70. Aurora
AURORA
Anyone can blame me who likes, but I wasn’t about to stay inside while the battle was taking place overhead.
I loved Ryse and he was my Wing Leader—I would obey him and not try to fly with the more experienced cadets, but I wouldn’t just sit in the Academy and wait to hear if he was all right or not.
I needed to see what was happening for myself.
L’eesha felt the same way, of course. She was already waiting for me when I slipped up to the Caverns on Level Five.
You wouldn’t think that a huge golden dragon could be sneaky, but she was as quiet as a mouse as we slipped through the honeycombed caverns until we came to the wide single entrance that had been kept open.
We stayed in the shadows, watching as the Wings mounted and flew out, taking their formations in the sky above. Then, when all of the dragons that were flying in the upcoming battle had gone, we went right to the entrance to watch.
I was a little afraid that the two elderly dragons guarding the entrance would stop us, but L’eesha told them to let us pass and they didn’t give us any problems. And so, the two of us were able to take up watch right at the edge of the entrance where we had a clear view of the sky above.
At first all I saw were the different Wings flying in formation. They were spaced evenly but each Wing was separate from the others. There were worryingly large gaps between them, too.
“If they keep flying like that, the Madlings will get through,” L’eesha pointed out.
“I know,” I murmured, but what could we do?
I didn’t see any Madlings coming and for a brief instant, I hoped that we had all been mistaken. The rising sun was lighting the sky and shedding light on the villages below the base of the Old Drake. I saw no activity there—the villagers were clearly staying inside—very wise of them.
I watched Ryse and M’alex flying at the front of their Wing and felt my heart swell with hope and love for both of them.
“i love them too,” L’eesha told me. “even when Ryse gets mad at me, I still love him.”
I started to laugh…but the sound died in my throat, which was suddenly horribly dry. Up ahead, where the Western Mountains loom, I saw it—a black smudge on the horizon.
At first I hoped it might be a trick of the light—a play of shadows from clouds, maybe. But the smudge kept getting bigger and bigger and darker and darker…whatever it was, it was coming fast.
You know what it is, whispered a dark little voice in my head. And you know what it means.
Death.
That was what the Madlings meant, always. No one knew where they had first come from or why they chose to hunt humans, but their bite was invariably fatal. Only dragon fire could cleanse their evil from the sky.
“They’re here,” L’eesha said, and I knew she’d seen the smudge too. Her whole body trembled with eagerness—with the instinct to fly and wipe that wrongness from the air.
I put a hand on her neck.
“Easy, dearheart. You know we’re not allowed.”
“I know…I know…” She shifted from foot to foot. “But maybe I should have them put my saddle on, just in case.”
I looked down at the Flight Terraces on the level below us. The Terrace workers were just standing there, waiting. Every dragon who was flying had already been harnessed and saddled. Now there was nothing for them to do but wait.
“All right, let’s go down,” I said to her. “Come on, it should be safe for me to ride you long enough to go down a level.”
But just as I was about to climb up her offered foreleg, the Madlings came into view.
I had never seen one up close—no one had and lived to tell about it. I had seen the pictures in the ancient texts, of course, but it wasn’t the same. In the books and old drawings, they just looked like oversized bats.
But what I saw when they came close enough was so much worse than bats.
They were much bigger than bats for one thing—most of the ones I saw were the size of a person—a large man, in fact.
Even worse, their faces looked almost human—human but distorted, as though some dark God had made a corrupted creation and given it wide, leathery black wings and huge, grasping claws for hands and feet.
Their mouths were wide slashes in their faces, filled with tiny, needle-sharp teeth and their burning, sightless eyes stared blindly as they turned their misshapen heads from side-to-side as though they were seeking something.
As they came, I could feel their hunger—a single-minded purpose to devour. These creatures weren’t newly hatched, I suddenly understood. They had been sleeping for years—for over a century. And now they were starving and we were their prey.
The South Third Year Wing wheeled together, coming to meet the evil creatures. But even before the dragons could start to flame, their formation started to fall apart.
“what is happening to them?” L’eesha exclaimed. “why aren’t they flaming?”
I was wondering the same thing…and then I felt it.
An overwhelming sense of terror rolled through the air and hit me like a slap. Suddenly, I was filled with dread. It sapped my courage and made me want to run away, to hide, to make myself small and pray that the nightmares coming for me would pass me by.
I had to grip my dragon’s hide tightly to keep myself from running—had to remind myself that I was safe and tell myself I wasn’t going to run, no matter what.
“Fear,” whispered a voice in my ear. “They hunt by fear.”
I frowned and looked at L’eesha—had she spoken to me?
But my dragon was busy watching the battle above and besides, the voice didn’t sound like her.
Then I remembered where I had heard it before—in my dream last night!
“Fear,” I said aloud. “They can send emotions! And they pick up on emotions, too—they can feel them all.”
“that must be why the wings are scattering,” L’eesha said. “look—they’re flying away instead of flaming!”
She was right. The Wings that had been at the front of the formation were falling apart, riders and dragons veering away from the Madlings who darkened the sky.
The Madlings were feeding the riders’ fear and the dragons were echoing and enhancing it. The terror became a loop—Madlings to rider to dragon to rider and then back again to the Madlings, who could feel the terror they inspired to hunt their prey.
How did I suddenly know all this, I wondered. It seemed that the knowledge was just there—in my brain. Maybe it had to do with the dream I’d had or the familiar voice whispering in my ear.
But knowing what was happening didn’t do me any good. I watched in horror as the Madlings fell upon rider and dragon alike—dragging the riders from their saddles and sinking their claws into the dragons’ hides to bite and gnaw their flesh with their needle-sharp teeth.
My heart fisted in my chest as I watched the awful spectacle. The air was filled with cries of horror and terror—the Wings were in complete disarray.
I looked wildly for Ryse and saw M’alex beating the air with powerful strokes as he hovered in position.
Behind them, their Wing still held—ragged but unyielding.
They flamed on command and a few of the Madlings fell, screaming and burning to the ground far below.
But there were more of them—always more coming.
The sky was black with them, and the air was charged with terror and despair.
“Ryse is telling them to hold their ground, no matter what they feel,” L’eesha told me. “M’alex says the dragons are scared because their riders are scared.”
“Of course they’re scared,” I said, my throat tight with terror.
“It’s the Madlings—they’re making everyone crazy!
” I still wanted to run myself, but I was holding my ground by sheer force of will.
Only the need to see Ryse and be sure he was all right kept me from hiding at the back of the caverns and whimpering like a child alone at night.
And somehow I managed to do the most important thing, which was to put a barrier between my fear and my dragon.
If I let L’eesha catch even a whiff of the terror I was feeling, she would feed it back to me tenfold—she might even broadcast it to the rest of the dragons.
I couldn’t allow that that, so I kept a tight reign on my feelings.
“You must break the cycle,” the voice whispered in my ear. “You have the only Golden Queen—use her!”
Use her? How? My fear-addled brain refused to think for a moment. Then I remembered how L’eesha could project emotions. It was a gift no other dragon had—not even the mightiest Gold-wing could send his feelings to anyone but his rider. But my Golden Queen could.
“Dearheart,” I said to her, stroking her neck. “What they need is courage. Can you send it to them?”
I felt L’eesha quiver under my hand. She was frightened too—I could feel her fear clawing in my mind like a trapped animal.
“i don’t know,” she sent back to me. “i’m so scared, my Auri!”
“I know you are—I am too,” I told her.
And then I heard the voice in my ear again—the one only I could hear, apparently.
“Remember,” it said, “It is the dragon who echoes the rider’s emotions. You must master your own fear—do not feed it to your Queen. Give her courage that she may send it to all the others.”
“I’ll try,” I whispered. “I swear, I’ll try.”
Though I hated losing sight of Ryse, even for a moment, I closed my eyes tight. I did my best to shut out the horrible terror that was knotting my stomach and making me want to run.
Courage, I told myself. Be brave—have faith. Think of Ryse, up there fighting those things. He isn’t backing down—he and M’alex need you and L’eesha!
I dug deep, remembering the few short months I’d had with Ryse.
I remembered the way he’d caught me when I fell off the Flight Simulator…
the first time we went flying together when he wrapped his arms around my waist and said he didn’t trust anyone else with me.
I thought back to when I’d showed him who I really was, how he hadn’t gotten angry or told on me.
Instead, he brought me tea and helped me clean up and washed out the sheets that were stained with my blood…
“He loves you,” whispered the voice in my ear. “You can use that. Love will brave anything—love will dare to do what should be impossible.”
Slowly, I began to feel it—my love for Ryse and his love for me. I put both my hands on L’eesha’s neck, and I poured it into her.
“Courage, sweetheart,” I said to her. “Courage and love. Can you feel it?”
L’eesha’s head went up and her eyes—which had been sunken in fear—were suddenly bright.
“i feel it, my Auri!” She told me excitedly. “i feel it now!”
“Good—and can you send it out to the others?” I asked her.
“not from here—we need to get closer. hurry—get on my back.”
There was no time for a saddle. I knew how dangerous it was, but the battle was going horribly now.
The sky was black with Madlings and almost none of the Wings were holding.
Ryse and his wing were still flaming in formation, but they were the only ones.
Everywhere I heard screams of terror and defeat.
I closed my ears to all of them and climbed on my dragon’s back.
“No fancy flying today,” I warned her. “I’m only holding on to your dorsal spine!”
“i will be careful, my Auri,” she promised.
And, beating her huge wings, she rose into the air with me clinging to her back.