Chapter 26
One wingbeat, two, three, and we were above the rooftop.
Two more, and we caught the breeze, full of chimney smoke and the faint bite of chemical smells drifting from the factories.
I let out a scream of pure delight as we lurched forward.
Myth’s emotions mingled with my own, and I felt so full of joy that I started to laugh.
I couldn’t stop, half-shouting, half-laughing with every breath.
With two more flaps, we were high above the city, soaring through the darkening night. Azeron rose beside us.
I glanced over at Rush. He was watching me, his hair whipping around his face, his eyes unmoving.
Though my stomach was clawing its way into my throat, Rush’s steady gaze settled the turmoil inside me.
He looked at home in the saddle, so much at ease that he only held one handle, his other hand hanging limply against his thigh.
He nodded at me, and I turned my attention forward.
Knuckles white, I gripped my saddle’s handles as Myth banked over the city, dotted with the golden glow of lamps and warm windows.
Fingers of smoke drifted up from a thousand chimneys.
Few other dragons flew over the city at this hour, and it felt like we had the sky to ourselves.
I smiled and let out a whoop. Myth dove forward, tucking his wings and curling into a twist. A panicked yell clawed from my throat, and Myth leveled out, letting his wings catch an updraft.
I could feel his heart beating a steady rhythm.
This was what he longed for, even more than me.
The rooftops beneath us looked small, like a child’s miniature city.
This was where I belonged, too. Pressed forward in the saddle, I smiled at the city below us.
As we floated through the night, I let one hand drift from the handle and stroke Myth’s neck, the slightly bumpy scales a familiar texture now.
“Thank you,” I whispered to him, thinking of all the hours in my childhood I’d dreamed of flying.
After a half hour of circling over the rooftops, my nose was numb and my cheeks ached from the bitter cold. Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes from the wind. Myth had flown directly for the forest north of the city, a little ways from the school but likely still on the school’s vast property.
Rush directed Azeron in front of us, cutting Myth off from the forest. He waved at us to follow, and soon, I spotted a field full of sheep. Rush pointed at the ground and nodded.
Myth didn’t need any more encouragement.
He tucked his wings, and I nearly vomited as he dove for the sheep, coming up with one in his claws.
The lurch as he climbed vertically back to where Azeron waited left my brain in a spiraling fog.
Finally, I regained my composure and glanced at Rush, whose mouth was curled into a mocking grin.
He made a circle with his fist, indicating it was time to head back.
A few minutes later, Myth dropped his kill in the courtyard a moment before touching down. I wanted to fly forever, but my muscles were shivering violently from the cold, and I needed to get inside.
Myth offered a low growl at Azeron and tore into the sheep. Cringing away from him, I found Rush staring at me.
The point in his throat bobbed. “Let’s go inside. He wants to be alone when he eats anyway. Az, be good,” he called, and to my surprise, his dragon curled up in the corner of the courtyard, away from Myth as he ate.
When we slipped inside the house, Rush lit the kerosene lamp in the entryway, not wanting to use the electric lights for fear a neighbor might think the house was in use.
From an inside pocket in his jacket, he withdrew the worn leather journal I’d seen that first night I’d found him in the lair.
He hadn’t brought it back since that night.
Thumbing to a point near the middle, he read aloud, “‘The secrets are in the spines.’” His eyes flashed up to me. “Any idea what that means? It’s been plaguing me for months.”
I gave a noncommittal twist of my lips.
To my surprise, he turned the journal toward me. “The notes end there. I’ve been researching dragon bone structure for months, everything from draconarian surgical techniques to old-fashioned bone harvesting, from when people used to think dragon bones could heal any disease.”
I traced the notes with my finger. “But dragons aren’t the only things with spines,” I whispered.
“I thought about that. But what could human spines have to do with—”
“Not bones.” I swatted him. “Books.”
His eyes widened. “Books. What sort of secrets could be hidden in—?” He stopped short and flipped the journal closed. “Come with me.”
He led me through the dark house, up one flight of steps, a second.
The third floor contained a bedroom and a study.
We entered the study. There were no ghostly sheets here.
The room looked as if it were still in use.
A large wooden desk occupied one side of the room; bookshelves lined two walls.
The smell of dust and pages greeted my nose as Rush strode toward the bookshelf and tipped one leatherbound book into his hand.
“How could I have been so stupid…” He opened the book, scanned a few pages. Then he turned the book over in his hands and squinted at the binding. His brow was pinched, his eyes roving, angry, as they studied the book.
“It’s just a thought,” I said with a shrug. “You’re the one with the journal.”
Rush snapped the book shut, staring down at the spine of the book from the top. He moved the book closer, then farther away. With a jerk, he stormed back toward the desk, ripped open a drawer. In his fist was a dagger-shaped letter opener.
He stood the book on the desk, pages falling open, and rammed the letter opener into the spine.
I cringed. “What if I was wrong?”
With a single motion, he ripped the pages off the binding.
“Oh, well, guess it doesn’t hurt to be thorough,” I mumbled, wide-eyed.
He glanced up at me, the edges of his mouth curling in a quiet victory.
“What is it?” I asked, hurrying around the desk.
“Look.” He held up the book cover, now deprived of its pages. Glued behind the leather cover was a small lump of brown fabric, barely discernible. The edge of the letter opener slit through the fabric, and a tiny item fell onto the rug.
I dropped to my knees a second before he did. My fingers roamed the carpet, but his found the small item first.
Rising at the same time, we peered down at a tiny emerald in his palm. He pinched the jewel between two fingers and brought it up to his eyes, twisting it in the light. Its facets sparkled like fireflies.
“The secrets are in the spines,” he muttered. “Ari, I feel like the biggest fool. You figured it out immediately.”
“You had dragons on your mind, not books.” Shrugging, I glanced down at the still-open journal. “So, what does it mean? It said secrets, not stones.”
He set the journal on the desk and pulled it toward him, then angled it so I could read the line where his finger rested.
“‘The secrets are in the spines. They will prove it all.’ All what?” I asked.
“Magic. Dragonfire. All of it. My mother left me this journal, in a lockbox at a bank never tied to her real name. She didn’t want Father knowing about it. What she wrote in here, it would change everything.”
Silence hung between us a moment as I pondered what it would be like to have something of my father’s that mattered, some leftover piece of his soul that proved he’d used his life for good, not evil. A piece of him that would improve the world.
Instead, I thought of the card under my pillow at Cardan Lott, and a sting of anger poked at my heart.
I had vowed to never turn out like him. But Rush was right—I was a gambler.
I only hoped I was gambling for things that mattered, things that would change the world for the better.
Otherwise, I would die like him, chasing a pipe dream.
“Ari, look.” Rush was now pointing at the hollow book cover discarded on the desk.
“What about it?”
“Read it.” He held it toward me.
I read the title aloud. “A Biography of Everton Dale.” That sounded innocuous enough. I thumbed the pages. Nothing out of the ordinary struck me. “Who is Everton Dale?”
Without answering, he held the emerald against the cover and I blinked, rubbing my eyes as the words shifted.
“Now read the title.”
I yanked the shelled book toward me, but as he let go, the words reverted to the title I’d read first. He stepped forward and placed the emerald against the cover once more.
The cover now read A Biography of Evelyn Rook.
Our eyes met. “The secrets are in the spines,” I whispered.
“But why change the name of this biography?”
He took the book cover gingerly from my hands, set it aside, then gathered up the sewn pages that flopped limply in his grip.
Holding the emerald in his palm, he thumbed through several pages.
Nothing groundbreaking. Then he set the emerald down and again flipped through the pages.
A quiet scoff drew my eyes toward a single heading.
I reached out and clutched Rush’s arm. The heading read The Care of Flamebred Dragons.
“Whoever Evelyn Rook was, she was effectively erased from history with this.” He held up the tiny emerald. “With magic.”
“They erased the part about raising dragons with flame.” My heart surged. “Interesting that the Empire didn’t destroy the book instead.”
Rush nodded, moving back toward the desk and leaning against it. “This way, they preserve the truth but they keep it hidden. They can access it when they want it, but no one else knows what’s at play. The secrets can be passed along only to the people they choose.”
“Because otherwise, if it was truly erased, they’d run the risk of forgetting the truth themselves over the centuries.” I looked at the wall of books. “Is there a stone in all of these, do you think?”