First Chosen by the Dragon

Chapter 108

[Evelyn's POV]

The battle is nothing like training. I knew this intellectually. I feel it now in every bone as Aspis banks hard left and a ballista bolt screams past my shoulder close enough to feel the displaced air.

"Left flank — two more incoming!"

"I see them!"

Aspis rolls and I press flat against her scales, thighs burning with the effort of staying mounted. Two more bolts cut through the space we occupied a heartbeat ago.

Below us, the eastern shore writhes with movement — landing boats, warriors in blue and gold, the organized chaos of an invasion that refuses to stop.

"The ridge. Riven's force is engaging."

"How many boats are still coming?"

"For every one we scatter, two more push through."

"Then we must be more efficient. The channel mouth — I can create a barrier."

"Steam wall?"

"Like we practiced." I scan the cliffs. Three ballista positions, staggered heights, overlapping fields of fire. "Get me a clear line. Five seconds."

"The crews are coordinating their fire. You will need to be fast."

"Fast I can do, trust me."

"I always trust you. It is the power I do not trust."

Aspis dives and I reach for the moonlight. It comes surging through the bond, wilder than in training. The current pulls against my control like a river fighting its banks.

"Steady. Channel through me."

"I’m trying. The power feels different — like it's fighting me."

"Combat amplifies everything. Channel the energy, do not fight it."

I narrow the light. The beam cuts across the approach channel and hits the water.

Steam erupts — a wall of white vapor that swallows the incoming boats, blinds the crews, turns their coordinated assault into chaos.

"It's working!"

"Hold the channel. Don't let the power —"

The surge hits me like a fist. The same spike from the training yard, but amplified by combat, by fear, by the bond straining at its limits.

Light erupts from my body. Not a beam — a sphere that expands fifty feet in every direction, searing white radiance that turns the air to glass.

Aspis's wings lock mid-beat as she channels everything she has into containing the surge, pulling the worst of it away from allies below.

"EVELYN!"

The sphere collapses. I'm gasping. My vision spots with afterimages — black shapes burned into my sight. My hands feel like they're on fire, and when I look down, I see light still bleeding from my fingertips in silver wisps.

"Aspis, are you hurt?"

"I am functional, but it seems you are not. That surge nearly broke the bond."

"I didn't mean to lose control —"

"The power consumes you. Each burst costs more than the last: the moonlight is outpacing your ability to channel it."

"What do I do?"

"Let me carry the overflow. Filter through the bond instead of forcing it alone."

I force my eyes to focus, blinking against the afterimages still seared across my vision. Below, the eastern gate holds: Torren's unit fighting with savage efficiency. Bodies pile at the threshold.

But to the south, smoke rises. My stomach drops.

"The residential quarter is burning. Draven's people are dying, and we need to relieve the southern front."

"Another surge like that could kill you."

"What about those people inside those walls?!"

"Do not use them against me," my dragon’s cuts sharp through the bond, edged with, as it seems to me for the first time, fear. "I am trying to keep you alive."

"If the compound falls, none of it will matter. Can you get me there?"

Silence. Then, heavy with reluctance: "I can, but promise me: we work as one! And if I feel you slipping again —"

"You pull me back, I know."

Aspis banks south. Smoke thickens, acrid and choking, and the sounds of combat swell from every direction.

I see Khaira in the distance, Draven on her back raining shadow-fire on the fleet. He's too far away. The ballista crews have forced us apart.

"The southern gate — siege equipment. A battering ram coming up the main approach."

"I see it! Too much crossfire from the positions. And… Evelyn, your hands."

I look down. She's right: a tremor runs from wrist to fingertip that I can't suppress.

"I can do this, I have to. Every second I hesitate, someone dies. Help me control it, Aspis. That's what partners do."

I gather the moonlight, smaller this time, controlled. I think of it like breathing — in and out — rather than like a weapon. The power barely responds.

The first burst clips a ballista position — wood splinters, the crew scatters. But the recoil hits me harder than it should. Pain spikes behind my eyes, and the tremor in my hands worsens.

"One more, and then we pull back. That is the agreement."

"One more. I can hold it."

"Can you? Or are you telling yourself what you need to hear?"

"One more, Aspis."

I aim for the second position, draw the power, and shape the beam.

The volley hits before I can fire. Four ballista bolts — coordinated, sequenced, fired in a pattern designed to bracket rather than strike.

Aspis dodges the first two. The third passes beneath her belly, and the fourth catches her left wing at the joint where membrane meets bone.

She screams. The bond carries every shred of her agony into me. Her wing buckles, membrane tears, and we are falling — a controlled descent that still carries too much speed.

"Brace — I cannot hold the glide —"

"Aspis!"

"BRACE!"

She hits the ground hard. Her legs absorb the first impact, but the momentum throws me forward.

I'm airborne for a sickening instant — rock and smoke and sky spinning — and then I hit the earth and roll.

Stone tears through my armor. My shoulder takes the worst of it — a grinding impact that sends pain lancing from collarbone to fingertips.

I roll twice, three times, and come up on my knees, with vision blurred.

Aspis is twenty yards away. She's on the ground, damaged wing extended at a wrong angle, fighting to rise.

Through the bond, I feel her fury — not at the pain but at the indignity of being grounded, reduced from sky to earth.

"I can still fight. The wing will not lift me, but I can still fight."

"How bad is the damage? Tell me honestly."

"Membrane torn at the joint and the bone is intact. I will heal, but not today, not in time for this battle."

"Can you move at all?"

"On the ground, yes. Not in the air. I am sorry, Evelyn."

"Just don't move! Let me get to you —"

"Evelyn, behind you!"

Between us and the compound, the secondary wall has been breached — stone blown inward by concentrated catapult fire. A gap wide enough for soldiers to pour through.

They are pouring through.

Mintian warriors in blue and gold, with blades drawn, flooding onto compound ground. A dozen already through the gap. More behind them.

Their eyes find me — silver-haired, dragon-bonded, grounded — and recognition sharpens their focus.

"The silver hair. They know exactly who you are."

"Yes, they've been waiting for this."

"Can you reach me?"

I'm on the wrong side of them, separated from the compound and from Draven. The gap between us fills with blue and gold armor.

"Evelyn, can you reach me?"

My dragon cannot fly.