Chapter 5 The Dragon's Defiance

After another hundred yards, my injured knee gave an unpleasant throb. I tried to ignore it. The bond did not.

Drake slowed.

“Don’t,” I said through gritted teeth. “We need distance. If the Syndicate sends scouts—”

“They will,” he agreed. “Which is why limping loudly along a ridge makes you an easy target.”

He stopped altogether, forcing me to stop as well unless I wanted my arm wrenched out of its socket.

I whirled on him. “Keep moving or I’ll—”

“You’ll what?” he asked quietly. “Warn your army where you are? Alert them to your little mishap, so they can drag you in with me and decide which of us to dissect first?”

The words landed like blows.

“You don’t know anything about them,” I said. “Or me.”

“I know enough,” he replied. His gaze dropped, for the first time, to the faint, burned-silver scar along my forearm—the one that curled like a crooked smile from wrist to elbow. “That mark is old. Dragonfire. You survived it as a child?”

“How did—”

“The way you flinched, when I breathed fire.” His voice softened. “I can feel it through the bond. Memory tastes like smoke and bone, did you know that?”

I wanted to scream. Or hit him. Or both.

“Stay out of my head,” I snapped.

He shook his head once. “That isn’t how this works.”

He stepped closer, slow enough that I could have backed away if I wanted to. I didn’t. Pride rooted me to the rock.

He lifted his free hand—slowly, open-palmed, like you’d approach a skittish animal—and hovered his fingers above my forearm, not touching, just close enough that I felt the heat of him.

The mark there—the old burn—tingled.

“This scar sings when the bond hums,” he said. “Fire remembers fire. You were touched once and lived. That kind of survival leaves a mark on more than the flesh. The Syndicate would have seen potential in that.”

“They saw someone worth training,” I said.

“They saw someone who couldn’t be burned away,” he corrected. “So they decided to aim you like a weapon.”

A memory rose unbidden: standing in a training circle at sixteen, hands shaking as I tried to channel flame through the carved sigils at my feet. An instructor walking slow circles around me, voice low and even.

You are not here because you are loved, Knight. You are here because you are not disposable. Do you understand the difference?

I shoved the memory back into its box and slammed the lid.

“Enough,” I said again, harsher. “Whatever you think you know, save it. We aren’t allies. This isn’t a confession circle. I need you alive and contained until we find someone who can undo this. That’s it.”

He studied me for a long moment, eyes searching my face for something I didn’t intend to show him.

At last, he nodded. “As you wish, Christine Knight.”

He stepped back, the heat of his hand leaving my skin, and started walking again.

I exhaled slowly, realizing I’d been holding my breath without noticing. The bond buzzed faintly, like it disapproved of emotional honesty.

We traveled in strained silence for a while. The sun dragged itself higher, turning the haze into a washed-out smear. Heat rose off the rock, mixing with the constant, subtle warmth radiating from Drake’s skin. Sweat trickled down my spine. My armor chafed. Every muscle in my body ached.

We rounded the base of a jagged outcrop and finally saw the shape I’d been looking for: a narrow cut between two towering rock walls, like someone had taken a knife and slit the mountain.

“The eastern chute,” I said, pointing with my chin. “Beyond that, there’s a ravine that curves north. Follow it and we hit the outpost from behind cover.”

“And if your people have already moved to occupy it?” he asked.

“Then we adjust,” I said. “But either way, we need supplies. Meds. Water. A place to regroup.”

“You mean where you can quietly ask your superiors how they’d like their dragon delivered,” he said.

I didn’t answer.

We stepped into the chute. The temperature dropped slightly, shadows wrapping around us like cool hands. The ground here was rougher, scattered with loose scree. I slipped twice, catching myself on the rock with my free hand. Both times, the chain snapped taut; both times, Drake braced automatically, using his weight to steady us.

The second time, I muttered, “Stop that.”

“Stop what?” he asked.

“Helping.”

“It’s self-preservation,” he said. “If you fall and break your neck, we both die. I’d prefer to avoid that.”

“Fine,” I muttered. “Just… don’t act like you’re doing me a favor.”

He didn’t reply, but I could feel the faint, amused twist of his mood through the bond. Not words. Just an impression, like catching the scent of smoke and knowing there was a fire somewhere you couldn’t see.

As the chute narrowed, forcing us closer, his shoulder brushed mine. Heat leaped from his skin to mine, and the bond flared bright enough that spots danced in my vision for a second.

I jerked away on reflex. The chain yanked us back together, harder this time. Our shoulders slammed, my hand splayed against his chest to catch my balance.

His heart pounded beneath my palm. Strong. Steady. An echo of my own, beating too fast.

For one suspended moment, we were pressed together in the shadowed throat of the mountain, breaths tangling, the hum of the bond all but drowning out the outside world.

His eyes met mine. No mockery now. Just heat and something sharper beneath it—an awareness neither of us had earned the right to feel.

“Careful, witch,” he murmured, voice barely above a whisper. “The chain isn’t the only thing between us that reacts when you pull.”

I shoved off him like I’d been burned.

“I don’t react,” I lied.

“If you say so.”

We emerged from the chute into the ravine. The walls here were high and close, turning the space into a long, crooked tunnel with the sky for a roof. Sparse scrub clung to the cracks. A dried-up streambed split the path; we followed its curve north.

After another twenty minutes of trudging, my head began to throb in earnest. The dual heartbeats in my chest seemed louder, like drums in a hollow room.

Every time Drake’s boot scuffed the stone in a certain rhythm, my pulse tried to match it.

“You feel that too, don’t you,” I said finally, unable to pretend otherwise.

“Feel what?” he asked.

“The… overlap,” I said. “Our hearts. Our breath. The way the bond keeps trying to sync them.”

He was silent long enough that I thought he might ignore the question.

Then he said quietly, “Yes.”

“Is that normal?” I pressed.

“For a soul bond?” he asked. “Yes. For one forged in a battlefield with hatred and panic?” He shook his head. “No. These chains are usually formed with intent. Ritual. Oath. Choice, at least somewhat.”

His voice dipped on the last word. I didn’t miss it.

“This was forced,” he continued. “The magic is trying to reconcile the contradiction. It wants a single pattern. We are two.”

“So what happens if it… succeeds?” I asked.

He looked at me.

I didn’t like the look.

“What?” I demanded.

“In time,” he said slowly, “it won’t be able to tell which of us is which.”

Ice slid under the heat in my veins.

“No,” I said. “That’s not how this ends. I’m not merging with you like we’re ingredients in someone’s stew.”

His mouth twitched. “Relax, Christine. It would take time. Days. Weeks. Longer, if we fight it.”

“Excellent,” I said. “I’m very good at fighting.”

“I’ve noticed,” he said dryly.

We walked on.

At some point, the shadows changed. The ravine widened, bending right, then left again. As we rounded the second bend, I saw a shape rising against the horizon—a squat, square building dug partway into the rock, antennae jutting from its roof.

The outpost.

Relief loosened something tight in my chest.

“There,” I said. “See? Supplies. Shelter. Maybe even a working radio. We can—”

“Stop,” Drake said sharply.

He yanked the chain back, hard enough that I stumbled.

“What are you—”

He jerked his chin toward the outpost. “Look.”

I narrowed my eyes, pushing my senses outward. From a distance, the building looked intact. The entrance hatch was closed. The antennae were still upright. No visible signs of explosion or collapse.

But the magic in the air… tasted wrong.

Too still. Too stiff. Like the echo of a shout that had nowhere left to go.

Then I saw it: faint glimmers along the doorway. Sigils. Fresh ones. Not standard Syndicate markings.

A trap.

My stomach dropped. “Who—”

“Who else hunts dragons and witches both?” Drake said quietly. “Your Syndicate is not the only power that crawls out of war, Christine.”

“The rebels,” I muttered. “Or something worse.”

“Or something older,” he said.

My head pounded. My knee ached. My heart beat in double-time with his. The outpost, the one place I’d counted on, was a question mark wrapped in a sigil I didn’t recognize.

I took a breath. Then another. The air felt thin.

“Fine,” I said. “We don’t walk into it blind. We pull back, observe, find another way in. Or another direction to run.”

Drake nodded once. “Now you’re thinking like someone who doesn’t assume her side owns the map.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked.

“It means,” he said, “that being chained to a dragon might yet save your life.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” I said.

“Wasn’t talking about me.”

The bond pulsed again, a slow, molten beat.

I stared at the outpost, my mind already racing through options and contingencies. Behind my ribs, two heartbeats tried to decide on a rhythm.

Bound by fire. Chosen by… what, exactly?

Whatever answer waited ahead, I had the ugly feeling “fate” wasn’t going to be gentle.