She looked up blearily, her face slick with tears. ‘Joe, it’s too late …’ 169

‘It’s not! Please. I have an idea,’ he repeated. ‘Remember what the book said, about silverblue and heat and moisture? Well, I reckon they actually need to be in the water!’ He saw her battling with the decision, as if it was easier to slip into despair than to dare to hope. ‘Winter! Don’t give up. Not yet. Not till we’ve tried everything,’ he begged her.

She didn’t reply, but she too tucked her egg carefully under one arm, then reached out with her other and let Joe help her up.

They left as fast as they dared, back down the steps and through the winding tunnels under Arcosi, all the way back to the large cavern.

They found the stream of water that bubbled and flowed through one side of the large cave. Joe dipped his hand into the pool, fearing it would be as ice-cold as that first day.

No, it was hot now, even hotter than before. What did that say about the volcano if there were hot jets bubbling up all over the region, even this far away from Mount Bara? He couldn’t worry about that now.

Joe stood next to the pool with his egg in his hands. Was he really going to do this? He had a strong instinctive sense it was the right thing. ‘They’re shadow dragons,’ he said aloud. ‘They’re different. They swim, don’t they? They belong in the water now.’ I hope! he added silently.

‘Joe, I’m scared,’ Winter said.

‘Me too, but we have to try. We can’t let them die.’ He held her gaze steady, wishing with all his heart that he was right. ‘Remember what else the book said, all the stuff 170about the elements? Well, they’re all here, all the elements: the silverblue we mined from the island, maybe that’s earth. There’s air that we breathe and the bubbles in the water. There’s heat from the volcanic flows – that must count as fire. And there’s water right here. Look, I’ll go first, to see if it works.’

He brought the egg to his chest and wished it all the luck in the world, and then he lowered it slowly into the pool of hot water.

There was a ledge there, and he released the egg carefully onto the rocky shelf. It stayed in position, the warm water flowing over it. The purple luminescence grew brighter, flaring below the water.

‘Look! That’s got to be good, right?’ Joe said.

Winter gasped, and hurried to do the same thing with her egg.

Joe felt for the silverblue, the little blue-white rocks gleaming like moonlight, and he put them in too, all around the eggs, like a nest.

They started fizzing. Each piece of silverblue sent up a stream of tiny bubbles.

‘What’s happening?’ Winter asked.

‘They’re reacting – that’s what the other book said. It must be part of the hatching process, to thin the eggshell …’ Joe watched all the silverblue pieces dissolve and vanish.