“Izzy, stop! You have to calm down!”
Izzy stopped struggling for one brief second to glare at Peter, and then continued to struggle. It was useless to try to break the Stabit spell Peter had cast on her, and she knew it. But she couldn’t force herself to calm down. Not when the love her life was in the hands of that awful wretch.
“Izzy,” another voice said. Izzy turned to see Mac, the head commander of the Falcon Cross military, hovering near her on a broomstick. Mac’s voice was gentler than Peter’s, and even sounded a bit choked up.
“We have to save him!” Izzy yelled, this time in Mac’s direction.
All around Izzy, Falcon Cross soldiers were cheering. The enemy soldiers had fled once they saw their leader fall. Dark wizards flew away as quickly as their broomsticks would carry them, while terrified evil shifters roared behind them. Some of the Falcon Cross soldiers had given chase to the fleeing soldiers, but just as many were now flying in circles through the still-pouring rain, drunk on the knowledge that, at long last, Saul himself had been defeated.
“Izzy! Izzy, listen to me!”
Izzy turned her head sharply, surprised to hear Grayson’s voice. Grayson was one of the Redwood Dragons, but he had been in dragon form only minutes before. None of the Redwood Dragons could talk while in dragon form—talking while in animal form required dark magic, and the Redwood Dragons stayed far, far away from that. But Grayson had shifted back into human form, and was riding on the back of his lifemate Zoe’s broomstick. The realization that not even the dragons themselves were going after their clanmate filled Izzy with terror. The dragons would give their lives to save Noah if they thought there was even a one percent chance of helping him. If they were not pursuing him, that meant things really were hopeless. Izzy stopped fighting against the Stabit spell that held her back, and started to cry. Her sobs were quiet things she tried to hold back, but she couldn’t completely stop them.
“We have to help him,” she said weakly.
“Izzy,” Grayson said, his own voice sounding like it was thick with tears. “That’s what Saul wants. For us to go after Noah. He’s running out of power himself. He’s sold too much of his own soul to dark magic, and he’s having trouble using the ruby to its fullest extent. He thinks that if he draws several good wizards and shifters in, he can draw energy from their souls and make one more push with the dragon ruby. Noah is dead, whether we go after him or not. Saul was already trying to pull from his soul as they fell. That’s why Noah’s cries were so anguished.”
Izzy felt her body going numb with shock. “Dark wizards can use other people’s souls to perform dark magic?”
She’d known that dark magic required the person using it to give up a piece of their soul for each spell performed. But she’d had no idea that a dark wizard could draw from someone else’s soul to perform evil spells. Izzy looked over at Peter in confusion. The old wizard nodded sadly in confirmation.
“It’s not easy to do, but it is possible for wizards to use other people’s souls to perform dark magic. It requires a very advanced use of dark magic, and the magic is weaker so you have to have dozens of souls at once, unlike when you use your own soul and only need yourself. But if anyone could do it, Saul could. He’s been doing nothing but practicing dark magic for most of his life, as far as we can tell.”
Izzy felt bile rising in her throat. “We can’t just leave Noah, though!” she said again. But again, everyone shook their heads sadly at her.
“Izzy,” Mac said. “This is war, and unfortunately there are casualties. We’ve lost many soldiers, and Noah happens to be one of them. He wouldn’t want us to come after him. He’d know the risk of Saul performing a counterattack would be too great. The risk of our frail victory falling through is too great. The best thing we can do now is wait Saul out. Saul is dying, and as long as he has no good, pure souls to reenergize his dark magic, he’ll be gone soon. Noah knows this. He’ll be proud to die as a martyr for the cause.”
Mac was keeping her voice as gentle as possible, but the words still felt like swords in Izzy’s heart. The war was all but won, but what did it matter? If Noah was dead, then Izzy had no reason to live. The happy cheers of the Falcon Cross soldiers near Izzy felt empty. There would be no victory celebrations for her. There would only be mourning. Mourning that she had barely found her lifemate before losing him.
Peter seemed to sense that Izzy had given up her struggling. As she sat dejectedly on her broomstick, hunched over with silent sobs, she heard him say, “Stabit terminantur.” She felt a small rush of cool air as the Stabit spell around her was cancelled. She could move freely again, but what did it matter? There was no saving Noah. She felt like she never wanted to move again.
The rain was starting to subside now, and Izzy felt betrayed by it, too. How could the sky dare to stop crying, when she had just lost everything?
“Come on, Izzy,” Peter said. “Let’s all head down to camp. You can get a warm meal and get some rest.”
Izzy was pretty sure she would never eat again, but she didn’t say that. Instead, she silently turned to follow Peter as he made his way down toward the earth below, where a supply squadron would already be on the way with tents and food. Around Izzy, the dragons and other wizards flew. Many of the Falcon Cross soldiers were still cheering and swooping happily through the sky, but the soldiers closest to Izzy, the VIPs, were somber. The dragon shifters still in dragon form seemed to have no life left in their wings as they flew, and the faces of the wizards were strained.
This isn’t right, Izzy thought as she descended. I don’t care if it puts all of us at risk. I cannot just let Noah die. And besides, the ruby needs to be rescued. We can’t leave it there for god only knows who to find. What if someone truly evil gets to it before us, once Saul is dead?
Izzy’s heart thumped in her chest as she flew. A burning in her core, which she now recognized as the lifemate bond, was growing hotter and hotter. Her connection to Noah was telling her that he was in trouble. She dreaded the moment that the heat started to subside. She would know, then, that Noah was dead. She’d rather have this searing heat burning her from the inside out than know that Noah was gone. Didn’t Peter or the other dragons understand how the lifemate bond burned within her? How it urged her to risk everything for Noah’s sake, for her lifemate who was in mortal danger?
With sudden clarity, Izzy realized that this was the problem. The others didn’t realize how her very core burned for Noah. They didn’t realize that she and Noah were lifemates, and that she could not turn her back on Noah, no matter what the consequences. The lifemate bond was born of deep, pure love. Love that would sacrifice everything. Love that would rescue Noah or die trying.
Izzy looked around at the wizards surrounding her. Peter could cast strong spells, so if she wanted to get away she’d have to fly out of his range with lightning speed—before he realized what she was doing. The only wizard who could fly faster than her was Zoe, but Zoe was carrying Grayson on her broomstick at the moment, which might just slow her down enough to give Izzy a real shot at flying away. Izzy felt a cold sweat breaking out on her forehead as she considered her options. Was she really going to do this? Was she really going to defy the head wizards and dragons, and risk her own soul, just to go confront Saul? Saul, the evil dragon whom she was more terrified of than any other living thing in existence? Izzy didn’t have to ponder the question. She already knew the answer. Her lifemate was in danger. Fears be damned. The high wizards and dragons be damned. She was going to try to save Noah, even if it was the last thing she did. Which, she realized, it very well might be the last thing she did.
Izzy slowed her speed ever so slightly, just enough to let Peter and the others pull imperceptibly ahead of her. She fell back as far as she dared—any more and suspicions would rise about what she was about to do. Taking one more deep breath, Izzy bit her lip in determination and then, as quickly and silently as possible, she turned and flew in the opposite direction of Peter and the rest of the crew.
She didn’t dare look back. She knew they would be chasing her in a matter of seconds, and she didn’t want to slow her speed just to see what she already knew. She bent low against her broomstick and put every ounce of her energy into the effort of flying.
In less than five seconds, she heard shouts from behind her. They had realized what she was doing. She kept flying, praying that her tiny head start was enough. She didn’t know how long it took Peter to realize what was going on, but it must have been long enough for her to zoom out of his range. She heard him start to yell stopping spells, and she braced herself for impact, but nothing happened. Her heart leapt with joy. Now, if she could just stay ahead of Zoe, she was home free.
Izzy flew and prayed, and prayed and flew, panting hard and hoping against hope that she could make it away from the others before they could stop her. For a moment, she thought Zoe’s shouts were growing louder, but then they started to fade away again. It was several minutes later before Izzy finally dared to look over her shoulder. No one was following her anymore. She could see the outlines of the dragons and wizards far behind her, hovering in midair. They were letting her go. Zoe had been too slow with Grayson as a passenger, and the others knew this meant that Izzy would get away. They were likely giving her up as lost at this point, too.
Izzy swallowed hard, a fresh lump of fear in her throat. She hoped with all her heart that they were wrong to think that no one would be able to challenge Saul right now while still keeping his or her soul intact. The idea of Saul using her to perform dark magic was a terrible one, but more terrible still was the thought of Noah dying at the mercy of a crazed, evil dragon wizard.
“Hang on, Noah,” Izzy said as she faced forward and headed toward the spot where she’d seen Saul and Noah falling toward the earth. “I’m coming for you.”