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Regan! The man’s tone had turned strange. It was tinged with pain. But why? I was the one screaming.

Another rush of pain slammed through me all at once, coming back with a crash. My chest was an open wound filled with agony. My back arched off a table as another scream tore from my throat.

“Hold her!” a man’s voice shouted. His was familiar—the healer Viktor had argued with. “Hold her down, she mustn’t move. Not until I’ve concluded the tests.”

Hands grabbed me. I thrashed my body, my muscles clenching in protest. I tried to force my eyes open again. The room spun in a blur of light. A woman’s face suddenly loomed over me, her expression strained as she forced my arm down and strapped it to the table. I looked up at her. Briefly, our eyes met. Her breath hitched. Her face was familiar; I knew her. But the thought flew away before I could place her face. My vision swam.

Another figure leaned into my field of view, another woman. She wasn’t struggling to tie me down. She merely observed, her expression cool.

Recognition cut through the pain. Memory rushed back. Kage as a wolf. The Peacebringer’s Hill. We’d been in Veilmar. Where was I now?

The woman’s eyes traced my body with detached curiosity. “When do you think we can complete the ritual?”

I tried to scream again, tried to call back the voice that had been in my head, to ask for help.

“My tests weren’t conclusive. We can’t risk it until I’ve conducted further assessments. If she dies, we’ll lose our chance completely. He’ll be furious. We need to put her back under,” a male voice said, sounding frantic.

I felt a sting in my arm like a tiny insect’s bite. The world tilted violently, and a dreamless darkness fell.

Chapter 14

FLORENCE

The Vale was loud and warm in a cozy and chaotic way that was comforting despite the crowd of people. I’d claimed a small table near one of the windows that looked out over the water. I pushed my chair back against the stone wall, my legs crossed and a book carefully balanced against my gray-and-black tweed skirt. Neville slept at my feet, his tail curled around him like a huge fluffy blanket. Some students walked past my table but didn’t even realize he was there. Neville had always been like that. When he wanted to be noticed, you noticed him. But when he wished, he could make himself almost … well, not invisible exactly, but he could choose not to be observed.

A blueberry tart sat neglected on my plate, still warm from the oven. I picked it up and took an absent-minded nibble, my attention fixed on my book. It was a romance novel, of course. A beautifully written, whimsical one. In the chapter I’d just finished, tiny dragons no larger than cats roasted apples that tasted like true love. The entire scene was adorable. As the heroine bit into an apple, I wondered what exactly true love tasted like—apparently the key was dragon fire. I thought of asking Nyxaris to roast an apple for me, but I suspected if I asked and then told him why, he would laugh until he choked.

The thought of his deep, rumbling laugh sent a warm flutter spiraling through my chest and heat to my cheeks. I glanced around, but no one was sitting close enough to notice me. Still, I tugged my cardigan closer as if it might hide the evidence of my thoughts.

I still hadn’t told Medra, not because Nyxaris had forbidden it—he hadn’t specifically told me I couldn’t—but I didn’t feel as if I had the right. Not when Medra looked so weary and miserable all the time. Not when Blake was still missing and her heart was, well, breaking. How could I tell her the most wonderful thing was happening to me when she was barely holding herself together?

No. Maybe afterward. After we’d found Blake.

My eyes drifted back to the page and to those two magical words, true love. My traitorous thoughts slid back to that night on the beach. To Nyxaris’s body pressed up against mine, holding me as if I were something beautiful and fragile, something he treasured but which terrified him at the same time. My fingers tightened on the book, my cheeks burning now. I fumbled, trying to turn to the next page, and Nyxaris was suddenly there growling inside my head. Not with warmth or desire but with pain.

What is it? Nyxaris, what’s wrong? I asked in alarm.

A horrible moan. The Dragon Court.

I’m on my way.

I was already moving. My chair scraped as I stood up, the novel vanishing into my bag. Neville was on his feet, his huge, pointed ears perked up and alert. The fluffin followed at my heels as I left the scone abandoned on the plate, pushed my way through a growing crowd of students lined up at the counter and wove between tables. Once out in the corridor, I broke into a run, satchel slung over my shoulder, my skirt gathered in my hands. Neville kept pace easily, a little flicker of gold and orange skimming across the ground.

As I burst into the Dragon Court, my lungs were burning. Nyxaris was already there in his Duskdrake form. He sat silent and still in the precise spot that his statue had once stood. I caught my breath. To anyone else, he might have looked like true stone again. Carved from shadows, his obsidian scales hardly caught the daylight.

He wasn’t looking at me but across the courtyard. I followed his gaze—and stopped dead.

Where the statue of Alabryss, the House Mortis dragon, had once stood, all smooth white marble, there was now nothing but ruin. The alabaster stone was ash and powder, scattered across the ground like the remnants of a funeral pyre. A chunk of sculpted wing lay shattered on the ground, its edges fused and glassy.

I looked up, scanning the skies. Dragon fire—the air still smelled faintly of it. Who did this, Nyxaris? Viktor or … ?

Vorago. The name dragged out of his chest like a wound torn open. This was Vorago.

My stomach dropped. Blake was just here? I stepped toward him, my boots crunching over the grit. Why would he do this?

Not Blake. Vorago, Nyxaris corrected. Why? To hurt me and to punish her.

Is there nothing we can do for Alabryss?