PANIC FLOODED MY VEINS. I WANTED TO RUN. NEEDED to run.
But I was loaded down with the backpack and weapons, and Tirta was blocking the door. She stepped toward me, one hand outstretched. “Let me explain—”
“I don’t want to hear it.” The noorestones in my pack were impossible to reach, especially with my hurt shoulder, but I took one from a sconce on the wall and gripped it so tightly my knuckles paled. “You lied to me about who you were. About how long you’ve been here. You said you were here to look out for me, but all along you worked for them.”
Her face hardened, and the sweet, friendly girl I’d known disappeared once more. “Don’t do this, Mira.”
I should have taken a weapon. A real one. Knives were fairly self-explanatory. And even though I’d done something with a noorestone in the interrogation room, I wasn’t sure what. Or how. Or if I could again.
And I couldn’t trade the noorestone for a knife now, or Tirta would realize I wasn’t in control of this . . . power.
“I’m on your side, Mira.” In spite of her insistence, her fingers curled on the baton she’d taken from Altan. “If you just listen to me, you’ll understand that I’m trying to help. But we need to move quickly or the Luminary Guard will realize something’s wrong. I’ve missed my check-in already.”
“They’re here?” My heart pounded as I shoved past her, but the hall was empty when I looked.
Tirta grabbed my arm. “Mira—”
Every single noorestone in the room dimmed.
Immediately, she backed off, retreating farther into the armory.
My face must have revealed my shock, but before Tirta could act, I stepped into the hall and pulled the door after me.
The keys were still in the lock, jangling as the latch clicked into place. A thud sounded on the other side of the door as Tirta rushed forward and grabbed the handle, but I twisted the key and the bolt slid home.
“Mira!” She banged on the door. “Let me out!”
“I’m sorry.” I drew the keys from the lock and stowed the ring on the hilt of a sword. “I don’t trust you anymore.”
Just as I aimed myself toward the first level again, I realized my error: I hadn’t taken the dragon reins. They were secured in Tirta’s belt, where she’d put them right before admitting her association with the Luminary Council.
Indecision stalled me. I’d taken the long way to the first level solely to retrieve the reins. But if I went back for them, Tirta would be waiting on the other side of the door. And she had a room full of weapons.
Well, I had a room full of noorestones.
But I had no idea how to harness their power.
A low rumble filled my ears. Footfalls? Tirta? Luminary Guards? More angry baby dragons? It was impossible to tell, but that made the decision for me: I ran.
Although I’d secured everything as well as possible, the extra weight slowed me, made my heart thrum heavily and my breath scrape inside my chest. It hurt, but I forced myself onward, careening around corners and down a flight of stairs.
I was not built for running, even when I wasn’t loaded down with noorestones and weapons.
But I kept going. Even when cramps gripped my sides, and when fire throbbed through my shoulder. Even when sweat poured down my body and soaked my skin, and when my breath came in short, shuddering gasps. Even when black spots swarmed around the edges of my vision—and then everything faded into faint shadows. I knew where to go. My work cleaning had burned into my mind the number of steps to and from different places, and I used that as a map.
At last, I found myself in the anteroom. Struggling to catch my breath, urging my sight to return to normal, I found the thin blankets always stored here, took six, and slipped them through the straps of my backpack. They dangled around my legs, but I’d take anything that looked useful now. I had no idea what we might face outside the prison.
If we got out.
Still wishing I’d taken the reins from Tirta, wishing warriors kept calm-whistles, I hauled open the cellblock door. It was time to face the dragon.
Heat gusted outward. I staggered back, but I forced myself to move deeper into the hall.
It was dim, as always, but eerily quiet considering there were nine prisoners and a dragon inside.
I lifted my noorestone to my side, to keep the shine out of my eyes, and that was when I saw her. Kelsine slinked out of one of the cells, no longer terrified and cowed by the Drakon Warriors, but with a confidence that revealed her understanding of her dominance. She might be a young dragon, but she was still a dragon in a cellblock full of delicate, flammable humans.
A small gasp escaped me, drawing her attention.
At once, Kelsine lunged down the hall, her brown scales shimmering in the faint light.
“Wait!” I shouted, as if she could understand me. As if she had any reason to trust me.
“Mira?” That was Ilina’s voice.
Talons scraped the stone floor as Kelsine charged me, and deep, red flames dragged around her teeth. She was too young to ignite the air, and her fire was nearly extinguished now—probably from using so much—but that didn’t change the danger I was in. She had teeth. And talons.
A cacophony of voices rose up, all screaming at me, at the dragon, at the bars on their cells.
I clutched my noorestone in one hand, wishing to all the Fallen Gods I’d managed to get the dragon reins. Or a calm-whistle. Anything that would help. Anything but this pathetic jacket that might be fire resistant but certainly wasn’t crush proof.
I had two options:
1. Duck into one of the cells on either side of me.
2. Retreat into the anteroom.
They were both terrible solutions.
And then there was Kelsine herself. Though charging at me, she was exhausted, and the dying fire proved it. She was all fear and adrenaline, a dangerous combination for me and for her. This poor creature. Her parents taken. Trapped in a strange hall. Humans screaming at her.
“Oh, Kelsine,” I whispered. My heart broke. I could imagine the anguish of family ripped away, the terror of being surrounded by strangers, the wild need to survive against all odds—because I’d been there. I was still there.
At two dragon-lengths away, Kelsine stopped and lifted her eyes to mine.
My heart thrummed as her entire posture shifted from aggressive to . . . submissive? That couldn’t be right. But her wings folded, her back lowered, and her face turned downward to the floor. A huge sigh rolled out of her.
“What happened?” Varissa’s question hissed across the cellblock, and I quickly looked for Kelsine’s response, but the dragon appeared sedated.
“Don’t say anything,” I warned them, doing my best to keep my voice level. Tone neutral. Kelsine made herself smaller.
I needed to move. To free my friends. This was our chance to get out of here, but the longer I took, the more likely it was that Altan awakened and came for us. And I couldn’t imagine a world where Tirta didn’t search this very cellblock when she escaped the armory.
So I took one step forward. Two. Three. The numbers steadied my thoughts as I strode toward the dragon, knelt, and caressed the ridge of hot scales over her eye. Her third lid slid into place, but she didn’t back away. She didn’t break her gaze.
“I know you’re scared,” I whispered. “So am I.”
A deep shudder tore through her, but she was listening.
“I won’t let them hurt you again, sweet dragon.”
She blinked slowly as I stood up, then moved around her—toward Ilina’s cell. Over the incredible pounding of my heart, I heard only a small scrape of talons on stone as she turned to watch.
I breathed. In long. Out long. Just like Doctor Chilikoba had taught me. I made every breath last five steps, and little by little, the worst of the anxiety cleared.
Finally, I reached Ilina.
“How did you do that?” she asked.
“She’s a baby. I calmed her.” I passed her the bow and quiver, then twisted so she could remove Altan’s key ring from the sword hilt where I’d stowed it. “Fourth from the maces, I think.” At least, that was the key for my cell. “If that’s not it, we’ll have to find a way to pick the locks.”
“How encouraging,” she said, but she was still searching me like she couldn’t believe what I’d done.
While Ilina dealt with the keys, I went to Hristo’s cell and passed him a sword. He nodded in thanks. Then I went to Gerel’s.
“I’m trusting you,” I said. “However unwise that may be, I’m trusting you, and I’m getting you out of here, too. Don’t betray me.”
“I have never lied to you.” She narrowed her eyes. “Give me the sword.”
“What about the dragon?” Ilina was just stepping out of her cell and moving toward Hristo’s.
“The real question,” said Altan, striding in from the anteroom with fourteen warriors at his back, “is what did you do to the dragon?”
In between us, Kelsine was slinking toward me, her wings still tucked against her sides. She was exhausted, and in no shape to defend herself, let alone fight on our behalf.
From the opposite end of the hall, another voice sounded.
“Mira Minkoba!” Tirta wore a hard scowl. In spite of her earlier claims of friendship, seven Luminary Guards flanked her.
My heart sank into the floor and through the depths of the island of Khulan. We were trapped on both sides. Twenty-three of them against six of us. And unless Aaru and Chenda were going to surprise me in the next few minutes, only two of us were trained for combat.
“With the authority granted to me,” Tirta went on, “by the Luminary Council of Darina and Damyan, I place you under arrest.”
“I’m already in prison,” I muttered.
Gerel snorted and drew her sword. “Make your friend let me out of my cage next.”
“Obviously.” I swung my backpack off, blankets flying everywhere, and dug for one of the knives. Noorestones scraped my skin, but it wasn’t a long search. I passed the knife through the bars as the sound of twenty-three pairs of boots grew louder. Closer.
“Why do you have all those noorestones?” Gerel asked.
I passed knives to Hristo, who’d just been freed from his cell, and then Chenda and Ilina.
“Stay in the middle,” Hristo said. “I won’t let anything happen to you. I swear it.” He drew both his knife and sword, and positioned himself facing Tirta.
I believed him. Of course I did. But just in case, I made sure to get an extra knife for myself.
Ilina went to work on Gerel’s door, and I found myself in front of Aaru’s cell.
He was standing at the front already, watching me with those dark eyes. Wordlessly, I slipped a knife through the bars, and when he took the weapon, fingers brushing mine, it felt like my heart was scattering apart.
Metal screamed as Gerel exploded from her cell, and both she and Hristo clashed blades with our jailers.
And then the earth shook.