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“Your Highness, be careful!” shouts Verros.
“Run!” I shriek at him.
The soldier scrambles down the tower ladder, and I prepare to follow him.
The dragon tosses his head and crunches the spear, snapping it in two. He growls something that sounds like a swear, but I don’t speak Dragonish so I can’t be sure.
I’m poised at the top of the ladder, my feet on the rungs, my hands gripping the stone parapet on either side. The dragon faces me, his nostrils flaring. Smoke gusts from them as he blows out a breath, proof that he could wither me with one blast of fire.
But he doesn’t. Instead he lifts his head, looking past me.
I twist around to follow his gaze and realize, to my shock, that the other dragons aren’t really fighting. They’re dodging the attacks of the guards, not even bothering to vomit fire or acid onto the soldiers. The cannons of a single airship overhead spatter them with gunfire and acid bombs, but the dragons ignore most of it, heading deeper into the city, plunging down into the streets briefly before rising up again. Every dragon that ascends has something clasped in his claws—a person.
They’re taking people. Why? As prisoners? For food? To torture?
A particularly strong gust of wind hits me as I cling there, poised on the ladder. My skirts fly up around my thighs, my hair whips free of its ribbon—and my sweaty hands lose their grip on the stone.
The next second, I’m falling backward, at the worst possible angle—I’ll miss the walkway along the top of the wall and crash onto the courtyard far below. I’ll be broken, splattered on the cobblestones.
For a heart-stopping moment, I’m in midair, my stomach thrilling with horror, limbs flailing, my own imminent death flashing through my brain—
And then I’m caught up, grasped between huge claws, borne high into the sky in a rushing blur of immense, beating wings.
I don’t even have breath to scream.
But the black dragon screams—a shrill cry of triumph, a summons. His wings pound the bright air, carrying him high, high, above my city. I can see the castle where my mother is making her final stand. It looks miniscule, and I’m dangling far above it, held only by the cage of the dragon’s claws around my torso and legs.
I do scream then. But my cry is thin and tiny up here, in so much vast air and sunlight. It’s like the wail of a rabbit in the grip of a mighty eagle.
“Let me go!” I cry out.
And a deep voice replies, “Very well.”
The claws uncurl, and I fall.
I plummet toward the earth, my dress and hair torn by the wind. Tears stream from my eyes. I can’t breathe.
The dragon’s shadow passes over me, and his claws pluck me neatly from gravity’s hold, securing me again.
“Next time you beg for your freedom, be more specific.” His voice reverberates through the dark bone of those claws, into my body. It’s terrifying, the depth of that voice. The fact that it speaks the Eventongue. The fact that this creature was playing with me like prey.
“You must not know who I am,” I manage. I’m not sure it’s wise to tell him, but perhaps it will grant me either a quick death or some value as a hostage.
“I know exactly who you are,” he replies. “Ridiculous attire, more frivolous than that of other humans—fine gold jewelry dangling from your ears and throat—an overblown sense of your own importance and skills—and that soldier called you ‘Highness.’ You’re the Crown Princess of Elekstan, the Queen’s only child. But that title is meaningless from this day forward. From now on, your only title is ‘captive,’ and your only place is within my nest. Your will, your future, and your body are mine.”
3
Mordessa.
Grimmaw.
Vylar.
Elegrin.
Eshterel.
Nyreza.
