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The Stone Keeper was still facing the rune panel, but at the sound of Visha’s voice, she finally spun. For a moment, she looked confused, then furious. “What have you done?”

“Zaira, stop this now!” Kazmyn shouted.

“You fools!” Zaira exclaimed. “Don’t you understand? This is the only way. We must protect the eggs.”

Pendragon lay white and still on the stone slap. Frost crawled across her freckled throat.

“Will it kill her?” I demanded, raising my voice in a roar.

Zaira looked down at me, her eyes righteous with certainty. “That is the price.”

“Then, the price is too high,” I said. I looked at Visha. No words were needed.

“You would doom the world for the sake of one girl?” Zaira screamed.

But it was too late. Visha’s dagger sank below the Stone Keeper’s ribs. Blood sprayed across the rune panel. The barrier fell.

I scrambled up onto the stone landing in a heartbeat. “Pendragon!” I dropped to my knees beside the slab.

Kazmyn had run up, too. He didn’t move to where Zaira lay, fallen. Instead he was at the rune panel. He coated his fingers in his sister’s blood and touched one rune, then another, his face anxious. The clasps around Pendragon’s wrists and ankles parted, but she didn’t move.

“Pendragon,” I whispered, gently picking her up off the slab. I slid her down onto my lap carefully, cradling her head. She was cold, so cold, and her body was limp.

I choked on a sob. Fuck. Pendragon wasn’t moving. She was dead.

This wasn’t supposed to be how it went down. This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. Not for her. She was never supposed to be the price we paid.

Rodriguez was suddenly at my shoulder. He grabbed Pendragon’s wrist before I could stop him, holding his fingers to her pulse point. “She has a pulse,” he murmured. “Barely.”

I turned on him, half-feral. “My blood. I should give her blood.”

“Wait,” he said sharply. He looked at her wrist, then at her ankles, where the clamps had held her. “I have an idea.” He rifled through his satchel. I heard the clink of glass. He pulled out two small bottles and uncorked them with his teeth, dumping the contents into his hands, and started rubbing them together forming a mixture. I eyed his hands, smelling something citrusy. The concoction was a very dark blue.

“Shadowroot and mirthleaf,” he explained. He reached for Pendragon’s wrist and began slathering the mixture over the marks the clamps had left. “Shadowroot for the frostbite. Mirthleaf to interrupt the rune’s poison. If I’m right, the clamps were contact points. But they’ve left wounds on her that are still drawing, even now that the restraints have been released. This should disrupt that.”

“Should?” I echoed.

“Shut up and let me try,” he snapped, reaching for Pendragon’s other wrist. He moved to her ankle, then the other. A crack sounded. We turned to see white ice creeping back across the gates.

“You fools,” Zaira gasped. I’d almost forgotten she was there. The Stone Keeper was slumped against a stone column. Blood had soaked across the front of her robes, but her eyes still burned. Kazmyn crouched beside her, his face very still.

“Her death … is the only thing … that can open gates. You’ve doomed us all.”

“We’ll take our chances,” Rodriguez said coldly, watching Pendragon’s chest.

“Come on, little dragon,” I whispered. “You can do this.” Moments passed painfully. I’d never been good at waiting.

Then Pendragon’s breath hitched.

Her chest lifted and fell. Her color wasn’t returning, but at least now I could see her breath.

“Now,” Rodriguez instructed. “Give her your blood. It should help to revitalize her.”

I tore my wrist open and pressed it gently against her lips. “Come on, Pendragon. Drink up for me.” I dribbled the blood into her mouth. At first, nothing.

Then finally I saw her throat move. She swallowed weakly.

I was practically sobbing with relief. I smoothed her hair back with my free hand. “There you go. That’s it. I’ve got you. You’re all right, little dragon.”