We all laugh, and Hudson looks at us like he has no idea what the joke is. But I can see the humor lurking in the back of his eyes despite the deadpan delivery.

“Well, then you’re really going to hate this,” Flint tells us as he puts a hand up to the glass…and it dissolves right in front of us. And out of nowhere, we’re at the edge of the room, forty-five stories above Times Square, with absolutely no barrier to keep us from plunging to our deaths.

And that’s before Flint steps right off the edge of the building and straight out into thin air.

91

Up Broadway

Is the New

Off Broadway

Luca makes a grab for him but misses and ends up plunging out the window as well.

Macy screams as he falls, and soon half the room is gathered around us, watching as Luca splays out five hundred feet above Times Square. Because he’s not falling. He’s just lying there, on the air, at Flint’s feet.

“It’s okay, babe,” Flint says, reaching down to help him to his feet as the guests behind us titter in amusement. Because for no rhyme or reason that I can understand, Flint and Luca are literally walking on air.

And so are a lot of the other guests, who must decide it’s time to exit the premises. Twenty or thirty of them are swarming into the air above Times Square, bejeweled champagne glasses still clutched in their hands.

Part of me wants to put it down to them being dragons, but none of their wings are out. Plus, Luca is standing there right next to Flint, and I know he can’t fly.

“What is happening?” Macy asks, putting voice to the question all five of us are thinking.

“Come on out and see for yourself,” Flint says. And though I’m not altogether sure I buy what he’s selling, I decide to do what he says. Worst-case scenario, I start to fall—at least I have wings to keep me from plummeting to my death.

But when I walk off the edge of the hotel, I don’t feel air beneath my feet. I feel solid ground.

Which is impossible, as we are literally standing in the middle of the air. When I look down, I can see people wandering Times Square. The billboards, the traffic, the lights of Broadway…they are all right there. We were standing down there just a few minutes ago and there was nothing up here. I was looking straight up at the top of this very building.

And yet, here we are. Hudson, Macy, and Eden join the rest of us on what feels like a giant sheet of glass stretching over Times Square—and all the way down Seventh Avenue and Forty-Fifth Street as well. Because as far as I can see, people—dragons—are lining the sides of the glass streets waiting for the action to start.

It is the most mind-bending thing I have ever seen in a year of mind-bending things. But somehow, somehow, the dragons have harnessed enough air magic—at least I’m guessing this is magic—to hold an entire festival in the air right above Times Square and no one down below can see it.

It’s genius and diabolical at the same time. And also way, hella cool.

“You’ve got to admit,” Hudson says as he elbows Luca. “This takes balls.”

“Major balls,” Luca agrees.

“Who even thought of this?” Macy asks. “And how did you guys pull it off?”

Flint just grins. “You didn’t actually think witches were the only ones who could harness the air, did you?”

“Actually, yes,” she tells him. “I kind of did.”

“I’ve heard the Court did this,” Eden says, and it’s the first time I’ve ever heard her awestruck in the entire time I’ve known her. “But I never actually believed it before now.”

Flint holds out his arms. “Surprise!”

“No fucking shit surprise,” Luca grumbles, but he’s grinning almost as hugely as Flint.

“Want to go find a spot?” Flint asks.

“Don’t you have royal duties to perform over there?” I ask, pointing to what looks like the main stage for the whole event.

“Later,” he says. “I begged off initial duties so I could entertain our royal guests.” He gestures to Hudson and me.

Hudson just laughs. “Sounds like a bunch of bollocks to me.”

“Absolutely,” Flint agrees. “But it got me out of show pony duty, so I’ll take it. Now, come on. The festival is going to start in about five minutes, and I want to be able to see it.”

He ushers us away from the hotel and a little farther down the block to a roped-off VIP area. It’s still crowded, but not nearly as crowded as some of the other areas along the street, so we duck under the ropes gratefully.

We must make it just in time, because we’ve barely gotten ourselves arranged behind the rope line when the music starts. At first, it’s low, barely noticeable, wind chimes spinning through the air. Then it gets louder, bells and flutes joining in, and then the other woodwinds, and finally light strings as the music rolls and flirts its way through the audience, dancing on the air.

It’s gorgeous—some of the most beautiful music I’ve ever heard—but I don’t recognize it at all. “What is this?” I whisper, not wanting to break the spell it’s weaving over all of us.

“It’s dragon song,” Hudson answers solemnly, “just in musical form.”

“I didn’t know that was a thing.”

“It definitely is. Ask Eden or Flint to sing for you sometime. It will blow you away.”

As the song grows louder and louder, soaring over us, the first performers burst onto what I’m beginning to realize is a giant parade route. Dragons in human form perform aerial acrobatics, tumbling and flying, twisting and weaving ribbons around themselves as they twirl their way down the street. Elaborate makeup on their faces, dressed in colorful leotards with gauzy skirts and overshirts, they epitomize a delicacy I didn’t realize dragons were capable of.

As they move farther down the parade route, the music changes—gets louder, more demanding, more powerful. And just as it reaches a crescendo, dragons launch themselves off the tops of the highest buildings all around us and come hurtling straight toward the center of the street.

Lightning sizzles through the sky while fire and ice shoot out in all directions. The dragons race down the glass street, then soar high, high, high above us, only to perform incredible dives and twists and somersaults as they race back down at death-defying speeds.

They do this over and over again, each dive getting more dangerous than the one before it. Then the music changes again, back to the light, ethereal sound of the very beginning. But I can’t place the instruments in this song, and as the dragons come into view, I realize why. They are all female, all in human form, and they are singing…this is the dragon song that Hudson mentioned before, and it is so beautiful that it has tears forming behind my eyes.

“You’re right,” I whisper to him, and my voice breaks just a little bit.

He smiles at me in return, and it’s a soft smile rather than his usual sharp ones. And though I worked hard to bat them away, he must see the remnants of unshed tears in my eyes, because he wraps an arm around my shoulder and pulls me into the shelter of his body.

“This is incredible,” Macy says as the dragon singers move farther down the line.

“I know,” I tell her. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

But then more dragons drop down onto the parade route. Big, strong, powerful, they send wind whipping through the audience, fire dancing along the edges of the ropes holding us back from the course.

One dragon shoots a ball of fire in our direction, and I gasp, rear back from it, but Flint just laughs. Right before another dragon scoops it out of the air, turning the fire into a large ring. Soon there are a dozen rings of fire lined up in the center of the street, one right after the other, and the dragons take turns flying through the circles as they get narrower and narrower.

After them come the younger dragons, small boys and girls walking the parade route in human form as they throw handfuls of gems and gold coins at the audience.

I half expect people to rush one another for them—God knows, humans would trample one another trying to get a diamond the size of a baby’s fist or a sapphire so blue that it nearly looks black—but the dragons seem to take it all in stride, as if they know that everyone who wants something is going to get it before they leave.

More dragons fly by after them, lightning crackling across the air right above us. It’s powerful lightning, loud and bright, and I can’t help glancing down to see if the people below us have seen or heard anything. But not one of them is looking up at all—it’s like they really are alone down there, with nothing but sky above them.

After the lightning dragons zip by, fireworks start going off above us—as big and bright as the ones last night over the Hudson. I figure they mark the end of the show, but then in the middle of all the exploding fireworks, an array of golden dragons comes racing down Seventh Avenue faster than I ever dreamed it was possible to fly.