72. Aurora
AURORA
“He’s gone—you mustn’t touch him!” Professor Zephyr was trying to pull me away, but I didn’t let her.
“He’s not gone—leave me alone. Leave me alone!” I insisted, pushing her away. “L’eesha—keep them back!” I ordered as the Head Master and several of the Terrace workers started to close in.
I heard her hiss in warning, and she stood guard for me, keeping them all away. M’alex stood beside her, but he was already keening for the death of his rider.
“Tell him to stop—he’s not dead yet,” I told L’eesha.
But Ryse looked bad—there was no denying it. The Madling had had him in its grip for far too long. The sleeve of his flight leathers had been ripped off and I could see the gray lines already spreading from the tiny rows of needle-sharp bites.
His golden eyes were going dark as I knelt beside him and cupped his cheek in my hand. His skin was cold—icy cold. It was as though the Madling bite was sucking all the vitality out of him, even though the wretched creature was gone.
“Ryse,” I called softly. “Ryse, please don’t leave me!”
His head turned towards me blindly.
“Auri? Is that you?”
“It’s me,” I said, and my tears were falling on his face now, though he didn’t seem to notice.
“Shouldn’t…touch me,” he managed to get out. “Bit me…no cure.”
“I don’t care about that!” I said, the words coming out in a sob. “You can’t leave me, Ryse—I love you!”
“And your love will save him…if you let it.”
It was the voice in my ear again—the same one I’d heard in my dream last night, I finally realized.
“Yes, it is I, Elleena. I spoke to you last night and I am speaking again through the power of our dragons’ bloodlines,” she told me. “There is a way to save your lover, but you must be willing to sacrifice to do it.”
“Anything!” I told her eagerly. “Do I need to take his sickness to heal him? I’ll gladly die in his place.”
“Nothing as extreme as that,” she said to me. “You have the power through your Golden Queen to draw the sickness out.”
“I do?” I asked. I must look crazy, like I was talking to myself, but I didn’t care. Suddenly, I remembered what Ryse had said—that there was healing in the hands of the rider of a Golden Queen.
“You do,” Elleena sighed in my ear. “But you wear a powerful piece of magic that inhibits your power. The Dragon Glass keeps your Queen’s power from flowing out of you and into your lover. You must smash it to end the glamour that keeps your power from flowing.”
I gripped for the familiar dragon’s head at the hollow of my throat.
For over six months I had worn it and never taken it off except in my room alone with Ryse.
For six months it had kept me safe, protected my true identity and hidden my secret.
Without it I would be exposed for what I was—a fraud.
A woman pretending to be a man. An imposter who had taken her brother’s place and was here at the Academy under false pretenses.
I yanked it off without a second thought and smashed it on the stone ledge I was kneeling on.
The Dragon Glass—beautiful and brittle—shattered into a million pieces. I scarcely even noticed. Gripping Ryse’s face between my hands I called for L’eesha.
“Come here—put your nose against my back!” I ordered her.
She did it at once and for the first time, I felt what I had been missing.
I had never touched her without the Dragon Glass pendant on before. I never took it off except in my room at night, so every time I’d been with her, I’d been wearing it. Now I felt as though a switch had been thrown inside me.
The best way I can describe it is what might happen if you were born seeing the world only in black and white and someone suddenly gave you glasses that allowed you to see color.
L’eesha’s power—the power of a Golden Queen—flowed into me and through me, opening a whole new world of possibilities.
It was a golden river of light—light that could cleanse the impurity that was spreading through Ryse’s blood and rid him of the Madling’s evil curse.
“Heal…heal…be healed,” I chanted, channeling the power of my dragon directly into him. I felt L’eesha chanting with me, her breath hot against my back as she concentrated on sending me her power to heal the man we both loved.
And slowly, it began to work.
I watched as the gray lines on his skin began to fade. Then the tiny needle-punctures left by the Madling’s teeth began to heal. The color came back to his face and his eyes—which had turned a dull copper—were gold again.
As the pain and impurity left his body, he looked up at me in wonder.
“Auri,” he breathed. “What…what did you do to me?”
“Healed you,” I said and leaned down to kiss his forehead. “Please tell me you feel better.”
“I think I feel better than I ever have in my life!” He sat up and flexed his shoulder experimentally. “You really did heal me—the bite is gone!” he exclaimed.
I laughed in delight and I felt L’eesha echo my joy. Everything was all right! Ryse was going to live! The Madling poison had been expelled from his blood and his wound was healed—not even a single mark remained.
Then a heavy hand fell on my shoulder and someone spun me around.
It was the Head Master, glaring down at me with angry, incredulous eyes.
“Who the hell are you?” he demanded. “And what is a girl doing at my Academy?”