“Stop. Fucking. Coddling. Her.” Xaden bites out every word at Dain. “She is not a child. She’s a full-grown woman. A rider. Start treating her like one and at least have the decency to give her the truth. You think Melgren or any other general—to include her own mother—is going to let her sit on a power like this? It’s not like she can hide it, not the way she just demolished one of the practice forts.”

“You just want her to be like you,” Dain argues. “A cold-blooded killer. Soon you’ll be telling her that it’s all right, you get used to the killing.”

I inhale a sharp breath.

Xaden nails him with a glare. “The blood in my veins is as warm as yours, Aetos, and if it’s my job you want next year, then you’d better start understanding that you never get used to killing, but you do understand that it’s necessary.” He turns back to me, his dark gaze boring into mine. “This isn’t primary school. This is war—and you heard me say it once before, but the ugly truth those not on the front lines choose to forget is there are always body bags in war.”

I start to shake my head, but his eyes narrow on mine. “You might not like it, might even loathe it, but it’s power like yours that saves lives.”

“By killing people?” I cry. If Sgaeyl is right, and signets reflect who we are at our core, then I’m exactly as Xaden nicknamed me…Violence.

“By defeating invading armies before they get the chance to hurt civilians. You want to keep Rhiannon’s nephew alive in that little border village? This is how. You want to keep Mira alive when she’s behind enemy lines? This. Is. How. You are not just a weapon, Sorrengail. You are the weapon. You train this ability, own it, and you’ll have the power to defend an entire kingdom.” He smooths back more wind-loosened tendrils of my hair behind my ears, clearing my vision so I have no excuse but to see the honesty in his eyes. When he’s sure I’m not going to argue further, he looks to his side. “Rhiannon, can you get her back to the citadel?”

“Absolutely.” Rhiannon hustles over.

Dain scoffs and walks toward the other squad leaders, leaving us.

“The saddle—” I start.

“Tairn can get it off himself. It was one of his many design stipulations.” Xaden turns to leave but pauses. “Thank you for saving Liam. He’s important to me.”

“You don’t have to thank…” I sigh at his back. “And he’s already gone.”

“You two have the weirdest relationship,” Rhiannon says, linking her arm with mine.

“We’re not in a relationship.” I look up at Tairn, who’s surprisingly held his tongue through whatever that was with Xaden and Dain.

“Go,” Tairn urges. “But do not wallow in guilt, Silver One. Whatever you feel is natural. Allow yourself to feel it but then let it go. The wingleader made a valid point. With a signet like that, you are the best hope the kingdom has against the hordes of evil that seek to harm it. Rest and I will see you tomorrow. I’ll get my own saddle off.”

“You’re most definitely in a relationship,” Rhiannon continues, tugging me off the field. “I just can’t figure out if it’s the opposites-attract partnership that has you two baring claws or the slow, lethal burn of scalding sexual tension.” She glances sideways at me. “Now tell me how the hell you two moved that fast out there.”

“What do you mean?”

“When Liam was falling, Feirge and I flew as fast as we could, but I knew we’d be too slow given our angle and speed, and I thought you…” She shakes her head. “It just looked like you were high above him one second and had him in the next. I’ve never seen a dragon fly that fast. It’s like I blinked and missed it.”

Now guilt bites into me for a whole other reason. Rhiannon is my friend, my closest one here, if I’m being honest about what Dain and I have become. Of everyone, she should know—

“Do not feel guilt that you cannot tell her. This secret belongs to dragonkind, not you,” Tairn warns. “No one has the right to risk our hatchlings. Not even you, Silver One.”

“Tairn is really fast,” I say in way of explanation. It’s not a lie, but it isn’t the full truth, either.

“And thank gods for it. Zihnal must really love Liam, cheating death twice today.”

But it wasn’t Liam who cheated death.

It was me.

And I can’t help but wonder if somewhere, on some plane of existence, Malek sits on his throne, angry that I stole a soul from his grasp.

But then again, I gave him Jack’s.

Of course, it might have broken mine forever.

…

The wooden target in my room wobbles as one of my daggers sinks into the wood beside the last one I threw. I might be angry with the world, but at least my aim isn’t off. If I miss, there’s a good chance the blade is flying out the window, considering where I have the target propped up on the wall.

I throw three more, rapid-fire, and hit the throat of the person-shaped target every single time.

What’s the point of going for shoulders anymore if I’m already taking people out with bolts of lightning? What was my restraint for? With a flick of my wrist, I send the next dagger soaring, putting it straight through the figure’s forehead just as there’s a knock at my door.

It’s either Rhiannon asking for the tenth time if I want to talk about what happened today or it’s Liam—

I pause. It can’t be Liam, checking to see if I’m actually turned in for the night, because Liam is still in the infirmary, healing from the sword he took to the side.

“Come in.” Who cares if I’m in nothing but my dressing gown? It’s not like I can’t strike an intruder dead with a knife. Or lightning.

The door opens beside me, but I don’t bother looking as I throw another dagger. That height? That hint of dark hair I catch in my peripheral vision? That incredible scent? I don’t even need to look fully—my body tells me it’s Xaden.

Then my body reminds me exactly what it feels like to have his mouth on mine, and my stomach flutters. Shit, I’m too on edge to deal with him or the way he makes me feel tonight.

“Imagining that’s me?” he asks, shutting my door and leaning back against it, folding his arms across his chest. Then he does a double-take, his heated gaze roaming over my body.

Suddenly, the spring breeze coming through the open window isn’t enough to cool my skin, not when he’s looking at me like that.

My long braid swings across my back as I take another dagger off my dresser. “No. But it was you about twenty minutes ago.”

“Who is it now?” He raises a brow, crosses one ankle over the other.

“No one you know.” With a flick of my wrist, the next blade goes through the sternum. “Why are you here?” I glance his way just long enough to note that he’s bathed and wearing our standard uniform instead of flight leathers, and definitely not long enough to note how fucking good he looks. Just once, I’d love to see him disheveled or unnerved, anything outside that calm control he wears like armor. “Let me guess. Since Liam is out of commission, it’s your duty to lecture me about sleeping in plain cotton.”

“I didn’t come to lecture you,” he says softly, and I can feel the warmth of his gaze like a caress as it rakes over the thin black straps of my dressing gown. “But I can definitely see that you’re not wearing your armor.”

“No one is going to be ridiculous enough to attack me now.” I take another dagger from the dresser, my pile dwindling. “Not when I can kill them from fifty yards away.” Tapping the end of the razor-sharp weapon, I pivot slightly, just enough to face him. “Do you think it works inside? I mean, how does someone wield lightning if there’s no sky?” Keeping my eyes locked on his, I fling the dagger at the target. The satisfying sound of split wood tells me I hit true.

“Fuck, that’s hotter than it should be.” He pulls in a deep breath. “I think that’s something you’ll have to figure out.” His gaze drops to my mouth and his arms tense.

“You’re not going to step in and say you can train me? You can save me?” I click my tongue and have the absolutely ridiculous urge to run it up the lines of the relic on his neck, tracing the intricate pattern. “How very un-Xaden of you.”

“I have no clue how to train a lightning wielder, and from what I witnessed today, you don’t need saving.” There’s pure longing in his eyes as he scans the length of my body from my bare toes to the hemline that skirts my thighs, over my breasts to my neck, finally reaching my eyes.

“Only from myself,” I mutter. The things I think about doing to him when he looks at me like that would surely ruin me, and tonight I’m not sure I care. That’s a dangerous combination. “So then why are you here, Xaden?”

“Because I can’t seem to stay away.” He sounds anything but pleased by the admission, but my breath catches anyway.

“Shouldn’t you be out there celebrating?” Everyone else is.

“We won a battle, not a war.” He pushes off the door and takes a single step, closing the distance between us, and lifts my braid from over my shoulder, slowly rubbing his thumb along the strands. “And I figured you might still be upset.”