A Dawn of Dragonfire - By Daniel Arenson Page 0,90

heard them all, and if she hadn't, she'd heard enough to figure out any new ones. But a dumb tongue twister Mori invented? There was no chance she could have answered it." He swept his arm around them. "And it worked. It blew her apart." He sighed and looked into Lyana's eyes. "I do know what I'm doing sometimes, Lyana. I'm not always a woolhead."

She sighed, looked away, and blinked silently for long moments. Finally she looked back at him, leaned up, and kissed him on the lips.

"That," she said, "is the last kiss you'll ever get from me, so I hope you enjoyed it." She grabbed his hand and pulled him. "Now let's enter this archway and wake this Starlit Demon of yours."

They walked toward the bleeding archway. Shadows and mist swirled within it. With deep breaths and drawn swords, they stepped into the darkness.

BAYRIN

They slept through the night, holding each other as rain pattered against their scales. Dawn rose cold and so misty, Bayrin could only see several feet ahead: pines behind him, a rocky beach at his sides, whispering waves ahead. When he rolled onto his side, his scales clinked and his wounds blazed.

Mori stirred, smoke rising from her nostrils like more mist. Her eyes cracked open and gleamed. Dew glimmered on her golden scales, and lamprey bites dug red and raw on her shoulder, belly, and tail.

"Are we… are we on the island?" she whispered. "Or was it a dream?"

Bayrin struggled onto his feet, wincing as the bites across him burned. He unfurled his wings, flapped once, and tossed his head. His neck creaked. He was a lanky dragon, bones longer than most. And yet the island's pines dwarfed him; they must have stood two hundred feet tall, maybe more, as tall as Requiem's palace. Birds chirped, hooted, and cawed within them, and mist floated between the branches like ghosts. The piny scent filled the air, thick and heady. He breathed it deeply.

Mori rose to her feet, craned her neck back, and gasped. Her eyes lit up.

"Look at the size of them!" she whispered. "I've never seen trees so large." She turned to Bayrin, a smile showing her teeth. "These must be Mist Pines. Luna the Traveler wrote about them in her books. She said they're the largest trees in the world, and some are ancient, five thousand years old; that's older than Requiem itself."

Bayrin looked around at the mist. "How are we going to find the Moondisk here? Would it just be lying on the ground, hidden in a cave, stuck in a tree?" He snorted smoke. "Did Luna the Traveler write about that?"

Mori shook her head, scattering raindrops. "No. All I know is what I read in the book Artifacts of Wizardry and Power." She quoted from it, chin raised. "In the Days of Mist, the Children of the Moon sailed upon ships to the Crescent Isle, built rings of stones among the pines, and danced in the moonlight. A Moondisk they forged of bronze inlaid with gold, and upon it the moon turns, and the Three Sisters glow, and its light can extinguish all sunfire, so that the Sun God may never burn them."

Bayrin watched a snowy owl glide between the trees. He flapped his wings, rose in the air, and tried to grab it for breakfast, but it hooted and flew away. He landed back on the shore, claws digging ruts into the pebbly sand.

"So, we look for rings of stone," he said. "And we look for these Children of the Moon, whoever they are. That seems like a good start. Flying won't help us; the whole place is cloaked in mist and treetops." With a deep breath, he shifted into human form. When he stood upon his human feet, the trees seemed even larger, towering monoliths. "Let's walk and explore and find these Children of the Moon, if they're still around."

Mori shifted back into human form too. Her dress was tattered and damp, and tangles filled her hair. Her cheeks were pink and crusted with salt from the sea. Her eyes, however, still shone with hope, and Bayrin felt a jolt run through him, like a shot of strong rye on a cold night.

Stars, she's so beautiful when she's happy, he thought, and the thought surprised him. Mori—beautiful? How could Elethor's baby sister, a frightened girl who'd cry and run from him in childhood, seem so fair and kind and gentle?

He noticed that he was staring and looked away toward the