A DRAGON.
Here.
In the Shadowed City.
But this wasn’t just any dragon. I knew the shape of this one, the flash of brilliant red scales, and even the pitch of her scream as she clawed her way toward the sky.
“Lex!”
Her name tore from my throat, and before I could think better of it, I was running toward the raging dragon. Slippered feet pounded on the dirt, then the docks, and then the thuds vanished under the cacophony of shouts and cries and chaos.
Everyone was running. Dockworkers, buskers, vendors—most fled the spray of fire and rush of smoke. Others stared in wonder and terror, because there was a dragon on the docks.
But I ran toward the flames as they caught on barges and pillars. “Lex!”
Someone screamed my name, but I felt as though I were flying. My whole body was hot with fury, and my thoughts an inferno of anger. Some foreign instinct took over, guiding me through the crush of people trying to escape the fiery wrath, and once they were behind me, I saw her fully.
Lex was coiled around the mainmast of the galleon from which she’d erupted, her talons gouging into the wooden flesh, wings pumping. She hadn’t finished her climb into the air, and now that I could see her more clearly, it was obvious why: jagged rips left the bottom of her left wing in shreds like a decorative fringe. No matter how she flapped, the wing prevented her from scooping enough air to escape. Maybe in time she’d be able to compensate, but not now. Not half-crazed with hunger.
Hot wind made fires jump around her, and the whole ship groaned and shuddered under the violence of an angry Drakontos rex. It was going to sink, and she would fall with it.
Heat gusted, pushing me backward, but I pushed forward. This was dangerous, I knew. Unwise. But there was still some part of me that believed I could help this dragon.
I reached out my hand through the heavy, dry air which tasted of ashes. I reached as though I could touch her. “Lex!”
Still, she thrashed her head and roared at the sky, spitting out flames that sputtered deep red. Her fire was dying, and so was she.
“Lex!” I took another step forward, my arms open toward her.
This time, she heard me. Or she saw me. I couldn’t be sure. But either way, she released her grip on the mainmast and abandoned the sinking galleon. With one heavy pump of her good wing, she leaped to the docks.
Wood cracked and crumbled beneath her, falling into the churning sea. Lex clawed toward me, her gaze locked with mine.
And behind me, screams began anew. Everyone thought the dragon was coming to eat them; they didn’t know Lex would never harm a human.
Well, not before all this. Now? I couldn’t be sure.
My heart pounded as the great Drakontos rex prowled forward, head low and wings arched. Her talons gouged into the docks, and bloodred fire burned deep in the back of her mouth, behind a hundred knifed teeth.
“Lex,” I said, as gently as I could. How many times had I actually met her? Ilina had far more contact with the big dragons than I, but Lex had seen me before. With Ilina. Multiple times.
I kept my hands lifted toward the great dragon. From here, I could see that her scales were duller than they’d been, and her eyes sunken inward. She was ill. Starved. Abused. If she’d been LaLa, I could have taken her in my arms and kissed her nose, but Lex was as big as my bedroom. She was a wild creature, not one who obeyed my commands.
And yet, as she reached me, Lex rested her chin on the docks at my feet, her golden eyes turned upward to me. Her wings pulled in, and the rest of her body lowered as well.
“Hello, my sweet.” Slowly, I began to kneel. Heat rose off her scales in waves, cooling as the shock and anger wore off. A soft groan worked through her throat. “Poor Lexy,” I murmured.
“Now!” a man shouted.
Bowstrings twanged and a volley of arrows flew in from the north, dragging a heavy net behind them.
Latticed ropes crashed onto Lex, and at once, I realized my mistake. All of my focus had been on her, and none on my surroundings. While I’d been distracted—while I’d kept Lex distracted—police and soldiers and guards had staged themselves at a distance, just out of my peripheral vision.
“No!” The scream ripped from me, but I was too late.
So was Lex. She reared back, but the arrows plunged into the water, drawing the net tightly over her, and pinned her great wings to her sides. Flame curled from the back of her throat, but there wasn’t enough to save her. The fire died at the tip of her tongue.
And then, her golden eyes shifted back to me, and she surrendered. Breaking free of the ship had taken all her effort, and now she was resigned to captivity once more.
“Go,” I rasped, reaching for the net. “Try one more time.” But before I could even touch the net, everyone swarmed in: soldiers and police to Lex, Elbena and Luminary Guards to me.
I was surrounded. The white-uniformed men took my hands and arms, drawing me away from the fray of everyone struggling to contain Lex. I thrashed, feeling as wild as the dragon, but it was no use. The Luminary Guards were bigger. Stronger. And there were ten of them. “Stay still!” one shouted.
“Let me go!” All I wanted was to get back to Lex, but I couldn’t even see her through the wall of bodies. “Let me go!” I jerked my arm free, only to find another’s hands clasped around it.
“Release her!” Elbena shouted.
All ten Luminary Guards stepped away, and I started to run toward Lex again, but Elbena stood in my way. It was over. Lex was lost to me.
I crumpled to the ground with a desperate sob.
“Oh, Mira.” Elbena pressed her hands to her heart. “What a brave thing you did. Are you all right?”
Adrenaline rushed through my veins and my chest squeezed. I was not all right. But what could I do but nod? The movement was jerky, and I was certain that nothing I did right now looked natural.
Elbena extended a hand to me, her smooth brown fingers in a delicate arc. “Let me help you up, dear.”
We were in full view of everyone who could bear to take their eyes off the dragon.
I counted the masked guards ringing us. Still ten. Twenty-five Shadow Spires in the city. Fifty people gathering nearby, gawking at us, and at the display on the docks behind us.
Innumerable cries from Lex.
“Mira.” Elbena’s voice was firm. She still held her hand toward me.
Hating myself, I placed my work-callused hand in hers and allowed her to pull me into a brief hug. “Don’t do anything to jeopardize your freedom,” she murmured.
I gave a jolting nod, but couldn’t bring myself to give voice to assurances of my behavior. It was all I could do to keep my trembling at a minimum, and my tears caged inside me.
“Good.” Quickly, she smoothed my hair, straightened my dress, and pulled me around to survey the activity on the docks.
The burning galleon was half-drowned by now, and a terrible shrieking came from within. Not a shrieking of the ship, but something else. Something real. Something terrible.
I staggered forward, but a Luminary Guard held me back.
“Stay,” said Elbena. “It’s too late for them.”
“For them,” I repeated, like a question, though it wasn’t one. I already knew what she meant, and it made my voice tight and high. “How many dragons?”
“There were three aboard the Whitesell. I suppose the other two are lost now.” Disappointment filled her tone—the kind of upset that came from a bad investment or a burned meal. Like the loss of two dragons was simply an inconvenience that she’d have to deal with later.
Seven gods. What if the other two were LaLa and Crystal?
My knees gave out and I would have fallen to the ground again, but one of the Luminary Guards stepped forward to hold me up, and a spark of clarity hit. They weren’t LaLa and Crystal. The voices were too big, too loud to belong to anything other than a large species.
It was a cold comfort. Two dragons were dead. One was captured and on the verge of death.
I didn’t understand it. I didn’t understand her. She felt none of this devastation for lives lost, but it was the only thing I could feel. All I could hear were the shrieks of the dragons burning and drowning within the ship.
The Great Abandonment threatened a catastrophe of tremors and landslides. Why didn’t the ground open now and swallow everything?
Right before my eyes, the Whitesell was sinking into the sea. A brigade had already put out fires on the neighboring ships and on the docks, while police and guards coordinated to secure Lex and push back the growing crowd of onlookers. Because of course people wanted to gawk at her suffering.
All the while, a Luminary Guard held me upright, and Elbena muttered under her breath. Already preparing how to deal with the inconvenience.
When Lex was sedated and the guards had the crowd under control, Elbena took my hand and strode forward.
“Here she is!” She lifted our fists into the air and let her voice ring out over the din of shocked cries and groaning wood. “The girl who stopped the beast from destroying the Shadowed City: Mira Minkoba!”
As one, the crowd turned to us and began to cheer. “It’s Mira!”
“The Hopebearer!”
“Look at her!”
“She charmed the dragon and saved us!”
Elbena looked at me askance. “Smile, Mira. You’re a hero now.” And then, when my expression didn’t change—couldn’t change—she gave me a little shake. “Smile, Mira. Or there will be consequences.”
I forced my mouth into the correct shape, but I couldn’t imagine anyone would mistake it for something real. Still, as long as I did what she ordered, maybe it didn’t matter.
“Why is Mira here?”
“Where is her family?”
“How did she know what to do with the dragon?”
“Why were there dragons on that ship?”
Distantly, I registered that those were good questions, and at least I wasn’t the only one who didn’t know all the answers.
“How did the dragon get out of the ship?”
Elbena held up her other hand to quiet the crowd. “We don’t have time for questions. All we can say right now is that these dragons were on their way to your local sanctuary as part of an interisland breeding program. Unfortunately, one mistook our intentions and escaped.”
People nodded.
How easily they accepted her lies. Elbena had long ago mastered that talent.
“Thank the Fallen Gods and the Upper Gods, too: Mira has extensive experience with dragons, and she was perfectly aware of what she was doing. As soon as Mira and I heard the crash, I sent her to calm the dragon, because I knew she was the only one here who could possibly accomplish such a feat.”
“She knows their hearts,” someone said. “Mira the Dragonhearted.”
“Yes!” Elbena shouted. “Mira the Hopebearer, and Mira the Dragonhearted!”
A dark chill ran through me as Lex drew my gaze once more. Rope bound her wings tightly to her sides. A steel muzzle caged her jaws—something that would never have been possible even a decan ago. But now that she was weakened by starvation, the metal held her teeth shut together—not that she tried to open her mouth and shoot fire anymore. She knew it was pointless. Her golden eyes had dulled into dim acceptance of my betrayal.
Like when Aaru discovered my identity.
I hurt everyone I cared about.
I wanted to scream that I hadn’t done this on purpose. That Elbena hadn’t wanted me to run toward Lex, and this was her effort to make the situation work in her favor. But Elbena squeezed my hand so tightly my bones rubbed together, and I forced my grimace into another smile.
“She saved the city! Mira the Dragonhearted saved the Shadowed City.”
The cries of joy went on and on, rising in fervor as the Whitesell sank deeper into the sea. As salt water quenched dragon fire. And as the voices of two dragons were silenced forever.
THE STORM ARRIVED and loosed its fury across the Isle of Shadow.
It was to the drum of rain and roar of thunder that we drove to a grand inn, which loomed over the water-shrouded street. Wind made palm trees dance and bow, and cold air seeped into the carriage through the windows, but when we pulled into the drive, Elbena held up a hand.
“Wait.” She nodded at the Luminary Guard who’d been sitting next to me. “Make sure everything is secure.”
The Luminary Guard unfolded himself and opened the door, admitting a gust of stinging rain into the carriage. And then, the rush was cut off, leaving Elbena and me alone in the dim space.
“This is going to change things,” Elbena muttered, almost inaudible under the storm.
I could hardly breathe for the numbness creeping through my body. From the cold rain. From the sight of the ship sinking. From the memory of Lex in chains.
I’d done that. Maybe I hadn’t physically put the muzzle on her, or captured her in the net, but without my interference she might have gone away from the city—toward freedom, rather than toward me.
“Is this why you brought me here?” My voice sounded scraped away. Hollow. “Did you bring me here to name me a savior of the people while I watched dragons die?”
A smile twisted up her face. “I brought you here to give a speech. Do you recall giving a speech while you watched dragons die?”
Strength through silence. I desperately wanted the kind of strength Aaru displayed, but he had a lifetime of practice and I had a lifetime of doing as I was told.
“But I suppose,” she went on, “anything is possible. You think I’m some sort of monster now, and perhaps a monster would arrange for a dragon to escape its confines just at the moment of your arrival.”
The shipping order I’d seen had given the Shadowed City as one of the locations where dragons would be, but the transport ship should have left over two decans ago. So why were they still here? Or rather, why were only some of them here?
Elbena wore a faint smirk as she watched me struggle to decipher her intentions.
I dropped my eyes to my hands and forced my expression neutral, though even thinking the word dragon made hot tears swell in my eyes.
“Tomorrow is a big day.” Elbena leaned back in her seat. “Your speech will be given at a state dinner in the evening, so you’ll spend the day preparing. Hair, face, clothes—everything. It will be just like before, though your mistress of beauty won’t be here. The inn has a wonderful staff that will assist you in her absence. I’m sure you don’t mind.”
My heart squeezed at the thought of Krasimir, but of course she wasn’t here. She was too sympathetic to me. “When will you give me the speech?”
“It will be waiting for you in your room. Councilor Bilyana will have brought it when she arrived in Bopha on last night’s tide. Your speechwriter sent it with her so that she could have a couple extra days to finalize it.” She leaned forward. “It’s a delicate thing, you understand. We needed to make sure every word was perfect. And if you have any questions, we can talk about it tomorrow.”
“What will the speech say?”
She shook her head. “We’ll discuss that tomorrow.”
Dimly, I knew that denying me answers was another method of controlling me. Maybe she had arranged for Lex’s escape, and the deaths of the two on the ship. I wouldn’t put it past her. Not since learning of the council’s involvement with the disappearance of dragons. Or, if not involvement, concealment for sure.
“You said if I give the speech tomorrow, then I’ll be set free from the Pit.”
“Yes, although I suppose I shouldn’t have assumed that you knew your good behavior was also a factor.” She gave me an annoyed look. “You aren’t as necessary to the council as you think. We could easily elevate another pretty face to replace you.” Her lips curled up. “Unfortunately, prison time doesn’t seem to agree with your pretty face.”
Her blow to my vanity stung.
Before I could devote any more thought to it, someone pounded on the carriage, and a Luminary Guard opened the door. Quickly, I was shuffled into the inn. The space was dim and quiet, save the inconsistent number of Luminary Guards prowling through the parlor as though searching for threats.
Without stopping to greet the owners, Elbena took me to a room upstairs. Before we could enter, yet another Luminary Guard emerged.
Above the white mask, his eyes darted first to me, then to Elbena. “It’s clear.”
My heart stopped. I knew that voice.
“Thank you,” Elbena said.
The Luminary Guard bowed and started toward the stairs. He didn’t look back.
Elbena nudged me toward the open door. “In you go.”
“Where are you staying?” My words sounded breathless. I could barely form them around the pounding of my heart.
She smiled sweetly. “Down the hall. You’re on your own tonight, but there will be guards outside your door and window. Everything is locked and I’m the only one with the keys. I hope you’ll behave.”
I gave her a look that just oozed obedience, and when I stepped inside the room and shut the door, I barely paid attention when the lock turned behind me with a heavy clunk.
Instead, I was thinking of the miracle that had just occurred. The barest eye contact. The timbre of his voice. The mask pulled tight against his dark skin.
Hristo.