“You had the power to make this easy, little bird. With you we could have properly taken this Rimback’s gold with minimal pain. Now she’ll be stripped one scale at a time until there is nothing left. I’m going to enjoy it, too. Enjoy her screams like I’m enjoying yours.”
I gasp like a fish out of water.Fight back!But I can’t focus enough to even sense metal. The throbbing pain overwhelms. It’s already so dark and yet black spots dance in front of my vision.
“Now be a good girl. Turn this beast around. Maybe I’ll let you save whoever my men hurt at the party trying to find you.”
“Nity,” I wheeze, but I don’t exactly know what I’m asking from her, how she can help. She’s exhausted too. I don’t know how to get out of this.
“Is that her name? Nity?” he scoffs. “You think she’s your friend? She doesn’t care whether you live or die.”
Suddenly, Nity jerks sideways, and it surprises him enough to roll off of me. I suck in my first full breath in minutes. She… listened to me. Saved me.
I climb clumsily to my knees, hand pressed to my knife wound gushing blood. I don’t dare pull it out though. “You want gold so badly?” I craft gold off my forearm and throw the rich yellow metal at him. “Take it.”
The gold connects to the scaler’s chest. The blow doesn’t kill him, but the hit knocks him to Nity’s left side, teetering on the edge.
“No,” he shouts. Hands scramble to detach the golden mound of metal on his torso. He thinks I mean to craft against him, that I mean to stab him like he stabbed me.
“Nity will never be yours. How can she, when she listens to me?” I crouch, holding on to Nity’s spikes as I yell out one clear instruction. “Nity, turn.”
She tips to the side and he stumbles. The gold on his chest acts like a weighted stone. The poacher is a pinwheel of arms one moment, gone the next. He screams as he falls and then… nothing. Soundless except Nity’s beating wings and heavy breathing.
The sky lays calm. And I relax, sagging against Nity’s scales, from the wretched pain throbbing in my arm. I’ve done it. I stopped their leader, knocked that poacher right off Nity. I saved her! I breathe again, a deep gulping relief of air. I—
Nity lurches.
I’m jerked with such a staggering force I pitch sideways and right off Nity’s back. My hands clamber for a handhold, but swipe at empty air. For a moment all I know is I’m falling. Then I twist, and I see her. Nity tumbles in the other direction, feet away.
“Nity,” I shout as loud as I can. Because she still could grab me out of the sky. We’re not finished yet. I made a mistake and missed an attacking poacher, but she can still save me. She can rebound from inferior metal hitting her like she has this whole fight.
But Nity doesn’t flap her wings. She’s limp and unresponsive. Her power, the tremendous energy of her golden metal flickers like a light. Whenher body turns, shining yellow in the darkness, I finally notice the spear sunken into her chest. A river of blood courses down her golden scales. I can’t breathe as wind whips and roars around me. Reality slams down and though I refuse to think it, I still know why Nity isn’t commanding the air and disregarding gravity. I know why I can’tfeelher. That lance hit one of her unprotected, unscaled spots.
She continues to fall because she’s dead. The last golden dragon is dead.
Time slows, and so do I. It must be a trick of my mind, but I’m weightless. For excruciating seconds, I don’t notice the wind or the cold or the darkness anymore. I’m a torrent of screams. And not because I’m plummeting to my death. I scream for Nity, reach for her. All useless because we’re both falling. Somehow she reaches the ocean before me. A giant splash erupts like a thunderclap. Then nothing. Because she’s already gone. She’s not resurfacing, and neither will I. The grief and agony come just like the freezing water—all at once.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONEWHEN TRYING TO SAVE THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE
JAMES
Farren and Nity are free-falling, both shining in gold.
All I can see is terror because all I am is terror. I breathe it out as I holler. I drown in it as Farren tumbles closer to the water and Nity doesn’t right herself. Seconds ago, Art fell from the same height, his body hitting the ocean waves like concrete.
The riders I was chasing have all been unseated from their dragons. The two others, including the one who struck Nity, curse as they fly away. Even if they’re headed to the cave, I don’t move to follow. I jerk Hort toward Farren. Farren, who’s plummeting through the air.
I’m too far, too damn far, but as we blast toward her, I reach forward and craft. I’m sure Nity can readjust and save herself, but Farren can’t fly.
Screaming, I pull at every muscle I have, lift every weight of pressure and focus it in on the girl shining in gold. In my desperation something snaps into place. The well of power I reach for when crafting extends. As I tremble, as my body clenches in taut pain, I reach outward for Farren like I could grab her, like I could save her. And then miraculously, somehow, sheslowsand thenstills.
The realization hits. I’vegold-craftedFarren from falling to her death.
Now Nity just needs to right herself and maybe, just maybe, she can grab her out of the air.
My focus veers toward the golden dragon. Something’s wrong. Her body doesn’t hold the right tension for a dive. Her wings are neither pinned to her side nor flapping in resistance. They’re lifeless. Her neck, her tail, her entire rounded torso—all lifeless.
Nity strikes the water with a boom of sound, and I jolt. Waves erupt like they’re crashing against cliffs. She… she didn’t right herself. I hold Farren and wait, wait for Nity to surface. But she doesn’t. The dark water closes over her. My connection to Farren’s gold breaks as understanding knocks me back. She’s not resurfacing.
Nity… she…