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Contents ( 50)
  1. CONTENTS
  2. PROLOGUE
  3. CHAPTER ONE
  4. CHAPTER TWO
  5. CHAPTER THREE
  6. CHAPTER FOUR
  7. CHAPTER FIVE
  8. CHAPTER SIX
  9. CHAPTER SEVEN
  10. CHAPTER EIGHT
  11. CHAPTER NINE
  12. CHAPTER TEN
  13. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  14. CHAPTER TWELVE
  15. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  16. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  17. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  18. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  19. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  20. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  21. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  22. CHAPTER TWENTY
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  32. CHAPTER THIRTY
  33. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  42. CHAPTER FORTY
  43. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  44. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  45. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  47. EPILOGUE
  48. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  49. Also by Liz Flanagan:
  50. COPYRIGHT

‘Winter!’ Joe said urgently. ‘That’s them! That means ours – with the thick eggshells. They might die!’

‘They mustn’t die! They can’t!’

‘It’s happening, don’t you see?’ He thought fast. ‘It’s like it’s all coming together – us finding the tunnels and the eggs, the water running hot in the caves last night. It’s connected! It’s got to be.’

‘Joe, are you dreaming? If there’s a volcano heating up, it won’t matter about the eggs. We’ll all be dead.’

‘So why does it say the eggs need silverblue to hatch? And what is it? We have to find some. It’s important.’

‘I don’t know.’ She sounded tired and full of despair. ‘I’ve read so much I can’t see straight. And it’s nearly light. We have to go now before we get caught.’

‘T-t-there is someone who will know. I mean, there might be.’ Joe paused, getting used to the idea. ‘Yes. We have to. I know who we can ask,’ he said. ‘Come on, there’s no time to lose.’

They hurriedly replaced the books, with one final glance to check they’d left no sign of their presence. They left the palace through the same door and crept back into the gardens, where the night was fading to ashy dawn.119

Joe kept returning to the horrible idea that his dragon might die before it could hatch.

To save its life, he was going to have to come back from the dead …

120

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Joe and Winter were more careful now, sneaking first through the tunnels and then out into the empty city as it grew light. Joe led Winter, knowing exactly where to find the person he needed: his cousin Milla.

Milla ran the island’s healing centre, bought with her in­heritance from their grandmother. With her team of healers, she continued the work done by Vigo’s mother, the duchess who’d been killed in the revolution. It was a huge airy build­ing right in the centre of Arcosi. It had a large square garden for dragons to land in, and sandy spaces for them to bask. Milla believed that the dragons speeded healing and that being with the city’s people nurtured the dragons in return. Most days you could see people walking slowly or sitting quietly there, one hand on a dragon’s scaly flank.

‘She’s usually here,’ Joe whispered to Winter, trying to see between the railings that fenced the square.

To his relief, he saw his cousin sitting on a bench with 121her friend Thom Windlass, both drinking coffee, while their dragons – Iggie and Ruby – basked in the cool yellow sun­shine. Milla was yawning. Thom sprawled next to her, long legs stretched out in front of him.

Joe had always liked Thom. He looked like Joe’s image of a pirate: tall, with a broad handsome face, a neat trimmed beard and long brown hair tied back in a ponytail. He was the son of a fisherman, and he was now in charge of mapping the whole area around Arcosi. He and his dragon, Rubina, Ruby for short, would be gone for days, even weeks, survey­ing the whole region, and then instructing the cartographers back on Arcosi how to update the ancient maps.