Valdris's POV
I'm going to die fighting five possessed dragons.
I've made peace with it. Five hundred years of torture, two weeks of freedom, and this is how it ends—buying time for a gentle thief and a sick child to escape.
There are worse ways to go.
I charge at the first possessed dragon, claws extended. We collide mid-air, and the impact sends shockwaves through the cave. The Soul Eater wearing this dragon's body fights with mindless rage, all instinct and no strategy.
I was a warrior before I was a prisoner. I know how to use that.
I twist, using the possessed dragon's momentum against it, and slam it into the cave wall. The Soul Eater shrieks, but the sound is wrong—too many voices layered together.
Behind me, through our bond, I feel Elara's panic. She hasn't run yet.
Go! I think desperately at her. Take Miko and GO!
Her emotions flood back through the bond: defiance, determination, and something else. Something that feels like—
No. I don't have time to analyze what I'm feeling from her.
Two more possessed dragons attack simultaneously. I barely dodge, feeling their claws scrape across my scales. Pain flares, but it's nothing compared to five hundred years of torture. I can handle pain.
What I can't handle is the growing exhaustion. The exorcism drained me more than I admitted. Every movement costs more energy than it should.
I'm not going to last long enough to save her.
Then I hear it—Elara's voice, not through the bond, but out loud: "Valdris, DUCK!"
I drop without thinking. A blast of healing magic shoots over my head and slams into one of the possessed dragons. The Soul Eater screams as her magic tears at it, trying to rip it free from its host.
She didn't run. Of course she didn't run.
You're supposed to be saving the children! I roar through the bond.
I am! You're one of them! Her response is fierce. Absolute. Now stop arguing and let me help you!
Despite everything—the danger, the exhaustion, the imminent death—I feel something warm bloom in my chest. Something I haven't felt in five hundred years.
Hope.
"Commander Ravik!" Elara shouts. "You said you had a choice to make. Make it now!"
Ravik stares at her, this slip of a girl who just exorcised a Soul Eater and is now demanding an elite war mage commander help her save dragons. The absurdity of it seems to break something in him.
"War mages," he says quietly. "Target the possessed dragons. Containment spells only—we're trying to save them, not kill them."
His soldiers hesitate. Lady Catryn laughs from her perch on the largest possessed dragon.
"You're betraying Theron for a thief and a monster?" she calls mockingly.
"No." Ravik meets her eyes. "I'm betraying a system that tortures children and calls it strength. There's a difference."
He raises his hand, and twenty war mages unleash their magic. Not destructive blasts—binding spells, containment circles, barrier magic. They're trying to trap the possessed dragons without hurting them.
It gives me the opening I need.
I lunge at the largest possessed dragon—the one carrying Catryn. She screams and jumps clear as I tackle it. We crash through the cave wall and into the forest beyond, rolling and clawing and biting.
Through our bond, Elara pours her power into me. Not healing this time—strength. Energy. The feeling of her absolute refusal to let me die.
It's intoxicating.
The possessed dragon beneath me roars, and I see its eyes flicker—black to gold to black again. The real dragon inside is fighting the possession.
"Hold on!" I snarl at it. "Just hold on a little longer!"
Then Elara is there, her hand on the possessed dragon's scales, her magic flooding through it. The exorcism is faster this time—she's learning. The Soul Eater shrieks and explodes out of the dragon's body.
I breathe fire, burning the entity to nothing.
The freed dragon collapses, gasping. Its eyes clear to gold.
"Valdris?" it whispers. "Is it really you?"
I recognize her—Seraphina, a young dragon who was captured three hundred years ago. She was barely a hatchling when they took her.
"I'm here," I tell her gently. "You're free now."
"We did it!" Elara laughs breathlessly. "We actually—"
The other four possessed dragons hit us simultaneously.
I throw myself over Elara and Seraphina, taking the impact. Claws tear through my scales. Fire scorches my wings. Pain explodes through my body, and through the bond, Elara feels all of it.
She screams—not in pain, but in rage.
Her magic erupts like a volcano. Pure, concentrated healing power that doesn't ask or suggest. It demands. The four possessed dragons are blasted backward, and I feel her magic tearing at the Soul Eaters inside them.
But it's too much. Four exorcisms at once. Through the bond, I feel her life force draining dangerously fast.
"Stop!" I gasp. "You'll kill yourself!"
"Then help me!" She grabs my claw, and our bond blazes. "Show me how you survived five hundred years of torture! Show me how to endure!"
And because we're soul-bound, because she's demanding it, I can't refuse.
The memories flood through our connection—my memories, raw and unfiltered. She experiences everything I've endured:
The betrayal. My most trusted friend, a Dragon-Tender named Lyria, leading the war mages to me. Her tear-stained face as she whispered, "I'm sorry, but they have my daughter. Please forgive me." The chains closing around me. Her death scream when Theron killed her anyway, just to prove compassion was weakness.
The torture. Five hundred years of magical blades cutting into my scales. Essence-draining needles piercing my heart. Fire that burned but never consumed. Pain that never ended, never dulled, never gave me the mercy of madness.
The loneliness. Centuries watching other dragons get captured, tortured, broken. Hearing their screams and being unable to help. Slowly watching hope die until only rage remained.
But also—the before. The golden age. I show her what the world was like when Dragon-Tenders existed.
Humans with healing magic living alongside dragons, tending our wounds after battles, easing our pain during sickness, celebrating our hatchings. Dragon-Tenders weren't servants—they were partners. Friends. Family.
I show her Lyria before the betrayal. How she would sing to injured dragons, her magic weaving through their scales like gentle rain. How her daughter would play with dragon hatchlings, giggling as they chased each other through meadows.
I show her the day the war mages came. How they murdered every Dragon-Tender in a single coordinated strike. Hundreds dead in minutes, their bodies burned, their magic erased from history. And then the hunting began—tracking down every dragon, imprisoning us, torturing us to fuel their war machine.
"They didn't just kill the Dragon-Tenders," I tell Elara through the bond. "They convinced the world that healing magic was worthless. That only destruction mattered. They built an entire kingdom on the lie that gentleness is weakness."
Through our connection, Elara feels my five hundred years of rage. My burning need for revenge. My absolute certainty that this kingdom deserves to burn.
But she also feels what I've been trying to hide: beneath all that fury is grief. Profound, aching grief for a world that no longer exists. For friends who died screaming. For the protector I used to be before torture transformed me into a weapon.
"You're not a monster," Elara whispers, tears streaming down her face. "You're someone who's been hurt so badly, you forgot what kindness felt like."
Her words hit me harder than any torture ever did.
"I remember now," I tell her softly. "You reminded me."
The moment breaks when Lady Catryn's voice cuts through: "How touching. Too bad you're both about to die."
The four possessed dragons have recovered. They circle us, ready to attack again. Commander Ravik's war mages are struggling—containment spells aren't enough against Soul Eaters.
Elara sways on her feet, exhausted from the exorcisms. Miko is unconscious in Ravik's arms. Seraphina is too weak to fight. And I'm bleeding from a dozen wounds.
We're going to lose.
Then I feel it through the bond—Elara making a decision. A terrible, brilliant, impossible decision.
"The amplification circles," she says. "The ones in the ancient dragon council grounds. If we could reach them, I could broadcast the exorcism magic to all forty-three possessed dragons simultaneously."
"That would kill you," I say flatly. "The power required—"
"Would kill a human alone, yes." She looks at me, and through the bond, I feel her absolute certainty. "But I'm not alone. I have you. Our bond can handle it."
"You don't know that—"
"I know I can't save the children while forty-three Soul Eaters hunt us. I know we're out of time and options." Her hand tightens on mine. "I know this is our only chance."
She's right. I hate that she's right.
"The council grounds are ten miles north," I say. "Even if we could get there, Theron will have it guarded. He's not stupid—he'll figure out what we're planning."
"Then we'll have to fight through." Elara looks at Commander Ravik. "Are you with us?"
Ravik stares at her—this young thief who's asking him to commit full treason, to attack his own kingdom's forces, to help save dragons that his entire military career was built on torturing.
"My sister had healing magic," he says quietly. "They executed her when she was sixteen. Called her weak. Called her useless. I believed them because it was easier than admitting I served monsters." He draws his sword. "I'm done believing lies. War mages—we're helping the Dragon-Tender reach the amplification circles. Anyone who refuses can leave now."
Three mages leave. Seventeen stay.
"Then let's—" Elara starts.
The cave entrance explodes for the third time today. But this time, it's not enemies.
It's Morvanna, the copper dragon who saved us before. And she's not alone. Behind her are six more dragons—freed from the Citadel, exhausted and wounded, but alive and unpossessed.
"Did someone call for backup?" Morvanna asks, landing with a ground-shaking thud.
Through the bond, I feel Elara's wild hope. Maybe we actually have a chance.
"Get everyone to the council grounds," I tell Morvanna. "Protect Elara at all costs. She's going to—"
An arrow hits Elara in the shoulder.
Not a regular arrow. A soul-poison arrow—the kind designed to corrupt Dragon-Tender magic from the inside out.
Through our bond, I feel the poison flooding her system. Feel her magic twisting, turning against itself. Feel her life force starting to collapse.
"No!" I catch her as she falls.
Lady Catryn stands at the cave entrance, bow in hand, smiling triumphantly. "Soul-poison takes thirty minutes to kill. You have a choice, dragon: waste time trying to save her and let the children burn, or abandon her and complete your mission alone."
Through the bond, I feel Elara's magic dying. Feel the poison spreading. Feel her consciousness fading.
And I realize: this is exactly what happened five hundred years ago. Forced to choose between saving someone I care about and stopping a greater evil.
Last time, I chose wrong. Everyone died anyway.
What choice do I make this time?