She decided she’d never be satisfied with anything as ordinary as an airplane again.

The rain thinned, and as the sun struggled to carve beams through the clouds, she saw the rainbow. It arched, a bleeding blur of delicate colors that seemed to drip through the rain. With a lazy sweep of wings, Larkin turned so that the arch glimmered like a doorway ahead. And the colors deepened, seemed to shine like wet silk. As shafts of sunlight cut through the clouds, the rain and those soft, arching colors turned the sky to wonder.

There was a trumpeting call, a kind of joyful blare. Then the sky was filled with dragons.

She lost her breath, literally felt it whiz out of her lungs as beautiful winged beasts soared beside her, in front of her, behind. In more colors than the rainbow, she realized, with their emeralds and rubies and sapphires. She felt Larkin’s body ripple as he answered their call, and grinned like a fool when he turned his head and fixed a laughing gold eye on her.

She was flying with a flock of dragons. Herd? Pack? Pod? What did it matter? The wind from their wings blew over her face and hair, sent her coat billowing as they soared through the rainbow sky. The other dragons circled, looped, somersaulted in playful dances. Anticipating, she gripped the harness, shouted for Larkin to: “Do it! Do it!”

And screamed with excitement as he dived and rolled. Hanging upside down as he soared belly-up, she could see the mists tear and reveal the sparkling green and deep, deep brown of the land of Geall.

He skimmed the treetops, dipped over the rush of a river, then climbed, climbed, climbed into air that gleamed now with the strengthening sun.

They flew on, past rainbows and jeweled wings, until it was only the two of them and the sky. Overcome, she lowered to him, laid her cheek on his neck. He’d said he’d owed her a gift, she remembered. He had given her one beyond price.

They flew through sunlight now, and occasional and surprising showers of rain. Below she could see small villages or settlements, the rough roads that joined them, the tangle of streams or narrow rivers, tough little knuckles of forest.

But ahead lay the mountains, dark and mist-shrouded and somehow foreboding.

She could see the edge of the valley that lay at their feet, broken land scarred with rock. The first shudder rippled down her spine as she looked down on what she’d too often seen in dreams.

The sun didn’t sparkle here. It was as if the light was absorbed, just sucked away into the dark belly of gullies and chasms, rejected by the dull grass that fought with the spears and juts of weather-pocked rock.

The land dipped and rose, tightened in on itself into folds. And the looming mountains cast great shadows across it, shadows that seemed to cause the land itself to move and shift.

It was more than a shudder that ran through her now. It was an unreasonably, atavistic fear. A fear that this hard and forbidding land would be her grave.

As Larkin veered off, she closed her eyes and let the fear have its way for a moment. Because it couldn’t be beaten off, she thought, couldn’t be battered down by fists or weapons. It had to be recognized, and accepted.

Once it had, she could control it. If she were strong enough, she could use that fear to fight, and to survive.

When he touched down, she slid off. Legs a little shaky, she admitted to herself. But they held her up, and that’s what counted. Her fingers might have felt stiff, but they worked, and she used them to uncinch the weapon harness.

Then Larkin stood beside her.

“It’s an evil place.”

It was almost a relief to her to hear him say it. “Yeah, oh yeah, it is.”

“You can almost feel that evil rising up out of the ground. I’ve been there before, and it always seemed to me to be a place out of Geall. Not quite a part of it. But it never felt as it did today, as though the ground itself wanted to open up and swallow you whole.”

“Oh boy. It got to me, I’ve got to be honest. Turned my blood cold.” She rubbed her hands over her face, then glanced around. “Where are we?”

“Just a ways off from it. I didn’t want to set down there. It’s an easy walk from here, and I wanted a few moments first.”

“I’ll take them.”

He touched her cheek. “A long way from rainbows here.”

“The wrong side of them, I’d say. And I want to say something else, before we head back and face that place. That flight—the rainbow, the other dragons, the whole ball of it, it was the most incredible experience of my life.”

“Is that the truth of it?” He cocked his head. “I thought the most incredible experience of your life would be making love with me.”

“Oh yeah, right. Well, next to that.”

“All right then.” He tipped up her chin to kiss her. “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

“It was more than enjoyment. It was just flat down amazing. The best gift anyone’s ever given me.”

“Handy for me, that rainbow. Dragons can’t resist one.”

“Really? They’re so gorgeous. I thought my eyes would pop out of my head.”

“Happens you’ve seen a dragon before,” he reminded her.

“And you’re the most gorgeous and handsome of them, blah blah, but honestly, Larkin, they’re extreme. All those colors, and the power…Hold on—do people ride them, the way I’ve been riding you?”

“No one rides like you, a stór. And they don’t, no. They’re not horses, after all.”

“But if they could. You talked to them.”

“It’s not what you’d call conversation. It’s a kind of communication to be sure. A sort of expression of thought of feeling. And something I can only do when I’m in the dragon, so to speak.”

“Aerial warfare would give us a big, fat advantage. I want to think about this.”

“They’re gentle creatures, Blair.”

“So, for the most part, are the women Glenna and I are training to fight. When worlds are on the line, pal, you use everything that comes to hand.” She could see the resistance clearly enough on his face. “Let me just play with it in my head awhile. It’s this way, right?”

“It is.”

They walked the narrow road, framed in hedges and lined with spears of orange lilies. He bent, plucked one, then passed it to her.

Blair stared down at it, delicate petals in a strong and vibrant color. Something wild and lovely.