The stables smelled of hay and damp earth. Lanterns swung from iron hooks, throwing steady light across beams and rows of stalls. Hooves shifted. Leather creaked. Familiar. Grounding.
Revik lounged in the doorway with his arms folded, smirk already in place. The moment Lyra stepped into the lantern glow—boots laced, hair braided with a strip of linen—he fired.
"Well, well," he drawled. "Now you look more like the thief you are."
Lyra didn't miss a beat. "Better a thief than boring company."
Revik pressed a hand to his chest. "Please. I happen to be excellent company."
I shook my head, a dry chuckle slipping out. "You would think that."
He grinned wider and pushed off the post. I moved to the boy waiting by the stalls. Barely ten, but standing stiff as a spear, proud to be seen.
"Have you readied the horses?" I asked.
"Aye, Highness. All three." He puffed his chest as if he'd shod them himself.
"Good."
Lyra's fingers caught my elbow, tighter than she probably meant. "Three?"
"One for each of—" I stopped. She held my gaze, chin high, mouth tight. The answer was obvious. "You don't know how to ride."
Not a question.
She hesitated, then gave a small shake of her head. "Not exactly."
Revik barked a laugh, swung onto his mare, and patted the space behind him. "You can ride with me, lovey. I don't bite. Much."
Heat rose in my chest before thought. "That's not going to happen."
Before she could argue, I gripped her waist and lifted her onto my stallion. She tensed under my hands but didn't resist. I mounted behind her and gathered the reins. Her back brushed my chest. Close. Warm. I kept my shoulders square and my hands steady.
Revik's smirk sharpened. "Possessive much?"
I ignored him and leaned close enough for her alone. "Hold on, little thief."
We rode into the night.
—
The countryside slipped by in the rhythm of hooves. Fields gave way to low hills; stars cut hard across a black sky. The air tasted cleaner than the city's smoke. Revik rode ahead on a loose rein, humming under his breath.
Lyra sat stiff at first, fighting the saddle. After a while, stubbornness gave ground to discomfort. She shifted, chasing relief, and every movement pressed her closer against me. Her shoulder brushed my chest. Her hair snagged my coat and slid free, carrying the faintest trace of cherry from the bath she'd taken. Out of place. Distracting.
"Comfortable?" I asked, low.
"You mean on this torture device you call a saddle?" she muttered.
The corner of my mouth tried to move. I didn't let it. "You'll survive."
"Easy for you to say. Your backside isn't falling off."
"Hold still," I said. "You fall when the stallion jumps."
She stiffened. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?"
"Not particularly. You're too much trouble to scrape off the rocks."
A short laugh escaped her before she could stop it. The sound eased something tight in my chest I hadn't noticed was there.
Silence settled—comfortable enough. I kept my eyes on the road, scanning hedgerows, culverts, the lines of the land where trouble hides. The best way to stay alive is to assume someone wants you dead. It's rarely the wrong assumption.
"Do you always patrol from the saddle?" she asked after a time.
"When I need to know what the land is saying."
"And what's it saying now?"
"Don't trust corners."
She snorted softly. "Sounds like the city."
"It is. Just a wider one."
The land rose by degrees until the Black Mountains cut the horizon into jagged teeth. The path narrowed, stone pressing close. The horses shortened their stride and chose their feet with care. Wind slid down the gullies, thin and cold.
Her voice came again, quieter. "Do you heal unnaturally fast?"
My grip on the reins tightened. "Why?"
"My shoulder," she said. "It was ruined. I should be dead. Now it's fine."
I exhaled slowly. "Dragons heal faster than humans. But when you nearly died, your body wasn't awake yet. It reacted human." I leaned closer, voice steady. "But your dragon is awoke just in time. You'll heal faster. See sharper. Hear more. You'll feel danger a breath before it arrives."
Revik looked back with a grin. "Lucky you."
Lyra rolled her eyes. The faintest tug touched the corner of her mouth.
"Why didn't you tell me sooner," she said.
"You weren't ready to hear it sooner."
"Arrogant."
"Accurate."
Another soft snort. The wind took it.
We rounded a shoulder of rock and the world tightened. Cliff face to our right, a long drop to our left. The stallion's ears flicked forward. He snorted once. The air shifted.
"Revik," I said, low. "Eyes up."
He straightened. Lyra lifted her head. Her breath changed.
Figures slid down ropes from the ridges above—mercenaries, not soldiers. Patchwork armor. Masks. Obsidian blades meant to chew through scale if they got lucky and close.
Then came the beasts.
Two handlers urged them down on chains—massive things with a bear's bulk and a lizard's hide. Scaled shoulders, heavy claws, wide jaws lined with uneven teeth. Their tongues flicked. The sound they made set my stallion's ears flat.
"Hybrids," Revik muttered, drawing his sword. "Lovely."
The mercenaries cheered as the creatures hit the path, claws grinding stone.
I slid off the saddle and caught Lyra as she came down. Her boots hit gravel; she caught herself and moved to my side, knife in a white-knuckled grip.
"Can't you just—" she gestured at the ridge, "zap them?"
"Not without bringing the cliff down on us."
"Right," she said, tight. "Let's not do that."
I drew my sword. Lightning crawled along the steel in a thin skin—contained, sharp. Enough to drop what faced us. Not enough to wake the mountain.
"Stay behind me," I told her.
"Beside you," she shot back.
No time to argue.
The first beast lunged. I stepped forward and cut across its shoulder. The charge snapped muscle; the creature locked mid-stride and shrieked, tail whipping. Two mercenaries rushed to cover it.
Revik took one down with a neat cross-cut and shoved the other off balance. He smiled the way he always does when math turns violent.
Another beast roared, shaking grit down the rock face. Lyra flinched but held her ground, chin high, eyes bright.
"I can fight," she said.
"Against them?" I parried a thrust and countered through a merc's ribs. "Against war-beasts bred to maul?"
"I won't just stand here."
The second beast slammed the wall, claws tearing grooves in stone. Lyra's knife trembled now.
"I—" Her voice cracked. "Raiden, I can't. Not like this. I don't know how to fight them. I'll slow you down."
I turned to her and met her eyes. She wasn't surrendering; she was telling the truth.
"Then don't fight," I said, steady. "Do what you're good at."
She blinked. "What—"
"Move. Vanish. Make them chase a ghost."
Her jaw worked once. She nodded, hard and small. Then she was gone—slipping into shadow, finding holds a soldier would miss, climbing fast and clean.
"After her!" a merc bellowed.
The handlers loosed chain. The beasts roared and charged uphill, claws dragging sparks. They were hunting her.
Mercenaries pressed harder on the path to pin us while the beasts went high. Sensible division of labor for men who didn't plan to live long. I cut one down and stepped forward to take his place before the gap could swallow us. Revik's blade flashed at my right, low and brutal.
"Count?" he asked, breath even.
"Two dozen on the ropes at least," I said. "Plus handlers."
"And our charming hounds."
"Four. For now."
He grinned. "Better odds than last winter."
"We nearly died last winter."
He shrugged. "And yet."
Steel hammered my guard; I twisted the wrist behind it wrong and felt the joint give. I bled a short pulse through the blade into the next man's thigh and let him drop twitching. The air smelled of blood, sweat, and singed flesh.
Above us, claws tore at the ridge. Lyra's pale shape darted between rocks, quick and low, choosing paths the beasts couldn't take straight on. They changed angles and came at her from the sides. Smarter than I liked.
"Left," Revik warned.
I pivoted. A merc came in hard with a hooked blade meant to catch ankles. I took it at the crook, turned his momentum, and sent him face-first into the wall. He slid down and stayed there.
"Still with me?" I called up to the ridge, I needed her to hear me.
A breath later, her voice came back, tight. "Unfortunately."
Good.
The first beast crested a ledge and snapped at her heels. She jumped, caught a seam with her fingertips, swung to another shelf, and ran. The second beast rammed the ridge where she'd been. Rock cracked. Gravel rained over us.
"Hybrids are faster than they look," Revik said, eyes scanning high as he cut low.
"Not smarter," I said. "Make them commit."
"On it."
He feinted open on the ground to invite a rush and then stepped aside so two mercs collided and tangled themselves. He laughed once, short and mean, and put both down hard.
The handlers tried to steer the beasts with whistles and jerks on the chain. I saw the pattern—three long, one short to attack; sharp double to hold. I adjusted my footing to be where a pull would slow them at the wrong time.
"Leave the handlers to me," I told Revik.
"My favorite kind of chore."
He watched my right while I angled left for the chain team. A merc lunged to stop me; I slipped inside his swing and let a tight burst run up my sword and into his chest. He locked and fell. The first handler dragged at his chain and whistled hard. The beast checked for half a heartbeat at the wrong place on the slope.
I cut the chain.
Lightning rode the edge at the last instant, snapped through links, and blew a ring of molten metal from the last loop. The freed beast stumbled, confused. It chose a new target on instinct—the closest moving body on the slope. Not us.
The merc who'd shouted "After her" didn't shout again.
"Neat," Revik said.
"Next handler."
He jerked his head. "Right ridge. Halfway up."
I saw him—lean, masked, braced wide with the chaîne wound around one forearm. He yanked, double-whistled, trying to hold the second beast on Lyra as she cut across a notch in the rock. She slid under a jutting shelf; the beast jammed itself against stone and roared, thrashing.
I took the angle, set the charge light and precise, and cut. The chain blew apart. The beast lurched, furious and off-balance, then swung blindly at the last place it had scented her. It hit rock. The ridge shook.
Lyra didn't waste the opening. She was already moving—small steps, quick hands, choosing lines even a goat would avoid. She didn't look down. She didn't need to. I was there.
"More on the ropes," Revik called. "Left and rear."
"Copy."
We fell into rhythm: step, cut, shock; step, parry, drive. Don't waste motion. Don't give ground for free. Keep the charge small. Keep the blade clean. Let them make the big mistakes while we make none.
For every man we dropped, two more came down. The narrow trail pressed us hard against the wall. The drop to our left took on a voice of its own—cold and patient.
Lyra's outline flickered above, then vanished behind a fin of rock. I lost sight of her for three breaths and hated it more than I should have. When she reappeared, she sprinted across a skinny ledge, threw a handful of stones into a merc's face, and kept running. He went down cursing and slid until his partner grabbed him.
"Good girl,"I muttered, satisfied.
The freed beasts regrouped without chains, guided now by the nearest handlers' whistles and the mercs' shouts. One took the upper path; the other began to circle lower, cutting off Lyra's options. They were learning.
"Raiden," Revik said quietly.
"I see it."
We needed space or a break in their line, and soon. The shelf ahead angled toward a shallow cut in the rock that would give us a few seconds of cover if we reached it. If we didn't, we'd be squeezed between a wall of men and open air.
"Horses," I said.
Revik whistled once. His mare came quick. My stallion stamped, head high, eyes rolling. He wanted motion.
I cleared a step with steel and shouted to Lyra. She dropped from a lower shelf to the path. "On."I yelled while grabbing her waist.
She didn't argue. I threw her up; she landed light and found the horn with one hand. I mounted behind her. Revik swung into the saddle beside us.
"Move," I said.
We drove forward. The first curve came fast—a blind left with a tooth of rock jutting at shoulder height. "Down," I told her, and she folded into me without hesitation. Something cut the air where her head had been. The stallion gathered himself, leapt a washout, landed sure. We pressed on.
The path narrowed to the width of a thought and widened again around a bulge in the wall. I spent those heartbeats buying room: a thin pulse into a hairline crack ten paces behind us. The edge of the main trail shelled off and took three mercs with it. The mountain groaned and settled. Shouting bled into the wind.
We didn't slow.
A rope team tried to get ahead of us and drop onto the track before the next bend. We rounded the corner at speed and met them chest-high. I cut the first man off the line and shoved the second into the third; Revik took the fourth across the shin and left him curled like a shrimp.
"Last push," he said between breaths.
"Not yet," I answered. The handlers were whistling new patterns.
My stallion was slowing, Lyra must have taken notice because before I could react she threw herself back onto the cliffs. "Go!, I'll be right behind you." She shot over her shoulder as she climbed.
I caught on quickly, she took the worse-looking line—the one with less stone and more air—and made it look easy. The beast hesitated, tested a paw, and chose the safer path. That delay would cost them. If we could keep the ground alive under our feet, she could keep the high ground.
"More coming," Revik muttered. "Left and right. They're going to box us."
He wasn't wrong. Mercenaries kept pouring down the ropes, boots thudding, masks turning our way. The narrow shelf gave us no room to breathe. The beasts' snarls rolled down the cliff like thunder.
The leader finally showed himself—white stripe painted across his mask, calm hands lifted as he gave silent signals. Not a fool. Watching for our mistake. Waiting to turn it into his win.
I shifted my grip. Lightning hummed along my blade, tight and hungry. The cliff to our left fell away into black. The wall at our right pressed close, hard and cold.
We were being closed in from both sides—the mercenaries tightening the line on the path while the hybrids chased her along the ridge.