Page 252 of Starside

I tuck the starlight sword against my back, and it stays there, humming. Ready.

So am I.

I mount my dragon, and say, “Let’s finish this.”

45

Wind whips my hair back, but my eyes do not close against it. I am solely focused forward. The Astral Queen was right. I can feel him. Like a vise around my very soul, snaking through my marrow, tugging like a rope, I follow the glittering string across the world to him.

He’s gotten far, quickly. Perhaps he was always capable of this speed. Maybe I just slowed him down. Maybe that’s all I ever was to him—an obstacle to overcome.

Of course I was. Why would I ever think anything different?

I see you too.

Those words haunt me, my eyes stinging. “You saw me, and you left me,” I say into the wind, my voice echoing through it.

After everything, foolish of me to think that something I cared about would ever be anything other than temporary.

Anger and agony and betrayal shape me, until I become more than just this body, just this armor and this glimmering sword of starlight. I become a sword myself, forged in fury.

The gods don’t know what’s coming for them. I don’t fear death like they do.

This will kill me.

It’s supposed to.

My dragon’s wings push forward, conquering the skies, riding with the winds, fighting right beneath me, as if she has her own purpose. Flat on my stomach, I hear her strong pulse echo against mine.

“Your name,” I whisper, and I know she hears me. “I never—I never got your name. Maybe that’s why, when I called you, you couldn’t hear me.”

She hums below me, her scales trembling.

“I don’t think I’m going to walk out of there alive,” I say. “You saved me, for this. You helped me, for this. And for that, I thank you.” I take a shaking breath. “I would like to thank you by name.”

Don’t thank me yet.

The voice isn’t a voice at all, but a feeling strung into words. I can sense it, as if she’s speaking directly into my mind. I can’t hear her … but somehow, I know the words anyway. Just like my sword, telling me its name.

“How did you do that?” I breathe.

But there’s no response.

The string in my chest tugs—Raker. He and our swords are close. “There,” I say, seeing a shimmering arch even from the sky. It’s blocked by a wall of clouds, thick as a storm.

I grip her scales as she dives forward.

Right through the tempest.

And we plunge into a sea of magic. It’s everywhere, glimmering, poured into all my senses, drowning me from the inside out.

Everything pulls my focus. There are holes in the clouds, with rainbows spilling out of them, like paths, brushing against the sparkling ground. Every time I focus on one thing, the rest vanishes.

This place is its own test. Someone could make it all the way here, I think, and get lost in its maze of radiance.

Luckily, I have my dragon. She cuts through the beauty, landing in front of an arch formed from beams of silver light. This must be the entrance to the well of magic. I can’t see what’s beyond it. The place wears a cloak of enchantment.

I slide off my dragon’s back. Just when I’m about to enter, a shadow casts around me. I tense. Snap around.