As we blast toward the Drifting Isles, other airships take note. Several peel away after us, and as we get closer, I’m surprised to see we’re actually not the first in the area. Two other ships are floating near the base of the cloud, carving paths through flocks of tiny black specks in the sky.

  “What are they doing?” I ask.

  Flint, working on some mechanisms at the back of the airship, doesn’t look up at my question. Maybe he assumes Zyneth was the one who asked it, as I receive no double take for speaking up.

  “Same thing I’m here for,” he says. “Going to catch some lizards. Breeders in the southern cities pay a pretty penny for them. Make good messengers, I’ve heard. Some fancies even raise them as pets. Can you believe that?”

  As we get closer, the black dots begin to resolve into more distinct shapes. I’d have assumed they were birds if Flint hadn’t just indicated otherwise. I Check them, and Echo confirms they’re wyverns. I’d seen the animals a few times in Harrowood, actually, though only ever in merchants’ cages, never in use. They’re cat-sized dragons, as far as I can tell, with their wings doubling as their front legs.

  “Are they rare?” I wonder.

  Flint deploys a net below the hull of our ship. “‘Round these parts they are. Only ever see them when the Drifting Isles come by, or if a squall off the coast blows a flock in. They eat beetles, I’m told, which don’t live up here. I guess the Isles are teeming with them, though. See?”

  Condensation speckles my glass as we pass through the outer edges of the cloud, and steadily, shapes begin to resolve within. A thicket of vines hang from the underside of the Isles, water dripping from the massive structure and turning to rain as it falls. The wyverns are spiraling among the vines and hanging from the greenery like bats. One of the airships passes through, and the creatures scatter with hundreds of chittering noises.

  “Please tell me that’s not our way up,” Attiru says, eyeing the vines dubiously.

  I’m prone to agree with them. Even with the void to help give my glass limbs better grip, I am not wild about the idea of climbing up slippery vines which could snap at any moment and plunge us into a hundred-foot drop.

  “What?” Flint says. “No, of course not. That would be suicidal. I’ll be dropping you off on its base.”

  Yeah, that makes a lot more sense. It’s nice to not be the only one asking dumb questions for once.

  Flint turns his craft, aiming at a nearby flock of wyverns, then begins amping up the speed. The animals pay us no heed until we’re nearly upon them, at which point Flint blasts a flame through the ship’s propulsion system, and the lizards scatter. He hits a second lever next, and the net that’s hanging beneath the ship scoops forward and up, like a sailor catching fish. From the squeaking and scratching coming from beneath our feet, he seems to have caught a couple.

  “Not to interrupt,” Zyneth says, “but we would prefer to access the Drifting Isles before the day grows late, if possible.”

  “Keep your knickers on,” Flint grumbles. “We’ll get there. Just got to snatch up some of the goods before everyone else arrives and it’s all picked over. These opportunities don’t come every day, you know!”

  I watch him skeptically. “It didn’t really seem like anyone was aware the Isles were floating by until we pointed it out.”

  Flint gives a displeased grunt as he hauls the net up. Three wyverns are struggling to get free. “Not like we can really predict when it will come by, can we? Rinviu flaps their wings, and only they know where the world’s winds might blow. But that’s life in the Stalwart. Seize opportunity when it comes.”

  Despite Zyneth’s mounting impatience—only noticeable by his increasingly pinched brows—Flint continues to fly circles around the base of the Drifting Isles and trap wyverns for another half hour. By then, several more airships have joined us, and it’s started to get crowded.

  “Alright,” Flint finally says with a sigh. “I think they’re about picked over at this point. I’ll be taking you up to a place you can disembark now.”

  Rezira, who’s remained especially quiet the whole trip, lets out a relieved sigh.

  Our airship peels away from the rest, faint sunlight shining through the cloud as we emerge from beneath the Drifting Isles. Flint takes us up, careful to give the structures within the Isles a comfortable berth. I can’t make out anything directly above us he might run into, but the balloon obscures much of our view overhead, and I guess he’d rather not risk it. Once we’re about fifty feet up, he slowly begins to float us closer to the cloud.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  It’s strangely tense and quiet as we all look out over the ship’s rail and into the Drifting Isles. It’s still obscured by thick tufts of cloud, but every once in a while the mists part, revealing marble columns and hints of greenery within.

  “Ain’t natural,” Flint mutters, hesitantly pushing us closer. “We should be able to see through the clouds this close. Storm magic I reckon.”

  We slowly circle around the enormous cloud, Flint pressing us closer when he feels comfortable, and backing off when the cloud protrudes in suspicious shapes. It feels like a game of chicken. At some point, we’re going to need to take a chance and press through—as long as doing so won’t damage the balloon and send us all spiraling to our deaths.

  “There,” Zyneth says suddenly, pointing. “There’s a platform in the arm of that cloud beneath us. You should be able to hover over it, and we can drop down to its surface.”

  Flint rotates the ship to take a look. There’s a flat cloud beneath us not far ahead. “Don’t see a platform myself. But if you all want to go jumping off, be my guest.”

  “Or we could find a more clear entry point,” Attiru suggests, nervously eyeing the cloud.

  “We could be circling it for hours without finding another such opportunity,” Zyneth says. “I’m certain I saw stone there. Trust me.”

  I do, at least, but that doesn’t make me any less nervous.

  Flint flies us down to the cloud Zyneth indicated, hovering a dozen feet over the surface. “That’s as close as I’ll risk it,” he tells Zyneth, leaving the helm to begin unfurling some ropes along the sides of his craft. “These should reach thirty feet. Should be plenty if your eyes are as good as your looks.”

  I stiffen. Excuse me? Is he flirting with Zyneth?

  The predator notices my abrupt irritation and peeks over my proverbial shoulder. It sees I am feeling possessive. Yes, good. No one can be allowed to take our things.

  He’s not… At one point after Zyneth and I became official, I’d attempted to explain the change in our relationship to the predator. Somehow, it had eventually come to the conclusion that Zyneth now belonged to us, despite my repeated attempts to clarify this was not the case.

  I mentally sigh. Oh, shut up. I’m in no mood to argue this one again.

  I snatch up one of the ropes, my annoyance evaporating as I peer over the edge. Yikes. It really does look like we’re about to rappel down onto—and then through—a cloud.

  Everyone but Zyneth appears equally daunted. “Ready?” he asks us.

  We are clearly not.

  “Let me try something real quick,” I say, withdrawing a handful of glass from my satchel. I gesture it out over the edge of the ship, then float it down beneath us, activating Elemental Radar.

  The spell is designed to create a three-dimensional map of my surroundings—once my Attuned elements actually have a chance to interact with my surroundings. It had worked pretty well in the ocean, sort of creating a bubble of awareness around me. That same bubble of awareness is now descending through the cloud, which is telling me nothing more than “there’s a whole lot of empty space here.”

  Then, I feel it clink against something hard. And just like that, as the dozens of pieces encounter and then sweep over the ground, a smooth stone floor appears in my mind’s eye.

  “I can feel it,” I report back. “It’s not too far beneath the cloud’s surface. Solid ground, just like Zyneth said.” The drop feels a lot less daunting now that I can semi see what I’d be rappelling toward.

  “Excellent,” Zyneth says. “Thank you for the confirmation. Well? See you all on the other side.” He flashes me a grin, takes one of the ropes, and leaps off the edge of the ship. My soul lurches as he spins down the line, vanishing into the fog within moments. Only a few seconds later, something kicks one of my pieces of glass. He’s down.

  “All clear!” Zyneth’s voice calls back up.

  “Show off,” Rezira grumbles, hands still tightly gripping the ship’s rail.

  “Ready?” Noli asks her. “I can go after you if you like.”

  Attiru is already straddling the side of the ship, tightly clutching the rope and slowly edging themself over the side.

  “We could tie it to you,” I suggest to Rezira. “Then help lower you down.”

  Rezira gives me a pained look. “Even you’re taking pity on me? This is a low point.” She sighs, grabbing two of the ropes. “Let’s get it over with already.”

  Noli stays at the top with me, helping to coax her wife over the edge as the orc lets loose a stream of swears under her breath. Attiru vanishes, and then finally Rezira does as well.

  Noli gives me a nervous but excited smile. “Just us left.”

  “Race you?” I offer, sounding far more confident than I feel.

  Noli laughs. “Alright. Let’s!” She grabs one rope, and I take another, void overlapping my glass to increase my grip. Noli looks to me.

  I use a second set of signing hands to signal. “Ready… go!”

  Terror and exhilaration spike through me as we jump over the side of the airship. Reacting to my fear, the predator takes control of our void before I can object, snatching at the rope spinning beneath our feet so I can wrap my legs around it. It realizes a moment later that there’s amusement mixed in with my fear. It has absolutely no idea what to make of this. How can a threat to our mortality be fun?

  Noli vanishes beneath me in an impressive display of dexterity I really should have seen coming. It’s not even going to be close. I descend after her at a much more leisurely pace, focusing on all the bits of my body moving in ways I’ve never really needed to move them before. I’m right at the top of the cloud when a blast of wind hits us.

  Flint’s airship whips to the side, and half a second later I’m snapped after it, the rope nearly yanked from my grasp. I squeeze onto the rope, the predator likewise anchoring us; this fear is devoid of all amusement. This fear, it understands.

  The airship bobs, righting itself as I swing beneath it and out away from the cloud. I’m abruptly met with a heart-stopping view of a valley hundreds of feet below.

  A roar bellows from a nearby cloud. The mist there swirls, disturbed by the buffet of air. And within that vortex, a great head emerges. Sky-blue and serpentine, tongue flicking at the air, the creature parts its jaws to reveal the carnivorous fangs within.

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