Out of the thousands of inhabitants she’d encountered, Tomaaz had been the only one to see her, to wake her from her living nightmare and fight for her to be free. She automatically flexed the arm Bill had broken. It was healthy again, not quite as strong as her other, but it would recover. Although she’d never be rid of the whip scars on her back, they would fade. She would not let Bill damage her for life.
Nearby, Singlar, Lars’ purple dragon, sprang from a ledge. Her fingers itched to paint the dragon’s majestic wings, limned in light as it flew over a waterfall that tumbled down an icy slope.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
Lovina spun back to the arch. Erob and Maazini were both still asleep. The voice had sounded odd, like she’d heard it in her head, not with her ears. Had one of the dragons mind-melded with her? She shrugged it off. She’d probably imagined it.
“I’m over here. The other way.”
She spun again. On the other side of the ledge, beyond Erob and Maazini’s sleeping forms, under the overhang where the mountainside blocked the snow and sunlight, deep in shadows, was a green dragon. The dragon stretched its limbs and paced past the others toward her. As it stepped into the sunlight, its scales glinted like emeralds. Lovina had seen dragons before, but not like this, full of majesty, glory—and deep sadness.
The creature bowed its head gracefully before her. “Lovina …”
The voice was in her head. She hadn’t been mistaken. The dragon’s tones were like sweet music that welled inside her. Sunlight played across its hide, turning the green into wondrous shades: moss, fresh mint, new spring grass, evergreens, emeralds and baby ferns in woodlands. If only she had her paintbrush and a palette of colors.
The dragon gazed at her with deep blue eyes.
A rush of wonder engulfed Lovina. Warmth spread through her. A sense of belonging.
“Will you be my rider?”
“Me?” Even as she asked, Lovina was drawn forward. She placed her hand on the dragon’s head. Its skin was warm and supple. “I’m not up to this. I’m untrained. Only a slave.”
“Then we are well suited. I, too, have been enslaved by Zens.”
She barely dared breathe. “You, too?”
“But now I am free. And so are you. Come, fly with me.”
The music inside her grew until she was swept up, leaping onto the dragon. Its haunches tensed and with a flip of its wings, they were airborne, high above the basin, spiraling up toward the peaks. Something loosened inside Lovina. It had started with Tomaaz, and, now, it loosened further. Carefree and unfettered, she laughed.
The dragon chuckled in her mind. “Lovina, for years I was miserable serving a master who had chained me with swayweed, making me hate the ones I loved. I was powerless, but now we can make a new life.”
“So that was the source of the sorrow I sensed in you,” Lovina replied. “For eight years, I was numlocked, beaten and abused. My home was burned and my family killed.”
“I am now your family. Dragons’ Hold will be your home.”
The music swelled inside Lovina, bursting into brilliant harmony. She’d never felt like this before. Never had such a sense of belonging.
“I was called Ajeuria, but now I will be known as Ajeurina, in your honor.”
It was an honor. “Ajeurina,” she liked the way it sounded. Like a new start. So, this was Erob and Maazini’s sister—all three were Zaarusha’s offspring. Fleur, the former master healer and traitor, had been her last rider. “Why don’t you show me my new home?” Lovina asked.
“That would be my pleasure.” A deep wave of Ajeurina’s satisfaction flowed through Lovina, driving away the cold and making her tingle with warmth. Ajeurina dipped her wings and they shot over the basin toward the distant peak of Fire Crag.
Stuck
By the time Ezaara made her way to the mouth of the crevasse to sneak back out of Death Valley, it was broad daylight. Shards, how long had she been holed up watching Roberto? It was one thing to slip into Death Valley wearing an invisibility cloak at night. It was another to walk out among troops of tharuks in broad daylight. Should she chance it?
No, she’d be handing Zens her head on a platter. Roberto’s hand signals had said to flee, not to find Zens and join him in the dungeons.
The stomp of tharuk troops echoed from the main tunnel down the crevasse Ezaara was hiding in. She huffed her breath out, crept further into the crevasse and wrapped her cloak around her. She couldn’t go too far in. Roberto was obviously afraid Zens would sense her. Hastily, she chewed some freshweed. She’d have to wait this out like a brooding dragon, but at least she could disguise her scent. Then she submerged her mind, the way Roberto had taught her, and waited.
§
“Roberto, I know you can hear me.”
Roberto groaned, but not too loudly. He couldn’t show any weakness or Zens would exploit it. But he was weak. Weak from 000’s latest torture and from Zens’ relentless mental battering. Even when Zens wasn’t in the cavern, he bombarded Roberto with insidious thoughts.
“I will beat you. I’ll break your mind and body. You have no hope. Soon, I’ll be your master.”
Even though it was cold, sweat rolled off Roberto’s face as he gritted his teeth and held an image in his mind that Zens couldn’t use against him: the wall of this cavern. He blinked with his good eye. The other eye was swollen shut and his face was stiff with crusted blood. He tried
