I closed my eyes.

I AWAKENED IN my bed in the palace, darkness and silence all around me.

My body ached. Skin and muscles and bones. It all felt raw and ready to fall off. Even the soft silk of my sheets hurt, scraping places that felt like they should have scales. The muscles in my back felt clipped short, broken, pulled tight and snapped.

Everything felt wrong.

A groan squeezed out as my mind slipped from confusion to sharp understanding of what had happened.

The high magistrate had attacked Sunder.

Aaru and I had fought back.

It hadn’t been enough.

Even now, after, I could still feel the giant noorestones—twelve of them. They buzzed in the back of my head, terrible, but nothing compared to the nightmare of the attack. Of the crystal crashing into the city. Of the fire burning through my body. Of the shriek of something in that noorestone changing just before it was launched at thousands of unsuspecting people.

No. This harsh humming was nothing compared to that.

“The strangest thing happened in the park.” Ilina’s voice came from across the room. A sigil lit just above her head, illuminating the way she’d half vanished into the giant cushions of a chair. Her legs were tucked against her chest, and she wore a long nightgown of creamy cotton with embroidery stitched along the hem.

I opened my mouth, but only another groan fell out. Still, she understood the question, and unfolded herself to rise.

“You tried to absorb all that noorestone fire. I knew you could do that.” She sat on the bed next to me. “Hristo told us all about what happened at the theater. What he saw. What he thought he saw. So even though it was a shock to actually see you like that, I wasn’t that surprised. But there was something else.”

I just looked at her.

“Scorch marks,” she said. “In the shape of a huge dragon.”

“What?” That hadn’t been what I’d thought she was going to say at all.

“All across the grass, the flagstones, even under the dragons. It was incredible. And you were at the heart of it.” She touched my shoulder, casually like a friend, but then— ::Everyone saw. There have been questions.::

My wingsister’s quiet code was slow, cautious, but it was a relief to know she was able to communicate like this. And the light was low enough that anyone watching wouldn’t be able to tell—unless they could see in the dark.

Which was possible, I supposed. Imperial magic was a mystery of possibilities.

I took her arm and tapped slowly. ::What questions?::

::About the wings. The scorch mark. What dragon it was. Then someone asked if it was the same kind as the bones.::

I groaned.

::When I told them I hadn’t seen the skeleton, they took me into the throne room. I got a good look.::

She didn’t need to say that the scorch mark and the bones were the same species. Drakontos celestus. The first and the last. Although she probably didn’t know what to call it yet.