“Say it,” Rhiannon urges quietly.
I shake my head, unwilling to follow my thoughts to their logical conclusion.
“What questions would you ask about the attack?” Devera cuts in. “This one’s been briefing officers for too long and doesn’t remember the art of teaching.” She cuts another mean side-eye at Brennan.
“Fuck it. I’ll say it,” Ridoc mutters. Then asks at full volume: “Were they looking for weaponry?”
“Absolutely.” Brennan nods. “That’s the only reason for fliers to attack Navarrian outposts directly.” He glances at me like he knows the question was really mine, and then stares in that challenging look of disapproval he mastered before the age of fifteen, daring me to rise, to stop avoiding the consequences of my own actions.
Fine. “Did the fliers attack Samara before or after the news of our… ” Gods, what are the right words for what we did? “Departure from Basgiath leaked into Poromiel?”
Brennan’s stare softens in approval.
“After,” Devera answers.
The lump in my throat swells painfully, threatening to rip apart what facade of calm I have left. They attacked because they know we can’t supply them. They’re defenseless.
“It’s not your fault,” Rhiannon whispers.
“Yeah, it is.” I focus on taking notes.
Brennan turns to the map. “On to enemy movements. In the last week, venin have taken the town of Anca. Not surprising, given its proximity to the recently fallen Zolya.”
I don’t bother looking at Anca. My gaze is locked on Cordyn, where Viscount Tecarus has the only other known luminary. It’s the next largest city between Zolya and Draithus, and still outside venin-controlled territory. The seaside city was a two-day flight from Basgiath, but from here? I bet Tairn could make it in twelve hours.
“Ten,” he corrects me. “But it’s not entirely safe,” he states, but it’s not an argument.
“So Xaden says, but neither is being here beyond the wards without a forge to arm anyone, including ourselves.” Good thing we’ll have the wards up soon.
“She makes a good point,” Andarna agrees. “Can you carry a luminary?”
“That question insults me.”
“Can you carry a luminary while insulted?” she prods.
Tairn growls.
“What’s concerning is that it appears the town was drained, and then the dark wielders pulled back to reassemble in Zolya,” Devera says. “What does that tell us?”
“They’re organized and basing out of Zolya,” Rhiannon answers. “It’s like a supply trip for an ongoing campaign.”
“Silver One!” Tairn’s tone changes. “A riot approaches!”
My breath seizes as my head swings toward the back of the theater, as if the small windows there will give me any clue of what’s coming.
“Yes. They’re not just consuming but occupying territory for the first time. Good—” Brennan quiets, no doubt talking to Marbh, then focuses as the entire theater falls silent. “Everyone get to the great hall and wait there,” he orders, turning to Devera as the auditorium descends into quiet chaos.
“How many?” I force myself to breathe through the terror and shove everything into my pack and stand as everyone around me does the same in a hushed panic.
“Are they coming for us?” Ridoc asks quietly. “Navarre?”
I thought we’d have more time. How can this already be happening?
“I don’t know,” Rhiannon answers.
“Can Tairn take Codagh?” Aaric asks as I throw my pack onto my back.
My mouth opens and shuts as I think of General Melgren’s dragon. I don’t even want the answer to that question.
And Tairn is suspiciously quiet.
“Shortest revolution in history.” Sawyer mutters a swear word and yanks the drawstrings of his pack tight.
“Forty. Sgaeyl is approaching as well, but she’s too far out to—” Tairn pauses. “Wait. Teine leads the riot.”
Teine?
Mira. Fear knots my stomach.
Fuck waiting.
I push past Sawyer to the outer aisle of the theater and then run, ignoring every voice that calls after me, even Brennan’s. Running every morning for the past three months has bolstered what advantage I already had on most of the riders in this room—speed.
“Ready the crossbolts!” Brennan shouts above the fray.
Mira will get herself killed. Or maybe she’s come here to kill us. Either way, she’ll have to look me in the eye before she does it.
Legs pumping, I race across the back of the theater, cutting First Wing off from the exit and sprinting through to the main hallway. Statues and tapestries blur as I run by, my lungs burning as I dart past the guards and riders flowing into the thoroughfare.
Please, Dunne, do not let her incinerate this house before I get the chance to talk some sense into her.
I sprint past Emetterio as he shouts for me to get into the great hall, then nearly slip turning into the foyer, not daring to break my stride even when my heart pounds hard, protesting the altitude. The guards hold the doors open, no doubt so riders can mount, and I fly straight through, my feet barely skimming the marble steps into the courtyard just in time to see Teine’s wings flare directly in front of me to halt a rapid descent.
That knot of fear lurches into my throat, and I skid to a stop about thirty feet outside the front door, my feet making furrows in the gravel.
Rock flies in a dusty barrage from the impact of the Green Clubtail’s claws, and I throw up my arms to cover my face as Teine lands directly in front of the courtyard doors, blocking the exit into the town, and two others flank him, their landings just as abrupt.
I cough as the dust clears and immediately spot an angry-looking orange and glaring red facing me, their teeth bared.
Fuck me, four more land on the outer walls, shaking the masonry. They’re everywhere.
My stomach sinks. We’ve been betrayed. Someone’s told Navarre our location.
“Tairn—”
“Here,” he answers a moment before dropping out of the sky like a damned meteor. The ground shudders with the force of his landing to my left, and the shade of his wing blocks out the sun overhead. He roars so loudly my teeth rattle, then lowers his head, his neck only inches from my shoulder, and streams a river of fire in a clear warning shot across the legs of the dragons.
Heat blasts my face for the length of a heartbeat before he draws back, his head darting in a serpentine motion.
Teine steps forward, and time feels like it slows to milliseconds as Tairn lunges, opening his massive jaw and latching onto Teine’s throat just like he had Solas’s.
“Tairn!” I scream in raw fear. If Teine dies, so does Mira.
“For fuck’s sake, Violet!” Mira shouts.
“I have his throat, but I have not broken his scales,” he assures me like I’m the dramatic one here.
“Well, as long as it’s just a threat,” I reply sarcastically. “Dismount peacefully and Teine lives!” Others rush into the courtyard behind me, their feet loud on the gravel, but I keep my eyes locked on Teine and Mira.
She dismounts with enviable ease and strides toward me. Her cheeks are red with windburn, and her eyes are wild as she lifts her flight goggles to the top of her head. “We all come peacefully. It was Riorson who came for us. How else would we have found you?” She glances up at the house without breaking pace. “Gods, I thought this place was ash.”