Silence fell between the four of them.
Torvek stopped straining against Rasken's arms. Rasken's mouth hung slightly open. Seraya's hand stayed pressed against Simon's chest, but her eyes had turned toward the sea.
Simon looked at Haldis.
The Leviathan had stopped breathing fire. Now it was fighting her with its body.
One of its fin-wings swept toward her like a burning scythe. Haldis met it with her hexagonal shield, angling it so the wing's edge skidded off the shell instead of striking it head-on.
SKRRRRRK!
Sparks of molten scale sprayed across the sky. The force still pushed her back a dozen meters through the air.
The Leviathan's tail came at her next. She parried that too, then twisted away from its snapping jaws as the beast tamer calmly guided its head from between its horns.
She was holding it off.
But Simon noticed what the others hadn't.
