She wasn’t sure how long things went on this way. It felt like hours, but she didn’t trust her sense of time to be accurate right now. She kept flying, dodging and attacking in turn, and holding onto her broomstick tightly to ward off the jolts from the constant rushes of power caused by the dragon ruby.
Izzy still hadn’t seen Noah. In fact, she hadn’t seen Raven, or any other familiar faces, since she’d started flying toward the front lines. Izzy tried her best not to think about what that might mean. She told herself that the armies were too big for her to be able to keep track of people she knew, and she kept fighting. She felt like she was in some sort of strange dream. She could feel herself moving, and she could hear the battle noise surrounding her, but she felt strangely removed from it. Her mind felt like it was shutting down, refusing to believe that she was actually here in the middle of such an intense fight.
And then, miraculously, Izzy started to notice fewer and fewer dark wizards. Even though she was still flying toward the front lines, the mass of soldiers seemed to be growing thinner rather than thicker. She realized that the soldiers around her were mostly Falcon Cross soldiers, and the attacks against her were lessening. Her heart leapt with hope, even as another blast of destructive power from the dragon ruby tried to knock her off her broomstick. The other Falcon Cross soldiers around her seemed to have notice the change, as well. One of them even let out an excited whoop.
Izzy’s breath caught in her throat. Was it possible they were going to win this war after all? She’d been too worried to be optimistic about the future, but now, she allowed thoughts of a peaceful life, of lazy days with Noah, to fill her mind. She couldn’t help but smile, and that smile only widened when she saw Raven zooming toward her, looking triumphant.
“We’re doing it!” Raven shouted, not addressing anyone in particular. Her words were intended to buoy the spirits of any Falcon Cross soldier within earshot. “We’re driving them back, slowly but surely. The dragon ruby is powerful, and Saul is still fighting with all his might, but he’s falling short. With the other three dragon stones, and all the Redwood Dragons’ artifacts on our side, we’re managing to push them back.”
Excited whoops broke out from the Falcon Cross soldiers, but Izzy didn’t pause to join in. Instead, she started flying forward, as quickly as she could, to the front lines, where she knew Noah would be. She only wanted to see him, and know that he was alright. She knew the fight wasn’t over yet, but it was getting close, and she wanted to celebrate their victory with him by her side. This moment had been so long in coming. She wanted to enjoy it to the fullest.
As she flew closer to the front lines, the blasts from the dragon ruby began to feel stronger. She wasn’t sure whether this was due to her being closer to their source, or whether Saul was, in desperation, pushing the ruby to the absolute limits of its power. Whatever the case, the Falcon Cross army was continuing to push back the forces of darkness. The soldiers in charge of the dragon emerald, dragon sapphire, and dragon amethyst were responding with all-out attacks of their own, and the rest of the Falcon Cross army was gathering strength from the realization that they were winning. The air crackled with excitement as Izzy flew, and she felt her own excitement rising as she drew nearer to where she hoped to find Noah.
She could see blasts of fire now, and she followed them. Those flames would lead her to the dragon shifters, and to Noah. She admired the reddish-orange glow of fire that lit up the sky so fully. The dragons were fighting harder than ever, and she felt a puff of pride in her chest knowing that one of those dragons was hers. Soon she would be with him. As she drew closer, shooting down the occasional dark wizard who came at her, Izzy finally caught sight of Noah. A deep smile crossed her face as she locked her eyes on his form.
“I’m coming,” she whispered under her breath. “I’m coming to fight by your side.” She was so excited in that moment, that she even forgot about her fear of Saul. But it only took one glimpse of the evil dragon to remind her.
He appeared seemingly out of nowhere. His dark, spiked dragon form glowed a sickening red, even in the pouring rain. When lightning lit up the sky, Izzy could see that Saul held his magic wand in one dragon foot, and the dragon ruby in the other dragon foot. A thousand horrible memories came rushing back to Izzy’s head as Saul’s glowing red eyes turned toward her. She pulled up short on her broomstick, all of her courage draining away in an instant. But Saul wasn’t looking at her directly. He was looking past her, at the vast Falcon Cross army behind her. His own army had dwindled, but he refused to give up. Izzy watched in horror as he raised the ruby high, and then brought it down with a mighty roar.
It was the heaviest blow yet. Izzy managed to hold on to her broomstick, but she was pushed backward several dozen feet by the force. Little shockwaves of pain echoed through her body, and she yelped in anguish before she could stop herself. All around her, she heard similar cries of pain.
But then, the answering blow came from the Falcon Cross army. Flashes of green, blue, and purple light echoed across the sky, and seemed to all hit Saul at once. The evil dragon roared in pain, and was himself pushed backward. He started to fall, and Izzy felt her hope returning once again. It looked like he was going down, possibly for good. The rest of the soldiers on the field, both good and bad, seemed to feel the same, because there were yells of joy and terror. One army was watching its leader go down while the other army was watching their evil nemesis suffer his last blow—or so they thought.
Izzy started moving forward toward Noah again. He turned to face her, and a smile of recognition curled up his dragon lips when he saw her. She smiled back, but then, as she flew toward him, she saw his smile turn to a gasp of pain. Izzy’s own mouth dropped in horror.
Saul, on his way down, had somehow used his tail to reach up and pull down the first soldier he could catch. And Noah’s dragon just so happened to be in the perfect spot for Saul to grab. Izzy screamed as she saw Saul falling away, with Noah struggling but unable to escape as the dragon ruby glowed red. Izzy dimly realized that Saul was somehow using the dragon ruby to keep a firm hold on Noah. Saul’s face was twisted in an awful, evil expression, and he laughed with a chilling, haunting sound as he and Noah both fell toward the earth.
“No!” Izzy screamed. Without stopping to remember that she was more afraid of Saul than anything else in the world, Izzy pointed her broomstick downward to rush after Noah. But when she tried to fly, she couldn’t move forward. She screamed again, and struggled to fly, but she was stuck. Helpless, she watched as Noah’s dragon fell further and further away from her, and Saul’s taunting laughs grew more and more distant.
Chapter Ten
“Izzy, stop! You have to calm down!”
Izzy stopped struggling for one brief second to glare at Peter, and then continued to struggle. It was useless to try to break the Stabit spell Peter had cast on her, and she knew it. But she couldn’t force herself to calm down. Not when the love her life was in the hands of that awful wretch.
“Izzy,” another voice said. Izzy turned to see Mac, the head commander of the Falcon Cross military, hovering near her on a broomstick. Mac’s voice was gentler than Peter’s, and even sounded a bit choked up.
“We have to save him!” Izzy yelled, this time in Mac’s direction.
All around Izzy, Falcon Cross soldiers were cheering. The enemy soldiers had fled once they saw their leader fall. Dark wizards flew away as quickly as their broomsticks would carry them, while terrified evil shifters roared behind them. Some of the Falcon Cross soldiers had given chase to the fleeing soldiers, but just as many were now flying in circles through the still-pouring rain, drunk on the knowledge that, at long last, Saul himself had been defeated.
“Izzy! Izzy, listen to me!”
Izzy turned her head sharply, surprised to hear Grayson’s voice. Grayson was one of the Redwood Dragons, but he had been in dragon form only minutes before. None of the Redwood Dragons could talk while in dragon form—talking while in animal fo
rm required dark magic, and the Redwood Dragons stayed far, far away from that. But Grayson had shifted back into human form, and was riding on the back of his lifemate Zoe’s broomstick. The realization that not even the dragons themselves were going after their clanmate filled Izzy with terror. The dragons would give their lives to save Noah if they thought there was even a one percent chance of helping him. If they were not pursuing him, that meant things really were hopeless. Izzy stopped fighting against the Stabit spell that held her back, and started to cry. Her sobs were quiet things she tried to hold back, but she couldn’t completely stop them.
“We have to help him,” she said weakly.
“Izzy,” Grayson said, his own voice sounding like it was thick with tears. “That’s what Saul wants. For us to go after Noah. He’s running out of power himself. He’s sold too much of his own soul to dark magic, and he’s having trouble using the ruby to its fullest extent. He thinks that if he draws several good wizards and shifters in, he can draw energy from their souls and make one more push with the dragon ruby. Noah is dead, whether we go after him or not. Saul was already trying to pull from his soul as they fell. That’s why Noah’s cries were so anguished.”
Izzy felt her body going numb with shock. “Dark wizards can use other people’s souls to perform dark magic?”
She’d known that dark magic required the person using it to give up a piece of their soul for each spell performed. But she’d had no idea that a dark wizard could draw from someone else’s soul to perform evil spells. Izzy looked over at Peter in confusion. The old wizard nodded sadly in confirmation.
“It’s not easy to do, but it is possible for wizards to use other people’s souls to perform dark magic. It requires a very advanced use of dark magic, and the magic is weaker so you have to have dozens of souls at once, unlike when you use your own soul and only need yourself. But if anyone could do it, Saul could. He’s been doing nothing but practicing dark magic for most of his life, as far as we can tell.”
Izzy felt bile rising in her throat. “We can’t just leave Noah, though!” she said again. But again, everyone shook their heads sadly at her.
“Izzy,” Mac said. “This is war, and unfortunately there are casualties. We’ve lost many soldiers, and Noah happens to be one of them. He wouldn’t want us to come after him. He’d know the risk of Saul performing a counterattack would be too great. The risk of our frail victory falling through is too great. The best thing we can do now is wait Saul out. Saul is dying, and as long as he has no good, pure souls to reenergize his dark magic, he’ll be gone soon. Noah knows this. He’ll be proud to die as a martyr for the cause.”
Mac was keeping her voice as gentle as possible, but the words still felt like swords in Izzy’s heart. The war was all but won, but what did it matter? If Noah was dead, then Izzy had no reason to live. The happy cheers of the Falcon Cross soldiers near Izzy felt empty. There would be no victory celebrations for her. There would only be mourning. Mourning that she had barely found her lifemate before losing him.
Peter seemed to sense that Izzy had given up her struggling. As she sat dejectedly on her broomstick, hunched over with silent sobs, she heard him say, “Stabit terminantur.” She felt a small rush of cool air as the Stabit spell around her was cancelled. She could move freely again, but what did it matter? There was no saving Noah. She felt like she never wanted to move again.
The rain was starting to subside now, and Izzy felt betrayed by it, too. How could the sky dare to stop crying, when she had just lost everything?
“Come on, Izzy,” Peter said. “Let’s all head down to camp. You can get a warm meal and get some rest.”
Izzy was pretty sure she would never eat again, but she didn’t say that. Instead, she silently turned to follow Peter as he made his way down toward the earth below, where a supply squadron would already be on the way with tents and food. Around Izzy, the dragons and other wizards flew. Many of the Falcon Cross soldiers were still cheering and swooping happily through the sky, but the soldiers closest to Izzy, the VIPs, were somber. The dragon shifters still in dragon form seemed to have no life left in their wings as they flew, and the faces of the wizards were strained.
This isn’t right, Izzy thought as she descended. I don’t care if it puts all of us at risk. I cannot just let Noah die. And besides, the ruby needs to be rescued. We can’t leave it there for god only knows who to find. What if someone truly evil gets to it before us, once Saul is dead?
Izzy’s heart thumped in her chest as she flew. A burning in her core, which she now recognized as the lifemate bond, was growing hotter and hotter. Her connection to Noah was telling her that he was in trouble. She dreaded the moment that the heat started to subside. She would know, then, that Noah was dead. She’d rather have this searing heat burning her from the inside out than know that Noah was gone. Didn’t Peter or the other dragons understand how the lifemate bond burned within her? How it urged her to risk everything for Noah’s sake, for her lifemate who was in mortal danger?
With sudden clarity, Izzy realized that this was the problem. The others didn’t realize how her very core burned for Noah. They didn’t realize that she and Noah were lifemates, and that she could not turn her back on Noah, no matter what the consequences. The lifemate bond was born of deep, pure love. Love that would sacrifice everything. Love that would rescue Noah or die trying.
Izzy looked around at the wizards surrounding her. Peter could cast strong spells, so if she wanted to get away she’d have to fly out of his range with lightning speed—before he realized what she was doing. The only wizard who could fly faster than her was Zoe, but Zoe was carrying Grayson on her broomstick at the moment, which might just slow her down enough to give Izzy a real shot at flying away. Izzy felt a cold sweat breaking out on her forehead as she considered her options. Was she really going to do this? Was she really going to defy the head wizards and dragons, and risk her own soul, just to go confront Saul? Saul, the evil dragon whom she was more terrified of than any other living thing in existence? Izzy didn’t have to ponder the question. She already knew the answer. Her lifemate was in danger. Fears be damned. The high wizards and dragons be damned. She was going to try to save Noah, even if it was the last thing she did. Which, she realized, it very well might be the last thing she did.
Izzy slowed her speed ever so slightly, just enough to let Peter and the others pull imperceptibly ahead of her. She fell back as far as she dared—any more and suspicions would rise about what she was about to do. Taking one more deep breath, Izzy bit her lip in determination and then, as quickly and silently as possible, she turned and flew in the opposite direction of Peter and the rest of the crew.
She didn’t dare look back. She knew they would be chasing her in a matter of seconds, and she didn’t want to slow her speed just to see what she already knew. She bent low against her broomstick and put every ounce of her energy into the effort of flying.
In less than five seconds, she heard shouts from behind her. They had realized what she was doing. She kept flying, praying that her tiny head start was enough. She didn’t know how long it took Peter to realize what was going on, but it must have been long enough for her to zoom out of his range. She heard him start to yell stopping spells, and she braced herself for impact, but nothing happened. Her heart leapt with joy. Now, if she could just stay ahead of Zoe, she was home free.
Izzy flew and prayed, and prayed and flew, panting hard and hoping against hope that she could make it away from the others before they could stop her. For a moment, she thought Zoe’s shouts were growing louder, but then they started to fade away again. It was several minutes later before Izzy finally dared to look over her shoulder. No one was following her anymore. She could see the outlines of the dragons and wizards far behind her, hovering in midair. They were letting her go. Zoe had been too slow with Grayson as a passenger, and the others knew this meant that Izzy would get away. They were likely giving her up as lost at this point, too.
Izzy swal
lowed hard, a fresh lump of fear in her throat. She hoped with all her heart that they were wrong to think that no one would be able to challenge Saul right now while still keeping his or her soul intact. The idea of Saul using her to perform dark magic was a terrible one, but more terrible still was the thought of Noah dying at the mercy of a crazed, evil dragon wizard.
“Hang on, Noah,” Izzy said as she faced forward and headed toward the spot where she’d seen Saul and Noah falling toward the earth. “I’m coming for you.”
Chapter Eleven
Noah groaned as another jolt of painful, electric energy flowed through his dragon body. Saul, also in dragon form, let out an awful laugh. In some ways, the sound of that laugh was worse than the physical pain of each jolt from the dragon ruby.
Noah did his best to act as though Saul’s little performance with the dragon ruby was not affecting him, but that was getting harder and harder to do. Noah knew what Saul was doing. Peter had briefed all of the dragons on the fact that it was possible for someone as advanced in dark magic as Saul was to use someone else’s soul to power dark magic spells. All of the dragons had agreed that, because of this, they would not attempt a rescue should one of them be captured. It was better to let one dragon fall than to risk giving Saul access to all the dragons. If rescue attempts went poorly and the dragons were captured, Saul would have ten dragon souls at his disposal. That might be enough for him to power through some seriously destructive spells.
Victory and the Dragon Page 8
