A second rider joined him, a young man who had once tossed Laira a few nuts on a cold winter night. He knelt before her, sword lowered.

"Chieftain," he said.

A third rider joined him, then a fourth. Soon dozens of rocs landed in the canyon, cawing nervously. Their riders covered the boulders, kneeling before her, heads lowered.

"Chieftain.

"Chieftain Laira."

"Daughter of Ka'altei."

They spread across the canyon, kneeling in a great wave. Laira stood, staring upon them—her people. She looked to her side where Maev and Tanin struggled to their feet—her new family.

"Our war ends now," Laira said softly. She lowered the severed head. "Goldtusk and Requiem will forge peace. We—"

A grunt rose ahead, followed by a strangled cry.

Laira raised her eyes and her heart nearly stopped.

"No," she whispered.

Jeid stumbled forward across the boulders, back in human form. A young man—not a rider of Goldtusk but a foreigner in the robes of Eteer—walked behind, holding a blade to Jeid's throat.

SENA

 
SENA

He shoved the gruff, bearded man forward, holding a knife to his throat. Everyone stared at him. Everyone judged him. Everyone thought him a villain. Sena trembled and felt tears stream down his cheeks, and he pushed the knife a hair's width closer.

"Stand back!" he shouted. "Stand back or I slit his throat!"

This battle, like all of this autumn, had been a feverish dream. For so long Sena had languished in Aerhein Tower, chained, starving, mad with his thoughts, the demons flying outside his window to torment him. Since fleeing that place, he had found no solace.

They said the north would be safe, Sena thought, the blade trembling in his hand. They said this would be a home.

But here too people hunted his kind. Here great vultures, each larger than ten demons, slew dragons.

"I can't live like this," Sena whispered, voice shuddering, as they stared at him. "I'm a prince. I'm a prince!" His tears flowed. "I can't live in the wilderness, hiding in caves, hunted, hurt. Look. Look at the blood. Oh Taal . . ."

The dead spread around him. He saw scattered limbs blackened with fire, white bones thrusting from the torn flesh. A severed head lay before him. Globs of flesh and puddles of blood lay everywhere. A dragon claw had disemboweled a roc, and pink entrails spilled across the ground, wet and stinking.

A home? This was a morgue. This was a nightmare.

The burly, bearded man grunted in his grip. Sena held the brute tightly, pushing his blade closer against the skin.

"Be still!" Sena said. "Be silent! I will cut you."

Upon the boulders, Maev leaped up and glared. "Sena! You pathetic little snake. You foul piece of pig shite. I saved your backside from that tower. You hold my father now!" She hopped across a boulder, moving closer. "Drop your knife or I'll smash your head against the canyon wall."