First she would go to Vayle and Wise Queen Malka’s abandoned outpost. If Val didn’t want her to be able to find an egg on her own, she shouldn’t have told her exactly where to find one.
After that . . . she didn’t know where, and she didn’t know how, but Veronyka would find other Phoenix Riders if it was the last thing she ever did.
That was the day her loss became my victory, and everything changed between us.
- CHAPTER 9 -
TRISTAN
TRISTAN PERCHED ON THE edge of the rocky cliff, staring down at the steep, jagged drop. The sky was vast above him, with barely a cloud to break the endless blue, and below, his phoenix’s scarlet feathers were the only pop of color among a sea of gray stone.
The other Apprentice Riders, along with their instructor, stood behind him, awaiting their turn.
Tristan took a deep breath, steeling himself. It was no small thing to leap blindly into the abyss, timing his jump just right so he landed on the back of his phoenix as he soared far below.
But this, believe it or not, was the easy part. The hard part? Rex, his bondmate, was supposed to be in full flame when Tristan landed.
It didn’t get much worse than being a Phoenix Rider who was afraid of fire.
Maybe, Tristan thought darkly, fighting to keep his legs from trembling, being afraid of heights would be worse. Maybe.
Logically, Tristan knew that, at least when it came to his bondmate’s fire, he couldn’t be harmed—their bond protected him. An animage bonded to a phoenix had a higher tolerance to all fire, though Tristan had yet to test the theory. Would never ever test the theory.
He squeezed his eyes shut. Focus.
Rex’s fire couldn’t harm him—that was what mattered. When an animage and a phoenix bonded, their magic intertwined, and their beings became inextricably linked. Emotions and internal sensations were shared, so that when Tristan felt angry or scared, Rex did too. The same was true of certain abilities. Rex’s immunity to fire extended to Tristan, and likewise, Tristan’s use of language and communication expanded the phoenix’s mind beyond what it would become on its own.
Tristan repeated the reassurances over and over in his head, trying to bury his fear in facts and centuries-old knowledge, but it never worked. Fear, he’d learned, didn’t leave room for logic. It didn’t leave room for much of anything, except mistakes.
Fear is a luxury.
It was one of his father’s favorite maxims, lifted from some ancient bit of Pyraean poetry. When Tristan thought about luxury, he imagined fine silks, expensive Arborian honey wine, and gilded furniture. Not a ridiculous fear of fire. But he supposed that while he couldn’t afford those luxuries—not anymore—he could afford his fear even less.
Rex would try to help, of course, but while their bond would make it easier to time the landing, Rex couldn’t very well stop in midair if Tristan’s muscles refused to make the leap. All their bond would do then was allow Rex to feel Tristan’s terror before he plummeted to his death.
Calm as the mountain, he told himself, repeating one of the phrases his mother used when he was angry or sullen as a child. She would tell him to look up at Pyrmont and imagine himself as stone, still and quiet and unchanging. He tried it now, pressing his feet into the steady, solid ground beneath him.
“Whenever you’re ready, Tristan,” prompted Fallon, their instructor, his voice seeming to come from very far away. He was the youngest of the Master Riders to survive the war and something of a hero to a lot of the apprentices. Fallon had both youth and experience—even if he’d been too young to actually fight in the Blood War—and Tristan hated the idea of embarrassing himself in front of him.
No one knew about Tristan’s fear. They probably thought he was delaying for dramatic effect or trying to one-up Fallon’s demonstration. That was not who Tristan was, but with a Master Rider father who was confident and fearless—and who held the rest of them, particularly his only son, to an impossible standard—many thought Tristan was the same. A hardheaded perfectionist. Serious to a fault.
“While we’re still young and pretty, Tristan!” shouted Anders from somewhere behind him.
“When were you ever pretty?” asked Latham, and laughter broke out.
Tristan clenched his fists. He knew they were only messing around, that they didn’t have any clue what he was dealing with—but their teasing didn’t