Chapter 15
VAELA
Min was untouchable.
We circled a low-lying mountain peak, losing the smaller dragon in the confusion of the mists before flying back to Ember Ridge.
By the time we reached the square, the crowd had dispersed, the smashed flower stall had been swept up, and the injured had been carted away to the infirmary.
Except for the smoldering remains of the kites, no one would know a dragon stand-off had happened earlier.
There was nothing more for us to do here.
I gave Min a pat, and she swept over a mixture of thatch and red clay rooftops, ruffling the colorful streamers and dragon-themed decorations that hung across doorways.
When we reached the outskirts of town, she touched down in the field bordering the nesting shed.
The landing was harder than I’d expected, jarring my teeth, and I almost lost my seat again.
I pressed my hand to her scales, feeling the wheeze as she inhaled. Fear thumped through me, burning more intensely than the heat from five circling dragons.
I slid down Min’s side, landing in the grass just as she collapsed onto her stomach with a rumbling groan. She hadn’t even made it back to her nest. I knelt next to her head, staring into one pearly black eye.
“Hey, girl. You all right?” I asked, stroking the ridge of smaller scales that covered her brow. My pulse thumped with uncertainty.
Min made a pathetic chirping sound. I could hear the exhaustion that rattled up her throat with each breath, and had to fight off the pressure behind my eyes.
“Rest,” I croaked, forcing a smile as I tried to get a handle on my emotions. Min needed me to be strong. “Just rest now.”
She sucked in another wheezy breath, letting her head flop over on a bed of wild snapdragon flowers.
Concern raced through me as her eyelids fluttered closed.
It tasted sour on the back of my tongue, and I fought off the worrisome thoughts that plagued me.
How long could Min keep doing this? What if her next flight was her last?
Maybe it really was time to retire her.
But I knew if I so much as broached that with Min right now, when she was so vulnerable, she’d bare her teeth at me.
I just wished I had the lake to offer her instead of a grassy mound of dirt or the lonely nesting shed.
She deserved to be comfortable when she finally stopped flying.
She deserved to be taken care of the same way she’d cared for this town all these years.
I sat with Min for several long minutes, mulling over what to do, waiting until her breaths evened out and for the spirals of warm smoke to drift from her nostrils.
Once she was caught in the safety of sleep, I got to my feet and set off for town, making my way through the square.
Snapdragons lay scattered across the cobblestones, those yellow and purple snout-shaped petals crushed between feet and the wheels of carts.
I pressed on, trying not to feel hopeless about Min’s situation as I headed to the infirmary.
By the time I arrived, the windows were dark, so I set off down the path to Bramble Cottage.
When I stepped onto the porch, the door swung open.
I hadn’t even had a chance to knock. Eden looked up at me, her hair pulled from its knot, loose coils hanging by her temples and next to her ears.
I wanted to tuck them away and cradle her cheek with my hand.
My body warmed at the thought of pulling her close and holding her as I inhaled the calming concoction of lavender and honey.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “You’re not hurt?” She clamped onto my wrist, dragging me into the cottage, her hands suddenly everywhere, poking and prodding at my ribs, my shoulders, my spine.
I winced. “M’fine.”
“That didn’t sound fine.”
“Sore,” I said.
She tutted. “That’s what happens when you get flung from a dragon.”
“Could have been worse,” I reasoned. “I’ll be a little bruised, but that’s nothing. Min’s the one I’m worried about.”
Eden ceased her inspection, tilting her head to look at me in the flickering candlelight. “Is she—”
“Asleep,” I said, wanting to run my thumb over the worry line that cut across her forehead. “The scuffle exhausted her. But I’ve never seen her run down after something like that.” The memory of her stumbling ached inside me.
“I’m sorry.” Eden showed me to the rocking chair, and I handed her my prosthesis.
“There’s nothing to be done now but to let her recover,” I said, rocking back and forth slowly.
“Do you think she’s getting close to…”
“Hanging up her wings?” I huffed a humorless laugh. “Yes. But I know she doesn’t want that. Not without me. She won’t trust any other dragon to fly with me.”
“And you’re not ready to retire?”
“Mmm…” How could I be? I had years of wrangling left before me. “I can’t imagine doing it without Min.”
Eden placed my prosthesis on her desk, those brown eyes, almost gold in the candlelight, inspecting it carefully.
“How were the patients from town?” I asked. “Any serious injuries?”
She shook her head, dropping a bag onto her desk. Metal clinked as she produced a pair of pliers and a small hammer. “We managed to send everyone home for the evening with extra bandages and salves. Then the kingsguard paid us a visit.”
I sat up straighter. “What for?”
“They wanted to speak to the boys who flew the kites in the first place.”
“Ah, yes.” I relaxed back against the chair. “That’ll likely be the last time they do something so foolish. It’s all fun and games until you actually rile up a herd.”
Eden smiled softly. “From what I heard, they’re spending the night with the kingsguard, standing watch for the Wretch.”
“A relatively harmless punishment, all things considered,” I said. “They’ll be tired come morning and cold—”
Eden laughed under her breath, settling down in her desk chair. “In my opinion, a couple of them sounded a little too excited.”
“And the others?”
“Oh,” she said, smirking, “absolutely shaking in their boots.”
I chuckled. I shouldn’t be laughing, but with Eden sitting close, a grin on her face, I couldn’t help but be comforted.
The crisis had been averted, after all. Min and I had managed to ensure no one was critically injured—that was as much as any wrangler could hope for.
And the kids were only really looking for a bit of fun.
“I hate to say it, but it’s the kind of thing my brother and I would have done as children. ”
“I suppose we’ve all done something foolish at some point in our youth,” Eden mused.
“I can’t imagine you ever doing anything like that. You seem far too…”
“Too what?” she asked, one blond eyebrow arching.
“Sensible.”
She hummed. “I wasn’t always so sensible.”
Eden picked up another tool, tinkering with a hinge.
I watched her work for a beat, her movements curious and gentle.
Her hands were delicate but strong. I’d felt their sturdiness every time she had to bandage my hand.
I wondered briefly what they would feel like elsewhere, her palms running over my shoulders, down my arms, lifting to cup my face.
Heat crawled up my neck, and I cleared my throat. “Can I ask you something?”
“I expect you will anyway,” she said, holding up a small bolt, her lips pursed.
“Why are you a burn nurse?” I studied the thoughtful shift in her expression. “You could have done anything with your life, and yet you decided to pursue a career that only exists because of the thing you fear most.”
Eden was quiet for a long moment. The only sound was the scratch of charcoal on parchment as she started sketching. “I guess, despite my fear of dragon fire, there’s nothing I’m better at in the world.”
Her words hit me hard. Eden woke up every morning, prepared to face her fears, simply because she was good at it.
“My mother used to say with talent like mine, I’d be wasted on anything else,” she continued. “Of course, that was before we lost my father. But the same was still true after.”
“Is your mother a burn nurse?”
“She never carried the title,” Eden explained, “because she was never formally trained. But yes. We spent so much time in rider camps with my father, tending burn injuries. I used to follow around after her while my father trained.” A fond expression crossed her face.
“I loved it. Hiking my mother’s satchel of supplies over my shoulder as I marched around to visit patients.
Crouching next to her as she opened jars and prepared poultices and salves.
The smell of honey and lemon balm and aloe. ”
“It sounds… nice,” I said.
“It was for a time,” she admitted. “And then… after the accident. Well, everything changed.”
“How do you mean?”
“The loss wore my mother away.” Eden held her sketch up to the light of a candle.
She wouldn’t look at me as she spoke. “She was never one for the pub, but after the accident, that’s where I found her more often than not.
Sometimes she tried to stop, but her hands would tremble so badly during the day.
There were times she’d take me with her to make her rounds, and I’d wrap bandages that she was no longer steady enough to do herself.
At the time, I thought I was so grown up, so special, getting to help.
Now, looking back, I understand the way the grief ate at her. ”
As her story spun out in my mind, I thought of losing my own mother. I’d only been a baby, of course. But was that how my father had felt—trembling and unsteady, coming apart at the seams? When he looked at me, was I the grief that ate at him?
“She left one night,” Eden said. “And I haven’t seen her since.
I don’t know if she’s alive or dead. If she ran off with some wealthy traveler who could feed her habits.
If she succumbed to the grief in some alleyway.
I waited as long as I could for her to return, but when I got hungry enough, I left camp. ”
“Where did you go?” I asked, hating the thought of her out there alone in Cai’amar.
“I moved around and worked odd jobs like I told you. Dishwashing. Laundering.”