Page 162 of Fourth Wing

No fucking way. Every cell in my body rebels at the thought.

“No!” I fight, but there’s no point. He’s too strong. “Mira! What if you get hurt? Tairn’s speed could be the only thing that saves you. At least let us stay.”

She looks over her shoulder at the doorway, but there’s steel in her expression. “You want me to trust you, Riorson? Get her the fuck out of here and find a way for her to keep her seat. We both know she’s dead if she doesn’t.”

“Mira!” I scream, clawing at Xaden’s arms, but he’s already half carrying me down the stairs with an arm clamped around my waist as if I weigh less than the sword on his back. “I love you!” I call up the turret, but there’s no way of knowing if she heard me.

“Can I trust you to get your own pack?” Xaden asks as he marches down the hallway of the barracks. “Or am I going to have to carry you out of here without whatever you brought?”

“I’ll get it myself.” I shove at him, and he lets me go.

It takes mere minutes to grab my pack and Rhiannon’s, since we’ve left them intact, even cramming in our cloaks. Then I’m back in the hallway where Xaden waits, his own pack slung over his shoulder. It looks considerably smaller than the one he arrived with, and I don’t want to even think about what he’s left behind in order to force me out faster.

I don’t bother looking at him, marching for the door, but he grabs my elbow and spins me around. “Nope. It’s too dangerous to leave the fortress walls. We’re going up.” He wraps his arm around my waist and all but hauls me to the nearest turret. “Climb.”

“This is bullshit!” I yell at him, uncaring that every other member of our squad who’s climbing the same turret can hear. “Tairn could help them!”

“Your sister is right. You have to make it out, so we’re leaving. Now fuckingclimb.”

“Dain,” I argue, realizing he’s right in front of us.

He turns around and takes Rhiannon’s pack, slinging it over his own shoulder. “For once, Riorson and I agree. It’s not just you we have to get out, Violet. Think of every other first-year.” The plea in his eyes shuts my mouth. “Are you going to sentence an entireuntrainedsquad to death? Because I’ll make it. Cianna, Emery, and Heaton will, too. And we all fucking know Riorson will. But what about Rhiannon? Ridoc? Sawyer? You want their deaths on your hands?” he asks, his words choppy as we race upward toward the open door.

This isn’t about me.

We burst onto the roof as Emery mounts his dragon, who is precariously perched on the thinner-than-quadrant wall.

Oh gods, I’m never going to be able to mount Tairn at this angle.

“Ridoc and Quinn are already in the air,” Liam tells us as Emery launches skyward, where Cath and Deigh hover, their wings beating the air.

“You’re next!” Xaden shouts at Liam, and Dain nods.

Deigh crumbles the masonry with the force of his landing, and Liam takes off down the narrow walkway toward the large Red Daggertail.

“You next, Aetos,” Xaden barks.

“Vi—” Dain starts to argue.

“That’s an order.” There’s no room for argument in that tone, and we all know it, especially when Cath takes Deigh’s place on the wall. “I’ve got her. Go.”

“Go,” I urge. I’d never be able to live with myself if something happened to Dain on my account. He may have been an ass the last few months, but that doesn’t negate the years he’s been my best friend.

Dain looks like he’s about to fight but finally nods, turning to Xaden. “I’m trusting you to get her out.”

“There’s a lot of that going around today,” Xaden retorts. “Now get on your dragon so I can get her on hers.”

Dain gives me a long, intense look, then turns and runs, racing up Cath’s foreleg in a way that’s so reminiscent of the Gauntlet that I get flashbacks.

“Where are you?”I ask Tairn, seeing empty skies above us.

“Almost there. I was doing what could be done.”

“I can’t do this,” I say to Xaden, turning in his arms to face him. “The others are gone. Call it the favor you owe me, I don’t care. We can stay. I can’t just leave her here. It’s wrong, and it’s something she’d never do to me. I have to stay for her. I just have to.”

There’s so much compassion, so much understanding in his eyes, that when he lets go of my waist, I think he might just let me stay. Then his hands are on my cheeks, sliding back to cup the base of my neck as he brings his mouth to mine.

The kiss is reckless and consuming, and I give it my all, knowing it might be the last one. His tongue licks into my mouth with an urgency I return, angling to take him deeper.

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