“These are the things you know about her,” Asha said, laying her new jacket down beside her, then ticking fingers off her burned hand as she spoke. “She’s brash—there’s no room in the palace she won’t break into. She steals things that have monetary value—the ruby, Dax’s seal. And she steals things that are valuable only toyou—like the tapestry I gave you and your uniforms.”
Asha leaned back, planting her palms on the red-brown earth beneath her. “So,” she said thoughtfully, looking out over the dragon fields, “what is the brashest, most valuable thing she could possibly steal from the king’s commandant?”
They both fell silent, thinking.
Safire didn’t have any valuables—other than maybe her throwing knives, which were a gift from Asha. She might have royal blood running through her veins, but there had been nothing royal about her upbringing. Safire didn’t like to think about the time before the revolt, when she was kept out of sight, forbidden to touch or even stand near her cousins, taunted andabused while the palace staff looked the other way.
Just as she was shaking off the memories, a sound issued from across the field.
It was a series of quiet, nervous clicks familiar to both Safire and Asha, who looked up. Across the grassy plain, away from the commotion of the dragons and their riders, a tall, thin boy with coppery hair and freckled skin made his way toward them.
Torwin.
Several paces behind Torwin walked an ivory-scaled dragon with one broken horn. He stepped warily, casting his gaze ahead and behind, looking like he would bolt at the slightest irregular movement. Safire knew this dragon. His name was Sorrow.
Several weeks ago, while Asha and Torwin were collecting old stories in Firefall—a city west of Darmoor—they’d found this half-starved creature chained in the courtyard of a wealthy home, with an iron muzzle locked around his jaws. He’d been severely abused by the children of the house, who were keeping him as a pet.
As a result, Sorrow let very few people get close. He stayed deep in the Rift mountains and never came near the city. Asha didn’t think he’d ever pair with a rider, because he was so mistrustful of humans. A few had tried, but the bond that normally formed in first flight never took.
As Torwin stepped toward the two cousins, then sat down in the dirt next to them, Sorrow crept toward Kozu, whose hulking black form was curled in the sun, soaking up the warmth. Sorrow’s ivory scales were a sharp contrast to Kozu’s obsidian.
“Everything’s packed,” said Torwin. He held a large knife inhis hands, its silver sheath embossed with intricate star patterns. “If we leave at dawn, we should arrive before sundown.”
Despite having just returned from Firefall, Asha and Torwin were flying to the Star Isles tomorrow. The reason for their trip was currently gripped in Torwin’s hands: the Skyweaver’s knife.
The weapon had saved Roa’s sister a few weeks previous, and Roa now wanted it returned to where it came from. She believed it was too dangerous an artifact to keep here in Firgaard. So Asha and Torwin had gone through the accounts of the last man who’d bought it—one of Firgaard’s wealthiest barons—and tracked down its history to a place called the scrin.
“If Roa wasn’t so insistent, I’d drop this thing to the bottom of the sea and be done with it,” said Torwin, sliding the blade out of the sheath just enough to reveal the silver-blue blade concealed within. He shivered. Looking up, he squinted through the sunlight. “Are you sure you don’t want to come with us, Safire?”
“Come? To an archipelago known for its monsters, tempests, and ship wreckers?” Safire wrinkled her nose, thinking of the treacherous waters of the Silver Sea. “I think I’ll pass. Besides, Roa and Dax will be joining you in a few days.”
The empress of the Isles—a fearsome woman named Leandra who was rumored to be deathless—wanted to present the new dragon king and queen with a gift. One that Leandra hoped would help the dire situation in the scrublands. As Dax’s Namsara, Asha had been invited to the empress’s citadel, too, but she’d turned down the invitation.
I don’t have the time or the interest in rubbing shoulders with foreign monarchs,Asha told Safire when the invite came.That’s Dax’s role.
“Someone has to be the responsible one,” Safire said. “Someone has to stay behind to ensure this city doesn’t fall apart.”
Those were her official reasons for remaining in the capital. But as she spoke them, she thought of the criminal prowling through the palace like it was her own personal playground.
Safire would never leave Firgaard at the Death Dancer’s mercy.
Torwin, as if sensing her thoughts, said, “Caught that thief of yours yet?”
Sighing, Safire fell back into the grass. “No.”
Thatwas why she was here on the dragon fields. The king’s commandant was running from her own failure. She’d hoped to have the Death Dancer locked in a cell by now. Instead, the criminal continued to elude her.
Sometimes she felt a... presence. In the middle of the day or the night. In the palace or in the street. Watching her. Trailing her. But when she turned, knife in hand, all she found was shadows. Sometimes, when she entered a room, she couldn’t shake the sense that her thief had been there just a heartbeat before. It felt as though they were playing a game of cat and mouse.
Only Safire wasn’t sure who was the cat and who was the mouse.
She needed to catch this Death Dancer. She wanted to see the look in the thief’s eyes when she locked her up for good.
Once she did, she could go back to sleeping through the night.
“Saf’s beginning to believe the rumors are true,” said Asha.
Torwin shot her a look. “Rumors?”
