“They say the Death Dancer is uncatchable,” Asha explained. “That she’s half god, half shadow.”
Safire closed her eyes, letting the sun warm her face as she thought of Asha’s idea. One step ahead... a trap was what she needed. But with what could she bait it?
“Well,” Torwin said, “if anyone can catch her...”
His voice trailed off. Safire waited for him to finish, but the silence continued. And then, even with her eyes closed, Safire felt it: a cold darkness sliding across her face. It smelled like musk and smoke.
She opened her eyes.
The dragon called Sorrow stood over her. Ivory scales. Broken horn. Black eyes staring down into hers.
It amazed Safire how much sadness she always found in the depths of those eyes.
Normally, her first instinct would be to reach for her knife. But Safire knew what it was like to be at the mercy of brutes. She knew the horrible things that had been done to this creature and how little it took to frighten Sorrow.
So she lay still, forcing herself to relax.
Beside her, Torwin and Asha were tense and silent.
What they didn’t know was that when Safire couldn’t sleep, she liked to walk the hunting paths up into the Rift. Most often, they took her here—to the dragon fields. The fields werealways bare beneath the stars, the riders gone, the dragons sleeping somewhere in the hilly terrain. All except one: Sorrow.
With no one else around, Safire told the dragon stories. Not old stories, though. Not the myths of gods and heroes Asha was so good at, the ones the dragons liked best. Safire didn’t know many of those. Instead, she told Sorrow the stories that kept her up at night.
She told him about being the daughter of an unlawful union and, as such, growing up forbidden to be touched. She told him about the revolt she helped lead—a revolt that put her cousin Dax on the throne. She told him about the day that same cousin made her his commandant.
And then, whenever she finished telling a story, they played a game. It involved Safire stepping as close as possible, and Sorrow standing as still as he dared.
Sorrow always bolted before Safire came close enough to touch.
That was why, when Safire reached her hand slowly toward the dragon’s ivory snout now, she expected Sorrow to flinch and run.
Except Safire hadn’t flinched when she’d opened her eyes. Hadn’t reached for her knife. And Sorrow sensed it—Safire’s instinct, as well as the suppression of it. Sorrow was doing the same now.
The dragon trembled with the fear of being touched, but he didn’t run.
When Safire’s fingertips touched the warm scales of Sorrow’s snout, her skin prickled. She felt the effort it took thedragon to keep himself still. Safire held her breath as more and more of her skin came in contact with the dragon’s scales. Soon, Safire cupped Sorrow’s snout and the dragon’s warm breath was moist on her palm.
Sweet boy,she thought.How could anyone want to hurt you?
And then, like the wind changing, Sorrow jerked away. Safire froze, but the dragon only lifted his head, turning into the wind. Sensing or smelling or hearing something Safire herself couldn’t. She sat up, looking where Sorrow did.
Safire felt it then—that same feeling that haunted her footsteps through the palace: that tingling sense of being watched.
Sunlight flickered through the dark green boughs of the forest’s edge, the trees bending in the wind.
“What is it?” Asha whispered.
Safire rose, striding toward the cedars, thinking of the Death Dancer. She was about to plunge into the pines when the strange pitch of her cousin’s voice stopped her.
“Saf...”
Safire turned to find both Torwin and Asha watching her with worried eyes. Only Sorrow still scanned the trees.
“What?”
“Some time away from Firgaard might be good,” Asha suggested. “It would only be for a few weeks. Surely your soldats are too well trained to let Firgaard fall to pieces in so little time.”
Safire was about to point out that they themselves had led a revolt in less time, breaching Firgaard’s walls and dethroning the former king. But Torwin interrupted.
