The New Dragon Riders

The goats never cooperated at dusk. Maelis had the gate latch half-secured when the nearest one shoved into her arm, hard enough that she grabbed the post to keep her footing. She forced the iron loop down, checked it twice, and moved over to the trough.

Behind her, Corvus was still talking.

“The Vethran Codex describes it exactly like this.” He turned slow circles in the yard, one hand raised toward the sky. “Two cloud layers moving in opposing currents. The lower band west, the upper east. It calls it a herald formation, Maelis. A herald.”

“Bucket,” she said.

He passed it over without pausing. “Are you listening to me?”

“I hear you.” She tipped the water into the trough. She had heard the Vethran Codex dozens of times across the past year; the herald formation, the crossing of realms, and every scrap of lore he had traded coin or favors to borrow from crumbling manuscripts were burned into her memory. “Are you getting the feed, or do the goats starve tonight?”

“Getting it,” he said, and turned toward the shed. “Don’t rush me.”

She looked up despite herself.

He was right about the clouds. The lower band crawled west while the upper layer pushed steadily east, and the light between them sat thick, orange, and motionless over the tree line in a way that had nothing to do with the hour. She told herself it was just strange weather.

Then the streak tore across the horizon.

It was brilliant white, blue at the trailing edge, and it moved faster than any falling rock she had ever seen. It vanished behind the northern ridge before she could even set the bucket down, and the ground shuddered hard through the soles of her boots. Dark smoke climbed into the orange sky, thick and heavy over the crest.

Corvus went completely still.

“That’s it.” His voice dropped flat. “Blue at the edge. A star that burns blue at the edge; that’s exactly what the Codex said...”

“Corvus, wait!”

He was already running.

“Get back here!” She dropped the bucket and vaulted the fence after him. “You don’t know what came down over that ridge!“He was already a dark shape against the open grass, sprinting with total precision as if he had run this exact path a hundred times before. The homestead gate sat half-latched, the feed sacks still stacked in the open barn.None of it mattered now.She ran hard, boots catching on roots and loose stones in the failing light. Above the tree line, the sky flickered with a sudden, sourceless flash. Corvus disappeared into the brush ahead.

Corvus descended without a word. His boots crunched through the blackened dirt, each step deliberate and measured as he checked his balance against the slope. When he reached the bottom, he stopped a few feet from the egg and spread his hands slightly at his sides.

“From the cold between stars,” he said, his voice low and formal, “you have fallen into warmth. I am here. I am ready. I offer...”

“Corvus.” She picked her way down the slope, sliding on loose soot before catching herself. The heat hit her before she reached the bottom - not just scorched ground but something deeper, pressing against her face and palms like a physical warning. “Stop.”

“This is the bonding sequence. If I complete it before...”

“You cannot control that thing.”

“I know exactly what it is.” He didn’t look at her, his eyes fixed entirely on the shell. “Three years, Maelis. Every text, every account. This is it. This is actually...”

“Can’t you feel that?” She reached the bottom, where the warmth was no longer simple heat; it was heavy pressure gathering sharp behind her eyes, humming with something electric and deeply wrong. “Come back. Right now.”

“Are you telling me to walk away after everything?” He took another step toward it.

She moved without deciding to. She lunged for his arm to yank him back, but he shifted and her palm slammed flat against the shell instead.

Cold hit first. Then searing heat ripped through her skin, and something intensely electric drove straight through her bones. The surface was slick under her hand. For one second, nothing happened.

Then the cracks came. Hairline fractures spread outward from her palm in every direction, racing across the pale surface, and each line filled with blinding light as it opened. The glow flared instantly. The uneven pulse accelerated into an urgent, rising hum that vibrated the stone underfoot.

Corvus stiffened in horror. “What did you do?”

She tried to pull her hand back, but the surface held her fast like dried resin. The fractures kept spreading, wider now, and the light inside was no longer faint; it was blinding, washing over the dark walls of the pit.

Neither of them moved. Neither looked away.The shell split down the middle. Both halves peeled back clean, and the blinding light dropped to a steady glow. Maelis pulled her stinging palm free and stepped back.

The hatchling was small, impossibly small. She had braced herself for something massive that matched the weight of three years and every burned candle Corvus had spent over crumbling manuscripts, but the creature uncoiling from the center was barely the length of her forearm. It had lean scales and a ridge of pale spines running from skull to tail. Its eyelids parted, and clear golden eyes locked straight onto her face.

Corvus stepped forward with both palms raised, his voice dropping into the measured rhythm she had heard him practice in the dark of the farmhouse.

“The time has come,” he said, speaking in that low, formal cadence. “Take my mind, take my strength. Accept the pact.”

The hatchling did not even look at him.

Then the force hit her. It tore upward from somewhere she had not known existed, cracking open a path through the center of her thoughts. Hunger came first, raw and enormous. Right behind it followed total recognition, like something that had searched for ages and finally found its mark.

She pressed both hands against her temples and grimaced. “Get out of my head.”

The presence did not move, driving deeper into her skull instead.

Corvus went completely still, his hands frozen in the empty air. “Maelis, answer me. What’s happening?”

“It’s inside my head,” she said, straining to keep her voice level against the pressure. “I can’t push it out.”

He took an urgent step toward the hatchling and reached out his hand. “Focus on me,” he commanded, his knuckles trembling slightly. “Sever the link right now. Complete the contract with me.”

The creature tilted its head toward his outstretched fingers, but then it turned its golden gaze back to her.

Her balance gave out. Her knee hit the scorched ground, and she caught herself on one hand while sharp blackened dirt bit into her skin. The presence pressed harder with the blunt stubbornness of something that simply did not understand refusal. It had waited, and it had found her. That was the entirety of its logic.

“I can’t stop it, Corvus,” she gasped, fighting to breathe. “It won’t let go.”

She forced herself to look at him, and his expression stopped her cold. He was not furious. He made no move to help her up. He stood with his arms hanging limp at his sides, staring at the hatchling as it ignored him completely. His mouth opened, then closed. The desperate hope that had driven him across three years drained from his face, leaving only hollow disbelief.

“Corvus - ” Her throat closed. The bond locked into place, and silence settled hard across the crater.