Page 29 of Draekora

Alex was about a second away from hyperventilating as they soared over the Silverwood, her near-death experience and encounter with Aven wreaking havoc on her adrenaline levels. She forced herself to count backwards from twenty, attempting to focus only on the numbers and nothing else. Then she did it again. When she was nearing the end of her third countdown, the dragon slowly crested an arc, turning on his wing until they gradually spiralled to the ground and landed smoothly.

Ha! How awesome was that!His triumphant voice cheered in her mind.I think I’m going to be great at this bonding thing—you didn’t even jostle.Go me.

Quite sure she was having a stroke, Alex unclenched her limbs and slid bonelessly to the ground where she collapsed to her knees, her wobbly legs unable to hold her up. She noticed they were back in the Silverwood somewhere, but bizarrely, there was no snow. None. Zip. Nada. In fact, judging by the heat of the sun overhead, wherever they were, it wasn’t even winter.

In a trembling voice, she again asked, “What is going on here?”

You don’t look so good, the dragon said, leaning his huge face closer until he was barely a handbreadth away. Had she not been frozen in shock, she definitely would have scurried backwards when his hot breath tickled her eyelashes.Should I find you some water or something?

Alex shook her head. Then she shook it again. “How can you—I don’t—” She had too many questions and didn’t know where to begin, so she settled on asking, “How can I hear you in my mind? And so clearly?”

The dragon sat back on his haunches and said, out loud this time, “I’m Xiraxus.”

Alex blinked. “Xiraxus?”

“You can call me Xira,” he offered.

“Zeera?” Alex repeated his pronunciation.

Xiraxus bobbed his head. “You’re Alex. You wield the Sword of the Stars.”

“I—What?”

“The Sword of the Stars,” Xiraxus repeated. “The Bringer of Light. The Blade of Glory. The Weapon of the Ages.”

Alex looked blankly at the dragon. “Let’s ignore A’enara for the moment and go back to you being a talking dragon who can speak in my mind.”

Xiraxus let out an annoyed snort. “Draekon,” he said. “Not dragon. Draekon.”

Making a mental note, Alex said, “Fine, adraekonwho can speak in my mind. And that would be because…?”

If it was at all possible, Xiraxus actually looked guilty. His big body squirmed and his blue eyes looked away from her, reminding her of a puppy who was aware it had done something wrong. “I may have… panicked slightly.”

Alex moved from her knees to cross her legs underneath her, not ready to test her shaky limbs just yet. “Panicked? Yeah, I got that with all your incomprehensible ‘abrassaclosing, Golden One come’ mutterings. What was all that?”

“Theabrassais the Void Between,” Xiraxus told her. With his words, a picture forced itself into her mind of the ink shimmering into the sky; darkness they had flown straight into.

Alex gasped. “Did you do that?” she asked, referring to the invasive image she certainly hadn’t conjured on her own.

Xiraxus nodded and said, “Unbound mortals can’t survive travelling through theabrassa. But I was scared. The Golden One was nearly upon us. You were kind to me. You saved me. I couldn’t let him hurt you. But I didn’t have time to drop you off anywhere else.”

“So you took me with you through theabrassa,” Alex deduced.

He nodded again. “Your heart nearly stopped halfway through the Void. I had to enactvaelianawith you. It was the only way for you to survive. But even with the bond, I lost hold of you when we came out this end. TheZeltorafound you on the outskirts of the Great City and they took you back to the palace before I could get to you.”

Alex frowned and repeated, “‘When we came out this end’—what does that mean?”

“The Golden One pulled me through theabrassa,” Xiraxus said. “He pulled me from here. From… before.”

Alex just stared at him. “You’re going to have to start making more sense.” But even as she said it, her heart began picking up speed again, because deep down she already knew what he was implying. Unless she’d entered a parallel universe—which was not impossible given what she’d experienced in Medora so far, but it was still unlikely—there was only one way Kyia and Roka would have peacefully been in the same room as Aven. There was only one explanation for why Kyia allowed Aven to pull her close, why Aven called Roka ‘brother’ in such a fond voice, why none of them had recognised her—why none of them but Roka even understood her language.

“Xira, thisabrassathing… this ‘Void Between’… What is itbetween, exactly?”

Fidgeting slightly, the draekon said, “Space. Worlds.” He huffed out a gust of air and admitted, “Time.”

Time.

Flipping heck.

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