Page 106 of The Last Valkyrie

Then I jumped.

A moment of freefall launched my stomach to my throat, that split second of weightlessness making my heart lurch. I beat my wings hard and lifted into the sky, balancing my equilibrium as the wings carried me through the wind. I howled, careening over the students and watching below as their ant-sized heads craned and whipped around to follow me above them.

My wings snapped great gusts of wind, blowing their hair about. I veered down, timing my dive to level out as I reached a place just above them—banking hard when I was ten feet off the ground.

Even with my heart rampaging against my ribcage, it was impossible not to smile at the sheer freedom and audacity I felt atflying.

I was the only human or elf to ever do it.

“Fuckme!” a student wailed as I shot over his head and continued my twirling flight, dive-rolling and pulling up short in the sky.

My wings snapped furiously, catching the wind like sails billowing in the sea. And then I was standing in the air, ten feet out from the edge where I’d given my speech, fifty feet up. Only my gently flapping wings kept me aloft—straight-backed and proud as I hovered over my classmates and comrades.

“Ser’karioth!” elves muttered in their elegant language, pointing up at me.

Lightbearer,I thought, smiling down at them.

“Valkyrie!” cried a human student.

The uproar was immediate, with just as many confused and scared tones in the cacophony as there were awestruck, optimistic ones.

Glancing over my shoulder, I noticed my mates standing at the cliff’s edge behind me. While I flew around like a crazed moth in the moonlight, they had used the distraction to take their positions side-by-side.

The wall of five men took turns sweeping their hands down at the audience and creating a moment of grandeur to fit the occasion.

“The Ljosalfar stand with Ravinica!” Corym announced, punching a fist proudly.

“The shifters stand with Ravinica!” Sven echoed.

“When the Hersirs fail us, the last valkyrie will lead us!” Grim shouted in his booming voice.

The audience’s mood began to turn, quieting to listen to my mates, and then joining them in their strident cheering. Fistsjoined the sky as my mates lifted theirs—combative, unifying, defiant fists.

Arne added the next words. “She is one-of-one, and must be protected at all costs! Give her a chance, comrades!”

Magnus spoke last, adding a bit of wryness to the conversation as it went down the line. “From one fucked-up student to another, I stand with Ravinica. You all should too!”

The cheering swelled.

It was hard to keep out the tears. The moment I had been planning for but never knew how to implement—certainly not withdragon wings on my back—was coming to fruition.

It was working.

It may have been a moment of naivety, or self-assuredness I didn’t have any business owning. But things feltrightthen, with the hundred students below hollering and cheering, finding new vigor and strength in their bones at the sight of my wings.

I wasn’t sure what this meant for the academy as a whole. This was more of a symbolic gesture than anything else, but it was a necessary one, I felt. If the students could look to me as some kind of beacon, maybe in the horrors and midst of combat they’d draw on their inner strength knowing that the last dragonkin, the last valkyrie, fought alongside them.

I had no delusions my wings somehow made me equal to the jotnars’ power or the dark elves’ wickedness. We still had our work cut out for us. It would be a deadly, bloody conflict coming.

Yet our greatest weapon was our togetherness, and if I could stoke the flames of unity by showing the academy we had some aces in the hole of our own . . . then I would gladly take on that mantle.

Joining my comrades, my mates, and my friends, I added to the chorus—and there was music indeed—as I helped lift the song to the heavens while thrusting both my fists above my head.

“Long live Vikingrune Academy!”

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