The second wyvern tried to tear the strange feather from its own wing.
One backward bite was enough to pull the filament across a hanging bridge. Black-green fiber looped the lower chain, tightened through the wet flight feathers, and yanked the wyvern out of its crossing turn.
Its rider left the saddle on the next wingbeat.
A leg strap held. The rest of the rider swung beneath the wyvern, striking the bridge boards hard enough to break one loose. The board fell past the nursery ledge and vanished into the white cataract below.
Slate's stolen homebell rang under the clouds.
The trapped wyvern answered by folding the wrong wing. Its body rolled toward the bridge chain, and every frightened effort wound another length of filament around living feathers.
"Stop biting it!" Eda shouted from Cress's back.
The rider could not hear her over the cataract. Perhaps the wyvern could. Its jaws opened without taking another feather, but the fall had already begun.
