text:  When the war has lasted twenty years...
  
   the dragonets will come.
  
   When the land is soaked in blood and tears...
  
   the dragonets will come.
  
   Find the SeaWing egg of deepest blue.
  
   Wings of night shall come to you.
  
   The largest egg in mountain high
  
   will give to you the wings of sky.
  
   For wings of earth, search through the mud
  
   for an egg the color of dragon blood.
  
   And hidden alone from the rival queens,
  
   the SandWing egg awaits unseen.
  
   Of three queens who blister and blaze and burn,
  
   two shall die and one shall learn
  
   if she bows to a fate that is stronger and higher,
  
   she'll have the power of wings of fire.
  
   Five eggs to hatch on brightest night,
  
   five dragons born to end the fight.
  
   Darkness will rise to bring the light.
  
   The dragonets are coming....
  
  A dragon was trying to hide in the storm.
  
  Lightning flickered across the dark clouds. Hvitur clutched his fragile cargo closer. If he could make it over the mountains, he'd be safe. He'd escaped the sky dragons' palace unseen. And the secret cave was so close. …
  
  But his theft had not been as stealthy as he thought, and eyes as black as obsidian were already tracking him from below.
  
  The enormous dragon on the mountain ledge had pale gold scales that radiated heat like a desert horizon. Her black eyes narrowed, watching the gleam of silver wings far up in the clouds.
  
  She flicked her tail, and behind her two more dragons rose to the sky and dove into the heart of the storm. A piercing shriek echoed off the mountains as their talons seized the moon-pale ice dragon.
  
  "Bind his mouth," the waiting dragon ordered as her soldiers dropped Hvitur on the slick, wet ledge in front of her. He was already inhaling, ready to attack. "Quickly!"
  
  One of the soldiers grabbed a chain from the pile of smoldering coals. He threw it around the ice dragon's snout, clamping his jaws together with a sizzling smell of burning scales. Hvitur let out a muffled scream.
  
  "Too late." The sand dragon's forked tongue slithered in and out of her mouth. "You won't be using your freezing-death breath on us, ice dragon."
  
  "He was carrying this, Queen Burn," said one of the soldiers, handing her a dragon egg.
  
  Burn squinted at the egg through the downpour. "This is not an IceWing egg," she hissed. "You stole this from the SkyWing palace."
  
  The IceWing stared back at her. Hissing steam circled his snout where the hot chains met cold silver scales.
  
  "You thought you got away unnoticed, didn't you?" Burn said. "My SkyWing ally is not a fool. Queen Scarlet knows everything that happens in her kingdom. Her lookouts reported an IceWing thief sneaking away, and I decided finding you might add some violence to my boring visit."
  
  Burn held the large egg up to the light of the fire and turned it slowly. Red and gold shimmered below the pale, smooth surface.
  
  "Yes. This is a SkyWing egg about to hatch," Burn mused. "Why would my sister send you to steal a SkyWing dragonet? Blaze hates any dragon younger and prettier than she is." She thought for a moment as rain drummed on the ledge around them. "Unless … the brightest night is tomorrow. …"
  
  Her tail flicked up like a scorpion's, the poisonous barb inches from Hvitur's eyes. "You're not in Blaze's army, are you? You're one of those insipid underground peacemongers."
  
  "The Talons of Peace?" said one of the soldiers. "You mean they're real?"
  
  Burn snorted. "A few worms crying over a little blood. Unwrap his chains. He won't be able to freeze us until his scales cool down." The enormous sand dragon leaned closer as her soldier pulled the chain away. "Tell me, ice dragon, do you really believe in that pompous old NightWing's prophecy?"
  
  "Haven't enough dragons died for your war?" snarled Hvitur, wincing at the pain in his jaws. "All of Pyrrhia has suffered for the last twelve years. The prophecy says —"
  
  "I don't care. No prophecy decides what happens to me," Burn interrupted. "I'm not letting a bunch of words or baby dragons choose when I die or what I bow to. We can have peace when my sisters are dead and I am queen of the SandWings." Her venomous tail dipped closer to the silver dragon.
  
  Rain pattered on Hvitur's scales. He glared up at her. "The dragonets are coming, whether you like it or not, and they'll choose who the next SandWing queen should be."
  
  "Really?" Burn stepped back and turned the egg slowly between her talons. Her forked tongue slipped in and out of her smile. "So, IceWing. Is this egg a part of your pathetic prophecy?"
  
  Hvitur went still.
  
  Burn tapped lightly on the eggshell with one long talon. "Hello?" she called. "Is there a dragonet of destiny in there? Ready to come out and end this big bad war?"
  
  "Leave it alone," Hvitur choked out.
  
  "Tell me," Burn said, "what becomes of your precious prophecy … if one of the five dragonets is never hatched at all?"
  
  "You wouldn't," he said. "No one would harm a dragon egg." His blue eyes were fixed desperately on her talons.
  
  "No 'wings of sky' to help save the world," Burn said. "What a sad, sad story." She began tossing the egg from one front claw to the other. "I guess that means you should be very, very careful with this terribly important little — oops!"
  
  With an exaggerated lunge, Burn pretended the wet egg was slipping through her talons … and then she let it fall over the side of the cliff into the rocky darkness below.
  
  "No!" Hvitur shrieked. He threw off the two soldiers and flung himself toward the edge. Burn slammed her massive claws down on his neck.
  
  "So much for destiny," she smirked. "So much for your tragic little movement."
  
  "You're a monster," the IceWing gasped, writhing under her talons. His voice cracked with despair. "We'll never give up. The dragonets — the dragonets will come and stop this war."
  
  Burn leaned down to hiss into his ear. "Even if they do — it'll be far too late for you." Her claws ripped through the silver dragon's wings, shredding them as Hvitur shrieked in agony. With a swift movement, she stabbed her poisonous tail through his skull and flung the long, silver body over the edge of the cliff.
  
  The ice dragon's screams cut off long before the echoes of his corpse slamming into the rocks below.
  
  The SandWing turned her black eyes to her soldiers. "Perfect," she said. "That should be the last we hear about that stupid prophecy." She held out her talons so the rain could wash away the glistening dragon blood. "Let's go find something else to kill."
  
  The three dragons spread their wings and lifted off into the dark clouds.
  
  Some time later, far below, a large dragon the color of rust crawled over the rocks to the broken body of the ice dragon. She nudged his tail aside and lifted a shard of eggshell from underneath it, then slipped back into the labyrinth of caves under the cliffs.
  
  Stone walls brushed against her wings. She breathed out a plume of flame to light her way along the dark passage, deep into the mountain.
  
  "I stand with the Talons of Peace," hissed a voice in the shadows. "Kestrel? Is that you?"
  
  "We await the wings of fire," answered the red dragon. A blue-green SeaWing emerged from a side cave, and she tossed the eggshell at his feet. "Not that it'll do us much good now," she snarled. "Hvitur is dead."
  
  The SeaWing stared at the eggshell. "But — the SkyWing egg —"
  
  "Broken," she said. "Gone. It's over, Webs."
  
  "It can't be," he said. "Tomorrow is the brightest night. The three moons will all be full for the first time in a century. The dragonets of the prophecy have to hatch tomorrow."
  
  "Well, one of them is already dead," Kestrel said. Rage flickered in her eyes. "I knew I should have stolen the SkyWing egg myself. I know the Sky Kingdom. They wouldn't have caught me a second time."
  
  Webs grimaced, scratching one claw over the gills along his neck. "Asha is dead, too."
  
  "Asha?" A spurt of flame shot from Kestrel's nose. "How?"
  
  "Caught in a battle between Blaze's and Blister's forces on the way here. She still made it with the red MudWing egg, but she died of her wounds soon after."
  
  "So it's just you, me, and Dune to raise the little worms," Kestrel growled. "For a prophecy that can never be fulfilled. Let's break the cursed eggs now and be done with it. We'll be long gone before the Talons of Peace return for the dragonets."
  
  "No!" Webs hissed. "Keeping the dragonets alive for the next eight years is more important than anything. If you don't want to be part of that —"
  
  "All right, enough," Kestrel snapped. "I'm the strongest dragon in the Talons of Peace. You need me. It doesn't matter how I feel about nasty little dragonets." She eyed the eggshell on the floor, rubbing her scarred palms together. "Although I thought at least one of them would be a SkyWing."
  
  "I'll find us a fifth dragonet." Webs pushed past her, scales scraping against rock.
  
  "There's no way back into the Sky Kingdom, brainless," she said. "They'll be guarding the hatchery closely now."
  
  "Then I'll get an egg somewhere else," he said grimly. "The RainWings don't even count their eggs — I could take one from the rain forest without anyone noticing."
  
  "Of all the horrible ideas," Kestrel said with a shudder. "RainWings are wretched creatures. Nothing like SkyWings."
  
  "We have to do something," Webs said. He hissed as his tail sent the eggshell skittering across the floor. "In eight years, the Talons of Peace will come looking for five dragonets. The prophecy says five, and we're going to make it come true … whatever it takes."
  
  A wave roared onto the beach and crashed around Tsunami's talons. Her webbed claws sank into the wet sand. Her blue wings billowed in the wind.
  
  She lifted her head, breathing in the wild sea air.
  
  This was where she was supposed to be. This was her ocean.
  
  "Let me guess," Glory said mockingly behind her. "You guys, that's the smell of freedom."
  
  "Freedom smells a lot like fish," Starflight observed. "Which, to be clear, is kind of nose-curlingly awful."
  
  "I love it," Tsunami said. This was what the Talons of Peace had stolen from her. They'd kept her trapped in the stale, dreary air under the mountain her whole life, when she was meant to be out here, flying and swimming and living like a real SeaWing.
  
  Starflight glanced up at the sky and edged back toward the dark foliage that lined the beach. "Shouldn't we stay under the trees? What if a patrol spots us? I mean —" He stopped and took a deep breath. "We must stay under the trees. All right. Yes. Everyone back into the trees right now."
  
  The others ignored him, although Sunny gave him a pitying glance.
  
  Tsunami bent her head to study the waves washing over her talons. Small shapes, silver and green and yellow, darted through the shallows. The ocean smelled much more alive than the cave river.
  
  Was it only a week since they'd run away from their guardians? It was hard to remember exactly how long they'd been trapped in the SkyWing prison.
  
  But there was one thing Tsunami remembered clearly: the sound of bone snapping under her talons.
  
  She poked a hole in the sand with her claw. I had to kill that SeaWing. Queen Scarlet forced us to fight. There was no other way out of the arena. He was crazy. It was him or me.
  
  The same thoughts kept circling in her head like lame-winged dragons. She shook her head and flared her wings. This was ridiculous. Was she a dragon or a scavenger? Dragons were meant to be fierce warriors; one little death shouldn't rattle her so much.
  
  Besides, Glory had done worse with her deadly venom, and she didn't seem bothered at all.
  
  "You know what I love?" Clay said mournfully. "Fish. Lots of fish. Big fish I can eat, not these little wriggle-scraps." The MudWing sat down on the sand beside Tsunami. His stomach growled loud enough for all of them to hear.
  
  Sunny giggled. "Clay, it's only been a day since you caught that enormous pig for all of us."
  
  "Wasn't enormous," Clay said. He sighed, his wings drooping. "That was the smallest pig in the whole world."
  
  "You should have eaten my carrots." Sunny clambered up to sit on his back and peer out at the ocean. The sun was just rising in a peach-pale sky, casting broken paths of light across the water. Two of the moons, barely slivers like thin claws, were vanishing behind the mountains.
  
  "I'm serious, everybody," Starflight said. "It's not safe out on the beach, not with all the MudWings and SkyWings looking for us." The NightWing was standing well out of reach of the waves, trying to shake sand off his talons.
  
  As far as Tsunami was concerned, they'd already wasted a day flying south of the Diamond Spray Delta, basically because Starflight had worried and complained until everyone agreed. Yes, the SkyWings were after them. Yes, they were probably mad about the dragonets' escape from SkyWing prison. And they were pretty definitely mad about the part where Glory maybe killed their queen on the way out.
  
  But Tsunami didn't want to keep running. She wanted to find her family. Once they knew who she was, she was sure the SeaWings would protect her and her friends.
  
  Most of all, she really wanted Starflight to stop fretting, complaining, and bossing. It made the others ner vous and harder to organize. She almost wished the NightWings hadn't given him back.
  
  "Why are you so worried?" Tsunami asked him. "If they do recapture us, won't your NightWing friends come swooping in to rescue you again?"
  
  Starflight fluttered his wings indignantly. "I'm not worried for me," he said. "I'm trying to keep all of us safe." He glanced at Sunny and ducked his head.
  
  "I'm keeping us safe just fine!" Tsunami protested. "When have I ever led us wrong?"
  
  "Well," Glory pointed out, "there was that one time we got captured by SkyWings and their queen nearly killed us all...."
  
  Tsunami smacked her tail into the water to send a cold wave over Glory. The RainWing hissed and jumped away from the sea.
  
  "Stop it!" Sunny said. "Stop fighting, all of you. Clay, stop them." She patted the top of his head to pull his attention back from the tiny fish swimming around his feet.
  
  "Oh, yes, let's hear from our bigwings," Glory teased. Her scales this morning were gold like Sunny's, but with drifting splashes of ocean blue. She sat down and yawned at Tsunami, displaying her venom-spitting teeth.
  
  "Hey," Clay said, nudging Tsunami's wing with his own. "It's all right for Starflight to worry. We don't even know if Queen Scarlet is alive or dead. But," he added quickly, "I know you want to find the SeaWings as fast as possible. So let's find them instead of fighting about it, and then we can get to safety sooner."
  
  Tsunami shot one more narrow-eyed look at Starflight, then turned back to the ocean. Clay was right; the important thing was to find her family and a safe place for them all to hide.
  
  "Aww," Glory said. "So wise and big."
  
  "I think he is," Sunny said, wrapping her forearms around Clay's neck. Starflight sat down, flipping his tail around his talons unhappily.
  
  Glory settled her sun-colored wings. "So now what? Should we shout 'Hey, SeaWings, we've got your missing princess!' and wait for dragons to bound joyfully out of the ocean?"
  
  "With a feast!" Clay cried, startling a seagull into the air. "There was a feast at the end of the story! When the missing SeaWing princess got home, her parents were so happy they made a feast. I remember the feast. They ate a whole whale. That was a good feast. I bet I could eat a whale. Do you think we'll get a feast?"
  
  "The Missing Princess was just a story in a scroll," Starflight said. "We have no idea what we'll actually find in the Kingdom of the Sea."
  
  "That's true." Clay's wings drooped. "It might not be what you're hoping for, Tsunami. Like finding out my mother sold me for a cow."
  
  "Hey," said Glory. "It was at least two cows."
  
  "Hmmm. Comforting," said Clay.
  
  It wouldn't be like that for Tsunami. She was sure of it. Maybe Clay's dreams of his family had turned out all wrong, but hers would be perfect. Especially now that she knew her egg had been stolen from the Royal Hatchery.
  
  She was the daughter of the SeaWing queen.
  
  Not only that, but according to Starflight, none of the queen's other female dragonets had survived to adulthood. Tsunami was the only living heir to the SeaWing kingdom. One day, she would be queen of the SeaWings.
  
  True, that meant one day she'd have to fight her own mother to the death to become queen. But that day could be as far off as she wanted it to be. Not something she had to think about now.
  
  She spread her wings and breathed in the salt-spray air again. Out of the corner of her eyes she kept seeing tiny creatures pop out of the speckled sand and then vanish again.
  
  "I could just dive in and look for the SeaWing palace," Tsunami suggested.
  
  "Out there?" Starflight sounded alarmed. He spread his wings and shook sand off them, blinking anxiously.
  
  "Where else do you suggest I find the SeaWings?" she asked.
  
  "Swimming in the ocean is not like swimming in an underground cave river," Starflight lectured. "There are strong currents and unpredictable waves and, and big things with teeth —"
  
  "I'm a big thing with teeth." Tsunami grinned at him.
  
  He didn't laugh. "It's not safe," he said. "What if we lose you?" Tsunami wanted to poke his wrinkled-up worried snout with her sharpest claw.
  
  "Starflight, cheer up," Sunny interjected. "Tsunami can do anything. And how is she supposed to get home to her family if she can't go into the sea?"
  
  "Oh, no!" Clay heaved himself to his feet, scattering sand and nearly dislodging Sunny, who grabbed his neck with a yelp. Sand and seashells and tiny, astonished crabs flew through the air as he lashed his tail.
  
  "Ow! Stop that!" Glory commanded, covering her eyes.
  
  "What about us?" Clay's big brown wings flapped. "I didn't think of that! Tsunami, we can't go with you to the SeaWing palace. We can't breathe down there! How can we stick together if you're underwater?" He clawed at the water, leaving deep gouges in the wet sand. "What are we going to do?"
  
  Tsunami kind of adored Clay when he was in a tizzy. She also adored that it had taken an entire day for it to occur to him that the Kingdom of the Sea was underwater.
  
  "Seriously?" Glory said to Clay. "All of those geography lessons, and not a single one sunk in?"
  
  Clay turned in a confused circle. Crabs scurried out of the way of his giant talons. "What?"
  
  "The SeaWings have an above-water palace, too," Starflight said in his "see, you should have studied more" voice. "So they can receive guests, like their SandWing ally Blister. It's on an island somewhere in the Bay of a Thousand Scales."
  
  "Oh." Clay sat down with a whooshing sigh.
  
  Sunny patted his shoulder. "I didn't remember that either," she offered. "So we go there, right?"
  
  "Not easily," Starflight said. "Both SeaWing palaces — underwater and on land — are well hidden. That's how they've lasted so long in this war, even though they don't have fire like the other tribes. Nobody can find them to attack their homes."
  
  "Sounds like the NightWings," Glory sniped.
  
  "It's nothing like the NightWings!" Tsunami cried. "SeaWings aren't trying to act all mysterious and pretentious. They're just being sensible about guarding their home."
  
  "There are over a thousand islands to search, but it's still probably —" Starflight stopped midsentence and glanced at the sky again. "Does anyone else smell fire?"
  
  "Three moons, Starflight. I'm not hiding in the trees every time some little thing spooks you," Tsunami said.
  
  "Wait, I think he's right," Sunny said, lifting her head. "I hear wingbeats."
  
  "I do, too," Starflight said. The spiny ridge along his back stood up in alarm, and he bolted for the trees, running as fast as he could.
  
  "From this far away?" Tsunami said skeptically. "I don't see anything up there." But just as she said it, she spotted a cluster of red specks like spattered blood in the sky, winging down from the mountains in the northwest.
  
  A SkyWing patrol was coming their way.
  
  "Quick, into the water," Tsunami ordered. It was closer than the trees, and would hide them just as well.
  
  "No way," said Glory. She sank to the ground, spreading her wings, and shifted color. Her scales flowed into the rocky, sandy pattern below her until she was impossible to see, especially from the air. It happened so fast, Tsunami nearly lost track of where she was. Glory was getting better at that trick.
  
  "Fine. Come on, Sunny." Tsunami reached for the little SandWing.
  
  "I'd rather not," Sunny squeaked. "I can make it to the trees. I'll fly really fast." She jumped off Clay's back and flapped after Starflight.
  
  Tsunami stamped her foot, spraying ocean water across the sand. Glory made a muffled, grumpy noise.
  
  "It'll be safer in the sea," Tsunami huffed. She cast a worried look at the sky. The specks were getting closer fast — maybe faster than Sunny could hide. But it was too late to catch her now. Tsunami turned and dove into the ocean.
  
  Clay was already burrowing into the shallow mud shelf, displacing startled flatfish and sending up clouds of minnows. The MudWing didn't have a problem with water like the others did, since he could hold his breath for up to an hour.
  
  Tsunami breathed in and salt water rushed into her gills. It surprised her how sharp it felt, like inhaling smoke. It was nothing like the crystal clear water of the underground cave. What's more, the current kept trying to shove her back to the beach, then yank her out again.
  
  But she plowed forward and down, past Clay, beating her wings as the water got deeper. Schools of tiny purple fish whirled away from her like stars exploding. Over the edge of the sand shelf, the deeper ocean floor was covered in bundles of eel grass. Waving dark green tendrils reached up to brush Tsunami's underbelly.
  
  She glanced up at the sky above her — still empty — and decided to risk surfacing. She had to be sure Sunny was safely hidden.
  
  The thunder of wingbeats echoed in her ears as she poked her head out and turned toward the beach. The little SandWing was almost to safety. Tsunami could see Starflight standing under the trees, reaching his front claws out to pull Sunny in.
  
  Overhead, an orange shape shot past, flying at full SkyWing speed — faster than any other tribe could fly. A red dragon flew close behind the first, followed by three more. Their enormous wings nearly blotted out the sun as they whooshed over the dragonets' heads.
  
  Tsunami sank a bit lower in the water, but it seemed like the patrol was going too fast to notice a lone SeaWing in the ocean. Maybe these soldiers weren't hunting for the escaped prisoners.
  
  Then she saw the last dragon — sunset orange, flames flickering from his nose, with a jagged tear on the tip of his left wing. He flew slower than the others, bringing up the rear, and his head swung back and forth, dark eyes searching the ground below them.
  
  Tsunami found herself holding her breath. The SkyWing's snout swung toward the trees just as Sunny's tail whisked out of sight.
  
  He paused, beating his wings back to hover in the air for a moment.
  
  Was he staring at the trees?
  
  Had he seen Sunny?
  
  What if he called the others back? The patrol dragons were several wingbeats away already — but one shout could bring them hurtling around at lightning speed. Sunny and Starflight were no match for six full-grown SkyWing soldiers.
  
  Actually they were no match for one SkyWing soldier. The two of them together would probably have trouble fighting a sleepy bat.
  
  A curl of smoke rose from the SkyWing's nose, and he opened his mouth. If there was any chance of saving her friends, Tsunami had to shut him up.
  
  She burst out of the water in a great leap, smashing her tail behind her for momentum. Her wings powered her up to ram right into the SkyWing's underbelly.
  
  He coughed out a puff of fiery smoke and clutched his midsection, the breath knocked out of him. Tsunami had a few moments before he could recover enough to call for help. She ducked around him, slammed her tail into his head, and landed on his back as hard as she could.
  
  The SkyWing nearly fell into the water, but he fought back up into the air. Tsunami kicked at his wings with her claws and slid back toward his tail, trying to drag him down with her weight. He was too big and too strong for her up here; only taking him by surprise had given her a temporary advantage. She needed to get him in the ocean to even out the fight.
  
  The orange dragon snarled and twisted, shooting a blast of flames out of his snout, which barely missed her. Tsunami yanked him down toward the water, but his massive wings beat harder and harder. It felt like a hurricane whistling around her ears. She could tell that he was gaining height, and in a moment he'd be strong enough to call the other soldiers back.
  
  You're not getting my friends! Tsunami thought fiercely. She found the vulnerable spot on his tail and sank her teeth in. He convulsed with pain, nearly throwing her off, and shot another blast of fire under his wing at her.
  
  At first Tsunami thought he had missed. Then she felt a searing trail of agony spreading along her neck. It felt as if someone were trying to saw through her scales with a scalding-hot wire.
  
  She closed her eyes and clamped her jaw harder, determined to hang on although spots were starting to dance in her vision.
  
  Suddenly the dragon lurched toward the sea. Tsunami's eyes flew open.
  
  Clay had flung himself between her and the dragon's snout, spreading his fireproof wings. His claws clamped on to the SkyWing's back, and the extra weight drove the soldier down and down, toward the sea.
  
  Together, Clay and Tsunami dragged the SkyWing into the ocean. He fought wildly the whole way, but his flames couldn't hurt Clay's fire-re sis tant scales, and his giant wings couldn't help him once he was underwater and cut off from breathing.
  
  As soon as they hit the water, Tsunami swam to the SkyWing's head and held it below the surface until he stopped thrashing.
  
  She let go and so did Clay. The dragon's body began to drift slowly toward the seafloor.
  
  A shudder rippled through Tsunami's scales. Him or me.
  
  This didn't feel right.
  
  Why couldn't she be ferocious and not care?
  
  She swam after the dragon and grabbed one of his wings, then looked back up at Clay. He met her eyes, and to her relief, didn't even hesitate before swimming to the other wing.
  
  They dragged the SkyWing up onto the beach. The current had carried them farther away than Tsunami had guessed, and it was painfully hard to swim back to shore, especially with a full-grown dragon weighing them down.
  
  She gritted her teeth, ignoring her exhaustion and the pain from the burn on her neck. She was a SeaWing. This was supposed to be her element. She was the boss of the ocean, not the other way around.
  
  By the time they reached the beach, the rest of the patrol had vanished from sight. She wondered how long it would be before they noticed this one missing and came back to look for him.
  
  Tsunami collapsed onto the sand beside the SkyWing. Clay peered into the dragon's snout, then started thumping his chest.
  
  "What is wrong with you?" Glory's voice snapped. The RainWing materialized from the sandy background, turning her scales a darker shade of brown so they could see her. She glared at Tsunami. "Why did you do that?"
  
  "Oh, you're welcome," Tsunami said. "Just saving your life, as usual."
  
  "By attacking random dragons?" Glory cried. "In another moment they would have been gone! And what are you doing?" She jabbed Clay in the side with one of her wings.
  
  "Uh," Clay mumbled. "Fixing him." He kept thumping the SkyWing's chest.
  
  "What?" Glory yelped. "You can't let him live!" She tried to grab one of Clay's forearms, but Tsunami shoved her away.
  
  "We don't have to kill him," Tsunami said. "We'll tie him up and leave him here."
  
  "Great," Glory said. "How about a trail of cow parts, too? And a map of where we're going? Or perhaps we could set this part of the forest on fire, just to make sure everyone knows how to find us. Would you like me to spell out 'DRAGONETS WUZ HERE' in giant rocks?"
  
  "Fine!" Tsunami said. "Here he is. You kill him."
  
  Glory looked down at the unconscious dragon and hesitated. "I don't kill dragons who can't fight back," she said finally.
  
  "Why not?" Tsunami said. "Just splat some venom on his face and melt him, if it's that easy for you."
  
  Glory sank her claws into the sand, scowling. Bubbles of dark purple began spreading across her scales.
  
  Sunny and Starflight landed on the beach beside them. Sunny gave the SkyWing a horrified look, and Tsunami remembered that she'd been trapped in another part of the palace during the arena fights. She'd never seen her friends battle another dragon.
  
  "Is he all right?" Sunny asked Clay.
  
  "Try this," Starflight offered, coming over to help. Clay shifted aside, and they rolled the dragon onto his stomach.
  
  "Why did you attack him?" Sunny blurted at Tsunami. The little SandWing's harmless tail flicked back and forth anxiously.
  
  "To save you!" Tsunami said, stung.
  
  "But he wasn't even doing anything," Sunny protested. "He was just flying by."
  
  All four of them were looking at Tsunami like she was the kind of dragon who hid under rocks and bit innocent passersby for fun. She arched her neck indignantly.
  
  "I thought he saw you," she growled. "He was about to call out to the others. I saw him open his mouth!"
  
  "So did I," said Glory. "I'm pretty sure he was yawning."
  
  "Pretty sure?" Tsunami said. "Would you risk our lives on 'pretty sure'?"
  
  Was he yawning? Did I attack him for nothing? That can't be right. I saw danger and reacted appropriately. Didn't I?
  
  "Maybe if you'd just stopped to think for a second —" Starflight said.
  
  "Or forever? Like you? Think think think, worry worry, never do anything?" Tsunami cried.
  
  The SkyWing suddenly coughed, and seawater flooded out of his snout. Clay ruffled his wings with a pleased expression.
  
  "Oh, wonderful. Our enemy will survive. Well done. We have to get out of here," Glory said. She took a step back and glanced at the sky where the other soldiers had disappeared. "So what do we do with him now, O Great Leader?"
  
  Tsunami had no idea. She glanced around frantically. Maybe if they could find some vines to tie him up with...
  
  "There's a tree," Starflight said, jumping to his feet. "In the forest."
  
  "No way," Glory said. "A tree in the forest?"
  
  "Being sarcastic is not helping!" Tsunami snapped at her.
  
  "I mean, a fallen tree," Starflight said. "We can use it. Glory, stay and guard him; Clay and Tsunami, come on, quick."
  
  Clay charged up the beach behind him. Tsunami paused for a moment — she didn't like leaving the soldier, even if he wasn't fully awake yet. She also didn't particularly like taking orders from Starflight.
  
  "Go on, hurry," Sunny said, nudging her with one wing.
  
  Not far into the forest, a large tree had fallen, with the top of its branches brushing the sand. Clay and Tsunami shoved and rolled it onto the beach and dragged it back to the SkyWing while Starflight flapped around squawking instructions. As if we need to be told how to move a tree, Tsunami thought grumpily.
  
  The soldier's eyes were blinking awake as they reached him. He coughed and coughed again, lifting his head to peer groggily at the dragonets.
  
  "So how does the tree help?" Tsunami asked.
  
  "We put it on top of him," Starflight said. "So he'll be trapped in place, at least long enough for us to get away."
  
  Tsunami hated to admit it, but it was a good idea. She helped Clay wrestle the tree over until it lay heavily across the orange dragon's back and wings. The SkyWing tried to push himself up, but the tree kept him pinned to the sand.
  
  "What if he's stuck here forever?" Sunny worried. She reached over and brushed some sand off the SkyWing's snout. He snorted a puff of smoke, and Clay pulled her back. "Maybe we should just let him go."
  
  "We can't do that," Tsunami said.
  
  "I wish you hadn't attacked him," Sunny said, ducking her head.
  
  "Me too," said Glory.
  
  "It wasn't the smartest move," Starflight agreed.
  
  Tsunami's gills flared, and she spread her wings. "You don't know that!" she said. "Maybe I saved us! Again!" She looked at Clay, but he only shrugged as if he wasn't sure. Thanks for the support, guys, Tsunami thought angrily. When all I'm trying to do is keep everyone safe.
  
  "Don't worry, Sunny," Clay said, patting the little SandWing's head. "His friends will come looking for him eventually."
  
  "Eventually or soon," Glory said. "So like I said, let's seriously get out of here."
  
  "Wait," the SkyWing rasped. His voice was hoarse and deep. He wriggled, lashing his tail across the sand. "Don't leave me like this."
  
  Starflight stepped into his line of sight and gazed down at him. "Remember we could have killed you," he said. "Remember that the dragonets of destiny were merciful. We want peace, not more death. We have come to save Pyrrhia."
  
  "Oh, good grief," Tsunami said as Glory rolled her eyes. "No more hanging out with NightWings for you."
  
  "I thought it sounded nice," Sunny said. Starflight shot her a grateful look.
  
  "Sunny, don't encourage him," said Glory.
  
  Carefully Starflight draped a few large leaves over the dragon's head, so he couldn't see where they went. He pointed toward the forest and mouthed, "Just to be safe."
  
  Tsunami sighed. More flying in the wrong direction. She wanted to go home already. Home to the ocean and the SeaWings and her royal parents.
  
  But she couldn't argue about it with the SkyWing listening, and the others were already nodding. All of them were ready to follow anxious, overly cautious Starflight yet again. And none of them thought she'd done the right thing by attacking this SkyWing, even though it was to save their stupid scales.
  
  As they lifted into the sky, she cast a longing look over her shoulder at the ocean.
  
  Soon, she thought. Soon I'll be with my own dragons.
  
  The Bay of a Thousand Scales was farther away than Tsunami had realized. She'd been studying the map of Pyrrhia since she was tiny, but it was hard to fit that picture over the enormous world below her. She kept expecting to find neat little spirals of islands that would fit in the palm of her talons. Instead, she found herself flying over vast expanses of empty ocean, dotted here and there with a solitary outcropping of rock.
  
  After they took a long detour inland to convince the SkyWing they'd gone in the opposite direction, they circled around south and flew out to sea. They managed to make it to a small rocky island shortly after night fell, but according to Starflight they were still a long way from the Bay of a Thousand Scales. He'd calculated the distance and their speed and had a long boring lecture ready to explain it all. The rest of them fell asleep halfway into it, and he spent the next day sulking about that.
  
  Still, Tsunami had to admit — if only to herself — that it was useful having someone with all the geography and flight plans in his head. For a few days they stopped whenever they saw an island, ate a seagull or fish if they could catch any, and then flew on. Tsunami tried diving into the ocean several times and was disappointed to discover she couldn't swim as fast as she flew. The only good news was that the ocean water helped to heal the burn on her neck.
  
  It was four mornings later when Tsunami finally woke up on an island that was officially part of the Thousand Scales.
  
  She started awake from a dream in which their cave had collapsed and was slowly crushing her to death, and discovered that Clay had rolled over on top of her in the middle of the night. Grumbling, she wriggled out from under him and let his tail flop over onto Starflight's head.
  
  The five dragonets were packed into a cavern halfway up a tall sea cliff. It was cramped and uncomfortable and smelled of seagull droppings. Clay had barely been able to scrunch his wings low enough to crawl inside.
  
  And why were they sleeping in this horrible spot instead of on the nice white sandy beach below?
  
  Tsunami sat down in the cave entrance and glared at Starflight, which wasn't very satisfying since everyone was still snoring away. Clay was stuffed against the back wall with Sunny between his front talons and Starflight curled up alongside. Even Glory had her tail draped over Clay's. Her scales glinted orange and gold in the light of the rising sun, with bursts of red when she shifted sleepily.
  
  Starflight had been acting so weird since the NightWings gave him back. Suddenly it seemed like he wanted to argue with Tsunami about every thing. If she said, "Let's sleep on the beach! It'll be fun!" he'd say, "No, no, we have to sleep in a hidden cave; that'll be much safer." Safer! As if there was anything to worry about all the way out here, in the middle of the night.
  
  But everyone was still mad at her about attacking that soldier, so they all voted with Starflight.
  
  She didn't like that development at all.
  
  Tsunami watched them sleep for a moment. It was so hard to lead effectively when everyone kept questioning you and complaining about every thing. She only wanted what was best for them. Didn't they know that? She'd always figured she would fight a hundred SkyWings to protect them.
  
  But maybe I shouldn't. Maybe my friends don't want my protection after all.
  
  Maybe they wanted Starflight to be their leader instead. Even though he'd never risked one scale on his body for them.
  
  Tsunami glanced down at the sea, sparkling aquamarine below her. Somewhere in those blue-green depths was her family — her parents, her kingdom, every thing that should have been hers, if the Talons of Peace hadn't stolen her away and ruined her life.
  
  Perhaps the problem with her friends was that they were from different tribes, all stubborn and muddled up instead of sensible like SeaWings. Maybe her own kind would understand her better. They'd appreciate her instead of yelling at her.
  
  Well, she didn't have to sit here waiting for everyone else to wake up. It wasn't like they'd be much help when it came to searching anyway.
  
  Tsunami stretched her wings and then tipped forward out of the cave opening. Wind whistled past her snout, tugging at her tail as she plummeted down the cliff. At the last moment, she snapped her wings open and sailed across the top of the water, skimming it with her claws. Joy tingled through her scales. She spun and dove into the water.
  
  The sea was warmer here and busy with underwater life. Her splash sent what seemed like thousands of fish scattering away, several of them disappearing into a pinkish-orange coral reef that curled out of the sand like a petrified forest. A blobby dark blue octopus goggled at her from the branches. Tsunami kept seeing flickers of bright yellow and silver at the edge of her vision as fish fled from her webbed claws.
  
  No welcoming committee of delighted SeaWings, though.
  
  No glowing jellyfish marking a path to Queen Coral's castle. No cavalcade of bowing seahorses and bejeweled lobsters to lead the way.
  
  Not that she'd been picturing the homecoming scene from The Missing Princess or anything.
  
  Tsunami swam along the coral reef, peering at the creatures hiding in the nooks and holes. A hideous thing she thought might be an eel stared back at her. Little orange-and-white fish nestled in the waving lavender anemones.
  
  She still wasn't used to swimming in the sea, and that frustrated her. Unexpected currents kept knocking her off balance. The salt water felt like it was scraping roughly against her gills. Where were her natural SeaWing instincts? Her world was supposed to make her stronger, faster, tougher — not pathetic.
  
  She swam all the way to the next island, fighting the currents. More of the pinkish coral reef stretched across the sand here as well, dotted with waving green fans and lacy dark purple ferns. Her wings felt sore and tired, so she spread them wide and floated near the surface, not far from the land.
  
  Something flashed below her in the shadows of the coral reef.
  
  Something very large.
  
  Tsunami had a brief vision of all the large, toothy things that might live in the ocean, then dismissed it. If it was a shark, she would kill it and bring it back to the others to eat — mainly so she could see the look on Starflight's face.
  
  She flicked her tail to swim closer.
  
  It was another SeaWing.
  
  A shiver rippled across her scales when she saw him, and part of her wanted to bolt right back to her friends.
  
  Don't be a smoke-breather, she scolded herself. This is what you were hoping for: a dragon from your own tribe.
  
  She took a deep breath. The strange SeaWing had dark blue horns and sky-blue scales several shades paler than hers. He was paddling by the reef, shifting his talons and wings slightly to change course. His head turned alertly from side to side.
  
  Well, it wouldn't hurt to follow him for a while first, Tsunami told herself. She crept along the top of the reef, peering over the edge at him. Her claws caught on small gaps in the coral. She accidentally poked an indignant black lobster, which came bustling out with its long whiskers bristling and pincers snapping. It took one look at her and hustled right back into hiding.
  
  Up here, the reef was covered in a layer of green mosslike algae. Tsunami passed a couple of large sea turtles slowly swimming nearby. An enormous, tentacled thing like a sea spider sat nibbling bits of algae. The tips of its eight dark purple legs glowed orange-yellow and so did its eyes.
  
  The SeaWing down below stopped suddenly and glanced around. Tsunami flattened herself against the reef. Knobbly bits of limestone poked into her underbelly. She peered through one of the holes at the other dragon.
  
  He spun slowly, staring into the ocean depths. Had he heard her?
  
  But he didn't look up. The dragon checked around him one more time, then lit up the stripes along his wings.
  
  Almost immediately another dragon swam out of a cave in the coral reef.
  
  Hmmm, Tsunami thought, much less handsome. His green scales were perfectly nice, but she didn't care for the black spiral patterns on them. She'd never seen a pattern like that on a dragon before. And his face wasn't nearly as handsome or friendly-looking as the first dragon, although perhaps that had something to do with the giant bruise swollen over his left eye.
  
  She wondered if they were guards switching patrol duty. If so, they were being quite strange about it.
  
  The two dragons floated in place, staring at each other, for what seemed like an eternity. Occasionally the stripes on one SeaWing would light up, then on the other. They moved their talons about as if waving away fish, even though no fish went anywhere near them.
  
  And then the spiral-marked dragon ducked back into the cave, and the blue dragon swam on.
  
  Some kind of SeaWing patrol ritual? Tsunami wondered. I guess I'll have to learn all that stuff in order to become queen. She lifted her wings to swim after the first dragon, and a pair of yellow-striped fish wriggled out from under her and shot away.
  
  The sky-blue dragon swam back the way he'd come, toward the stretch of open sea between this island and the one where Tsunami's friends were sleeping.
  
  Now or never, Tsunami thought. She'd rather meet this dragon than the other one, and she'd rather do it while he was alone, if she could. That seemed easier than trying to explain herself to a whole bunch of dragons at once.
  
  She beat her wings to catch up, dove over the edge of the reef, and swam around in front of him.
  
  The SeaWing started back in an eddy of ripples. His eyes were a blue so dark they were almost black.
  
  Tsunami pointed up at the surface. Come on out of the water so we can talk, she tried to signal. Hopefully he'd figure out what she meant.
  
  To her surprise, he whipped around and fled. His tail smacked a wave of water in her face.
  
  Well, that's unfriendly, she thought. She swam after him, swinging her tail to propel herself even faster. He glanced back over his shoulder, saw her chasing him, and put on a burst of speed.
  
  Why was he running away? And how was he so fast?
  
  "Stop!" she tried to yell through the water. "I just want to talk!"
  
  Of course that didn't work. He didn't even slow down.
  
  But then he twisted to look back at Tsunami, and so he didn't see the whale that suddenly loomed out of the deep in front of him.
  
  Tsunami waved her talons and pointed. "Watch out!" she shouted in a cascade of bubbles.
  
  The SeaWing smacked into the whale's side and careened backward. The whale was only slightly bigger than the dragon, with ridges all along its back and a flat, mild-mannered face. It made a weird squeaking groan and blinked at the SeaWing in confusion.
  
  The dragon was still shaking his head, trying to reorient himself, when Tsunami caught up, grabbed his tail, and pinned him to the sand.
  
  The whale blinked again and swam on. Eddies rippled around the two dragons as it powered away through the water.
  
  Now what do I do? Tsunami thought. I have to get him to the surface to talk to him, but if I let him go, he might try to escape again.
  
  She frowned down at the dragon and pointed at the surface again. Flashes of sunlight shimmered up above them, like pieces of broken gold-white glass floating on the water.
  
  The other dragon tipped his head to one side. Luminescent stripes lit up along his wings, flashing fast, then slow.
  
  All right, Tsunami thought. I can do that, too. Maybe he's testing me.
  
  She lit up her own stripes, illuminating the ones on her snout, then the ones along her tail, and finally her wings. See? My stripes flash, too. I'm a SeaWing. Now let's go up and talk.
  
  Slowly she spread her wings and lifted up, prepared to grab him if he tried to bolt again. He scrambled upright but stayed with her. Encouraged, Tsunami swam a bit closer to the surface. He followed, but only for a bit before he stopped and looked around.
  
  His stripes flashed again, this time along his neck and tail.
  
  Impatiently Tsunami lit up her stripes one more time, mirroring what he'd done.
  
  The SeaWing's wings flared open with a whoosh that scared fish into the reef. He lunged toward Tsunami, fast as a minnow. His front talons reached for her.
  
  Tsunami roared, blasting him in the eyes with bubbles, and sliced her claws across his snout. She didn't know why he was attacking. Maybe he was a traitor SeaWing. Or maybe he was guarding his territory or trea sure. Perhaps he thought she was an intruder, although he wasn't much of a guard if his first instinct was to run away, and his second was to attack with no reason.
  
  He'll be sorry when he finds out who I am! she thought fiercely.
  
  She kicked his underbelly hard with her back legs. He coughed up a stream of bubbles and fell back. Tsunami spread her wings, snarled at him one more time, and shot to the surface.
  
  She burst into the air and kept beating her wings to rise into the sky. In the distance, she could see the cliff-side cave and the worried faces of her friends poking out.
  
  An enormous splash sounded behind her. The other SeaWing surged out of the ocean. His massive tail whacked the water twice as he lifted into the air, sending giant waves rushing in all directions.
  
  He looked even bigger out here in the air. His hooked claws gleamed sharply in the sunlight. His dark blue eyes were fixed on her wings.
  
  The first true citizen of her kingdom she'd ever met, and he was coming to kill her.
  
  Tsunami shot toward the island where her friends were. The SeaWing was close on her tail. He roared something, but the wind whipped it away so she couldn't hear it.
  
  She saw Clay wriggle out of the cliff and take to the air. That's what she needed — backup. With a quick twist of her wings, she aimed for the strip of white sandy beach where she'd wanted to sleep the night before. The other three could stay safely in the cave. She and Clay together could handle this SeaWing.
  
  She hoped.
  
  "Wait!" her pursuer yelled. "Where are you going? What's wrong?"
  
  Tsunami's wings missed a beat, and she nearly dropped into the ocean. She swung around, hovering over the sea between the cliff and the beach. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Clay veer into a circle in the air, waiting to see what she would do.
  
  The other SeaWing paused as well. He kept the length of two dragons between him and her. The scratches on his snout were bleeding.
  
  "What's wrong?" Tsunami cried indignantly. "Didn't you just attack me?"
  
  "I certainly did not!" he protested. Glowing lines flickered along his snout. "I thought you — that's the normal —" He seemed to be getting more and more embarrassed. "You said you liked me!" he finally burst out.
  
  "I didn't say anything of the sort," Tsunami said, astonished.
  
  The SeaWing's brow furrowed. "You very clearly said you liked me, and you'd followed me all the way out here to tell me that."
  
  Tsunami just about fell out of the sky. "You are a delusional squid-brain," she cried.
  
  "Well, maybe not in those exact words!" he said. "All right, it was a little confusing. Maybe a lot confusing. But the message was in there. And why else would you be chasing me?"
  
  "When, exactly, do you imagine I said all this?" Tsunami demanded. "Shortly after you attacked me, perhaps?"
  
  The other dragon touched his snout gently and winced. "You were the only one doing any attacking," he said. "I was being friendly after what you said."
  
  "Stop," Tsunami said. Maybe she'd misunderstood his actions. Maybe his approach had been a SeaWing greeting ritual she didn't know. In which case... his poor snout. She winced guiltily. Perhaps she shouldn't have gotten defensive so quickly. "Tell me exactly what you think I said."
  
  He sighed. "I said, 'What are you doing all the way out here?' and you said —" He paused, rubbing his front talons against his head. "You said, 'Hey, sparkling teeth, I totally love three of your claws but not the others, and I wish your nose was a herring so I could eat it, and also your wings sound like sharks snoring.'"
  
  Tsunami burst out laughing.
  
  "All right, I get it," she said, although she didn't really. Did all SeaWings have a strange sense of humor? Would she have to develop one, too? "You're making this up."
  
  He stared at her. "Are you seriously going to pretend you didn't say any of that?"
  
  "Of course I didn't," Tsunami said. Maybe he wasn't kidding. Maybe he was mentally unbalanced. "I didn't say anything at all — we were underwater, remember?"
  
  The strange dragon hovered for several wingbeats, glowing stripes lighting up along his blue scales. His face slowly went from confused to angry as he frowned at her.
  
  "Who are you?" he demanded.
  
  "I'm a SeaWing," she said hotly. "Just like you, so no need to get hostile."
  
  "A SeaWing who doesn't speak Aquatic?" he growled. "Not likely. What are you really? How did you make yourself look like a SeaWing?"
  
  Tsunami's heart sank. Aquatic?
  
  SeaWings have their own language?
  
  Of course they do, she realized. It felt like the tide was going out inside her, leaving nothing but stretches of bare sand. And of course nobody ever bothered to teach it to me. Just one more creative way the Talons found to ruin my life.
  
  Why hadn't she thought of that before? Three moons, she was as thick as Clay. The dragons of the sea had a whole palace underwater — of course they needed a way to communicate down there. They couldn't just pop to the surface every time they needed to chat.
  
  She glanced down at her webbed talons and remembered the gestures she'd seen the two SeaWings making while their luminescent stripes flashed. Talon signals and glowing stripes — she must have said all that nonsense with her stripes without realizing it.
  
  But how can I be queen of the SeaWings if I don't even speak their language?
  
  And why didn't anyone ever tell me about this?
  
  Clay had never met a dragon of his own kind before. That's why he knew nothing about MudWings. But Tsunami didn't have that excuse: one of the guardians who'd raised them had been a SeaWing.
  
  So why, why, had Webs never taught her the SeaWing language or even told her they had one?
  
  All those scrolls about SeaWings... now that she thought about it, there was plenty of dialogue in the underwater scenes, like in The Missing Princess when the lost daughter found her parents. Tsunami had always assumed that was a storytelling technique, not an actual underwater language.
  
  She looked up and met the SeaWing's dark blue eyes. His head was tilted curiously.
  
  "You don't look guilty," he observed. "You look sad. And I imagine it would be hard to fake those." He nodded at the webs between her claws. "So where did you come from, and what's wrong with you?"
  
  Tsunami bristled. "There's nothing wrong with me," she snapped. "I just happen to have been raised by idiot —"
  
  His gaze suddenly shifted behind her. "Look out!" he yelled. His tail whipped around and slammed into her, knocking her aside. She spun toward the water, dizzy and shocked. Her wings brushed the ocean waves as she righted herself and turned around.
  
  The strange SeaWing was grappling with Clay up in the sky.
  
  Tsunami gasped. The SeaWing was full-grown, bigger than Clay, and he was not afraid to lash out with teeth, tail, and claws. But she could tell Clay was holding back, worried about hurting a possible ally. He ducked his head between his front talons and tried to dive away, but the SeaWing seized Clay's tail and dug his talons viciously into Clay's scales. Clay howled with pain.
  
  The other dragon started to drag him down to the ocean, where he would have all the underwater advantages of SeaWings, and Clay would eventually drown.
  
  "Clay!" Sunny shrieked, launching herself out of the cliff-side cave.
  
  Tsunami got there first. She smacked the SeaWing over the head with her tail, seized his wing in her talons, and yanked him away from Clay when he turned around in surprise. He tried to spin around her to get back to his prey, but she blocked him with her wings and lashed out at his snout again. He flinched back, and that was enough time for Clay to scramble out of reach.
  
  "What are you doing?" the SeaWing yelled at Tsunami. "I'm saving you from that MudWing!"
  
  "Well, don't!" Tsunami yelled back. "He's my friend!"
  
  "But —"
  
  Sunny slammed into the back of the SeaWing, landing between his wings and wrapping her talons around his neck. "Leave him alone!" she panted.
  
  The SeaWing looked more astonished than alarmed. He wriggled his shoulders and twisted his neck, trying to see what was on his back. Sunny kicked his wing, and he yelped.
  
  "That's my other friend," Tsunami said. "Sunny, try not to hurt him too badly. We need his help."
  
  "I hardly think this gnat is going to hurt me," the SeaWing growled.
  
  Sunny kicked him again. "Promise me you won't attack Clay," she said.
  
  His eyes went to the brown dragon circling just above them. Clay rubbed his head anxiously.
  
  "The MudWings are our enemies," the SeaWing snarled at Tsunami. "If you don't know that, then you'd better leave the Bay of a Thousand Scales before Queen Coral's army finds you and does what they always do to traitors."
  
  "I'm not a traitor," Tsunami said. "And Clay is not your enemy." She glanced up at him, then back at the SeaWing. "You'd better learn some respect, squid-brain. We're the dragonets of destiny."
  
  "Riptide," Sunny said again. "That's a funny name."
  
  "I like it," Tsunami said. "Fierce and scary, like mine."
  
  Riptide was pacing the beach, lashing his tail in a long swooshing trail through the sand. His sky-blue scales glinted metallically in the morning light. He had claw-mark scars along his pale underbelly and what looked like an old bite mark on his tail. Tsunami was pretty sure he was only a couple years older than she was. The scratches she'd given his snout had finally stopped bleeding. She hoped those wouldn't leave scars, too — he had a very handsome snout when it wasn't all clawed up.
  
  "All right," he said. "So the Talons of Peace are real."
  
  "Unfortunately," Glory muttered.
  
  Riptide glanced at her, and Tsunami felt a weird tingle of jealousy run through her scales. Glory had found a large rock to perch on, spreading her wings open to the sun, and her scales were shimmering silver and rose.
  
  "I thought everyone knew about the Talons," Sunny said.
  
  "Just rumors and whispers," said Riptide. "None of the tribe queens would be pleased to find a member of the peace movement in their midst. Conspiring with other tribes? Stealing eggs?" He shook his head. "Queen Coral would kill any dragon she found working with the Talons." He gave Tsunami a searching look she didn't understand.
  
  Clay was sitting with his tail in the water. He had muddy sand packed over the spot where Riptide had clawed him. Sunny sat next to him, giving Riptide fierce looks whenever he paced too close to Clay.
  
  "And you're the dragonets of destiny. For real. The ones in the prophecy. That's real." Riptide stopped, inhaled deeply, and blew out again. "And you're here. In SeaWing territory. Just like —" He glanced at Tsunami again, then went back to pacing.
  
  "I know it's thrilling," Tsunami said. "But we're really looking for somewhere safe to go. The Talons of Peace treated us terribly, and I figured the SeaWings would welcome and protect us."
  
  "I suppose," Riptide said not very reassuringly. "So you were all raised in a cave?" He stopped in front of Tsunami. "With no ocean? Never? You never went into the ocean?"
  
  This seemed to be the hardest part for him to believe. "Not until we escaped," Tsunami said.
  
  "But that's awful," said Riptide.
  
  "Thank you," Tsunami said, flaring her wings. "I know it was. I've always said our life was miserable, but these dragons keep arguing with me."
  
  "Not me," Glory said.
  
  "I can't believe the Talons did that to you," Riptide said, clawing the sand.
  
  "Tell me about it," Tsunami said. "They really are the worst."
  
  "Even Webs — Webs didn't take you to the ocean?" Riptide asked.
  
  "You know about Webs?" Sunny asked.
  
  Riptide ducked his head and frowned at his talons. "He's pretty infamous in the tribe. We all know he deserted during a battle, and later he came back and stole one of the queen's eggs. At least, Queen Coral was sure it was him. But nobody knew if he stole it for the Talons of Peace or for his own reasons. We're not really supposed to talk about the Talons of Peace rumors."
  
  "Didn't anyone think he might have stolen the egg to be part of the prophecy?" Starflight asked.
  
  Riptide nodded. "Some of us did. But again, nobody talked about it. Queen Blister doesn't like hearing about the prophecy, so that's also been a forbidden topic."
  
  Tsunami wrinkled her snout. "Blister gets to decide what SeaWings can talk about?"
  
  Riptide shifted uncomfortably and picked up a large conch shell. He twisted it between his talons. "You'll want to call her Queen Blister when you meet her," he said.
  
  "Not until we decide she should be queen," Tsunami said stoutly. "That's up to us, remember?"
  
  It looked for a moment like Riptide was trying not to smile.
  
  "Well," Starflight stammered, "she is a pretty good — I mean, she's the smart one — I think we'll probably —"
  
  Tsunami tilted her head at him. What was he rattling on about? He snapped his mouth shut and went back to picking sand out of his scales.
  
  "Did you know Webs?" Clay asked Riptide.
  
  The SeaWing dropped his gaze. "Not really. He ran away during a battle when I was only two years old. But I've been hearing about his treachery my whole life." He sighed. "I really can't believe he never took you to the ocean in all that time."
  
  "It's true," Tsunami said. "And he never taught me Aquatic. I wish I had all the Talons of Peace here so I could bite them."
  
  "To be fair, the Talons were just keeping us safe," Sunny interjected. "They needed us to survive to fulfill the prophecy."
  
  Tsunami snorted, and Sunny gave her an injured look.
  
  "But the prophecy," Riptide said. He pointed at Glory. "It calls for a SkyWing. She's not a SkyWing."
  
  "It's a little complicated," Tsunami said as a hint of sea green rippled across Glory's scales. "Anyway, I'm not sure we really care about the prophecy. But we do care about finding the families we were stolen from."
  
  "I care about the prophecy!" Sunny protested. She poked Clay's side, and he nodded agreeably.
  
  Starflight cleared his throat, but Tsunami hurried on before he could start lecturing again. His egg hadn't been stolen; the NightWings had handed it right over. So maybe he didn't care about getting home, but she certainly did.
  
  "Only a few days ago, I found out I was stolen from the Royal Hatchery," Tsunami said. "So... so I thought maybe my parents were looking for me. Like in The Missing Princess? Do you know that scroll?"
  
  Riptide definitely squashed a smile this time. "I do," he said. "It's required reading in school."
  
  "School," Starflight said in the wistful tones Clay used to talk about food.
  
  "Required reading?" Tsunami echoed. That was odd. It was a fairy tale, not a historical document. And not, perhaps, the best-written scroll she'd ever read, although it was still one of her favorites because of the story.
  
  "But I can't take you to the palace," Riptide said firmly. "Not with him along." He jerked his head at Clay.
  
  "Weren't you listening?" Tsunami said, exasperated. "He's not a regular MudWing. He's certainly not allied with Burn or the SkyWings. You can trust him."
  
  "Perhaps you should stay here," Riptide suggested, "and I'll bring Queen Coral back to you." He glanced across the water at the other island, where he'd met the green dragon with the black spiral patterns. Tsunami wondered if he was wishing for reinforcements.
  
  "Nope," she said. "We're all coming with you."
  
  "I'm in enough trouble with Queen Coral," Riptide protested. "That's why I'm stuck patrolling all the way out here. If I bring a MudWing back to the palace, I might as well pull out my own teeth."
  
  "Ew!" Sunny cried. "That's not a real punishment, is it?"
  
  Tsunami didn't want to know the answer to that. She wanted to meet her mother without images of horrible things in her head. "Think of it this way," she said quickly. "What happens if Queen Coral finds out you met her missing daughter and didn't bring her back to the palace?"
  
  Riptide squirmed and wrinkled his snout. "Can't I bring you and leave the others?" he asked. "At least until Queen Coral gives her permission?"
  
  "No," she said stoutly. "We all go together. She'll understand once she realizes we're the dragonets of destiny."
  
  Riptide sighed. "All right, but he has to be blindfolded." He looked at the other three, rubbing his chin. "It'd be better if they could all be blindfolded."
  
  "What am I going to do?" Glory asked. "Round up some scary RainWings to come sleep on your roof? I thought no one was afraid of my tribe."
  
  "We're not," Riptide objected. "Afraid of RainWings. Pffft. What a thing to say."
  
  More streaks of pale green appeared along Glory's scales and then faded away. "Wonderful," she said. "So no blindfold for me, then." She tossed her head and turned back to the ocean.
  
  Riptide looked doubtfully at Starflight and Sunny.
  
  "The NightWings know every thing," Starflight said loftily. "It's no use trying to keep secrets from them. I mean, us. I could just use my powers to figure out where your palace is."
  
  Tsunami rolled her eyes. Starflight had no powers whatsoever, as far as any of the dragonets knew. But if he wanted the SeaWings to think he did, maybe that could be useful eventually.
  
  "Please don't argue with him," Tsunami said to Riptide. "Once he starts yammering on about how amazing NightWings are, we'll never get him to shut up."
  
  Starflight ruffled his wings in outrage. Riptide muttered something under his breath and started poking around in the shallow water below the rocks.
  
  "You can blindfold me," Sunny offered. "I don't mind."
  
  "If you do that, she can ride on my back," Tsunami suggested. She missed having the little SandWing come lean against her trustingly. Sunny was still acting jumpy and ner vous around her, four whole days after her fight with the SkyWing soldier, as if Tsunami might suddenly attack someone out of nowhere, for no reason.
  
  "Or my back," Starflight jumped in quickly. Tsunami frowned at him. Why was he trying so hard to take her place?
  
  "You think you're strong enough?" she challenged.
  
  "Sure he is," Sunny said. "I'll ride with him, and you can lead Clay."
  
  Well, fine, then, Tsunami thought. I guess everyone's giving the orders now.
  
  Riptide came stomping back with several long strands of thick black seaweed. Sunny immediately looked like she was regretting her offer. But she let the big SeaWing wrap the seaweed tightly around her head, covering her closed eyes.
  
  "Ew," she said, shivering. "It's all wet and slimy."
  
  "I like wet and slimy," Clay said, ducking his head to make it easier for Riptide to blindfold him.
  
  "That's weird, Clay," said Glory.
  
  Riptide's attention was focused on plastering seaweed all over Clay's broad head. When he was done, it looked more like an octopus trying to eat Clay's brain than a blindfold. But of course, Clay didn't complain. He never complained about anything except being hungry. It was one of the things Tsunami loved about him.
  
  Tsunami helped Sunny climb awkwardly onto Starflight's back, balancing in the narrow space between his wings. The SandWing was small, but Starflight wasn't as burly as Tsunami or Clay.
  
  "If you can't handle it, tell me and I'll take her," Tsunami said to him.
  
  Starflight nodded, breathing deeply. His wings curled in, and he shivered as Sunny lay down, rested her head on his neck, and clasped her forearms trustingly around his shoulders.
  
  Tsunami turned to Clay and brushed one of his wing tips with hers.
  
  "Can you feel that?" she asked. "If I do that in the air, can you stay with me?"
  
  "I think so," Clay said doubtfully.
  
  "I'll fly on your other side," Glory said, hopping down from her rock. She reached up and nudged his other wing. "That way we can steer you together."
  
  Clay shook his head a little and a loose flap of seaweed went glop flop against his neck. "This is really strange," he said. "It's as dark as the underground river. Only with breathing, so, better. I'm in favor of breathing. Definitely better than not breathing."
  
  "Just don't go too fast. And listen to me," Tsunami ordered.
  
  "To us," Glory chimed in. "And we promise not to drown you." She gave Tsunami an arch look.
  
  If I do decide to drown somebody, I know who's at the top of my list, Tsunami thought, shooting a glare back at her. "All right, let's go," she said to Riptide.
  
  The sky-blue SeaWing waved his talons in front of Clay's face to make sure there was no reaction. Finally he sprang into the sky with the dragonets close behind him.
  
  Tsunami forgot to be mad at Glory and Starflight as they flew over the bay. Green-and-white islands glowed like scattered jewels in the ocean below them. Several of them were shaped like claws, curving neatly through the water. From up by the clouds, she could see part of the spiral pattern in the archipelago. And when they swooped down close to the sea, she saw pearlescent pink dolphins leaping in the clear water.
  
  Glory told Clay about the dolphins, and his head went up hopefully. "Can we eat them?" he asked.
  
  "No," Riptide called back over his shoulder. "Queen Coral has forbidden it. She thinks they might be distantly related to us."
  
  Tsunami glanced down at the sleek darting shapes. Related to dragons? What a bizarre idea. It didn't really fit with how she'd imagined her mother.
  
  Well, I can stop imagining soon, she thought.
  
  She had no idea how the SeaWings had managed to hide a palace on one of these islands. From the air, it seemed like you could see every thing — the white sand below the azure waters around the islands, every hole in the twisting rock formations, every palm tree and cormorant nest and scraggly bush on every cliff. There were a lot of small islands, but surely the enemy had searched every one by now, after eigh teen years of war.
  
  "Here comes our welcoming committee," Riptide said, just loud enough for Tsunami to hear.
  
  She spotted a formation of blue and green dragons flying toward them — fifteen or more, with huge wings and bared teeth. She could hear them hissing from a distance.
  
  "Uh-oh," Riptide muttered.
  
  "Clay, stop and hover," Tsunami instructed. He paused in the air, with Glory close beside him.
  
  "What's happening?" Sunny asked, lifting her head from Starflight's shoulder as they caught up. Starflight, for once, didn't say anything. His jaw was set, and it looked like he was using all his energy to stay aloft with Sunny.
  
  "The advance guard," Riptide said. He swung in a slow circle around the group and stopped in front again, facing the incoming dragons. "They make sure no one even gets close to the Summer Palace."
  
  A few moments later, they were surrounded. The flapping wingbeats filled their ears and pushed the air currents around.
  
  "Rrrriptide," growled the dragon in the lead. His scales were a green so dull it was almost gray, like stone where moss had been scraped away. He had tiny bone-pale eyes that never seemed to blink under a knobbly protruding forehead, and his horns twisted strangely toward each other. Tsunami noticed that, unlike Riptide, the new dragon had no battle scars. Which either meant he stayed away from the fighting — or he was a very skilled fighter.
  
  "What are you dragging home now?" he snarled.
  
  Riptide looked him straight in the eyes. "I've found the missing princess."
  
  That's not how I would have put it, Tsunami thought. I was the one doing all the finding out there.
  
  A ripple of shock went through the other SeaWings. Tsunami's scales felt like insects were crawling under them as the guards all stared at her. She lifted her snout and tried to look regal and imposing.
  
  "Oh, really?" said the leader. "You, Riptide? Of all dragons? What an unusual coincidence." His unsettling eyes scanned Tsunami from wing tips to claws, as if she were a dead eel someone had left half-eaten on the beach. Tsunami wanted to shred the skeptical, arrogant look right off his face.
  
  "And who are you?" Tsunami demanded.
  
  Riptide winced. "This is Shark," he said. "Commander of palace defense and brother to the queen."
  
  "Oh, really," Tsunami said, deliberately making her tone even more insolent and challenging than Shark's. She was not about to start her life with the SeaWings by kowtowing to every soldier dragon who came along. Even if he was her uncle.
  
  Shark narrowed his eyes until they nearly disappeared into his scales. "What makes you believe this snip of a dragon comes from the stolen royal egg?" he asked Riptide.
  
  "Why, do you lose a lot of eggs?" Tsunami jumped in. "Maybe whoever's in charge of defense isn't doing such a good job, then. Oh, wait, that's you, isn't it?"
  
  "Her story makes sense," Riptide said desperately. "She knew about — about Webs. He raised her. And look at the glow patterns under her wings."
  
  All of the SeaWings craned their necks to stare at Tsunami's wings. She snapped at a couple who got too close, then peered around to see what they were seeing.
  
  Under her wings, when she lit them up, the luminescent stripes formed spirals around the outer edges. Starbursts shaped like webbed dragon footprints branched away from the lines in the middle. Was that weird? She glanced at the other SeaWings. Most of them had smaller starbursts and no spirals. Only Shark's patterns matched her own.
  
  Because we're both royal. She lifted her head and met his gaze triumphantly. But one day I shall be queen, and you will always be nothing but a soldier.
  
  Shark let out a long hissing breath. "Very well," he said. "Kill the other four and bring her."
  
  "Don't you touch them!" Tsunami yelled. She whirled and smacked a SeaWing out of the sky as he reached for Clay. Starflight had already ducked below Clay's massive wings. Glory drew her neck back and bared her fangs.
  
  "I am the queen's daughter, and I order you to leave these dragonets alone," Tsunami shouted.
  
  The guards looked from her to Shark uncertainly. His eyes were pale reflecting pools, hiding his thoughts. He slowly raised one talon and made a strange circling motion with it — a sign in the SeaWing language, Tsunami guessed. Whatever it was, it worked. To Tsunami's relief, the guards backed away.
  
  But when she glanced at Riptide, she noticed that he still looked tense and unhappy. Maybe he's just afraid of Shark, she thought.
  
  "Very good," she said, trying to sound like she was in command. "Now take us to my mother."
  
  "The queen is conducting business at the Deep Palace," Shark said flatly. "We will take you to the Summer Palace, where you may wait for her." He made another talon signal, and two of the guards broke away from the group, winging off across the water. Taking the message to my mother, Tsunami thought, her wings expanding with joy. They were so close to every thing she'd always imagined. I'm going to meet my parents today.
  
  Islands flashed by below them as they flew on, now with a tight guard of SeaWings. Some of the islands were small patches of sand, barely big enough for one dragon to land on, and others were towering, jagged rocks shooting out of the water. Ahead, Tsunami saw one that looked like a huge dragon skeleton, with holes and gaps all through the pale stone.
  
  The stone skeleton's nose pointed toward another island, this one ringed with forbidding-looking rocks and presenting only a high, sheer cliff face on all sides. The top was a rioting jungle. Thick green vines and trees pressed so close together that there was not a single spot clear enough to land on.
  
  Tsunami was startled when Shark suddenly swerved and dove toward the base of the cliff. He splashed down between two spiraling rocks, sharp and evenly matched like dragon horns, and vanished into the azure water.
  
  She blinked. Where had he gone? The water was so clear here that she could see fat black turtles strolling across the sand at the bottom of the sea.
  
  But then, one by one, half the guards around them dove for the same spot, and each of them disappeared the same way — gone before the bubbles of their splash had cleared.
  
  "Clay, stop," she said, brushing his wing. "Riptide?"
  
  "It's the entrance to the Summer Palace," Riptide said. "There's no other way in. You'll all have to swim."
  
  Sunny let out a small, unhappy noise. "How far?" she asked Riptide.
  
  "You only have to stay underwater for short swims," he answered. "It has been redesigned so Queen Blister in particular can visit."
  
  "And she hates water," Sunny said hopefully, "since she's a SandWing, too."
  
  "Is she, uh — is she here now?" Starflight asked.
  
  Riptide shook his head. "She is not fond of swimming, and even after all the changes we've made, she rarely visits."
  
  Tsunami was secretly a bit relieved to hear that. After meeting Burn, she wasn't looking forward to encountering the other two rival SandWing sisters. What if they were all equally dangerous and crazy and controlling?
  
  But eventually the dragonets would have to choose one of the three to win the war. To be fair, Tsunami thought they probably needed to meet both Blister and Blaze.
  
  Then again, if Tsunami's mother liked Blister — enough to alter her palace to accommodate her — surely that was a sign in Blister's favor, wasn't it? Maybe they didn't have to meet Blaze. Maybe supporting the SeaWings and Blister would be the obvious right thing to do.
  
  "Stay close behind me," Riptide said. "I'll light up my stripes so you can follow, and I'll flash them to signal you to surface at the breathing spots."
  
  "Um," Clay said. "So... about this blindfold, uh... any chance —"
  
  "Once we're in the tunnel," Riptide answered. He turned and dove for the dragon-horn rocks.
  
  Tsunami flipped her tail into Clay's front talons and dove after Riptide, towing Clay behind her. Her scales tingled with excitement.
  
  "Deep breath, Clay," she called.
  
  She was not far behind Riptide when he dove into the water, but even so, she nearly lost him in the fizz of bubbles that swarmed up in her face as she splashed down. She blinked frantically, searching for a hole or a tunnel entrance.
  
  Long, sun-colored tendrils of kelp grew up from the sandy floor, glowing an orange gold in the light filtering down from above. They were clustered around the base of the cliff, waving like a forest of octopus arms as tall as the five dragonets laid end to end.
  
  The hole in the cliff must be hidden by the tendrils, but where?
  
  Then Tsunami saw Riptide's glowing tail knocking the golden kelp curtain aside, and she plunged after him. It was hard to swim as fast as she wanted to with Clay clinging to her tail. She could feel him trying to beat his wings and kick helpfully, but he kept accidentally whacking into under water boulders and slowing her down.
  
  She poked her head into the forest and felt the tendrils of kelp slide and slither around her snout. Up close she could see little clear globules growing on them. These were surprisingly sticky, while the rest of the tendril was slippery smooth. It felt like gigantic golden inchworms were swarming around her.
  
  She had to swim through a thick patch, following the glimmer of Riptide's lit-up tail, before reaching the cliff wall. Suddenly the tendrils slithered away and popped her out into a dark underwater tunnel.
  
  Not entirely dark — Riptide was directly in front of her, his luminescent stripes all glowing. He reached around her, guided Clay into the tunnel, and unwrapped the seaweed blindfold. Clay blinked and rubbed his talons against his eyes, then immediately turned back toward the faint sunlight, searching for the others.
  
  Glory came through next, her snout wrinkling as she pushed tendrils off her wings. Tsunami noticed that her scales had ripples of the orange-gold color crisscrossing the silver that had been there before. She wondered if Glory had done that deliberately or if her scales automatically tried to match their environment when she was stressed.
  
  After a long pause, Starflight burst through after her. His face was puffed up like he was about to explode and, on his back, Sunny was shivering violently.
  
  Riptide flashed the lights in his tail and shot upward, aiming for a hole in the tunnel roof not far inside the entrance. Tsunami was expecting more of a swim and was surprised when her head almost immediately popped out into air.
  
  It wasn't much air — a tiny cavern, barely lit by a faraway gleam of sunlight up a long narrow chimney. The dragons' bodies were still in the watery tunnel below. There was only enough room in the cavern for their heads, all gathered closely in the pool. Tsunami could see right away that there was nowhere to climb out. This was a place to stop and breathe, nothing more.
  
  Sunny and Starflight both gasped for air like they hadn't breathed in months. Clay fumbled in the dark to pat Sunny's head and pulled her blindfold off as well.
  
  "Good thing this breathing hole is here," Clay remarked to Riptide. "So close to the entrance, I mean."
  
  Riptide inclined his head in a sort of nod. "Queen Blister insisted on it."
  
  Tsunami felt the whoosh of several SeaWing guards swimming past below them. She knew there would be a few of them bringing up the rear, making sure none of the dragonets ran off to spread the news of the Summer Palace's secret location.
  
  She couldn't keep her wings still. They thrummed like trapped dragonflies, wanting to spring loose. She was so close. This was her palace! Her dragons were only a few wingbeats away! After six years of imagining what this would be like, she didn't think she could stand another minute of waiting.
  
  "Let's go, let's go," she said, splashing the others enthusiastically with her tail.
  
  "Good grief," Glory said with a shake. "It's like you've been possessed by Sunny or something."
  
  "Come on, we're almost there." Tsunami flashed her stripes happily, and the other dragonets covered their eyes.
  
  "I can swim from here," Sunny said to Starflight. "Or I'll hold on to Clay if you all go too fast."
  
  Starflight looked disappointed and relieved at the same time.
  
  Riptide sank below the surface, and Tsunami ducked after him, too excited to wait for the others.
  
  Now it was easy to follow Riptide's glowing scales. The tunnel twisted up and down and around corners, with frequent stops like the first for breathing. Too frequent, if you asked Tsunami; each one made her want to bang her head into the cliff walls. She lost count after the fourth stop, but there had to be at least ten. How long was this tunnel?
  
  Then suddenly, finally, there was light ahead — real light, not glowing scales. A moment later they swam out of the tunnel into an open lake, lifted their heads above the water, and breathed in deeply. Green-tinted sunlight dazzled their eyes at first, but as her vision cleared, Tsunami saw dragons.
  
  Over a hundred blue and green dragons surrounded them, all of them staring expectantly at Tsunami.
  
  Her tribe. Her dragons. Her future subjects.
  
  They had reached the Summer Palace of the SeaWings, in the heart of the Kingdom of the Sea.
  
  Overwhelmed, Tsunami spread her wings to float on the water and gazed around.
  
  They were inside the island, surrounded by towering cliffs on all sides. Far above them, sunlight filtered through a thick green canopy — the vines and treetops she'd seen from the sky, woven so thickly it looked like a jungle from above. Like an emerald umbrella over the island, the canopy protected the Summer Palace from view and gave the light a sea-green quality that made Tsunami feel like she was still underwater.
  
  Waterfalls cascaded down from several holes in the cliffs, like slender dragon tails of silver, bursting into spray as they hit the lake. The only exit Tsunami could see was the tunnel behind her.
  
  Four pillars of blue-tinted white stone spiraled out of the water, winding toward one another until they formed a towering pavilion in the middle of the lake. The pavilion had twelve circular levels, each one smaller than the one below. There were few walls, most of them very low, and the whole structure was latticed with curving shapes and holes and little wading pools. It didn't look like it had been built; it looked as if it had grown that way, although Tsunami was pretty sure that was impossible.
  
  Dragons were clustered along the edges of the pavilion, on ledges of the cliffs, and all across the water. She'd never seen so many faces like her own, dark blues and pale greens and sharp see-in-the-dark eyes staring.
  
  The only sound was the splashing of the waterfalls, the soft hush of dragons breathing, and the quiet lapping of waves on the beaches around the lake.
  
  After a moment, Starflight spotted the nearest stretch of sand and set off for it in a frantic paddle that sounded horribly loud in the silence. Sunny and Clay and Glory followed him.
  
  Tsunami stayed where she was, ignoring the tiredness that was flooding her scales. She wanted to make a good impression on the dragons of her kingdom. Many of them were floating on the water, like she was, but many more were perched in cave openings all along the cliff or on rocks that jutted out of the water, while others lined the shallow beaches. Tsunami wondered what they'd all been doing before she appeared to capture their attention.
  
  She spotted Shark hunched on one of the spirals of the closest pillar. She rather thought he should have given some sort of welcome speech, but he only stared at her with his pale, unblinking little eyes.
  
  In the story, the royal parents had swept forward with a parade and a whole orchestra to welcome back their missing princess. But her parents weren't here yet, and now that she thought about it, dolphins playing harps would probably be a bit silly looking.
  
  Well, she was a future queen, and she wasn't going to be intimidated by crowds of staring dragons. She shook her head and lifted her neck out of the water.
  
  "Hello, fellow SeaWings," she called, and then paused as her voice echoed off the rocks, much louder than she'd expected. "I'm Tsunami, and, um — I'm very happy to be home at last, and — and I look forward to meeting each of you."
  
  Three moons, was that the most awful speech in the history of Pyrrhia? What were all these still, silent faces thinking? Could the dragons see Tsunami's natural royalty? Were they excited that she'd be their queen one day?
  
  She remembered her royal stripe patterns and lifted her wings out of the water so everyone could see them. To be sure they were visible, she lit them up, and then, with a sinking feeling, remembered what she'd accidentally said to Riptide. She really, really hoped she hadn't just told her entire kingdom that they had delicious fish breath or something.
  
  A murmur ran around the gathered dragons, but she couldn't tell if it was good murmuring or bad murmuring. She turned to Riptide, who was watching Shark with a grim expression.
  
  "I think you should take me somewhere I can wait for my mother," Tsunami suggested in a low voice — or she thought it was low, but the echoes still skipped back to her across the water. And now there was more murmuring. Tsunami wished she had NightWing powers so she could hear the dragons' thoughts.
  
  "Up there," said Riptide, nodding to the top of the pavilion. He glanced at Shark again. "You should bring your friends."
  
  The other dragonets were sprawled on the white pebbles of the beach, in front of a tall cave opening lined with sand. They had their wings spread out and were gasping in a rather undignified way. All except for Glory, who was sitting neatly by the cave, peering in. Her silver scales were now mottled with azure blue. Any SeaWings who weren't staring at Tsunami were staring at her.
  
  Tsunami thwacked the water with her tail to get their attention. When Clay finally looked over, she pointed to the pavilion. He nodded, and she lifted into the air. Her wings felt heavy out of the water, and it took a few beats to get her balance. She wished the SeaWings would go back to whatever they were supposed to be doing.
  
  Riptide flew up beside her. He looked uncomfortable with all the scrutiny as well.
  
  "Tell me about the Summer Palace," Tsunami said, trying to distract herself.
  
  He flicked his tail at the cliffs. "Guest rooms are in the caves. Queen Blister usually stays in the one closest to the tunnel. We brought in extra sand to line the floor for her, and it's the only cave where fire is allowed." His snout turned toward the pavilion as they flew higher. "She meets with Queen Coral on the second level from the top, which is only for visiting royalty. Each level has a different purpose — for instance, there's a floor for dragonet school visits, one for celebration spectacles, and one for war planning. When they are here instead of the Deep Palace, the Council meets on this level, halfway up."
  
  He paused, beating his wings, so Tsunami could look across the middle level. Twelve dragon-sized pools were arranged in a circle with small channels running from one to the next and crisscrossing the center. Glittering emeralds the size of fish eggs, which were embedded in the stone, spelled out words by each pool. Tsunami saw one marked TREASURY, one labeled DEFENSE, and another that said SECRETS & SPIES. Before she could read any further, Riptide turned to fly higher.
  
  "Council?" Tsunami said, catching up to him.
  
  "They prefer the Deep Palace, as does the queen," Riptide said. "Only Shark and Lagoon are here at the moment."
  
  Tsunami had no idea what he was talking about, but she didn't want to reveal how ignorant she was of SeaWing politics. She wondered if there was anything about a council in Starflight's favorite scrolls.
  
  "So which level is for missing princesses?" she joked.
  
  "I think the top pavilion would be best," Riptide said. "That's for new visitors, and we hardly ever have any of those. Queen Blister was probably the last — oh, no, it was that NightWing." He landed gracefully on the uppermost ledge of the pavilion, his claws catching on polished ridges in the bluish-white stone.
  
  "What NightWing?" Tsunami asked, landing beside him. This level was bigger than she'd expected. A spiraling starburst of webbed talon-print shapes was carved into the floor and filled with glittering water, lined all along the bottom with tiny pearls. Tsunami realized the pattern was the same as the one on her wings.
  
  "I don't know," Riptide answered her. "He only spoke with Her Majesty and Queen Blister, and all I heard was that he wanted to fly out through the canopy instead of the tunnel — but of course they wouldn't let him do that. He looked big and bad-tempered."
  
  "Sounds like Morrowseer," Tsunami muttered, although she didn't exactly have a lot of other NightWings to compare him to. But he seemed more meddlesome than the rest of them. While most of the tribe hid in their secret location, being all mysterious and unhelpfully powerful, Morrowseer kept turning up... delivering the dragonet prophecy, inspecting the dragonets, trying to get Glory killed, saving Starflight (but no one else) from the SkyWings, then giving him back once everyone had escaped. Tsunami could easily imagine him poking around here, although she couldn't guess why.
  
  Riptide glanced down at the dragons below, including Shark, who hadn't moved from his spot on the pillar. "I can't believe you spoke to Shark like that," he whispered. "I've never seen anyone talk back to him, apart from the queen and Queen Blister."
  
  "He deserved it," Tsunami said, settling her wings. "Arrogant blowfish-head. When I'm queen, I'll make him go sit in a lagoon and grow seaweed."
  
  Riptide coughed hard to cover a laugh. "Don't talk like that!" he whispered. "Don't you know the difference between brave and reckless? Shark will eat you and your friends for lunch if he thinks you're a threat to him."
  
  "Pfft," Tsunami said. "He can try." She shoved away the creepy memory of Shark's unblinking, malicious eyes.
  
  "By the moons, you make me ner vous," Riptide said.
  
  One end of the top floor was raised and carved into a magnificent dragon throne, studded with emeralds and sapphires and shot through with gold lines in the shape of waves. Beside and below the throne was another, smaller throne carved to match, with the same patterns made of tinier gemstones.
  
  Tsunami tilted her head at the second throne. It looked too small to be for a king. So was this for her? Had Queen Coral prepared a throne for her missing daughter, waiting all these years for her to come fill it?
  
  She took a step toward it, her heart pounding with excitement. A throne of her own! Already!
  
  The arrival of her friends stopped her, as the four dragonets crashed down around the ledge. Sunny landed lightly, avoiding the channels of water, but Clay somehow stumbled as his claws hit the stone and nearly somersaulted right off the other side. Glory darted in his way and pushed him back, then made another loop around and landed close to the throne. Her green eyes studied it closely; she looked almost ready to climb onto it herself.
  
  Starflight arrived last, catching on to the side and pitching forward as if his wings had barely been strong enough to carry him. He lay there like a woeful black puddle for a moment, taking deep breaths. Sunny hopped over a watery footprint to nudge his wing gently.
  
  Tsunami managed not to roll her eyes, but really. Couldn't everyone at least try to act a little more impressive?
  
  "This is a really big thing!" Clay said to her and Riptide. His tail accidentally splashed Glory, but she was too busy looking at the throne to snap at him. "I mean, this thing we're standing on. What do you call it? It's really tall — taller than our prisons in the Sky Kingdom, I think." He peered over the edge, missing Riptide's sharp look. Tsunami realized they hadn't told him about being captured by Queen Scarlet and the SkyWings.
  
  "I like it," Clay went on, sitting down and splashing Glory again. "Of course, it's much nicer to be this high when your wings are free. But at least the SkyWings gave us a pig sometimes. Do you have pigs? Octopi would be all right instead if you don't. Or squid. Or manatees. I could go for a manatee right now. Or a whale. I'm not fussy, is what I'm saying. Say, how did you make this big thing? Did it take forever to build?"
  
  Riptide blinked for a moment, following Clay's train of thought. "The pavilion? An animus SeaWing designed it, many generations ago, and magicked the stone to grow this way," Riptide said. "Even so, it took nearly ten years to reach this form."
  
  "Wow," said Clay, and Tsunami couldn't help being impressed, too. She hadn't realized animus dragons had that kind of power. In their lessons, Webs had told them animus dragons could enchant chess pieces to play themselves. Sometimes they left curses on their jewels to poison anyone who tried to steal them. But making a whole pavilion grow from stone — that seemed like strong magic, more powerful than anything the NightWings could do.
  
  Starflight was clearly thinking the same thing, judging from his disgruntled snout. Tsunami hurriedly interrupted before he could begin a lecture.
  
  "This top level is where Queen Coral meets new visitors, like us," she said importantly to her friends. "So when she arrives, everyone please act like dragonets of destiny instead of half-drowned seagulls, for goodness' sake."
  
  Sunny looked wounded, and Starflight sniffed loudly while Glory turned up her snout like she wasn't taking any orders from Tsunami. Clay poked his nose over the edge and blinked at the lower pavilion tiers.
  
  "Which level is the feasting on?" he asked. "You do have feasting, right?" His wide brown eyes turned to Riptide. "No reason. Just wondering."
  
  "Sure, sometimes we have feasts," Riptide said. "Especially when Queen Blister is —"
  
  A commotion from below interrupted him. Tsunami sprang to the edge and gazed down at the lake.
  
  A huge blue SeaWing, exactly the color of Tsunami's scales, burst out of the tunnel. Vines of pearls were woven around her horns and neck and wings, and a twisted white horn with a wicked-looking point was attached to the end of her tail. She had odd black stains on her claws, but she was the most beautiful sight Tsunami had ever seen.
  
  All over the palace, dragons were folding down into low bows.
  
  This had to be her mother — queen of the SeaWings. Tsunami reached to grab Riptide's forearm, feeling dizzy with joy.
  
  But as Queen Coral shot out of the water, Tsunami saw that she wore a thin, webbed harness with a long cord... which led to a harness on another dragon, flying close behind her.
  
  The second dragon was much smaller — a dragonet only about a year old, perhaps. She flapped her wings frantically, trying to keep up. With a jolt of shock, Tsunami spotted the royal pattern of stripes on the underside of her wings.
  
  "Who is that?" she hissed at Riptide. He was backing away to the edge of the floor, the farthest spot from the throne.
  
  "That's Anemone," he said, blinking in surprise. "Your sister."
  
  An enemy.
  
  Anemone.
  
  An enemy.
  
  It took Tsunami a few moments to realize what Riptide had actually said. Her skin prickled, hearing an enemy, an enemy, until it sank in that he'd been saying a name.
  
  Anemone. Tsunami's sister. Another heir to the throne.
  
  So much for being special. So much for her guaranteed future kingdom.
  
  "Uh-oh," Glory said, echoing her thoughts. "Looks like you've got some competition. Maybe you're not destined to be queen after all."
  
  Tsunami whirled toward Starflight, her gills flaring. "You said I was the only one," she cried. "You said none of the others survived."
  
  "That's what I read," he protested. He spread his black claws. "Blame the Talons, not me. Our scrolls were often old and outdated. The Royal Lineage of the SeaWings, from the Scorching to the Present must have been written before this one was hatched." He nodded at the little dragon flapping behind the queen.
  
  Anemone was a pale, pale blue, almost white like an IceWing, with hints of pink along her wings and ears and horns. She looked a little bit like the dolphins they'd seen earlier, and Tsunami wondered grumpily if that was really why Queen Coral had forbidden SeaWings to eat them — in case one of them ate Anemone by mistake. Anemone's eyes were large and blue, and tiny strands of pearls were woven around her neck and tail as if to match her mother's.
  
  That could have been me, Tsunami thought. I could have been the one with matching pearls and a matching throne and a mother who loved me, if the Talons hadn't stolen me from my home.
  
  She didn't have a chance to notice anything else, because suddenly Queen Coral was landing and running toward her.
  
  "My baby!" Coral cried. Enormous blue wings whooshed around Tsunami, enveloping her in a hug that smelled of sea air and starfish. Pearls pressed into Tsunami's face as Coral cuddled her close. Her wet scales were warm and her talons were gentle as she stroked Tsunami's head and back and wings.
  
  "I knew you'd come back to me," she said. "I knew you were out there, trying to find your way back. I never stopped searching for you."
  
  It was exactly what Tsunami had always wanted to hear.
  
  Actually it was word-for-word what the queen said in The Missing Princess, but Tsunami shoved that thought aside.
  
  She leaned into her mother, feeling elation flood her from horns to claws. Someone does want me. I have a place in the world.
  
  "Mother," whined a tiny voice from behind them. "Ow. That was too fast. I think I hurt my claws."
  
  Queen Coral let go of Tsunami, whirled around, and tugged Anemone closer with the harness cord. The little dragonet crept under her wing and held out her front talons with a pitiful expression.
  
  "I'm sorry, sweetheart," Coral said, carefully examining Anemone's claws and then giving them a quick lick with her forked tongue. "Is that better?"
  
  "I guess," Anemone said, flexing her talons mournfully.
  
  "Look, darling, it's your sister. The one I told you about, who was stolen six years ago." Coral reached out and slid one webbed talon over Tsunami's snout. "Isn't she gorgeous?"
  
  Anemone blinked at Tsunami. She was really tiny, no taller than a scavenger, and she didn't look very strong. Maybe I don't have to worry about her, Tsunami thought. She'd be easy to defeat, and obviously I'd make a better queen.
  
  Then she felt a stab of guilt for thinking about something like that on her first meeting with her real family. She held out one of her front talons to Anemone, and after a small pause, Anemone pressed her own talon against it.
  
  "Hi," Tsunami said. "I'm Tsunami."
  
  "Ah," Queen Coral said. "A good name. Webs did one thing right." Her green eyes narrowed. "Where is he now? I have been planning his punishment for years." She glared over Tsunami's shoulder, but when Tsunami looked around, the only dragon there was Riptide. He had his head ducked and his wings folded as low as he could get.
  
  "I knew he was a coward and a deserter," Coral said, "but after he returned to steal my egg... well, let's just say it won't be a quick death."
  
  "Oh, no," Sunny squeaked. "Please don't hurt him. He was the only one who was really nice to us."
  
  "We don't know where he is anyway," Tsunami said as Queen Coral turned to stare at Sunny. "He escaped when —"
  
  "What are you?" Coral asked Sunny. Her gaze fell on the other dragonets, and her tail lashed dangerously. "WHY IS THERE A MUDWING IN MY SUMMER PALACE?" She took a step toward Clay, gills flaring.
  
  "These are my friends," Tsunami cried, leaping in front of Clay. "You can trust them, I promise. We were all stolen from our homes as eggs. We're the dragonets of destiny, from the prophecy."
  
  "Ha," muttered a voice, and Tsunami realized that Shark was now perched on the rim of the ledge along with nine other very large dragons.
  
  "Oh," Queen Coral said slowly. "Oh, I see." She studied Clay suspiciously, then turned her gaze to Starflight, Sunny, and Glory. "Yes, that was the rumor. If you believe in things like prophecies, of course. Dragonets of destiny. Well, Queen Blister will be so interested to meet you. We'd better make sure you don't go anywhere." She flashed the royal patterns along her wings and clapped her front talons together. Seven burly SeaWings rose up behind the dragonets, claws twitching ominously.
  
  "Put these four in Blister's cave," Queen Coral commanded, "and set a guard so they stay there."
  
  "What?" Sunny cried. "But we came here to be safe! Not to be prisoners again!" She squeaked in terror as one guard snatched her into the air. Starflight stared after her, frozen in place with his claws half outstretched.
  
  "Nobody touches me," Glory snarled at the SeaWing who was reaching for her. Black clouds billowed up in her scales.
  
  "Don't hurt Sun — ow," Clay yelped as three SeaWings landed on him at once, pinning him down. "Ouch! Ow!" One began lashing woven seaweed ropes around his wings and claws and snout.
  
  "Wait," Tsunami said. She clasped her talons pleadingly. "Your Majesty... Mother." The word felt so odd on her tongue, even though she'd imagined saying it a million times. "You don't have to do this. They're my friends, and I brought them here so you could protect us. I swear they're trustworthy."
  
  "It's for their own safety, too, dear," Coral said, stroking Tsunami's head again. "We won't hurt them, of course. You've come to the right place for protection. But they shouldn't wander the palace unsupervised — most of my dragons will attack MudWings and unfamiliar SandWings on sight."
  
  "Or whatever that is," Shark muttered, sniffing at Sunny. Starflight shot him a glare, then looked away quickly as the SeaWing turned his gaze to him.
  
  "I guess this means no feast?" Clay said mournfully. He rested his snout on the stone with a sigh.
  
  "Food can certainly be arranged," said the queen. "Lagoon, make sure our guests are well fed." A plump turquoise dragon bowed and dove off the ledge. "See, darling, we'll take good care of you all. Please tell that one to stop looking so fierce." Coral flicked a claw at Glory, who was still facing off with a ner vous-looking SeaWing guard.
  
  Tsunami thought, uncomfortably, of Glory's secret weapon. In the SkyWing palace, they'd discovered Glory could spit a deadly venom, which seemed to be a RainWing skill most dragons didn't know about. It certainly hadn't been in any of the scrolls, which rarely mentioned RainWings at all.
  
  But Tsunami hoped Glory would decide to keep her venom a secret for now. Melting one of the queen's guards probably wasn't the best way to introduce the dragonets of destiny to the SeaWings.
  
  "You don't have to tie them up," Tsunami said. "They'll go with you."
  
  "Speak for yourself," Glory growled.
  
  "Calm down, Glory," Tsunami said. She hoped her mother and the other dragons would see her as the leader of the dragonets. "You heard the queen. It's for your own safety. You'll be fine."
  
  Please don't argue with me in front of my mother, Tsunami prayed.
  
  Glory glared at the SeaWing guard for a moment longer. "All right," she snarled. "I'll go with you. But I still say nobody touches me."
  
  "Fair enough," Queen Coral purred with another gesture and flash of her stripes. "Off you all go, then. Tsunami, darling, come sit with me and let's talk." She swept over to her throne, towing Anemone behind her. The tiny dragonet settled onto the small throne, flicking her pearly wings and watching Tsunami's friends with big eyes.
  
  "It'll be all right," Tsunami said to Clay as the guards hefted him into the air. "I'll come join you very soon." He nodded, still looking rather anxious. Another guard tentatively tried to shoo Starflight off the edge. The NightWing backed away from him unhappily, then turned and flew after the guard who had Sunny.
  
  Tsunami watched her friends spiral down to the cave by the entrance — brown and gold, black and silver, all of them so out of place here. She saw them vanish into the dark hole, and then the guards emerged and planted themselves outside. It didn't look like the way you'd treat guests.
  
  At least it's better than the SkyWing palace, she thought. At least we're not being forced to fight to the death. My mother is keeping us safe. She's really being welcoming, in her own way. She glanced up at her mother's warm eyes. Especially to me.
  
  Her mother reached out her talons to her, smiling. She was perfect — just what Tsunami had always imagined.
  
  Her friends would be all right, Tsunami was sure. They were in the SeaWing palace now. She was home with her family. This was her lifelong dream.
  
  There's nothing to worry about, she told herself. Nothing at all.
  
  "Here," Queen Coral said, taking a strand of pearls off her own horns. "You're so unadorned, my beautiful dragonet. I have to start making up for all the presents I missed giving you." She leaned forward and draped the pearls around Tsunami's neck. They were heavy and smooth, sliding coolly across Tsunami's scales.
  
  My first trea sure.
  
  It was a strange thrill, having something of her very own. All dragons loved trea sure — it was the only thing they had in common with scavengers. But this was more than a shiny, beautiful thing. It belonged to Tsunami and nobody else. And it made her look even more like her mother.
  
  Tsunami stroked the pearls with her claw and tucked her tail around her back talons. She wished Anemone would stop staring at her. She must hate me, she thought. I would if I were her. She must know I want the throne she thought was hers.
  
  But not yet. Now was the time for getting to know her mother.
  
  "Can we talk alone?" Tsunami asked. The ten dragons were still perched like creepy sentinels, with Shark the creepiest of all.
  
  "Of course," said the queen. "Council, you are dismissed. Moray, send a message to Queen Blister and see how quickly she can get here. As for you, creature, go back to your guard outpost and stay there until someone actually wants to see you."
  
  Riptide crouched, nodding, and dove over the edge. Tsunami leaned out to watch him swimming into the tunnel.
  
  "What's wrong with Riptide?" she asked as the other ten dragons also flew away in a thunderclap of wingbeats. "I thought he was nice."
  
  "Oh, no," Queen Coral said with a shudder. "He can't be trusted. Webs is his father. Their bloodline is tainted with betrayal."
  
  Tsunami felt like a giant wave had just knocked her over. "Webs is his father?" But she'd liked Riptide — and all along he was the son of her kidnapper. Which he'd carefully never mentioned. What else hadn't he told her?
  
  "Nasty family," Coral went on. She lashed her tail, nearly hitting Anemone in the head. "Not fitting company for royalty by any means. We keep him as far away from us as possible."
  
  Poor Riptide, Tsunami thought. It wasn't his fault his father had turned traitor, but he suffered for it anyway.
  
  And yet, he had hidden the truth from her, and she didn't like that at all.
  
  Was Queen Coral right about him? Surely she knew her own subjects better than Tsunami did.
  
  But there was still a part of Tsunami that hoped she'd see him again.
  
  She glanced at Anemone. "So — we were saying — alone —?"
  
  "Oh, no, Anemone never leaves my side," Queen Coral said. She reached over and lovingly patted the little dragonet's head. "I finally got a living daughter, and I'm keeping her that way."
  
  "By watching me every second," Anemone said. She widened her eyes at Tsunami, who wondered if she'd imagined a hint of sarcasm in her sister's words.
  
  "And now I have two daughters!" Queen Coral said proudly. "Possibly four by the end of next week, if Tortoise does her job right." She gave Tsunami a worried look. "Maybe we should make a harness for you, too, dear."
  
  "Oh, no, that's all right," Tsunami said, eyeing the straps that lashed Coral and Anemone together. "I've managed to take care of myself up to now. I promise I'll stay alive." Much as she already loved her mother, she could not imagine being attached to anyone every moment of every day.
  
  "Hmmm," said the queen. "Well, we'll think about it." She studied Tsunami's shoulders as if she was mentally measuring her for a harness anyway.
  
  "I have to tell you something," Tsunami said, hoping to change the subject. "I — I don't know the underwater language. Webs never taught it to me."
  
  Queen Coral stared at her. "What is wrong with that dragon?" she growled. "It's all right, sweetheart. We'll have Whirlpool teach you — he's a terrific teacher. Right, Anemone?"
  
  Anemone shrugged.
  
  "So what do you know?" Queen Coral asked. "Did they teach you anything?"
  
  "Of course!" Tsunami said. She didn't want her mother to think she was unfit to be queen. "We had lots of battle training. And Webs taught us the history of Pyrrhia. We learned all about the Scorching and how the tribes were founded and how we nearly wiped out the scavengers. Um, and he did geography, too. Dune taught us hunting. Kestrel was supposed to teach different tribe strengths and weaknesses, but mostly she just yelled and tried to set us on fire a lot."
  
  Anemone's eyes were bright with interest. "Why don't I get to learn those things, Mother?" she asked.
  
  "You will, dear," said Queen Coral. "When I think you're ready."
  
  "What do you study?" Tsunami asked.
  
  Anemone glanced up at her mother. "How the Council works," she said. "Aquatic, of course. How to interpret battle reports and order our defenses. Managing the food supply and the treasury, although the Council commanders really do all that."
  
  "It's still important to stay on top of them," purred the queen. "Dragons do their best work if you watch them closely the whole time."
  
  "But mostly I'm stuck in training sessions with Whirlpool," Anemone said. Her wings drooped.
  
  "For what?" Tsunami asked. "Aquatic?"
  
  "Never mind, dear," Queen Coral interrupted. "You'll see eventually. Were the Talons of Peace very cruel to you?"
  
  "Terribly!" Tsunami said. This was one of her favorite topics. "They never let us out of the caves at all! They acted like we were brainless snails! Nobody ever listened to me. And they wouldn't tell us anything about our families or where we came from. I only found out about you a few days ago."
  
  "My poor, poor baby," Queen Coral said, stroking Tsunami's head again.
  
  Exactly, Tsunami thought. This was the sympathy she'd always wanted. Although she didn't appreciate the skeptical look on Anemone's face.
  
  "What are these?" Tsunami asked. She leaned forward and touched the dark stains on the queen's talons with one claw. They looked too dark to be bloodstains, but she couldn't guess what else they were.
  
  "The perils of my job!" Queen Coral said with a laugh. "Well, my hobby. My art, you might call it. I should show you." She sprang to her feet, tugging Anemone up with her. "And then you can meet Whirlpool. You'll adore him. He's just the most wonderful, brilliant young dragon."
  
  Tsunami was nearly certain she caught Anemone rolling her eyes. She followed the two of them down four levels to a floor with low walls and several shapes like large cauldrons molded into the stone. Black and blue webbed talon prints trailed all around the floor, and a raised podium stood at one end with space for an audience of thirty dragons in front.
  
  At the other end was a long gray stone table with a scroll spread out on it, held down at either end by a small seahorse carved of dark brown wood. Tsunami peered at the scroll, which looked only half written.
  
  "That's my work in progress," Queen Coral said proudly. "Whirlpool, come here!" She bustled over to one of the cauldrons, and Tsunami realized they were all packed with neatly rolled scrolls.
  
  "This is beautiful," she said, lifting one of the carved seahorses. They were heavy and intricately detailed, with curiously dragonlike expressions on their tiny faces.
  
  "Orca made those," Queen Coral said sadly. "My first daughter. She was a very talented sculptor."
  
  First daughter? What happened to her? Tsunami hadn't thought any of them lived long enough to become artists. She gave Anemone a quizzical expression, but her sister was watching the queen intently. I'll ask Starflight later. Orca must be in that lineage scroll he was going on about.
  
  A dark green dragon with pale green eyes rose up from the Council level. He had a remarkably large gold hoop piercing one ear and dappled, light green scales in wave patterns along his back. He also had the same dark stains on his talons.
  
  "Your Majesty," he said with an elaborate bow. "And Your Smaller Majesties." His voice was oily and slow, like squids creeping into Tsunami's ears. She guessed this was Whirlpool, although he didn't look particularly "wonderful" or "brilliant."
  
  He bowed to Anemone and Tsunami as he settled onto the floor behind the stone table. His eyes almost immediately went from them to the scroll in front of him, and he tilted his head thoughtfully. After a moment, he reached forward and dipped one claw into a small pool of black ink in the top corner of the table. With the ink, he scratched a few more words at the point where the scroll went blank.
  
  "Oh," Tsunami said, glancing from his talons to her mother's. "Oh, it's ink."
  
  "Yes, dear," said Queen Coral. She pulled an armful of scrolls out of the cauldron. "It's a special formula made of squid ink and a touch of whale blood, so it never fades. Immortality is worth a few claw stains, don't you agree? Whirlpool invented it. He's terribly clever." She peered at the words he'd written. "Exactly what I was thinking! This is an exciting one, isn't it?"
  
  "Certain to win all the awards in the kingdom, Your Majesty," Whirlpool oozed.
  
  Queen Coral piled four scrolls into Tsunami's talons. "These are my favorites. You can read them all tonight, and tomorrow I'll give you four of my other favorites."
  
  "Read all these tonight?" Tsunami echoed, dismayed. Reading was Starflight's specialty. She liked it fine, but only if there were exciting stories and female warrior dragons. She didn't read very fast, and really she'd rather be fighting something.
  
  "Start with this one," Queen Coral said, plucking one of the scrolls free.
  
  It was The Missing Princess! Relief flooded through Tsunami. "I've read that one!" she cried. "That was my favorite story ever."
  
  "Really?" Queen Coral looked delighted, and Tsunami was pretty sure Anemone had rolled her eyes again. "I wrote it for you!"
  
  "You —" Tsunami looked from Queen Coral to Whirlpool and the scroll on the table. "You wrote The Missing Princess?"
  
  "I wrote all of these." Queen Coral waved her talons at all the scrolls in the cauldrons. "I'm really quite prolific. Whirlpool makes sure hundreds of copies are instantly made and distributed all over SeaWing territory — and wherever else on Pyrrhia we can send them. My communications herald, Moray, is in charge of the printer dragons who make the underwater copies. She also makes sure they go to all the schools. But Whirlpool organizes my readings here. Isn't he brilliant?" She lowered her voice and winked at Tsunami. "And don't you think he's very handsome?"
  
  Whirlpool looked up and gave Tsunami a toothy smile that didn't reach his eyes. His teeth were weirdly small, and his eyes were too pale and blobby, like frog eyes. Tsunami couldn't help thinking of Riptide, who was much more handsome, if you asked her — although she knew better than to tell Coral that.
  
  "He'll make a fabulous king one day," Queen Coral added in a loud whisper.
  
  Oh dear. Tsunami hid her shudder. Is Queen Coral throwing him at me? She glanced at Anemone and saw the little dragonet quickly erasing a hopeful expression from her face. Hmmm. She bet Anemone could clear up a lot of mysteries, if Tsunami could get her alone for a moment. Too bad that was impossible.
  
  "Your Majesty." They all turned and found another Council dragon hovering in the air behind the queen, with a smaller dragon beside her. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but Urchin just arrived with strange news. I knew you'd want to hear it right away."
  
  "Of course, Moray," said Queen Coral. "You always know what's best."
  
  Moray's scales were the same dull gray green as Shark's, and her eyes were also small and colorless. Tsunami wondered if they were related. The Council dragon pressed her snout into a brief smug look. "That's because I have had excellent training at the side of the most wonderful queen in Pyrrhian history," she said.
  
  Oh my word, Tsunami thought. This time she was able to catch Anemone's eye, behind the queen's back, to make an "Is she serious?" face. Anemone looked startled for a moment, then made a face back that Tsunami was pretty sure meant "Believe me, it gets worse."
  
  Moray went on. "Apparently a dead dragon has been found only a few islands from the Summer Palace."
  
  "Oh, how sad," said Queen Coral with a little yawn. She glanced at her scrolls as if she wanted to get back to them. "What happened to him?"
  
  "Her," said Moray. "And we don't know yet. But the strange part is that it's not a SeaWing. It's a SkyWing."
  
  "WHAT?" Queen Coral leaped to her talons. "That close to the palace?" She snapped at the air and spread her wings. "Get Shark and Piranha and take me to the body. Now."
  
  The queen shot into the air with Anemone flapping wildly to keep up. Tsunami dropped the scrolls and jumped after them, flying in a tight spiral down to the water. This was her chance to see the queen in action!
  
  She thought she heard someone shout her name as she splashed down. Sunny or Clay? The water rushed into her ears, muffling the cry. They didn't have to worry; she wouldn't be gone long. They'd be safe here.
  
  Shark whipped past, churning up the water as he charged into the tunnel ahead of her. He was between her and Coral now, but Tsunami wasn't going to let that stop her. She swam after them as fast as she could. She felt another dragon close on her tail, but didn't turn around or slow down.
  
  It felt like only moments later when Tsunami's snout emerged into the golden kelp curtain. She followed the eddies left by the dragon tails ahead of her and realized they weren't going to the surface.
  
  So they weren't flying to the body; they were swimming there. Which made sense. They were SeaWings, after all.
  
  All right. I can do this. Tsunami ignored how tired her wings felt and beat them harder, determined to keep up. Even so, the two dragons behind her quickly passed her — Moray and another from the Council, who she guessed was Piranha.
  
  She saw both dragons dip down in the water and suddenly speed up. Despairing, she tried to do the same thing — tipping her wings to dip down to the same level. A fierce current immediately caught her up and shoved her along after them.
  
  For a moment, Tsunami struggled against it. She didn't like being caught by anything stronger than her. But then she realized the other dragons were using it to travel faster, and she'd have to do the same thing if she wanted to stay with them.
  
  Slowly she relaxed and let the current sweep her along. It gave her a chance to look around. A school of black fish with silver speckles shot by overhead, like a flock of crows or NightWings, spinning and whirling in shifting formations. Large translucent mushrooms sprouted from the ocean floor, with tiny orange fish clustered around them.
  
  A pulsing reddish-pink octopus wobbled by, and Tsunami wondered if they were delicious; they were definitely slow enough to catch.
  
  Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted movement behind a swarm of iridescent jellyfish. She squinted and realized it was Riptide, following her from a distance. She lifted one of her wings and waved to him, and after a moment, he sheepishly waved back.
  
  She didn't know what he was supposed to be doing, but this probably wasn't it.
  
  Still, she kind of liked having him there, so she wasn't going to tell Coral on him. Not until she decided how mad she was about the "Webs being his father" secret anyway.
  
  They swam for what felt like miles, over wide stretches of algae-covered coral reef that looked like ancient stone ruins: palaces and temples that had collapsed long ago. Occasionally a large greenish-silver fish would dart up, swim alongside Tsunami for a moment, notice her with a start of alarm, and flash away again. She was hungry but too tired to try eating any of them.
  
  Even with the help of the current, Tsunami felt ready to collapse. Finally, up ahead, she saw Moray and Piranha sweep up to the surface. Relieved, she struggled out of the current and followed them into the air.
  
  Queen Coral was already standing on a large, craggy boulder that jutted out of the sea at the base of an enormous cliff. Anemone was crowded onto a tiny outcropping beside her. Not far away, a seal edged ner vously into the water, trying not to attract their attention.
  
  Waves pounded the rocks, roaring like angry dragons and spraying salt water over everyone who was clustered around the queen on smaller rocks.
  
  Tsunami found a jagged black rock the right size for her and clambered up. For a moment she just breathed, happy not to be moving. She had no idea how she'd make it back to the Summer Palace. Deal with that later. Far off to the north, she saw a bank of dark clouds huddled on the horizon, muttering and flashing.
  
  "She's been dead a day or two," Shark said grimly. "Killed quite violently, by the looks of it."
  
  Tsunami glanced down at the broken red body snagged on the rocks. Shark was leaning over the corpse, inspecting the deep slashes across the throat. He shook his head and stepped back.
  
  A bolt of shock and terror shot through Tsunami.
  
  She knew this SkyWing.
  
  It was Kestrel, the dragon who'd raised them.
  
  Kestrel was dead. And somebody had clearly murdered her.