Aidan grabbed Kachka and Nina, pulled them in close, and charged to one side. Uther grabbed Zoya, because he was a very brave dragon. Zhi caught hold of his mother around the waist and dove out of the way with his siblings as the first giant lava ball came through the gold wall and exploded in the middle of the floor.

They were just picking themselves up when arrows poured through the hole the lava ball had left. Several landed in Aidan’s back but the chain mail kept them from piercing his spine.

He pushed Kachka and Nina away and shifted to his dragon form, shaking the arrows off.

“Mì-runach!” he bellowed. “With me!”

But before they could burst out of the palace and kill all in their way until they were cut down by their enemies to die with honor, Ju moved in front of them.

“Wait! We can use you and your friends, Southlander,” she told Aidan, “but not if you are all going to be idiots about it.”

Aidan didn’t think he was being an idiot about it until the Riders ran out the doors and right into the battle, Zoya screaming, “Who wants to be first to die before I meet my ancestors?”

Aidan shrugged. “Okay, you may have a point. . . .”

* * *

“I think Xing is going to strike now,” Keita said. And she sounded so confident that Brannie almost took her at her word, but she was her mother’s daughter. She still had to ask the question.

“Why do you think that?”

“Because the time is right. In fact, the time is perfect.”

Not really liking the sound of that at all because it was just so vague, Brannie sort of growled in the back of her throat. A reaction that Izzy would understand immediately. Sadly Keita didn’t understand much about Brannie and she didn’t seem too interested in finding out.

“Look, I think I was to be the first. A message to Xinyi to tell her how far they’d go.”

“But you weren’t the first, Keita. Ren was the first, which was stupid. They should have held him for ransom.” Brannie motioned to Batu. “Wouldn’t you have held the Empress’s son for ransom?”

“I would have held dragon over mother’s head, sending her pieces of him, until I got what I wanted and then I would kill him in front of her eyes, so I could see her suffering.” He shrugged. “That is how we do it.”

“That was a lovely story, Great Leader. Thank you.” Brannie turned back to her cousin, widening her eyes to suggest to her kin they might want to burn the tribal territories to the ground, but Keita was gazing past Brannie.

“Keita? Are you okay?”

“It was . . .” She took in a breath. “You were right, Brannie! You were right, we have to go!”

“Go? Go where?”