[A/N: Seven down. Three to go. Miranda brings Dart back down from the mountains, back to the life she left behind, but some things aren't easily forgotten.]

NORTH OF THE WIND

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Chapter Seven: Candle Under Glass

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The fabric of your flesh, pure as a wedding dress
Until I wrap myself inside your arms, I cannot rest
The saints can't help me now, the ropes have been unbound
I hunt for you with bloody feet across the hallowed ground
And howl!

[Florence & The Machine: Howl]

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After six weeks of the resounding mountain quiet, the ruckus of the streets of Deningrad is deafening. The stifling funk of the streets chokes me. Pointless hurry or maddening complacency marks every face. They can't know real strain, real heartache, not when their biggest concern is a half per cent increase in taxes. I glance back at Dart, leading our Runners—his went lame trying to throw him—unwashed, threadbare, red-eyed. The only difference between us is his bristly unshaven jaw. These people look only half alive. We look half dead.

Every time I come back to Deningrad, I'm a stranger. For the sake of the Queen's reputation I've knotted one of the spare shirts around my hair, hoping no one will identify the First Sacred Sister in this tall scarecrow. I'd rather wade through the gutters and reach the Crystal Palace like a beggar than be recognized.

As for Dart, not even his friends would recognize him now.

The snow that fell on the mountains never reached here. In the warm gusty sunshine, the streets are webbed with lines of flapping laundry. Rusty-backed chickens scurry about underfoot, pecking at the shiny bits of glass that are can still found between the cobblestones, almost two years after the Divine Dragon smashed through the Palace. "Smells like fresh bread," Dart says behind me. He eyes a baker's racks under a patched awning, where someone has tethered a yellow-eyed goat.

I snap my fingers in front of his face until I get his attention. "You'll get all the fresh bread you want in a bit—and none of the weevils. Come on."

We'll have the Runners returned later; they'd know me at the stables. But no one notices us in the crowd, no one points, no one mutters "There she is, the Queen's cuckoo-bird, the disgrace." We're almost in the shadow of the Crystal Palace—it doesn't stretch as far as it once did—when I spot a vermilion robe and come up short.

Dart collides with me. "Ow!"

"We're taking the long way," I say, shoving him toward the nearest alley. I don't think Bishop Dille has seen us yet, even if he could recognize us under all this grime. He and I have always been on good terms, better than any of my Sisters, and my stomach gives a funny twist at the thought of hiding from him. I couldn't even put the reason into words. All I know is that I don't want to talk to him just yet. If we took the straightest route to the Palace, we would walk right by the steps of his often-vandalized church.

The alley spits us out into a street parallel to the one we just left, only narrower, dustier, louder, and more crowded. The Queen's carriage could never make it through the press of bodies here. It smells like mercantile humanity, the sweat of people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps only to find no room to stand on the heights of prosperity.

I was robbed on these streets once, a mere kid still ashy from burning my father's body and the house he raised me in, before Queen Theresa found me.

I worm through a seething knot of people and almost get run over by a pushcart. At first glance I think it's loaded with baskets. They're birdcages, though: birdcages made of wire and wicker, birdcages heaped higher than my head in a teetering mountain, lashed together with twine. In that jumble, the birds are trembling, molting spots of color. "Songbirds for sale, beautiful songbirds," the peddler yips, but these pitiful creatures are mute.

I squeeze back against the crowd, giving him room to pass. Several dozen bright black eyes transfix me. Thoughts of my father's backcountry superstitions tumble through my head—thoughts of an osprey far from its home, of Lavitz's ghost waiting for me on the glacier—Shana's pyre—my God, whose are these eyes? Do we buy and sell the dead like we buy and sell the living?

This is absurd.

"Buy a pretty songbird, miss," the peddler wheedles. His brows shoot up when I can't stop laughing. In an instant, the dreamlike strangeness of the past few weeks is gone. I'm awake now.

And Dart's not behind me.

Backtracking, I find him cornered by a persistent little Tiberoan smuggler. Dart is transfixed by the bottle the man brandishes in his face, where some sort of colorful sea snake floats in alcohol, its red eyes blank and dead. "Caught it m'self, right off the reef like," the smuggler announces shamelessly. "Li'l bugger went near crazy in the net and bit hisself til he died, full up of his own poison."

I muscle between them and hook Dart's arm. "Hey, lady," the smuggler whines. I blast him with the most contemptuous look I have and haul Dart out of there.

"Miranda, the snake..."

"Shut up before someone hears. And check for your wallet." Maintaining my hold, I eye the crowd. "Dart, where are the Runners?"

He pauses. "Crap."

I'll have to take it out of the treasury. Wink is going to savage me for that. If that's the only reason, though, I'll consider my life a little more divinely smiled on than before. If she gets wind of me wandering through back alleys, grubby as an urchin, she might flay me on principle. Setie would like that.

All smiles: we reach the scullery door of the Crystal Palace without further incident. With no Runners left to worry about, I stride in bold and free past the guards. We're halfway through the servants' hall before anyone thinks to shove the butt end of a spear our way. "Beggars outside," a guard rumbles. "Sister Wincesca sees supplicants on third and fifth days only."

Soa blight them all. They're not even pretending Queen Theresa is ruling Mille Seseau anymore.

Seething, I rip the shirt off my hair and fling it at his feet. It smacks down in a weirdly solid, in-need-of-cleaning way, and a puff of dust, ash, and pollen floats up. "First Sacred Sister Miranda demands that you get that potsticker out of her face before she makes it a permanent fixture in your body!"

The guard, a tubby man with a yellow mustache, peers at me, then Dart, as if not sure to whom I refer. I swat the spear aside and grab him by the chinstrap of his helmet. "What's your name, man? What's your rank?"

"C-Criker," he gasps, looking to his fellow guards for backup. They don't stir. "Sergeant."

"Sergeant Criker, tell your superior that Sister Miranda assigns you latrine duty for a month for disrespecting a Sacred Sister and daughter of Queen Theresa." I twist the chinstrap a little tighter before shoving him away.

Behind me, someone mutters, "Yep, that's her all right." In my peripheral vision I glimpse someone hurtling up the stairs and out of sight.

Leaving Criker to wheeze, I turn back to Dart. He's eyeballing me quizzically, shaking his hand as if it hurts. Come to think of it, mine feels stiff. Then I realize I've been crushing his in mine ever since I dragged him away from the snake-merchant. "Come on and we'll get this muck cleaned off," I say, ignoring my burning ears. "Then maybe they'll feed us before Wink starts lecturing. There's no need to lie low now."

The tattletale must have had wings on their heels. We're less than halfway up the stair that join the servant quarters to the Palace proper, when a beribboned minor courtier (his name escapes me) clatters down to meet us. "Sister Miranda, Sister Wincesca has requested your immediate presence in the Grand Hall." He hesitates, eyes shifting to Dart. Evidently the messenger hadn't mentioned him.

We've gone into battle together before now, and he doesn't abandon me here. "I'll come with Miranda," Dart announces offhandedly, scratching his scalp. A few pine needles drift to the floor.

The courtier watches them fall, his expression sinking in unconscious parody. "Perhaps you wish to, ahem, refresh yourselves first..."

I flash a brittle smile. "I wouldn't want to keep Sister Wincesca waiting."

The courtier can't keep up with my long strides the way Dart can, and he trails after us anxiously, aware of every footprint we leave behind. All I have to do is check in, survive a tongue-lashing, and then figure out what I'll do with Dart.

The Palace isn't as grand as it once was, even though masons from Fletz and glassmakers from Bale have done a respectable job patching or disguising the places where the Divine Dragon shattered Wingly-crafted crystal. It's more crowded now, too, with the two uppermost floors completely smashed. The Grand Hall is a euphemism for what used to be a ballroom, just off the second landing of the great stairs. At the highest surviving point of the Palace, the Throne Room itself remains empty, wind blowing through the gaps in its walls, waiting for Queen Theresa to recover or a new Queen to be crowned.

The Holy Knights posted outside recognize my stride and twitch to attention, spears angled away with proper reverence. A small herd of gentry is being shooed away, probably to spare them the sight of me. "I don't remember this place," Dart mutters, as I shove the heavy doors open ahead of the courtier.

A bristling wall of weaponry greets us. Every Holy Knight and guardsman in the room has formed a semicircle around the door, braced as if awaiting a mammoth to come rampaging through. I peer through the hedge of steel, past the Commander of the Holy Knights standing guard over by my Sisters, who have risen from their ornamented chairs on the dais. Cupping my hand around my mouth, I call, "This is why I don't come home."

Luanna puts her hand on the captain's shoulder. Her sightless seashell-white eyes seem fixed on Dart. "Miranda, who is with you?"

"It's Dragoon Dart," Setie pipes up, and the tension palpably drops. I think Wink says "That would explain it" to Luanna, but it's drowned out by the rattling din of swords being sheathed and spears lowered.

I shoulder aside the Knights still in my way and approach the dais. Standing on it, even Setie is taller than me, which grates. She hops down. For a moment I think she might even hug me. Before I've figured out what I'll do with my arms in that case, she backpedals, wrinkling her nose. "Ew, Miranda, you smell."

"You'd be no bed of roses if you'd been where I've been," I shoot back.

"Where's that? A pigsty?"

Dart steps up beside me. "She didn't sass this much, last I remember," he says to me.

"It's a recent development," I explain in an undertone. "If she doesn't grow out of it soon, she might not see her next birthday."

"You are dismissed to your posts, noble sirs," Wink says over me, addressing the Holy Knights. "Your attentive service has been noted." Then, while the room empties, she turns to me. I hate it when I have to look up at her.

Wink looks ever so pretty, almost seraphic, in teal and dark blue velvet with her hair up under a smaller version of Queen Theresa's gable hood. Her cheeks are delicately flushed. If she's mad, she hides it well. I'd be red as a beet and already yelling. That's why she wears the trimmed robes and the hood, and I stand here leaving dirty footprints on the rug. She makes me feel small in a way that has nothing to do with daises.

"Luanna said you'd be back today," she starts, pitching her voice so that it won't carry far. Her next sentence tells me how peeved she really is, even if she's smiling. "Queen Theresa has been worried. I was beginning to think that you've forgotten about us."

"It's my fault," Dart interrupts, coming to my defense. "I called her out of the city and kept her away all this time. Otherwise she'd have come back."

None of us really believe that, but Wink turns her smile on him. Her lips get a little thinner; she hasn't forgotten Dart's role in Lloyd's death (or what I told her was Lloyd's death, back in Vellweb), even if she's forgiven him for wounding her on Kashua Glacier. "It's a pleasure to see you again, Dragoon Dart—I hadn't recognized you at first."

No, but Luanna recognized what was inside of him. The urge to protect, to deny, rears up. I want him away from Luanna before she remembers the last time she sensed that eerie, destruction-bent soul.

I pivot on my heel and fix the maid who's been gawking through the doorway with my stare. "Draw a hot bath and fetch a change of clothing for the noble Dragoon Dart Feld. Likewise for myself. Dart, I'll find you after we take care of family business."

"I don't mind waiting."

"Family business," I repeat a little more firmly. "I'll be along soon." He catches on, pats my shoulder twice for reassurance, and goes.

The maid lingers a moment after he leaves. "Sister Miranda, I'm afraid the guest chambers aren't ready."

She says it cautiously; all of us still forget what was and was not destroyed by the Dragon, and I'm the most contentious about being reminded. This time, though, I didn't forget. I've had it in mind the whole journey back that Dart should stay where I can keep an eye on him, at least for a little while. He's a grieving man and this Palace can be cruel.

Besides, as a Dragoon, I'm the only one with any right to care for him.

"I'm aware. Have someone fix up a place for him in my room. Borrow Sister Setiana's settee if you must; she doesn't use it anyway."

"Hey!"

"And get him a proper meal," I finish. The maid bobs and disappears.

The Commander of the Holy Knights lingers by Wink's side. He's been pushing her patience lately, always a little too attentive and eager to please, making a big show of how devoted he is. "If Sister Luanna sensed danger from that man, Sister Wink, I would be happy to have a guard stationed by him," he declares, with a servile bow.

My lip curls. "You can keep your guard, commander. If a Dragoon meant any harm to this city, you couldn't stop them." Unintentionally, I just threatened him. I add, "You will treat my guest with respect. Dart Feld is a hero and a better man than anyone under your command." That didn't help. He bristles.

"Dismissed, commander," Wink interrupts mildly. "The Sacred Sisters will attend to their own concerns." When she issues orders with a smile so sweet, it's no wonder the Knights go moon-eyed for her. He blushes, bows again like a broken toy, and strides out.

Now that we're really alone, the angelic glow leaves Wink. Putting her hands on her hips, she shakes her head down at me. "Oh, Miranda," she sighs, sounding so very disappointed.

Setie copies her pose, but her little bun-shaped nose crinkles with a grin. Her eyes sparkle with mischief. In a sing-song tone, she remarks, "Sleeping in your room, huh? I thought Dart got married..."

"He was," I answer shortly. "She died. We burned her body two nights ago."

"Oh."

"Two nights ago, a bright light was reported on the nearest mountain," Wink muses.

"Yeah."

I don't have to stand before the dais, like a prisoner on trial; one of the gilt seats up there is mine. I step up and walk around it to the big bay window. Each pane has a frosted design of the Divine Tree in the center. I rest my forehead against the glass, gazing down on the streets and rooftops of the city I hate and call home. Those weeks on the mountain seem like a lifetime ago—a time like a dream, spent in another world that has nothing in common with this one. The Miranda of the mountains is gone, too. I'm a different person here.

I wonder what the weather is like in Serdio this time of year. What view does Dart have when he turns his eyes out the window of his little cottage?

In the ghostly reflection of the glass, Luanna approaches. Her hand rests on my shoulder. I turn and gently move it away. "I'm filthy," I warn. "You don't want to touch me right now."

"I'm only blind, Miranda," she reminds me. Wink can recreate the Queen's gracious, imperial poise, but Luanna is the only one of us to have inherited her fearless love. She sees in me what eyes couldn't discern. "You're troubled—there's grief around you, but it's been muddied with guilt and fear."

I squeeze the hand I'm still holding.

Our private conversation is cut short. Wink wouldn't drive me so crazy if it weren't for her need to know about (and control) everything that goes on around her. "I don't know what you were thinking," she begins, "vanishing for almost two months and coming back looking like a beggar. Do you think it's funny? Is the public opinion of the Sacred Sisters a joke to you?"

"No." I'm the joke here. Sullen, I fling myself down in my chair and drape my legs over the armrest, which doesn't make it any more comfortable. Already I miss Dart.

"People whisper about you and I can't stop them. All in all, you're missing for almost half of the year. How are we supposed to maintain order, or any sort of cohesive policy? The Queen lets you overrule Setie and me in decision-making, yet you aren't around Deningrad enough to understand the issues involved or put policies into practice."

During the lecture, my eyes have drifted down to watch flakes of mud dropping from my boots. I glance up to spot Setie mimicking my pose. Her legs don't come anywhere near the floor. She sticks her tongue out at me.

"Queen Theresa hasn't taken another consort because of you, even if it would mean good things for Mille Seseau. She always said she has you to fight for her honor. When you take off like that, how do you think it reflects on her?"

Now the lecture starts to sting. With all the self-control I have, I clamp my lips shut. Wink won't go on much longer if I can keep myself from roaring back.

This time, she does.

"Did you know that when she adopted Setie and I, she told us every day about the wonderful big sister we were going to have? You were somewhere off in Serdio then, but she told us so much about you that I couldn't wait to meet you. You were so brave and so strong. I really wish she had mentioned that you hate Deningrad and don't give a rotten fig for all she's given you!"

Anger bursts out of me like a thousand little knives, cutting my tongue free. "You don't understand!"

"You're right, I don't," she snaps right back. The shock halts the rest of my retort long enough for her to add, "I don't understand how you can gallivant off with strangers and abandon everything here."

Luanna tries to intervene, but she has no practice in raising her voice. "Wink, Miranda, calm down. We will talk this out like civilized people."

I'm not civilized, just tamed, and right now the wild thing in me is thrashing in its chains. I sit up and thump my feet onto the floor. "I do what I have to do as a Dragoon. You don't see how important that is—you never have. There are only seven of us in the whole world."

"And there are only four Sacred Sisters!"

That dashes icewater on my burning anger. My teeth click closed on my tongue. My trembling hands knot into fists. Setie sits up and wraps her arms around her knees. She isn't laughing anymore.

Wink puts her hand on the back of my chair so that we're face to face. Her cheeks are redder than before, her eyes big and blue and welling up. There's an apology hiding under the accusations. "Do you want me to drive you away, Miranda?" she asks, softly now, her voice gone hoarse with strain. "Throw you out and disown you? I could never do that. You're my Sister. You're family. I'm only yelling because I love you."

If she had left it there, she might have broken me. She goes one step too far, though, when she finishes, "Maybe that word means nothing to you, but it means a great deal to me."

I stand up so fast that Wink would have gotten a bloody lip if she didn't jump back. Luanna steadies her before reaching out to me. I recoil. "I'm going to visit the Queen," I grit out. "See you at supper." I don't trust myself to say another word. If I start, we'll be bellowing at each other all day long.

The door of the Grand Hall slams behind me. The Holy Knights outside wear blank, wooden expressions; that lets me know they've heard every word. I punch holes through them with my eyes and stalk off to check on my bath. I need time to cool down before I see Queen Theresa; I don't want her to worry.

Half an hour later, the bath is full of gritty, smoke-colored water and I'm several shades lighter than before. I snarled at the too-helpful maids and scared them off, before it occurred to me that they might have lent a hand with my matted hair. They left me with fresh clothing laid out on a chair: crisply pressed breeches and a long jacket styled like the captain of the guard's, if he wore embroidered velvet, and (bless them) clean knickers. Everything smells like lavender soap.

There are perks to be the Queen's adopted daughter. Sometimes I have to leave for a while to remember them.

I wring out my hair the best I can and slip, barefooted, from the bath chamber to the Queen's room. I hear Dart's voice as I pass my room; Setie's harassing him. The smell of beef drifts up from the kitchen. He'll be fine for a little while longer. He's doing well for a newly widowed man.

Before the Divine Dragon, all of the Sisters lived in a wing that we shared with Queen Theresa. My room lay closest to the door, where I would be woken by (and then reckon with) any intruders. Then came Wink's, then Setie's nursery, and lastly Luanna, who slept in the room right beside the Queen's. With Luanna's psychic sensitivity, she had to sleep far from my nightmares.

That wing was demolished. Now we split up the remaining guestrooms, and leave the former consort's chambers for Queen Theresa. I don't like being so far from her. As I head up to visit her, knots of servants and guards stop whispering to watch me pass. I'm proud of myself, though. I didn't roar much. Caring for Dart has gentled me somehow.

A little trepidation grips me when I enter the Queen's bedroom. The doctors prescribed laudanum for her declining condition, and I've spent whole afternoons in the past waiting for her to wake. If she doesn't know me now, I don't think I could handle it. Her head is on the pillow, her eyes closed, and a book lies open facedown on her stomach. I sit on the edge of the bed, heart sinking.

Her hand stirs, then she opens her eyes and smiles at me. "I've been waiting for you, Miri," she whispers—the only one since my father died to nickname me. Her birdlike hands take and caress mine. "Forgive me for dozing off. I told the doctors this morning not to dose me. Luanna told me you would be coming back today, and I wanted to see you."

Silly, childish tears blur my sight. I scrape them away with my free hand. Her withered skin and hollowed face is too much like Shana's before we burned her, except she's still alive, still speaking, still smiling. Around her, the nightmares and the anger and the shame can't reach me; her unconditional love is my guardian. I blot my face dry and kiss her knuckles. "I'm sorry I took so long," I whisper back. It's hard to speak around the lump in my throat.

She pats my hand to forgive me. "You went to the mountains?" I nod. "They must be beautiful this time of year."

"I was with Dart Feld, the Dragoon. He came to Deningrad needing my help."

"Did you help him?"

"I tried." Maybe trying would be the better word. "His little wife, Shana—she passed away. We cremated her remains up in the mountains."

A shadow crosses Queen Theresa's face. She remembers Shana fondly. She doesn't waste words trying to express the feeling, but a glittering line trickles down from the corner of one eye. Squeezing my hand again, she shakes her head. My Sisters didn't cry for Shana, although she gave herself completely to preserving their world.

"I'm sorry," I say again. Like a little child, I curl up on the covers next to her and put my arms around her. Moving the book aside, she strokes my hair. I want to tell her about arguing with Wink—about the horrible lightness of Shana's body—about the snake and the birds—about Bishop Dille's church—about Dart and the twisted-up feeling I have around him, but that can wait. Right now, I only need her to hold me in her arms and for us to breathe in sync.

"I had a dream about you, Miri," she murmurs after a bit. Her voice is very faint. She's gotten weaker since I left. If she refused the laudanum today, then she must be in terrible pain, but she'll never admit it.

"A dream?"

"You were flying..."

I wait for more, but she doesn't continue. After a minute of silence goes by, I raise my head. Her eyes have closed. Her chest rises and falls steadily with the graceful rhythm of sleep. My stomach growls, but I don't have any inclination to move now. I shut my eyes and let the afternoon creep past. Here, my world is as right as it is ever going to be.

Finally, when I'm too hungry to linger, I slip free, careful not to wake her. I glance around at the medical paraphernalia that has been gradually spreading through the room, like lichen, little by little. Potions and tinctures, infusions and needles. This is how death comes to normal people: slowly, inevitably, gently. I don't think I'll die gently.

What do you want, Miranda?

I want Queen Theresa to live forever and never be sad.

I sit for a minute, watching the flutter of her eyes under the silk-thin lids. It isn't only the fading condition that links Shana and the Queen in my mind. The heart-shaped bones of their faces are similar. I've lived this moment before, only two days back, with my heart a stone inside of me and no hope left in anything at all.

Again, I lean down and lay a kiss on a beloved forehead. Last time, it brought me a miracle. Maybe it will again.

Silently, I leave my adoptive mother to her rest, and return to my own room. The lamps have not been lit yet, but the curtains have been drawn back to let in the evening sun through the great wall of windows. Supper will be served soon. Dart must have gone down already. I head for the vanity to see if I left any hairbrushes unbroken. Someone would shoot me for a lion if I went out with this mane dripping down my back.

I hear my name, whispered softer than thought.

Something catches the corner of my eye, almost hidden in the deepest shadows of the room. Dart sits at my writing desk, head in his hands. My face heats. He calls me again, scarcely louder than before:

"Miranda..."

The room seems to drop several degrees. Without moving he peers up at me, blue eyes painfully bright, red-rimmed. They've scrubbed and shaved and dressed him, so he looks almost like a gentleman, rather than the grimy vagabond I've kept under my wing. With his hair combed back and those shadows in his face, he looks more like his father than ever. But he's still my Dart—boneheaded and lost as a little child.

I kneel so that our heads are level. "What's got you looking so gnawed on?"

"Miranda, it's calling me. I hear it."

He ducks his head, hand sliding down his chest, grasping vainly at the soul of the monster far away inside of him. I shake my head sharply, trying to yank him out of these thoughts. I shouldn't have left him for so long. "Stay with me now, Dart. Don't start talking crap like this. Dragons don't think or talk like people, they're just big predators."

"Then I'm losing my mind," he says, all choked like he's fighting tears, "because it knows my name."

Oh, hell with this.

I cover his ears, as if I could block out the voice he alone hears. His head comes up, bashing his nose into my chin. Both of us wince. He grunts, still sore from when I punched him. "If you've got to believe in something," I stammer, "then believe in me," and our faces crash together again in my clumsiness before I get my lips on his.

It's like kissing stone. I twist my fingers into his hair for a better grip—how long do you hold a kiss, anyway? He doesn't respond, other than a long, slow shudder. If it weren't for my hands covering his ears, I would run, but now we're both frozen.

Then his hands come up and grip my waist. They dig in painfully, like claws. A stupid wheezing noise escapes through my nose when he drags me close against his chest, between his bent legs. He smells like soap and heat. "D—" is all that gets out before his mouth covers mine, and it's my turn to shiver.

Inexperience and anxiety flavored my fumbling kiss. Some raw hunger fuels his. I hold on tightly to keep from being lost in it. He pulls me closer, lifting me half up off my knees, and a fire I've never known rushes down to my toes.

We'll never make it to supper.

Maybe I pulled, maybe he pushed. Abruptly, the chair is abandoned and we crash to the floor. My head hits the stone, followed by a rush of stars. I'm pinned by Dart's weight, his hands now fire, now ice. I can't get a breath. There are teeth in his kisses, no tenderness. He knows what he's doing and I just hold on. His strength overwhelms me. Shana's heart stopped beating three days ago and her husband is going to devour me.

I'm choking. The only air in my lungs comes from his. I'm crushed underneath him, ribs creaking, heart hammering against his. His knee is between mine. At some point I've stopped kissing him and started fighting to breathe. My grip in his hair might as well be caresses for all the good it does me. He's oblivious to my resistance. I've wanted to taste his lips for weeks but I didn't plan to die doing it.

Letting go of his hair, I work my hands between us, against his chest. If I can't shove him off, then at the least I'll make him feel it. The insides of my eyelids go splotchy and dark. I dig my nails in hard over his heart, until the skin breaks with a soundless snap and blood trickles hotly down my fingers.

The lips that were suffocating me break away. Lightheaded, I gulp air that tastes like the night of Shana's pyre. My head throbs.

Dart has both of my wrists now, staring at the drops of blood that stain both of our chests. He runs his tongue over his lips. "I can't," he breathes, horrified, as his pupils go to pinpricks. "I'm losing hold."

The red-rust stain spreads too rapidly across his shirt, crusting over and building on itself like cooling lava. It spatters across the floor and smokes—across my arms, and I almost scream at the acid burn. It becomes armor, shell, hide, and plating all in one, the hideous coloration of dried blood and old bone, already pitted and scored.

Dart arches his spine. His bones twist and branch, warping into alien shapes. Bladelike protrusions rip through the skin of his swelling arms, surrounding me. His hands become claws half as big as I am. Sickly pale light emanates from him, melting the colors from the walls.

He hunches over me and wings burst out of his back, not coalescing silently the way we knew, but ripping with a grinding shriek out of his own body. The weight of them bows him over, gasping. He catches himself and opens his eyes to mine—all seven staring, frantic, deadly eyes. I've seen those eyes in nightmares.

The Divine Dragon has him.

A breath burns my face, smelling like opened graves, blasting tears from my stinging eyes. "Dart!" I yell up into his ghastly white face, nose to nose. "Dart, come out of it!"

Useless. Fate doesn't smile, she laughs at me. Once turned Dragoon, even I can't find myself again until its impulse is spent, and this one won't let him go easily.

Neither will I.

I hammer on his shoulders, tearing my hands open on the thorny roughness of the Divine Dragoon's plating. He grabs a clawful of my scalp and stands. My feet dangle. The monster it makes of Dart is taller than any man. Its furled wings scrape the ceiling of my room.

Monster, accursed, bogeyman and horror, a vision from hell; but within the hideous mass of its armor it still wears Dart's face. I reach toward that face, scrabbling at any chance to turn him back. I'll kiss him until neither of us has breath left to live. I'll claw his eyes out to save him.

Among the crazed dragon eyes, the blue human pair search my face without recognition. Gentler than I thought possible, claws rake back the tangles that hang over my face. A voice emerges: too strangled, deep, and hollow to carry any remnants of a Serdian drawl.

"Sh... Sha... na. Shana..."

His eyes answer him while my throat is too dry for sound. I'm nothing like the girl he needs. He drops me.

Something pops in my shoulder when I hit the ground. No time to think about it. I scrabble to my knees, calling on the soul of the White-Silver Dragon. It flutters weakly inside me. I'll drag it out. Merciful Soa, the unstillable voice of doubt wails, it took seven of us to take down the Divine Dragon the first time, and only after Lloyd had wounded it. This hybrid creature killed a god.

The familiar glowing pulse rises in my fists, behind my eyelids. But I never get the chance. The Divine Dragoon draws a deep breath and howls.

The force of it—the anger and the pain—flings me sprawling. Before we killed the monster, its shrieking turned the strongest hearts to water. This close, it peels the muscles from my bones. I can't stand, can't even protect myself. The power of my Dragoon bleeds away beyond any recall. I hear the discordant shattering of all the windows in the room, all the glasses, all the mirrors—they come crashing to the floor in lethal shards. Then I can't hear anything but a high ringing.

The Divine Dragoon sweeps its clawed arm, splintering desk, chair, and a bedpost in a single reach. Move, Miranda, get out of here, I order myself, but I can't move. Forget wrenching Dart back to himself. All I want is not to die. Nothing has made me cower since I was a child. Now all I can do is lie at Death's feet, deaf and paralyzed, as helpless as a newborn.

It roars again—to me, a soundless gape of fanged jaws. When it flares out its wings, a billowing sheet of flame fills the room. I squeeze my eyes shut and feel my flesh sear.

Before my eyes, the world darkens, losing meaning.

Silent images come and go like visions from a nightmare. The Divine Dragoon stands at the ruined wall of windows, poised for flight; then it is gone, swallowed up by the fire of the setting sun. The canopy of the bed crumples, all in flames. The broken glass on the floor is colored red by the sunset, the spreading fire, and blood. It's probably mine.

I wish I could think clearly. It's hot, hard to breathe. My eyes hurt. I didn't get down from Shana's pyre in time. Dart needs me. Once upon a time, the Divine Dragon left the Crystal Palace in ruins and I couldn't stop it.

The door is open. White faces outside—guards, knights, servants—frozen, afraid to cross the threshold of Hell. Setie squirms through the crowd, trying to reach me. Wink appears suddenly hauling Setie back by her ear the way I would. Her mouth is open, shouting, but I can't hear. The Commander of the Holy Knights wades through the roaring flames. The world flickers out again before he reaches me.

Firelight dazzles off the crystal walls. These aren't my walls anymore. It's cool. I'm lying in the hallway, and men run past me with buckets of water. Too late, I want to say, but my mouth is dry and empty. He stole my breath from me and left smoke in its place.

My head is in Luanna's lap. Her blind eyes are full of tears. They fall onto my face and sear me like ice. I want to wipe them away, but I can't lift my hand. Don't cry, Luanna, not if I can't join you. I'm not able. I'm a dry husk, like a dead girl's body. Even if I could take away her tears, though, I couldn't take away what she knows. I brought home a monster, thinking I could keep it tame. Instead, I set it free.