Page 7 of Swift Wings Shadowed Heart
“Hear! Hear!” the guests chant in unison.
“As you can see,” she gestures behind her, “all six Primes are here for the ceremony and subsequent training of the new riders. They are spared from the front lines for barely a month, during which the chosen will get acquainted with their dragons and put their Aerie Academy training to good use. No more riding mechanical dummies. Simulations are over. The sky and the clouds will, at last, become some of these candidates’ long-awaited homes.”
My chest swells at the thought of truly flying. The Academy’scogwings, as we call the mechanical dragons, taught me much, but I’ve been ready for more for a very long time.
Silas elbows me, wearing a huge grin. We are all ready. I can feel restlessness in every graduate. It saturates the air.
Phoebe Breezehart glances over her shoulder to look at me. She’s one of the nine females who made the cut. She wears a copper-colored dress that matches her curls and contrasts with her pale skin. I incline my head. She offers me a smile. We have never been friends. At Aerie Academy, she was part of a different group, most of which didn’t make it here. I’ve noticed she has been interested in me. Her element is also wind, like me. Maybe she thinks we can be allies.
“The Keep awaits,” Commander Voltguard says, ratcheting my heart rate into a drumroll. “Candidates, please proceed through these portals.” She gestures toward a set of double doors carved with Embernia’s coat of arms, a citadel nestled against a backdrop of soaring mountains, and above it all, a magnificent dragon, wings spread wide, our watchful guardian. The mottoFrom the Dragon, Strengthis carved at the bottom.
Two Claws—the term used for non-rider, non-officer cadets—throw the doors open, revealing an austere room with gray stone walls and floors. Its only adornment is the great vaulted columns that hold up the concave ceiling. A somber air descends over the group.
We file in, an incongruous sight in our party attire. There’s nothing frilly about dragon riding. Dragon riding is a raw, streamlined experience, much like the room that awaits.
An image of Neutro Cindergrasp’s terrified face threatens to rise and overshadow this moment. I shove it down.
No room for you here, you bastard.
He’s gone, and I won’t let him poison my future too. Enough of his taint has already blemished many years of my past. Not a second of my new life will be wasted on him.
4
Rhea
From the Dragon, Strength.
When Embernia was a primordial landscape, humans roamed the earth in small tribes and sustained themselves on paltry provisions from whatever they could forage and hunt. Their numbers were small, and their stock weak. They struggled to survive the many predators that roamed the earth and the sky, dragons of all sizes and shapes who had a taste for human flesh. The land was rich and dragons—its most abundant inhabitants—held dominion over everything.
The creatures, with their keen intelligence, foresaw the eventual depletion of the land’s bounty. Inevitably, earthbound dragons and skyborne dragons became enemies, fighting over the same resources. The wingless creatures hoarded food, concealing entire herds under mountain passes, unreachable to their winged counterparts.
Starvation gnawed at the sky dragons.
Until one day, the most clever of the sky dwellers—their queen, sole female, and most powerful of all, Heratrix— discovered something… the humans had gifts.
They could control the elements in the same way they could.
Not only that. She also discovered that when a dragon and a human agreed to work together their gifts were greatly enhanced.
In need of each other, they formed an alliance, and it was thus that sky dragons triumphed over earth dragons, and a mutually beneficial relationship was born between dragons and humans. The winged creatures, grateful to the humans and led by Heratrix, vowed to forever protect them. From the most powerful humans, a king was chosen, an earth elemental bound by honor.
And together, they prospered.
That is until, many centuries later, Heratrix disappeared.
This is our story, and as I walk into the Keep, I’m reminded of our origin, a mighty legacy I yearn to be part of.
Once inside the vaulted-ceiling room, the doors behind us close with athudof finality. The Commander and the Primes have joined us, but the guests remained behind. What happens here is a secret known only to the Academy’s elite. No one talks about the ritual. It is forbidden.
A female Claw with scale-like tattoos on the backs of her hands bids me to move away from the others and stand to the side. She wears a dark blue uniform, indicating her non-rider status. I try not to panic about being singled out. But when she bids the other female candidates to join me, my shoulders relax. She’s simply separating the males from the females.
Phoebe takes the spot to my right, and I won’t lie and say her friendly smile doesn’t calm my nerves somewhat. I return the gesture if a bit shakily. Doubts are starting to fill my mind.
What if I’m not chosen? What if I wasted the last four years training to become nothing more than a Claw? What if I never fly and my most important task in my Sky Order career is to separate the females from the males at the Rite of Flight?
Quiet, Rhea,a much calmer inner voice commands.
I take a deep breath and shove my doubts down, down, down. I make my own path. I’ve been working toward this goal for years. No one and nothing will get in the way.
