Soul of Smoke Read Online Free PDF Page A

you!”
    Kai hesitated, staring at Deryn’s brilliantly glowing eyes before glancing in the direction of the ravine. She should run. Or at least hide. Instead, she looked up at the massive beasts that roared and battled above, her heart jamming her throat. Feeling exposed and insignificant, she ran back to the fire.
    The swords Cadoc had dropped were still there, gleaming in the dim light. Kai bent and hefted one, surprised by its weight. The sheathed blade lay heavy in her hand, its hilt winking with rubies and milky white stones. Standing there with dragons in the sky and a sword in her hand, Kai nearly laughed.
    I
must be insane.
    Dragon roars deafened her, the snap of jaws and
whoosh
of wings thrummed through her skull. Around her, long grass undulated like a mad ocean. The air was bitter with lightning and burnt with fire. The damp scent of earth slammed into her nostrils as two dragons crashed screeching to the ground, their talons gashing deep, soil-bleeding gouges into the meadow.
    Reality broke over Kai in a wave as she watched a blue dragon rake its claws across a green dragon’s hide not fifty feet away. The green dragon roared, blood spurting from half a dozen long gashes in its flank. A tiny silver dragon zoomed past, unleashing a spear of lightning from delicate jaws and scoring a direct hit on the blue, which jerked and fell twitching to the ground. The crackle of electricity made the hair on Kai’s arms stand on end.
    This is real.
The thought sank in for a long moment, only to be interrupted by an angry shriek. Deryn had reached the top of the hill.
    I
can’t just let her die.
Kai sprinted after Deryn, the unfamiliar weight of the sword pulling her to one side. Still, she reached Deryn in less than a minute.
    “Turn around!” Kai grabbed for Deryn’s arm, but the tall girl shrugged away. Frustrated, Kai slammed her sheathed blade between Deryn’s shuffling feet, putting the girl’s life above her injured leg. Deryn went down with a shout of pain.
    Kai wrenched the sword free and pointed it at the sky, where black dragons spewed clouds of yellow vapor. “Freaking
dragons
!” she shouted.
    One of the dragons bellowed, and Kai clamped her fists to her ears, knocking herself on the head with the pommel of the sword and swearing.
    Deryn tried to stand, but another dragon swooped low overhead and Kai threw herself on top of the other girl, sending Deryn’s sword flying. Luckily, none of the dragons seemed interested in them. Not at the moment, anyway.
    “What is going on?” Kai yelled.
    “They’re trying to kill us!” Deryn shrieked back.
    “They’re
dragons
!”
    “Yes, they are!
Get off me
!”
    Kai rolled off, stunned at the confirmation that someone else was seeing what she was seeing. Deryn scrambled to her feet, digging her nails hard into Kai’s shoulder for leverage. A thunderous roar of pain sounded from above. Kai looked up only to be blinded by a column of fire.
    “Stop!” Kai blinked the afterimage from her eyes in time to see Deryn reach toward her sword. “They’ll kill you!”
    Deryn ignored her.
    Kai lunged. She reached the weapon first and threw it back toward the fire pit, still clutching her own.
    “I have to help them!” Deryn shouted, stumbling after the weapon.
    “They’re
freaking dragons
!” Kai shouted back, clamping a hand around Deryn’s arm. “They don’t need you!”
    “
I’m
a dragon! I have to help!”
    “You look pretty human to me!”
    “Thanks to Rhys,” Deryn growled. Her eyes flicked across the sky then widened. Kai followed her gaze.
    One of the dragons had spotted them. At first, Kai thought it was Ashem. He had turned into a black dragon. But then she heard Deryn’s strangled whisper.
    “Kavar!”
    Kavar, the black dragon, dove straight for them, silver eyes flashing. Deryn stiffened, her mouth wide in wordless terror. Kai’s entire body went numb, freezing her to the spot.
    With an audible
thud
, a dragon whose scales glittered like