Nat fought a smile. She remembered that when she had raised her gun, she had hoped for this outcome, had wished for it with everything she had.
“Seriously though, I felt that bullet rip me apart. But I’m here.”
“You are,” she said with a laugh, feeling giddy with happiness. They were wrong about me, she thought. They told me I didn’t have a heart. They told me I would never love anyone . . . and look . . . look at him . . . look how beautiful he is . . . how alive . . .
“You knew this would happen?” Wes said. “But how?”
“It doesn’t matter how,” she said. “You’re here, and that’s all that matters.” A powerful protection spell. I must like him so very, very much, she thought.
“Nat,” he said, taking her hand in his. “I wanted to say something to you before . . . I don’t know if you want to hear it . . . and I don’t know what’s going to happen when we reach the Blue . . . but . . . maybe we can . . . after you find what you’re looking for . . . if everything’s okay . . . maybe we can . . .”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes.” Whatever happened, the answer was yes. Yes!
His eyes lit up with joy. “Yes?”
“Yes.” She leaned down, but he was the one who pulled her to his lap, his strong arms surrounding her, and then they were kissing, and kissing, and kissing, and his mouth was on hers, and they were together, where they belonged, and she buried herself deep into his arms, and he kissed her everywhere, her nose, her cheeks, her neck, her mark, and she was laughing with happiness.
“All right then,” Wes said, squeezing her tightly, his old grin returning, happy to be back on his ship with his crew. “What did I miss?”
Nat was about to reply when Roark burst into the room. “We’re here . . . at the doorway to Arem. But Donnie says we’ve come too late.”
Ahead of them, on the distant skyline, they saw the battleships approaching the small island.
48
THE NAVY FLEET HAD SURROUNDED A tiny green island, almost invisible as it was hidden so well by the gray frozen ones around it. It was in the middle of the archipelago, a small green gem.
“Supercarriers,” Wes said with a frown.
“Missile destroyers, frigates, missile cruisers. It’s a full drone army.” Shakes whistled, peering through the binoculars. “They’re serious about this.”
Liannan paled. “They must not be allowed to enter the doorway. My people cannot defend themselves against this firepower. If they are allowed to enter, it will mean death to Vallonis. If only we still had our drakonrydders . . .”
Nat was startled out of her paralysis. She had been overwhelmed by the size of the fleet, helpless against the magnificent array and might of the country’s massive military machine, commanded by soldiers somewhere in bunkers, hidden far away where they could not be stopped. She had done this. She had given away the stone, and now it was too late—there was nothing they could do now, nothing they could do to stop it—but something Liannan said struck a chord in her.
Drakonrydders.
“The drakon,” she whispered. “The monster in the sea. The wailer. You called it a protector of Vallonis.”
“Yes, but it is missing its rider and it is uncontrollable without one, a wild animal; otherwise it is our greatest defense.”
Nat felt as if she were waking up from a deep and dream-filled sleep, as the memories she had long suppressed returned to her all at once.
The voice she heard inside her . . . that had ceased to speak because it was speaking in other ways . . .
The song of the little white bird . . .
The creatures that came to feed them . . .
They all said the same thing . . .
You have returned to us.
Bless you . . . bless the drakon . . . bless its rider.
The voice had stopped speaking to her after the death of the white bird. The wailer had been grieving. The wailer was the drakon.
She was not alone. Never alone.
I have been searching for you, but now it is you who must come to me. Journey to the Blue. The Haven needs you.
It is time we are one.
Don’t resist your power. You have to accept who you are, Wes had told her.
She was part of the drakon. She was its familiar, its shadow. When the ice came, the universe was split in two, so that when the drakon was born sixteen years ago, it was split as well, its soul born on the other side of the doorway. The drakon had been looking for her ever since.
She had no heart.
Because she was the drakon’s heart, the drakon’s soul. She and the monster were one and the same. Torn from the other, lost, alone, and only complete, together.
She walked out to the deck, watched as the navy made its way toward the green island that held the doorway to the other world. This was why she had journeyed to the Blue, because the Blue needed her as much as she needed it.
“Nat—what are you doing?” Wes asked, running out to the deck where she stood by the railing, her arms outstretched. “You’re going to get killed!”
She stepped away from him, as she felt her power surge within her, wild and free, unchained; she let it wash over her, let it cover every part of her body and her soul, felt its fury and its delight at being unleashed. She did not cower from it, she did not hide from it, she let it run over her, take over her spirit, she accepted the force of its magnitude.
It scared and exhilarated her.
The awesome power within her, that had kept her alive, that kept her safe.
She was a drakonrydder. A protector of Vallonis. They had kept the land safe for centuries upon centuries. She was the catalyst for destruction. She had been preparing for this all of her life.
She knew now why she had given the stone to Avo, and in turn to his commanders.
She was drawing the RSA to the doorway, drawing its entire fleet there, its entire might to one location, so that she could destroy it. Her dreams had prepared her for exactly this moment. Everything in her life had led up to this, so that she could answer the call, could perform her duty when the time came.
Fire and pain.
Rage and ruin.
Wrath and revenge.
Valleys full of ash and cinder.
Destruction.
Death.
She had brought the war here, had brought the war to the edges of the earth, to rain vengeance on her enemies, to protect her home. This was what she was made for, this was her purpose, her calling.
She turned to Wes and blinked back angry, happy tears. “I know what I have to do now. You were right, Wes, I can fix this thing.”
Then Nat raised her arms to the sky and called for her drakon.
49
DRAKON MAINAS, ANSWER MY CALL. HEED MY WORD.
ARISE FROM THE DEEP AND VANQUISH OUR ENEMIES!
Nat was the drakon, she was its heart and soul, she was its master and its rider.
The sea parted, and a blackened creature rose to the surface. Its skin was the dull color of coal, rippling and studded with spikes. Its eyes were the same shade of green and gold as Nat’s, the pale green of summer grass, the gold of a bright new morning, and it carried the mark of the flame on its breast, the same one that was on her skin. Its massive wings fluttered and folded, a curtain, an umbrella. It was huge, almost as large as a ship, a wonder to behold, terrifying and beautiful.
“DRAKON MAINAS!”
“ANASTASIA DEKESTHALIAS,” he rumbled.
Her real name. Her immortal name that had come to her in a dream. Natasha Kestal was Anastasia Dekesthalias. Resurrection of the Flame. Heart of Dread. Heart of the Drakon.
The creature fixed upon Nat and Nat felt something inside her transform, as if she were opening her eyes for the first time. The world around her grew brighter, and the smallest sound resonated in her ears. Even her mind seemed to expand. She stared into the creature’s eyes and in a flash, the two of them were linked.
Nat’s chest burned; she could hardly think as a new and intense pain washed over her body.
What was it?
Fire. She was breathing fire.
She was made of fire, of ashes and smoke and blood and crystal.
She was burning, burning.
Nat could see everything the drakon saw, felt everything it felt, sensed its anger and its rage.
The drakon rose into the air and the sky exploded with gunfire and missiles as the ships targeted this new enemy, but the drakon was faster and flew higher.
Destroy them! Vanquish our foes! Rain death upon our enemies!
The drakon roared. It zeroed in on the smaller ships first, pounding their hulls, tilting them against the waves and rolling the men into the water. Its powerful wings sent tsunami-like splashes of toxic water onto the ships’ decks. The drakon used the black ocean as a weapon. The frigates swayed and bobbed, and soon toppled over. The black ocean became thick with smoke.
Nat watched as the drakon dove beneath the dark water, disappearing into the depths only to emerge a moment later beneath one of the ships—lifting it up above the waves and breaking it in half as if it were a child’s toy. With a mighty screech, it grasped another ship and tossed it high into the air. When it fell, it slammed it into another boat, sinking them both.
The surviving soldiers beat a retreat into their lifeboats, and other ships begin to follow.
We’ve won, Nat thought, as the armada scattered and ships began to turn away from the green island. But a fresh volley of gunfire exploded from the two massive supercarriers. Their guns fired in elaborate patterns, guided by computers that tracked, plotted, and anticipated the creature’s course as it dove and wound through the sky.
Hide, hide, Nat sent urgently, and the drakon rose upward, its ashen underbelly blending with the dark clouds. But the gunfire continued its relentless rhythm. Red and orange flares sparked through the smoke.
The drakon was nowhere to be seen.
Nat panicked until the creature reemerged. The clouds disappeared into steam as flames shot down from the sky, dissolving the fog like mist meeting the morning sun. The drakon’s fire lit the dark ocean with a light that the black water had not seen in a hundred years.
Its flame as bright-white as day, its wings tucked behind its back, the drakon descended like a bomb towards the middle of the nearest destroyer. Its fire engulfed the ship, and the air reeked of burnt plastic and molten steel. The ship collapsed into the waves, its hull crumpling like twigs before flame.
Another supercarrier released an array of missiles directly at the drakon. The creature rolled away, but the ship’s guns met their mark. A rocket shell tore the drakon’s wing and the clouds glowed a fiery red once more.
Down below, Nat collapsed on the deck.