Chapter 27
Chapter
Twenty-Seven
The summons came just before dawn, when the world was the color of steel, and the wind over Asgar’s southern rim hissed like a blade being drawn.
The flight field was still covered in pre-dawn mist when the dragon riders arrived, each one silent, focused, and already armed.
Weapons clinked softly as they affixed swords, bows, spears, and daggers across their backs.
Shields glinted in the pale morning light.
Each rider was clad in reinforced flight leathers, marked with the sigils of their squad, First Squad, and their element.
Thorne adjusted the straps at his waist and rolled his shoulders, his eyes narrowed to the skies. Behind him, the black behemoth known as Vornokh shifted his weight, wings flexing like thunderclouds ready to split the sky.
“You’re late,” Vornokh grumbled in his mind, voice like molten rock sliding through shadow. “Next time, try earlier. I nearly incinerated a squirrel out of boredom.”
“Barely,” Thorne replied, strapping his twin swords into place on his back.
“Commander Dareth changed the order that we leave at dawn so we can all get a night’s sleep after the events that unfolded with Thaelyn," he added, mounting smoothly and settling into the saddle between Vornokh’s shoulder ridges.
Nyxariel came. Her wings folded like liquid light, scales flashing between violet and silver storm.
Thaelyn mounted her, the pull in her chest already thrumming, faint, steady.
Him. She didn’t want to name it, didn’t want to feel it.
But Thorne was there, even without seeing him at first, his presence humming like an ache behind her ribs.
Commander Dareth arrived on the field. His voice carried through the misted arch of the flight yard.
“Saddle and seal. Border Patrol along the southern outpost. You fly light and fast.” His gaze cut to Thorne.
“You take point.” Then to Thaelyn, a heartbeat of hesitation she caught and resented. “You’re with him.”
“Objective?” Rory said, strapping down a satchel at her saddle.
Cool, steady. Always steady. She gave a nod to Baelor, her male burnished copper dragon.
He was fast, skilled, and daring as his fearless rider.
Together, they command the sky with impossible dives and spirals.
His fire bends to the wind, creating living vortexes of light.
He is descended from Razorth’s bloodline, and he carries both grace and arrogance in equal measure.
“Signal tower at Godshollow,” Commander Dareth answered, not looking away from the map cuff on his wrist. “Beacon flared twice then guttered. Scouts reported fog moving with the wind. No reply since.” His eyes slid to Thorne.
“No glory. In and out. You see corruption, you mark it and pull back. I want heads, not heroics.”
Beside Thorne, a rush of air drew his gaze.
Darian vaulted onto Kaeroth, his massive red dragon, whose scarred flank gleamed in the morning sun.
Smoke curled from the beast’s nostrils as Darian tightened the last strap of his harness.
"Try not to burn down a forest today, Kaeroth," Darian muttered, patting the dragon’s thick neck.
"I make no promises," Kaeroth rumbled with a smirk in his voice.
Behind him came Garric, calm and unreadable, hoisting himself onto Vaelion, the male green dragon with scarred ridges and eyes like frost, whose wings shimmered with silver veins.
Tarken, a serious and feisty, large female orange dragon, landed with a boom. She snarled at the other dragons. Rowan smiled at her and scratched below her chin. He then ran up her leg and hopped into her saddle.
Brynnek thundered in, helmet under one arm, muscles taut as he swung onto Tieren, his thick-legged, earthen-brown dragon with armored shoulders and gnarled horns.
Last was Sorren, quiet, precise. He barely made a sound as he moved, and Mirra, his red-scaled, silver-eyed female dragon, padded in silence behind him. She lowered her head. He climbed on.
Each dragon was distinct, and as one by one they began their takeoff, the earth shivered. Vornokh launched first; his sheer mass thundered across the field as he galloped, then leapt. His wings beat once, twice, and the sky swallowed him.
Kaeroth followed, red and roaring, a streak of molten fire across the dawn.
Then Vaelion, the icewind hum of his wings sharp and focused.
Tarken roared and leaped into the air, leaving a trail of grass floating in the air.
Tieren lifted with a rumble, scattering dust and leaves.
Mirra was last, vanishing mid-run. Her cloaking magic swallowed both her and Sorren before they soared into the clouds like phantoms.
They flew for hours, the wind in their ears, the horizon stretching endlessly.
They banked over mountain spines and dipped beneath low clouds.
Garric leaned into a tailspin loop with Tarken, his blue dragon diving and pulling up with elegant control.
Sorren and Mirra vanished from sight entirely, then reappeared beside them, silent and watching.
Vornokh soared highest, massive and regal, while Nyxariel stayed close to his side.
Kaeroth dipped in fireborne spirals, trying to keep a competitive edge over Baelor.
Tieren coasted low to the ground, trees bowing beneath his wind pressure.
Thorne had not even spoken to Thaelyn yet. She wanted to talk to him about the kiss last night. She reached through the bond so no one could hear.
“You’re in a mood today. Anything you want to say?”
He didn’t even look at her. “No.”
“Not even about last night?”
Thorne met her eyes, finally. His were flat.
“Oh, so we are just pretending today.”
“I didn’t say that,” he replied coolly. “But if you're looking for meaning, don’t. You’re with Darian. We have a mission to do today. I don’t want my mind cluttered with things that don’t matter.”
“You’re an ass.”
“It was just a kiss, Thaelyn. I’ve had dozens of girls kiss me. It was nothing special.”
“You cocky bastard.”
“No more than you expected from me.”
A ripple of unnatural wind pulsed over them. The air pressure seemed to change and grow thick.
“Something’s ahead.” Thorne’s voice was loud so the squad could hear.
Vornokh stiffened mid-flight. “Yes. I feel it too. Shadows gathering. Far ahead.”
Garric’s hand went to the blade at his back. “Do you feel that?” he called out.
“I feel it,” Brynnek growled. “Dark magic.”
Ahead, the sky thickened. Fog moved against the wind, curling around the tower at Godshollow like a living thing. The signal flame that should have burned bright was gone.
“Hold formation,” Thorne ordered, voice tight. “We keep formation and fight it together.”
Ahead, a fissure split the earth, and black figures began to rise, hooded, skeletal, cloaked in unnatural black flame. Necromancers mounted on flying beasts. Some also appeared from nowhere and struck from the sky.
Dark bolts hurled upward and across the skies.
Vornokh spun left, shadows whipping out of his wings to shield Thorne.
Kaeroth roared and dove, unleashing a pillar of fire that consumed two wraiths in a single breath.
Tieren tore left, crumbling a war-beast from the sky.
Brynnek vaulted from his back to slam his spear into its skull.
Thorne spun Vornokh in a tight arc, shadow bleeding from his palms. “Cover the left flank! Sorren, ghost the ridge!”
Mirra vanished. Her shadow streaks flickered through the fog like knives. One necromancer fell without a sound, throat slit by nothing visible.
The air itself warped. Thaelyn’s vision blurred, every sound doubled, her heartbeat pulsing with Thorne’s through that unbearable bond.
“Thaelyn,” his voice rasped in her mind, uninvited but there, steady. “Don’t fight Nyxariel. Let her guide you.”
“I don’t know how.”
Then learn now, Nyxariel said. Open. Let the storm breathe through you.
Thaelyn inhaled, and the world shifted. She didn’t control the wind; it listened. Threads of current tangled around her arms, alive, ready. When she released, the sky obeyed.
Nyxariel dove, lightning whispering across her scales. The shockwave shattered the necromancers’ ring, scattering their shadows like ash.
Sorren whispered a spell, Mirra vanished again, reappearing behind enemy lines, and they took out a junior warlock. Sorren’s dagger flicked, vanishing midair. A robed figure fell silently from its perch, throat sliced by something no one saw.
Vaelion twisted in a freezing arc, launching a burst of jagged ice that impaled three shadows.
Garric shouted, eyes glowing with a strange shimmer.
For the first time, he felt something different.
“What the hell?” he shouted. It was faint Aether magic, borrowed from Vaelion’s core.
The air bent around him. Water and ice spiraled into a blade in his palm, then exploded outward in a storm of razor hail.
“Whoa, did you see that? Where have you been hiding that power?” yelled Darian.
“I’m as surprised as you are, man! Let’s go!” prided Garric.
A Necromancer flung a shadow bolt through the air.
Thorne caught it midair with one of his shadows and twisted it back.
The dark magic from the bolt came down and wrapped around his palm and lashed a spark outward like a whip.
Thorne struck it with blade and shadows, in tandem.
He whipped around, turning his back, sheathed the dagger, and grabbed his second sword.
He sliced through the air with both swords in each hand at two creatures before they could blink. Both plummeted to the ground.
“Thorne!” Garric shouted. “Behind!”
Thorne spun. Another warlock rushed him; he ducked the strike and sheathed one sword. Fire burst from his free hand and engulfed the attacker in flames. Another shadow bolt of black magic came from nowhere and pierced through his arm. It cracked the bone in Thorne’s arm.