Tieran backed up a pace and then settled. This is ridiculous, Kerrigan. You cannot steer. There is nothing there for us to connect with. It will just be me flying with you on my back. That isn’t what the program is for.

“Shh,” she hissed.

Fordham glanced at her in confusion. “Set?”

She nodded. “Yeah, we’re ready.”

Following Netta through the trees was as exhilarating as any other flying she’d ever done, but Kerrigan wasn’t in control. She had no reins or tether to her dragon. Each time she reached for something—anything—to get them through it, she found open air. She gritted her teeth and pushed herself to do more than just sit there.

But Tieran was right. It was ridiculous. She wasn’t doing anything. And she didn’t know how they were going to hide this from everyone else.

Fordham directed them to try a pass of their own. The first one was easy. But as they progressed past the beginner’s course, Kerrigan realized why the bond was so necessary. She couldn’t feel Tieran beneath her. Not really. She only had an abstract sense of what he was going to do at any given point. And when he decided to take Fordham’s instructions literally, as he would do in battle, she had no concept of what was coming next, and that resulted in her slipping and crashing down into the trees.

Her shield collapsed with the fall. She yanked on her air magic to cushion her fall, but still, she landed hard on her back, torn up from the trees on the way down. Air rushed out of her lungs, and her eyes burned.

“Gods,” she groaned.

Tieran circled around and came back for her. You don’t look so good.

“Let’s do it again, jerk,” she said, groaning as she came to her feet and climbed back on her dragon.

But a dozen more runs, and she was still falling off of his back. Her shield stayed in place almost every time, but that hardly made a difference. It was muscle memory, not talent. Even when Tieran started to warn her, she’d still lose momentum and cling to him for her life. It was obvious they were out of sync.

Four days later, when they hadn’t progressed to mind-to-mind bond control and she was still landing on her ass in the snowy forest, Fordham called it quits for the day.

“No,” Kerrigan ground out. “We have to keep practicing.”

“We have been out here all day, every day for four straight days, Kerrigan. You’re not improving, and there’s no healer for all the myriad of bruises atop your body.”

“You once said that pain was part of the program. You had to learn to live with it.”

“Yes,” he ground out. “When we were running five miles a day. Not when your spot in the Society is at stake.”