Or would she always feel like an outsider?
“What are you hunting for?” Silver asked. Ferdi leaped, his feet sure on the slippery rocks, and drove his hand into the water again.
“Whatever the sea provides.” He straightened up and grinned, holding his arm high. The weak winter sky backlit him, so he looked like a magnificent granite statue of a warrior. A wiggling, multilegged creature dangled from his hand. “Octopus. Delicious. And there’s loads of laver here. Sea greens,” he amended, seeing Silver’s confusion.
Ferdi came back to the beach and pulled out a knife. With swift expertise, he cleaned the octopus, sliced it into pieces, and wrapped it in the sea greens. He passed several little packages to Silver. “Breakfast. For strength.”
She sniffed the food, forcing her expression to remain neutral even though the briny scent was heavy enough to make her stomach flip-flop. It was just different, she reminded herself. An entire civilization thrived on this kind of food.
She popped one package into her mouth and chewed. The taste was sharp, the texture chewy at first, then tender.
“It’s good,” she said.
Ferdi laughed. “Don’t sound so surprised. I’m actually a pretty decent cook. It’s either learn how to make delicious things from what the seas provide or live off those horrible hard crackers I’m always sent on my journeys with.”
Silver thought about what Brajon would make of the octopus packages. It would probably tear him apart, his love of food warring with his dislike of everything about the ocean. Despite her exhaustion, Silver laughed.
“What?”
“I’m imagining Brajon doing what you just did. He’d fall in before he’d ever catch anything, and then if he did catch something, he’d probably refuse to eat it, whining about not knowing if it was poisonous and wishing he’d brought his mom along to cook for him.”
“He has it good. Desert food is wonderful,” Ferdi said.
“Islander food is pretty great, too.” Silver shared a smile with Ferdi, then dropped her lashes, her cheeks flushing with warmth.
“Good enough to make you hurry to the islands, once you’re done at the Keep?”
“I don’t need good food for that,” Silver said.
Silver looked at her hands, chapped from salt water and callused from where she gripped Hiyyan’s mane as she rode the water dragon. Her fingertips would always be that sickly shade of gray. The water dragon–shaped burn scar would always pucker at her wrist.
“What’s wrong?” Ferdi said, brushing his hands of the last of their meal.
“Nothing. Thinking about home.”
Ferdi looked thoughtful. “You’ll be a hero to them, you know.”
“Not to my father.” Silver shook her head and looked down again.
Ferdi leaned forward, twisting his head upside down so that Silver had to look at him. A laugh burst from her without warning.
Ferdi sat back on his heels, pleased. “I get it. I know all about complicated fathers.”
“Better than most, I suppose.” Silver curled a strand of hair around her finger as she pondered. “Ferdi, what do you think the gift will be? The one the heartstone will enhance?”
Instead of answering, Ferdi asked a question of his own. “When Sagittaria says she cares only about water dragons, and nothing more, do you believe her?”
Before seeing Kyan and Dortaal face off, Silver would have answered with an emphatic no. But maybe Sagittaria Wonder knew things Silver didn’t. Things about underground rumblings and council members who did—and certainly did not—want to have any involvement whatsoever with humans.
Was her bond with Hiyyan wrong? Even if it was, would it change anything? Silver could never want to sever her bond with Hiyyan. He didn’t seem to want that, either, even when he was faced with the water dragon council. With his kind, with his home.
Home is beside you. Always.
That was the most important truth, wasn’t it?
Still, she wished someone she trusted could answer her questions. Nebekker’s life of hiding away meant the old woman knew little. And Sagittaria Wonder’s villainous behavior meant Silver couldn’t safely turn to her.
A face flashed in her mind: a shaven head tattooed with the constellations, layers of cloaks and belts concealing all manner of herbal tinctures and mystic paraphernalia.
Arkilah.
Silver shuddered and pushed the image from her brain. Perhaps the threat of the unknown was more terrifying than what Silver did know.
“I don’t know.” Silver stood. “I don’t know a lot of things. But I do know that Hiyyan’s healed. I have my dragon heartstone. What comes next…? I think … I fear … it will be a lot. I’m going to need your father’s help. I have so many questions, but there have to be answers out there somewhere. And I have to go—now—to begin finding them.”
“You know you have help, Silver. His, mine, all my people’s.” As if to seal the promise, Ferdi placed his hand over his heart and grinned.
TWENTY-THREE
Under the soft light of winter’s midmorning, Hiyyan lowered his body for Silver to climb on. He waited a moment, even after she’d settled astride and one of her hands was wrapped in his mane, to allow Silver to squeeze the dragon heartstone in her other palm and send her thoughts to Kirja.
Silver blinked at a starry sky that seemed close enough to swim in and waited. How far could she send her communications with the assistance of the heartstone?
Is it safe back at the Keep? she tried.
It is safe. We are the only guests here.
Silver smiled to herself, looking down at the heartstone. Very far, then.
“Let’s go.” Hiyyan inhaled two deep breaths, then made two running leaps, and they took to the skies.
It was night when they reached the mighty stone Keep at the summit of the mountain. Hiyyan landed heavily in front of the entrance, sending Silver rolling into the fresh, powdery snow. Silver remained on her back, staring narrow-eyed up at the Aquinder. Hiyyan snorted a few laughs.
“One of these days I’ll trade you for a less troublesome water dragon,” Silver said. “A sweet little Snowfluff dragon, maybe?”
Hiyyan blew a cloud of steam into her face and chuckled again.
Silver stood and pounded on the massive wooden Keep door. Mele opened the door, just like the last time Silver had come to the Keep. She and Hiyyan entered, letting the heavy tapestry fall behind them.
“You’ve come back,” Mele said. There was uncertainty in her voice.
“You wondered if we ever would?” Silver said.
Mele bit her lip, wanting to say more, but a sound across the great room changed her mind. Both girls looked to where Nebekker stood at the top of the staircase, appearing far healthier than the last time Silver had seen her. The old woman still leaned heavily on her walking stick, but her face was full of color once more and her eyes shined with depth of curiosity.
“And so the two of you have returned in one piece,” Nebekker said. She descended, her walking stick punctuating every stair and step she took. “I am glad you weren’t lost.”
Silver rubbed the back of her glove across her mouth. Yes, she and Hiyyan were there, and they hadn’t lost each other. They were more strongly bonded than ever before.
But Silver had lost other things, though it was hard to really put her finger on what. She felt tired and a bit older, sadder and more fearful than she ever had in her life.
But there was, as there always was, hope.
“You look healthy,” Silver said.
“I feel hale as a great racer. Ready to take on an army of water dragons.”
Silver raised an eyebrow at the mention of an army of dragons. What did the old yarnslady actually know? Before she could ask, Mele piped up.
“You look like you could use some food.”
“I’m desperate for a hot meal or three,” Silver admitted. There would be time to question Nebekker later.
“Come on, then.” Mele headed acro
ss the room.
“She’s made herself useful here,” Nebekker said.
“My talent for hospitality, you mean?” Mele shared a meaningful smirk with Nebekker.
“It’s amazing what one can get away with when they make themselves agreeable. A certain desert fox could learn something about patience, about the delicate art of fading into the background instead of always being front and center. This one’s a listener of the finest sort.” Nebekker cocked her head to one side. “A bit of a Watcher, as well.”
Silver dropped her gaze to the ground. She couldn’t help who she was … but maybe she could learn to be more things.
“What has she been seeing?” Silver said.
A cloud fell over Nebekker’s face. “We’ll discuss that after you’ve had a meal and a rest.”
A sharp pain like a desert scorpion bite burrowed into Silver’s chest, but she bit her tongue. If Nebekker thought it best she waited to hear the news, then she would wait. Be patient.
Silver joined Mele and Nebekker at the dining table for flatbreads topped with meat in a garlicky eggplant and yogurt sauce.
“Tell me, did you recover your heartstone?” Nebekker added a pinch of sumac and a drizzle of pomegranate molasses to her bowl.
“Yes,” Silver said.
Mele leaned forward, her food untouched. “Was it a great battle between you and Sagittaria?”
“The biggest battle was against a volcano rat.” Silver wiped her mouth with a napkin and sat back. Thinking about what had happened in the dragon council lair dashed away her appetite.
Silver told them about getting to the coast, finding Ferdi, following Sagittaria into the underwater volcano, and the chase through tunnels and across lava pits.
“And then we went through a kind of hidden door and were in the council’s den.”
“What was it like?” Mele asked.
Silver told her about the various dragons, including the four leaders.
“More Aquinder,” Mele breathed.
“One of the things that stood out the most to me was how independent they were, how they lead and ruled without input from humans.”
“Different than our racing-obsessed lifestyles,” Mele said.
“Right.” Silver nodded and looked at Nebekker. “Two things are troubling me. One, Sagittaria got her hands on a heartstone.” Silver ignored Mele’s meep! “And two, the council talked about trembles starting up again. Do you know what that all means?”
Nebekker pushed her bowl away and shook her head. “No, quakes aren’t uncommon, but the fact that the dragons are noticing more seems to mean something, doesn’t it?”
“Stay for a while and let’s search the library for clues,” Mele said.
“What I really want is to go home.” A vision of her parents made Silver’s eyes mist up. She blinked it away. “But I can’t. Not yet. Ferdi’s mapped out a covert path to the Island Nations, with his warriors stationed along the way. He assures me we’ll get to King A-Malusni safely, and we might be able to discover some clues about the tremblings in his culture’s old stories. But we have to leave tonight, under cover of darkness.”
Out the window, the twilight sky was streaked with rose-jelly pinks. It was a lazy, olden-days sky, the kind Silver would have appreciated without a care in the world back in her Jaspatonian life. But now, it just meant it was time to be on the move again. Silver looked from Nebekker to Mele, ready to see their nods and hear their agreements with Silver’s plan. Except …
“I’m staying,” Mele declared, avoiding Silver’s searching look. “Something is keeping me here, and I’m not sure what it is. A feeling. I’m going to stay until I sort that out.”
Silver set her spoon gently on the table. Dinner was turning into a rock in her belly.
“But Mele—”
“I’m better off here, searching that library for clues. Jaspaton isn’t my home, and I don’t need King A-Malusni’s help with anything. In fact…”
“You have his water dragon.”
“Silver Batal.” Mele wagged her spoon at Silver. “Aren’t you the one always telling me that water dragons don’t belong to any human? That Luap and I, bonded as we are, are meant to be together?”
Silver’s laugh was a little sad. She appraised her friend in the low golden candlelight. She had dragged Mele through more than the girl had ever bargained for already. Could she really blame her for wanting to remain somewhere safe, warm, and full of the kind of knowledge Mele was most interested in? The race for Aquinder freedom—and Silver’s, too—wasn’t Mele’s, it was Silver’s alone.
“It’s true. You don’t have his dragon. Luap is her own dragon. And you’re your own person. Which means…” Silver sighed. “I’ll miss you.”
“Same.”
Silver nodded and sat tall once more. “Nebekker? Will you be ready soon?”
The old woman sipped a hot chocolate complacently. “Kirja and I are going west.”
“West?” Silver’s spoon rattled against the table as her knee bumped the wood with shock. “What in the deserts for?”
“In search of information that will help shed light on what you saw in the dragon council den. Perhaps in search of legend and lore. And, above all, in search of an old friend, Silver.” Nebekker set her mug down. “It’s time Arkilah and I had our reckoning. Mele saw her returning to the deep deserts in the Ever.”
“What will you do when you find her?” Silver said.
Nebekker stood and pulled her hood over her head. “I only look wise, Silver Batal. Even an old woman like me acts on half-formed plans sometimes. The hope that they’ll work out in the end never truly fades away. We become more wary, true, but we also believe harder that things will work out for the best, whatever that might be. Arkilah knows things that I need to know, too.”
“And that I need to know! What else are the heartstones capable of? What can Sagittaria Wonder do with hers? What’s the queen planning next? And the rumbles the dragon council mentioned?” Silver’s mind swirled with all the things she needed to know. “I’m coming with you. The Island Nations can wait.”
Nebekker came around the table to stand next to Silver’s chair. The old yarnslady looked down on Silver, and there it was: that warm, grandmotherly expression. Maybe Silver was still Nebekker’s favorite scrappy young person, after all.
“Your safety in the Island Nations can’t wait.” Nebekker’s hand rested on Silver’s shoulder. “It’s time, Silver, for you to learn something. Your desires are not at the center of our journeys. We are your loyal friends. We love you deeply. We will help when we can. But we are all on our own paths. You and me and Mele. Even Hiyyan, Kirja, Luap. Let us help when we can, when we offer. And let us go when we don’t. I’m going to the deep deserts alone.”
From any other person, said in any other way, Silver would feel reprimanded. But Nebekker’s words put into the air something Silver had been coming to understand on her own, and instead of feeling shameful, she felt stronger than ever. Proud and understanding.
Her dream of water dragon racing still danced at the edges of her future, but it didn’t have anything to do with anyone else, and that was okay. Her goals and plans were shifting into bigger things, like freedom and the bonds between humans and water dragons, and that was okay, too.
She nodded at Nebekker. A part of her wanted to ask when she’d see Nebekker again or to make plans to meet up in a particular place and a particular time, but something told her that they would find each other again when the time was right, simple as that.
It’s time to leave, Silver sent to Hiyyan, down in the Dragon Den. And then he, too, needed to be asked a certain question: Are you coming with me?
Hiyyan’s delight was brief, but Silver felt it as a delicious warmth in her arms and legs.
I am coming with you. You are my human.
Silver rose and hugged Nebekker, even though the old woman straightened her back like a prickly desert shrub and mumbled something about disliking good-byes.
/> “Keep watching,” Silver said to Mele.
And then she was off, gathering her things, bounding down the stairs to the great room, and dashing out the side door, where Hiyyan waited. She climbed on, relishing their connection as they moved as one. Silver pulled out the rough map Ferdi had sketched her and sent a vision of it to Hiyyan. The grand Aquinder spread his wings.
“To the sky, to the sea, to the islands, where we’ll be free,” Silver said against the frosty night sky.
Hiyyan roared at the stars.
A new race had begun.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I brim over with gratitude when I think about all the hard work and heart that goes into putting Silver Batal’s adventures into book form.
To my editor, Tiffany Liao: Your strengths and talents counterbalance my weaknesses. I am becoming a better writer, thanks to you. I deeply appreciate your vision for these books and this series, your thoughtfulness and insight, and your in-house advocacy for our project.
The Holt/Macmillan team is a powerhouse that I’m so grateful to have in my corner. Thanks to all, and most especially to Christian Trimmer, editorial director; Mark Podesta, assistant editor; Lindsay Wagner, production editor; Jie Yang, production manager; Brittany Pearlman, senior publicist; Mariel Dawson, executive director of ad/promo; Lucy Del Priore, school and library marketing director; and Jen Edwards, head of sales.
I am also grateful to all the book stores, small and large alike, who have stocked my books on their shelves. Thanks to Jess Brigman for so passionately getting SILVER out there!
The cover and interior illustrations, and the book design, take my breath away. Sincerest thank-yous to artist Ilse Gort and designer Liz Dresner, who probably have holes in their tongues for how often they must bite them when someone says, “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” (You know better, and it shows in the best way possible.)
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