Nerves pricked at her. In the rush of getting ready, she hadn’t considered what she was doing. This wasn’t the first time she had flown into battle. She’d gone with Helly and Tavry across the world to protect Cyrene’s homeland, but somehow, it felt different now that she was in charge of her own dragon.

“As I’ll ever be,” she finally said.

Helly smiled kindly. “You’ll do just fine. Instincts will kick in.”

Tavry touched her mind. Just like we did in Eleysia, right?

Kerrigan laughed. She loved Tavry so much. “Right. Let’s do this.”

One moment, they were all waiting, and the next, Trulian led them into the skies on the back of his beautiful dragon, Androma. Tieran took off in the middle of the pack. Fordham, Audria, and Roake formed around Kerrigan, settling into an easy formation with Fordham at the head. In practice, Audria had flown lead, but things had shifted, and Fordham had taken over.

It was a several hours’ flight north to the House of Shadows and then east to Lethbridge. Trulian hoped to cut the House of Shadows off before they reached the fortified town. It had a large stone wall surrounding it, and if they took it, they would be in a much better position than if they were out in the open. They had no explicit ground forces. Lethbridge was Sayair tribe territory, but their standing guard would be much farther north, high in the Vert Mountains. Which meant that Bryonican forces would be called in and they were several days away by foot, maybe farther. Kerrigan hoped it wouldn’t last that long.

Once in the air, the dragons spaced out. Kerrigan got her first glimpse of what an aerial army looked like, flying in formation. It was terrifying. Even with so few active dragon riders in the mountain, at least forty or fifty were flying out today with more on the way.

I never thought that I’d see battle, Tieran said in her mind.

“Our circumstances changed quickly—that’s for sure.”

How did this come to be? Explain yourself.

Kerrigan leaned forward on Tieran’s back and began to recount her story of what had happened after she left his side. How she had inspired a march through the streets and then come back and blacked out, only to remain locked in her own mind on the plane for three full days, where she saw what had really caused the wall for the House of Shadows.

And you believe that your blackout caused the wall to come down? he asked carefully.

She shivered. Zina had suggested that she’d had some part in what happened. She’d connected to the wall when she was in the House of Shadows. She’d received the visions from Mei’s memories. It was possible that she had also caused the wall to shatter when her magic was erratic.