Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
IDALLIA
I’ve already been up and training again for three days when Bale tells us all to meet after lunch in the large field by Upper Drayke Lake.
Fyrestar and I land in the already scorched meadow, and Rimblaze and Embersol perch in nearby trees.
It’s our usual training venue, and the terrain reflects the abuse, the dirt churned up and the grass rough and burned.
The autumn day is hotter than most, making the huge, meandering lake look tempting for a swim.
If I didn’t know the clear, cold mountain water would freeze an instant scream out of me, I’d dive in.
Once we’ve gathered, the wing guards all watching from close by, Bale looks us over with a critical eye. We’ve been training hard with vampire tactics in mind, knowing the Porthwood stakeout approaches.
“Bloodwold raiders don’t burn and always attack in groups.
” Bale’s amber eyes cut to me, assessing.
I stare back at him, my chin high. Does he think I’m not ready for a hard workout?
I can’t wait to prove him wrong. “As usual, today we train in skin instead of scales so that we’re skilled enough to beat them at their own game.
It’ll be swords, knives, feet, and hands.
Fight dirty if you have to. Fight to win. ”
It was the same when I was at school. Students almost always trained in their common form—which definitely helped me—but the switch from scales to skin only happened a few years before I got there, just after the Vampire King’s human sorcerers accomplished the one thing that could even the odds between vampires and dragon shifters.
Rannigan Bloodthief’s sorcerers somehow created a magical shield against firebreath.
That kind of magic is too taxing to maintain over long periods or cover too many people, so Rannigan limits it to protecting his raiders.
In, out, then the magic wears off. In the meantime, dragon shifters have to get out of the air, or be picked off by arrows and spears.
Fangs don’t even really help because dragon shifters can’t get close enough to bite before they’re riddled with holes or a sword is driven straight into their softer underbelly scales.
After the initial losses, Bale and his captains around Torridaig quickly understood they had to fight Bloodwold vampires differently—on two legs and without mercy.
“What are the teams?” Kellan asks. His blue eyes flick to me. I look away from him.
“You’re in pairs against Idallia.”
I pivot toward Bale so fast that wind whistles in my ears. “How is that fair?”
His eyes glint, seeming to answer my earlier, chin-lift challenge. “I didn’t say it was fair. I said we’re doing it. Besides…do you not think you can win?”
I snap my mouth shut. Maybe I can. It depends on how desperate the others make me.
If I don’t feel a true sense of danger—or fury—I can’t always accelerate and focus like I should.
I fight my best when I’m the underdog, especially when winning is the only way my birds and I can survive.
It’s harder to unlock that blast of violence in training. Sometimes, I’m not sure I should.
Bale’s gaze returns to the rest of the team. “All of you are going to savagely attack Idallia like you are vampires who want to pierce her flesh and drink her blood until the husk of her lifeless body falls to the ground.”
“Thanks for the visual,” I mutter.
Bale’s lips almost seem to twitch, but I know he wants to push them into pushing me. “Just motivating them.”
Good. The more vicious my opponents, the better I fight. The dragon shifters of the Elite Wing are highly skilled, dangerous, and not afraid of drawing—or losing—blood. Training with them is brutal, just the way I like it.
Fyrestar hops to my side. His eyes brighten, and flames roll in his beak. “We’ll savagely attack back.” He sounds as eager as I am for some real sparring. Everyone’s been going easy on us for days.
Bale shakes his head. “Not you this time, Fyrestar. Idallia fights on her own.”
I glare at the Dragon King in outrage, and Fyrestar’s shrill squawk of protest attacks my ears. “That will never happen in a real fight,” my warbird heatedly chirps.
“It could,” Bale answers solemnly. “You might be eternal, but that doesn’t mean you can’t die and leave Idallia on a battlefield while your primal lifespark returns here to be reborn.”
Fyrestar almost argues, then claps his beak shut. Smoke coils from his nostrils, and he takes off to join the other wing guards without a word. His disgruntled sparking says it all.
I watch Fyrestar go, angry now that I’m truly alone. I recognize this as Bale’s second motivation attempt—direct and effective. I preferred the dead-husk visual to losing the help of my warbird, and I give Bale the side-eye, letting him know I’m not fooled. This time, his lips really do twitch.
“Wade and Danica—you team up first.” Bale turns to me, his expression hard. “And you—fight like you’re going to die. Then I know you’ll win.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Bale,” Wade tosses across the sparring field as he starts limbering up. His good-natured smile takes the sourness from his words, but I don’t let his affable nature fool me. He’s a beast in any form once the fighting starts.
Danica unsheathes lethally long daggers and twirls them in her hands. “It’s so much more fun fighting like this. It’s always over too fast when we’re in scales.”
I get my hands comfortable around the hilts of my twin blades as I move forward into the sparring area.
“I guess we should thank Rannigan Bloodthief for finding a human sorcerer skilled enough to come up with a spell to counter firebreath. Chomp, chomp, and it’s done might’ve turned you all into lazy dragon shifters a long time ago. ”
We start to circle. Two against one means I have to watch all sides and move faster than either of them.
“Is that your best trash talk, Idallia?” Danica chuckles menacingly as she edges forward. “It needs some work.” Quick as the beat of a dragon’s wing, she leaps in and strikes hard.
I counter her attack, hold Wade off with my other sword, then kick Danica in the hip, sending her stumbling back. “So does your footwork. I’d suggest keeping your legs under you in a fight.”
Sensing more than seeing the menace from behind, I duck Wade’s swing, and his blade sails over my head. Instead of popping up, I drop low and sweep a kick around to hit his legs. He jumps at the last second, and momentum carries me around. I twist and roll, coming back up into a defensive stance.
Wade takes another swing at me, coming in high while Danica goes low.
Deflecting them both at once isn’t easy, but the challenge is just what I need for strength to surge inside me with that thunderclap only I can hear.
I speed up, but they’re fast and relentless, pounding at me in quick succession and looking for ways to disarm me.
The harder they try, the better I fight back, my movements faster and harder to track.
My assets are speed and reactivity. I’ll never hammer with the brute strength of a dragon shifter, but I don’t need to if I can get in just the right hit.
The longer we spar, the more my reflexes come alive, and my senses sharpen.
Then suddenly, I can hear everyone’s breath, the grinding of insects, the rustle of leaves, the fluttering of our warbirds in the trees.
I can even sense a ripple of wind on the lake, feel each ray of sunshine sinking into my skin, and hear Bale’s soft inhalations through his nostrils as he evaluates my moves.
Instead of helping, the overload of information starts to distract me.
Wade gets in a kick, and I stagger to the side, my ribs aching fiercely.
Clenching my jaw against the pain, I regroup, filtering out the excess and sharpening my focus on what counts—my opponents.
Wade’s next swing doesn’t even come near me as I leap back, avoiding Danica’s next attack just as fast.
“Is that all you’ve got?” I taunt, grinning viciously.
Danica’s unspoken answer is to bring her blades in close to her body and spin at me with a flying kick that hits my middle so hard I skid backward through the dirt.
The impact of her foot ejects all the air from me, and I can’t breathe, a howling ache in my abdomen almost making me double over and vomit.
She lands, still turning, and swings at me as Wade lunges in with a downward strike to match hers.
Sensing their imminent win as sharply as the pain in my stomach, I react on pure instinct and speed up with a second thunderclap, louder than the first. I move so fast I don’t even see or comprehend my own retaliation until the flurry of hits and ringing steel suddenly stops, and I have to pull up short or else run my blade straight through Danica’s chest.
I back off, my eyes widening. Neither of them holds a weapon anymore. “Sorry.”
She shrugs, smiling. “No one’s dead. We’re all good.”
I huff a laugh, then see the blood pouring down Wade’s arm and sober. “Did I do that?”
“I’ll be fine. You’re a terrifying small person, though.” His smile reaches his eyes, so I believe him—about both things—and turn my attention to my next match.
I want to get started before my speed and focus wither like the autumn leaves around us. Momentum can be a real problem for me. Even if I can find it, I often can’t keep it.
Wade heads back toward the lake with Danica, who’s fussing over his injured shoulder, and Kellan and Maia step forward to take their place.
They’ll be harder to beat, and I’ve barely had time to breathe, but both disadvantages will keep me motivated.
These two are usually right and left wing to the Dragon King, always fastest to the pillars—and they keep their balance.
That means they’re the best of us, but I’m up for the challenge.