“You’re right-handed.”
Her familiar emitted a lazy squawk, and the gold Dragon surrendered. “Honestly, I’m beginning to understand why Tain is so attached to boredom.”
Kaylin, however, was staring at her hand, because the lower half of Spike began to melt.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Terrano said, as if he had eyes in the back of his head.
“You focus on the cohort. I’ll worry about me.”
“You don’t do a very good job of it.” He stiffened, lifting his head. “Hold on tight.”
“To what?”
“Anything.”
Kaylin grabbed Bellusdeo—with her right hand. Spike was now half a ball; the other half had apparently become a thin, shining glove around her left hand.
I’m here.
“Tell me what he’s looking at.”
That is something you do with the eyes that you have, yes?
“Yes.”
“Nothing.” Spike spoke the last word aloud, so that Bellusdeo could also hear his reply.
Bellusdeo snickered at Kaylin’s muted shriek. So did the familiar. “What is he sensing, Spike?”
“There is an anomalous fragment in the material.” Hearing his voice, the Dragon stiffened.
Kaylin ignored her. “You mean the landscape?”
“The landscape? No. Terrano is shaping it as we walk.”
“Bellusdeo?”
“Ahead of you,” the gold Dragon replied, the sound of her voice shifting as she once again surrendered the human form for the draconic one. It was far easier to leap up on her back from flat ground than it had been from curved claws, and Kaylin did.
“The air isn’t that much different,” Terrano said, although he hadn’t looked back. “Keep your feet on the ground unless you have no choice.”
If Bellusdeo was reluctant to take orders from the equivalent of a Barrani child, it didn’t show. “If we’re swept off this path, can you find us?”
Terrano didn’t answer.
Kaylin, however, said, “Probably not.”
“No?”
“If he could find us, he would have already found the cohort. I’m not sure he knows where we are.”
*
Anomaly was not the right word. Kaylin had traveled portal paths that had almost—but not quite—disintegrated beneath her feet before. She had retained her footing on increasingly unstable ground. Those of her companions who had not been as lucky had vanished; Kaylin had been informed that most of them had made it back to the Hallionne eventually.
Given that Bellusdeo was the only female Dragon, and given her importance to the Eternal Emperor, Kaylin understood that eventually was more than just career-limiting. And, if she were honest, Bellusdeo was her friend. She was part of Kaylin’s daily life. If Bellusdeo were lost in the whatever it was, Kaylin firmly intended to be lost with her.
Yes, Spike said.
“Is something coming?”
Something is already here.
Terrano was cursing, now. Or at least Kaylin assumed that’s what he was doing; she only recognized two of the words. “I’ll teach you Leontine,” she told him. “It’s better. More visceral.”
More cursing, but some of it was now aimed at Kaylin. She laughed.
He stopped.
“Bellusdeo.”
“On it already,” the Dragon said. She took two steps, and caught Terrano by the collar. With her teeth.
The land upon which he’d been standing reared up in a wave. It rounded, as if about to burst, and when it did, Kaylin was reminded of an egg, because something emerged from it. It had eyes, or what looked like eyes; it was hard to count them because they opened and closed at random. There was a least one mouth, but Kaylin had the queasy impression that mouths, like eyes, appeared and disappeared as they opened or closed. There were teeth, though.
She wondered, then, if this is what the cohort had faced.
Bellusdeo couldn’t breathe fire without dropping Terrano. She didn’t try. She lifted off, having secured him, and the moment her claws lost contact with the ground he had somehow created, the creature began to fissure and melt simultaneously.
Terrano was not familiar with Leontine, and unlike Mandoran or Annarion, couldn’t hear Teela’s internal voice; he hadn’t learned it. Kaylin was therefore learning a lot of new Barrani words. “Land!” he shouted. “Land there!”
Bellusdeo’s reply was muffled. Given she was speaking with full Dragon throat, this didn’t mean inaudible. “There’s no there!”
He didn’t tell the Dragon to let him go. “It’s not a danger—we need to land before we lose it!”
It’s not a danger my butt, Kaylin thought. “Bellusdeo—”
“He’s insane. That’s a Shadow—”
The familiar squawked. Although in theory his throat and jaws were much, much smaller, his screeching got through, and the Dragon immediately changed direction.
*
Terrano did not stop cursing when they landed; the landing was rough, but he managed to squeak out a single command: stay on the ground!
And ground still existed. It was the lake that had vanished. So had the creature, although something amorphous and foggy remained in its place; something smaller, with—thankfully—less visible definition. Terrano shook himself free of the Dragon’s teeth; the Dragon was making spitting noises, as if he’d left something behind and she didn’t want it staying in her mouth.
Terrano, however, didn’t seem to notice. He raced across the ground, his stride almost unnaturally long.
The familiar squawked loudly, and Terrano shuddered at the sound, but his stride narrowed and although he didn’t stop moving once, he slowed. Kaylin had no idea what he intended to do; she expected him to stop once he reached what her eyes perceived as the edge of the mass.
But no, that would have been too sensible. He did pause, but only to bend into his knees, readjust his weight, and throw his arms back to provide momentum.
He leapt into the shimmering mass, and disappeared from sight.
21
“Should we be worried?” Bellusdeo asked; she retained draconic shape and size.
“You’re not?” Kaylin replied, the words drifting over her shoulder as she ran. The familiar on her shoulder was sitting upright, and his squawk was shrill. He lifted a wing and smacked it across Kaylin’s face, but didn’t withdraw it. The wing did not reveal anything that her own eyes didn’t see.
He bit her ear as she slowed. She could hear voices.
“Do you intend to follow?” Bellusdeo could move. Although the size of the form made her movements feel slower, they weren’t.
“I don’t know where he went. What do you see?”
“Haze.”
Kaylin nodded. “Terrano!”
No answer.
“He really does remind me of Mandoran,” the Dragon said, in a far more natural voice. “I want to strangle him.”
“Stand in line.” And then, casting a backward glance at her companion, Kaylin added, “You sure you want to lose the size advantage?”
“The ground is still here. Terrano, in some fashion, is still present. And I think he may need help.”
“Will he need any help that we can give him?”