Page 72 of Kingdom of Rot & Ruin
My eyes strained as I squinted, desperately willing the familiar black silhouette to appear.
And impossibly, it did.
Emotion swelled in my heart as Zariah’s dragon form grew larger and larger. I waved my hands over my head, jumping up and down and not caring if I looked like an absolute fool.
“OVER HERE! ZARIAH!”
The dragon banked hard from his path, taking in the scene with his keen eyesight and adjusting his trajectory.
“Fuck, fuck!”
Shava’s arm muscles shook and spasmed with effort, her fingers sliding off from the edge as she couldn’t hold on any longer.
Zariah was close.
D cried out in warning.
Shava fell.
Zariah dove. That’s when I noticed he already carried something in his claws.
Or someone.
How would he catch Shava?
D curled into himself and covered his head, unable to look. I wanted to do the same, but forced myself to watch.
Zariah dove after Shava as she plunged, catching her leg in one claw and pulling up hard with a roar, inches from the ground.
“YES!”
My fist pumped the air, and I jumped up, grabbing D and twirling him around in my arms.
He squeaked in terror and punched me in the nose.
The blow wasn’t hard, but it surprised me. I fell to myass, wincing but unable to take my eyes off the sky as D scurried away from me.
Zariah wheeled around wide as he leveled out and regained control, fighting hard to gain altitude and flying back towards us. Shava’s face was a red blob as Zariah awkwardly held her upside from one leg, but she was still the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen as he set her down as gently as he could.
“Shava!”
I rushed forward to help her up, her hair a frizzy, tumbled mess over her face and shoulders as she fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs. She accepted my hand to stand, then immediately swung for me.
Expecting it, I ducked and put my hands up to block any more blows.
“I was trying to scare him so his screams called Zariah!” I argued. Surely she couldn’t be mad once she understood I did it for her, and the overall greater good?
Her face didn’t soften in understanding. If anything, her eyes burned hotter with hatred. She held her arms out and D ran into them, not crying but clutching onto her tightly, as if at any moment she might fall off the cliff again. “You’re heartless. You don’t terrorize a child like that!”
My jaw dropped. Was she serious? Shava was angry because I’dsavedher?
“You could have told me to scream! I would have!” She shot at me.
I laughed. “Oh? You would have simply accepted you needed to scream and not asked why, or peppered me with a thousand questions?”
Her lips thinned. “Maybe, but at least I wouldn’t have traumatized anyone else for no reason!”
My eyes slid to D, who glared back but also slid himself a little behind Shava.
