Gwen drew her sword, shifting her grip and letting the tip of the blade fall, her arm lax at her side. Isobelle’s heart squeezed. Gwen’s bad shoulder was in some kind of terrible pain, Isobelle could see that much. But before Isobelle could draw another breath, Gwen swung the sword, tightened her grip, and touched her heels to Achilles’s sides. Then came the drum of Achilles’s hooves as he pushed from a trot to a canter and up to a gallop.

“Fall back!” Isobelle cried, and as one the women began to retreat, the circle around the dragon growing once more.

Gwen had nearly won the Tournament of Dragonslayers, but even the best of knights only hit the other rider’s shield sometimes. Achilles had charged endlessly through that orchard under Madame Dupont’s eye, Gwen aiming for that dragonseye ring, missing more often than she hit.

Now, she had one chance, and one chance only, to finish the beast. For Gwen would have to ride close enough to the dragon to use her sword, and in doing so, she would give the dragon its opening to finish her with a single sweep of head or claw.

Gwen was lit by the moonlight, the pinpricks of the flaming torches reflected in her gleaming armor as though she were made of stars. She seemed to become part of the night sky itself, nature’s answer to this unnatural beast from beneath the earth that spewed fire and killed for the love of it.

She came flying across the open field, her black hair streaming like a banner, white skin smeared with blood and dirt, steel luminous in the silver light.

Facing her was the dragon itself, all browns and bronzes and lurking flame, the color of dried blood and darkness. It had heard the thunder of Achilles’s hooves and spread its wings wide, its head snaking toward her, swinging this way and that to pinpoint the origin of the sound.

Isobelle was vaguely aware she had stopped breathing—that she had lowered her torch until the tip rested on the cold earth at her feet. That she was whispering something, mouthing the words, her body rocking forward as if she were riding Achilles, too.

“Go, Gwen. Go.”

She whispered the words again and again, like a prayer—like a spell she was casting, one she knew the others were casting, too.

And then Gwen was there, and she was rising up in her saddle, perfectly balanced in her stirrups and moving with the rhythm of Achilles’s gait, both hands wrapped around the hilt of her sword.

The dragon roared and threw its head up, swiping at her with one great forefoot, tattered wing trailing as it raked its claws toward Achilles’s rump. The horse dodged with a breathtaking leap, and Gwen braced one foot against his saddle and then threw herself at the dragon’s throat.