“I know. Pa will never find us here,” Roberto replied.
“If we ever have to run away, I’ll meet you here.”
Shards, what a life, scared of their own father.
“Silent witness,” Roberto melded. “Submerge.”
She quieted her thoughts, striving to become a silent witness.
“Ezaara, you’re like an iron fortress standing in my path. Be gentle, simply fade away.”
Ezaara blocked him out, but the vision of Adelina died.
“Try again.”
Perhaps it was like sleeping or dreaming, just relaxing and letting her mind slip away.
“That’s it. You disappeared.” He broke mind-meld. “You could still see my memory, right?”
“Phew, that’s easy, but still really hard work.” Ezaara wiped her brow. “Now that we’ve mastered the silent witness, how do tharuks mind bend?”
“Using the silent witness lets you sense what someone’s thinking, unobserved. Mind benders inflict mental violence and terror. I won’t teach anyone those techniques. It was bad enough having them thrust upon me.”
“So why are you teaching me?” she asked.
“As Master of Mental Faculties and Imprinting I have to test people on trial. If you could perform tests too, we’d have a better chance of discovering spies and traitors, and if anything happened to me, my skills wouldn’t be lost. I’ve been trying to convince the council to train more people, but they’re too scared of mental powers.”
So that was it. “You’re teaching me because you might not come back.”
Roberto’s eyes slid away. “There is that,” he finally said, meeting her gaze. “These tools are valuable. I don’t want them lost.”
“And I don’t want to lose you.”
His eyes burned through her and he bent his head, kissing her again. Their sathir swirled around them, enveloping them in a protective cocoon—his dark blue flecked with silver dancing with her vibrant colors.
Roberto smiled. “Now, let’s compose ourselves and go back to face the council so Tomaaz and I can receive our final instructions.”
Unbidden, Handel’s vision rushed into Ezaara’s mind—Roberto lunging at her, his handsome face twisted with hatred.
She clamped down on the vision. No, Roberto would never harm her. He’d nearly given his life for her, bleeding out on the desert sands with a gut wound inflicted by feuding Robandi. This awful prophecy had to be wrong. But Ezaara couldn’t help the dark feeling rising inside her. As Roberto took her hand and they walked back to their dragons, a shiver snaked down her spine.
Dragons’ Hold
Tomaaz was slumped in the saddle, his head leaning on Maazini’s spinal ridge, clinging on with aching arms. How many days had they been flying? It felt like forever. His hip throbbed like someone was pounding it on an anvil, the pain making him dizzy. His throat was parched and his stomach twisted with hunger, but he had no food and he was too weak to reach for the trickle left in the waterskin.
Ahead, moonlight glanced off snow-clad slopes. Maazini beat his wings, ascending a mountainside. Tomaaz’s eyes blurred and drifted shut, darkness claiming him.
The dragon’s voice rumbled in his mind, jolting his eyes open. “Tomaaz, we’re nearly there.”
Tomaaz dimly registered the glance of moonlight on snow. If that was snow, he should be cold, but he was burning up, limbs trembling as he clung to his loyal dragon.
Lovina’s face swam before his eyes, and he reached out to stroke her cheek, slipping sideways.
“Tomaaz!” The sharpness of Maazini’s tone snapped him out of delirium.
They swooped over a mountain peak, and plunged down the other side toward a dark forest. His head spun. Maazini headed across the basin, backwinging alongside a ledge. Grunting, the dragon scrabbled on the rock for a foothold, scattering shale and snow down the mountainside. “We’re at Dragons’ Hold.”
“Made it … we made it.” Tomaaz fumbled to untie the saddle straps around his waist—the only things that had stopped him from sliding out of the saddle. Sweat stung his eyes as his fingers fumbled with the knots. And then he was free.
“Easy,” Maazini cautioned as Tomaaz gritted his teeth and hoisted his good leg over the saddle.
Red hot pain seared like a poker in his hip, rippling up his side. He clamped his teeth down and drew blood, salty and wet. He sucked down the moisture. Jaw clenched, he slid out of the saddle, breaking his descent with the straps.
“Ugh. Ah—” He landed on his uninjured leg. Leaning against Maazini, he struggled for breath. He had to see Ezaara, pass her a message. He haltingly put some weight on his injured leg, but his hip, awash with fire, gave out. Tomaaz slipped and struck his head on the stone floor, and everything went black.
§
Screams sliced through the night, waking Marlies. Throwing back the covers, she dashed to the next room, where her son Tomaaz usually slept. There, in the flickering candlelight was the nameless slave boy, thrashing in his tangled bedsheets. Marlies shook him awake. Scooping him into her arms, she carried him to the rocking chair. He was so light, the weight of a young littling. She settled in the chair, tucking a blanket around him.
He stared up at her, his eyes wide with terror.
The poor thing. Since Tomaaz had rescued him from Death Valley, he’d never slept through once, constantly plagued with night terrors. What had the poor boy been through? How many years had he lived there, and how had he survived? Most died within months of arriving, through starvation, sickness, sheer exhaustion or from the tharuks’ brutal beatings—Death Valley had earned its name, thousands of lives over.
She smoothed back his dark hair, rocking and crooning. Although he’d been at Dragons’ Hold over a moon and a half, he still hadn’t spoken a word. They had no idea whether his family was alive or dead, how old he was, or even what his name was.
“It’s all right,” she crooned,
