Valor

She clung to the harness strap with one gloved hand, her sword in her other, his wings carrying them through the thick smoke rising from the raging fire burning out the siege engine below. Sparks made her blink, releasing her hold on his saddle to swipe at their biting kiss, helmet sliding forward as sweat trickled down her forehead and temples from beneath the thin metal.

Our main line is taken, he sent to her, wings banking to avoid collision with a shrieking bat that tumbled from the sky, chest skewered with a dozen blue-fletched arrows from their soldier’s own bows. He circled with a flip of his wings, heart-shaped face, white feathers dusky with ash, swiveling around to her. Our queen is in danger, Bria.

I know, she sent back through clenched teeth, sting of the open wound on her thigh burning as the only remaining strap keeping her in the saddle dug into the edge of the cut. The last bat she’d fought had steel tips on his wings, a new addition to the imp army, still no match for the wee folk’s owls.

Except the rest of her wingmates were already fallen and she was the last in the air. High enough to see Valor was right, his eyesight even keener than hers. Despair clutched her close, a blow she can’t bear, worse now than it had when she’d seen Orthan fall beneath a wave of bats, his brave rider, Johnos, fighting all the way to the ground and the bitter end.

Wee Folk Queen Kordatha’s front held just behind the destruction of the defending line, her army scattered over the once-lush farmland turned to a bloody battlefield under the marching feet of the advancing imps. If onlys rang in Bria’s head, a string of them she’d heard from generals and battalion leaders and her own wing captain just before they’d taken flight today.

If only they’d paid attention when the bats were first spotted. If only they’d kept closer attention at the border. If only the mages hadn’t abandoned them.

If only.

There. Valor’s deep voice reached her where nothing else would have in her spiral to despair. Over the distant shouts from the ground, the clash of steel on steel, the screams of the dying and the rush of the wind as he flew, only he could bring her back to herself. Imp Queen Hadelle has chosen to lead her troops to victory personally.

Horrible hope woke, and understanding as the imp monarch, her grotesque body borne on a litter carried by a dozen of her soldiers, waved a token sword she’d never borne into battle. As though this was her victory and not the wee folk’s failure.

We won’t survive. Bria tightened that single strap, wished for her shield, long gone in a skirmish with three bats, and lowered her visor.

So be it. Valor spread his wings wide, carrying them up, up away from the battlefield while Bria gathered the last of her strength and courage and clung to him with all her might.

You have been my rider, he sent, and my friend and it has been the greatest honor, Bria DeLoma, to fly with you.

“And you, Valor TenTalon,” she whispered on the wind, knowing he would hear her as he slowed his ascent, paused at the apogee of the rise, hovering on his widespread wings, ghostly face turning to her one last time. “Now,” she said.

He dove, those wings tight to his slim body, beak tucked low, Bria huddled close to prevent her own form from slowing their drop.

The battlefield looked so far away from up here, but they closed the distance quickly, fear impossible now, only tight focus and their prey in their sights. Bria was vaguely aware of a stray bat that lunged for them, missing when Valor hurtled through the imp’s defenses. She caught the scent of wildflowers from somewhere, smothered as they dropped below the smoke line by the acrid burn of charring everything. Her eyes stung with it, squint only narrowing her attention further, one chance, one final effort from the back of a falling owl.

They came without warning, Bria and Valor, dropping from the heavens into the arms of the enemy, unnoticed and unchallenged until the very last moment. Bria saw Queen Hadelle look up, her slagging imp face of ebony shining with ichor, grossly obese body a blob on the litter, that ceremonial sword raised for nothing.

Something clipped Bria’s shoulder, hit her hard, a wayward bat attempting to save its queen. The last strap on her saddle gave way as Bria, screaming his name, flew clear of Valor. With a perfect view—in the kind of slow-motion only near death and terror can bring—of her friend and partner, she could only watch as he dove, alone and unprotected, directly into the queen’s litter, sending the entire line of imps carrying her to the ground in flurry of feathers.

Bria hit the ground on her back, landing hard, her last word his name as darkness took her.

“Valor!”

She woke in the black and muted quiet, though it was a soft cry for mercy nearby that had her sitting up, clutching for the sword she no longer held. She found it, scrabbling in the mud and worse, the hilt slippery in her palm but welcome, as footfalls drew near, a torch flaring to light in her eyes while the voice asking for help was silenced with a thud.

“Wee or imp?” She scrambled to her feet, wavering there, sword outstretched. The torch lowered and a soldier, his small face lighting up without need of the flames he held, lunged for her. “Rider, where’s your owl?”

She sobbed once, then, remembering. Turned, heart breaking. Without care for the battle’s ending—surely they’d won if her kind were here cleaning up the mess, that voice she’d heard likely an imp now dead by her people’s hand—or for the fate of her own queen, Bria staggered toward where the litter had been.

Someone had come already. The imp queen’s head stood on a pike, her bulging eyes weeping blood, crown askew, her soldier’s staked around her.

Even that sight didn’t hold her attention. Something shining white caught the light from the torch, the soldier following her when she knelt and retrieved the single feather. Tried to brush free the filth and blood, clutching it to her chest, weeping over what she knew was true already.

“It was you.” He breathed that over her shoulder, kneeling to her and, to her shock, so did the other soldiers he’d brought with him, circling her, bowing their heads to her. “You killed the queen.”

“Valor did,” she whispered. “It’s over then?”

“The moment she died our own queen turned the tides.” He sighed. “They’ve taken him away already, Rider DeLoma.” He knew who she was, now, it seemed. Knew who flew her and who died to save her. “Had we known you were here, we would have taken you, too.” He stood then, offered his hand. “Come, please. Queen Kordatha will want to meet the hero who saved us all.”

It took her a long time to stand. To go with the soldiers. But she would never release the single feather in her hand.

The Ballad of Bria and Valor

Though the battle had turned, and all seemed lost,

They flew alone through smoke, the cost

In blood ran rivers while imps slew wee.

Lone Bria and Valor. “To the skies!” Said she.

He carried her high, the two as one,

Surely death awaited their final plunge

And fearless yet their dive commenced,

Swift flew the owl with wee warrior hence.

To death they fell, to death they flew,

To deliver, for the wee, evil her due.

With courage of heart and strength of feather,

They slew the queen, Owl and wee together.

Forever remember, and weep, and honor

The warrior Bria and her beloved owl, Valor.