Page 44 of The Storm of the Empire

“Where did you get that idea?” She sat on the window ledge next to me.

I didn’t actually know where it came from. “I thought you were lighter on your feet?”

“I think you made that up.” She peered in the same direction I was looking. “What were you looking at?”

“Just outside.” Telling her I always needed to know an escape route from every room I walked into sounded like I was flighty at best, paranoid at worst.

“Are we going to go find the book?” she asked.

“No, I don’t think we need it. I think we need to go to the source.” I said, hoping I could convince her to do this the way my gut was telling me.

“What are you talking about?”

“We need to make sure Alora’s egg is okay ourselves before we do anything else. Don’t you think?”

“Now?” she asked.

“No, tonight won’t work. I think we have to come up with a better way to get in there. You said you were friends with her, right?”

“We are, as the only two active dragons from Storm.”

“Then I think it will be a lot less alarming to go see her tomorrow instead of showing up in the middle of the night.”

“You’re right. The priests aren’t due there until tomorrow anyway.”

I wrapped my arm around her shoulder. “Get some sleep then. Tomorrow, we’ll figure out what to do about the priest visit.”

FIFTEEN

HAZEL

Iwas coming out of my skin with worry over Alora’s egg by the time I surfaced in the morning. I’d slept fitfully and dreamed badly. Mom had already left for the training schools, and my brothers were gone to the fields. Only Dad remained, and he was serving a hefty breakfast to Luka in the kitchen when I walked in. I felt pulled to Luka’s room even after we spoke, and I hated feeling this restless.

“Oh, good, you’re up. I made you a plate, too,” Dad said, placing a kiss on my forehead as he passed me.

“Thanks, Dad.” I took the seat opposite Luka, who smiled as he took a bite.

Dad set a plate before me. “I’m going to be down in the hydroponic garden if you need me,” he said, then left us to our meals.

“How did you sleep?” Luka asked.

“Not well,” I admitted. “You?”

“Pretty well, but I spent two long nights on a ship sitting up on the floor and not getting a wink before that, so a safe bed made for good sleep.” The way Luka appeared contradicted his claim. He seemed as overtired and restless as I felt.

But why wouldn’t he be honest? Did he not want to insult my family’s hospitality?

“I was just going over and over it all in my head. What are we going to do? If Alora loses that egg, we won’t have another dragon for Storm in who knows how long.” Maybe until I decided to have younglings, if I ever could. “So many dragons are finding out they can’t year after year. And then even if they have an egg, more than half of them aren’t viable or die in the year it takes to hatch.

“So she has to sit on that thing for a year waiting for it to hatch?” Luka sounded incredulous.

“No, she doesn’t have to sit on it. We use hot sand to create a nest. We can heat the sand with our flame, and it stores the heat for several hours. The egg just needs to be guarded and tended every so often, rotated and such.”

Luka nodded and went quiet in thought.

“I have a question,” he said suddenly, sounding decidedly unsure.

“Hmm?”

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