Magpie rose from her crouch. “How about to save him, then?” she asked.

Fade turned back to her. “What did you say?”

“The Blackbringer already killed one Djinn.”

Fade stared at Magpie, and she thought his eyes grew brighter, like a stoked fire. “Killed a Djinn?” he repeated.

“The Vritra,” said Magpie. “And now he’s killing in Dream-dark and sending his spies down the Magruwen’s well!”

Fade’s head moved closer to Magpie, and the smell of brimstone grew strong. “Spies?” he asked.

“Aye, he sent a scavenger imp down hunting for something.”

“Did he get it?” he demanded sharply, his eyes blazing.

“Get what?” asked Magpie, squinting up at him. Seeing the intensity in Fade’s eyes, she was filled with curiosity as to what Batch had been after. What had he said, a turnip? She thought not.

But the dragon just blinked his huge, inscrutable eyes and said, “It is not for me to say.”

“More secrets!” exclaimed Bellatrix. “Fade, something must be done! The devils were his own mistake, and he must unmake them!”

Fade turned to her with a snarl. “He never made such mistakes! He never made a devil.”

Bellatrix and Magpie fell silent and looked at each other. Everyone knew the devils were the Djinns’ mistakes. Where else could they have come from? Where else would anything have come from?

Still snarling, Fade went on, “Creatures with no dreams of their own can do naught but destroy the dreams of others. So it has been since the beginning. So were the devil armies forged, by one who did not dream.”

Bellatrix said irritably, “Dragon! This is no time for riddles. Please speak plain. If the Djinn didn’t make the devils, where did they come from?”

Indeed. If not from the Djinn, then where? Magpie was silent. A thought was skimming the surface of her mind, and she felt as if she were looking up at it from underwater. Then, suddenly, she realized what it was: eight. The eight sacred columns of the temples. Why eight and not seven? Traceries of light spun in Magpie’s sight and she saw painted there the symbol for infinity that graced all the temples. It twisted then and she saw it, too, suddenly, as an eight. Why eight . . . ?

“Fade,” she said in a rush. “Was there another once? An eighth Djinn?”

He snorted. “There have only ever been seven Djinn!”

Magpie chewed her lip, ashamed to have voiced such blither. The idea had seemed to simply spin into her mind on a curl of light.

Fade spoke again, more quietly. He said, “The eighth was not a Djinn.”

And Magpie and Bellatrix stared at him, dumbstruck.

“In the time before time there were seven sparks . . . and one wind.”

“A wind . . . ,” breathed Magpie.