Darkness of Dragons

  Winter had been flying in an odd pattern for a few minutes, sweeping away and above them as if he was surveying the land below. Now he pulled up on Anemone’s left, frowning in his brooding aristocratic way.

  “Princess,” he said, “where exactly are you taking us?”

  “The old Night Kingdom is south of those mountains,” she said, pointing to a range of tall peaks in the near distance.

  “On the Talon Peninsula?” Qibli asked, picturing the map of Pyrrhia in his head. “But — it’s so small. There’s no way a whole tribe could have lived there.” That was one of the theories he’d had and dismissed, studying the map with Moon while they were in Possibility together.

  “It used to be bigger,” Anemone said with a shrug. “Earthquakes, avalanches, tidal waves, something something blah blah blah. Darkstalker was a little melodramatic about it, to be honest, like Roar where did my kingdom goooooooo, but like, what did he expect? I mean, he’s been gone for thousands of years. Of course it’s different. Anyway, the tribe is small enough to live there just fine for now, and he was already muttering about pulling rocks out of the sea and rebuilding the whole place with his magic.” She made a grumpy huffing sound with her nose. “I was supposed to help him, but I’m CERTAINLY NOT GOING TO NOW.”

  Qibli suddenly realized that Winter had fallen behind them. He paused in the air and turned, hovering, to face his friend. “Winter? Everything all right?”

  “I can’t go there,” Winter said.

  “Why not?” Qibli asked, startled.

  “It’s cursed.” Winter waved a talon at the sharp-edged shapes of the mountains. “No IceWing has ever returned from those mountains alive. They’re a legend as old as Darkstalker in our tribe.”

  “With a poetically ominous-sounding name, I bet,” said Qibli. “Peaks of Doom? Mountain Range of Certain Death?”

  Winter frowned at him. “We call them Darkstalker’s Teeth,” he said with immense dignity.

  “Seriously?” Qibli cried. “SERIOUSLY? A mountain range called Darkstalker’s Teeth, and you never thought maybe the old Night Kingdom was on the other side?”

  “It’s not like I think about it very often!” Winter objected. “And no, honestly, we all assumed he went around cursing random parts of Pyrrhia as traps for IceWings to fall into.”

  “What are we waiting for?” Anemone demanded, flying back to them.

  “Winter thinks the mountains are going to eat him,” Qibli answered.

  “I DO NOT,” Winter protested. “But I do think they’re going to kill me, yes.”

  “Um, a whole horde of dragons just flew over them a few days ago.” Anemone flicked her tail at the evening sky, dimming to purple. “And they’re all fine.”

  “Because they’re not IceWings,” Winter pointed out.

  “The mountains only eat IceWings,” Qibli explained with a straight face.

  “STOP THAT,” Winter hissed at him. “It’s a REAL CURSE.”

  “If it’s real, then it’s not a curse, it’s a spell,” Qibli said practically. “And if it’s a spell, then Darkstalker cast it, in which case the earring will protect you.”

  Winter touched his ear doubtfully. One piece of jewelry against centuries of nightmare stories … Qibli could practically see Winter’s courage trying to stamp out his childhood fears.

  “You’ll make it through,” he said. “Remember, Moon is on the other side.”

  He knew that would work, because it was working for him.

  Winter gave him a puzzled look, as though he would never understand Qibli. “Yes,” he said. “All right. Let’s fly.”

  “Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinally,” Anemone grouched, wheeling about in the sky.

  As they flew through the shadowy peaks, with darkness stretching long thin claws around them, Qibli did sort of wish Winter had kept his ghost stories to himself. But nothing reached out to grab them; no ancient spells dragged them screaming into the perilous ravines below.

  And at last they flew up behind a towering palace and saw the ruins of the Night Kingdom — now dotted with flickers of firelight, as though Darkstalker had spread his wings out to welcome his new tribe and each flame was one of the starlike scales against the black.

  She’s here. She’s close. Qibli’s heart thumped painfully.

  “So, King of Winging It,” Winter asked. “Are we sneaking in, or do we knock on the front door?”

  “We can go in through the room he offered me,” Anemone suggested. “No one will be in there, since it’s dusty and dreadful and unfit for dragon occupation, let alone a princess.” She swept huffily up the walls of the palace to a dark balcony.

  Qibli and Winter followed as she hopped off the balcony rail and crunched through debris into the deserted room beyond. As Qibli had expected, it was nine times the size of any room he’d ever lived in, even at Thorn’s palace. He breathed out a small flame so he could look around. True, it was a little run-down now, but he could imagine how beautiful it must have been all those centuries ago. It looked as though it even once had a running fountain, over in the corner.

  His fire reflected off something on the floor next to the tiled fountain pool. He picked his way carefully over to it in the dark and then breathed out again to find it.

  He’d expected some kind of treasure, but it turned out to be a strange-looking little contraption, like a telescope with an hourglass attached — but an odd hourglass, with black sand on one side and white sand on the other. He picked it up and studied it in the moonlight. Was this some kind of advanced machine the NightWings had built and then lost all knowledge of over the last two thousand years? What did it do?

  “Hey, fire-breather,” Winter said gruffly. “Do something useful and light this for us.” He shoved a torch under Qibli’s nose.

  Qibli was too absorbed in the little machine to make a crack about royal IceWing manners. He absentmindedly lit the torch and then peered through the miniature telescope at Winter. It seemed to work like a regular telescope, but then what was the hourglass for? Oddly, when he tipped the whole thing upside down, nothing happened to the sand inside the hourglass. One side held white sand, the other black, and although they shifted around inside their bulbs, the grains of sand never drifted to the other side or mingled together. Maybe it was broken.

  “Strange,” Qibli said.

  “You mean boring,” Anemone said with a yawn. The princess seemed to be listing slightly to the side, and he remembered that she was younger than him and his friends.

  “When was the last time you slept?” Qibli asked her, tucking the telescope-hourglass object into his bag so he could study it later.

  “I … can’t remember?” she said.

  “Do that first,” he said, handing Winter the torch and nudging her toward a blanket that had been left inside the door.

  “No!” she whispered loudly. “I want to go kill Darkstalker!”

  “And rescue Turtle,” he prompted her.

  “Right,” she said. “I’m very busy. I don’t have time to —” She stumbled over the blanket and flopped onto it. “Maybe just a little nap.” She sighed as her eyes closed and she curled into a ball.

  “Don’t go anywhere without us,” Qibli whispered in her ear.

  She mumbled something that sounded like “Go sit on a reef.”

  “Right,” said Winter. “She’ll definitely be gone when we get back.”

  “Have a little faith in your fellow royal,” Qibli said with a grin. “Ready to explore?”

  Winter nodded, and they crept out into the hallway. The palace was massive and imposing, but they could hear music coming from somewhere, so they followed that until it grew louder and they saw lights glowing up ahead.

  The corridor they were in turned out to lead to a long colonnade encircling and overlooking a courtyard, which, at present, was full of dragons mingling and chatting, feasting and dancing. All around the courtyard, like sentinel ghosts from the distant past, were statues of dragons in black marble in various hero
ic poses, all of them with diamonds for eyes.

  Four NightWings were in one corner playing instruments Qibli had never seen before. It was silvery cheerful music but without the driving excitement of any drums. The smell of food wafted up from long tables around the courtyard — fried bananas and roasted sweet potatoes and wild boar; all taken from the rainforest, Qibli guessed.

  Winter and Qibli crept forward, staying low, until they spotted Darkstalker, sprawled across an unmistakable throne, wearing a spiky crown on his head.

  Qibli hadn’t seen Darkstalker in days, and in his mind, the ancient NightWing had grown bigger and scarier and more menacing every minute. It startled him to see how normal Darkstalker looked in reality — bigger than everyone else, yes, but not cackling with power or dripping with blood or glaring dangerously down at his cowering subjects. He looked friendly, at peace, even a little bored. His tail flicked occasionally in time to the music, and he kept glancing around the courtyard like a host who’d invited all the wrong dragons to his party.

  Qibli searched the crowd intently, but he couldn’t see Moon or Kinkajou anywhere.

  “Is it time yet, Your Majesty?” called a tall, bony NightWing from the center of the crowd.

  All faces immediately turned toward Darkstalker as though he were the sun. Qibli hoped he didn’t look like that at Thorn. There was loyalty and then there was … this, this other thing, something more desperate and grasping.

  The NightWings had nothing for so long, he thought, remembering the brief glimpse he’d had of the volcanic island where they’d lived for the last two thousand years. They lost their homes, their status, their powers. They want Darkstalker to give them back everything they think they should have. They want power to be dropped on them magically, because they think they deserve it.

  He inhaled sharply. But … isn’t that what I want, too?

  “All right,” Darkstalker said, waving at the musicians, who all dropped their instruments and leaned forward in the eager silence that followed. “You’re all very lucky. Once again I have found a way to hand out ten gifts tonight.”

  NightWings clasped one another’s talons and whispered excitedly.

  “Although,” Darkstalker went on in a cautionary tone, “again, in order to make that work, I had to prepare the gifts ahead of time. So these can’t be individually chosen, I’m afraid. These are for dragons who can be happy with whatever they’re given.” He stood up and beckoned, and a bristling female dragon came striding out of the shadows carrying a basket of silver bracelets. She plunked it down next to Darkstalker and gave him a rebellious face.

  “Thank you, Fierceteeth,” he said politely. “Let’s see, is our guest here … ? Oh, yes, there you are. Come watch; I think you’ll be impressed by this.”

  Qibli somehow knew in his bones who it would be, and yet he still felt a pit opening in his stomach as he saw his grandfather slither forward to stand beside Darkstalker.

  “Who’s that?” Fierceteeth asked. “What’s a SandWing doing in our secret kingdom?”

  “It doesn’t have to be secret anymore,” Darkstalker pointed out. “We can have normal allies and trade routes now. And this SandWing may be our hope for a truly loyal and helpful ally to the north. Which we’ll need when the IceWings decide to unfairly attack us, as my visions say they might. Welcome, Vulture.”

  Vulture’s eyes were avidly scanning the courtyard — cataloging Darkstalker’s wealth in his head, Qibli guessed. He ducked lower, unable to avoid the feeling that Vulture’s obsidian gaze would snatch him up no matter how well hidden he was.

  “These bracelets,” Darkstalker announced, “like the ones last night, bestow the powers of superstrength and invulnerability on anyone who wears them. Pretty exciting, don’t you think? Now who wants one?”

  “Me!” shouted several dragons in the crowd. “ME! ME!” At least twenty of them started pushing forward, clawing their way to the front.

  The other NightWings fell back to leave a space for the combatants, watching with laughter or cheers or hisses. Darkstalker watched, too, a small smile curving the arch of his mouth, as his subjects began brutally fighting at his feet. Eventually the ground was littered with defeated, groaning challengers, and only ten dragons were left standing. They were still bleeding and gasping for breath as they staggered forward to the basket.

  But once the bracelets snapped around their wrists, each one stood taller, his or her wounds healed. A new surge of power seemed to ripple through their muscles.

  Together, they threw their wings back and bowed to Darkstalker.

  Qibli’s eyes met Winter’s, and he saw his worst fears reflected in the IceWing’s pale blue eyes.

  Darkstalker was preparing for war with the IceWings … and creating an army of super soldiers to kill them with.

  Qibli couldn’t watch this anymore. He couldn’t stand seeing Vulture this close to Darkstalker, the two of them chuckling together like best friends plotting to tear apart the world.

  “Let’s check the gardens for Moon,” he whispered to Winter. On a night as clear as this, he had a feeling she would be outside under the stars.

  “I want to watch him a bit longer,” Winter said, flicking his tail at Darkstalker. “In case he says anything else about fighting the IceWings.”

  Qibli hesitated. He didn’t want to leave Winter alone — but he felt something tugging him toward Moon, like he was a broken vase and she was the piece that would fit him all back together. “All right,” he whispered. He slipped away from the balcony edge. “Meet you back in Anemone’s room?”

  Winter nodded absently. His breath had left small traces of frost on the stonework of the railing.

  Qibli followed the breeze he could feel wafting through the corridors until he reached a grand staircase that swept down into the terraces of gardens. At least, he could tell that there used to be orderly terraces around the levels of the palace, but the plants had rioted in the last several centuries. Vines and ivy had wrapped their way around the stonework a hundred times over, and it was hard to tell where the gardens were supposed to begin and end anymore.

  He stopped for a moment, looking up at the moons, and then suddenly he got a strong, horrible creeping feeling along his spine … like someone was staring at him from one of the shadows … like he was being watched.

  He was definitely being watched.

  He vaulted quickly over the railing and into a large, leafy bush. Acidly fragrant flowers assaulted his nose as he tried to calm his breathing.

  He couldn’t see anyone. No NightWing guards appeared, no super soldiers with enhanced sight or whatever other magical abilities Darkstalker might have thrown around.

  The staircase was silent. The shadows were still.

  And yet he was sure. Something had been watching him. Something that could still be out there, waiting. Someone, he corrected himself. There’s no such thing as ghosts. There are no vengeful spirits haunting this palace. I am not hiding from a phantom.

  In these ruins, though, it was all too easy to imagine something unearthly whispering through the crumbling halls.

  Qibli crept through the greenery as soundlessly as he could, keeping close to the wall where the vegetation would hide him. The prickling feeling in his scales slowly subsided, and he breathed a sigh of relief when he finally reached a spot out of sight of the staircase.

  He rounded the corner and collided head-on with a very sturdy bit of empty space.

  Empty space that yelped with joy and tackled him as he staggered back dizzily.

  “Qibli!” cried the empty space. “You’re here! You’re really here! SHHHHH!”

  A pair of invisible talons closed around his snout and he felt the flutter of wings around his face for a long moment.

  “All right, he’s still there,” she whispered, “but keep it down, would you?”

  The talons retreated as Qibli muffled a laugh. “Kinkajou?” he whispered. “I hope?”

  “Oh, yes, it’s me!” she said softly. An outline
of her wings and face shimmered into view briefly before her scales shifted back to camouflage. “I’m investigating a suspicious character.”

  Suddenly her talons wrapped around his mouth again. “Shh, he just turned around!”

  “Mm mmsbmms chmmmr?” Qibli inquired.

  She tipped his head toward a half-tumbled tower that rose out of a swarm of ivy by the edge of the terrace. He spotted a dragon snooping around the base of the tower, picking up anything that glinted.

  “I was on a mission,” Kinkajou whispered, “exploring the palace, just like that intrepid detective in the scrolls Moon was helping me copy back at school. And then I saw the weirdest thing — a MudWing. Here, in the old Night Kingdom! Just sauntering around the palace like it was his own personal swamp!”

  Qibli stared alertly at the distant dragon. A MudWing. It has to be Bog. He must have come with Vulture.

  “So I followed him,” she said, “very stealthily, it was awesome, you’d be so impressed, and then he went into a room and closed the door. And I stood there thinking about ways to keep spying on him, but then the door opened and out came a NightWing. Well, that’s not so weird, right? So I waited until the NightWing was halfway down the hall and then I zipped into the room because he’d left the door open and guess what? The MudWing was gone. I guess out the window? But I couldn’t see him anywhere. So I figured I’d follow his friend over there. He’s kind of a big honking NightWing, I have to say. And a little boring; all he’s done is steal little crumbs of treasure wherever he can find them.”

  Yup. Bog. Or rather, in this form, Shapeshifter.

  He tapped her claws and she let go of his snout. “Kinkajou,” he whispered, “don’t freak out. But I’m pretty sure that’s the dragon who attacked you in the Sky Kingdom.”

  Little splashes of startled orange appeared in the air as Kinkajou’s scales reacted. “No way,” she whispered. “The one who can change shapes? Peril’s dad?”

  Oh, right. Qibli had actually managed to forget that part of it. “Turtle told you about him?”

  “He sure did,” she said fiercely. “I owe that guy a few broken bones and a coma.”