Page 124 of Grave Situation

Leicht doesn’t reply, just continues his shallow dive toward the ground. When he doesn’t let up speed, I begin to wonder if he’s planning to smash me into it, but then he pulls up sharply, drops me the remaining six or so feet, and angles steeply upward, leaving me staggering to regain my feet in the downdraft of his wings.

“I hate you.”

“I can’t speak to you right now. You’re a disgrace.”

“It’s not my fault I fell! You should have warned me before turning—and told me where to hold on!”

He wheels midair and returns to hover above me, staring down in a way that makes me think he’s considering whether roasting me would be worth the backlash.

“No rider, ever, falls on such a gentle turn.”

“I’m not a rider,”I remind him.“I don’t have what they have. Anyway, I know for a fact that they spend time learning how to keep their seatbeforethey climb onto a dragon!”I remember that much from Tia’s first few months at the academy.

He huffs, and he’s close enough that hot breath washes over me.“You’re a rider now,”he insists,“and you will learn what must be learned.”The words ring inflexibly through my mind as he lands nearby.“Try again.”

I give him the most “are you fucking kidding me?” look in my repertoire.“Or, we could talk about the mechanics of flying. Maybe draw some diagrams.”

“No.”

I try to stare him down, but it’s hard when he’s looming over me. It seems unlikely that this is a fight I can win.

Resigned, I walk toward him, and the movement makes me ache. I guess I must have picked up some bruises when he caught me—or maybe when I hit the ground. Either way, I hope Jaimin’s still got that bruise cream he packed.

“Put your leg out,”I demand. If he’s making me do this, I’m going to do it right. Or at least waste time trying. Jaimin will interrupt us when it starts to get dark, I’m sure.

I hope.

Leicht gives me a superior look and extends his foreleg. I squint at it. The problem is with the angle. It’s too steep to climb without handholds—for me, anyway. Tia and other riders seemto get up with no problems, but that’s beyond my skill set right now.

Instead of making even more of a fool of myself by trying, I back up, crouch, and push off with my back leg, taking a running start. That gets me more than halfway up his leg, and I stretch up toward his shoulder, using my height to my advantage. The joint bone protrudes just enough to give me a handhold, and I brace my feet and scramble the rest of the way.

“Acceptable,”Leicht grumbles as I drop into what I’m privately thinking of as the saddle. I have a feeling he wouldn’t be happy if I called it that out loud. I don’t care, though—I made it up here on my own, and nobody can take that from me.

My satisfaction lasts right up until my next fall.

Nearly two weeks later,Jaimin rubs bruise balm into my hard-to-reach places and says, “They’re not as bad today. Are you sure you don’t want me to heal?—”

“No.” I soften my tone and smile at him over my shoulder. “Thank you, but no. The ache reminds me I need to try harder. Is it causing a problem for you?”

He shakes his head and screws the lid back onto the jar. “Not how you mean. I don’t like knowing that you’re in pain, though.”

Turning, I pass him a cloth to wipe his hands on, then kiss him while he’s preoccupied with that. Kissing him is the new highlight of my day.

“All my pain vanishes when we do this,” I murmur, and he chuckles against my mouth.

“Excellent. I’ll have to start testing this method of treatment with other patients.”

The growl that escapes my throat sounds remarkably like a more human version of the sound Leicht makes when he’s annoyed. “You willnot.”

“I won’t,” he agrees, stealing another kiss. “Put your clothes back on and come out for dinner. Coryn caught six rabbits, and Arimen found some mushrooms, so we’ve got a decent meal tonight and leftovers for stew tomorrow.”

Rabbit and mushrooms, plus whatever we still have from yesterday’s forage… yay. I promise to be right there, then sigh when he’s left the tent. I’m going to need to talk to the stone later. We’re dangerously low on supplies, and even this far south, winter means poor foraging and game. The stone has to let us detour to a village or at least a larger farm so we can resupply. I haven’t said anything to anyone else, but I can tell Jaimin and Coryn are aware of how close we are to disaster. Plodding across back fields like this feels like a waste of time—if the stone really does want us to go to Caimae, there were faster, easier ways to get us there. Also, even though I’m still in regular contact with Master, we all feel cut off from the rest of the world right now. Our only sources of news and information are my master and Leicht. Master’s not omnipotent, and Leicht says the other dragons aren’t telling him everything. They say he needs to focus on his mission.

Every time I see smoke in the distance, my gut curdles with the thought of what it might be. Leicht admitted that he’s spotted a few dragons in the area—not close enough for human eyes to see, but clearly they’re patrolling even this remote region. There has to be a reason for that. The zombies haven’t found us—yet—but we haven’t found them either, or any clues to their whereabouts, or the champion.

Could the champion be a recluse, living apart from the world at Caimae? I give the stone a mental nudge, but it refuses torespond. Even if the championisat Caimae, why couldn’t we have hired a nice, swift boat to take us there?

Those are all questions the stone refuses to answer.

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