed. After sitting on the hard scales for so long, pinching her thighs together at every windy buffet, her muscles protested any other movement. While it was not unlike the way she felt after a long night of riding Astra, her legs felt too wide, and the seat of her hips ached.

“Eat.” Kall held his traveling pack open with one hand, and the other offered a sandwich wrapped in a cheesecloth.

Ariadne accepted the food, then frowned as she opened the wrapping to find roast beef, cheese, and vegetables stacked between two thick slices of bread. She had not expected the meat. “Who made this?”

Kall swayed his hips from side to side as though stretching out the same soreness she felt. “Me.”

She smiled at him. That he had considered the kinds of food she would enjoy meant more than she could express in the two simple words she uttered in reply, “Thank you.”

“I like food.” He frowned, the words clearly not what he had wanted to say. “I happy…make food.”

“Making food makes you happy?” She took a bite from the sandwich, the flavors jumping to life on her tongue after a long night of fasting. Though Kall had offered her food mid-flight, she had not trusted it to stay put, given how often Bindhe had had to twist through ravines.

The dhemon grunted in response and bit into his own sandwich packed with vegetables. Raw meat would, after all, spoil after such a long flight.

Bindhe, however, just curled up in the sand and closed her eyes.

“Does she have anything to eat?” Ariadne glanced at the food in her hand, which would not be nearly enough for such a large creature.

Kall tilted his head to the side in consideration. “She eat before. She fine.”

“Will we make it to Algorath tomorrow?”

Another grunt as he chewed another bite. After swallowing, he said, “Bindhe fly close, then we walk.”

Of course. They would need to keep the dragon a secret, as they have done for so long. The moment anyone outside the dhemons and their allies discovered their existence, the mountains and tundra would be crawling with vampires, mages, and fae searching for the clutch.

When Ariadne had asked Madan why the dhemons never used the dragons in the war efforts, his answer was simple: “They were. Sometimes. No one from those villages survived to speak of them. We made sure of it.”

“Why not attack Laeton or Monsumbra?” she had asked. Valenul’s capital would have been an ideal target, though the stories of burned villages now made sense. That nothing and no one had survived had been hard to imagine.

Madan had sighed and shook his head wearily. “We had no guarantee of victory, and no one wanted to risk their dragon’s life.”

For the Valenul army did, in fact, have the artillery to fell a dragon. Catapults, trebuchets, and ballistas were stationed at every provincial capital and even more in Laeton and the Hub. Though Ariadne had never seen any of them in action, she suspected they were devastating in battle.

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