AERYN'S POV

I caught Misty's eyes across the deck, and she waggled her fingers with a grin, vest zipped up to her chin. Her usual rich, brown skin was ashen and dark circles hung beneath her dull, green eyes as she shifted her weight. Nyaxia stood beside her, aiming a hateful look my way as she examined our exchange.

I felt the pressure of an intense glare and swept my gaze to the culprit. A different set of green eyes fastened on mine as he folded his arms over his chest, lifting his chin as the gentle wind rippled through the sleeveless shirt he wore in spite of the permanent cold. I tried to ignore the way his biceps flexed and the veins that flowed along his muscular arms as he tensed, narrowing his dark brows on me. He'd let his hair grow longer and it curled under his ears and tangled around his horns in the slight gusts.

Zoran dropped his chin in a minuscule dip so quick that I wasn't sure he'd even moved.

Did he want me to choose him?

I scrunched my brows, trying to gauge his unreadable expression.

"Me," he mouthed.

Yup. Zoran wanted to be my partner.

I bit my lip. On one hand, pairing up with him offered high odds of getting to the scale, but on the other, I would be admitting that I needed his help in the challenge. He didn't need a bigger ego than he already had, and he couldn't always get what he wanted. Even if what he wanted was also what I wanted.

"I choose Misty," I said, smug smile spreading across my face as Zoran's lips tilted down in a sour frown and he shook his head.

Misty gave her sister a hug and nearly skipped over to me, braids bouncing against her back. She grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight, saying, "We got this!"

From the look on Zoran's face, I wasn't so sure he'd let that happen. I wouldn't be surprised if he went after the scale and won it just to stick it to me. He didn't need it; he already had a guaranteed spot in the Ice Force, but he could win it so that he could ruin my chance of choosing my Duty. He didn't want me in the Force any more than my father didn't. He could sabotage me during the challenge to guarantee I'd never become a Champion.

And if I didn't win the scale or do well in the challenge today, then my position in the top fifteen percent of the class could drop, prohibiting me from joining the Force.

Zoran wouldn't have to burden himself with training me if that happened.

Immediate regret surfaced as I feigned excitement to match Misty's energy. I felt foolish and ridiculous, especially when no one else paired up with the furious Draconian.

Once everyone was standing next to their partner, Trainer Reishell continued, "War is unkind, and this battle will mimic a real one. Thus, the use of flying, powers, dragons, and fire breathing are all permitted. You must remain airborne for the entire challenge and defeat at least one other pair before you can begin searching for Hyrule's scale. A win is called when both of your opponents tap out, touch the ground, or are killed. Clear Water is the designated 'safe zone' where you can touch the ground and rest."

A resounding silence consumed us, and we shared looks of apprehension. 

Did Reishell just say killed? I understood she was attempting to throw us into a battle-like simulation to prepare us for the frontlines, but we needed more bodies to aid us in the war – not to mention the pupils who would be assigned Duties that would prevent them from ever seeing combat to begin with. 

"This is the most dangerous challenge, and it is your last one before final evaluations and Duty assignment. The weak will be weeded out today or will risk losing their lives to the unforgiving war after graduation," she deadpanned. "Both partners must survive and make it to the scale to win. With that said, the challenge starts...now!"

Why were we killing our fellow Draconians when the enemy was already doing that for us in the Voltant Isles?  

I did not understand the rationale behind Reishell's decision to create the deadly challenge since we were already losing Draconians at a rapidly concerning pace, and we needed all the ones left to give us the upper hand in the war the empire was not close to winning.

All around me, shifters bolted into the air and summoners sprinted to the front of the academy to summon their dragons or awaken them from their perches.

Misty pulled on my wrist and dragged me after her as she ran for the entrance of the building with her dragon's scale clutched in her other hand. Knocked out of my reverie, I yanked the dragon scale from my pocket as I tripped after her and rubbed the surface just as we breached the front steps.

Neon blue frost fire ignited on the ground in front of me and Serene materialized from the flames, dropping her neck for me to climb on. Hefting myself up by her horns, I was grateful for the gloves trapping the sweat on my palms as she vaulted over Misty's head and launched into the sky as a plume of violet mist puffed around my partner. The midsized dragon with an assortment of varying purple scales came out of the mist with a roar, Misty's three-phased rock Insignia marking its forehead. Poisonous venom dripped from its fangs as it bared its teeth at the nearby dragons taking off.

Misty patted the dragon's chest with urgency until it lowered its neck for her. She grabbed onto its curled horns and joined us in the sky.

A large flash of red streaked by us as the magma spewing dragon collided with Misty's much smaller purple one. The dragons entangled themselves in a mess of snapping fangs and slashing claws as their riders desperately tried to hold on. I caught sight of a shy, yet astute pupil on the dragon's neck. Tauren's shaggy brown hair was cleared from his forehead as his red dragon reared its head back, loosening its jaw as lava bubbled up its throat.

The dragon stiffened as a crackle of green static coursed down its body, immobilizing the creature. Its wings stopped pumping, and it plunged fifty feet, slamming into a section of the mountain that jutted out. The summoner was knocked from his dragon, and he spiraled through the air as the dragon fell after him.

I held my breath as the summoner crashed into another outcropping in the summit and tumbled down the side of the mountain with his dragon scrambling to reach him.

"Tauren is eliminated!" Trainer Reishell called out from somewhere above us.

"That one's my point," Nyaxia said, hand illuminated with a green glow as she zoomed by, clipping my cheek with her wing. Shooting a sinister look over her shoulder, she threatened, "You better protect my sister, or I promise you'll end up like Tauren."

I looked down as Tauren's body rolled off the edge of a narrow cliff and he dropped hundreds of feet. I forced my eyes away before he could make contact with the ground of solid ice but couldn't keep my gaze away for long. Tauren's dragon let out a devastated roar and my skin prickled as I watched it limp toward Tauren's lifeless form and wrap its body around its summoner, heaving a grief-stricken sigh.

"Aeryn! Behind you!"

Misty's voice startled me from the somber reverie I'd trapped myself in, and I whirled my neck around as a shifter with orange hair and freckles raised her hand that was enveloped in a white light. A powerful rush of wind slapped us with sharp lashes of air, battering Serene against the mountain. She fell several feet, and my knuckles whitened around her horns as I pulled back on them, getting her to beat her wings with vigor. The shifter, whose name I was almost certain was Pallonia, swung her arm out and sent another squall of wind at us. I jerked Serene's horns to the side, and she banked sideways, narrowly avoiding the wind wielder's assault.

I directed Serene in a wide arc as Misty steered her dragon at Pallonia. A second shifter intercepted Misty's path, levitating between his partner and Misty's dragon. Serene came up behind Pallonia's unaware back and she opened her mouth with a hiss.

"No!" I yelled.

But it was too late.

Serene unleashed a torrent of frost fire on the wind wielder and her partner. Pallonia's back bowed as a screech tore from her throat in agony. The flames licked up their bodies as they both waved their arms in frantic movements. Our opponents patted at the fire that was incinerating their bodies from the inside and stopped moving as the icy hot fire engulfed them with the freezing cold. Their skin turned to liquid in the span of a few seconds as their bones melted and their organs fried. What was left of Pallonia and her partner dribbled and dispersed in drops of molten skin in the drifts of air.

My stomach churned and I pitched my head over the side of Serene's neck, hurling up the food I'd scarfed down this morning.

I'd just killed a Draconian – two Draconians.

"Pallonia and Derryn are out!" Reishell informed us.

I felt sick.

Misty's dragon swooped alongside Serene, and she faked a smile that came out as a shudder. "It's okay, Aer," she said. "Those are the rules of the match. They would have done the same to you if you hadn't done it first. That's war."

Reishell ticked off a few more names of eliminated pupils and I hoped they had just tapped out. I didn't want to think about the other possibility.

Unconvinced, I just nodded at her and swallowed the burning vile in my throat.

"Let's go find the scale," Misty said, drawing her dragon around the side of the mountain.

Serene followed them, sticking close to the mountain to steer clear from the other battles going on around us. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to fight another Draconian.

As it turned out, it didn't matter what I wanted.

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