“No. Listen.” I stepped closer, ignoring the taste of metal in the air. “We’ve spent years believing the last of our kind were here and that we were all that remained. But clearly, that isn’t true.” I pointed at the draken. “What ifothers survived the destruction of Lyoness and were scattered and lost?”
Ronan’s gaze flicked to mine, quick and sharp. He was excited. “If there are others?—”
Kieran just gawked, gaze going back from the dead draken to us. Benedict looked simply shocked, as if the possibility had never even occurred to him. Even the sea seemed to hesitate between breaths, hesitating where the ocean pulled and pushed. A strange emotion went through that I couldn’t identify—jealousy, fear, or … something else?
Having more drakens was cause for celebration.
For so long, Benedict had carried our extinction like a birthmark: visible, unchangeable. His species on the brink of disaster, he’d finally fetched me, the last female draken in existence, hidden under an enchantment among humans. My pregnancy was the first spark of hope anyone had dared speak aloud.
Would I be as special or revered if I wasn’t the only one anymore?
What a stupid, selfish thing to worry about. I should instead be worried about the little one growing inside of me and the drakens on my island.
But this dead body changed everything.
“Bring him up to the beach,” Benedict said finally. “We’ll examine him properly. Ronan, you and the healers?—”
“No.” The word tore out of me sharper than I meant. “No hall. Not yet. Not where everyone will see. The witches will want to poke and prod and … just no.”
News like this would spread faster than any flame. Hope was dangerous when people were still learning to live without it.
Benedict’s jaw muscles flexed. He knew I was right. “The volcano?”
“We aren’t hiding him, just not letting everyone know right away. We need to ask Meruse if she saw anything. What if there are more? What if someone comes looking for him?”
Kieran was already reaching for the draken. His shoulders were tense beneath his leathers, muscles coiled in ways I hadn’t seen since the war.
As they worked together to gently pick up the draken and roll him over in the sand, Ronan knelt beside the body again, fingertips hovering over the unfamiliar sigil carved into the draken’s bracer. It was circular: a serpent eating its own tail, but the serpent was split through the center like it was wounded.
“Do you recognize it?” I asked.
“No,” he said softly.
The tide surged once, foam lapping at the dead draken’s talons. For an instant, the light caught on his scales, and they shimmered like emerald glass. Alive. Just for a breath.
The baby squirmed and rolled beneath my palm: a small, deliberate push as if it was answering something older than words.
Ronan noticed. “What is it?”
I swallowed hard. “The baby moved.”
He looked at me for a long moment, grinning. “It will be soon!”
Kieran turned toward Benedict. “What do we do?”
Before Benedict could answer, a shout went up from the cliffs. Then another. By the time I looked over my shoulder, the path was already crowded. Dozens of drakens spilled down the slope, wings catching the dawn light, eyes wide.
We’d been seen.
Word traveled faster than fire.
“So much for keeping it a secret,” I murmured.
Ronan’s mouth quirked grimly. “Secrets aren’t a thing on a small island.”
Voices rose around us as the crowd reached the beach, in shock, fear, and curiosity. A dozen questions layered over one another, each more dangerous than the last.
“Who is he?”
