The battleship swooped through the Kladuu’s atmosphere, breaking through a small bank of clouds, and hovered above the glimmering teal ocean near the Katu’s jungle. Tane didn’t know the area well because he’d spent most of his airtime fighting in the Arakid war and he’d never seen the Hylan city in person, but the glass behemoth of a castle rising from the waters couldn’t be anything other than the Vydal.

“It’s so gaudy,” Kinyi said with her face pressed close to the window glass.

When he didn’t respond, she glanced back at him, her pretty face creased with worry. Somewhere along the way of their daring mission, she’d lost the bandage on the side of her face, and the weeping wounds were red. He hated that she would return to her people without her markings. He hated that they’d see her like this. He was so tense and on edge that if any Draqon even looked at her as less than because of her missing scales, he would break their face.

“It looks like a million little daggers pointing at the sky,” he said, turning his focus back to the city of glass beneath them.

Kinyi shuddered. “You’re right. Maybe the Hylas wanted it to look like their teeth.”

Beneath the ship, the ocean rippled, sending white-capped waves crashing outward in a wide circle. They were close enough to the shore that Tane could watch as the massive waves battered the closest foliage and trees on the beach. At the city’s edge, the water splashed against the glass walls and white froth spilled over the numerous walkways.

As they descended, more Hylas appeared around the massive city, gathering in the castle’s windows, or along the pathways leading out to the smaller wooden huts, or even swimming close to the ship with their scaled tails flipping back and forth in the water.

It was almost dusk on Kladuu, the two moons rising high overhead as the sun folded into the horizon. The sunset’s colors bloomed like a seeping wound across the sky, garish with reds and deep purples. It was a sky worthy of battle, and before he knew it, he was thinking about what it would be like to fly through those colors, to burst through the clouds, with the sun on his scales and Kinyi on his back.

He blinked, knowing without needing to see Kinyi’s face that his eyes had gone completely black. He scented his madness in the air like lightning in a storm.

“This won’t end well.” He took a deep breath and felt his partial shift subside with his exhale.

“If we knew it would go well, it wouldn’t be fun.”

Before he could respond, the ship settled above the water, right off the city’s edge, and a powerful rumble crescendoed beneath their feet. The stabilizers descended to keep the ship in a hover position.

“Looks like this is our stop,” he said, hoping his voice didn’t betray his nerves.

If it did, Kinyi didn’t embarrass him by acknowledging it. “Then we better hide in case the humans come to their ships before the ramps descend.”

But she’d hardly finished her sentence before the massive windows wrapped around the entire hold began to whine. Together, they stepped back, giving the plasteel walls plenty of room to open. The panes lifted upward on top hinges, angling so far back that they disappeared against the ship. A fresh ocean breeze gusted in and greeted them with the heavy smell of brine.

Tane stepped forward and looked down. Beside him, Kinyi let out a low whistle. “That’s a long way down.”

The drop to the ocean had to be nearly fifty feet. The waves, which he knew were sizeable considering the way they hit the beach about a mile out from the ship, looked like tiny white dots. Farther away, toward the front of the ship, he spotted a pod of Hylas swimming out to meet the human soldiers.

“We should go before the Hylas come any closer. I’m not an expert on nasty sea creatures, but I’m pretty sure they’ll hear us splashing around if they’re close.”

He stepped up to the edge of the opening and a gust of wind met him. He licked his lips, tasting salt and the fresh, crisp scent of Kladian air. His gut twisted. Kinyi had been right—this place was home, no matter how far he ran from it.

“Wait.” Kinyi grabbed his arm. “I’m not that great of a swimmer.”

“Seriously?” He couldn’t imagine her not being good at something.

“Don’t look at me like that. It’s not like I’m scared or anything.” Her scowl deepened. “Well, maybe. But it’s not like the hot springs back at the hive are deep and all the lakes are frozen! I was learning to ride, not swim.”

He grinned, which only hardened her glare. Turning his back to her, he reached over his shoulder and slapped his back. “Hop on.”

“What?”

“Get on. You can ride me down.”

“That’s a good idea. Shift and fly us away. They’ll never catch us in time.”

He glanced back to see whether she was serious, but now she was the one grinning. “Very funny.”

“Just making sure you’re paying attention.” She climbed onto his back and cinched her legs around his waist. He grabbed her ankles as her arms came around his neck.

“Ready?”

“Just don’t drop me. Or let me drown.”

Mimicking her motion from earlier, he took her hand and kissed the soft skin of her palm. “Never.”

He stepped over the edge.

Kinyi’s arms and legs tightened around him like a jungle serpent squeezing the life out of its prey. The sudden lack of solid footing beneath him made his stomach jump into his throat. His eyes watered as the wind gusted past him, but he kept his head down and his eyes open. The ocean rushed closer and closer. At the last second, he took a deep, long breath and held it.

The water hit them like a concrete barrier.

His grip on Kinyi slipped. Her arms weren’t around his neck anymore. He was completely submerged in the water and sinking deeper. He twisted his arms and legs to stop his descent.

He looked up and found Kinyi a few feet above him, her legs kicking wildly. Then she went limp, her chest heaving as she swallowed mouthfuls of water.

When he’d stopped sinking, he swam upward with powerful strokes, cutting through the water and grabbing her around the waist. His lungs were nearly bursting when he broke through the surface. Almost instantly, a wave took them high up and carried them deep into the trench. It crashed down on them and hurled them back beneath the surface.

The ship’s stabilizers created a storm on the ocean, and the waves kept coming, crashing over his head and pushing them under. They drove him toward the beach with a violence he could barely keep up with, and then sucked them back out with a vengeful undertow.

He crawled onto the beach, choking on water with his breath lodged tight in his throat. His vision spotted with black.

Kinyi’s face was paler than usual, and her lips were blue. He laid her out in the sand and pumped on her chest.

One… Two… Three ...

How long had they been out there, trying to swim back? He couldn’t smell her scent over the ocean’s salt and the pungent jungle. But when he pressed his ear to her chest, he should have heard her heart beating.

He heard nothing but the waves at his back.

“You can’t go out like this,” he growled, resuming the rib-bruising compressions. “You can’t drown.” He punctuated every word with a powerful press of his hands. “Like. Some. Fucking. Wet. Katu.”

He reared back and slammed his fist down on her chest.

A few of her ribs broke in a symphony of cracks.

But she arched off the beach, hacking and choking up the water. Tane rolled her onto her side as she sputtered water, her body contorting with the effort. When she got the last of it out, she collapsed onto her back, her hands clutching her sides as she wheezed in shallow breaths.

“You asshole,” she rasped.

“Proper chest compressions always break a few ribs. Enver taught me that,” Tane defended.

“You almost let me drown.”

“You’re very slippery when wet.”

Her eyes snapped to his and narrowed dangerously. “How the hell did you just make this sexual?”

He placed a quick kiss on her lips. After standing and swiping the sand off his legs, he offered her his hand.

“Don’t drop me. Again.” She took his hand and stood, hissing from her ribs.

“Those will hurt for a while. But you heal fast. I give them a day.”

“I know how fast I heal. Let go of my hand. I’m mad at you.”

She tried to jerk her hand free, but he held it tightly and pulled her against his chest. He kissed her, long and deep, tasting the salt on her lips and the fire in her blood. Already her Draqon blood worked to heal her broken bones. It tasted like a fine wine in his mouth, and any other time, he would have slowed down to savor her flavor, but he nearly trembled with relief. Against his closed eyelids, he saw her pale face and blue lips, her unmoving hands and too still body. It was wrong. It was horrible.

When he released her, she sucked in a deep breath of air, her hand going to her ribs again. “You kiss like you do chest compressions. I’m fine. Calm down. I can smell your relief. It’ll take more than some stupid water to take me out.”

“I know, Ice Queen.” He cupped her injured cheek, his thumb grazing the edge of a missing scale. “But you looked awfully dead to me.”

She sucker-punched him in the stomach. Not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to steal his breath. He coughed.

She smirked at him. “If you tell another soul about this—”

A low screech built in the sky. They both ducked farther into the jungle and looked up as the sound morphed into a piercing, ear-rupturing scream. A dart of metal tore by high above their heads, followed by another and another. The sun’s final rays gleamed off the metal hulls of the ships, all outfitted with massive guns and cannons, escorted by a handful of larger Falconers. Booms echoed overhead as the ships blasted off, breaking the planet’s sound barrier.

Kinyi twisted around to follow the ships’ progress over the jungle. “Oh no,” she breathed, her face turning pale again. “Why are they already attacking?”

Tane glanced back at the battleship, no other small, combat-equipped ships left the massive carrier. He shook his head. “They can’t be attacking. They didn’t take all the ships. It’s probably just a scouting group.”

“Then why did they take Falconers?”

“Because the hive is far away? It would take them almost an hour to fly to the farthest mountain ranges.”

Kinyi glanced back toward the jungle. “I don’t know. I have a bad feeling—”

An explosion cut her off. It shook the ground and made the surrounding trees rustle and sway.

“Fuck,” Tane growled, grabbing Kinyi’s arm. “That was close. But what would they be dropping bombs on?”

“The Vilkas,” she whispered, horrified as she turned to face him. “That was their mountain.”